ITO ATB310: LOW POWER TOUCH CONTROLLER

The ATB310 is a mixed signal chip that provides a digital interface to touch button panels that use analog piezo components.

Piezo touch interfacing is a new and exciting user interface technology that has significant advantages over both traditional mechanical buttons and other surface touch technologies such as capacitive touch sensing.

The piezo technology enables entirely new materials such as steel and leather for designers to use in their seamless user interfaces. Due to the inherent robustness of the piezo technology the user interface is vandal proof and waterproof and provides exceptional reliability in various environmental conditions.

The ATB310 is part of a family of piezo interfaces for low power applications. A similar device ATB210 is available for more cost sensitive applications that do not require ultra low power.

 Within the SmartPIE project, piezoelectric polymer composite sensors were developed. These sensors show extreme temperature stability up to 100ºC. The use of piezoelectric composite materials allows for manufacturing robust devices which can easily be integrated with conventional polymer processing. Piezoelectric composites of lead zirconate titanate (PZT) and two types of polymers, polyamide-6 (PA6) and a liquid crystalline thermosetting polymer (LCT) were used to manufacture sensor devices. The behavior of the output signal of different types of sensors was studied with focus on both temperature dependence of the output signal and the drift of the signal with time. The properties of the PA6 based composites and devices are highly temperature dependent while the output signal of LCT based composites and devices has a very low temperature dependence and drift, even outperforming the PZT reference device. The temperature dependence of the output signal of the composite devices is dependent on the device configuration as well as the material properties, such as polymer permittivity. The drift of the signal is strongly dependent on the resistivity of the PZT–polymer composite material used in the sensor. The results were published inthe journal Sensors and Actuators A.

 

Link to full article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.sna.2010.06.010

 Recently, SmartPIE researchers developed high performance piezoelectric composite materials comprising of the piezoelectric Lead Zirconate Titanate (PZT) powder and a liquid crystalline thermosetting matrix polymer (LCT). The matrix polymer is a liquid crystalline polymer comprising of an HBA-HNA backbone with phenylethynyl end-groups, and is extremely temperature resistant. The use of a high performance polymer makes the composite a possible candidate to be used in sensor applications at elevated temperatures. The composite properties were optimised by calcining (heat treating) the PZT powder at different temperatures, prior to mixing the powders into the polymer matrix. It was found that a relationship exists between the calcining temperature of the PZT powder and the piezoelectric properties of the composites. The results were published in Journal of Electroceramics

Link to full article: http://www.springerlink.com/content/92wm203111891t86/

Recently, SmartPIE scientists developed new piezoceramic powder-polymer composites that are easy to manufacture but show enhanced properties over traditional piezopowder composites. The piezoelectric properties of the material are increased while ceramic volume fraction for maximum sensitivity is lowered leading to lighter, cheaper composites. The results were published in the Journal of Applied Physics.

Link to full article (http://link.aip.org/link/JAPIAU/v107/i2/p024107/s1 or http://repository.tudelft.nl/view/ir/uuid%3A0f938f54-7f7e-4d30-8c9c-6654d23fdf87/)

Ferroelectric devices created by pressure modulated stencil deposition

Ferroelectric Pb(Zr_xTi_1−x)O₃ sandwiched between SrRuO₃ electrodes devices were fabricated by a single stencil deposition method. By varying the pressure, the dimension of the deposited pattern could be controlled. The dimension becomes larger in the high pressure shockwave regime, which is typical for pulsed laser deposition. The particle interactions result in an increased amount of broadening. At lower pressures, the deposited material is still in the correct crystalline phase and broadening is minimized. Top electrodes are isolated from the bottom electrode by controlling the broadening of the ferroelectric medium. With this method, multilayered oxide devices can be created in situ. ©2008 American Institute of Physics

Journal of materials Science Volume 42 #15
Journal of materilas Science Volume 42 number 15 D. A. van den Ende, P. de Almeida and Sybrand van der Zwaag Abstract  A novel series of lead acterized...