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RF, Microwave and mm Wave Sensors and Applicators for Chemical, Biological and Medical Applications

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A special issue of Sensors (ISSN 1424-8220). This special issue belongs to the section "Chemical Sensors".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 December 2018) | Viewed by 44474

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Special Issue Editors

Prof. Dr. Adrian Porch

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Guest Editor

School of Engineering, Cardiff University, Cardiff CF24 3AA, UK
Interests: microwave properties of materials; microwave sensors and applicators; superconductivity; high frequency electomagnetics

Dr. Heungjae Choi

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Co-Guest Editor

School of Engineering, Cardiff University, Cardiff CF24 3AA, UK
Interests: microwave interdisciplinary science; microwave power amplifiers; mmWave design and on-wafer characterization; dielectric material characterization and sensing; healthcare applications
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Dr. Daniel R. Slocombe

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Co-Guest Editor

School of Engineering, Cardiff University, Cardiff CF24 3AA, UK
Interests: microwave activation and measurement of catalytic processes and chemical synthesis; dielectric spectroscopy and new methods using magnetic resonance phenomena

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

High-frequency sensors are now ubiquitous, not only in the traditional domain of electronic communications, but increasingly so in many areas of the chemical, biological and medical sciences. This call for a Special Issue of Sensors invites contributions from scientists and engineers from all disciplines involved with innovations using high frequency sensors, specifically those operating from RF thorough microwave to mm wave frequencies. This also includes high frequency applicators, which may have the useful dual role of both excitation and sensing.

The unique advantages of such devices make them useful for a wide range of techniques such as dielectric measurements of chemical processes in catalysis and synthesis, EPR and NMR, where new innovations are still emerging. Advances in these measurements have renewed momentum and have led to new in operando techniques for electromagnetic sensing of reaction conditions.

Whilst cross-disciplinary contributions are welcomed, so too are those from the traditional high frequency circuits community and contributions that deal with fundamental interactions of high frequency electromagnetic fields with material samples of all types, which underpins all sensing and applicator platforms.

Prof. Dr. Adrian Porch
Dr. Heungjae Choi
Dr. Daniel R. Slocombe
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sensors is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

Microwave and mm-Wave sensors and applicators
Novel sensor concepts and technologies
Emerging microwave sensor applications
Microwave chemical sensors and applicators
Microwave biological sensors and applicators

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

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14 pages, 5322 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Microfluidic Microwave Sensor for Detecting Saline in Biological Range

by Joni Kilpijärvi, Niina Halonen, Jari Juuti and Jari Hannu

Sensors 2019, 19(4), 819; https://doi.org/10.3390/s19040819 - 17 Feb 2019

Cited by 31 | Viewed by 5359

Abstract

A device for measuring biological small volume liquid samples in real time is appealing. One way to achieve this is by using a microwave sensor based on reflection measurement. A prototype sensor was manufactured from low cost printed circuit board (PCB) combined with a microfluidic channel made of polymethylsiloxane (PDMS). Such a sensor was simulated, manufactured, and tested including a vacuum powered sample delivery system with robust fluidic ports. The sensor had a broad frequency band from 150 kHz to 6 GHz with three resonance frequencies applied in sensing. As a proof of concept, the sensor was able to detect a NaCl content of 125 to 155 mmol in water, which is the typical concentration in healthy human blood plasma. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue RF, Microwave and mm Wave Sensors and Applicators for Chemical, Biological and Medical Applications)

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16 pages, 7416 KiB

Open AccessArticle

An Interdigital Capacitor for Microwave Heating at 25 GHz and Wideband Dielectric Sensing of nL Volumes in Continuous Microfluidics

by Tomislav Markovic, Juncheng Bao, Gertjan Maenhout, Ilja Ocket and Bart Nauwelaers

Sensors 2019, 19(3), 715; https://doi.org/10.3390/s19030715 - 10 Feb 2019

Cited by 17 | Viewed by 4133

Abstract

This paper proposes a miniature microwave-microfluidic chip based on continuous microfluidics and a miniature interdigital capacitor (IDC). The novel chip consists of three individually accessible heaters, three platinum temperature sensors and two liquid cooling and mixing zones. The IDC is designed to achieve localized, fast and uniform heating of nanoliter volumes flowing through the microfluidic channel. The heating performance of the IDC located on the novel chip was evaluated using a fluorescent dye (Rhodamine B) diluted in demineralized water on a novel microwave-optical-fluidic (MOF) measurement setup. The MOF setup allows simultaneous microwave excitation of the IDC by means of a custom-made printed circuit board (connected to microwave equipment) placed in a top stage of a microscope, manipulation of liquid flowing through the channel located over the IDC with a pump and optical inspection of the same liquid flowing over the IDC using a fast camera, a light source and the microscope. The designed IDC brings a liquid volume of around 1.2 nL from room temperature to 100 °C in 21 ms with 1.58 W at 25 GHz. Next to the heating capability, the designed IDC can dielectrically sense the flowing liquid. Liquid sensing was evaluated on different concentration of water-isopropanol mixtures, and a reflection coefficient magnitude change of 6 dB was recorded around 8.1 GHz, while the minimum of the reflection coefficient magnitude shifted in the same frequency range for 60 MHz. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue RF, Microwave and mm Wave Sensors and Applicators for Chemical, Biological and Medical Applications)

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16 pages, 15697 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Multi-Band MIMO Antenna Design with User-Impact Investigation for 4G and 5G Mobile Terminals

by Naser Ojaroudi Parchin, Haleh Jahanbakhsh Basherlou, Yasir I. A. Al-Yasir, Atta Ullah, Raed A. Abd-Alhameed and James M. Noras

Sensors 2019, 19(3), 456; https://doi.org/10.3390/s19030456 - 23 Jan 2019

Cited by 53 | Viewed by 11157

Abstract

In this study, we propose a design of a multi-band slot antenna array applicable for fourth-generation (4G) and fifth-generation (5G) smartphones. The design is composed of double-element square-ring slot radiators fed by microstrip-line structures for easy integration with radio frequency (RF)/microwave circuitry. The slot radiators are located on the corners of the smartphone printed circuit board (PCB) with an overall dimension of 75 × 150 mm². The proposed multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) antenna is designed to meet the requirements of 4G and 5G mobile terminals with essential bandwidth for higher data rate applications. For −10 dB impedance bandwidth, each single-element of the proposed MIMO design can cover the frequency ranges of 2.5–2.7 GHz (long-term evolution (LTE) 2600), 3.45–3.8 GHz (LTE bands 42/43), and 5.00–5.45 GHz (LTE band 46). However, for −6 dB impedance bandwidth, the radiation elements cover the frequency ranges of 2.45–2.82 GHz, 3.35–4.00 GHz, and 4.93–5.73 GHz. By employing the microstrip feed lines at the four different sides of smartphone PCB, the isolation of the radiators has been enhanced and shows better than 17 dB isolation levels over all operational bands. The MIMO antenna is implemented on an FR-4 dielectric and provides good properties including S-parameters, efficiency, and radiation pattern coverage. The performance of the antenna is validated by measurements of the prototype. The simulation results for user-hand/user-head impacts and specific absorption rate (SAR) levels of the antenna are discussed, and good results are achieved. In addition, the antenna elements have the potential to be used as 8-element/dual-polarized resonators. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue RF, Microwave and mm Wave Sensors and Applicators for Chemical, Biological and Medical Applications)

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13 pages, 4637 KiB

Open AccessArticle

An LC Passive Wireless Gas Sensor Based on PANI/CNT Composite

by Sanmin Shen, Zhihong Fan, Jiahao Deng, Xiaowei Guo, Lei Zhang, Guanyu Liu, Qiulin Tan and Jijun Xiong

Sensors 2018, 18(9), 3022; https://doi.org/10.3390/s18093022 - 10 Sep 2018

Cited by 24 | Viewed by 4926

Abstract

This paper proposes a wireless passive gas sensor based on the principle of LC mutual coupling. After the acidification of the carbon nanotube (CNT), the in-situ polymerization of the aminobenzene monomers was conducted on the surface of the acidified CNT to form a sensitive material composed of a polyaniline/carbon nanotube (PANI/CNT) composite. The Advanced Design System (ADS) software was used for simulating and analyzing the designed structure, which obtained the various parameters of the structure. A lead-free aluminum paste was printed on an alumina ceramic substrate via the screen printing technique to form an inductor coil, before the gas sensitive material was applied to prepare a wireless passive gas sensor, consisting of a single-turn inductor and interdigitated electrodes on the base structure. Finally, an experimental platform was built to test the performance of the sensor. The sensitivity of the gas sensor is about 0.04 MHz/ppm in an atmosphere with a NH₃ concentration of 300 ppm. The sensor was shown to have good repeatability and high stability over a long time period. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue RF, Microwave and mm Wave Sensors and Applicators for Chemical, Biological and Medical Applications)

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Review

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46 pages, 13356 KiB

Open AccessEditor’s ChoiceReview

EM-Wave Biosensors: A Review of RF, Microwave, mm-Wave and Optical Sensing

by Parikha Mehrotra, Baibhab Chatterjee and Shreyas Sen

Sensors 2019, 19(5), 1013; https://doi.org/10.3390/s19051013 - 27 Feb 2019

Cited by 136 | Viewed by 17700

Abstract

This article presents a broad review on optical, radio-frequency (RF), microwave (MW), millimeter wave (mmW) and terahertz (THz) biosensors. Biomatter-wave interaction modalities are considered over a wide range of frequencies and applications such as detection of cancer biomarkers, biotin, neurotransmitters and heart rate are presented in detail. By treating biological tissue as a dielectric substance, having a unique dielectric signature, it can be characterized by frequency dependent parameters such as permittivity and conductivity. By observing the unique permittivity spectrum, cancerous cells can be distinguished from healthy ones or by measuring the changes in permittivity, concentration of medically relevant biomolecules such as glucose, neurotransmitters, vitamins and proteins, ailments and abnormalities can be detected. In case of optical biosensors, any change in permittivity is transduced to a change in optical properties such as photoluminescence, interference pattern, reflection intensity and reflection angle through techniques like quantum dots, interferometry, surface enhanced raman scattering or surface plasmon resonance. Conversely, in case of RF, MW, mmW and THz biosensors, capacitive sensing is most commonly employed where changes in permittivity are reflected as changes in capacitance, through components like interdigitated electrodes, resonators and microstrip structures. In this paper, interactions of EM waves with biomatter are considered, with an emphasis on a clear demarcation of various modalities, their underlying principles and applications. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue RF, Microwave and mm Wave Sensors and Applicators for Chemical, Biological and Medical Applications)

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