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2001
Conference Paper
Titel
The use of correlation technique combined with sigma-delta-modulation for detection of defective sensor elements
Abstract
This paper presents a novel technique for detection of defective sensor elements. For this purpose the sensor elementis electrically stimulated using a pseudo random binary sequence (PRBS). The sensor element is read out and the analog output is digitized using a sigma-delta-modulator. In case of a defect-free sensor system the binary pulse density output of the sigma-delta-modulator contains the PRBS. A matched filter is used as a correlatorfor detection of the PRBS in the binary output and its sampled output is compared to a threshold. This comparison makes it possible to evaluate the functionality of the sensor system including the sensor element. Our solution for detection of detective sensor elements has been fully integrated using a 1.2µm CMOS process with only a moderate hardware overhead. Due to the small stimulation amplitudes using correlation technique no disturbance of the actual measurement happens.