Sensors in motion

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engineer is the latest researcher to design a tiny, easy-to-manufacture motion sensor, a development that could help popularize the sensors as standard equipment in personal electronics, medical devices and other applications.

The sensor, which measures about three square millimeters, is not the smallest motion sensor ever invented. But it is extremely sensitive, draws only a tiny amount of electrical power and is one of a new generation of sensors that can be made using the computer chip manufacturing industry’s standard techniques and equipment.

That means that in the near future “the application range can be expanded a lot,” said Huikai Xie, a UF assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering.

Motion sensors are hardly new, but they were large, heavy and typically used in airplanes and ships for navigational purposes in recent decades. Miniaturization techniques developed as part of a relatively new field called Micro Electrical Mechanical Systems (MEMS), have steadily reduced their size and cost.