Sensors - Infrared Thermopiles

6 JUNE 2016
Non-Contact Temperature Sensing

Many common temperature measurements are made by bringing the temperature sensor into contact with
the object being measured. Examples include sticking a thermometer into a turkey one is cooking, and
gluing a thermocouple onto a piece of equipment being monitored. Sometimes, though, it can be
inconvenient to try to measure temperatures via physical attachment -a non-contact temperature sensor is
what is really needed.

Temperature and Radiation

A non-contact temperature sensor relies on the phenomenon of radiation. All objects with a temperature
greater than absolute zero (-273C) emit electromagnetic radiation. The hotter the object, the more
radiation it emits.

The amount of radiation emitted by an object increases of the fourth power of its absolute surface
temperature. An object with a surface temperature of 200K would therefor emit 16 times the energy as
would be emitted by the same object at 100K. This fourth-power relationship means that small differences
in temperature will result in large changes in radiated energy. To measure an object's temperature at a
distance, we need a detector that is sensitive to this emitted radiation.

When referring to 'radiation' in the context of temperature measurement, we are generally concerned with
electromagnetic radiation with wavelengths ranging from a few tens of microns (infrared) down to
approximately half a micron (visible light). This range of wavelengths allows for useful measurements from
roughly room temperature to a few thousand degrees C. While temperature measurements of exotic
astronomical objects may require detecting x-rays or gamma rays, these applications are a bit too exotic for
this article.

The Infrared Thermopile

An infrared thermopile is a sensor IC that is designed to measure the amount of incident radiation. The
device is directed so that the 'window' on the top of the IC package is pointed at the object whose
temperature is to be measured.

Melexis MLX90247 Infrared Thermopile

How the Thermopile Works.

The figure below shows a very simplified view of what is inside a thermopile sensor. On the right is the
input window, which is also an optical filter that rejects visible light-this is why you can't see inside the
device. Under this filter is a silicon die which contains the thermopile sensor itself. Unlike most IC's this die
has had a cavity micromachined in the rear so as to produce a thin diaphragm on which the incoming
radiation falls.

The micromachined diaphragm is critical to making this sensor work. Because it is very thin relative to the
rest of the silicon die, it has a very low thermal mass, and heat is not conducted away to the case as
quickly as it would be from the rest of the silicon die. This allows even small amounts of incoming radiation
to create a temperature difference or gradient between the diaphragm and the rest of the die.

The actual sensing of this temperature gradient is performed by a thermopile -which is a string of
thermocouples connected in series, as shown in the figure below. One set of junctions (hot junctions) is
fabricated on the diaphragm while another set of junctions (cold junctions) is fabricated on the thicker part
of the die. While the voltage generated by a single hot-cold junction pair (or actually the interconnections
between them) is very tiny, a series string of dozens or hundred of junctions can generate voltages in the
range of a few millivolts, which while still small, is measurable.
Some Practical Considerations

While the simplified transducer described above can result in a sensor that is responsive to the temperature
of remote objects, there are a number of issues that must be considered when attmepting to implement a
generally usable sensor.

The first of these considerations is the use of the input filter. As mentioned before, this filter passes
radiation around 10um. Why this wavelength? Although a hot object emits radiation over a range of
wavelengths, the distribution of energy over these wavelengths is a function of temperature. More
specifically, for any given temperature there is a wavelength at which meissions are highest. For example,
an object at 1000C will emit most most of its energy in wavelengths around 2um, while one at 25C will emit
most strongly around 10um, as shown in the plots below. Note, however, that the plots have been
normalized to the peak emission for that temperature -because of the 4th power emissions law, the 1000C
object will emit 300 times the energy it would at 25C. If one is designing a thermopile sensor to measure
temperatures around 25C, it becomes very important to keep out other radiation such as near-infrared or
visible light which could interfere with the measurement.

Because the thermopile element itself measures temperature gradients, the measurement is sensitive to the
IC package's ambient temperature. Consider the case in which the package is at 25C, and the object being
measured is at 50C. Radiation from the object will warm the transducer's diaphragm to some temperature
slightly above 25C, creating a temperature gradient and an output voltage, which is what would be
expected. Now consider the case where the IC package is at 50C -the same temperature as the remote
object. In this situation, both the diaphragm and the remote object are in thermal equilibrium -meaning
that the diaphragm radiates infrared energy back out as fast as radiation enters. This results in the
diaphragm remaining at 50C, hence no temperature gradient and no output voltage.

To get around the problem of the transducer's ambient temperature, the thermopile may also incorporate a
separate thermistor dedicated to measuring the die temperature. By combining the die temperature
measurement with the measurement of the temperature gradient created by incoming radiation it now
becomes possible to account for the effects of the transducer's ambient temperature.
A major application issue is that of field-of-view. The thermopile's window may accept radiation coming in
from a wide range of angles, often more than +/-45 degrees off from its central axis. Because the
thermopile measures the total energy entering through the window, it can't distinguish between a very
small, very hot object that only fills a small part of this field of view from a much larger, but cooler object.
To get consistent measurements, you need to ensure that the field of view is filled in a consistent way.
One way of doing this is to collimate the field of view through a smaller hole, so that the transducer only
'sees' a well-defined region of the object whose temperature is being measured. Of course, the transducer
will now also be sensing the radiation emitted by the collimator, so this effect needs to be accounted for as
well in the measurement process.

Finally, not all surfaces are equally efficient at emitting radiation. This emission efficiency is referred to as
the surface's emissivity, and varies between 0 and 1, with 1 being a characteristic of the ideal case called a
black-body radiator. There can be substantial variation in emissivity between different materials. For
example, concrete surfaces can have emissivities in the range of 0.9, while a bright polished metal surface
can have an emissivity of only 0.1. Emissivity also varies as a function of temperature and surface
preparation (roughness, oxidation, etc.) so it is not something that can be taken for granted as constant
from sample to sample. Variations in emissivity from one material to the next can have a dramatic effect
on the accuracy of a thermopile sensor, so one must be very aware of how this property varies in the
course of the target application.

An Application

One particularly successful application for infrared thermopile sensors is in medical thermometesr,
specifically those which are inserted into a patient's ear for the temperature measurement. There are
several reasons that make this application a good match for this sensor.

Although high precision (0.1C) is needed, the required measurement range is rather limited to about a +/-
10C range. Much beyond this and you are either looking at a corpse or someone on the way to becoming
one.
Inserting the thermometer into one's ear effectively fills the transducer’s field-of-view, eliminating this
source of potential error
The emissivity of human skin is typically very high (~1). Additionally, the ear canal is a cavity with a small
opening. This makes it look like a cavity radiator, which behaves very closely to an ideal black body
(emissivity =1) regardless of the material of which the cavity is made. The combination of skin's high
emissivity and the cavity radiator effect combine to increase measurement consistency.
Since the thermopile element is tiny, it comes to thermal equilibrium in a matter of seconds, making for a
fast measurement. In contrast, it takes a lot longer to get a good temperature reading with a traditional
oral thermometer.