Quantitative Evaluation for Magnetoelectric Sensor Systems in Biomagnetic Diagnostics

Research output: Contribution to journalResearch articleContributedpeer-review

Contributors

  • Eric Elzenheimer - (Author)
  • Christin Bald - (Author)
  • Erik Engelhardt - (Author)
  • Johannes Hoffmann - , Kiel University (Author)
  • Patrick Hayes - (Author)
  • Johan Arbustini - (Author)
  • Andreas Bahr - , Kiel University (Author)
  • Eckhard Quandt - (Author)
  • Michael Höft - (Author)
  • Gerhard Schmidt - (Author)

Abstract

Dedicated research is currently being conducted on novel thin film magnetoelectric (ME) sensor concepts for medical applications. These concepts enable a contactless magnetic signal acquisition in the presence of large interference fields such as the magnetic field of the Earth and are operational at room temperature. As more and more different ME sensor concepts are accessible to medical applications, the need for comparative quality metrics significantly arises. For a medical application, both the specification of the sensor itself and the specification of the readout scheme must be considered. Therefore, from a medical user’s perspective, a system consideration is better suited to specific quantitative measures that consider the sensor readout scheme as well. The corresponding sensor system evaluation should be performed in reproducible measurement conditions (e.g., magnetically, electrically and acoustically shielded environment). Within this contribution, an ME sensor system evaluation scheme will be described and discussed. The quantitative measures will be determined exemplarily for two ME sensors: a resonant ME sensor and an electrically modulated ME sensor. In addition, an application-related signal evaluation scheme will be introduced and exemplified for cardiovascular application. The utilized prototype signal is based on a magnetocar-diogram (MCG), which was recorded with a superconducting quantum-interference device. As a potential figure of merit for a quantitative signal assessment, an application specific capacity (ASC) is introduced. In conclusion, this contribution highlights metrics for the quantitative characterization of ME sensor systems and their resulting output signals in biomagnetism. Finally, different ASC values and signal-to-noise ratios (SNRs) could be clearly presented for the resonant ME sensor (SNR: −90 dB, ASC: 9.8 × 10−7 dB Hz) and also the electrically modulated ME sensor (SNR: −11 dB, ASC: 23 dB Hz), showing that the electrically modulated ME sensor is better suited for a possible MCG application under ideal conditions. The presented approach is transferable to other magnetic sensors and applications.

Details

Original languageEnglish
Article number1018
JournalSensors
Volume22
Issue number3
Publication statusPublished - 1 Feb 2022
Peer-reviewedYes
Externally publishedYes

External IDs

Scopus 85123454127

Keywords

Keywords

  • Application specific signal evaluation, Magnetoelectric sensors, Quantitative sensor system characterization, Sensor system performance