We report evidence that a porphyrinic microsensor for detection of nitric oxide (NO) also detects biologically relevant concentrations of tyrosine (Tyr) in dog brain. Tyr is oxidized by this sensor at the same potential as NO, and the sensitivity for NO and Tyr are of the same order of magnitude. The interference from Tyr is of importance because 1) Tyr is abundant and 2) there is a concentrati...

Micromachining and MEMS technologies can be used to produce complex electrical, mechanical, fluidic, thermal, optical, and magnetic structures, devices, and systems on a scale ranging from organs to subcellular organelles. This miniaturization ability has enabled MEMS to be applied in many areas of biology, medicine, and biomedical engineering – a field generally referred to as BioMEMS. The fut...

Wireless microsensor networks lend themselves to trade-offs in energy and quality. In these networks, the individual sensor data per se is not necessarily important to the end user. Rather, it is the combined knowledge of all the sensors that describes what is occurring in the environment. By allowing the algorithms and protocols to adapt the quality of this description, with a corresponding ch...

Electronic circuit simulation programs like SPICE have built-in models for semiconductor devices like MOSFET and BJT. However, they do not provide models for electrochemical sensors like ISFETs (Ion-Sensitive Field-Effect Transistors). This paper presents a behavioral macromodel for ISFET-based pH-sensors implemented using PSPICETM. The macromodel is then utilized to present a comparative analy...

Emerging distributed wireless microsensor networks will enable the reliable and fault tolerant monitoring of the environment. Such microsensors are required to operate for years from a small energy source, while maintaining reliable communication link to the basestation. The design of energy-aware communication protocols can have a dramatic impact on the network lifetime for such applications. ...

Sensor networks are becoming increasingly important as tools for monitoring remote environments. As sensors are typically batteryoperated, it is important to efficiently use the limited energy of the nodes to extend the lifetime of the sensor network. Two factors can greatly influence the performance of protocols for these networks– the data delivery model, which describes how the end user want...

The performance features of MEMS transducers allow the development of a new class of small, low-power sensor microsystems which utilize a suite of sensors to support a wide range of applications. This paper presents a system-level framework for constructing such microsystems where system modularity for application adaptability is a primary design consideration. System architecture, communicatio...

This paper presents the development of a real-time microsensor-based monitoring system that can be used to detect and characterize volatile organic compounds in soil and groundwater. The system employs an array of polymer-based microsensors (chemiresistors) packaged in a waterproof housing that is designed to protect the sensor from harsh subsurface environments, including completely water-satu...

This paper is concerned with the detection and extraction of moving objects in infrared image sequences. We describe the implementation of a system using a small "microsensor" package that balances computational loading between FPGA devices and a DSP chip. The system satisfies tight design constraints that are crucial for some surveillance applications, involving processing speed, power consump...