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Sensors and Transducers

Simple stand alone electronic circuits can be made to repeatedly flash a light or play
a musical note.

But in order for an electronic circuit or system to perform any useful task or function it
needs to be able to communicate with the “real world” whether this is by reading an
input signal from an “ON/OFF” switch or by activating some form of output device to
illuminate a single light.

In other words, an Electronic System or circuit must be able or capable to “do” something
and Sensors and Transducers are the perfect components for doing this.

The word “Transducer” is the collective term used for both Sensors which can be used to
sense a wide range of different energy forms such as movement, electrical signals,
radiant energy, thermal or magnetic energy etc, and Actuators which can be used to
switch voltages or currents.
There are many different types of sensors and transducers, both analogue and digital
and input and output available to choose from. The type of input or output transducer
being used, really depends upon the type of signal or process being “Sensed” or
“Controlled” but we can define a sensor and transducers as devices that converts one
physical quantity into another.

Devices which perform an “Input” function are commonly called Sensors because they
“sense” a physical change in some characteristic that changes in response to some
excitation, for example heat or force and covert that into an electrical signal. Devices
which perform an “Output” function are generally called Actuators and are used to
control some external device, for example movement or sound.

Electrical Transducers are used to convert energy of one kind into energy of another
kind, so for example, a microphone (input device) converts sound waves into electrical
signals for the amplifier to amplify (a process), and a loudspeaker (output device)
converts these electrical signals back into sound waves and an example of this type of
simple Input/Output (I/O) system is given below.

Simple Input/Output System using Sound Transducers

There are many different types of sensors and transducers available in the marketplace,
and the choice of which one to use really depends upon the quantity being measured or
controlled, with the more common types given in the table below:

Common Sensors and Transducers

Quantity being Input Device Output Device

Measured (Sensor) (Actuator)

Light Dependant Resistor (LDR)

Lights & Lamps
Photodiode
Light Level LED’s & Displays
Photo-transistor
Fibre Optics
Solar Cell

Thermocouple
Thermistor Heater
 Temperature Thermostat Fan
Resistive Temperature Detectors

Strain Gauge Lifts & Jacks

Force/Pressure Pressure Switch Electromagnet
Load Cells Vibration

Potentiometer
Motor
Encoders
Position Solenoid
Reflective/Slotted Opto-switch
Panel Meters
LVDT

Tacho-generator AC and DC Motors

Speed Reflective/Slotted Opto-coupler Stepper Motor
Doppler Effect Sensors Brake

Bell
Carbon Microphone
Sound Buzzer
Piezo-electric Crystal
Loudspeaker

Input type transducers or sensors, produce a voltage or signal output response which is
proportional to the change in the quantity that they are measuring (the stimulus). The
type or amount of the output signal depends upon the type of sensor being used. But
generally, all types of sensors can be classed as two kinds, either Passive Sensors or
Active Sensors.

Generally, active sensors require an external power supply to operate, called an

excitation signal which is used by the sensor to produce the output signal. Active sensors
are self-generating devices because their own properties change in response to an
external effect producing for example, an output voltage of 1 to 10v DC or an output
current such as 4 to 20mA DC. Active sensors can also produce signal amplification.

A good example of an active sensor is an LVDT sensor or a strain gauge. Strain gauges are
pressure-sensitive resistive bridge networks that are external biased (excitation signal)
in such a way as to produce an output voltage in proportion to the amount of force
and/or strain being applied to the sensor.
Unlike an active sensor, a passive sensor does not need any additional power source or
excitation voltage. Instead a passive sensor generates an output signal in response to
some external stimulus. For example, a thermocouple which generates its own voltage
output when exposed to heat. Then passive sensors are direct sensors which change
their physical properties, such as resistance, capacitance or inductance etc.

But as well as analogue sensors, Digital Sensors produce a discrete output representing
a binary number or digit such as a logic level “0” or a logic level “1”.

Analogue and Digital Sensors

Analogue Sensors
Analogue Sensors produce a continuous output signal or voltage which is generally
proportional to the quantity being measured. Physical quantities such as Temperature,
Speed, Pressure, Displacement, Strain etc are all analogue quantities as they tend to be
continuous in nature. For example, the temperature of a liquid can be measured using a
thermometer or thermocouple which continuously responds to temperature changes as
the liquid is heated up or cooled down.

Thermocouple used to produce an Analogue Signal

Analogue sensors tend to produce output signals that are changing smoothly and
continuously over time. These signals tend to be very small in value from a few mico-
volts (uV) to several milli-volts (mV), so some form of amplification is required.

Then circuits which measure analogue signals usually have a slow response and/or low
accuracy. Also analogue signals can be easily converted into digital type signals for use in
micro-controller systems by the use of analogue-to-digital converters, or ADC’s.

Digital Sensors
As its name implies, Digital Sensors produce a discrete digital output signals or voltages
that are a digital representation of the quantity being measured. Digital sensors produce
a Binary output signal in the form of a logic “1” or a logic “0”, (“ON” or “OFF”). This means
then that a digital signal only produces discrete (non-continuous) values which may be
outputted as a single “bit”, (serial transmission) or by combining the bits to produce a
single “byte” output (parallel transmission).

Light Sensor used to produce an Digital Signal

In our simple example above, the speed of the rotating shaft is measured by using a
digital LED/Opto-detector sensor. The disc which is fixed to a rotating shaft (for example,
from a motor or robot wheels), has a number of transparent slots within its design. As
the disc rotates with the speed of the shaft, each slot passes by the sensor in turn
producing an output pulse representing a logic “1” or logic “0” level.

These pulses are sent to a register of counter and finally to an output display to show the
speed or revolutions of the shaft. By increasing the number of slots or “windows” within
the disc more output pulses can be produced for each revolution of the shaft. The
advantage of this is that a greater resolution and accuracy is achieved as fractions of a
revolution can be detected. Then this type of sensor arrangement could also be used for
positional control with one of the discs slots representing a reference position.

Compared to analogue signals, digital signals or quantities have very high accuracies and
can be both measured and “sampled” at a very high clock speed. The accuracy of the
digital signal is proportional to the number of bits used to represent the measured
quantity. For example, using a processor of 8 bits, will produce an accuracy of 0.390% (1
part in 256). While using a processor of 16 bits gives an accuracy of 0.0015%, (1 part in
65,536) or 260 times more accurate. This accuracy can be maintained as digital
quantities are manipulated and processed very rapidly, millions of times faster than
analogue signals.

In most cases, sensors and more specifically analogue sensors generally require an
external power supply and some form of additional amplification or filtering of the signal
in order to produce a suitable electrical signal which is capable of being measured or
used. One very good way of achieving both amplification and filtering within a single
circuit is to use Operational Amplifiers as seen before.

Signal Conditioning of Sensors

As we saw in the Operational Amplifier tutorial, op-amps can be used to provide
amplification of signals when connected in either inverting or non-inverting
configurations.

The very small analogue signal voltages produced by a sensor such as a few milli-volts or
even pico-volts can be amplified many times over by a simple op-amp circuit to produce a
much larger voltage signal of say 5v or 5mA that can then be used as an input signal to a
microprocessor or analogue-to-digital based system.

Therefore, to provide any useful signal a sensors output signal has to be amplified with
an amplifier that has a voltage gain up to 10,000 and a current gain up to 1,000,000 with
the amplification of the signal being linear with the output signal being an exact
reproduction of the input, just changed in amplitude.

Then amplification is part of signal conditioning. So when using analogue sensors,

generally some form of amplification (Gain), impedance matching, isolation between the
input and output or perhaps filtering (frequency selection) may be required before the
signal can be used and this is conveniently performed by Operational Amplifiers.

Also, when measuring very small physical changes the output signal of a sensor can
become “contaminated” with unwanted signals or voltages that prevent the actual signal
required from being measured correctly. These unwanted signals are called “Noise“. This
Noise or Interference can be either greatly reduced or even eliminated by using signal
conditioning or filtering techniques as we discussed in the Active Filter tutorial.

By using either a Low Pass, or a High Pass or even Band Pass filter the “bandwidth” of
the noise can be reduced to leave just the output signal required. For example, many
types of inputs from switches, keyboards or manual controls are not capable of changing
state rapidly and so low-pass filter can be used. When the interference is at a particular
frequency, for example mains frequency, narrow band reject or Notch filters can be used
to produce frequency selective filters.

Typical Op-amp Filters

Were some random noise still remains after filtering it may be necessary to take several
samples and then average them to give the final value so increasing the signal-to-noise
ratio. Either way, both amplification and filtering play an important role in interfacing
both sensors and transducers to microprocessor and electronics based systems in “real
world” conditions.

In the next tutorial about Sensors, we will look at Positional Sensors which measure the
position and/or displacement of physical objects meaning the movement from one
position to another for a specific distance or angle.

103 Comments

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Gage Haas
I believe that the definitions for active and passive transducers have been
switched in this article, which may be confusing. An active transducer generates
it’s own current or voltage in response to a physical change, and passive
transducers require excitation.

Posted on September 06th 2019 | 2:05 pm

 Reply

Ashish
Such a nice article. Please check my article on the same topic give some
suggestions.
URL is
Thank you

Posted on September 07th 2019 | 3:33 pm

 Reply

Sp
Didn’t get what I was looking for…
Posted on September 30th 2019 | 4:22 pm
 Reply

Karyadi
i want article more about transducer and sensor

Posted on October 03rd 2019 | 8:31 am

 Reply

Dipali tudu
Seminar topic sensor technology

Posted on November 08th 2019 | 12:40 am

 Reply

Michel
cool

Posted on November 21st 2019 | 8:24 am

 Reply

chandra mouli
I want artical more about seansor

Posted on December 04th 2019 | 2:02 am

  Reply

ANURAG GUPTA
Is amplifier a passive transducer? Note: I am asking about amplifier being passive
transducer and not active/passive device.

Posted on December 13th 2019 | 7:23 pm

 Reply

Hussen Hasen
nice

Posted on December 14th 2019 | 11:42 am

 Reply

maksood
i am maksood and i want to know if electrons travel through the sun and help find
the diameter of the nucleus

Posted on January 30th 2020 | 3:07 pm

 Reply

Prof. AMITABHA SINHA

Very lucid and interesting article.
Posted on February 13th 2020 | 1:41 pm
 Reply

Cardinal paul
I like it

Posted on February 25th 2020 | 7:46 am

 Reply

xmt
I am staggered by the discourteous behaviour of some people here who just
demand more knowledge about this, that and the other, without even saying thank
you for this wonderful and free information in the first place. They comes across as
rude, selfish and ungrateful, but please tell me if it is my flawed perception or is it
just a clash in attitude, culture and expectation? Could it be that they paid an
expensive subscription of some kind and demand value for money?

Posted on April 18th 2020 | 1:07 pm

 Reply

Dk
Sensors

Posted on April 30th 2020 | 2:31 pm

 Reply
Shihab
I want to measure …
1. Linear position
2. Mental object proximity
3. Mass
4. Angular velocity
5. Wind speed

Posted on June 29th 2020 | 3:49 am

 Reply

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