Development of high resolution eddy current imaging using an electro-mechanical sensor

Abstract

Typical eddy current probes are based on measuring the impedance change of a coil excited by an AC current when the coil is placed above a conductive sample. These types of probes are limited in spatial resolution to the dimensions of the coil, and coil diameter is limited by operating frequency. Because of this, the highest resolution available with these probes is on the order of 100 um. While detecting the impedance change of the probe has limited special resolution, various methods of detecting the change in magnetic field in and around the coil have been shown to improve the resolution of a standard coil. These methods have improved the resolution in eddy current imaging to 25 nm. To date, the resolutions achievable by modern eddy current technology have failed to encompass the 100nm - 100 um range, which would be ideal for microstructure characterization of conductive materials. In this paper, a new probe, called the electro-mechanical eddy current sensor (EMECS), is presented that is based on the electromechanical design to fill this resolution gap. The new probe is designed and developed with a sharpened magnetic tip attached to the membrane of an electret microphone. The magnet is actuated by an external coil with a low current AC voltage. The motion of the magnet produces eddy currents in a conductive sample, which then result in a damping force on the magnet. The results of the experimental measurements demonstrate that this probe has spatial resolution that is much higher compared with the measurements using the external excitation coil only. The role of competing eddy currents produced by the motion of the magnet and the excitation coil in the material are examined with numerical analysis and the effects of the eddy currents from the excitation coil are shown to be negligible. A governing equation for the probe is presented that treats the magnet as a magnetic dipole and uses the eddy current forces as a damping term in the equation of motion for the membrane. The equation is solved with finite differences and the resolution is indeed shown to be on the order of the tip diameter.