Improving the Yield and Lifetime of Microfabricated Sensors for Harsh Environments

Abstract

This paper details improvements in the design and fabrication of electrodes intended to function in the high temperature, corrosive environment of a molten salt. Previously reported devices have displayed low yield and lifetimes and this paper presents two strategies to improve these aspects of their performance. The first one involves reducing the critical area, which increased both the electrode yield and lifetimes. The second element utilized test structures, targeted at identifying failure mechanisms, which helped facilitate the materials/design modifications required to make the devices more robust.