Characterization of Metglas/poly(vinylidene fluoride)/Metglas magnetoelectric laminates for AC/DC magnetic sensor applications

Abstract

Polymer-based magnetoelectric materials show increasing interest for a large number of applications and, in particular, for the development of magnetic sensors. Nevertheless, relevant parameters such as sensitivity, accuracy, linearity, hysteresis and resolution have been vaguely or never discussed. This work reports on those parameters on a Metglas/Poly(vinylidene fluoride)/Metglas magnetoelectric laminate. The sensitivity and resolution determined for the DC (30 mV.Oe -1 and 8 µOe) and AC magnetic field sensor (992 mV.Oe -1 and 0.3 µOe) are favorably comparable with the most sensitive polymer-based ME sensors. Further, the correlation coefficient, linearity and accuracy values are 0.995, 95.9% and 99.4% for the DC magnetic field sensor and 0.9998, 99.4% and 99.2% for the AC magnetic field sensor. Therefore, the magnetoelectric materials reported in the present study can be used for innovative AC/DC magnetic field sensors.This work is funded by FEDER funds through the “Programa Operacional Factores de Competitividade – COMPETE” and by national funds from FCT – Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia, in the framework of the strategic project Strategic Project PEST- C/FIS/UI607/2014. P.M., V.C., S.R. and M.S. acknowledges also support from FCT (SFRH/BPD/96227/2013, SFRH/BPD/97739/2013, SFRH/BDE/406 51542/2011 and SFRH/BD/70303/2010 grants respectively). This work was also supported by Avel- electrónica Lda, Trofa, Portugal. A. Lasheras wants to thank the Basque Government for FPI grant. J. M. Barandiarán and J. Gutiérrez want to thank financial support from the Basque Government Industry Department under Project Actimat, (ELKARTEK Program)