High-Sensitivity, Low-Cost, Surface-Acoustic-Wave Based Microscale Thermogravimetric Analyzer for Nanoparticle Characterization

To meet NIST’s need for development of a new electronic system for microscale thermogravimeter nanoparticle analysis, X-wave Innovations, Inc. (XII) proposes a high-sensitivity, high-accuracy, low-cost, surface-acoustic-wave based microscale thermogravimetric analyzer (SAW-µ-TGA). The proposed approach is based on XII-developed surface acoustic wave (SAW) sensor technology, which is capable of simultaneously providing accurate temperature and mass change measurements at elevated temperatures beyond the required 700C in real time. The success of the proposed effort will result in not only a novel SAW-µ-TGA technology, but also a system that is inexpensive, accurate, fast, and easy to use for industrial product analysis in manufacturing environments.