AAS-930-164B Datasheet, PDF (1/4 Pages) Amphenol Corporation – Thermopile IR Sensor Applications

Thermopile
IR Sensor
Applications
What is a Thermopile?
Thermopile Features
A thermopile is a serially-interconnected array of
thermocouples, each of which consists of two
dissimilar materials with a large thermoelectric
power and opposite polarities. The thermocouples
are placed across the hot and cold regions of
a structure and the hot junctions are thermally
isolated from the cold junctions. The cold junctions
are typically placed on the silicon substrate to
provide effective heat sink. In the hot regions, there
is a black body for absorbing the infrared, which
raises the temperature according to the intensity
of the incident infrared. These thermopiles employ
two different thermoelectric materials which are
placed on a thin diaphragm having a low thermal
conductance and capacitance.
The thermopile has some unique properties not of-
fered by other detectors:
• Response to broad infrared spectrum
• No source of bias voltage or current needed
• Inherently stable response to DC radiation
Amphenol
Advanced Sensors