Denso Corporation

Nippondenso Co., Ltd.

Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha

Nippondenso Corporation

Minekazu Sakai

Tsuyoshi Fukada

Minoru Murata

Tetsuo Fujii

Yasutoshi Suzuki

Akira Kuroyanagi

Kiyomasa Sugimoto

Yukihiro Takeuchi

Hiroshi Muto

Inao Toyoda

Kenichi Ao

Hiroshige Sugito

Kazuhiko Kano

Seiki Aoyama

Shinji Yoshihara

Tomoya Jomori

Toshimasa Yamamoto

Seiichiro Ishio

Takashi Katsumata

Motoki Ito

Ryuichiro Abe

Masakazu Terada

Naoki Yoshida

Hiroshi Okada

Hiroshi Tanaka

Tameharu Ohta

Seiji Fujino

Junji Oohara

Akitoshi Yamanaka

Kazuaki Mawatari

Nobukazu Oba

Kazuhisa Ikeda

Eishi Kawasaki

Koki Mizuno

Yoshitsugu Abe

Koji Hattori

Yoshiyuki Kato

Naohisa Niimi

Makiko Sugiura

Toshio Yamamoto

Minoru Nishida

Shigenori Yamauchi

Yukihiko Tanizawa

Hirofumi Funabashi

Hirofumi Higuchi

Masaaki Tanaka

Yoshinori Ohtsuka

Yoshimi Yoshino

Kinya Atsumi

Kazushi Asami

Susumu Kuroyanagi

Takumi Shibata

Kenichi Yokoyama

Nobuyuki Kato

Toshio Ikuta

Norio Fujitsuka

Kimiharu Kayukawa

Masakazu Kanosue

Sumitomo Inomata

Fumiyoshi Ariki

Shoji Ozoe

Toshiyuki Tsuchiya

Yutaka Hayakawa

Yasuki Shimoyama

Yasuichi Mitsushima

Michihiro Masuda

Takeru Kanazawa

Takao Yoneyama

Hirotsugu Funato

Takahiro Higuchi

Shinsuke Watanabe

Youko Nakagawa

Tameharu Oota

Yoshiaki Murakami

Tomohiro Funahashi

Nobuaki Kuzuya

Nobukazu Ohba

Yuji Koyama

A piezoelectric element includes a plurality of vibration regions that are separated from each other by a slit, and the slit is formed to have a tapered portion that is tapered from a first surface of the vibration regions on an opposite side to a support to a second surface opposite to the first surface. An electrode film is positioned inside than the slit when being viewed from a normal direction orthogonal to the first surface, and an angle formed by a side surface of the tapered portion in the vibration region and a surface parallel to the first surface is in a range of 39 to 81 degrees.

Piezoelectric element, piezoelectric device, and method of manufacturing piezoelectric element

A piezoelectric element includes a support member and a vibrating portion. The vibrating portion has a support region supported by the support member, and a plurality of vibration regions, one end portion side of which is supported by the support region, and the other end portion side of which is opposite to the one end portion is floating from the support member. A first vibration region in which a mass on the one end portion side is heavier than the mass on the other end portion side serves as a pressure detection section outputting a first detection signal based on the charge of the piezoelectric film. A second vibration region in which a mass on the other end portion side is heavier than the mass on one end portion side serves as an acceleration detection section outputting a second detection signal based on the charge of the piezoelectric film.

Piezoelectric element, piezoelectric device, and manufacturing method of piezoelectric element

A physical quantity sensor includes a detection unit outputting a detection signal corresponding to a vibration of a vibrating element in an angular velocity sensor, and a self-diagnostic unit self-diagnosing a detection environment of an acceleration sensor and the angular velocity sensor on a basis of the detection signal outputted by the detection unit.

Physical quantity sensor

In a physical quantity sensor, a contact part that is directly and electrically connected to an external circuit is formed in a support substrate, and the support substrate is maintained at a predetermined potential through the contact part. With this configuration, the support substrate is maintained at the predetermined potential without disposing an electrode in the interior of the semiconductor layer. For that reason, a processing precision can be restrained from being reduced in forming the movable electrode, and hence a detection precision can be restrained from being reduced.

Physical quantity sensor and method for manufacturing the same

An angular velocity sensor includes a first substrate having first and second surfaces, a vibrating member disposed on the first substrate and including a drive piece capable of vibrating along the first substrate, a second substrate disposed on the first surface side, a first drive piece control electrode, a first drive piece auxiliary electrode, and a first drive piece control circuit applying a voltage to the first drive piece auxiliary electrode. The first drive piece control circuit adjusts, based on the capacitance generated between the first drive piece control electrode and the first drive piece auxiliary electrode, the voltage to be applied to the first drive piece auxiliary electrode to maintain a constant distance between the first drive piece control electrode and the first drive piece auxiliary electrode.

Angular velocity sensor

A capacitive physical quantity sensor includes a first substrate, a movable electrode, a fixed electrode, a second substrate, a signal applying unit, a C-V conversion circuit, and an auxiliary electrode. The auxiliary electrode is disposed from a portion of the second substrate which faces the movable electrode to a portion of the second substrate which faces a displaceable region of the movable electrode. The signal applying unit applies a predetermined potential to the auxiliary electrode at the time of self-diagnosis, to thereby increase a density of electric force lines generated between the fixed electrode located in a direction of displacing the movable electrode and the movable electrode.

Capacitive physical quantity sensor

When one direction of plane directions of a substrate is a first direction and a direction of the plane directions of the substrate perpendicular to the first direction is a second direction, a vibrating member is supported at an outer peripheral section via a plurality of beam sections having first beam-configuring members that can displace at least in the first direction and second beam-configuring members that are joined to the first beam-configuring members and that can displace at least in the second direction. In at least a subset of the plurality of beam sections, beam-configuring members on a side of the outer peripheral section among the first beam-configuring members and the second beam-configuring members are integrated with each other.

A sensor device has a gyro sensor and an acceleration sensor. The gyro sensor has a fixed base portion formed in a rectangular frame shape. The acceleration sensor is formed in an inside space of the fixed base portion of the rectangular frame shape. The gyro sensor is formed in an outside space formed between the fixed base portion and an outer frame portion of a sensor base plate. The gyro sensor and the acceleration sensor are formed in one chip. As a result, the sensor device can be made smaller in size.

Sensor device

A capacitive physical quantity sensor includes a first substrate, a movable electrode, a fixed electrode, and a second substrate. An auxiliary electrode is disposed on a portion of the second substrate to face the movable electrode and the auxiliary electrode has a facing area that faces the movable electrode. The facing area in a case where the movable electrode is displaced in one direction is different from the facing area in a case where the movable electrode is displaced in an opposite direction opposite to the one direction. The physical quantity is detected based on a capacitance, which is generated corresponding to the interval between the fixed electrode and the movable electrode, and a capacitance, which is generated corresponding to an interval between the facing area of the movable electrode and the auxiliary electrode.

In an acceleration sensor, a semiconductor layer is provided with a rod-shaped weight portion that passes through a center of a frame portion, extends in a second direction, and is connected to the frame portion through a first beam portion. A first-direction movable electrode and a second-direction movable electrode are provided on the weight portion. According to the above configuration, because a mass of the first- and second-direction movable electrodes can be applied to the vicinity of a center of the frame portion, and a rotational moment can be reduced. Thus, detection accuracy can be restrained from being reduced.

Acceleration sensor

A sensor device includes a semiconductor substrate and multiple sensing portions that are placed on one side of the semiconductor substrate and convert a physical quantity into an electrical signal. The one side is parallel to a reference plane defined by an X-direction and a Y-direction perpendicular to each other. The semiconductor substrate has a center point that is both a geometric center and a center of mass. The semiconductor substrate is axisymmetric with respect to each of a first reference line passing through the center point and parallel to the X-direction and a second reference line passing through the center point and parallel to the Y-direction. Each of the sensing portions is axisymmetric with respect to each of the first reference line and the second reference line.

A humidity sensor includes a detection device with a capacitance changing with humidity at a first ratio and a reference device with a capacitance changing with humidity at a second ratio smaller than the first ratio. The detection device has detection electrodes facing each other with a first gap and a detection humidity-sensitive film covering the detection electrodes. The reference device has reference electrodes facing each other with a second gap and a reference humidity-sensitive film covering the reference electrodes. The detection humidity-sensitive film and the reference humidity-sensitive film are made from the same material and have the same thickness. The detection electrodes and the reference electrodes are made from the same material and have the same width and thickness. The second ratio peaks when the second gap is equal to a predetermined value. The second gap is smaller than the first gap and the predetermined value.

Capacitive humidity sensor

A humidity sensor includes a humidity detention section, a pad section, and a dam section. The humidity detention section includes a pair of detection electrodes facing each other on a predetermined surface of a substrate and a humidity-sensitive film covering the detection electrodes. The pad section is spaced from the humidity detection section on the surface and covered with a protection gel section. The dam section is located between the humidity detection section and the pad section on the surface. The dam section includes a dam wire that is made from the same material as the detection electrodes and a dam humidity-sensitive film that is made from the same material as the humidity-sensitive film and covers at least part of the dam wire.

Humidity sensor and method of manufacturing the same

In an angular velocity sensor, a vibrator is coupled with a substrate through a beam part, and is movable in a first direction and a second direction that is perpendicular to the first direction. A driving part is configured to vibrate the vibrator in the first direction. A detecting part is configured to detect displacement of the vibrator in the second direction as a change in capacitance, the displacement being caused by Coriolis force generated in the vibrator due to vibration of the vibrator and an angular velocity around a third direction that is perpendicular to the first direction and the second direction. A restricting part is configured to restrict displacement of the vibrator in the second direction based on the change in capacitance. The angular velocity sensor is configured to satisfy a condition where &#x3b2; sin &#x3b8; is equal to or less than 1.

A physical quantity detection device includes: an insulating layer; a semiconductor layer on the insulating layer; and first and second electrodes in the semiconductor layer. Each electrode has a wall part, one of which includes two diaphragms and a cover part. The diaphragms facing each other provide a hollow cylinder having an opening covered by the cover part. One diaphragm faces the other wall part or one diaphragm in the other wall part. A distance between the one diaphragm and the other wall part or the one diaphragm in the other wall part is changed with pressure difference between reference pressure in the hollow cylinder and pressure of an outside when a physical quantity is applied to the diaphragms. The physical quantity is detected by a capacitance between the first and second electrodes.

Physical quantity detection device and method for manufacturing the same

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Kariya, Japan

Minekazu Sakai