Towards high-resolution flow cameras made of artificial hair flow-sensors for flow pattern recognition

Next to image sensors, future´s robots will definitely use a variety of sensing mechanisms for navigation and prevention of risks to human life, for example flow-sensor arrays for 3D hydrodynamic reconstruction of the near environment. This paper aims to quantify the possibilities of our artificial hair flow-sensor for high-resolution flow field visualization. Using silicon-on-insulator (SOI) technology with deep trench isolation structures, hair-based flow sensors with separate electrodes arranged in wafer-scale arrays have been successfully fabricated. Frequency Division Multiplexing (FDM) is used to interrogate individual hair elements providing simultaneous real-time flow measurements from multiple hairs. This is demonstrated by reconstructing the dipole fields along different array elements and hence localizing a dipole source relative to the hair array elements.