Yong Xia

Ph.D. Candidate

Education

Ph.D Candidate, Instrument Science and Technology, Xi’an Jiaotong University M.S., Mechanical Engineering, Xi’an Jiaotong University, 2015 B. S., Mechanical Engineering, Chang’an University, 2013

Current Research

Title: “Low-power (Si and SiC) microheater platforms for gas sensing.” Abstract: There is a strong need to detect gaseous species and their concentrations for chemical process control, environmental monitoring, food and beverage quality assessment, and clinical diagnosis. One of the most promising sensing methods is semiconductor-based resistive response to target gases, which is fast, sensitive, low-cost, and easy to operate. However, to activate surface reactions and promote gas desorption, sensors usually require heating. Existing such sensors have a large power consumption (100’s of mW) that inhibit their application in portable or remote gas sensing.

Miniaturization of these sensors through the use of microfabricated heaters is an effective way of improving the power and size requirements. Advances in novel high surface area nano-materials used with these low power platforms open up new exciting possibilities for low-power gas sensing. By shrinking the heated area and reducing the heat loss via back-etching to form a self-supporting heating/sensing layer, we have developed (poly Si and SiC) microheater platforms that consume only ~15 mW to reach 500 °C.

To address sensitivity problems caused by a limited sensing area, we are exploring the potential of various porous nanomaterials which possess high surface area per device footprint. Of particular interest are aerogels based on 2D materials such as graphene, transition metal dichalcogenides, diborides and their hybrid heterostructures. My project seeks to integrate these nanomaterials with the microheater platform, and investigate their gas sensing characteristics towards low-power, sensitive and selective gas detection.

Publications

  1. Zhao L, Xia Y, Hebibul R, Wang J, Zhou X, Hu Y, Li Z, Luo G, Zhao Y, Jiang Z. Evaluation of width and width uniformity of near-field electrospinning printed micro and sub-micrometer lines based on optical image processing. Journal of Micromechanics and Microengineering. 2018 Feb 2;28(3):035010.
  2. Xia Y, Zhao L, Lu D, Li L, Luo Y, Luo G, Zhao Y, Jia C, Jiang Z. Giant enhancement on response-speed of electrospun-based UV photodetector via polydimethylsiloxane coating. In2018 IEEE Micro Electro Mechanical Systems (MEMS) 2018 Jan 21 (pp. 1028-1031). IEEE.
  3. Zhao L, Zhao Y, Xia Y, Li Z, Li J, Zhang J, Wang J, Zhou X, Li Y, Zhao Y, Jiang Z. A Novel CMUT-Based Resonant Biochemical Sensor Using Electrospinning Technology. IEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics. 2018 Oct 31;66(9):7356-65.
  4. Xia Y, Zhao L, Luo Y, Hebibul R, Wang J, Li L, Luo G, Zhou X, Jiang Z. Optimizing electrospinning-hydrothermal hybrid process based on Taguchi method for modulation of point defects in ZnO micro/nano arrays towards photoelectronic application. Journal of Alloys and Compounds. 2019 Mar 30;779:167-74.

Presentations

  1. March 8, 2019: BSAC poster “Low-power consumption microheater based gas sensing.”

Affiliations

  1. Berkeley Sensor and Actuator Center (BSAC)
  2. Molecular Foundry

Contact

xia395714753@gmail.com