Optical sensors. Do they require a computer?

Abstract

Recently, optical sensors have obtained increasing interest in application and research. In principle , they are considered to detect selectively compounds in analyte mixtures by their specific activity of the chemicals or biochemicals in the sensor head. But, evidently this requirement cannot be fulfilled at the moment. For this reason, in addition to the use of microprocessors for the automatization of the sensor measurement, computers have to be used in the evaluation of data to increase selectivity by the use of sensor arrays and methods of multicomponentanalysis and pattern recognition, respectively. The necessity of computers in the physico-chemical characterization of the sensor material, in the process control, and in the data evaluation is demonstrated. Furthermore, some examples of sensors based on fiber optics and interferometric detection principles as well as wave guide applications are discussed.