This Small Business Innovation Research Phase I project will develop solid-state, low cost, intelligent sensor systems for fuel cell reformer control technology. The state-of-the-art sensor technology have limitations that are not suited for compositional monitoring of a number of reducing gases that are found in a fuel cell reforming process. The proposed sensing material will be Ga2o3 nanoceramics that have distinct relative sensitivities with respect to different reducing gases at different operating temperatures. A sensor array with each sensor element operating at different temperatures will be used in the Sensor system, and an on-chip-pattern-recognition neural network will be developed to relate the response matrix from the sensor array to analyze concentration. During Phase I, Nanomaterials Research Corporation (NRC) will establish the proof-of-concept that commercially useful, nano-engineered sensor arrays can be prepared and those on-chip-pattern-recognition neural networks offer significant performance advantage. Phase II effort will Seek to optimize the technology and produce prototypes for customer qualification. Phase III will commercialize the technology. The proposed research would provide solid-state, low cost, intelligent sensor systems for fuel cell reformer control technology. Chemical sensor systems for compositional detection of multicomponent gas mixtures can also be extremely useful for environmental monitoring, automobile engine control technology, and chemical and petrochemical industries.
