STMicro's Water-Resistant MEMS Pressure Sensors Target Budget-Conscious Applications

March 20, 2019

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STMicro's Water-Resistant MEMS Pressure Sensors Target Budget-Conscious Applications

The STMicroelectronics LPS33W water-resistant MEMS pressure sensor combines chemical compatibility, stability, and accuracy for applications such as fitness trackers and other wearables.

The STMicroelectronics LPS33W water-resistant MEMS pressure sensor combines chemical compatibility, stability, and accuracy for applications such as fitness trackers and other wearables, vacuum cleaners, and general-purpose industrial sensing. Protected by a viscous potting gel inside the cylindrical metal package, the IPx8-rated LPS33W withstands salt water, chlorine, bromine, and detergents such as hand soap and shampoo, e-liquids, and light industrial chemicals such as n-pentane.

Features include a built-in signal-conditioning ASIC, and a 0.008hPa RMS pressure noise for excellent measurement resolution. Susceptibility to reflow-soldering stress during assembly is also extremely low, drifting less than ±2hPa and recovering normal accuracy in 72 hours. Temperature compensation keeps accuracy within ±3hPa over the operating range from 0°C to 65°C.

The LPS33W operates at just 15µA in high-performance mode, with a 3µA low-power mode and 1µA power-down. A 128-bit FIFO stores up to 40 slots of 32-bit pressure and temperature data, helping save extra power by minimizing intervention from the host microcontroller. A low-pass filter and I2C and SPI digital interfaces are also built-in. The 3.3mm-diameter x 2.9mm cylindrical metal-cased LPS33W is priced from $3.60 for orders of 1000 pieces.

For more information, visit www.st.com/lps33w-pr.