Challenges
In line with the evolution of medical devices, advanced medical treatment using catheters has also evolved. The need for ultra-compact, high-precision thermistors (ceramic semiconductors) for catheters has increased as a result. But it has been difficult to achieve both miniaturization and high precision of thermistors using conventional manufacturing methods.
Efforts to address challenges
To address these challenges, SEMITEC developed the Fμ series of thin-film thermistors. Both ultra-compact and highly accurate, they incorporate our proprietary thin-film thermistor technology, the first of its kind in the world to succeed in mass production. This enables the production of thermistor temperature sensors with a diameter of 0.5 mm or less for use in advanced medical applications such as catheters. It allows thermodilution catheters to measure cardiac output by temperature change.
We are also striving to develop other types of sensors for advanced medical devices by expanding the manufacturing process for thin-film thermistors to MEMS technology and integrating this with microfabrication technologies we developed for catheter thermistors.
Through these efforts, we succeeded in developing the ultra-compact “Pμ sensor” pressure sensor and three-dimensional “CF sensor” contact force sensor. We are now proceeding with their commercialization.
