Design of electrical capacitance tomography sensors

Electrical capacitance tomography (ECT) has been developed since the late 1980s for visualization and measurement of a permittivity distribution in a cross section using a multi-electrode capacitance sensor. While the hardware and image reconstruction algorithms for ECT have been published extensively and the topics have been reviewed, few papers have been published to discuss ECT sensors and the design issues, which are crucial for a specific application. This paper will briefly discuss the principles of ECT sensors, but mostly will address key issues for ECT sensor design, with reference to some existing ECT sensors as a good understanding of the key issues would help optimization of the design of ECT sensors. The key issues to be discussed include the number and length of electrodes, the use of external and internal electrodes, implications of wall thickness, earthed screens (including the outer screen, axial end screens and radial screens), driven guard electrodes, dealing with high temperature and high pressure, twin planes for velocity measurement by cross correlation and limitations in sensor diameter. While conventional ECT sensors are circular with the electrodes in a single plane or in twin planes, some non-conventional ECT sensors, such as square, conical and 3D sensors, will also be discussed. As a practical guidance, the procedure to fabricate an ECT sensor will be given. In the end are summary and discussion on future challenges, including re-engineering of ECT sensors.