volume | PIER Journals

Abstract

Moisture measurement in industrial applications, both in liquid and solid materials, presents a significant challenge. In the field of biofuels, this becomes even more critical. Among the various approaches developed for this purpose, indirect electromagnetic techniques have emerged as a valuable tool for accurately estimating moisture content. These techniques utilize the complex dielectric permittivity ε as an intermediary parameter, which is influenced by the water content in the material. As a first step toward this purpose, a 1''5/8 two-port coaxial transmission cell, developed at LNE-CETIAT, was studied to make dielectric measurements on liquids. Characterization and validation steps were requested to demonstrate the accuracy of this cell. For this purpose, an intra-laboratory comparison has been performed first at LNE-CETIAT using the 1''5/8 cell and the EpsiMu® coaxial cell - a fully validated reference tool. Then, an inter-laboratory comparison with the Fresnel Institute has been performed using a coaxial probe and another EpsiMu®cell. The measurements were carried out under identical ambient conditions, using liquid reference materials. In this work, the performance of the developed cell in the frequency band [0,1-1,1] GHz has been validated, as well as the accuracy of the three electromagnetic techniques used. The results of the experiments confirm the effectiveness of the 1''5/8 cell developed at LNE-CETIAT for measuring the dielectric properties of liquids.

1. BiofMet, 19ENG09, New metrological methods for biofuel materials analysis, 2020-2023, biofmet.eu.

2. Topp, G. C., J. L. Davis, and A. P. Annan, "Electromagnetic determination of soil-water content --- Measurements in coaxial transmission-line," Water Resources Research, Vol. 16, 574-582, 1980.
doi:10.1029/WR016i003p00574 Google Scholar

3. Kupfer, K., Electromagnetic Aquametry --- Electromagnetic Wave Interaction with Water and Moist Substances, Springer, 2005, link.springer.com/book/10.1007/b137700.
doi:10.1007/b137700

4. Ochsner, A., L. F. M. da Silva, and H. Altenbach, "Advanced structured materials," Structmat, 2015, springer.com/series/8611. Google Scholar

5. Antunes Neves, A. L., Application au domaine biomedical des moyens de caracterisation electromagnetique de materiaux dans le spectre des micro-ondes, Thesis doctoral, Aix Marseille University, Marseille, 2017, theses.fr/2017AIXM0320.

6. Fasoula, A., J. G. Bernard, G. Robin, and L. Duchesne, "Elaborated breast phantoms and experimental benchmarking of a microwave breast imaging system before first clinical," Proceedings of the 12th European Conference on Antennas and Propagation (EuCAP), London, UK, April 9-13, 2018. Google Scholar

7. Rodriguez-Duarte, D. O., C. Origlia, J. A. Tobon Vasquez, R. Scapaticci, L. Crocco, and F. Vipiana, "Experimental assessment of real-time brain stroke monitoring via a microwave imaging scanner," IEEE Open Journal of Antennas and Propagation, Vol. 3, 824-835, 2022.
doi:10.1109/OJAP.2022.3192884 Google Scholar

8. Ben Ayoub, M. W., Dispositifs de mesure de constantes dielectriques dans les materiaux humides. Vers une meilleure tracabilite de la mesure de l'humidite des solides, Thesis doctoral, Aix Marseille University, 2018, theses.fr/2018AIXM0228.

9. Dubois, J. and J. M. Paindavoine, "Humidite dans les solides, liquides et gaz," Technique de l'ingenieur, April 10, 1982, P3760A v1. Google Scholar

10. Wernecke, R. and J. Wernecke, Industrial moisture and humidity measurement, a practical guide, February 2014, researchgate.net/publication/267376137.
doi:10.1002/9783527652419

11. Bhunjun, R. and R. W. Vogt, "Sensor system for contactless and online moisture measurements," IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement, Vol. 59, No. 11, 3034-3040, November 2010.
doi:10.1109/TIM.2010.2046692 Google Scholar

12. Skierucha, W., A. Szyp lowska, and A. Wilczek, "Aquametry in agrophysics," Advances in Agrophysical Research, 17-45, S. Grundas, A. Stepniewski, InTech., 2013. Google Scholar

13. Roussy, G. and J. A. Pearce, Foundations and Industrial Applications of Microwave and Radio Frequency Fields: Physical and Chemical Processes, Wiley, July 1995, wiley.com/en-us/9780471938491.

14. Chen, L. F., C. K. Ong, C. P. Neo, V. V. Varadan, and V. K. Varadan, Microwave Electronics: Measurement and Materials Characterization, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd, 2004, wiley.com/en-us/9780470844922.
doi:10.1002/0470020466

15. Georget, E., "Preuve de concept d'une liaison radio mer-air d'une balise autonome de petites dimensions --- Projet BELOCOPA Conception d'antennes multi-bandes sur substrat souple,", Thesis doctoral arseille, Aix Marseille University, 2014, hal.science/tel-01115478v1. Google Scholar

16. Nicolson, A. M. and G. F. Ross, "Measurement of the intrinsic properties of materials by time-domain techniques," IEEE Transactions on Instrumentation and Measurement, Vol. 19, No. 4, 377-382, 1970.
doi:10.1109/TIM.1970.4313932 Google Scholar

17. Lange, E. A., P. P. Puzak, and L. A. Cooley, "Standard method for the 5/8 inch dynamic tear test," NRL Report, 7159, Naval Research Lab, Washington DC, 1970. Google Scholar

18. Ba, D. and P. Sabouroux, "EpsiMu, a toolkit for permittivity and permeability measurement in microwave domain at real time of all materials: Applications to solid and semisolid materials," Microwave and Optical Technology Letters, Vol. 52, No. 12, 2010.
doi:10.1002/mop.25570 Google Scholar

19. Gioia, A. L., E. Porter, I. Merunka, A. Shahzad, S. Salahuddin, M. Jones, and M. O'Halloran, "Open-ended coaxial probe technique for dielectric measurement of biological tissues: Challenges and common practices," Diagnotiscs, Vol. 8, No. 2, 2018. Google Scholar

20. Baker-Jarvis, J., M. D. Janezic, J. H. Grosvenor, and R. G. Geyer, "Transmission/reflection an short-circuit line methods for measuring permittivity and permeability," NIST Technical Note, 1355, 1993, nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/Legacy/TN/nbstechnicalnote1355r.pdf. Google Scholar

21. Gregory, A. P. and R. N. Clarke, "Tables of the complex permittivity of dielectric reference liquids at frequencies up to 5 GHz," Technical Report, MAT 23, National Physical Laboratory, 2012. Google Scholar

22. Maryott, A. A. and E. R. Smith, Table of dielectric constants of pure liquids, National Bureau of Standards, Washington D.C., 1951, nvlpubs.nist.gov/nistpubs/Legacy/circ/nbscircular514.pdf.

Dr. Bayan Tallawi

Dr. Floriane Sparma

Dr. Eric Georgin

Professor Pierre Sabouroux