US 7,543,565 B2
	Optical system for detecting the concentration of combustion products
Domenico La Forgia, Bari (Italy); Arturo Antonio De Risi, Lecce (Italy); Massimo De Vittorio, Lecce (Italy); Roberto Cingolani, Lecce (Italy); Adriana Passaseo, Lecce (Italy); and Mauro Lomascolo, Lecce (Italy)
Assigned to Consiglio Nazionale Delle Ricerche - INFM, Genova (Italy)
Appl. No. 10/584,026 PCT Filed Dec. 22, 2004, PCT No. PCT/IB2004/004253 § 371(c)(1), (2), (4) Date Jun. 21, 2006, PCT Pub. No. WO2005/064315, PCT Pub. Date Jul. 14, 2005.
Claims priority of application No. BA2003A000066 (IT), filed on Dec. 22, 2003.
Prior Publication US 2007/0152237 A1, Jul. 05, 2007
Int. Cl. H01L 31/0264 (2006.01); H01L 31/0352 (2006.01); G01N 21/33 (2006.01)

U.S. Cl. 123—435  [257/184]

13 Claims

1. A system for controlling a combustion process in a motor vehicle internal combustion engine, characterized by an optical system for detecting the concentration of gaseous species, mounted on an exhaust duct of the engine, and comprising at least one source of ultraviolet and/or visible radiation and a photodetector device opposite that source, between which there flows an exhaust gaseous mixture, wherein the said radiation source is adapted to locally excite the gaseous mixture so as to bring about a combined absorption and emission effect by the exhaust gaseous species present, and wherein the said photodetector device comprises an active material based on gallium nitride (GaN), aluminium nitride (AlN) or indium nitride (InN) and corresponding alloys and is adapted to determine the concentration of the gaseous species present in the mixture through detection of the change in the spectrum emitted by the source.