Wireless and wired sensors are used in a wide variety of industries. For example, wireless pressure sensors are routinely used in automobiles and other vehicles, such as to monitor the pressure of tires on the vehicles. Also, the tires of a vehicle can often suffer from excessive temperatures, such as due to overloading of the vehicle or high temperatures in some regions of the world. Wireless temperature sensors can be used in a vehicle to monitor the temperatures of its tires.
Tire monitoring systems routinely need to be low in cost and use sensors that are wireless, small in size, and highly reliable with low drift. Existing tire pressure monitoring systems often use piezoresistive pressure sensors. These types of monitoring systems often require the use of radio frequency (“RF”) electronics as well as signal conditioning and processing circuitry. These types of monitoring systems also often require the use of batteries to power the sensors and related electronics and circuitry. However, these types of monitoring systems are often not attractive due to the weigh of the systems and due to the limited lifetime of their batteries, which can be discharged much faster in the harsh environment of vehicle tires.