Pitot Tube Type Compact Waterproof Airflow Sensor for Seabird Biologging

In this study, a waterproof airflow sensor is proposed for seabird biologging. Biologging, in which a sensor is directly attached to an animal to record its behavior, has attracted much attention to assess the animal's locomotion performance. Among them, it has been focused to evaluate the flight performance of seabirds. An airflow sensor becomes a powerful tool to measure the self-induced flight velocity of a seabird, however, the sensor is also required to have water pressure resistance. Here we propose a Pitot tube type compact waterproof airflow sensor with micromesh filters for seabird biologging. The Pitot tube structure with built-in the differential pressure sensor element realized a compact and robust sensor performance. The micro-mesh filter was attached to the air inlets to achieve high water pressure resistance. The developed sensor responded with high sensitivity to pressures up to 100 Pa and airflow up to 10 m/s without any loss of sensitivity caused by the filter.