Hands-On Industrial Internet of Things

Level 1 – sensors, transducers, and actuators

According to the IEC, the sensor is defined as the following:

"The primary element of a measurement chain, which converts the input variable in a signal suitable to the measurement."

The transducer is the following:

"The device that accepts information in the form of a physical variable (its input variable) and converts it to an output variable of the same or of different magnitude, according to a defined physical law."

Since the sensor and the transducer are often physically within the same component, the two terms are often used as synonyms. The actuator is a transducer that transforms a command signal into a physical action on the process. Basically, its function is complementary to that of ...