An electronic component is disclosed. In an embodiment, an electronic component includes at least one NTC element and at least two electrically conductive contact elements, wherein the NTC element is electrically conductively connected to a respective contact element via a connection material, and wherein a coefficient of thermal expansion of the contact elements is adapted to a coefficient thermal expansion of the NTC element.

A method of manufacturing resistor units that each comprise a carrier comprising resistor elements including ends with a respective first and second electrical terminal is disclosed. The method includes: a) providing a carrier plate; b) forming strips of a resistor material at the lower side of the carrier plate in a regular pattern such that a respective row of strips of the resistor material is formed along a longitudinal direction; c) forming a plurality of zones of an electrically conductive material at the lower side of the carrier plate in a regular pattern such that a respective row of zones of the electrically conductive material is formed along the longitudinal direction; and d) cutting through the carrier plate by regular transverse incisions, first longitudinal incisions, and second longitudinal incisions such that a respective resistor unit and a respective residual section are alternately formed along a transverse direction.

A process manufactures a PTC heating element (10) that includes at least one PTC component (20) and, on at least one side (50, 52) of the at least one PTC component (20), at least one carrier (14, 16) permanently connected to the PTC component (20). The process includes arranging solder material (46, 48) between the one side of the at least one PTC component (20), which side is to be permanently connected to the at least one carrier (14, 16), and the at least one carrier to be connected on this side of the at least one PTC component (20). The solder material (46, 48) is melted by induction soldering to connect the at least one PTC component (20) to the at least one carrier (14, 16).

An electronic component manufacturing method includes a blotting process of bringing a conductive paste applied to an end portion of each electronic component body held by a jig into contact with a surface of a surface plate. The blotting process includes simultaneous performance of a distance changing process of changing the distance between an end face of each electronic component body and the surface of the surface plate and a position changing process of changing a two-dimensional position where the end face of the electronic component body is projected on the surface of the surface plate in such a manner that the direction of the movement of two-dimensional position in parallel to the surface of the surface plate successively varies (e.g., along a circular path).

A method of manufacturing resistor units that each comprise a carrier comprising resistor elements including ends with a respective first and second electrical terminal is disclosed. The method includes: a) providing a carrier plate; b) forming strips of a resistor material at the lower side of the carrier plate in a regular pattern such that a respective row of strips of the resistor material is formed along a longitudinal direction; c) forming a plurality of zones of an electrically conductive material at the lower side of the carrier plate in a regular pattern such that a respective row of zones of the electrically conductive material is formed along the longitudinal direction; and d) cutting through the carrier plate by regular transverse incisions, first longitudinal incisions, and second longitudinal incisions such that a respective resistor unit and a respective residual section are alternately formed along a transverse direction.

The present invention discloses a method for manufacturing a high-sensitivity piezoresistive sensor using a multi-level structure design, including the following steps: forming first-level basic geometrical units formed of basic structural units on a substrate, where each first-level basic geometrical unit is a two-dimensional or three-dimensional network structure formed by stacking several basic structural units; stacking and combining several first-level basic geometrical units in an array to form a second-level geometrical structure, and forming a contact connection area located between adjacent first-level basic geometrical units; and dispensing a conductive adhesive in at least two positions on the substrate to form electrodes of a piezoresistive sensor, so as to obtain the piezoresistive sensor. A high-sensitivity piezoresistive sensor obtained by using the method of the present invention has flexible design and simple fabrication, can be desirably combined with various existing sensor fabrication methods, and has general applicability.

An NTC compound, a thermistor and a method for producing a thermistor are disclosed. In an embodiment an NTC compound includes a ceramic material of a Mn—Ni—O system as a main constituent, wherein the Mn—Ni—O system has a general composition Ni.sub.xMn.sub.2O.sub.4-δ, wherein y corresponds to a molar fraction of Ni of a total metal content of the ceramic material of the Mn—Ni—O system, which is defined as c(Ni):(c(Ni)+c(Mn)), and wherein the following applies: 0.500<x<0.610 and 0.197<y<0.240.

Provided are a thermistor element including a conductive intermediate layer containing RuO.sub.2 which can have a lower resistance and a thinner profile, whereby the increase in resistance can be suppressed even when peeling of the electrode proceeds; and a method for producing the same. The thermistor element according to the present invention includes: a thermistor body 2 made of a thermistor material; a conductive intermediate layer 4 formed on the thermistor body; and an electrode layer 5 formed on the conductive intermediate layer, wherein the conductive intermediate layer has an aggregation structure of RuO.sub.2 particles that are in electrical contact with each other where SiO.sub.2 is placed in the gaps in the aggregation structure, and has a thickness of 100 to 1000 nm.

A method includes blending a dielectric material including a titanate with a carbon-based ink to form a modified carbon-based ink. The method also includes printing the modified carbon-based ink onto a structure. The method further includes curing the printed modified carbon-based ink on the structure at a temperature that does not exceed about 250° C. In addition, the method includes processing the cured printed modified carbon-based ink to form a thick film resistor. Blending the dielectric material with the carbon-based ink causes the modified carbon-based ink to have a resistivity that is at least double a resistivity of the carbon-based ink.

A resistive element includes: a semiconductor substrate; a field insulating film deposited on the semiconductor substrate; a plurality of resistive layers separately deposited on the field insulating film; an interlayer insulating film deposited to cover the field insulating film and the resistive layers; a pad-forming electrode deposited on the interlayer insulating film, and electrically connected to one edges of the resistive layers; a relay wire deposited on the interlayer insulating film separately from the pad-forming electrode, and including a first terminal electrically connected to another edges of the resistive layers and a second terminal provided so as to form an ohmic contact to the semiconductor substrate; and a rear surface electrode provided under the semiconductor substrate to form an ohmic contact to the semiconductor substrate, wherein the resistive element uses, as a resistor, an electric channel between the pad-forming electrode and the rear surface electrode.