Patent ID: 8258441

Claim:
A method of sensing the temperature of an object, the method comprising the steps of: placing a re-magnetizable temperature sensor in thermal contact with the object, said temperature sensor comprising a plurality of magnetically susceptible, temperature-sensitive sensor elements each in the form of an elongated, amorphous metallic wire or thin strip, each of said sensor elements having a different composition and a correspondingly different set point temperature below a level of about 400° C.; generating an alternating magnetic field in the region of the temperature sensor in order to induce a different temperature-sensitive re-magnetization response from each of said sensor elements, respectively; and detecting the re-magnetization responses of the sensor elements, and using the detected responses to at least in part determine whether the temperature of the object is above or below the set point temperatures of the respective sensor elements, said detecting step comprising the step of using one of the sensor elements having a relatively lower set point temperature to measure the temperature of another of the sensor elements having a relatively higher set point temperature above the set point temperature of said one sensor element.