Bridge-based sensors operate by correlating a physical phenomena, such as strain, temperature, or force, to a change in resistance in one or more legs of a Wheatstone bridge. The general Wheatstone bridge, shown in the following figure, is a network of four resistive legs with an excitation voltage, V_EX, that is applied across the bridge. One or more of these legs can be active sensing elements.

The Wheatstone bridge is the electrical equivalent of two parallel voltage divider circuits. R1 and R2 compose one voltage divider circuit, and R4 and R3 compose the second voltage divider circuit. You measure the output of a Wheatstone bridge between the middle nodes of the two voltage dividers.

A physical phenomena, such as a temperature shift or a change in strain applied to a specimen, changes the resistance of the sensing elements in the Wheatstone bridge. You can use the Wheatstone bridge configuration to help measure the small variations in resistance that the sensing elements produce corresponding to a physical change in the specimen.