This application claims the benefit of Chinese Patent Application Serial No. 202011435343.2, filed Dec. 10, 2020, the entire content of which is incorporated herein by reference.
The present disclosure relates to an electronic device and related display device, and more particularly to an electronic device and a related display device which has fingerprint recognition.
Conventional fingerprint recognition devices are utilized in electronic devices such as mobile devices. When the conventional fingerprint recognition devices are integrated in the panel of an electronic device, an additional fingerprint recognition device is needed in the original circuit structure. When the panel is a liquid crystal display, the electric field generated by the high voltage direct current signal lines or the high voltage alternating current signal lines of the fingerprint recognition device might affect the liquid crystal layer of the panel, resulting in abnormal frames on the panel.
According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, an electronic device is provided. The electronic device includes a first substrate, a second substrate, disposed opposite to the first substrate, a liquid crystal layer, disposed between the first substrate and the second substrate, a sensing circuit, disposed on the first substrate and having a high voltage wire; and a conductor, disposed between the high voltage wire and the liquid crystal layer; wherein the conductor is less than the high voltage wire in voltage value.
According to an embodiment of the present disclosure, a display device is provided. The display device includes a first substrate; a second substrate, disposed opposite to the first substrate; a liquid crystal layer, disposed between the first substrate and the second substrate; a sensing circuit, disposed on the first substrate and having a high voltage wire; and a conductor, disposed between the high voltage wire and the liquid crystal layer; wherein the conductor is less than the high voltage wire in voltage value.
These and other objectives of the present disclosure will no doubt become obvious to those of ordinary skill in the art after reading the following detailed description of the embodiment that is illustrated in the various figures and drawings.
Hereinafter, package devices of embodiments of the present disclosure are detailed in the following description. It should be understood that many different embodiments provided below are implemented to different aspects. The following specific components and arrangements describe some embodiments just for simplicity and clarity. Of course, these are just for example and not for limitation. In addition, similar components may be labeled with similar and/or corresponding reference numerals indifferent embodiments for clarity of description. However, these similar reference numbers just describe some embodiments simply and clearly, and do not mean that there is any relationship between different embodiments and/or structures discussed herein.
When a first layer is located on or above a second layer, the first layer may be in direct contact with the second layer. Alternatively, one or more other layers may be spaced between them, and in such case, the first layer may not be in direct contact with the second layer.
The contents of the present disclosure will be described in detail with reference to specific embodiments and drawings. In order to make the contents clearer and easier to understand, the following drawings may be simplified schematic diagrams, and components therein may not be drawn to scale. The numbers and sizes of the components in the drawings are just illustrative, and are not intended to limit the scope of the present disclosure.
Certain terms are used throughout the specification and the appended claims of the present disclosure to refer to specific components. Those skilled in the art should understand that electronic equipment manufacturers may refer to a component by different names, and this document does not intend to distinguish between components that differ in name but not function. In the following description and claims, the terms “comprise”, “include” and “have” are open-ended fashion, so they should be interpreted as “including but not limited to . . . ”. It should also be understood that when a component is said to be “coupled” to another component (or a variant thereof), it may be directly connected to another component or indirectly connected (e.g., electrically connected) to another component through one or more components.
When ordinal numbers, such as “first” and “second”, used in the specification and claims are used to modify components in the claims, they do not mean and represent that the claimed components have any previous ordinal numbers, nor do they represent the order of a claimed component and another claimed component, or the order of manufacturing methods. These ordinal numbers are just used to distinguish a claimed component with a certain name from another claimed component with the same name.
When a component (e.g., film or region) is called “on another component”, it may be directly on the another component, or there may be other components in between. On the other hand, when a component is called “directly on another component”, there is no component between them. In addition, when a component is called “on another component”, there is an upper and lower relationship between the two components in a top view direction, and this component may be above or below the other component, and this upper and lower relationship depends on the orientation of the device.
In this document, the terms “about”, “substantially” and “approximately” usually mean within 10%, 5%, 3%, 2%, 1% or 0.5% of a given value or range. The quantity given here is about the quantity, that is, without specifying “about”, “substantially” and “approximately”, the meanings of “about”, “substantially” and “approximately” may still be implied. In addition, the term “range from a first value to a second value” means that the range includes the first value, the second value and other values between them.
It should be understood that according to the following embodiments, features of different embodiments may be replaced, recombined or mixed to constitute other embodiments without departing from the spirit of the present disclosure. As long as the features of the embodiments do not violate the inventive spirit or conflict with each other, they can be mixed and used at will.
In the present disclosure, the thicknesses, lengths and widths may be measured by optical microscope, in which the thicknesses may be measured from cross-sectional image obtained by electron microscope, but the present disclosure is not limited to this. In addition, any two values or directions used for comparison may have certain errors. If a first value is equal to a second value, it implies that there may be about 10% error between the first value and the second value; if a first direction is perpendicular to a second direction, an angle between the first direction and the second direction may range from 80 degrees to 100 degrees; and if the first direction is parallel to the second direction, the angle between the first direction and the second direction may range from 0 to 10 degrees.
Unless otherwise defined, all terms used herein (including technical and scientific terms) have the same meanings as those commonly understood by those skilled in the art to which the present disclosure belongs. It can be understood that these terms, such as those defined in commonly used dictionaries, should be interpreted as meanings consistent with the background or context of related technologies and the present disclosure, and should not be interpreted in an idealized or overly formal way, unless it is specifically defined in the embodiments of the present disclosure.
Package devices according to various embodiments of the present disclosure are detailed in the following description. It should be understood that the many different embodiments provided below detail different aspects and implementations. The following specific components and arrangements are provided for the purposes of simplicity and clarity. It should be noted that these embodiments are for illustrating the inventive features but the disclosure is not limited thereto. In addition, similar components may be labeled with similar and/or corresponding reference numerals in different embodiments for clarity of description. These repeated reference numbers are merely for describing the embodiments in a simple and clear manner, and do not mean that there is any relationship between the different embodiments and/or structures discussed herein.
When a first layer is located on or above a second layer, the first layer may be in direct contact with the second layer. Alternatively, one or more other layers may be spaced between them, and in such cases, the first layer may not be in direct contact with the second layer.
The contents of the present disclosure will be described in detail with reference to specific embodiments and drawings. In order to make the contents clearer and easier to understand, the following drawings may be simplified schematic diagrams, and components therein may not be drawn to scale. The numbers and sizes of the components in the drawings are merely illustrative, and are not intended to limit the scope of the present disclosure.
Certain terms are used throughout the specification and the appended claims of the present disclosure to refer to specific components. Those skilled in the art should understand that electronic equipment manufacturers may refer to a component by different names, and this document does not intend to distinguish between components that differ in name but not function. In the following description and claims, the terms “comprise”, “include” and “have” are open-ended fashion, so they should be interpreted as “including but not limited to . . . ”. It should also be understood that when a component is said to be “coupled” to another component (or a variant thereof), it may be directly connected to another component or indirectly connected (e.g., electrically connected) to another component through one or more components.
When ordinal numbers, such as “first” and “second”, used in the specification and claims are used to modify components in the claims, they do not mean to represent that the claimed components have any previous ordinal numbers, nor do they represent the order of a claimed component and another claimed component, or the order of manufacturing methods. These ordinal numbers are just used to distinguish a claimed component with a certain name from another claimed component with the same name.
When a component (e.g., a film or region) is described as “on another component”, it may be directly disposed on the other component, or there may be other components in between. On the other hand, when a component is described as “directly on another component”, there is no component in between. In addition, when a component is described as “on another component”, there is an upper and lower relationship between the two components in a top view direction, this component may be above or below the other component, and this upper and lower relationship depends on the orientation of the device.
In this document, the terms “about”, “substantially” and “approximately” usually mean within 10%, 5%, 3%, 2%, 1% or 0.5% of a given value or range. When a quantity is given without specifying “about”, “substantially” and “approximately”, the meanings of “about”, “substantially” and “approximately” may still be implied. In addition, the term “range from a first value to a second value” means that the range includes the first value, the second value and other values between them.
It should be understood that, according to the following embodiments, features of different embodiments may be replaced, recombined or mixed to constitute other embodiments without departing from the spirit of the present disclosure. As long as the features of the embodiments do not violate the inventive spirit or conflict with each other, they can be mixed and used at will.
In the present disclosure, the thicknesses, lengths and widths may be measured by an optical microscope, in which the thicknesses may be measured from a cross-sectional image obtained by an electron microscope, but the present disclosure is not limited thereto. In addition, any two values or directions used for comparison may have certain errors. If a first value is equal to a second value, it implies that there may be about 10% error between the first value and the second value; if a first direction is perpendicular to a second direction, an angle between the first direction and the second direction may range from 80 degrees to 100 degrees; and if the first direction is parallel to the second direction, the angle between the first direction and the second direction may range from 0 to 10 degrees.
Unless otherwise defined, all terms used herein (including technical and scientific terms) have the same meanings as those commonly understood by those skilled in the art to which the present disclosure belongs. It can be understood that these terms, such as those defined in commonly used dictionaries, should be interpreted as meanings consistent with the background or context of related technologies and the present disclosure, and should not be interpreted in an idealized or overly formal way, unless it is specifically defined in the embodiments of the present disclosure.
Furthermore, the conductor 15 may comprise multiple Indium Tin Oxide (ITO) pads 15′, wherein the voltage applied to the conductor 15 is a ground voltage and is utilized as a ground wire. An insulating layer 16 may be included between the conductor 15 and the sensing circuit 14, wherein the insulating layer 16 may include organic materials, e.g. polyethylene terephthalate (PET), polyethylene (PE), polyethersulfone (PES), polycarbonate (PC), polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA), polyimide (PI), photo sensitive polyimide (PSPI) or combinations of the above materials. Alternatively, the insulating layer 16 may include inorganic materials, e.g. SiOx, SiNx or combinations of the above materials, but is not limited thereto. In some embodiments, the insulating layer 16 may be a structure comprising a single layer or multiple layers, and/or with a planarization (PLN) function.
In general, multiple metal layers may be layered along the normal direction (i.e. the Z-axis direction) of the first substrate 11, e.g. a first metal layer M1, a second metal layer M2, a third metal layer M3 and a fourth metal layer M4 are included in the embodiment of
Notably, coverage area of the ITO pads 15′ illustrated in the embodiment of
Refer to
Step 402: Start.
Step 404: The electronic device 10 operates in a display mode.
Step 406: The touch function of the electronic device 10 is executed to determine an object coverage area of an object.
Step 408: Turn off the touch function of the electronic device 10 and execute the fingerprint sensing function.
Step 410: An integrated circuit (IC) of the electronic device receives sensed fingerprint sensing signals and performs recognition.
Step 412: End.
According to the operating method 40, the electronic device 10 is configured to control the liquid crystal layer 13 for displaying frames in step 404. In step 406, the touch function is executed to determine that the object touches the area of the electronic device 10 (i.e. the object coverage area). The object touching the electronic device 10 may be a finger, but is not limited thereto. Then, in step 408, the touch function of the electronic device 10 is turned off to execute the fingerprint sensing function. Meanwhile, the ground voltage is applied to the ITO pads 15′ for executing the touch function to reduce the interference of the high voltage wire HVL of the sensing circuit 14 to the liquid crystal layer 13. In step 410, the IC of the electronic device 10 receives the fingerprint sensing signals for recognition. Notably, a time period for executing the fingerprint sensing function is a display time of multiple frames before the IC of the electronic device 10 receives the fingerprint sensing signals.
In an embodiment, the fingerprint sensing function of the electronic device 10 according to an embodiment of the present disclosure may further include a fingerprint sensing method 50. Refer to
Step 502: Start.
Step 504: In the object coverage area, the switch element T2 is turned on via the gate line Gate n (PIN) of the sensing circuit 14, node voltages of the sensing circuit 14 are reset for charging the light sensing element P1, and the switch element T1 is turned on.
Step 506: The switch element T2 is turned off.
Step 508: The light sensing element P1 leaks the stored electric potential when the light sensing element P1 is exposed to the light.
Step 510: The switch element T3 is turned on via the gate line Gate n−1 (PIN) of the sensing circuit 14, and the IC reads the fingerprint sensing signals of each pixel via the switch element T3 for signal analysis.
Step 512: End.
According to the fingerprint sensing method 50, the switch element T2 is turned on via the gate line Gate n (PIN) of the sensing circuit 14 in the object coverage area, and the node voltages of the sensing circuit 14 are reset for charging the light sensing element P1. The light sensing element P1 may be a PIN diode, with an N terminal (N) and a P terminal (P), but not limited thereto. In an embodiment, a drain terminal (D) of the switch element T2 is coupled to the power supply line VDD (e.g. the high voltage signal line with up to 12 volts). Taking the light sensing element P1 of the PIN diode as an example, a source terminal (S) of the switch element T2 is electrically connected to the N terminal of the PIN diode, the electric potential of the high voltage signal is transmitted to the N terminal of the PIN diode via the switch element T2 to reset the node voltages of the sensing circuit 14 so as to maintain a high voltage potential among the source terminal (S) of the switch element T2, a gate terminal (G) of the switch element T1 and the N terminal of the light sensing element P1 to turn on the switch element T1. In addition, the reference bias line Bias is coupled to the P terminal of the PIN diode, and the light sensing element P1 is in a state of reverse bias. In step 506, the gate terminal of the switch element T1 is turned on and the switch element T2 is turned off.
In step 508, since the object touching the electronic device 10 is larger than the pixels, the object covers multiple pixels, i.e. the object covers the light sensing element P1 in each of the multiple pixels. When the object is a finger, which includes ridges and valleys, a reflective light generated by the ridges is stronger than that of the valleys, and thus the intensities of different reflective lights generated corresponding to different positions of the fingerprint are different. Moreover, since the light sensing element P1 is in the reverse bias state, the light sensing element P1 of different pixels receives the reflective lights with different intensities, and thereby different leakage currents are generated by the light sensing element P1 of different pixels. As such, a speed of voltage leakage of the N terminal the light sensing element P1 is not consistent due to the different leakage currents. The light intensity sensed by the light sensing element P1 corresponding to the fingerprint ridges is higher, and thus with higher leakage current after the fingerprint sensing, i.e. the fingerprint sensing signals of the N terminal (N) of the light sensing element P1 corresponding to the fingerprint ridges are of lower voltage values. In step 510, the gate line Gate n−1 (PIN) of the sensing circuit 14 turns on the switch element T3, and transmits the fingerprint sensing signals of each pixel to the IC of the electronic device 10 via the switch element T3, which is coupled to the read-out line RL. Since remaining voltage values of each pixel are not identical after the leakage, the remaining voltage values of each pixel may be respectively analyzed for the displayed fingerprint.
Therefore, based on the structure of the circuit of the ITO pads 15′ of the electronic device 10 of the present disclosure, the fourth metal layer M4 is utilized as the signal line with the high voltage signal, e.g. the power supply line VDD shown in
In an embodiment, a first distance exists between the third metal layer M3 and the fourth metal layer M4 along the normal direction (i.e. the Z-axis direction) of the first substrate 11 and a second distance exists between the fourth metal layer M4 and the ITO pads 15′, wherein the first distance is larger than the second distance, to reduce a parasitic capacitance equivalently sensed by the read-out line RL to improve a driving ability of the sensing circuit 14. The first distance is a shortest distance between the third metal layer M3 and the fourth metal layer M4, and the second distance is a shortest distance between the fourth metal layer M4 and the ITO pads 15′.
A low voltage signal line (about 0-5 volts) of the sensing circuit 84 may be utilized as the electric field shielding element 85, i.e. the voltage value applied to the electric field shielding element 85 is lower than that of the high voltage wire HVL (e.g. up to 12 volts). In addition, an insulating layer 86 may be included between the electric field shielding element 85 and the sensing circuit 14, the materials and functions of the insulating layer 86 are as stated above, and are not repeated herein.
In summary, the present disclosure provides an electronic device and a display device for an in-display fingerprint recognition, which shields an influence of an electric field generated by a high voltage wire to the liquid crystal layer and combines the in-display fingerprint recognition and a conventional touch panel.
Those skilled in the art will readily observe that numerous modifications and alterations of the device and method may be made while retaining the teachings of the disclosure. Accordingly, the above disclosure should be construed as limited only by the metes and bounds of the appended claims.
Number | Date | Country | Kind |
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202011435343.2 | Dec 2020 | CN | national |