Non-planar touch sensor pad

Abstract

A non-planar touch sensor pad is described.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The present invention is illustrated by way of example, and not by way of limitation, in the figures of the accompanying drawings.

FIG. 1A illustrates a conventional touch-sensor pad having diamond shaped electrodes.

FIG. 2 illustrates another conventional touch-sensor pad having triangular shaped electrodes.

FIG. 3A illustrates how a conductive object may affect the capacitance of a capacitive touch-sensing sensor element.

FIG. 3B is a conceptual cross-section view of the capacitive sensor element 300 of FIG. 3A.

FIG. 4A illustrates hexagonal shaped adjacent sensor elements within a sensor array according to one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 4B illustrates two embodiments of the gaps between hexagonal and octagonal shaped sensor elements.

FIG. 5A illustrates a top-side view of one embodiment of a sensor array having a plurality of hexagonal shaped sensor elements for detecting a presence of a conductive object on the sensor array.

FIG. 5B illustrates a block diagram of one embodiment of a capacitive sensor coupled to the sensor array of FIG. 5A.

FIG. 5C illustrates a top-side view of one embodiment of a two-layer touch-sensor pad.

FIG. 5D illustrates a cross section view of one embodiment of the two-layer touch-sensor pad of FIG. 5C.

FIG. 6 is a cross-sectional view illustrating a non-planar touch senor pad according to an alternative embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 7 is a perspective view illustrating a dome-shaped touch sensor pad.

FIG. 8 is a two dimensional view illustrating the sensor elements of the dome-shaped touch sensor pad of FIG. 7 according to one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 9 illustrates a block diagram of one embodiment of an electronic system having a processing device and touch-sensor pad for detecting a presence of a conductive object according to one embodiment of the present invention.

Claims

1. An apparatus, comprising: a touch sensing array having a plurality of sensor elements to detect a presence of a conductive object on the touch sensing array, wherein at least one of the plurality of sensor elements is non-planar with respect to one or more adjacent sensor elements of the plurality of sensor elements.

2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the touch sensing array comprises a plurality of layers.

3. The apparatus of claim 2, wherein the plurality of layers comprises a flexible substrate.

4. The apparatus of claim 4, wherein the plurality of layers comprises a conductive layer having the plurality of sensor elements.

5. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the plurality of sensor elements form a dome-shape.

6. The apparatus of claim 4, wherein one or more of the plurality of sensor elements has a first polygon shape having five or more sides.

7. The apparatus of claim 6, wherein the first polygon shape having five or more sides is a hexagon shape.

8. The apparatus of claim 7, wherein each of the plurality of sensor elements has the hexagon shape.

9. The apparatus of claim 7, wherein each of the plurality of sensor element have the hexagon shape to increase a vertical capacitance of each of the sensor elements to the conductive object while not increasing a fringe capacitance of each of the plurality of sensor elements to each other.

10. The apparatus of claim 6, wherein the first polygon shape having five or more sides is a pentagon shape.

11. The apparatus of claim 6, wherein another one or more of the plurality of sensor elements has a second polygon shape having five or more sides.

12. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the first polygon shape having five or more sides is a hexagon shape, and wherein the second polygon shape having five or more sides is a pentagon shape.

13. The apparatus of claim 11, wherein the hexagon shaped sensor elements are configured to increase a vertical capacitance of each of the sensor elements to the conductive object while not increasing a fringe capacitance of the plurality of sensor elements to each other.

14. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the plurality of sensor elements is fabricated from indium tin oxide.

15. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein groups of the plurality of sensor elements form separate sensor traces and wherein each sensor trace diverges at least twice to have a position on the sensor array in more than one location.

16. An apparatus, comprising: a touch sensing array having a plurality of sensor elements, wherein at least one of the plurality of sensor elements is non-planar with respect to one or more adjacent sensor elements of the plurality of sensor elements; andmeans for detecting a presence of a conductive object on the touch sensing array.

17. The apparatus of claim 16, further comprising means for determining a surface coordinate position of the presence of the conductive object on the touch sensing array.

18. A method, comprising: providing a sensing array having a plurality of sensor elements, wherein at least one of the plurality of sensor elements is non-planar with respect to one or more adjacent sensor elements of the plurality of sensor elements; anddetecting a presence of a conductive object on at least one of the plurality of sensor elements.

19. The method of claim 18, wherein at least one of the plurality of sensor elements has a hexagon shape, and wherein at least one of the plurality of sensor elements has a pentagon shape.

20. The method of claim 18, further comprising determining a surface coordinate position of the presence of the conductive object on the sensing array.