Apple Inc. (Cupertino, CA)
What is a Patent for Transparent high-resistivity material for the purpose of electrostatic friction modulation over a capacitive input sensor
Search Patent for Transparent high-resistivity material for the purpose of electrostatic friction modulation over a capacitive input sensor
A device that is electronic can contain an input sensor with capacitive capabilities that are placed beneath a surface in order to detect force or touch input to the surface. An input sensor that is capacitive is usually placed below the surface (e.g. sapphire, glass and shortly) which defines an input surface.
In certain circumstances, it may be desirable to position a conductive layer above the capacitive input sensor and below the dielectric protective layer. In many cases, however, the conductive layer interferes with the operation of the capacitive input sensor, and, additionally or in addition, it alters the appearance of the electronic device.
The embodiments described herein generally refer to electronic devices that include an opaque high-resistivity layer to facilitate electronic friction modulation. Particularly the case of the high-resistivity transparent layer, it is located over a capacitive input sensor which, is then, in turn, placed over an LCD. The transparent high resistance layer is connected capacitively to the capacitive sensor in such a way that ground shifting the capacitive sensor increases the transparent layer up to a voltage high enough to permit electrostatic friction.
The transparent high-resistivity layer can be formed in a number of ways including, but not limited to, defining a number of geometrically-separated regions of high-conductivity material spaced sufficiently close to enable charge carrier hoppingbetween regions.
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Patenting may lead to the development of new ideas and new inventions. This information can encourage creativity and could be eligible to be protected by patents.
Patents can be used to serve as an obstacle to unscrupulous third parties that profit from an invention’s efforts.
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The first step to get your patent is to do the patent search. You can do a google patent search or do a USPTO search. Once the patent application has been filed, the item covered by the application can be called patent-pending, and you can locate the patent application online on the public pair. After the patent office approves your application, you will be able to conduct an examination of the patent number to find the patent issued. Your product is now patentable. In addition to the USPTO search engine, you can also utilize other search engines such as espacenet as described below. For assistance, consult a patent lawyer. In the US, patents are granted by the US trademark and patent office, or the United States patent and trademark office, which also examines trademark applications.
Are you interested in similar patents? These are the steps to follow:
1. Brainstorm terms to describe your invention according to its function and composition or usage.
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- What is the goal of the invention
- What are the technical terms and keywords that describe the nature of an invention? To find the correct terms, consult a technical dictionary.
2. Use these terms to find pertinent Cooperative Patent Classifications for your invention at the Classification Text Search Tool. If you’re not able to locate the appropriate classification for your invention, look through the class Schemas (class schedules) and then try again. You may want to consider substituting the terms you’re using to describe your invention if you fail to find any results in your Classification Text Search with synonyms similar to the words you used in step 1.
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7. You can find other US patent publications by keyword searching in AppFT or PatFT databases, and also classification search for non-U.S. Patents per below. Also, you can utilize web search engines to search for non-patent-related literature disclosures about inventions. For instance:
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- Korean Intellectual Property Rights Information Service (KIPRIS)
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To review your search, you can hire a registered patent attorney to assist. A preliminary search will help one better prepare to talk about their invention and other related inventions with a professional patent attorney. In addition, the attorney will not spend too much time or money on patenting basics.