Gesture Sensor Interface Demonstrator

This video demonstrates the operation of a low-power capacitive gesture sensor interface in a gaming application. The interface circuitry converts two sensing element capacitances to digital values and consumes only 462 nanowatts of power. The capacitances and, correspondingly, the digital values are affected by the presence of the hand. The values can be read to a computer and used, for example, to control movement of vehicles or characters in games. The low power consumption allows the device to be powered by energy harvesting e.g. using a small solar panel or enables a long lifetime when it is powered by a battery.

The electronics design, implemented in a 180 nm CMOS process, has been presented in a publication accepted to the IEEE International Symposium on Circuits and Systems 2017. The title of the conference paper is 462-nW 2-Axis Gesture Sensor Interface Based on Capacitively Controlled Ring Oscillators.