The US Patent Office published the new patent US 2022/0240811 A1 on 4 August 2022. The invention by Prof Thomas Ertelt, André Kwiatek and Oliver Völckers describes a membrane whose electrical resistance corresponds to the force exerted at several points. The advantage over older sensor technologies such as FSR (Force Sensing Resistors) lies in an approximately linear characteristic curve and improved stability.
The patent application is based on the European Patent EP3965654A1 with the priority date 03. Nov. 2021.
Link to Google Patents with PDF: https://patents.google.com/patent/US20220240811A1/en
Abstract
The disclosure provides a sensor element (10) for detecting a force between a foot and a supporting surface. The sensor element (10) comprises a first layer (11) comprising an electrically non-conductive carrier foil (12) and a first semi-conductive layer (13) extending at least partially along a longitudinal direction of the first layer (11), a layer comprising a plurality of electrically conductive sections (19), at least one electrical connection area (17), and a second layer (14) comprising an electrically non-conductive carrier foil (15), and a second semi-conductive layer (16) extending at least partially along a longitudinal direction of the second layer (14), wherein at least one electrical connection area (17) is in contact with the one semi-conductive layer (13, 16) of the first and second layer (14) and being adapted to be connected to an electric energy source, and wherein the first semi-conductive layer (13) and the second semi-conductive layer (16) are arranged at a distance from one another and are adapted to selectively contact each other with a surface area that depends on the force applied to the sensor element (10), thereby changing a resistance value of the sensor element (10).