Sensor system and method for operating a sensor system

• US 20090288498A1
• Filed: 05/05/2009
• Published: 11/26/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 05/20/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Robert Bosch GmbH
• Original Assignee: Robert Bosch GmbH
• Inventors: Herrmann, Ingo, Herrmann, Daniel, Freund, Frank, Reinhart, Karl-Franz
• Granted Patent: US 8,695,442 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 73/862.46
• CPC Class Codes: G01D 5/14 influencing the magnitude of a current or voltage
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 10/94 Hardware or software architectures specially adapted for image or video understanding

Abstract

A sensor system has a first sensor-element block and a second sensor-element block, at least one first sensor element and one second sensor element are assigned to the first sensor-element block, and at least one third sensor element is assigned to the second sensor-element block. The third sensor element is situated between the first and second sensor elements.

Claims

1. A sensor system, comprising:

a first sensor-element block including at least one first sensor element and one second sensor element; and

a second sensor-element block including at least one third sensor element;

wherein the third sensor element is situated between the first sensor element and the second sensor element.

2. The sensor system as recited in claim 1, further comprising:

a fourth sensor element assigned to the second sensor-element block, wherein the second sensor element is situated between the third sensor element and the fourth sensor element.

3. The sensor system as recited in claim 2, further comprising:

a third sensor-element block including at least one fifth sensor element situated between the second sensor element and the third sensor element.

4. The sensor system as recited in claim 2, further comprising:

at least one additional sensor-element block including at least one additional sensor element situated between the first sensor element and the second sensor element.

5. The sensor system as recited in claim 3, wherein at least one of:

(a) at least two first sensor elements are disposed in a first column of the first sensor-element block;

(b) at least two second sensor elements are disposed in a second column of the first sensor-element block;

(c) at least two third sensor elements are disposed in a third column including the second sensor-element block;

(d) at least two fourth sensor elements are disposed in a fourth column including the second sensor-element block; and

(e) at least two fifth sensor elements are disposed in a fifth column including the third sensor-element block.

6. The sensor system as recited in claim 5, wherein the sensor elements in each column are electro-conductively interconnected by a connection line.

7. The sensor system as recited in claim 3, wherein the first and second sensor elements are connected via a first multiplexer to a first evaluating unit, and wherein the third and fourth sensor elements are connected via a second multiplexer to a second evaluating unit, and wherein the fifth sensor element is connected via a third multiplexer to a third evaluating unit.

8. The sensor system as recited in claim 3, wherein the first, second, third, fourth and fifth sensor elements are disposed in one row and electro-conductively interconnected by a further connection line addressed by an address multiplexer.

9. The sensor system as recited in claim 3, wherein each sensor element includes a diode, and wherein the sensor system is configured for at least one of:

(a) detection of concentration of gas; and

(b) spatially-resolved measurement of at least one of temperature, radiation and fingerprint.

10. A method for operating a sensor system having (a) a first sensor-element block including at least one first sensor element and one second sensor element, and (b) a second sensor-element block including at least one third sensor element, wherein the third sensor element is situated between the first sensor element and the second sensor element, and wherein a fourth sensor element is assigned to the second sensor-element block, the second sensor element being situated between the third sensor element and the fourth sensor element, the method comprising:

in a first method step, evaluating the first sensor element by a first evaluating unit and evaluating the third sensor element by a second evaluating unit;

in a second method step, evaluating the second sensor element by the first evaluating unit and evaluating the fourth sensor element by the second evaluating unit.

11. The method as recited in claim 10, wherein the sensor system includes a third sensor-element block including at least one fifth sensor element situated between the second sensor element and the third sensor element, and wherein, in the first method step, the fifth sensor element is evaluated by a third evaluating unit.

12. The method as recited in claim 11, wherein in each method step, the address multiplexer addresses the sensor elements in each column in a successive row-by-row sequence.