METHODS AND SYSTEMS FOR MODULATION AND DEMODULATION OF OPTICAL SIGNALS

• US 20180238734A1
• Filed: 04/23/2018
• Published: 08/23/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 09/29/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Hotelling, Steven P., Lamego, Marcelo M.
• Granted Patent: US 11,009,390 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/02427 Details of sensor
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/7225 Details of analog processing, e.g. isolation amplifier, gain or sensitivity adjustment, filtering, baseline or drift compensation A61B5/30, A61B5/316 take precedence; transformers for specific applications H01F38/00; amplifiers H03F
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/7228 Signal modulation applied to the input signal sent to patient or subject; demodulation to recover the physiological signal modulation H03C
• CPC Class Codes: G01J 1/0228 Control of working procedures; Failure detection; Spectral bandwidth calculation
• CPC Class Codes: G01J 1/18 using comparison with a reference electric value
• CPC Class Codes: G01J 1/44 Electric circuits for command of an exposure part G03B7/02
• CPC Class Codes: G01J 2001/0257 portable
• CPC Class Codes: G01J 2001/4242 Modulated light, e.g. for synchronizing source and detector circuit
• CPC Class Codes: G01J 2001/444 Compensating; Calibrating, e.g. dark current, temperature drift, noise reduction or baseline correction; Adjusting

Abstract

An electronic device includes one or more light sources for emitting light toward a body part of a user and one or more optical sensors for capturing light samples while each light source is turned on and for capturing dark samples while the light source(s) are turned off. A signal produced by the one or more optical sensors is filtered and demodulated produce multiple demodulated signals each associated with a light source. Each signal associated with the light source(s) is analyzed to estimate or determine a physiological parameter of the user.

Claims

1-20. -20. (canceled)

21. A biometric sensor within a housing of a wearable electronic device, the biometric sensor comprising:

an emitter for transmitting modulated light toward a measurement site of a subject through a first aperture in the housing;

an optical sensor for receiving modulated light through a second aperture in the housing, the modulated light at least partially exiting the measurement site;

a high pass filter to receive an output of the optical sensor, the high pass filter having a cutoff frequency above a frequency of a periodic optical property of the measurement site; and

an analog to digital converter to receive an output of the high pass filter.

22. The biometric sensor of claim 21, wherein the cutoff frequency is greater than a low-frequency alias that results from dark-channel subtraction.

23. The biometric sensor of claim 21, wherein the high pass filter is configured to remove direct current bias in the output of the optical sensor.

24. The biometric sensor of claim 21, wherein the emitter is a first emitter and the biometric sensor comprises a plurality of emitters each configured to transmit light toward the measurement site through the first aperture.

25. The biometric sensor of claim 24, wherein the first emitter is configured to transmit light within a first frequency band and a second emitter of the plurality of emitters is configured to transmit light within a second frequency band different from the first frequency band.

26. The biometric sensor of claim 25, wherein:

the first frequency band comprises green light; and

the second frequency band comprises infrared light.

27. The biometric sensor of claim 24, wherein the first emitter is configured to transmit light at a first time and a second emitter of the plurality of emitters is configured to transmit light at a second time different from the first time.

28. The biometric sensor of claim 27, wherein the first emitter and the second emitter transmit light in sequence.

29. The biometric sensor of claim 21, further comprising a programmable gain amplifier in series between the high pass filter and the analog to digital converter.

30. The biometric sensor of claim 29, wherein a gain of the programmable gain amplifier is based, at least in part, on an optical property of the measurement site.

31. The biometric sensor of claim 29, wherein a gain of the programmable gain amplifier is based, at least in part, on an output from the analog to digital converter.

32. A biometric sensor within a housing of a wearable electronic device, the biometric sensor comprising:

a first emitter for transmitting modulated light in a first frequency band toward a measurement site of a subject through a first lens positioned in the housing;

a second emitter for transmitting modulated light in a second frequency band toward the measurement site of the first lens;

an optical sensor for receiving modulated light through a second lens positioned in the housing and offset from the first lens;

a first amplifier to receive an output of the optical sensor; and

a high pass filter to receive an output of the first amplifier, the high pass filter having a cutoff frequency above a frequency of a periodic optical property of the measurement site;

a second amplifier to receive an output of the high pass filter; and

an analog to digital converter to receive an output of the second amplifier.

33. The biometric sensor of claim 32, wherein the first amplifier is a transimpedance amplifier and the second amplifier is a programmable gain amplifier.

34. The biometric sensor of claim 33, wherein a gain of the programmable gain amplifier is increased or decreased based on feedback from the analog to digital converter.

35. The biometric sensor of claim 32, further comprising a demodulation stage to receive an output of the analog to digital converter.

36. The biometric sensor of claim 35, wherein the demodulation stage is configured to:

sample data output from the analog to digital converter into a matrix; and

multiply the matrix by a demodulation matrix to demodulate the received modulated light.

37. The biometric sensor of claim 36, wherein the demodulation matrix is a first demodulation matrix and the demodulation stage comprise a plurality of demodulation matrices.

38. The biometric sensor of claim 37, wherein the demodulation stage is configured to iterate through each demodulation matrix of the plurality of demodulation matrices to determine which demodulation matrix is associated with a highest quality output signal.

39. A biometric sensor within a housing of a wearable electronic device, the biometric sensor comprising:

an emitter for transmitting modulated light within a frequency band toward a measurement site of a subject through a first aperture in a convex portion of the housing;

an optical sensor for receiving modulated light through a second aperture in the convex portion of the housing, the second aperture opposite the first aperture such that an apex of the convex portion of the housing is between the first aperture and the second aperture;

a high pass filter to receive an output of the optical sensor, the high pass filter having a cutoff frequency above a frequency of a periodic optical property of the measurement site; and

an analog to digital converter to receive an output of the high pass filter.

40. The biometric sensor of claim 39, wherein the optical sensor is configured to obtain at least one dark sample before each sample of the modulated light.