An Analog Front-End for Self-Capacitance Touch Sensing

with Environmental Noise Reduction Technique

Ho-Jin Kim, Yong-Sik Kwak, Kang-Il Cho, Seung-Hoon Lee and Gil-Cho Ahn
Department of Electronic Engineering, Sogang University
35 Baekbeom-ro, Mapo-gu, Seoul 04107, Korea
[email protected]

Abstract lines are used as a pseudo-differential input signal. The

cascaded two gain stages are employed to enhance the
A differential analog front-end (AFE) circuit for self- sensitivity. The proposed AFE can be used for both self-
capacitance touch screen panel (TSP) is described. It capacitance TSP and hybrid TSP.
receives two pseudo-differential signals from a panel to
cancel out common environmental noises. Each pseudo- 2. Proposed AFE for Self-Capacitance
differential input signal is achieved by using up and Touch Detection
down charge-pumps which convert self-capacitances of
two adjacent channels into voltages. The dc signal Fig. 2 shows the proposed differential AFE circuit for
resulted from the proposed capacitance-to-voltage a self-capacitance touch detection. It receives two
converter is cancelled out by summing the two pseudo-differential signals from a self-capacitance TSP.
differential inputs which have opposite polarity dc levels. Sensing lines of each pseudo-differential input, Ym, Ym+1
It enables the use of high gain amplifier which results in and Yn, Yn+1, are adjacently located as shown in Fig. 1 to
enhanced sensitivity. cancel out the common environmental noises. Each
pseudo-differential input signal is achieved by using up
Keywords: touch screen panel, analog front-end, and down charge-pumps to cancel out the dc signal term
pseudo-differential signal, common environmental noise of the individual sensing line output. To increase the
overall gain, an additional gain stage which consists of
1. Introduction CS2, CI2 and an op-amp is employed.

The utilization of touch screen panel (TSP) has been

expanding its boundaries from small electric devices to
Ym
large televisions or tablet personal computers. However, Ym+1
as the size of TSP increases, sensitivity and operation Yn+2

speed dramatically decrease due to the increased amount



of parasitic capacitance and the growth of resistance. Yn

The mutual-capacitance TSP, which is generally used for Yn+1

Yn+2
multi-touch function, is more severely affected by these
Xm Xm+1Xm+2 Xn Xn+1 Xn+2


issues since it scans sensing lines in sequential procedure.

Also, the oversampling technique, which is used for
sensitivity enhancement, results in more reduction of Fig. 1 Pseudo-differential input (TSP sensing lines) of
frame scan rate. To resolve these issues, hybrid TSP proposed AFE
which supports both self-capacitance and mutual-
capacitance touch detection methods are employed for TSP
IREF
large displays [1]. Since the self-capacitance TSP scans fI1 CS1 fR1 VA
Ym fR1 VA
multiple sensing lines simultaneously, the frame scan rate CP.m CT.m +VREF
fR1
-VREF
is faster than that of mutual-capacitance one [2, 3]. By fR1 CS1 CI1 CI2
Ym+1
combining these two detection methods, frame scan rate CP.m+1 CT.m+1
fI1
IREF
CS2
+VREF fR1
can be improved. fR1 VOUT.AFE
fR1 CS1
In this paper, an analog front-end (AFE) for self- Yn
CS2
fI1 CI1 CI2
capacitance touch sensing with environmental noise CP.n CT.n
IREF
IREF
fR1
fI1 CS1
reduction technique is proposed. It uses pseudo- Yn+1
fR1 fR1 VA VA
differential signals to process only touch dependent CP.n+1 CT.n+1
-VREF fR1
signal variation. To relax the influence of common fI1
environmental noises, two signals from adjacent sensing
Fig. 2 The proposed AFE for self-capacitance TSP

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 The operation of the proposed AFE is as follows. touching Yn and Yn+1 lines are identical as shown in Fig.
During the fR1 phase, the line capacitances CY.m 3c and Fig. 3d. In this case, the correct touch location
(CY.m=CP.m+CT.m) and CY.n+1 (CY.n+1=CP.n+1+ CT.n+1) are can be determined by monitoring the output signals from
reset to -VREF by connecting the sensing lines Ym and Yn+1 the adjacent sensing lines, (Yn-1, Yn) and (Yn+1, Yn+2).
to -VREF. Similarly, the line capacitances CY.m+1
(CY.m+1=CP.m+1+CT.m+1) and CY.n (CY.n=CP.n+CT.n) are reset 3. Design Example
to +VREF. At the same time, all the capacitors of the
proposed AFE (CS1.m, CS1.m+1, CS1.n, CS1.n+1, CI1, CS2, and To verify the operation of the proposed AFE, a
CI2) are initialized. During the following fI1 phase, the prototype self-capacitance TSP interface chip is
current sources of the charge pumps are connected to implemented in a 0.35-µm CMOS technology. Fig. 4
each sensing line to convert line capacitances into shows the block diagram of the prototype IC. It consists
voltages, VYm, VYm+1, VYn and VYn+1. Since the current of the proposed self-capacitance TSP AFE, a unity gain
directions of the charge pumps connected to Ym, Yn+1 and buffer and a 4-MS/s 12-bit cyclic analog-to-digital
Ym+1, Yn are opposite, the dc signal voltages from these converter (ADC). The overall gain of the cascaded two
four input signals are cancelled out. At the output of the gain stages in the proposed AFE is 500 (2520). The
proposed AFE, only the touch dependent signal given by conversion time of the prototype TSP interface chip is
(1) and (2) appears. 2μs.

Ym
Ym+1 12bit
Proposed 12-bit
(1) Yn TSP AFE X1 Cyclic ADC
Dout[11:0]

Yn+1

(k = 1,2, ⋯) (2) Fig. 4 Block diagram of the prototype TSP interface chip

Fig. 3 shows the output waveforms of the AFE in 4. Measurement Results

response to touch situations. For the simplicity, ideal op-
amps and current sources are assumed with perfectly Fig. 5 shows the die photograph of the prototype IC.
matched sensing line capacitances. Also, identical touch Measurement results of the prototype chip for the four
capacitances (CT.m, CT.m+1, CT.n, and CT.n+1) are assumed different touch capacitance values are shown in Fig. 6.
for the four sensing lines. The AFE output is zero when For the sensing line parasitic capacitances, 200pF
the four sensing lines are not touched as shown in Fig. 3a. lumped component devices are used. Similarly, the touch
If only Ym line is touched, the AFE output, VOUT.AFE, capacitances are also modeled by using lumped
changes as shown in Fig. 3b, where AFE.m is an amplified component capacitors. To measure the sensitivity, 1pF
touch dependent signal as (3). capacitors are connected to three sensing lines, Ym+1, Yn
and Yn+1. Touch capacitance of the Ym line is only
changed. The x-axis shows the digital values for the
output signal ∆AFE.m. The output of the prototype chip is
(3) measured for 1024 times with same touch capacitance to
monitor the effect of environmental and circuit noise.
Δm
+VREF The measured results show that the output histograms are
VYm
-VREF non-overlapped if the touch capacitance difference is
+V
VYm+1 REF
-VREF
more than about 43.3fF for the given conditions. The
VYn
+VREF averaged digital output value for AFE.m versus touch
-VREF Δn Δn+1 capacitance is illustrated in Fig. 7. This result indicates
+V
VYn+1 REF
-VREF linear operation of the proposed self-capacitance TSP
ΔAFE.n ΔAFE.n+1
AFE.
VOUT,AFE 0
ΔAFE.m
2750μm
a b c d

Fig. 3 Output waveforms of the proposed AFE

a No sensing lines are touched 850μm AFE Cyclic ADC
b when Ym line is touched
c when Yn line is touched
d when Yn+1 line is touched Fig.5 Die photograph
Similarly, if only Yn line is touched, VOUT.AFE becomes
+AFE.n as shown in Fig. 3c. The AFE outputs by

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 60 [3] K. D. Kim, et al: ‘A Capacitive Touch Controller Robust to
CT.m=967.7fF CT.m=909.1fF
CT.m=952.3fF
Display Noise for Ultrathin Touch Screen Displays’, ISSCC Dig.
CT.m=975.6fF
50 Tech. Papers, pp. 116-117, Feb, 2012
CT.m =43.3fF
40
Histogram

30

20

10

0
260 280 300 320 340 360 380 400 420
Digital Outputs for AFE.n

Fig. 6 Measured output histogram for the four different

touch capacitance values

390
Average digital output value, code

380
370
360
350
340
330
320
310
300
290
20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
Touch Capacitance, fF

Fig. 7 Average digital output value vs. touch

capacitance

5. Conclusion
An analog front-end (AFE) for self-capacitance touch
sensing with environmental noise reduction technique
has been described. To improve the common
environmental noise immunity, two adjacently located
pseudo-differential signals are used. By using opposite
direction charge pumps for each differential input, the
proposed AFE cancels the dc signal of the single-ended
sensing line outputs. It enables the use of high gain
amplification to improve the sensitivity. The measured
results of the prototype IC fabricated in a 0.35-µm
CMOS technology verify the validity of the proposed
TSP AFE.

6. Acknowledgement
This work is supported by Samsung Display.

7. References
[1] Noriyuki Miura, et al: ‘A 1mm-Pitch 80x80-Channel
322Hz-Frame-Rate Touch Sensor with Two-Step Dual-Mode
Capacitance Scan’, ISSCC Dig. Tech. Papers, pp. 216-218, Feb,
2014
[2] H. R. Kim, et al: ‘A Mobile-Display-Driver IC Embedding a
Capacitive Touch-Screen Controller System’, ISSCC Dig. Tech.
Papers, pp. 114-115, Feb, 2010

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