Everspin Technologies, Inc.

Philip Mather

Jon Michael Slaughter

Lianjun Liu

Sanjeev Aggarwal

Nicholas David Rizzo

Renu Whig

Kenneth H Smith

A semiconductor process integrates three bridge circuits, each include magnetoresistive sensors coupled as a Wheatstone bridge on a single chip to sense a magnetic field in three orthogonal directions. The process includes various deposition and etch steps forming the magnetoresistive sensors and a plurality of flux guides on one of the three bridge circuits for transferring a 'Z' axis magnetic field onto sensors orientated in the XY plane.

Process integration of a single chip three axis magnetic field sensor

A magnitude and direction of at least one of a reset current and a second stabilization current (that produces a reset field and a second stabilization field, respectively) is determined that, when applied to an array of magnetic sense elements, minimizes the total required stabilization field and reset field during the operation of the magnetic sensor and the measurement of the external field. Therefore, the low field sensor operates optimally (with the highest sensitivity and the lowest power consumption) around the fixed external field operating point. The fixed external field is created by other components in the sensor device housing (such as speaker magnets) which have a high but static field with respect to the low (earth's) magnetic field that describes orientation information.

Apparatus and method for reset and stabilization control of a magnetic sensor

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Phoenix, AZ, United States of America

Philip Mather