Wireless anti-static device for ESD mitigation
AssigneeIONA Tech LLC
InventorsDaan Stevenson, Jonathan Tapson
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A wireless anti-static device is disclosed, including an electronic sensing circuit that measures the polarity and electrostatic potential of the subject relative to its surroundings. Ion guns of positive and negative polarities are able to transfer an arbitrary quantity and polarity of charge from the subject by ejecting ionized air molecules into the surrounding environment. A control unit is programmed to trigger the appropriate ion gun when a corresponding charge is measured on the body, in order to continually maintain the net charge on the body below a desired threshold. The subject is thus effectively grounded relative to its environment without requiring physical tethers to ground.
Claims27
An electrostatic mitigation device without a direct grounding connection comprising:
- a sensing section that is physically attached to a user's body;
- a discharge section conductively coupled via an electrode to a user's body;
- a controller coupled to both the sensing section and the discharge section, and configured to, when the sensing section detects an absolute electrostatic potential between the user's body and a surrounding environment, and one or more objects within the surrounding environment, exceeding a threshold, instructing the discharge section to emit positive or negative ions of equal polarity to the absolute electrostatic potential to remove charge from the user's body until the absolute electrostatic potential falls below the threshold.
An electrostatic mitigation device without a direct grounding connection comprising:
- a means to detect electrostatic potential of a user's body, to which the device is coupled, relative to an absolute electrostatic potential of nearby objects;
- a means to discharge at least a portion of the electrostatic potential of the user's body by expelling positive or negative ions to a surrounding environment;
- an electrode coupled between the user's body and the means to discharge;
- and
- wherein the means to detect electrostatic potential also detects electrostatic potential of the user's body, to which the device is coupled, relative to an average electrostatic potential of the surrounding environment.
A method of maintaining a body below an electrostatic potential without a grounding connection, the method comprising:
- sensing an electrostatic potential of the body relative to the surrounding atmosphere and surrounding objects;
- identifying when the electrostatic potential of the body reaches a threshold;
- and then
- generating a voltage between an ion gun and an electrode coupled to the body that is large enough to initiate ion discharge from the ion gun, the polarity of the discharge selected to reduce the electrostatic potential of the body relative to the surrounding atmosphere and surrounding objects;
- and
- modifying the sensing after the ion discharge to reduce sensing artefacts caused by the ion discharge.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.