Electronic Devices Having Semiconductor Sensors With Metal Optical Filters

Abstract

An electronic device may include an ambient light sensor or other semiconductor sensor. The sensor may produce signals in response to light incident on the electronic device and therefore incident on the sensor. In some cases, components within the electronic device, such as infrared components, or external light sources may interfere with the operation of the sensor. Therefore, the sensor may include a filter that transmits at least a portion of visible light while blocking infrared light. Because light may be incident on the electronic device from a variety of angles, a diffuser in the sensor may scatter the light into a desired angular distribution. To ensure that infrared light is blocked regardless of the angle of the incident light, the filter may include both thin-film dielectric layers and metal layers. The metal layers may be interleaved with the thin-film dielectric layers.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.