ALEXANDRIA, Va., Oct. 28 -- United States Patent no. 12,449,913, issued on Oct. 21, was assigned to Apple Inc. (Cupertino, Calif.).
"Single photon avalanche diodes for rotational and translational input detection" was invented by Mieczyslaw M Dabrowski (San Francisco), Anand K Chamakura (San Jose, Calif.), Dong Zheng (Los Altos, Calif.), Peng Zhao (Redwood City, Calif.), David D Dashevsky (San Jose, Calif.) and Stephen N Sweet (San Jose, Calif.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "An input component for an electronic device configured to detect rotational and/or translational movement of a surface. In an implementation, the input component includes a movable input member with a shaft with a pattern...