Patent ID: 8165355

Claim:
A fingerprint motion tracking apparatus, comprising: a first linear sensor array configured to sense features of a fingerprint along a first axis of finger motion and configured to repeatedly sense at least two line segments of fingerprint data, the first linear sensor array including a plurality of substantially contiguous sensing elements configured to capture segments of image data; a second linear sensor array configured to sense features of a fingerprint along a second axis of finger motion and configured to repeatedly sense at least two line segments of fingerprint data, the second linear sensor array including a plurality of substantially contiguous sensing elements configured to capture segments of image data, wherein the first linear sensor array is non-parallel with respect to the second linear sensor array; a buffer configured to receive and store image data from each of the first and the second linear sensor arrays; and a processing element configured to generate fingerprint motion data for use in navigation, wherein the processing element uses image data from the first linear sensor array to determine velocity along the first axis of finger motion, and uses image data from the second linear sensor array to determine velocity along the second axis of finger motion, wherein the first linear sensor array is configured to sense a first set of features of a fingerprint along the first axis of finger motion and to generate a first set of image data captured by a plurality of substantially contiguous pixels of the first linear sensor array, and is also configured to subsequently sense a second set of features of the fingerprint along the first axis of finger motion and to generate a second set of image data captured by the plurality of substantially contiguous pixels of the first linear sensor array, and wherein the processing element is configured to compare the first and the second sets of image data to determine the distance traveled by the fingerprint over a time interval, and wherein the distance and the time interval are used to calculate navigational data for navigating a cursor on a graphical user interface relative to the motion of a fingerprint across the first linear sensor array.