Reducing Readout Complexity of Large Resistive Sensor Arrays

In this paper, we present a method that simplifies the interconnect complexity of ${\rm N} \times {\rm M}$ resistive arrays from ${\rm N} \times {\rm M}$ to ${\rm N} + {\rm M}$. In this method, we propose to use two sets of metal lines in row-column fashion with all the sensor elements having one of their ends connected to a row line and other end to a column line. The crosstalk among all the elements introduced due to this connection scheme causes the spreading of information over the whole area of the array. We have proposed and implemented the circuit to eliminate this crosstalk and to get automated sequential access of all the individual elements. The method has been verified using lock-in-amplifier based measurements on the light dependent resistors (LDR) in different array formats.