US Patent Issued to Apple on June 2 for "Surface texture detection and emulation" (California Inventors)

ALEXANDRIA, Va., June 2 -- United States Patent no. 12,644,701, issued on June 2, was assigned to Apple Inc. (Cupertino, Calif.).

"Surface texture detection and emulation" was invented by Nicholas C Soldner (Los Altos, Calif.), Arthur Y Zhang (San Jose, Calif.), Simon Fortin-Deschenes (Santa Clara, Calif.), Robert D Silfvast (Belmont, Calif.) and Timo Birnschein (Redwood City, Calif.).

According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A hand-held device that includes sensor components that enable the detection and measurement of surface features such as roughness or texture. Motion data (e.g., velocity and trajectory) may also be captured. The hand-held device may also include components for emulating surface fea...