These infrared transmitter (emitter) and receiver (detector) from lite-on electronics operate at 940nm and work well for generic IR systems including remote control and touch-less object sensing. 

Using a simple ADC on any micro-controller will allow variable readings to be collected from the detector. 

The emitter is driven up to 50mA with a current limiting resistor as with any LED device. The detect is a NPN transistor that is biased by incoming IR light.

IR Emitter (Yellow Dot) Datasheet

IR Detector (Red Dot) Datasheet

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