Patents by Inventor Kenji Otsuka

Kenji Otsuka has filed for patents to protect the following inventions. This listing includes patent applications that are pending as well as patents that have already been granted by the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO).

  • Patent number: 6429843
    Abstract: There is disclosed an active matrix liquid crystal display that suppresses formation of a stripe pattern on the displayed image. An active matrix circuit, a peripheral drive circuit, and A image data signal lines for supplying image data signals are all integrated on a common substrate. The liquid crystal display includes a sampling circuit to which sampling circuit input lines are connected. These sampling circuit input lines are in contact with the image data signal lines and include dummy conducting lines extending to a buffer circuit. These dummy lines average out impedances of the individual image data signal lines, thus making uniform the amounts of image data signals lost from the image data signal lines. Thus, the formation of the stripe pattern is suppressed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 12, 2000
    Date of Patent: August 6, 2002
    Assignee: Semiconductor Energy Laboratory Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Hongyong Zhang, Kenji Otsuka, Satoshi Teramoto
  • Publication number: 20020087553
    Abstract: A system for permitting access to a database, in which labor is saved and privacy of individuals is not invaded when the database is accessed from the outside. Access key information is used as a key when requesting access to the database in which personal credit information is stored. Access key information and conditions under which access is permitted are also stored in the database. When a request for access is made, inputted access key information is checked against the access key information stored in the database. When the inputted access key information matches the access key information stored in the database, and when the conditions under which access is permitted are satisfied, access to the database is permitted.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 10, 2001
    Publication date: July 4, 2002
    Inventors: Satoshi Kitahara, Kenichi Sugasawara, Kenji Otsuka
  • Publication number: 20020084220
    Abstract: The invention provides a method of recovering a copper component or a manganese component from a cleaning agent containing copper oxide, a cleaning agent containing basic copper carbonate, a cleaning agent containing copper hydroxide, or a cleaning agent containing copper oxide and manganese oxide, the cleaning agents having been used for removing, through contact with a harmful gas, a phosphine contained as a harmful component in the harmful gas. Also, the invention provides a method of recovering a copper component or a manganese component from a cleaning agent containing basic copper carbonate, a cleaning agent containing copper hydroxide, or a cleaning agent containing copper oxide and manganese oxide, the cleaning agents having been used for removing, through contact with a harmful gas, a phosphine contained as a harmful component in the harmful gas.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 9, 2001
    Publication date: July 4, 2002
    Inventors: Kenji Otsuka, Takashi Shimada, Minoru Osugi, Kei Kawaguchi
  • Publication number: 20020061272
    Abstract: There are disclosed a process for cleaning a harmful gas which comprises bringing the harmful gas containing as a harmful component, an organosilicon compound represented by the general formula: CH2CH-SiR3, CH2CH-Si(OR)3, CH2CHCH2 -SiR3 or CH2 CHCH2-Si(OR)3, wherein R indicates a saturated hydrocarbon group or an aromatic compound group, into contact with a cleaning agent comprising activated carbon adhesively incorporated with at least one species selected from the group consisting of bromine, iodine, a metal bromide and a metal iodide in which the metal is exemplified by copper, lithium, sodium, potassium, magnesium, calcium, strontium, manganese, iron, cobalt, nickel, zinc, aluminum and tin; and a cleaning agent comprising the same. The cleaning process and the cleaning agent enable to practically clean a harmful gas which is exhausted from a semiconductor manufacturing process and the like by the use of a dry cleaning process.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 21, 2001
    Publication date: May 23, 2002
    Applicant: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Kenji Otsuka, Yukichi Takamatsu, Youji Nawa, Kazuaki Tonari
  • Publication number: 20020044900
    Abstract: A column for purifying gases by a dry method contains a horizontal plate fitted at a position above a bed of a purifying agent and below a gas inlet, and an upstanding pipe passing through the center of the horizontal plate for guiding harmful gases from the gas inlet to below the horizontal plate, and inner wall surface of the column, upper surface of the horizontal plate and outer wall surface of the pipe form a space defining a collector for the powdered material. Thus there is provided a purifying means which facilitates the purification of harmful gases discharged from e.g. a semiconductor manufacturing process and containing powdered material without accompanying blocking of a purification apparatus, and, thereby, make the operation for the purification and maintenance of the facilities easy, while allowing a purifying agent to exhibit its purifying ability thoroughly.
    Type: Application
    Filed: August 15, 2001
    Publication date: April 18, 2002
    Applicant: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd
    Inventors: Kenji Otsuka, Takashi Shimada, Tomohisa Ikeda, Norihiro Suzuki
  • Publication number: 20020034467
    Abstract: There are disclosed a process for purifying ammonia which comprises bringing crude ammonia into contact with a catalyst comprising manganese oxide as an effective ingredient to remove oxygen and/or carbon dioxide that are contained as impurities in the ammonia, and a process for purifying ammonia which comprises bringing crude ammonia into contact with a catalyst comprising manganese oxide as an effective ingredient, and thereafter with a synthetic zeolite having a pore diameter in the range of 4 to 10 Å to remove at least one impurity selected from the group consisting of oxygen, carbon dioxide and moisture that are contained in the crude ammonia. It is made possible by the above process to remove impurities to an extremely low concentration from crude ammonia available on the market for industrial use and crude ammonia from a gallium nitride compound semi- conductor without decomposition of ammonia to generate hydrogen.
    Type: Application
    Filed: July 19, 2001
    Publication date: March 21, 2002
    Applicant: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Kenji Otsuka, Satoshi Arawaka, Takashi Kasaya, Tomohisa Ikeda
  • Patent number: 6331281
    Abstract: There are disclosed a process for cleaning ammonia-containing exhaust gas which comprises bringing the exhaust gas into contact with an ammonia decomposition catalyst (e.g. nickel, ruthenium) under heating to decompose most of the ammonia into nitrogen and hydrogen, subsequently bringing the resultant mixed gas into contact with an ammonia adsorbent (e.g. synthetic zeolite) for adsorbing undecomposed ammonia, and then heating regenerating the adsorbent, while bringing reproduced exhaust gas containing the ammonia desorbed from the adsorbent into contact under heating, with the ammonia decomposition catalyst or another ammonia decomposition catalyst; and an apparatus for carrying out the process. It is made possible by the process and apparatus to efficiently and completely clean ammonia-containing exhaust gas exhausted from a semiconductor manufacturing process and the like without generating useless byproduct and dispensing with secondary treatment.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 7, 1999
    Date of Patent: December 18, 2001
    Assignee: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Suehachi Teru, Yasusada Miyano, Noboru Akita, Kenji Otsuka, Takashi Shimada
  • Patent number: 6325841
    Abstract: A cleaning agent and a cleaning process for efficiently removing noxious halogen-based gases such as fluorine, chlorine, boron trifluoride, boron trichloride and tungsten hexafluoride from exhaust gases from semiconductor fabrication processes. The cleaning agent is produced by adherently adding alkali metal formate and/or alkaline earth metal formate to activated carbon, or adherently adding alkali metal hydroxide and/or alkaline earth metal hydroxide together with alkali metal formate and/or alkaline earth metal formate to activated carbon. By exposing exhaust gases to the cleaning agent, noxious halogen-based gases in the exhaust gases are efficiently removed with little desorption of halogen-based gases adsorbed on the cleaning agent. Also, the cleaning treatment is further improved in safety and efficiency by a pre-treatment cleaning agent comprising a metal oxide or a metal hydroxide and a post-treatment cleaning agent prepared by adherently adding sodium formate to a metal oxide.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 16, 2000
    Date of Patent: December 4, 2001
    Assignee: Japan Pionics., Ltd.
    Inventors: Kenji Otsuka, Satoshi Arakawa, Ryuji Hasemi, Yutaka Amijima, Norihiro Suzuki
  • Publication number: 20010010847
    Abstract: The heating packet of the present invention comprises an air-permeable bag containing a heat-generating composition or a sheet-like heat-generating body which generates heat upon contacting oxygen in air. The heat-generating composition or the sheet-like heat-generating body contains zinc powder instead of iron powder. By the use of zinc powder, the heat-generating composition and the sheet-like heat-generating body can be maintained flexible during the use of the heating packet or after heat generation.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 29, 2001
    Publication date: August 2, 2001
    Inventors: Kenji Otsuka, Yoshiki Matsumoto, Koichi Yada, Koshi Ochi
  • Patent number: 6261345
    Abstract: There are disclosed a process for recovering ammonia which comprises installing a shell and multi-tube adsorber which is equipped with plural adsorption tubes each packed inside with an ammonia adsorbent (e.g. synthetic zeolite) and equipped with a flow mechanism for a heat transfer medium for performing heat exchange through the adsorption tubes, passing an ammonia-containing gas through the adsorption tubes, while cooling the adsorbent with a heat transfer medium (e.g. water) to adsorb the ammonia, and thereafter collecting the adsorbed ammonia through desorption, while heating the adsorbent with a heat transfer medium (e.g. hot water) under reduced pressure; and an apparatus for the above process.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 7, 1999
    Date of Patent: July 17, 2001
    Assignee: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Yasusada Miyano, Kenji Otsuka, Satoshi Arakawa
  • Patent number: 6175348
    Abstract: There is disclosed an active matrix liquid crystal display that suppresses formation of a stripe pattern on the displayed image. An active matrix circuit, a peripheral drive circuit, and A image data signal lines for supplying image data signals are all integrated on a common substrate. The liquid crystal display includes a sampling circuit to which sampling circuit input lines are connected. These sampling circuit input lines are in contact with the image data signal lines and include dummy conducting lines extending to a buffer circuit. These dummy lines average out impedances of the individual image data signal lines, thus making uniform the amounts of image data signals lost from the image data signal lines. Thus, the formation of the stripe pattern is suppressed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 28, 1999
    Date of Patent: January 16, 2001
    Assignee: Semiconductor Energy Laboratory Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Hongyong Zhang, Kenji Otsuka, Satoshi Teramoto
  • Patent number: 5956009
    Abstract: There is disclosed an active matrix liquid crystal display that suppresses formation of a stripe pattern on the displayed image. An active matrix circuit, a peripheral drive circuit, and A image data signal lines for supplying image data signals are all integrated on a common substrate. The liquid crystal display includes a sampling circuit to which sampling circuit input lines are connected. These sampling circuit input lines are in contact with the image data signal lines and include dummy conducting lines extending to a buffer circuit. These dummy lines average out impedances of the individual image data signal lines, thus making uniform the amounts of image data signals lost from the image data signal lines. Thus, the formation of the stripe pattern is suppressed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 30, 1997
    Date of Patent: September 21, 1999
    Assignee: Semiconductor Energy Laboratory Co.
    Inventors: Hongyong Zhang, Kenji Otsuka, Satoshi Teramoto
  • Patent number: 5935540
    Abstract: There is disclosed a process for cleaning a harmful gas which comprises bringing a harmful gas containing at least one member selected from the group consisting of nitrogen fluorides, tungsten fluorides, silicon fluorides, hydrogen fluoride and fluorine, especially nitrogen trifluoride into contact with a cleaning agent comprising stannous oxide as an effective ingredient at a temperature of 200.degree. C. at the lowest. The above process makes it possible to clean the harmful gas in a high performance at a relatively low temperature without by-producing a harmful gas or a gas with a fear of causing environmental pollution.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 17, 1998
    Date of Patent: August 10, 1999
    Assignee: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Kenji Otsuka, Youji Nawa
  • Patent number: 5895521
    Abstract: A dust removing apparatus equipped with a back washing mechanism and a dust removing method for removing solid silica fine powder contained in a gas discharged from a semiconductor producing step of a single-wafer processing atmospheric pressure CVD apparatus without causing problems caused by the increase of a pressure loss and by a pressure fluctuation, wherein filter elements each having a ratio of a surface area of a primary side of a filter membrane to an apparent external surface area of the filter element of from 1 to 5 is used, gas jetting nozzle(s) for back washing is formed in the secondary side of the filter element, back washing is not carried out during filtration in the filter element and at or after changing the processing of a wafer in the CVD apparatus, back washing is carried out to blow down the silica fine powder accumulated on the primary side of the filter membrane.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 23, 1997
    Date of Patent: April 20, 1999
    Assignee: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Kenji Otsuka, Hiroshi Waki, Yoshio Yamashita, Satoshi Arakawa, Toshiya Hatakeyama
  • Patent number: 5882615
    Abstract: There are disclosed a cleaning agent for removing a fluorine-compound gas such as hydrogen fluoride, fluorine, tungsten hexafluoride, silicon tetrafluoride and boron trifluoride which agent comprises a molded article produced by using strontium hydroxide as a principal component, an organic binding agent as a molding agent and the hydroxide of an alkaline earth metal other than strontium as a molding aid; and a process for cleaning a harmful gas which comprises feeding a harmful gas containing a fluorine-compound gas into a column packed inside with the above cleaning agent to remove the fluorine-compound gas; and exhausting a gas substantially free from the fluorine-compound gas. The above cleaning agent is capable of removing the fluorine-compound gas in high efficiency without causing any danger, thereby making itself well suited to the cleaning of the gases exhausted, for example, from semiconductor manufacturing industries.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 10, 1996
    Date of Patent: March 16, 1999
    Assignee: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Hideki Fukuda, Kenji Otsuka, Satoshi Arakawa
  • Patent number: 5756060
    Abstract: A process for cleaning a harmful gas which comprises bringing a harmful gas containing a halogen gas and/or a halogen compound gas such as hydrogen fluoride, hydrogen chloride, tungsten hexafluoride, silicon tetrafluoride and boron trifluoride into contact with a cleaning agent comprising metal oxides composed principally of copper (II) oxide and manganese (IV) oxide that are spreadingly and adhesively incorporated with sodium formate so as to remove a harmful component from the harmful gas. According to the cleaning process of the present invention, it is possible to remove harmful components from the harmful gas in extremely high efficiency at ordinary temperature, dispensing with heating or cooling irrespective of the concentration of the harmful components. The cleaning capacity of the cleaning agent is favorably maintained without deterioration even when the harmful gas is in a dry state.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 4, 1996
    Date of Patent: May 26, 1998
    Assignee: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Kenji Otsuka, Satoshi Arakawa, Youji Nawa
  • Patent number: 5670445
    Abstract: A cleaning agent for removing acidic gases which are harmful materials from a harmful gas containing such acidic gases, and a cleaning method using the cleaning agent are disclosed. The cleaning agent comprises a molded product of a composition comprising strontium hydroxide and an iron oxide, and the harmful gas is passed through a cleaning column packed with the cleaning agent to contact the harmful gas with the cleaning agent, thereby removing the acidic gases from the harmful gas.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 23, 1995
    Date of Patent: September 23, 1997
    Assignee: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Koichi Kitahara, Kenji Otsuka, Toshiya Hatakeyama, Hideki Fukuda
  • Patent number: 5589148
    Abstract: There is disclosed a process for purifying a halogen-containing gas (halogen gas such as chlorine, fluorine alone or diluted with an inert gas) which comprises bringing the halogen-containing gas into contact with a purifying agent comprising a hydroxide of an alkaline earth metal such as strontium hydroxide and an iron oxide such as triiron tetraoxide to efficiently remove hydrogen halogenides such as hydrogen chloride and hydrogen fluoride along with moisture that are contained as impurities in the halogen-containing gas. The above process enables the formation of a non-corrosive halogen-containing gas having an extremely high purity and capable of being favorably used as etching gas for silicon films, aluminum alloy films, etc. in a semiconductor manufacturing process.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 23, 1995
    Date of Patent: December 31, 1996
    Assignee: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Kenji Otsuka, Hideki Fukuda, Satoshi Arakawa
  • Patent number: 5489327
    Abstract: There is diclosed a process for purifying hydrogen gas which comprises removing impurities such as nitrogen, oxygen, methane, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and moisture contained in a crude hydrogen gas by bringing the crude hydrogen gas into contact under heating with a hydride of a zirconium alloy such as Zr-V, Zr-V-Ni, Zr-V-Cr, Zr-V-Co, Zr-V-Fe, Zr-V-Cu, Zr-V-Ni-Cr, Zr-V-Ni-Co and Zr-V-Cr-Fe. By virtue of using the above Zr alloy hydride, the process enables highly advanced purification of crude hydrogen gas by removing such impurities as above to a level as low as 1 ppb or less in high safety and efficiency at low installation and running costs.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 17, 1995
    Date of Patent: February 6, 1996
    Assignee: Japan Pionics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Kenji Otsuka, Noboru Takemasa