Patents Assigned to Sharp
  • Patent number: 7392024
    Abstract: According to the radio receiver, a first path P1 included in a frequency conversion circuit 12 does not have a filter, and a filter 171 for extracting a reference signal 74c is provided in a second path P2 so that a second IF multiple signal 74 and the reference signal 74c are multiplied together in a mixer section 12a. Consequently, by extracting the reference signal 74c, the filter 171 in the second path P2 operates as a local oscillation signal source synchronized with the second IF multiple signal 74. Therefore, according to the signal obtained by down-conversion of the second IF multiple signal 74 with use of the reference signal 74c in the mixer section 12a, signals identical in quality to input signals inputted on the transmission side can be reproduced.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 25, 2005
    Date of Patent: June 24, 2008
    Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Eiji Suematsu, Keisuke Satoh
  • Patent number: 7391400
    Abstract: A liquid crystal display device according to the present invention includes a liquid crystal panel having a vertical alignment type liquid crystal layer, and a drive circuit for supplying a driving voltage to the liquid crystal panel, and performs display in a normally black mode. At least at panel temperature 40° C., a rise transmittance Tr is equal to or greater than 75% of the transmittance in the highest gray scale level displaying state, and a decay transmittance Td is equal to or less than 8% of the transmittance in the highest gray scale level displaying state. At a panel temperature T1 below 40° C.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 21, 2005
    Date of Patent: June 24, 2008
    Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Masumi Kubo, Tomoo Furukawa
  • Patent number: 7391334
    Abstract: A connection checking system of the present invention is arranged so as to apply a power supply voltage which is dropped by the resistance to a terminal when the control substrate and the unit are connected. Then, the control section determines that the unit is connected to the control substrate when the dropped voltage is applied to the terminal. On the other hand, when a dropped voltage is not applied to the terminal, the control section determines that the unit is not connected to the control substrate. The connection checking system of the present invention can be realized by using a conventional power supply cable, a signal cable and a terminal, and thus the connection checking system of the present invention can be manufactured at low costs.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 17, 2005
    Date of Patent: June 24, 2008
    Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Kouji Miyake, Hiroshi Ishii, Hideyuki Hiro, Kenji Tanaka
  • Patent number: 7390696
    Abstract: In order to fabricate a semiconductor device that can perform at its full capacity, in which (i) a single-crystal silicon integrated circuit is formed on an insulating substrate without an adhesive agent, and (ii) an active region of the single-crystal integrated circuit is not damaged by implantation of hydrogen ions, (a) the single-crystal silicon integrated circuit is formed on the insulating substrate, and (b) the single-crystal silicon integrated circuit is surrounded by an oxide (buried oxide layer made of silicon dioxide).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 9, 2004
    Date of Patent: June 24, 2008
    Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventor: Arinobu Kanegae
  • Patent number: 7391582
    Abstract: An objective lens holder of the present invention includes: (i) a cavity, having an entrance and an exit, which guides, to an objective lens, an incident light beam entering the entrance, the exit being provided on a side of the cavity where the objective lens is housed; and (ii) an aperture having an opening for limiting, to an effective diameter of the objective lens, a beam diameter of the incident light beam passing through the cavity. The cavity is surrounded with internal wall surfaces facing each other so that space between the internal wall surfaces gradually increases from the opening of the aperture toward the entrance or the exit. This makes it possible to provide a highly rigid objective lens holder that allows high speed read/write operations.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 1, 2005
    Date of Patent: June 24, 2008
    Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Toshiharu Inui, Takashi Kawano
  • Patent number: 7391489
    Abstract: The liquid crystal display device of the present invention includes a first substrate, a second substrate and a vertically aligned liquid crystal layer interposed between the first and second substrate. The device has a plurality of pixels each including a first electrode formed on the first substrate, a second electrode formed on the second substrate, and the liquid crystal layer interposed between the first and second electrode, and a shading region provided around the pixels. A plurality of supports for defining the thickness of the liquid crystal layer are placed regularly on the surface of the first or second substrate facing the liquid crystal layer in the shading region. The liquid crystal layer forms at least one liquid crystal domain exhibiting axisymmetric alignment when at least a predetermined voltage is applied, and the tilt direction of liquid crystal molecules in the at least one liquid crystal domain is defined with inclined sides of the plurality of supports.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 8, 2005
    Date of Patent: June 24, 2008
    Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaishia
    Inventors: Yasuhiro Kume, Kazuhiko Tamai, Noriaki Onishi
  • Patent number: 7391984
    Abstract: The present invention provides a fixing device for fixing a toner image formed on paper by sandwiching the paper in a nip region between a heating roller and a pressing roller and pressing the paper while heating the paper to a fixing temperature. This fixing device includes a cleaning roller that is in contact with the pressing roller, and temperature control means that sets a temperature of the heating roller to a cleaning temperature that is higher than the fixing temperature.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 5, 2006
    Date of Patent: June 24, 2008
    Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Shinji Sugita, Tatsuya Shinkawa, Takashi Yamanaka, Kan Mukai, Kouji Wakamoto
  • Publication number: 20080143732
    Abstract: In one embodiment, a predetermined amount of bitmap data is accumulated in a first cache memory, a predetermined amount of arrangement-converted bitmap data is accumulated in the second cache memory, the number of instances of switching between value 0 and value 1 when transferring/outputting bitmap data is compared to the number of instances of switching between value 0 and value 1 when transferring/outputting arrangement-converted bitmap data, and the bitmap data or the arrangement-converted bitmap data with the lesser number of instances of switching is transferred/output to a RAM; thus, the power consumption when transferring/outputting data to the RAM via a data bus is reduced.
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 31, 2007
    Publication date: June 19, 2008
    Applicant: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventor: Seiya Shiozaki
  • Publication number: 20080143937
    Abstract: The present invention is a substrate for a display device comprising an active matrix substrate and an opposed substrate which are opposed to each other with a display medium layer interposed therebetween, said active matrix substrate including a pixel electrode arranged in a matrix shape on the side of the display medium layer and said opposed substrate including a common electrode opposing to the pixel electrode on the side of the display medium layer, wherein said substrate for a display device includes an electrode slit formed in one of the pixel electrode and the common electrode; and at least one of the electrical connecting portions of said electrode slit is provided outside of a light-blocking region.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 10, 2007
    Publication date: June 19, 2008
    Applicant: SHARP KABUSHIKI KAISHA
    Inventors: Hidetoshi NAKAGAWA, Toshihide TSUBATA, Nobuyoshi NAGASHIMA, Yuhko HISADA
  • Publication number: 20080143940
    Abstract: The invention relates to a liquid crystal display device used as a display part of an information equipment and a method of manufacturing the same, and has an object to provide the liquid crystal display device which can obtain excellent display characteristics without raising the manufacture cost and the method of manufacturing the same.
    Type: Application
    Filed: October 31, 2007
    Publication date: June 19, 2008
    Applicant: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Hidefumi Yoshida, Yasutoshi Tasaka, Kazuya Ueda, Tsuyoshi Kamada, Masakazu Shibasaki, Kunihiro Tashiro, Tetsuya Kobayashi
  • Publication number: 20080143914
    Abstract: The present invention is a substrate for a display device comprising an active matrix substrate and an opposed substrate which are opposed to each other with a display medium layer interposed therebetween, said active matrix substrate including a pixel electrode arranged in a matrix shape on the side of the display medium layer and said opposed substrate including a common electrode opposing to the pixel electrode on the side of the display medium layer, wherein said substrate for a display device includes an electrode slit formed in one of the pixel electrode and the common electrode; and at least one of the electrical connecting portions of said electrode slit is provided outside of a light-blocking region.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 10, 2007
    Publication date: June 19, 2008
    Applicant: SHARP KABUSHIKI KAISHA
    Inventors: Hidetoshi NAKAGAWA, Toshihide TSUBATA, Nobuyoshi NAGASHIMA, Yuhko HISADA
  • Publication number: 20080144125
    Abstract: When a specific image is detected in inputted image data, specific image judgment is performed in consideration of the importance degree of this specific image, and thereby, the accuracy of the specific image judgment is improved, and misjudgment is prevented. There are provided a detection section 70 for detecting a specific image in inputted image data, a judgment section 71 for judging whether specific images are included in the image data on the basis of a threshold, and a threshold determination section 65 for recognizing the characteristics of the detected specific image and determining the threshold according to the characteristics. The characteristics of the specific image are changed according to the importance degree of the specific image. The threshold determination section 65 judges the importance degree from the characteristics of the detected specific image.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 18, 2007
    Publication date: June 19, 2008
    Applicant: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Yuji Okamoto, Shuhji Fujii, Nobuyuki Ueda
  • Publication number: 20080144476
    Abstract: A first photodiode for BD receives a laser light beam separated from a laser light beam emitted from a first semiconductor laser, detects laser power of the first semiconductor laser, and outputs an output current signal. A second photodiode for DVD/CD receives a laser light beam separated from a laser light beam emitted from a second semiconductor laser, detects laser power of the second semiconductor laser, and outputs an output current signal. An output terminal of the first photodiode and an output terminal of the second photodiode are connected to each other, and the output current signal and the output current signal are both inputted to the same input terminal of the first current-voltage conversion circuit.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 7, 2007
    Publication date: June 19, 2008
    Applicant: SHARP KABUSHIKI KAISHA
    Inventor: Tomiyuki Numata
  • Publication number: 20080143898
    Abstract: The liquid crystal display device of this invention includes a first substrate, a second substrate, and a vertical alignment type liquid crystal layer including liquid crystal molecules having negative dielectric anisotropy disposed between the two substrates. In each of a plurality of picture-element regions, the liquid crystal layer has a plurality of liquid crystal regions different in the direction in which liquid crystal molecules tilt upon application of a voltage. At least one of the first and second substrates has a light-shield layer overlapping at least part of boundary region defined as regions separating the plurality of liquid crystal regions from each other. The part of the boundary region overlapping the light-shield layer is a region permitting liquid crystal molecules surrounding the region to tilt so that the ends of the liquid crystal molecules closer to the substrate having the light-shield layer go away from the region upon application of a voltage.
    Type: Application
    Filed: February 13, 2008
    Publication date: June 19, 2008
    Applicant: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Kiyoshi Ogishima, Masumi Kubo
  • Publication number: 20080145084
    Abstract: In an image forming apparatus in which a visual image on a photosensitive drum is developed with columnar toner, and the developed toner image is transferred from the photosensitive drum to an intermediate transfer belt, a moving speed of the photosensitive drum and a moving speed of the intermediate transfer belt are different at a contact position (transfer nip section) where the photosensitive drum and the intermediate transfer belt are in contact. With this arrangement, toner scattering, nonuniform image etc. can be reduced in the image forming apparatus, in which the development is carried out with columnar toner.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 12, 2007
    Publication date: June 19, 2008
    Applicant: SHARP KABUSHIKI KAISHA
    Inventors: Kiyoshi Toizumi, Rika Hayashi
  • Publication number: 20080143915
    Abstract: A lamp holder includes a mounting portion, a lamp holding part which is connected to the mounting portion, and includes an end capable of surrounding a peripheral surface of a lamp, and is capable of being elastically opened and deformed with attaching and detaching of the lamp. The present invention also includes a recessed portion positioned at an opposed surface to the lamp in the lamp holding part and in a position between an end portion and a connecting region to a mounting portion, such that the recessed portion allows the lamp holding part to bend so that the end portion displaces in a direction to be away from the peripheral surface of the lamp.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 8, 2005
    Publication date: June 19, 2008
    Applicant: SHARP KABUSHIKI KAISHA
    Inventors: Yoshiki Takata, Tatsuya Kudari
  • Patent number: 7388994
    Abstract: Reduced complexity inverse discrete cosine transform (IDCT) masks and a method for reducing the number of IDCT calculations in video decoding are provided. The method comprises: accepting an n×m matrix of DCT coefficients; performing (n?y) horizontal IDCT operations, where y is greater than 0; performing y scaling operations; and, generating an n×m block of pixel information. Some aspects of the method further comprise: performing (m?z) vertical IDCT operations, where z is in the range between 0 and m/2. In some aspects, performing (n?y) horizontal ICDT operations includes performing IDCT operations for the first (n?y) horizontal rows. Then, performing y scaling operations includes: selecting the DC component from the first position of each horizontal row; scaling the selected DC component; and, copying the scaled DC component into the remaining positions of each of horizontal row.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 22, 2007
    Date of Patent: June 17, 2008
    Assignee: Sharp Laboratories of America, Inc.
    Inventors: Shijun Sun, Shwmin Lei
  • Patent number: 7388184
    Abstract: The image reading device of the present invention includes (i) a sensor substrate which functions as a photoelectric transfer element having a photodetecting TFT and a pixel capacitor and (ii) a driving IC for applying a voltage to a gate electrode of the photodetecting TFT so as to drive the photodetecting TFT into an ON state or an OFF state. The driving IC applies a voltage, whose polarity is opposite to average polarity of a voltage making the photodetecting TFT in the OFF state, to the gate electrode of the photodetecting TFT in an arbitrary period. Thus, it is possible to provide the image reading device which can suppress variation of a photodetecting TFT property (resistance value) which is observed in a short time.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 16, 2003
    Date of Patent: June 17, 2008
    Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Yoshihiro Izumi, Kazuhiro Uehara, Tomohiko Oda, Osamu Teranuma
  • Patent number: 7388715
    Abstract: First, second, third and fourth lens groups of a zoom lens portion are arranged on an optical axis in order from an object to be imaged side toward an electronic imaging device. The first lens group has a negative refracting power and a fixed position on the optical axis. The second lens group has a positive refracting power and is moved along the optical axis to effect focusing. The third lens group has a positive refracting power and is moved along the optical axis during a magnification change. The fourth lens group has a fixed position on the optical axis. An angle of incidence of a ray of a maximum image height when the zoom lens portion is in a state at a telephoto end is not greater than the angle of incidence of the ray of the maximum image height incident on the electronic imaging device when the zoom lens portion is in a state at a wide angle end.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 3, 2006
    Date of Patent: June 17, 2008
    Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventors: Ryo Abe, Minoru Ueda
  • Patent number: D571320
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 11, 2007
    Date of Patent: June 17, 2008
    Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventor: Toshiyuki Kita