Patents Examined by David N. Spector
  • Patent number: 8027100
    Abstract: An imaging lens includes a first lens group having a positive refractive power, an aperture stop, and a second lens group having a positive refractive power, which are disposed in order from an object. The first lens group has a first lens component having a negative refractive power and a second lens component having a positive refractive power, which are disposed in order from the object, and conditions expressed by the expressions 0.12<f/f1<0.47 and 0.016<D12/f<0.079 are satisfied, when f1 is a focal length of the first lens group, f is a focal length of the imaging lens, and D12 is an air distance between the first lens component and the second lens component of the first lens group.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 17, 2011
    Date of Patent: September 27, 2011
    Assignee: Nikon Corporation
    Inventor: Toshinori Take
  • Patent number: 8023194
    Abstract: A display apparatus is provided. The display apparatus includes a front side that is exposed the outside. A refractor or set of refractors is positioned so as to minimize the appearance of a shield member to a viewer, thus causing a non-display region of the display apparatus to appear to be smaller than its actual size, thus increasing a size of an image display region of the display apparatus.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 3, 2009
    Date of Patent: September 20, 2011
    Assignee: LG Electronics Inc.
    Inventors: Soon-Hyung Kwon, Deog-Jin Lee, Seung-Gyu Lee
  • Patent number: 8023169
    Abstract: One embodiment includes display comprising a light modulator configured to display a portion of an image such as a reflective light modulator, a light emitter configured to display the portion of the image and a circuit configured to selectively provide signals to at least one of the light modulator and the light emitter indicative of the portion of the image. In one such embodiment, an active matrix provides a simple, efficient drive for such devices. Other embodiments methods of making and driving such devices.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: January 25, 2010
    Date of Patent: September 20, 2011
    Assignee: QUALCOMM MEMS Technologies, Inc.
    Inventor: Je-Hsiung Lan
  • Patent number: 8018659
    Abstract: An image forming optical system comprising, in order from the object side: a first lens group G1 that is fixed during zooming and includes a reflecting optical element for bending an optical path; a second lens group G2 having a negative refracting power and movable during zooming; a third lens group G3 having a positive refracting power; a fourth lens group G4 having a positive refracting power; and a rearmost lens group GR, wherein during zooming from the wide angle end to the telephoto end, the third lens group G3 moves on the optical axis toward the object side, characterized in that the rearmost lens group GR satisfies the following condition: 0.95<?Rw<2.5 . . . (1-1).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 28, 2010
    Date of Patent: September 13, 2011
    Assignee: Olympus Imaging Corp.
    Inventor: Shinichi Mihara
  • Patent number: 8018662
    Abstract: An imaging lens includes a first lens L1 having positive curvature radii on both an object side and an image side, a second lens L2 having a concave shape on both sides, and a third lens L3 having positive curvature radii on both the object side and the image side. The first to third lenses L1 to L3 are arranged in this order from the object side toward the image side. When the first lens L1 has a focal length f1 and the second lens L2 has a focal length f2, the imaging lens is configured such that a relationship f1>|f2| is satisfied.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 19, 2010
    Date of Patent: September 13, 2011
    Assignees: Optical Logic Inc., Kantatsu Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Yoji Kubota, Ichiro Kurihara
  • Patent number: 8014077
    Abstract: On condition that a first lens group adopts at least one plastic lens; a second lens group adopts at least any two adjacent plastic lenses; the first lens group monotonously moves from an object side to an image plane side in a zooming; the second lens group monotonously moves from the image plane side to the object side; wherein fw/fpi represents a ratio of refractive power of the entire system achieved at a wide angle end to refractive power of the respective lenses; P1 represents a total of fw/fpi of the plastic lenses of the first lens group; and P2 represents a total of fw/fpi of the plastic lenses of the second lens group, the following conditional expressions ?0.22<P1<?0.01 and ?0.15<P2<?0.03, are both fulfilled.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 24, 2009
    Date of Patent: September 6, 2011
    Assignee: Fujinon Corporation
    Inventor: Kazunori Ohno
  • Patent number: 8014073
    Abstract: An absorptive coating is in contact with an optical beam splitter such that a signal beam and a reference beam incident on the beam splitter from opposite sides are can be combined to produce two interference beams having a phase difference of about ? 2 .
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 11, 2009
    Date of Patent: September 6, 2011
    Assignee: Optoplex Corporation
    Inventor: Yung-Chieh Hsieh
  • Patent number: 8009345
    Abstract: A crystallization apparatus includes a light modulation element, and an image forming optical system that forms a light intensity distribution set based on light transmitted through the light modulation element on an irradiation surface. The crystallization apparatus irradiates a non-single crystal semiconductor film with light having the light intensity distribution to generate a crystallized semiconductor film. A curvature radius of at least one isointensity line of a light intensity substantially varies along the isointensity line in the light intensity distribution on the irradiation surface, and a curvature radius of at least a part of the isointensity line has a minimum value of 0.3 ?m or below.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 8, 2010
    Date of Patent: August 30, 2011
    Assignee: Advanced LCD Technologies Development Center Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Yukio Taniguchi, Masakiyo Matsumura, Kazufumi Azuma, Tomoya Kato, Takahiko Endo
  • Patent number: 8004737
    Abstract: An electric-field-sensitive element (1) includes: an optical function layer (5) that includes a metal oxide selected from the group consisting of tin dioxide, titanium dioxide and zinc oxide, and an insulating material covering the metal oxide, the optical function layer (5) having a visible light transmittance that changes through application of an electric field; and a first and second electrode layer (7, 9) that sandwich the optical function layer (5) therebetween.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 2, 2006
    Date of Patent: August 23, 2011
    Assignee: Guala Technology Co., Ltd.
    Inventor: Akira Nakazawa
  • Patent number: 8004747
    Abstract: A method in accordance with particular embodiments includes receiving an electrical control signal. The method further includes adjusting a reflectance of a light modulating stack comprising a plurality of layers by changing the relative location of a plurality of electrophoretic particles with respect to the remainder of the light modulating stack. The method additionally includes receiving light waves from a light source. The method also includes converting the electrical control signal into a modulated optical signal that selectively switches between reflecting or absorbing at least a portion of the light waves.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 15, 2011
    Date of Patent: August 23, 2011
    Assignee: Raytheon Company
    Inventor: Gary A. Frazier
  • Patent number: 8000024
    Abstract: A zoom lens is provided and includes: a first lens group having a positive power, a second lens group having a negative power, a stop, a third lens group having a positive power, and a fourth lens group having a positive power in order. Zooming is performed by moving at least the first lens group, the second lens group, the stop, and the third lens group along the optical axis. During zooming, the stop is moved so as to be closer to an image plane at a wide-angle end than at a telephoto end and to be closer to the second lens group at the telephoto end than at the wide-angle end. The following conditional expressions (1) and (2) are satisfied. For the conditional expressions (1) and (2), fw is a focal length at the wide-angle end of the entire system, ft is a focal length at the telephoto end of the entire system, f1 is a composite focal length of the first lens group, and X1 is a displacement of the first lens group during zooming from the wide-angle end to the telephoto end. 4.0<f1/fw<7.0??(1) 0.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 2, 2009
    Date of Patent: August 16, 2011
    Assignee: Fujinon Corporation
    Inventor: Tetsuya Ori
  • Patent number: 7995283
    Abstract: Provided is a zoom lens in which both higher-order components of distortion and lateral chromatic aberration are corrected in a retrofocus type optical system. The zoom lens includes, in order from a magnifying side, a first lens unit which is negative, a second lens unit which is positive, and a rear lens group which is positive. A solid material having high dispersion and high extraordinary dispersion is used for a negative lens included in the first lens unit to provide a suitable shape and refractive power.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 8, 2009
    Date of Patent: August 9, 2011
    Assignee: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventor: Ken Wada
  • Patent number: 7995286
    Abstract: A zoom lens includes first to fourth lens units in order from the object side to the image side. The first, third, and fourth lens units have a positive refractive power. The second lens unit has a negative refractive power. During zooming from a wide-angle end to a telephoto end, the first lens unit moves along a locus convex toward the image side, the second lens unit moves along a locus convex toward the image side from the wide-angle end to an intermediate zoom position and along a locus convex toward the object side from the intermediate zoom position to the telephoto end, and the third lens unit moves such that the distance to the second lens unit at the telephoto end is smaller than that at the wide-angle end. Focal lengths of the first lens unit and the entire lens system at the telephoto end are adequately set.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 1, 2009
    Date of Patent: August 9, 2011
    Assignee: Canon Kabushiki Kaisha
    Inventor: Tomonori Kimura
  • Patent number: 7986354
    Abstract: A method for correcting a pixel defect of a solid-state image pickup device includes acquiring deviation of image signals obtained by imaging respective spectral lights at specific image pickup position or at vicinities of the specific image pickup position by image pickup device; comparing the deviation with a reference value; detecting a pixel defect in an image pickup device which has imaged one of the spectral lights based on the comparing result; and correcting a pixel defect. For each detected pixel defect, at least address in an image frame, deviation, and information specifying one of the spectral lights are stored, and a determination on a pixel defect correction is made based on the above information.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: February 20, 2009
    Date of Patent: July 26, 2011
    Assignee: Hitachi Kokusai Electric Inc.
    Inventors: Hideo Onodera, Hirokazu Kono
  • Patent number: 7982959
    Abstract: A novel HUD (Head-UP Display) design in which the image forming source producing flight and aiming symbolic information is based unlike conventional HUDs not on projecting CRT, but on two LCD matrices to reduce its size, weight and power consumption. The images produced on matrixes are projected by optical system on transparently-diffusive or diffusively-reflective screen which is positioned in focal plane of HUD's optical collimating head. To enhance HUD brightness and resolution the image forming source is carried out in two variants: image forming source containing two matrices in which each matrix is forming half of full image which is projected on corresponding half of the screen, image forming source containing two matrices which images are projected on full screen; the matrices are shifted between each other horizontally and vertically by half of pixel pace (pace is the distance between two luminous dots).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 2, 2010
    Date of Patent: July 19, 2011
    Inventors: Matvey Lvovskiy, Ilya Lipkind, Ilya Lvovsky
  • Patent number: 7982939
    Abstract: Apparatus for steering a beam of radiation includes a thermally anisotropic element configured such that the shape of the optical element can be varied by varying the temperature of the element. The beam is reflected from or transmitted through the element in a manner such that the direction of the beam on leaving the element can be varied by the change of shape resulting from the temperature variation.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 1, 2009
    Date of Patent: July 19, 2011
    Assignee: Coherent GmbH
    Inventors: Christian Kannengiesser, Ruediger Von Elm
  • Patent number: 7982941
    Abstract: The color display of the present invention involves a two particle system and is capable of displaying multiple colors with high quality black and white states. The color states are suitable for highlighting function. The color display does not require alignment between the electrodes and the display cells in which a display fluid is filled, which significantly reduces the complexity of the design and also lowers the manufacturing costs.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 25, 2009
    Date of Patent: July 19, 2011
    Assignee: SiPix Imaging, Inc.
    Inventors: Craig Lin, Robert A. Sprague
  • Patent number: 7978420
    Abstract: A zoom lens includes: first, second and third lens groups having negative refracting power, positive refracting power and positive refracting power, respectively, disposed in the order from an object side. During zooming from a wide angle end to a telephoto end, the first lens group is moved and the second lens group is moved together with a stop toward the object such that an air space between the first and second lens groups decreases and an air space between the second and third lens groups increases. The second lens group includes positive and negative lenses aspherically shaped on at least a side thereof facing the object and having a convex or concave surface facing the object, the negative lens being positioned on the image side of the positive lens. The zoom lens is configured to satisfy the following Conditional Expressions (1) and (2) 0.7<R2f/R2r<2.0??(1) 1.0<|Sga/Sgs|<1.5??(2).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 10, 2009
    Date of Patent: July 12, 2011
    Assignee: Sony Corporation
    Inventor: Daisuke Kuroda
  • Patent number: 7978415
    Abstract: An observation device includes at least one day vision channel, an information channel with a graphic electronic display for producing a display image and a combination optical system for combining the day vision channel and the information channel, so that a combined overall image forms.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 22, 2009
    Date of Patent: July 12, 2011
    Assignee: Vectronix AG
    Inventors: Bernhard Schoenenberger, Richard A. Leblanc, Felix Waelti, Patrick Drach, Marcel Zeller
  • Patent number: 7974012
    Abstract: A zoom lens system has a front lens group and a rear lens group along the optical axis and in order from the object side. The rear lens group has a first lens unit having a positive refracting power, a second lens unit having a negative refracting power, and a third lens unit having a positive refracting power. Upon zooming from a wide-angle end state to a telephoto end state, a space between the front lens group and the first lens unit varies, a space between the first lens unit and the second lens unit increases, and a space between the second lens unit and the third lens unit decreases. At least a part of the second lens unit is movable so as to have a component in a direction perpendicular to the optical axis.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 20, 2009
    Date of Patent: July 5, 2011
    Assignee: Nikon Corporation
    Inventor: Satoshi Yamaguchi