Patents Examined by Jeanne A. Di Grazio
  • Patent number: 6933992
    Abstract: A polarizer is provided on the upper side of a liquid crystal panel, and a light scattering member and a polarized light separator are provided in turn on the lower side of the liquid crystal panel. Of light incident on the upper side of the polarized light separator, a linearly polarized light component parallel to the drawings is transmitted, a linearly polarized light component perpendicular to the drawings is reflected, and for light incident on the lower side thereof, a linearly polarized light component parallel to the drawings can be emitted upward. When the switch is off, the external light incident on the display device is reflected by the polarized light separator to obtain a bright display, and when the switch is on, the incident external light is transmitted through the polarized light separator to obtain a dark display.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 4, 2001
    Date of Patent: August 23, 2005
    Assignee: Seiko Epson Corporation
    Inventors: Tsuyoshi Maeda, Osamu Okumura
  • Patent number: 6741303
    Abstract: An optical sheet comprises a base layer made of transparent synthetic resins and having an optical characteristic, wherein the base layer is formed of different materials alternately arranged.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 22, 2000
    Date of Patent: May 25, 2004
    Assignee: Keiwa, Inc.
    Inventor: Motohiko Okabe
  • Patent number: 6741304
    Abstract: Display device based on the scanning window principle, in which light loss in segments of the optical shutter element (21) is prevented by using reflective polarizers (35, 36).
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 31, 2001
    Date of Patent: May 25, 2004
    Assignee: Koninklijke Philips Electronics N.V.
    Inventors: Tore Nauta, Antonius Hendricus Maria Holtslag, Dirk Jan Broer, Hendrik De Koning
  • Patent number: 6727968
    Abstract: Liquid crystal devices are formed by a layer of a liquid crystal material enclosed between two cell walls, both carrying electrode structures, and one or both walls treated to align molecules of the liquid crystal material. Most alignment treatment give alignment and surface pretilt with a strong azimuthal and zenithal anchoring energy to contacting liquid crystal molecules. The invention reduces at least one of the azimuthal zenithal or translational anchoring energy to improve switching characteristics and optical performance by allowing movement of liquid crystal molecules at or close to the cell wall. The reduction of anchoring energy may be achieved by an oligomer or short chain polymer which is either spread on the surface or added to the liquid crystal material. The size of oligomer or short chain polymer is low enough that it does not appreciably phase separate from the liquid crystal material.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 7, 2000
    Date of Patent: April 27, 2004
    Assignee: Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
    Inventors: Guy Peter Bryan-Brown, Victor Chaklam Hui, John Clifford Jones, Ian Charles Sage, Emma Louise Wood
  • Patent number: 6693689
    Abstract: A reflective liquid crystal display includes a linear polarizer for converting natural light into linearly polarized light; a retardation film for converting the linearly polarized light into circularly polarized light; a liquid crystal layer for varying the phase of the light differently depending on the presence or absence of an electric field; a cholesteric liquid crystal color filter for selectively reflecting light received from the liquid crystal layer; and a black background for absorbing light passing through the color filter.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 28, 2000
    Date of Patent: February 17, 2004
    Assignee: LG Philips LCD Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Yong Beom Kim, Soon Bum Kwon, Heume Il Baek
  • Patent number: 6690449
    Abstract: A device that provides a display indicating an absence of power to an LCD is disclosed. The device includes a continuous polarizing filter layer disposed within a display area that makes up a portion of the total display area of the LCD. A layer of liquid crystals is disposed between alignment gratings and optically coupled to the continuous polarizing filter layer. A discontinuous polarizing filter layer is optically coupled to the layer of liquid crystals. The discontinuous polarizing filter layer has a plane of polarization aligned with the plane of polarization of the continuous polarizing filter, and the discontinuous polarizing filter layer comprises a contour within the display area conforming to an image, so that the image is displayed in the absence of an electric field and indicates an absence of power.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: June 11, 2002
    Date of Patent: February 10, 2004
    Assignee: Cisco Technology, Inc.
    Inventors: Edward Inglis, Andrew Cawte
  • Patent number: 6678030
    Abstract: There is provided a liquid crystal display device in which the gap between its transparent substrates can be kept uniform irrespective of whether the temperature of the device is normal temperature or high temperature. The liquid crystal display device includes transparent substrates disposed in opposition to each other with a liquid crystal being interposed therebetween, and plural spacers secured to one of the transparent substrates so as to support the other transparent substrate. The plural spacers include first spacers and second spacers, and the first spacers are formed of a material whose elasticity is higher than that of the second spacers, and are larger in height than the second spacers.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 13, 2001
    Date of Patent: January 13, 2004
    Assignee: Hitachi, Ltd.
    Inventors: Makiko Imabayashi, Shinji Hasegawa, Yasushi Iwakabe
  • Patent number: 6674504
    Abstract: A device and method of manufacturing a single layer multi-state ultra-fast cholesteric liquid crystal includes two optically transparent states with a liquid crystal arranged therebetween, and changing the optical states of the liquid crystal ranging from one state to any combination of broadband reflection, tunable narrow band reflection, light scattering, and transparency in accordance with a voltage applied to the device. A surfactant can be added to reduce the response time and a dichroic dye may be added to include the property of light absorption and reduce the bandwidth. The device can provide any and all of the aforementioned optical states for infrared light, visible light, and ultra-violet light. The desired outputs can be formed according to need, so that predetermined optical states can operate with either no voltage or a particular voltage or voltage range.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 1, 2001
    Date of Patent: January 6, 2004
    Assignee: Kent Optronics, Inc.
    Inventors: Le Li, Deng-Ke Yang
  • Patent number: 6671015
    Abstract: A liquid crystal display includes a pair of substrates which oppose each other with a liquid crystal layer therebetween; a light source provided on the exterior of one of the substrates; and at least an organic film, a metallic reflection film, an overcoat film, an electrode layer, and an alignment film formed on the inner face of one of the substrates. Many concave portions are contiguously formed on a surface of the organic film, the inner surface of each concave portion constituting a part of a spherical surface. The metallic reflection film has a thickness of 80 to 500 Å. A transflector and a liquid crystal display including the transflector are also disclosed.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 17, 2001
    Date of Patent: December 30, 2003
    Assignee: Alps Electric Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Tetsushi Tanada, Mitsuo Ohizumi, Mitsuru Kano
  • Patent number: 6671023
    Abstract: The active matrix display device of this invention operates under two operation modes: a normal operation mode in which the pixel element electrode sequentially receives the pixel element voltage in response to an image signal sequentially inputted and a memory operation mode in which display is made based on the data held by the retaining circuit. In this active matrix display device, at least a part of the retaining circuit is set for the predetermined voltage and functions as a storage capacitance element for holding the voltage between the pixel element electrode and the common electrode under the normal operation mode. In this configuration, it is possible to reduce the size of the storage capacitance element originally disposed, because at least a part of the retaining circuit works as the storage capacitance element. Therefore, as the size of the storage capacitance element gets smaller, the size of the pixel element can also be smaller, leading to the size reduction of the device as a whole.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 6, 2001
    Date of Patent: December 30, 2003
    Assignee: Sanyo Electric Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Yusuke Tsutsui, Ryoichi Yokoyama, Takeo Yoshimura
  • Patent number: 6654089
    Abstract: A self-alignment process for the precise alignment in a deposited diamond-like carbon (DLC), which results in a wider viewing angle for the display being manufactured. The process involves ion bombardment, which is swept across the liquid crystal panel in a two-pass process. In one embodiment, both ion sweeps are aligned at a 45-degree angle with respect to the bottom edge of the panel. The first pass is accomplished without any electrical bias on the panel. During the first pass the impinging ions may be at an angle with respect to a point on a plane defined by the surface of the panel that is less than 90 degrees. The second ion sweep is accomplished with the impinging ions at a second angle, greater than 90 degrees up to 180 degrees with respect to the point on the plane defined by the surface.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: May 3, 2001
    Date of Patent: November 25, 2003
    Assignee: International Business Machines Corporation
    Inventors: Praveen Chaudhari, James P. Doyle, Shui-Chih Lien, Minhua Lu, James L. Speidell, Robert J. Von Gutfeld
  • Patent number: 6642992
    Abstract: A method for manufacturing a liquid crystal display panel includes preparing first and second substrates having an active region, forming a sealant along a periphery of the active region on at least one of the first and second substrates, dispersing a liquid crystal material on the at least one substrate, the liquid crystal material having a photo-reactant material, attaching the first and second substrates, and irradiating ultraviolet light on an entire surface of the at least one substrate.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 7, 2001
    Date of Patent: November 4, 2003
    Assignee: LG.Philips LCD Co., Ltd.
    Inventor: Kyeong Jin Kim
  • Patent number: 6597421
    Abstract: A reflective liquid crystal display element including a liquid crystal cell filling between an upper transparent substrate and lower substrate with liquid crystal, a polarizing film disposed at the upper transparent substrate side of the liquid crystal cell, a birefringent film layer disposed between the polarizing film and liquid crystal, cell and light reflecting means disposed at the lower substrate side of the liquid crystal cell. The display element further includes an undulated layer, which is not formed in the connection terminal between the lower substrate side of the liquid crystal cell and the external circuit board. Preferably, the sectional shape of the transparent electrode in the connection terminal between the display area and external circuit is formed in three stair steps.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: November 13, 2000
    Date of Patent: July 22, 2003
    Assignee: Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Takayuki Hatanaka, Shingo Fujita, Masaki Nishinaka, Hiroshi Mizuno, Tetsu Ogawa
  • Patent number: 6593979
    Abstract: In the packaging of an LCD module within a small and lightweight case, the case comprising a front case and a rear case, a recess with a predetermined depth, formed at the edge of the bottom side of the LCD module, is combined with a boss formed at the case, and a recess with a predetermined depth, formed at the edge of its surface, is fastened to a fastening means for securing the LCD module, thereby minimizing the difference between the areas of the LCD module and the case and further reducing the number of processes required for combining the LCD module with the case. In addition, the recess formed at the surface edge of the LCD module is combined with a fastening hook formed at the rear case so that the LCD module can be secured to the rear case and to the front case without any separate fastening member such as a stud or insert.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 6, 2000
    Date of Patent: July 15, 2003
    Assignee: Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Jin-Ho Ha, Ick-Hwan Lee, Sang-Duk Lee, Yoon-Soo Kwon, Jung-Tae Kang
  • Patent number: 6587173
    Abstract: The present invention relates to a multidomain liquid crystal display device that is capable of appropriately adjusting the angle of the boundary line of a slit formed on one substrate and the pitch of liquid crystal to thereby obtain multidomain for a main viewing angle on each of domains, thereby allowing a simplified manufacturing process and improving the viewing angle and transmissivity. The multidomain liquid crystal display device includes first and second substrates, the first substrate having a plurality of pixel areas, a transparent conductive layer on each pixel area of the first substrate and having at least one or more slits inclined at a prescribed angle with respect to a boundary of the pixel area, and a liquid crystal layer between the first and second substrates.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: July 30, 2001
    Date of Patent: July 1, 2003
    Assignee: G. Philips LCD Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Jang Jin Yoo, Ki Hyuk Yoon
  • Patent number: 6580474
    Abstract: A liquid crystal display device and a method of fabricating the same are disclosed. The device, as disclosed, reduces the number of masks required for fabrication. Thus, cost is reduced and yield is increased. The device includes a plurality of gate lines, a plurality of data lines crossing the gate lines such that active regions are defined near the crossover points, thin film transistors are formed near the active regions, and a plurality of pixel electrodes are formed within regions defined by the adjacent gate and data lines. Also, pixel electrodes overlap gate lines and the two electrodes function as a storage capacitor.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 8, 2000
    Date of Patent: June 17, 2003
    Assignee: LG. Philips LCD Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Byung Chul Ahn, Byung Ho Lim, Soon Sung Yoo, Yong Wan Kim, Young Hun Ha
  • Patent number: 6552761
    Abstract: An apparatus for fixing an optical film used in a back light to an outer frame of the back light. In the back light, a protrusion protrudes from a frame rim of the outer frame. A film extension extends from one side edge of the optical film and is placed on the surface of the frame rim near the protrusion. A clip is provided with a hole for inserting the protrusion to be mounted onto the frame rim such that the protrusion is inserted into the hole, thereby fixing the film extension of the optical film onto the frame rim.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 19, 2000
    Date of Patent: April 22, 2003
    Assignee: LG. Philips LCD Co., Ltd.
    Inventors: Seung Ju Seo, Young Woo Park