Abstract: A method and apparatus for storing, in scrambled form, information relating to the personal features of a person. This information can be stored on a portable storage medium which can be carried by the person and used to gain access to a secured area by on-site decoding and verification of the stored information.

Abstract: The fingerprint sensor derives an electric output signal in accordance with the topographic relief of the finger under investigation. The sensor incorporates a contact body which is formed at least in part by a light-transparent elastic material. The contact body, preferably a flat sensor plate made of said elastic material and attached to a flat supporting plate, has a light receiving surface and a contact surface for receiving a contact pressure by the finger. Before an investigation process is started, the contact surface is smooth. By pressing the finger against the contact surface, the contact surface will attain a shape conforming to the fingerprint pattern of the finger. The sensor also incorporates a light source, a photodetector and an optical system. The light source obliquely passes light to the contact surface which reflects a light beam modulated in accordance with the fingerprint. The optical system passes the reflected light beam to the light sensitive area of the photodetector.

Abstract: A sensor for measuring a physical parameter at a first location which is remote from a second location. The sensor has a plurality of light transmitting fibers each having an input end for receiving light from a source and an output end for emitting the received light to a light detector and a lens for focusing light from the source on one of the input ends of the light transmitting fibers. The lens is displaced to project light to a specific one of the input ends of the fibers in accordance with the value of the physical parameter to be measured.

Abstract: The fingerprint sensor transforms the fingerprint information of a finger under investigation into an electric output signal. The sensor incorporates a contact device or sensor plate of a piezoelectric material. This sensor plate has a contact surface. The finger exercises a contact pressure thereon and changes thereby the distribution of electric charges on the contact surface. The new charge distribution is in accordance with the fingerprint pattern of the finger. The sensor further incorporates an electric device which provides the electric output signal in accordance with the distribution of charges.

Abstract: The fingerprint sensor device derives an electric output signal in accordance with the topographic relief of a finger under investigation. The sensor incorporates a radiation source, a fingerbed, a first radiation transmitting device, a scanning device, a second radiation transmitting device, and a measuring device responsive to the radiation. The fingerbed has an opening for passing a beam of radiation (light or ultrasound, for instance) from the source therethrough. The scanning device scans this beam of radiation across the finger. Thus, the finger relief is directly scanned by a beam of small impingement spot. The back scattered radiation is directed to the measuring device. Here, the intensity distribution is determined.

Abstract: An automobile identification system and a method for producing it are disclosed. The system utilizes a conventional license plate with alpha-numeric characters conveying identifying information perceptible by the unaided eye in combination with a hologram embodying encoded identifying information which cannot be decoded by the unaided eye.

Abstract: The fingerprint transducer contains a sensing member having a sensing surface for receiving a fingerprint. The sensing member is made of a material which has a transition or softening temperature that is higher than ambient temperature and close to the temperature of the finger. Particularly, the softening temperature is chosen such that the material of the sensing member will start to melt on the surface when the finger is pressed against the sensing surface. The sensing surface has a surface relief of random roughness. In other words, the sensing surface has variations in elevation which do not show a specific pattern. The method for analyzing fingerprints comprises the steps of generating a surface relief of random space on a sensing surface of a sensing member, generating the fingerprint on the sensing surface by pressing a finger thereto, and optically reading the fingerprint from the sensing surface.

Abstract: The fiber optical measuring device contains a fiber optical transmission line into whose input end are directed a first and a second light beam. Both light beams have wavelengths differing from each other. Associated with the output end of the transmission line is a mirror. This mirror passes the transmitted second light beam therethrough and reflects the transmitted first light beam back into the transmission line. Associated with the output end is also a sensor for measuring a physical parameter. This sensor receives the second light beam and returns a portion thereof back into the output end. This portion depends on the parameter to be measured. Arranged at the input end of the transmission line is an optical device which separates the reflected portion of the first light beam from the returned portion of the second light beam.

Abstract: The liquid level indicator contains a number of first light fibers, a number of second light fibers, optical lens means interposed between each output end of the first fibers and an associated input end of the second fibers, and light detectors associated with the output ends of the second fibers. The optical lens means has substantially the same index of refraction as the liquid. When the lens means is not immersed into the liquid, it focusses light from the first fiber to the second fiber. This focussing effect is eliminated when the lens is submerged into the liquid.

Abstract: There is disclosed an input sensor unit for a fingerprint verification system. A sensor plate facing a fingerbed is composed of a transparent polymer which is elastic so as to form a latent topographic relief of a finger pattern. A sensing light beam is coupled into the sensor plate through one edge surface. An output light beam emitted through a planar surface of the sensor plate at the opposite side of the fingerbed is directed onto the light sensitive area of an electro-optical sensing array. In the optical path of the output light beam there is arranged an optical lens for focusing the output light beam onto the light sensitive area and an optical filter for masking out the direct light of the output light beam.

Abstract: The fingerprint transducer contains a sensing member having a sensing surface for receiving a fingerprint, a device for generating an electrostatic charge on the sensing surface and a heating device for heating the sensing surface up to a temperature which is approximately the softening temperature of the sensing member. The method for enhancing fingerprints comprises the steps of generating the fingerprint on the sensing surface, electrostatically charging the sensing surface, heating the sensing surface up to the softening temperature, and thereafter cooling down the sensing member.

Abstract: An identification card, which has an increased safeguard against counterfeiting, comprises both a hologram containing information and information which is visible recorded in a single layer of recording material disposed on a substrate. The card is produced by first recording the visible information on a layer and then recording a hologram in a portion of the layer. Since the hologram may include both the visible information of the card and information which is coded to be read only by a machine, the process for evaluating the hologram converts the reconstructed hologram into electrical signals by means of a vidicon. Then the signals, which correspond to the machine-readable coded information, are separated from the other signals and processed separately.

Abstract: A process of recording information which is in the form of electrical signals by pulse amplitude modulating an object wave and directing it with a reference wave onto a moving light-sensitive storage medium to record hybrid holograms thereon characterized in that the object beam is split into a plurality of parallel object beams each of which is individually and separately pulse modulated with a separate signal to be recorded, focusing the parallel modulated beams into an astigmatic object wave and focusing the reference wave into an astigmatic reference wave, with each wave having a focal line extending parallel to the direction of feed being coplanar and each wave having a focal line which is extending perpendicular to the direction of feed being mirror symmetrical to the storage medium. Preferably, the rate of advance or feed of the storage medium is controlled so that the individual holograms are overlapping.

Abstract: An identification card with a holographic security safeguard in the form of a large area Lippmann-Bragg hologram recorded on a layer or sheet-like carrier disposed on a face of the identification card, capable of being read out without the use of laser light, employing merely normal light sources which produce incoherent light, whereby an image can be observed with the naked eye, and which can contain both binary and analog information, comparable, for example, with printed and other information contained on the identification card; and a method of producing such a card.

Abstract: A falsification-proof identity card comprises a first transparent layer on the underneath side of which conventional data is applied by printing technology. The card contains a holographic safeguard and additional safety measures such as metal structures, fluorescent structures, safety imprints and the like which are only visible in response to holographic reconstruction and/or other light applications, such as ultra-violet light. The holographic safeguard comprises a second transparent or non-transparent layer which carries on the entire surface which faces the first layer a phase hologram or an amplitude hologram which can be read out by light transmission or by light reflection, depending on the transparency of the layer, and which contains at least the visible data printed on the first layer in a direct recording.

Abstract: A method and apparatus for recording data in parallel extending information channels or tracks on a storage tape characterized by the object beam and reference beam being commonly and sequentially deflected in a direction perpendicular to the parallel information tracks or channels. The invention is also directed to a method of retrieving or reading-out the information which includes focusing a retrieval beam on the tracks with a cylindrical lens to either simultaneously illuminate each of the tracks and sequentially detect the information contained in the individual tracks or deflecting the focused beam sequentially in a vertical direction from track to track for sequentially retrieving the information recorded thereon.

Abstract: An arrangement for effecting holographic recording of information occurring in the form of electrical signals, wherein a coherent object wave which has been pulse modulated by an electrical signal is to be recorded, and a coherent reference wave is used to produce a unidimensional hologram upon a moving photosensitive storage medium, and a divergent reference wave and a convergent object wave, or a convergent reference wave and a divergent object wave, or two convergent reference and object waves or two divergent object and reference waves are used. The present invention defines the equation for the position of the reference and object points so as to provide accuracy in reproducing the holograms.

Abstract: An apparatus for sequential data storage employing a coherent light source from which an object wave and a reference wave source symmetrical to one another are created, each wave being directed through a spherical lens and then a plane-parallel, transparent plate to a moving storage medium for recording. Each of the plane-parallel transparent plates may be fixed selectively either normal to the path of its respective wave or obliquely to the path.