Patents by Inventor Jason C. Sauers

Jason C. Sauers 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: 11709365
    Abstract: A head-mountable device can effectively manage heat with a motor assembly that efficiently and accurately senses a temperature of a motor. A temperature sensor can be provided on an outer surface (e.g., case) of the motor. A flex circuit can be operably connect both the motor and the temperature sensor to a controller of the head-mountable device. The flex circuit can have a first side coupled to the outer surface of the case, a second side supporting the temperature sensor, and thermally conductive vias extending from the first side to the second side to conduct heat from the case to the sensor. The flex circuit can further include a memory comprising calibration data of the temperature sensor and a connector for outputting temperature data based on the temperature sensor and the calibration data of the memory.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 12, 2021
    Date of Patent: July 25, 2023
    Assignee: APPLE INC.
    Inventors: Muhammad F. Hossain, Jia Tao, Vijayanish Varadharajan, Alexander M. Brukwinski, Pyone P. Wynn, Hnin Ookhin, Samuel A. Resnick, Aviran Malik, Jason C. Sauers, Amarnath Vuppala
  • Publication number: 20230208079
    Abstract: Cowlings described herein for board-to-board connectors can provide high stiffness, low weight, and low total cost. Such cowlings can provide ribs with increased thickness for targeted stiffness to resist bowing in a given direction. The layers of the cowlings can include carbon fiber extending in directions parallel to the ribs in some layers and transverse to the ribs in other layers. The layers can be formed together within a mold tool that shapes the fibers into the ribs.
    Type: Application
    Filed: November 22, 2022
    Publication date: June 29, 2023
    Inventors: Noell G. JOHNSON, David R. CRAMER, Sina BIGDELI, Edward S. HUO, Jeremy C. FRANKLIN, Jason C. SAUERS
  • Patent number: 11212917
    Abstract: Connector receptacles that may be space efficient and provide a direct connection to a flexible circuit board. One example may provide an electronic device having a receptacle including a recess formed in a housing of the electronic device. The recess may have a sidewall and a bottom surface portion, and the bottom surface portion may include one or more openings extending through the bottom surface portion from an external surface to an internal surface. One or more contacts formed on a flexible circuit board may be aligned with the one or more openings in the bottom surface portion. In this way, the receptacle may be space efficient and provide a direct connection to a flexible circuit board inside an electronic device. A cosmetic cap may be placed in the recess to obscure the existence of the connector receptacle.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 21, 2020
    Date of Patent: December 28, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Dustin J. Verhoeve, Jason C. Sauers, Benjamin J. Kallman
  • Patent number: 11196148
    Abstract: An electronic device such as a wristwatch may have a housing with metal portions such as metal sidewalls. The housing may form an antenna ground for an antenna. An antenna resonating element for the antenna may be formed from a stack of capacitively coupled component layers such as a display layer, touch sensor layer, and near-field communications antenna layer at a front face of the device. An additional antenna may be formed from a peripheral resonating element that runs along a peripheral edge of the device and the antenna ground. A rear face antenna may be formed using a wireless power receiving coil as a radio-frequency antenna resonating element or may be formed from metal antenna traces on a plastic support for light-based components.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 19, 2018
    Date of Patent: December 7, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Rex T. Ehman, Jayesh Nath, Carlo Di Nallo, James G. Horiuchi, Erik G. de Jong, Jason C. Sauers, Makiko K. Brzezinski, Siwen Yong, Lijun Zhang, Yi Jiang, Zheyu Wang, Mario Martinis, Eduardo Da costa Bras Lima, Xu Han, Mattia Pascolini, Trevor J. Ness
  • Patent number: 11187914
    Abstract: A scene camera system that includes two or more mirrors that reflect light from a respective portion of a field of view (FOV) in front of the system and two or more cameras that each capture the light reflected by a respective one of the two or more mirrors. By using the mirrors to reflect the light, the cameras' entrance pupils are imaged to a location closer to a user's eyes to thus achieve a more accurate representation of the perspective of the user.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: September 25, 2019
    Date of Patent: November 30, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Daniel R. Hennigan, Noah D. Bedard, Branko Petljanski, Jason C. Sauers, Edward S. Huo, Ricardo J. Motta, Brett D. Miller, Yury Petrov
  • Publication number: 20210325680
    Abstract: A head-mounted device may have a head-mounted housing. The housing may include a chassis with left and right openings that overlap respective left and right optical modules that present images eye boxes. Each optical module may have a lens and display that presents an image through the lens. The chassis may have an inner frame and outer frame. A middle portion of the chassis may form a stiffened nose bridge structure. Components in the housing such as a display, a fan housing, a heat sink layer, optical module guide rods, and a rear cover may span the width of the housing and may be attached to edge portions of the chassis, thereby forming a box-shaped structure that provides rigidity and helps prevent housing deformation.
    Type: Application
    Filed: February 25, 2021
    Publication date: October 21, 2021
    Inventors: Ivan S. Maric, Aidan N. Zimmerman, Brian Baillargeon, Evan D. Christensen, Jason C. Sauers, Jia Tao, Phil M. Hobson, Sivesh Selvakumar
  • Publication number: 20210271093
    Abstract: A head-mounted display to be worn by a user includes a housing, and an eye chamber to be positioned adjacent to eyes of the user. A support assembly includes a headband and an adjustment mechanism that is operable to change fit of the headband relative to the head of the user in response to a control signal, wherein the adjustment mechanism includes a feedback component, and the control signal is generated based on output from the feedback component.
    Type: Application
    Filed: May 17, 2021
    Publication date: September 2, 2021
    Inventors: Killian J. Poore, Marinus Meursing, Jeffrey C. Olson, Fletcher R. Rothkopf, Jason C. Sauers
  • Patent number: 11106034
    Abstract: A head-mounted display includes an optical assembly and an actuator. The actuator includes a movement mechanism configured to adjust a position of an optical component within the optical assembly, a locking-release mechanism configured to modify operation of the movement mechanism upon detection of a dynamic event, and a dampening mechanism configured to control positional changes of the optical component during the dynamic event.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: April 10, 2020
    Date of Patent: August 31, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Jia Tao, Aidan N. Zimmerman, Phil M. Hobson, Jeremy C. Franklin, Ivan S. Maric, Jason C. Sauers, Jan K. Quijalvo, Eric N. Vergo
  • Patent number: 11036054
    Abstract: A head-mounted display to be worn by a user includes a housing, and an eye chamber to be positioned adjacent to eyes of the user. A support assembly includes a headband and an adjustment mechanism that is operable to change fit of the headband relative to the head of the user in response to a control signal, wherein the adjustment mechanism includes a feedback component, and the control signal is generated based on output from the feedback component.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 31, 2018
    Date of Patent: June 15, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Killian J. Poore, Marinus Meursing, Jeffrey C. Olson, Fletcher R. Rothkopf, Jason C. Sauers
  • Publication number: 20210142736
    Abstract: An electronic device such as a head-mounted device may have displays. The display may have regions of lower and higher resolution to reduce data bandwidth and power consumption for the display while preserving satisfactory image quality. Data lines may be shared by lower and higher resolution portions of a display or different portions of a display with different resolutions may be supplied with different numbers of data lines. Data line length may be varied in transition regions between lower resolution and higher resolution portions of a display to reduce visible discontinuities between the lower and higher resolution portions. The lower and higher resolution portions of the display may be dynamically adjusted using dynamically adjustable gate driver circuitry and dynamically adjustable data line driver circuitry.
    Type: Application
    Filed: January 15, 2021
    Publication date: May 13, 2021
    Inventors: Cheng Chen, Jason C. Sauers, Fletcher R. Rothkopf, David W. Lum, Chun-Yao Huang, Enkhamgalan Dorjgotov, Graham B. Myhre, Bennett S. Wilburn, Paolo Sacchetto, Shih Chang Chang, Wonjae Choi, Cheuk Chi Lo
  • Patent number: 10962788
    Abstract: A pass-through camera in a head-mounted device may capture image data for displaying on a display in the head-mounted device. However, only low-resolution image data may be needed to display low-resolution images in the periphery of the user's field of view on the display. Therefore, the pass-through camera may only capture high-resolution images that correspond to the portion of the user's field-of-view that is being directly viewed and may capture lower resolution image data that corresponds to the real-world objects in the user's peripheral vision. To enable the camera module to selectively capture high-resolution images, the pass-through camera may include an image sensor with two or more pixel densities, a distortion lens, and/or one or more planar or curved mirrors. Any of the components in the camera module may be adjusted to change which portion of a scene is captured with high-resolution image data.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: March 26, 2020
    Date of Patent: March 30, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Edward S. Huo, David A. Schmuck, Jason C. Sauers, Kevin A. Gross
  • Publication number: 20210080746
    Abstract: A head-mounted device includes a first device portion and a second device portion. A first coupler portion of the first device portion is connectable to a second coupler portion of the second device portion to define a connected position in which the first device portion is connected to the second device portion and a disconnected position in which the first device portion is disconnected from the second device portion. A second adjuster portion of the second device portion causes a first adjuster portion of the first device portion to move a first optical module and a second optical module in response to movement of the first device portion and the second device portion from the disconnected position to the connected position.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 15, 2020
    Publication date: March 18, 2021
    Inventors: Anna V. Mirabella, Wey-Jiun Lin, Jia Tao, Aidan N. Zimmerman, Jason C. Sauers, Anthony S. Montevirgen, Andrew Gallaher, Phil M. Hobson, Yoonhoo Jo
  • Publication number: 20210084758
    Abstract: Connector receptacles that may be space efficient and provide a direct connection to a flexible circuit board. One example may provide an electronic device having a receptacle including a recess formed in a housing of the electronic device. The recess may have a sidewall and a bottom surface portion, and the bottom surface portion may include one or more openings extending through the bottom surface portion from an external surface to an internal surface. One or more contacts formed on a flexible circuit board may be aligned with the one or more openings in the bottom surface portion. In this way, the receptacle may be space efficient and provide a direct connection to a flexible circuit board inside an electronic device. A cosmetic cap may be placed in the recess to obscure the existence of the connector receptacle.
    Type: Application
    Filed: September 21, 2020
    Publication date: March 18, 2021
    Applicant: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Dustin J. Verhoeve, Jason C. Sauers, Benjamin J. Kallman
  • Patent number: 10930219
    Abstract: An electronic device such as a head-mounted device may have displays. The display may have regions of lower (L) and higher (M, H) resolution to reduce data bandwidth and power consumption for the display while preserving satisfactory image quality. Data lines may be shared by lower and higher resolution portions of a display or different portions of a display with different resolutions may be supplied with different numbers of data lines. Data line length may be varied in transition regions between lower resolution and higher resolution portions of a display to reduce visible discontinuities between the lower and higher resolution portions. The lower and higher resolution portions of the display may be dynamically adjusted using dynamically adjustable gate driver circuitry and dynamically adjustable data line driver circuitry.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: August 14, 2017
    Date of Patent: February 23, 2021
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Cheng Chen, Jason C. Sauers, Fletcher R. Rothkopf, David W. Lum, Chun-Yao Huang, Enkhamgalan Dorjgotov, Graham B. Myhre, Bennett S. Wilburn, Paolo Sacchetto, Shih Chang Chang, Wonjae Choi, Cheuk Chi Lo
  • Patent number: 10877556
    Abstract: An eye tracking system for detecting position and movements of a user's eyes in a head-mounted display (HMD). The eye tracking system may include at least one near-IR (NIR) eye tracking camera positioned at each side of the user's face and pointed towards eye-facing surfaces of eyepieces of the HMD, an illumination source that emits NIR light towards the user's eyes, and hot mirrors located between the eye-facing surfaces of the eyepieces and the user's eyes. The hot mirrors reflect at least a portion of NIR light, while allowing visible light to pass. The cameras capture images of the user's eyes reflected by the hot mirrors. Positioning the hot mirrors at or near the eye-facing surfaces of the eyepieces allows the cameras to be placed at the sides of the user's face without having to image through the eyepieces.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: October 19, 2017
    Date of Patent: December 29, 2020
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Kathrin Berkner-Cieslicki, Ricardo J. Motta, Se Hoon Lim, Minwoong Kim, Kenichi Saito, Branko Petljanski, Jason C. Sauers, Yoshikazu Shinohara
  • Publication number: 20200400948
    Abstract: A display and vision correction system includes a head-mounted display unit, a glasses frame, and a removable lens assembly. The head-mounted display unit is configured to be worn on a head of a user and includes a display for providing graphical content to the user. The glasses frame is configured to be worn on the head of the user. The removable lens assembly is removably coupleable to the head-mounted display unit and to the glasses frame. The removable lens assembly includes a corrective lens element.
    Type: Application
    Filed: June 18, 2020
    Publication date: December 24, 2020
    Inventors: Ivan S. Maric, Andreas G. Weber, Anna V. Mirabella, Benjamin A. Shaffer, Forrest C. Wang, Jason C. Sauers, Jeremy C. Franklin, Julian Hoenig, Julian Jaede, Kristi E. Bauerly, Stephen E. Dey, Wey-Jiun Lin
  • Publication number: 20200355919
    Abstract: A head-mounted display includes an optical assembly and an actuator. The actuator includes a movement mechanism configured to adjust a position of an optical component within the optical assembly, a locking-release mechanism configured to modify operation of the movement mechanism upon detection of a dynamic event, and a dampening mechanism configured to control positional changes of the optical component during the dynamic event.
    Type: Application
    Filed: April 10, 2020
    Publication date: November 12, 2020
    Inventors: Jia Tao, Aidan N. Zimmerman, Phil M. Hobson, Jeremy C. Franklin, Ivan S. Maric, Jason C. Sauers, Jan K. Quijalvo, Eric N. Vergo
  • Patent number: 10785870
    Abstract: Connector receptacles that may be space efficient and provide a direct connection to a flexible circuit board. One example may provide an electronic device having a receptacle including a recess formed in a housing of the electronic device. The recess may have a sidewall and a bottom surface portion, and the bottom surface portion may include one or more openings extending through the bottom surface portion from an external surface to an internal surface. One or more contacts formed on a flexible circuit board may be aligned with the one or more openings in the bottom surface portion. In this way, the receptacle may be space efficient and provide a direct connection to a flexible circuit board inside an electronic device. A cosmetic cap may be placed in the recess to obscure the existence of the connector receptacle.
    Type: Grant
    Filed: December 9, 2019
    Date of Patent: September 22, 2020
    Assignee: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Dustin J. Verhoeve, Jason C. Sauers, Benjamin J. Kallman
  • Publication number: 20200225489
    Abstract: A pass-through camera in a head-mounted device may capture image data for displaying on a display in the head-mounted device. However, only low-resolution image data may be needed to display low-resolution images in the periphery of the user's field of view on the display. Therefore, the pass-through camera may only capture high-resolution images that correspond to the portion of the user's field-of-view that is being directly viewed and may capture lower resolution image data that corresponds to the real-world objects in the user's peripheral vision. To enable the camera module to selectively capture high-resolution images, the pass-through camera may include an image sensor with two or more pixel densities, a distortion lens, and/or one or more planar or curved mirrors. Any of the components in the camera module may be adjusted to change which portion of a scene is captured with high-resolution image data.
    Type: Application
    Filed: March 26, 2020
    Publication date: July 16, 2020
    Applicant: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Edward S. Huo, David A. Schmuck, Jason C. Sauers, Kevin A. Gross
  • Publication number: 20200187351
    Abstract: Connector receptacles that may be space efficient and provide a direct connection to a flexible circuit board. One example may provide an electronic device having a receptacle including a recess formed in a housing of the electronic device. The recess may have a sidewall and a bottom surface portion, and the bottom surface portion may include one or more openings extending through the bottom surface portion from an external surface to an internal surface. One or more contacts formed on a flexible circuit board may be aligned with the one or more openings in the bottom surface portion. In this way, the receptacle may be space efficient and provide a direct connection to a flexible circuit board inside an electronic device. A cosmetic cap may be placed in the recess to obscure the existence of the connector receptacle.
    Type: Application
    Filed: December 9, 2019
    Publication date: June 11, 2020
    Applicant: Apple Inc.
    Inventors: Dustin J. Verhoeve, Jason C. Sauers, Benjamin J. Kallman