Did You Know...
...During the Civil War, the Confederacy established its own Patent Office which issued 266 patents, a third of which concerned implements of war.
PatentStorm News
Make the Most of Our Site
See this month's Top Inventors and Most Cited Patents.
Stay on top of the latest innovations by subscribing to an RSS feed.
Registered users: Manage your profile.
| Number | Title | Issue Date |
| 6230071 | Depth enhancement of ion sensitized data A process of fabricating a durable data storage medium is disclosed, the durable data storage medium capable of storing, digital or alphanumeric characters as well as graphical shapes or characters. Additionally, a durable data storage medium including a ... | 05/08/2001 |
| 6225638 | Disc discrimination device and disc discrimination method In a disc discrimination device provided with a disc apparatus on which a plurality of types of disc can be loaded, when a disc D is loaded on a turntable, detection light is irradiated from light irradiation means 3 and light receiving means 4 receives t... | 05/01/2001 |
| 6225614 | Lens barrel and motion compensation device having a motion compensation optical system position detection unit A motion compensation device to compensate for motion of an optical system causing image blur, and having a position detection device to detect a position of a motion compensation optical system relative to a lens barrel. The position detection device inc... | 05/01/2001 |
| 6218655 | Optical pickup An optical pickup for irradiating a light beam onto an information recording medium and receiving a light reflected by the medium, includes a light source for emitting a light beam, and a liquid crystal panel for diffracting the light beam to produce a ma... | 04/17/2001 |
| 6207942 | Optical pickup device, error detection device, and detection method therefore A reflected beam 6 is diffracted by regions 7a and 7b of a hologram 71, these diffracted beams are converged or diverged, and &#b1;1-order diffracted beams from each region are received by light-receiving regions 9a+to 9b-arranged apart from the center of... | 03/27/2001 |
| 6201229 | Light intensity converter The light intensity converter comprises a transparent body including opposite first and second curved surfaces. The body is surrounded by an outer peripheral surface extending between the first and second curved surfaces. The body of the converter is arra... | 03/13/2001 |
| 6201228 | Optical pickup integrated with optical system In an optical pickup, a beam splitter is arranged on an optical path between a hologram and a grating. Beam splitter includes a first reflecting surface reflecting part of a beam reflected from a disk, and a second reflecting surface arranged parallel to ... | 03/13/2001 |
| 6198085 | Repeat control apparatus, information reproducing apparatus and information recording apparatus A repeat control apparatus is installed in an information reproducing apparatus. The repeat control apparatus performs a repeat control on a control signal. The control signal includes control information to be used for controlling reproduction of recordi... | 03/06/2001 |
| 6184512 | Semiconductor laser apparatus and optical pickup apparatus A semiconductor laser apparatus comprises a semiconductor substrate, a semiconductor laser which is fixed on the semiconductor substrate and a prism having a slanted plane. The prism is placed such that its slanted plane faces a side across from the semic... | 02/06/2001 |
| 6181422 | Optical surface measurement apparatus and methods An optical surface measurement device is disclosed. A beam of light is focused through an optical system into a spot on a sample and the optical system collects light reflected and scattered by the sample forming an image of the illuminated part of the sa... | 01/30/2001 |
| 6181491 | Optical head device, information recording and reproducing apparatus and optical system An optical head device capable of stably positioning an information head device even if a distance between the object point and the image point is reduced so as to miniaturize the device can be realized. The optical head device comprises a semiconductor l... | 01/30/2001 |
| 6178145 | Focus servo control system and disk reproducing system A focus servo control system is a system for selectively applying a light beam to a disk on which data is recorded on plurally layered recording surfaces and setting the focus position of the light beam on a selected recording surface of the two-layered r... | 01/23/2001 |
| 6172375 | Distance measurement apparatus having dual distance measuring means This invention allows photography even when distance measurement is impossible, reduces the number of out-of-focus photographs, and reduces the cost of an apparatus. In this distance measurement apparatus, an object is illuminated with an auxiliary light-... | 01/09/2001 |
| 6172350 | Optical head and an optical information reading method applied therein To provide an optical head wherein no collimate lens nor object lens is used and photo-detection can be made with more than one reflection beams, the optical head has an optical system (101) comprising a collimate hologram (104) working as a collimate len... | 01/09/2001 |
| 6154425 | Driving apparatus of an optical recording medium A low-speed focus servo operation in which an objective lens is moved slowly is performed in a start process that is executed after mounting of an optical recording medium. On the other hand, a high-speed focus search operation in which the objective lens... | 11/28/2000 |
| 6154275 | Optical disc inspection equalization system and method A system and method are provided that allow an optical media inspection device to detect defects on or in optical media despite the presence of gross deformations in the media that would otherwise interfere with the inspection process. A holding device ho... | 11/28/2000 |
| 6144470 | Holographic optical element with castellated aperture In an optical positioning system, a holographic optical element having a plurality of rectangular apertures has predetermined ones of its aperture edges castellated or notched in order to null out undesired light energy in target areas. The apertures may ... | 11/07/2000 |
| 6137580 | Autofocus system A method and apparatus for an improved autofocus in an optical system is presented. The improved autofocus system uses distinct optics from those of the primary optical system. Although optically distinct, physically, the autofocus optics are mechanically... | 10/24/2000 |
| 6134055 | Objective lens and optical pickup device An objective lens for condensing a light beam, has at least one of annular grooves and ridges producing a phase difference. Each of the annular groove and ridge is formed concentrically on at least one of an incident surface which said light beam is intro... | 10/17/2000 |
| 6133562 | Optical disk apparatus An optical disk apparatus comprises a focus error detecting section for detecting whether a focus error in a focus servo operation during a seek operation which is an optical pickup is moved from a given position on an optical disk to another given positi... | 10/17/2000 |
| 6130418 | Optical scanning unit having a main lens and an auxiliary lens An optical scanning device for scanning an optically readable record carrier (1) includes a radiation source (5), a radiation-sensitive detection system (7), and an optical scanning unit for focusing a scanning beam (3) produced by the radiation source to... | 10/10/2000 |
| 6104019 | Device for and method of focus control, and information reproduction apparatus having the device The first detection unit detects a focus search state in which focus search is required. The second detection unit detects one of the plurality of layers currently being accessed, i.e., information is being recorded or reproduced. Then, the focus search u... | 08/15/2000 |
| 6087644 | Focus capture for optical disc system including detection of quad sum signal to close focus A system for focus capture wherein a lens is initially retracted to the bottom of its stroke, moved up to the top of its stroke while looking for the maximum Quad Sum signal, then moved back away from the disc while the system looks for the total light co... | 07/11/2000 |
| 6034364 | Optical disc system including focus capture assembly with focus error signal circuit and method for operating same An improved method for operating an optical disc system having a focusing mechanism, a tracking mechanism, and a lens. The method includes the steps of impinging light upon a disc to be read, moving the lens to a first position by driving an actuator, mon... | 03/07/2000 |
| 5998776 | Track jump controlling unit capable of correctly jumping light beam spot of photo pickup device from one of tracks to other one of tracks In a track jump controlling unit, a tracking error detecting circuit detects a tracking error signal in response to a light beam detecting signal from a photo detecting circuit. A zero cross detecting circuit detects a zero cross of the tracking error sig... | 12/07/1999 |
| 5982513 | Method and system to align holographic images A method and a system to re-align onto a detector array a holographic image of a Fourier region hologram stored in a medium, with the medium spinning around a first axis, and the hologram being generated by a reference beam and a signal beam. In generatin... | 11/09/1999 |
| 5978148 | Beam projecting device A beam projecting apparatus includes a light source that emits a laser beam and a colliminating lens that renders the emitted laser beam a substantially parallel beam. A beam projecting device includes a beam projecting portion from which the laser beam i... | 11/02/1999 |
| 5974009 | Focus control device and method for use in multilayer optical disk reproduction system In making a layer jump or focus search on a multilayer optical disk having two or more signal recorded layers, an objective lens is moved in a focusing direction to focus a laser beam onto a desired signal recorded layer with focus servo kept OFF. Based o... | 10/26/1999 |
| 5939710 | Optical pickup system incorporating therein a beam splitter having a phase layer An optical pickup system reads an information signal stored on a recording surface of an optical disk. The optical pickup system comprises a light source for generating a light beam including a P and an S polarization component with a wavelength λ1 | 08/17/1999 |
| 5939714 | Tracking error detector employing phase difference detection method A tracking error detector employing a phase difference detection method, comprising a photo detector for generating four divided signals, a first adder for adding two of the four divided signals from the photo detector, a second adder for adding the remai... | 08/17/1999 |
| 5940174 | Optical disc inspection equalization system and method A system and method are provided that allow an optical media inspection device to detect defects on or in optical media despite the presence of gross deformations in the media that would otherwise interfere with the inspection process. A holding device ho... | 08/17/1999 |
| 5905255 | Objective lens driver In a objective lens driver, at least one permanent magnet is mounted on a movable member, and plural yokes, each being wound with a coil having its winding axis in the focusing direction, are disposed facing the permanent magnet. The yokes are arranged al... | 05/18/1999 |
| 5905254 | Compact sized optical pickup system An optical pickup system reads an information signal from stored on a recording surface of an optical disk. The optical pickup system includes a light source for generating a light beam including a P and an S polarization component with a wavelength λ | 05/18/1999 |
| 5900619 | Optical device comprising a photodetector for detecting light scattered outside a diffraction limit of an objective lens For the sake of reducing the number of parts and simplifying adjustment for the optical positions of the parts in an optical device wherein information signals from the light scattered or diffracted which is derived from an optical recording medium are de... | 05/04/1999 |
| 5898167 | Optical pick-up head and integrated type optical unit for use in optical pick-up head An optical pick-up head for reading writing information from on a magneto-optical record medium including a semiconductor laser, a multi-image plane parallel plate for separating an incident light beam emitted by the semiconductor laser from a return ligh... | 04/27/1999 |
| 5894370 | Inclination monitoring system An inclination status monitoring system which optically detects an inclination of a lens as it changes its inclination. A light beam having a diameter greater than the diameter of the lens to be inclined is incident on the lens. The lens has a planar refl... | 04/13/1999 |
| 5850081 | Method for generating a focus error signal due to astigmatism and optical pickup device using the same A method of generating a focus error signal in an optical pickup device including a photodetector including a light receiving surface for receiving the reflected light and divided into first to fourth quadrants defined in a tangential direction and in a r... | 12/15/1998 |
| 5828054 | Focusing method and system for focus capture and focus control in optical disc system including detection of Quad Sum signal to close focus An improved focusing method including focus capture and focus control in an optical disc system having a lens and a disc. The method includes the steps of impinging light upon a disc to be read; moving the lens to a first position; monitoring a Quad Sum s... | 10/27/1998 |
| 5825022 | Polarizer, including thin polarizing film, optical element with polarizer, optical head with polarizer and methods and apparatus for forming same A plurality of inclined planes (1419) are formed in the same substrate (1406) and a polarizing optical thin film is provided on these inclined planes. These inclined planes are filled with a transparent material so as to form a small sized and complexed p... | 10/20/1998 |
| 5814807 | Optical pick-up head and integrated type optical unit for use in optical pick-up head An optical pick-up head for reading writing information from on a magneto-optical record medium including a semiconductor laser, a multi-image plane parallel plate for separating an incident light beam emitted by the semiconductor laser from a return ligh... | 09/29/1998 |
