Did You Know...
...that while attempting to develop a super strong glue, 3M employee Spencer Silver accidentally developed a glue that was so weak it would barely hold two pieces of paper together? However, his colleague Art Fry needed the glue. Fry sang with his church choir and marked the pages of his hymnal with small scraps of paper that often fell out. He used Silver's glue to hold the papers in place. Today we call this invention Post-it Notes.
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| Number | Title | Issue Date |
| 7936647 | Optical information recording/reproducing device and associated method for increasing recording/reproducing speed An optical information recording device includes: a section that acquires recording information that should be recorded on an optical information recording medium on which information are recorded by forming a recording mark at a position where an optical beam is fo... | 05/03/2011 |
| 7778124 | Method and system for fluid mediated disk activation and deactivation Embodiments of methods and systems for controlling access to information stored on memory or data storage devices are disclosed. In various embodiments, fluid-mediated modification of information or access to information is utilized. According to various embodiments... | 08/17/2010 |
| 7403465 | Method and apparatus for writing on an optical disk with beam spots aligned at an angle to data tracks Data is written on a plurality of data tracks on an optical disk by a plurality of laser beams. The spots illuminated by the beams are spaced apart to prevent thermal interference. The spots are aligned along a line at an angle to the tangent of the data tracks. The... | 07/22/2008 |
| 7304918 | Servo error signal generation circuit and servo error signal generation method A servo error signal generation circuit comprises a first sampling unit for sampling first detection signals at first sampling timings, a second sampling unit for sampling second detection signals at second sampling timings which are obtained by periodically thinnin... | 12/04/2007 |
| 7283440 | Tracking error signal detecting method selectively using a push-pull method, an improved push-pull method, and a three beam method and optical recording/reproducing apparatus using the same An optical recording/reproducing apparatus includes an optical pickup and a signal processor. The optical pickup includes an optical splitting device which splits light emitted from a first light source into a main light beam and sub-light beams which are symmetrica... | 10/16/2007 |
| 7266072 | Semiconductor laser unit and optical head device A semiconductor laser unit includes a plurality of semiconductor laser elements arranged parallel with one another in a laser beam-emitting direction, and a base for positioning and fixing the plurality of semiconductor laser elements. The plurality of semiconductor... | 09/04/2007 |
| 7218451 | Integrated optical multiplexer and demultiplexer Optical multiplexers and demultiplexers are provided. In one implementation an apparatus is provided. The apparatus includes a first laser diode pair, a second laser diode pair, a polarization rotator coupled between the first and the second laser diode pairs, and a... | 05/15/2007 |
| 7215609 | Optical reproducing apparatus An optical reproducing apparatus that uses a hologram laser module and is applicable to a DVD Multi drive, wherein five sub spots of light in total that are most suitable to perform the differential push-pull tracking both for DVD-RAM and for DVD-R/RW are irradiated... | 05/08/2007 |
| 7187819 | Optical power distribution management and apparatus A method, apparatus and computer program are disclosed for managing the distribution of optical power to a plurality of optical data devices. The devices can be data storage drives, data replicators, fast optical search devices, or other components that use optical ... | 03/06/2007 |
| 7187631 | Disc apparatus for reproducing a signal on a disc using a laser beam A disc apparatus (10) includes an optical lens (14). A laser beam is irradiated onto a recording surface of the magneto-optical disc (68) through the optical lens (14), and a TE signal or an RF signal is detected on the basis of the laser... | 03/06/2007 |
| 7180833 | Information recording and/or reproducing apparatus An information recording and/or reproducing apparatus includes a laser light source from which a laser beam having a wavelength of from 220 nm to 280 nm exits; and a converging lens unit disposed at a nearfield area of a recording medium and upon which the laser bea... | 02/20/2007 |
| 7164630 | Optical disk apparatus A Differential Phase Detecting (DPD) tracking error generating section generates a DPD tracking error signal from a plurality of sense signals supplied from an optical sensor. A Push Pull (PP) tracking error generating section generates a PP tracking error signal fr... | 01/16/2007 |
| 7162035 | Authentication method and system The present invention provides a method and apparatus for the production and labeling of objects in a manner suitable for the prevention and detection of counterfeiting. Thus, the system incorporates a variety of features that make unauthorized reproduction difficul... | 01/09/2007 |
| 7151724 | Disk recording apparatus and disk recording method A disk recording apparatus for recording data to a disk includes: a reading and writing element for emitting a read beam onto the disk to read out recorded data therefrom while emitting a plurality of write beams simultaneously onto the disk to record data thereto i... | 12/19/2006 |
| 7151719 | Method for reducing the noise in a wobble signal The present invention relates to a method and a circuit for recovering information contained in a wobble track of an optical storage medium. One aim of the invention is to describe a method within an appliance for reading from and/or writing to optical storage media... | 12/19/2006 |
| 7095693 | Optical disc device and control method using preceding sub-beam to detect a disc defect The invention relates to an optical disc device and a control method for the optical disc device. The presence of defects on an optical disc is confirmed by, based on the result of detecting a return light corresponding to a sub-beam spot used for tracking control, ... | 08/22/2006 |
| 7088646 | Track search control circuit and optical disc drive Disclosed is a track-search control circuit for performing track-search of an optical disc stably even at the time of multi-speed reproduction of the optical disc. The track search control circuit comprises a circuit for detecting the light beam having traversed the... | 08/08/2006 |
| 7054242 | System and method for controlling focus in an optical disc drive A system for controlling focus in an optical disc drive for optical media with a premastered area that cannot be overwritten and a user-writeable area that can be overwritten includes instructions for turning focus on and off; and for acquiring focus on the optical ... | 05/30/2006 |
| 7048388 | Projection optical system, magnification projection optical system, magnification projection apparatus, and image projection apparatus A projection optical system guiding and projecting a light beam from a projected object surface onto a projection surface in an upstream-downstream direction through a transmission dioptric system and a reflection dioptric system. An intermediate image surface of th... | 05/23/2006 |
| 7035177 | Method and apparatus for aberration correction In a method and an apparatus for aberration correction according to the invention, aberration occurring in recording/reproducing information derived from causes such as thickness variation of a substrate, a tilt, a focus error and a tracking error is detected, and t... | 04/25/2006 |
| 7020061 | Device and method for preventing excess current flowing into pick-up head of optical storage device A method for detecting a current through a pick-up head in an optical storage device. An output value is first set and a root-mean-square value corresponding to the current is further obtained. Next, compute a new value according to the root-mean-square value and a ... | 03/28/2006 |
| 6999657 | High density optical data storage A data storage apparatus includes an array of optical fibers. The array has a first end and a second end. The first end of the array includes multiple optical fiber ends, each optical fiber end having an end face adapted for receiving light of a wavelength λ into t... | 02/14/2006 |
| 6985414 | Method and apparatus for writing on an optical disk with beam spots aligned at an angle to data tracks Data is written on a plurality of data tracks on an optical disk by a plurality of laser beams. The spots illuminated by the beams are spaced apart to prevent thermal interference. The spots are aligned along a line at an angle to the tangent of the data tracks. The... | 01/10/2006 |
| 6980495 | Optical recording apparatus with interleaving blank rounds into spiral track In an optical recording apparatus having an optical pickup, a rotating section is provided for rotating an optical disk which is formed thereon with a guide groove to define a spiral track having a plurality of rounds. The optical pickup has a light source for gener... | 12/27/2005 |
| 6980497 | Optical disk recording apparatus and control method thereof An optical system of an optical disk recording apparatus irradiates a disk with a main beam for use in writing a data signal onto a disk and a sub-beam succeeding the main beam. When writing a data signal onto the disk, a site on the disk at which a data signal is w... | 12/27/2005 |
| 6963522 | Optical head apparatus and optical information recording and reproducing apparatus Light emitted from a laser is separated into a main beam, first sub beams, and second sub beams. The distribution intensity of each first sub beams is the same as that of the main beam. The distribution intensity of each second sub beam is different from that of the... | 11/08/2005 |
| 6947364 | Detecting track jumps during reading or writing of data on an optical disk In use of an optical disk such as a Digital Versatile Disk (DVD) it is sometimes desirable to detect if a track jump occurs as quickly as possible after the occurrence. The optical disk format includes a pre-groove track structure which provides the frame work upon ... | 09/20/2005 |
| 6934227 | Optical disk device, semiconductor integrated circuit, pickup control method and vibration component detection method To increase the vibration resistance of an optical disk device with respect to vibrations in the focus direction. More specifically, an optical disk device is provided with a multiplication means for generating a focus vibration component FC from the focus error sig... | 08/23/2005 |
| 6930812 | Multi-beam light scanning optical system and image forming apparatus using same A multi-beam light scanning optical system includes n (n≧2) light source means having m (m≧2) light emitting points; beam synthesizing means for synthesizing n×m light beams emitted by the light source means; deflecting means for deflecting n×m light beams fro... | 08/16/2005 |
| 6912192 | Semiconductor laser unit and optical head device A semiconductor laser unit includes a plurality of semiconductor laser elements arranged parallel with one another in a laser beam-emitting direction, and a base for positioning and fixing the plurality of semiconductor laser elements. The plurality of semiconductor... | 06/28/2005 |
| 6894955 | Quick access information read and write devices There are provided an information write device and an information read device enabling to generate highly accurate contrast signals. When a main light spot Pc is located at the center of the a groove G, the light spot Pc and sub light spots Psa, Psb are each adapted... | 05/17/2005 |
| 6891675 | Optical device There is disclosed an optical device in which a first light source for outputting a first wavelength light is apart from a second light source for outputting a second wavelength light by a predetermined distance. An information recording medium is irradiated with th... | 05/10/2005 |
| 6882605 | FOCUSING METHOD, METHOD OF DETECTING FOCAL POINT DEVIATION, METHOD OF FORMING MASTER OF DATA STORAGE MEDIUM, FOCUSING CONTROL UNIT, UNIT FOR DETECTING FOCAL POINT DEVIATION, AND UNIT FOR FORMING MASTER OF DATA STORAGE MEDIUM Focusing control for maintaining a distance between an objective lens and a recording medium constant is executed using light whose wavelength is longer than that of recording light and whose detection sensitivity is better than that of the recording light, and a de... | 04/19/2005 |
| 6819639 | Method and apparatus for multi-channel auto-focus A method and apparatus are disclosed for a multi-channel imaging system wherein the beams of light corresponding to each channel can be individually auto-focussed. Individual channel focussing permits image data to be recorded on a surface of variable depth, such as... | 11/16/2004 |
| 6813235 | Optical pickup apparatus an optical axis correcting element An optical pickup apparatus has a simplified configuration for using a plurality of laser beams at different wavelength to reduce the size, and a laser diode chip for use therewith. An irradiation light path for leading a laser beam emitted from a light emitter to a... | 11/02/2004 |
| 6809996 | Optical head, optical recording/reproducing apparatus and laser module Two light sources radiating two light beams having different wavelengths are simultaneously operated. Reflected beams of these two types of laser beams from an optical recording medium are simultaneously detected by two detectors. When one of the two types of light ... | 10/26/2004 |
| 6766414 | Methods, apparatus and system for caching data The invention relates to caching data in a data processing system including a host computer and a storage subsystem including at least one customer disk and a cache disk. Write transactions are received specifying data to be written to at least one customer disk and... | 07/20/2004 |
| 6738325 | Optical disk unit capable of reducing tracking offset An optical disk unit, which performs tracking control by generating a tracking error signal based on detection signals of reflected lights of a main light beam for recording and reproduction and sub light beams for tracking, includes a first tracking error generatio... | 05/18/2004 |
| 6714493 | Optical disk apparatus An optical disk apparatus of the present invention includes: a light irradiator operable to converge a light beam and to irradiate an information carrier (a recording medium) with the converged light beam; a moving means operable to move a converging point of the li... | 03/30/2004 |
| 6704096 | Exposure apparatus and exposure method In an exposure apparatus and an exposure method, a disc master to be used in the preparation of an optical disc is applied to an exposure device, making it possible to perform exposure on a disc master for an optical disc which is substantially improved i... | 03/09/2004 |
