Did You Know...
...that the inventor of the electric motor was a blacksmith named Thomas Davenport? Described as "a brilliantly unsuccessful inventor", Davenport invented the first rotary electric motor. In 1836 he headed out -- on foot -- from his Vermont home to file a patent application at the Patent Office in Washington, D.C. By the time he got there, he had squandered away his money and couldn't afford the $30 filing fee so he turned around and went home. When he later mailed in his application with money he'd raised, the Patent office was destroyed in a fire. He did finally get credit for his invention on Feb. 5, 1837.
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 |
| 7916765 | Control circuit for a laser diode and a method to control a laser diode A control circuit for a laser diode is disclosed, in which the driving current may be suppressed even when the monitor PD breaks down to make the APC feedback control inoperable. The control circuit comprises an LD driver to supply the driving current to the LD, a m... | 03/29/2011 |
| 7885301 | Laser safety system A computer may include a database and a power reducing routine. The database may be configured to store an input power level of an input laser beam transmitted onto and storing power within a gain module. The database may be further configured to store a discharge p... | 02/08/2011 |
| 7860136 | Fault tolerant laser diode package A laser diode package (10) according to the present invention is tolerant of short-circuit and open-circuit failures. The laser diode package (10) includes a laser diode bar (12), a forward-biased diode (14), a heat sink (18), and ... | 12/28/2010 |
| 7817690 | Laser generator and method of controlling the same A laser generator includes a generation means for pumping by a pumping light source (7) a pumping medium (3) to generate a fundamental-wave laser beam, an output sensor (6) for measuring average output power or pulse energy of the fundamental-wa... | 10/19/2010 |
| 7756174 | Laser projector safety monitoring system An apparatus and method for a laser light projector, including a laser beam generated by a laser light source; a scanner associated with the laser light source and having one or more moving mirrors capable of scanning the laser beam along X-Y coordinates; a power me... | 07/13/2010 |
| 7653103 | Pulse oscillating type solid laser unit and laser process unit A pulse oscillating type solid laser unit that has a laser unit body whose exciting source is a laser diode that emits light in a principal energy absorbing spectrum of a solid laser activated media, and characterized by that prior to radiating laser light outside t... | 01/26/2010 |
| 7609736 | Laser power control arrangements in electro-optical readers Laser power control arrangements interrupt power to a laser used in electro-optical readers upon detection of an over-power condition not conforming to preestablished regulatory standards. In one embodiment, during an operational mode, a difference between laser dri... | 10/27/2009 |
| 7512164 | Laser drive IC and optical transceiver using same A laser driver IC has an RS flip-flop for latching a signal that indicates an event of fault detection, to output it as an internal fault signal, and a fault signal processing section for generating a disable signal for inactivating the driving function of the laser... | 03/31/2009 |
| 7443897 | Method for distinguish failure modes in an APC circuit and an optical transmitter using the same The present invention provides an optical transmitter that enables to distinguish failure modes of the auto-power control (APC) of the laser diode (LD). The transmitter provides the APC circuit comprised of the driver for supplying the driving current, the LD, the P... | 10/28/2008 |
| 7443896 | Optical midpoint power control and extinction ratio control of a semiconductor laser The present invention provides a method and apparatus, such as an integrated circuit, to control the optical midpoint power level and the extinction ratio of a semiconductor laser and maintain the optical midpoint power level and the extinction ratio substantially c... | 10/28/2008 |
| 7433378 | Optical element and method for manufacturing the same An optical element includes: a substrate; a surface-emitting type semiconductor laser that is provided on the substrate and emits laser light in a direction orthogonal to a surface of the substrate; a rectification element that is provided on the substrate and conne... | 10/07/2008 |
| 7365368 | Surface-emitting type wafer and method for manufacturing the same, and burn-in method for surface-emitting type wafers To simplify the burn-in process and reduce its cost for a surface-emitting type wafer and its manufacturing method, and for a burn-in method for a surface-emitting type wafer. A surface-emitting type wafer includes a substrate 10 and a plurality of surface-em... | 04/29/2008 |
| 7346088 | Voltage dividing apparatus for preventing sudden increases in power to a laser diode A voltage dividing apparatus for preventing sudden increases in power to a laser diode includes a laser diode module, a laser-driving unit and a Zener diode. The laser diode module includes a laser diode for receiving a driving current to emit light, and a photo dio... | 03/18/2008 |
| 7342949 | Laser scanning device A laser scanning device includes a semiconductor laser that emits a laser beam, a laser power detector that detects laser beam power of the semiconductor laser, a reference voltage generator that generates reference voltage for controlling the laser beam power of th... | 03/11/2008 |
| 7329251 | Laser treatment apparatus A laser treatment apparatus for performing treatment by irradiating an affected part with a laser beam comprises: a laser source capable of emitting beams of a plurality of different wavelengths; a first setting unit which sets an irradiation amount of a laser beam ... | 02/12/2008 |
| 7315558 | Disable/enable control for laser driver eye safety A circuit for disabling an energy-generating component. The circuit comprises an input operable to receive a disable signal and a disable circuit operable to disable the component in response to the disable signal for a predetermined duration of time sufficient to m... | 01/01/2008 |
| 7280575 | Eye safety logic with compensation for transient conditions An eye safety detection circuit for use in a laser transmitter. The eye safety detection circuit shuts the laser down if the laser is emitting excessive optical energy to the point of being unsafe to a user. The eye safety detection circuit includes a laser current ... | 10/09/2007 |
| 7215688 | Disable/enable control for laser driver eye safety A circuit for disabling an energy-generating component. The circuit comprises an input operable to receive a disable signal and a disable circuit operable to disable the component in response to the disable signal for a predetermined duration of time sufficient to m... | 05/08/2007 |
| 7212477 | Optical recording/reproducing apparatus with APC and SPS processes In an optical recording/reproducing apparatus of the present invention, a semiconductor laser driver supplies a selected one of a plurality of drive currents, including at least a first-level drive current and a second-level drive current, to a semiconductor laser t... | 05/01/2007 |
| 7209502 | Open loop laser power control for optical navigation devices and optical systems A current output of a drive signal, modulated between two current settings, is applied to a laser diode, e.g. VCSEL. The settings are selected such that laser diode's power output meets the average power and peak power limits of the eye safety standards. The drive s... | 04/24/2007 |
| 7200337 | Optoelectronic transceiver having dual access to onboard diagnostics An optoelectronic transceiver includes first and second controller ICs. Each controller IC includes logic, a memory, an interface, and at least one input port. Each memory is configured to store digital diagnostic data and has a unique serial device address to allow... | 04/03/2007 |
| 7184668 | System and method for protecting eye safety during operation of a fiber optic transceiver A single-chip integrated circuit, sometimes called a controller, controls operation of a transceiver having a laser transmitter and a photodiode receiver. The controller includes memory for storing information related to the transceiver, and analog to digital conver... | 02/27/2007 |
| 7180922 | Safety system for focused energy applications A system and method is disclosed for improving the safety of directionally sensitive medical and industrial applications, such as laser applications, and cutting or surfacing tools. A system of electromagnetic radiation safety beam emitters and detectors is used to ... | 02/20/2007 |
| 7164700 | Laser driving circuit There is provided a laser driving circuit having a small circuit scale which is capable of low voltage operation and in which unnecessary writing in an optical disc, or the like, is entirely prevented. To this end, the laser driving circuit includes a source-grounde... | 01/16/2007 |
| 7161882 | Method and arrangement for regulating the light power of a scanning beam in an apparatus for reading from or for writing to optical recording media In order to compensate for so-called clipping effects, it is proposed, in an apparatus for reading from and/or writing to an optical recording medium in which the light power of a laser diode (1) is to be set to a plurality of light power levels,to perform a ... | 01/09/2007 |
| 7162160 | System and method for protecting eye safety during operation of a fiber optic transceiver A single-chip integrated circuit, sometimes called a controller, controls operation of a transceiver having a laser transmitter and a photodiode receiver. The controller includes memory for storing information related to the transceiver, and analog to digital conver... | 01/09/2007 |
| 7149430 | Optoelectronic transceiver having dual access to onboard diagnostics The optoelectronic transceiver includes first and second controller ICs. Each controller IC includes logic, a memory, an interface, and at least one input port. Each memory is configured to store digital diagnostic data and has a unique serial device address to allo... | 12/12/2006 |
| 7145717 | Optical amplifier An optical amplifier that improves transmission quality by driving an excitation light source according to a change in the level of an input optical signal and by compensating for a change in the characteristics of the excitation light source. An optical amplificati... | 12/05/2006 |
| 7139680 | Apparatus and method for standby lighting A method and system for standby lighting uses a power supply module and a standby lamp in conjunction with an HID lamp. The power supply module has a processor with smart trigger circuitry, soft start capability, overlap timer, and an advanced current sense algorith... | 11/21/2006 |
| 7136405 | Laser beam irradiation device A laser beam irradiation device is equipped with a very strict safety arrangement, thereby assuring that a user can use it safely. A hand-held applicator has a face formed on its top, and a push button switch on its side. The face has a spherical lens press-fitted i... | 11/14/2006 |
| 7130323 | Semiconductor laser device and semiconductor-laser excited solid-state laser apparatus A semiconductor laser device in a semiconductor-laser excited solid-state laser apparatus is provided with a plurality of semiconductor laser diodes connected in series to one another. Each of a plurality of bypass diodes is connected in parallel to each semiconduct... | 10/31/2006 |
| 7095765 | Light emitter with a voltage dependent resistor layer A light emitter includes an emitting stack, a first electrode, a second electrode and a voltage dependent resistor layer. The emitter stack has a first surface area and a second surface area. The first electrode is formed on the first surface area of the emitting st... | 08/22/2006 |
| 7075047 | Temperature control apparatus A temperature control apparatus comprises a light-emitting device, a light-emitting device controller, a Peltier device for controlling the temperature of the light-emitting device to a target temperature, a temperature detector for the light-emitting device, a firs... | 07/11/2006 |
| 7050720 | Integrated memory mapped controller circuit for fiber optics transceiver A controller for controlling a transceiver having a laser transmitter and a photodiode receiver. The controller includes memory for storing information related to the transceiver, and analog to digital conversion circuitry for receiving a plurality of analog signals... | 05/23/2006 |
| 7002128 | Laser diode driving circuit with safety feature The invention relates to a feedback loop for a laser diode driving circuit for ensuring that the laser diode generates optical power at a constant safe level. The feedback loop includes a monitor diode, which generates a monitor current Imon, and a set re... | 02/21/2006 |
| 6998567 | Generation and application of efficient solid-state laser pulse trains A method and devices for generating laser pulse trains for delivery to a target including the use of a single laser generator which produces a plurality of pulse groupings of two or more individual laser pulses within each laser pulse train, generated at selected ti... | 02/14/2006 |
| 6978624 | Thermoeletric cooler controller A highly efficient thermoelectric cooler controller for temperature stabilization. The circuit comprises a temperature sensor and a thermoelectric cooler, both in thermal communication with a component to be temperature stabilized. The circuit further comprises a po... | 12/27/2005 |
| 6957021 | Optical transceiver with memory mapped locations A controller for controlling a transceiver having a laser transmitter and a photodiode receiver. The controller includes memory for storing information related to the transceiver, and analog to digital conversion circuitry for receiving a plurality of analog signals... | 10/18/2005 |
| 6952531 | System and method for protecting eye safety during operation of a fiber optic transceiver A single-chip integrated circuit, sometimes called a controller, controls operation of a transceiver having a laser transmitter and a photodiode receiver. The controller includes memory for storing information related to the transceiver, and analog to digital conver... | 10/04/2005 |
| 6941077 | Memory mapped monitoring circuitry for optoelectronic device Circuitry for monitoring operation of an optoelectronic device having a laser transmitter and a photodiode receiver includes analog to digital conversion circuitry for receiving a plurality of analog signals from the laser transmitter and photodiode receiver, conver... | 09/06/2005 |
