"I hate what they've done to my child...I would never let my own children watch it. "
Vladimir Zworykin, television pioneer ; Talking about an invention in which he played a critical role.
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 |
| 8115982 | Iris diaphragm device There is provided an iris diaphragm device comprising: two blade members supported on two rotary shafts; a lamp optical path between the two blade members; a motor driving directly one of the rotary shafts; and a means of transmitting power from the one rotary shaft... | 02/14/2012 |
| 7626746 | Shutter unit and laser processing device using same A shutter unit capable of preventing the scattering of the laser beam upon closing the optical path of the laser beam and capable of being miniaturized, and a laser processing device employing such a shutter unit. In a shutter unit 1, when the optical path of... | 12/01/2009 |
| 7338174 | Shutter device and projection type video display Each shading plate comprises a rotating shaft and a driving shaft arranged vertically. First divided shading plate is loosely fitted to and supported by (not adhere to) the rotating shaft and rotates around the shaft. Second divided shading plates are fixed to the r... | 03/04/2008 |
| 7334596 | Pendulous control valve system A housing containing a rotatable cage for rotatably supporting a spherical flow control valve having a vertically orientated open or filled conduit and an internal bottom weight mass centered on the vertical conduit. If the rotatable cage is tilted, the gravity-resp... | 02/26/2008 |
| 7330253 | Method and apparatus for radiation analysis and encoder Method and apparatus for analyzing radiation using analyzers and encoders employing the spatial modulation of radiation dispersed by wavelength or imaged along a line. ... | 02/12/2008 |
| 7286764 | Reconfigurable modulator-based optical add-and-drop multiplexer An optical add and drop multiplexer system comprising a first module for providing a first signal; a second module for providing a second signal; and a modulator for receiving a channel of the first signal at a first location, the first location configured to actuat... | 10/23/2007 |
| 7280735 | Combined optical fiber wheel, beamsplitter, switch, and logic gate A machine that can pass, reflect, filter, or block light along multiple paths. The specific portions of light that can be passed, reflected, blocked, or filtered, are controlled by an optical routing subassembly. This optical routing subassembly can be manipulated t... | 10/09/2007 |
| 7231128 | Hybrid solar lighting systems and components A hybrid solar lighting system and components having at least one hybrid solar concentrator, at least one fiber receiver, at least one hybrid luminaire, and a light distribution system operably connected to each hybrid solar concentrator and each hybrid luminaire. A... | 06/12/2007 |
| 7182470 | Light amount control apparatus and projector apparatus using the same A light amount control apparatus includes a pair of light amount control plates arranged at side edge portions of a light path, a driving device having a drive rotating shaft, and a transmitting member for transmitting rotation of the drive rotating shaft to the lig... | 02/27/2007 |
| 7177081 | High contrast grating light valve type device A grating light valve has with a plurality of spaced reflective ribbons are spatially arranged over a substrate with reflective surfaces. The grating light valve is configured to optimized the conditions for constructive and destructive interference with an incident... | 02/13/2007 |
| 7164817 | Optical switch and optical add/drop multiplexer using the same As a wavelength selection filter, a filter in which dielectric multilayered films are formed on a substrate, an optical fiber grating in which diffraction grating is formed in an optical fiber, and so on, can be used. As another optical demultiplexer 33, as d... | 01/16/2007 |
| 7083303 | Operating theater lamp having adjustable diaphragm An operating theater lamp has at least one lamp body with a discharge lamp, which illuminates a site of an operation via optical means. The illuminance of the operating theater lamp can be changed in the region of the site of the operation by a mechanically adjustab... | 08/01/2006 |
| 7068372 | MEMS interferometer-based reconfigurable optical add-and-drop multiplexor The interferometer comprises a beam splitter, a mirror and a phase modulator. The beam splitter splits a signal into a first portion and a second portion. The mirror reflects the first portion. The first portion includes an optical path length, which is fixed. The p... | 06/27/2006 |
| 7059733 | Display apparatus A display apparatus is provided which can display different text/image information depending on the viewing angle and the viewer, display a high reality three-dimensional image viewable from any direction and realize stereoscopic viewing without glasses or the like.... | 06/13/2006 |
| 7055966 | Illuminator and projector When a video signal is inputted to a projector (10) through a video input terminal, a luminance peak value of an image of the video signal is detected by an image-analyzing circuit (61) to be outputted to a CPU (71). A gain-adjusting circuit ( | 06/06/2006 |
| 7057819 | High contrast tilting ribbon blazed grating The light modulator includes elongated elements and a support structure coupled to the elongated elements. Each element includes one or more lengthwise slits within an active optical area, and a light reflective planar surface with the light reflective planar surfac... | 06/06/2006 |
| 7054515 | Diffractive light modulator-based dynamic equalizer with integrated spectral monitor An integrated device of the present invention comprises free-space optics, a bi-directional multiplexor/de-multiplexor, a diffractive light modulator, a beam splitter, an optical performance monitor, and a controller. The free-space optics collimate, transform and i... | 05/30/2006 |
| 7049164 | Microelectronic mechanical system and methods The current invention provides for encapsulated release structures, intermediates thereof and methods for their fabrication. The multi-layer structure has a capping layer, that preferably comprises silicon oxide and/or silicon nitride, and which is formed over an et... | 05/23/2006 |
| 7042611 | Pre-deflected bias ribbons A modulator for and a method of modulating an incident beam of light including means for supporting a plurality of active elements and a plurality of bias elements, each active and bias element including a light reflective planar surface with the light reflective pl... | 05/09/2006 |
| 7027202 | Silicon substrate as a light modulator sacrificial layer An optical MEM device is fabricated with a patterned device layer formed on a silicon wafer. Preferably, the patterned device layer is patterned with plurality of ribbons and/or access trenches. The central portion of the ribbon is released from the silicon wafer us... | 04/11/2006 |
| 7012730 | Optics arrangements including light source arrangements for an active matrix liquid crystal image generator A system for producing modulated light is disclosed. The system comprises a spatial light modulator including a light modulating medium switchable between different states so as to act on light in ways which form overall patterns of modulated light. The system also ... | 03/14/2006 |
| 7003188 | Low loss optical switching system An optical switching system that switches the path of an optical signal by moving a microstructure onto which a light-guiding structure is mounted. The microstructure is formed by a MEMs and semiconductor process to be integral to the substrate. The light-guiding st... | 02/21/2006 |
| 6999165 | Method and apparatus for radiation analysis and encoder Method and apparatus for analyzing radiation using analyzers and encoders employing the spatial modulation of radiation dispersed by wavelength or imaged along a line. ... | 02/14/2006 |
| 6956878 | Method and apparatus for reducing laser speckle using polarization averaging A method and apparatus for reducing speckle uses polarization averaging. A polarizing beam splitter divides a first polarized laser output into a second polarized laser output and a third polarized laser output. A plurality of mirrors creates an optical path differe... | 10/18/2005 |
| 6956995 | Optical communication arrangement An arrangement for optical communication comprises an optical coupler, an opto-electronic board, and an optical fiber. The optical fiber comprises a first refraction surface, a second refraction surface, and an internal reflector. The first refraction surface has a ... | 10/18/2005 |
| 6947613 | Wavelength selective switch and equalizer A device comprising a light modulator including a plurality of elements wherein each element is selectively operable such that the plurality of elements are dynamically configurable to combine selected ones of a plurality of grating periods such that selected portio... | 09/20/2005 |
| 6934070 | Chirped optical MEM device A light modulator comprises a series of ribbons divided by a series of gaps. Sequences of consecutive ribbons and gaps are grouped together to form a plurality of pixels that are configured to process a respective plurality of wavelengths. The spacing from center-li... | 08/23/2005 |
| 6928207 | Apparatus for selectively blocking WDM channels An apparatus for selective blocking WDM channels comprises a light modulator, a diffraction grating, and a transform lens. The light modulator comprises an array of pixels. Each pixel of the light modulator is selectively operable to direct light into a first mode a... | 08/09/2005 |
| 6927891 | Tilt-able grating plane for improved crosstalk in 1×N blaze switches A light modulator includes elongated elements arranged parallel to each other. Each elongated element includes a light reflective planar surface with the light reflective planar surfaces configured in a first grating plane. A support structure is coupled to the elon... | 08/09/2005 |
| 6922272 | Method and apparatus for leveling thermal stress variations in multi-layer MEMS devices A MEMS device such as a grating light valve™ light modulator is athermalized such that the force required to deflect the movable portion of the MEMS device remains constant over a range of temperatures. In MEMS embodiments directed to a grating light valve™ ligh... | 07/26/2005 |
| 6908201 | Micro-support structures A MEM device in accordance with the invention comprises one or more movable micro-structures which are preferably ribbon structures or cantilever structures. The ribbon structures or cantilever structures are preferably coupled to a substrate structure through one o... | 06/21/2005 |
| 6886944 | Projector brightness enhancement using rectilinear apertures A projector includes an array of micromirror light modulators and a projector light source for generating an illumination light beam along an optical path. An elongated rectilinear illumination aperture is defined at a first location along the optical path, with one... | 05/03/2005 |
| 6812979 | Color-separating apparatus for liquid crystal projector of single panel type A color-separating apparatus for a liquid crystal projector of single panel type that is capable of improving light efficiency and color revival property. In the apparatus, a color filter has red, green and blue colors formed in a spiral shape. A reflective plate is... | 11/02/2004 |
| 6762833 | Method and apparatus for spectrum analysis and encoder A disc serving as a spatial radiation modulator has dispersed radiation filters thereon. Each filter has a transmittance or reflectance modulation function of the form sin2(mθ+pπ/4), where m is a positive integer and p has one of the four values 0, 1, 2... | 07/13/2004 |
| 6757090 | Transmission mechanism A transmission mechanism for an optical device is provided to change an angle of an optical element. The transmission mechanism includes a first member and a second member. The first member has a slanted surface and is capable of sliding back and forth along a first... | 06/29/2004 |
| 6714716 | Variable optical attenuator A mechanically-adjustable variable optical attenuator includes an azimuthally-tapering, rotatable beam attenuator. In a plane perpendicular to the light beam to be attenuated, the projection of the beam attenuator comprises a sharp distal tip, a proximal region, and... | 03/30/2004 |
| 6700690 | Tunable variable bandpass optical filter A variable bandwidth tunable optical filters comprised of two transparent optical substrates, upon each of which is deposited a linearly variable multilayer interference filter coating which varies in total thickness from end to end in a wedged fashion. T... | 03/02/2004 |
| 6693561 | System for and method of wide searching for targets in a marine environment An above-the-water system for and method of finding targets, both animate and inanimate, in a marine environment, especially by determining the distance and depth of targets at, above or below the surface of, the water. An optical transmitter transmits in... | 02/17/2004 |
| 6646819 | Interactive dynamic imaging A manually controlled, variable-size, variable angular position, sector-shaped optical mask for use at an objective aperture of an optical imaging system to permit an object to be viewed from selected angles and directions.... | 11/11/2003 |
| 6580560 | Laser light projector having beam diffuser and associated methods An apparatus and method for a laser light display projector for projecting a beam of laser light so as to produce a light pattern forming a visually perceptible light image includes a laser light source generating a substantially parallel light beam; a di... | 06/17/2003 |