Bizarre Patents
Pet Toilet-Like Water Disk and Food Storage
One pet-friendly inventor patented "a device for watering pets, e.g., a dog or cat." The device, he helpfully noted, "has the general shape of a toilet."
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 |
| 7929860 | System and method for sonet equipment fault management A fiber-optic communications interface (110) and method of operation that operates with a paired fiber-optic communications interface (112) in a redundant communications termination point (101). The fiber-optic communications interface (110 | 04/19/2011 |
| 7657177 | Communications test receiver Distortion of an optical signal transmitted over a fibre optic link is characterized by a receiver including a photodetector for converting optical radiation into an electrical signal. A delay line delays the electrical signal. At least two delay line taps drive a r... | 02/02/2010 |
| 7427164 | Optical connector arrangement comprising a converter The invention relates to an optical connector arrangement wherein the connector and the converter are connected by short plastic fiber sections. The aim of the invention is to provide one such connector arrangement which can be produced in a simple and cost-effectiv... | 09/23/2008 |
| 7424221 | Optical network terminal with illegal transmission detection circuitry An optical network terminal, which includes an optical transmitter, monitors the status of the optical transmitter, such as the output or the power consumption of the optical transmitter, to determine when the optical transmitter is illegally transmitting. When an i... | 09/09/2008 |
| 7406268 | Optical receiver circuit An optical receiver circuit is constructed to be immune to interference from external interference signals. The optical receiver circuit includes a differential amplifier having an optical reception device connected to one input of the differential amplifier. The op... | 07/29/2008 |
| 7400829 | Transmission apparatus and path selection method of a transmission apparatus A transmission apparatus that receives an optical signal by selecting any one of a plurality of provided optical signal transmission paths through protection control is configured to include a plurality of optical signal outputting sections that output the optical s... | 07/15/2008 |
| 7336901 | Reconfigurable optical add-drop multiplexers employing optical multiplex section shared protection A reconfigurable optical add-drop multiplexer is disclosed that enables Optical Multiplex Section (OMS) shared protection rings. The ROADM comprises a first optical supervisory module, coupled to a first amplifier module, which in turn is coupled to a first broadcas... | 02/26/2008 |
| 7319824 | Optical signal receiver, and method for controlling identification point for binarization processing performed thereby A method for controlling an identification point for binarization processing in an optical signal receiver which can diminish a code error rate by optimally tracking an identification point at all times in accordance with a received signal, thereby maintaining trans... | 01/15/2008 |
| 7302190 | Optical communication system including replaceable electro-optic and opto-electric converters In an optical transmitting or receiving apparatus, a plurality of replaceable electro-optic converters or a plurality of replaceable opto-electric converters are provided in correspondence with optical transmission lines. ... | 11/27/2007 |
| 7295776 | Optical LAN device An ring type optical LAN device includes a master node and a plurality of slave nodes that are interconnected by an optical fiber cable. A plurality of optical bypass transmission lines are provided in correspondence with each one of the slave nodes. Each of the opt... | 11/13/2007 |
| 7283739 | Multiple subnets in an optical ring network and method An optical network includes an optical ring and at least three subnets. Each subnet includes a plurality of add/drop nodes coupled to the optical ring. The add/drop nodes are operable to passively add a first traffic stream in a first direction on the optical ring a... | 10/16/2007 |
| 7283740 | Optical ring network with optical subnets and method An optical network includes a plurality of subnets. The subnets each include a plurality of add/drop nodes coupled to the optical ring and operable to passively add and drop traffic to and from the optical ring. The network further includes a plurality of gateway no... | 10/16/2007 |
| 7277633 | Receiving error rate control device A reception error rate controller in which the settling time can be shortened at the time of feedback control by controlling the quality of a received signal when the error rate is low. The reception error rate controller identifies the received signal by comparing ... | 10/02/2007 |
| 7274876 | Integrated electrical/optical hybrid communication system with revertive hitless switch A system according to embodiments of the invention may include a first communication path that converts an optically-modulated source signal to a radio signal based on a detected degradation in a quality of a received optical signal, and a second communication path ... | 09/25/2007 |
| 7269347 | Optical receiver decision threshold tuning apparatus and method A method of controlling an optical signal receiver utilizes three control loops: a first control loop tunes the decision threshold of the receiver when the optical network is in a substantially steady state and a second control loop rapidly switches to a reference d... | 09/11/2007 |
| 7263286 | Fast testing system for optical transceiver and testing method thereof The present invention provides a fast testing system and method for optical transceiver, which integrates multiple testing machines in the testing environment for the optical transceiver, so that the user can employ the testing system for optical transceiver for rap... | 08/28/2007 |
| 7257323 | Signal-off detection circuit and optical receiving device using the same This invention offers a signal-off detection circuit allowing arbitrary setting of an issuing time (response time) of a signal disconnection alarm without being affected by a time constant of a direct current feedback circuit giving an offset voltage to an amplifier... | 08/14/2007 |
| 7242860 | Optical protection switching using 2 by 2 switching functions A network is protected against interruption of service while one or more faulty switches or optical fiber transmission lines are repaired or replaced, by an interconnecting configuration of small N×N optical input/output switches, where N is 2 or greater than 2. Th... | 07/10/2007 |
| 7164859 | Free-space dynamic wavelength routing systems with interleaved channels for enhanced performance A novel wavelength routing apparatus is disclosed, which uses a diffraction grating to separate a multi-wavelength optical signal from an input port into multiple spectral channels; a channel-interleaving assembly (e.g., an array of prisms) to interleave the spectra... | 01/16/2007 |
| 7113699 | Fault forwarding in an optical network A system and method for forwarding fault information in an optical network is disclosed. Responsive to a fault being detected at a node, the fault information is forwarded to the destination node in the form of a loss-of-signal condition by turning off laser transmi... | 09/26/2006 |
| 7110678 | Hybrid wireless optical and radio frequency communication link A hybrid wireless optical and radio frequency (RF) communication link utilizes parallel free-space optical and RF paths for transmitting data and control and status information. The optical link provides the primary path for the data, and the RF link provides a conc... | 09/19/2006 |
| 7103073 | Optical line termination, passive optical network, and method and apparatus for performance monitoring A method of performance monitoring according to an embodiment of the invention includes, in a passive optical network (PON), sending system time of an optical line termination (OLT) to an optical network unit (ONU). The method further includes retrieving, by the OLT... | 09/05/2006 |
| 7099578 | 1:N protection in an optical terminal A communication network includes first and second terminals, nodes, and links. The first node is coupled to the first terminal through the first link, and coupled to the second terminal through the second link and the second node. The first node preferably includes ... | 08/29/2006 |
| 7089161 | Method and system for characterizing optical receivers by mathematical derivation The present invention describes the method and system for characterizing optical receivers based on the measured impulse response and by applying linear system theory. In a first embodiment, the impulse response of an optical receiver is obtained. Convolving the imp... | 08/08/2006 |
| 7076166 | Low-cost optical burst transmission system, apparatus, and method This invention discloses an optical burst transmission system in which an optical generator generates Type 1 lightwaves having different wavelengths corresponding to transmission lines and having undergone intensity modulation with obtained data; a broad spectrum op... | 07/11/2006 |
| 7076176 | Optical signal receiver and optical space transmission system An optical signal receiver comprising an opto-electric converter for converting an optical signal transmitted from a remotely opposed transmitter into an electric signal, a reproduction circuit for reproducing a data signal from an output of the opto-electric conver... | 07/11/2006 |
| 6959153 | Dynamically reconfigurable add/drop multiplexer with low coherent cross-talk for optical communication networks An add-drop multiplexer is described, in one embodiment the add-drop multiplexer includes an optical transmission signal input port adapted to receive a wavelength division multiplexed optical transmission signal, an optical transmission signal output port adapted t... | 10/25/2005 |
| 6941071 | Test method and apparatus for parallel optical transceivers using serial equipment A test method and apparatus are provided for testing parallel optical transceivers. Each of a plurality of channels of the parallel optical transceiver is connected in series. A predefined data pattern is applied to a first channel of the series connected plurality ... | 09/06/2005 |
| 6889009 | Integrated environmental control and management system for free-space optical communication systems A method of managing a free-space optical network includes monitoring environmental and weather conditions in the vicinity of one or more free-space optical links in the network. Data is gathered by environmental condition instruments, such as visibility meters, and... | 05/03/2005 |
| 6889010 | Star topology network with fiber interconnect on chip An optical transmission device configured as a central node, wherein each central node has dedicated pixels for receiving data and transmitting optical data so destination addressing is not required. The network is configured such that transmission on any particular... | 05/03/2005 |
| 6879559 | Router line card protection using one-for-N redundancy Router line cards are partitioned, separating packet forwarding from external or internal interfaces and enabling multiple line cards to access any set of external or internal data paths. Any failed working line card can be switchably replaced by another line card. ... | 04/12/2005 |
| 6848006 | Ring-mesh networks A ring-mesh network architecture is provided for increasing the working/protection bandwidth ratio (W/PBR) of transport networks. The ring-mesh network has mesh connections between some nodes, the traffic on the mesh connections being unprotected. This increases the... | 01/25/2005 |
| 6788899 | Dynamic wavelength add/drop multiplexer for UDWDM optical communication system A method and device for optical add/drop is disclosed. The add/drop splits an input signal into two portions. The first portion is optically filtered to remove the channels, leaving an unmodulated carrier which is modulated with the newly added information. The seco... | 09/07/2004 |
| 6763195 | Hybrid wireless optical and radio frequency communication link A hybrid wireless optical and radio frequency (RF) communication link utilizes parallel free-space optical and RF paths for transmitting data and control and status information. The optical link provides the primary path for the data, and the RF link provides a conc... | 07/13/2004 |
| 6700654 | Automatic dark current compensation A monitoring system useful for monitoring the state of a fiber communication channel in which a portion of the fiber signal is tapped and detected by a photodiode. The dark current of the photodiode and other DC offsets of the system may be compensated by... | 03/02/2004 |
| 6678478 | Correcting method of optical signal transmission system and optical signal transmission system using said correcting method A correcting method of an optical signal transmission system that applies an optical signal generated by light-emitting action to an input end of an optical fiber and converts an optical signal arising at an output end of said optical fiber to an electric... | 01/13/2004 |
| 6623185 | Loss of signal detector for low-level optical signals Amplified noise signals in an optical communication system can be advantageously used to detect an LOS condition for particular wavelengths of interest. The disclosed method includes generating a sampling window of suitable size and counting the number of... | 09/23/2003 |
| 5631759 | Automated system, and corresponding method, for measuring receiver pulse width distortion of electro-optic modules An automated, computer-controlled system automatically measures various parameters associated with the transmitter and/or receiver of an electro-optic module. Measured transmitter parameters include transmitter average power, transmitter rise/fall time, t... | 05/20/1997 |
| 5598360 | Automated system and corresponding method for testing electro-optic modules An automated, computer-controlled system, and a corresponding method, for testing electro-optic modules, is disclosed.... | 01/28/1997 |
| 5589683 | Optical receiver apparatus for quickly detecting loss of a composite optical signal input employing a loss-of-clock detector An optical signal receiver apparatus contains: a photoelectric conversion circuit for receiving an optical signal conveying cyclic timing information, and converting the optical signal into an electrical signal conveying the cyclic timing information; a r... | 12/31/1996 |
