Seektech, Inc.

University of California

Seescan, Inc.

Deepsea Power & Light LLC

Christoph Hans Maier

Mark S Olsson

Ray Merewether

Michael J Martin

Paul G Stuart

Gert Cauwenberghs

Amos H Jessup

Jeffrey A Prsha

Patrick Mercier

Hui Wang

Sohmyung Ha

Edward N Denaci

Chul Kim

Jiwoong Park

Abraham Akinin

Yu Mike Chi

In one respect, there is provided an apparatus for neural stimulation. The apparatus may include an antenna, a plurality of electrodes, and a voltage supply generator. The antenna may be configured to receive, from an external source, radio frequency energy. The voltage supply generator configured to generate a voltage supply by at least ramping up a voltage of the radio frequency energy in successive increments, wherein the voltage supply drives a current to the plurality of electrodes during neural stimulation. Related methods and computer program products are also disclosed.

Radio frequency powered adiabatic stimulation with energy replenishment

Portable self-standing electromagnetic (EM) field sensing locator systems with attachments for finding and mapping buried objects such as utilities and with intuitive graphical user interface (GUI) displays are described. Accessories may include a ground penetrating radar (GPR) system with a rotating Tx/Rx antenna assembly, a leak detection system, a multi-probe voltage mapping system, a man-portable laser-range finder system with embedded dipole beacon, and other detachable accessory sensor systems are accepted for attachment to the locator system for simultaneous operation in cooperation with the basic locator system. The integration of the locator system with one or more additional devices, such as fault-finding, geophones and conductance sensors, may be used to facilitate the rapid detection and localization of many different types of buried objects.

Buried locators systems and methods

An electric field sensor includes one or more sensing electrodes connected to an integrated amplifier that bootstraps all parasitic capacitances at the sensor input to provide for a very high input impedance without the need for neutralization or other adjustments and calibration. The integrated amplifier for the electric field sensor further includes low-noise ESD/biasing structures to stabilize the DC-potential of the sensor with a minimum amount of added noise, leakage and parasitic capacitance.

Integrated electric field sensor

A portable self-standing electromagnetic (EM) field sensing locator system with attachments for finding and mapping buried objects such as utilities and with intuitive graphical user interface (GUI) displays. Accessories include a ground penetrating radar (GPR) system with a rotating Tx/Rx antenna assembly, a leak detection system, a multi-probe voltage mapping system, a man-portable laser-range finder system with embedded dipole beacon and other detachable accessory sensor systems are accepted for attachment to the locator system for simultaneous operation in cooperation with the basic locator system. The integration of the locator system with one or more additional devices, such as fault-finding, geophones and conductance sensors, facilitates the rapid detection and localization of many different types of buried objects.

Tri-pod buried locator system

A human-portable utility locator system for locating and tracing a buried utility line characterized by an electromagnetic field emission. The locator may include a horizontal spaced sensor pair for detecting the horizontal field asymmetry of the emitted field in one or more independent frequency bands, which is employed to assist in determining an accurate 'virtual depth' measurement for producing detection events. An event detector may be disposed to detect events corresponding to extremum in the B-field gradient with respect to time and a user interface (UI) coupled to the event detector signals the detected event to a user. In a preferred embodiment, one pair of spaced-apart 3D magnetic sensor arrays is disposed substantially orthogonal to another intermediate spaced-apart pair of sensors.

Locator with apparent depth indication

A self-tuning resonator for use in a transmitter apparatus for inducing alternating currents in a buried conductor. The resonator is dynamically tuned at frequencies below 500 kHz by exploiting the inherent voltage-variability of net capacitance in multilayer ceramic capacitors. The transmitter apparatus provides improved efficiency and induced output power suitable for use in a man-portable locator system, providing a very high magnetic field output from a physically small battery-powered resonator at frequencies under 500 kHz. The resonator exhibits a very low equivalent series resistance (ESR) and is adaptively returned to a predetermined resonant frequency responsive to any changes in resonance arising from phenomena such as component heating, thereby supporting very high tank circuit currents from battery-powered source to produce very high magnetic flux output.

Compact self-tuned electrical resonator for buried object locator applications

A blind locating system for finding and tracing buried objects such as utility lines, conductive pipes and sondes. A sensor array is coupled to a signal processor, which determines a field vector for one or more buried objects by producing a data signal representing a covariance matrix corresponding to the covariances of the time-varying sensor array signals over a selected frequency band and accumulation interval. The covariance matrix is characterized by eigenvalues and associated eigenvectors and a user interface (UI) indicates the field vector associated with the eigenvector having the largest eigenvalue. Using several different frequency bands, a plurality of underground objects may be simultaneously detected and indicated in the UI without foreknowledge of their existence or characteristics.

Growing community of inventors

San Diego, CA, United States of America

Christoph Hans Maier