Canon Kabushiki Kaisha

Canon U.s.a., Inc.

The Brigham and Women's Hospital, Inc.

Ichiro Okumura

Takayuki Tsukimoto

Kazuhiro Izukawa

Hitoshi Mukohjima

Takuo Okuno

Akira Hiramatsu

Jun Tamai

Takashi Maeno

Takahisa Kato

Naoya Kaneda

Hiroyuki Seki

Nobuyuki Kojima

Tadashi Hayashi

Isao Hayashi

Yoshihiro Shigemura

Kazuki Fujimoto

Jiro Shirakata

Kiyoshi Takagi

Tohru Kawai

Seiji Hara

Masaaki Naoi

Takayuki Hirano

Nobuhiko Hata

Hisae Shimizu

Kenjiro Takemura

Yuri Mizutani

Shinji Yamamoto

Yusuke Tanaka

Hiroshi Ito

Yasushi Miura

Akio Atsuta

Yutaka Maruyama

Masahiko Igaki

Masahisa Tamura

Yasushi Murayama

Yoshifumi Nishimoto

Yoshikuni Ito

Makoto Shihoh

Kosuke Fujimoto

Hajime Kanazawa

Masaya Kobayashi

Koichi Ueda

Sadayuki Ueha

Hidekazu Kose

Manabu Takayama

Katsumasa Nishikawa

An apparatus, method, and system for a steerable medical device, configured to be used in conjunction with guide tools and devices in medical procedures, including endoscopes, cameras, cutting tools and catheters.

Steerable medical device and method

An apparatus including a tendon-driven device such as an endoscope comprising a bendable body, a tendon attached to and extending a length of said body, and an actuator that will actuate said tendon based on a control signal from a controller. The controller is configured to send said control signal to said actuator and comprises a forward-kinematic-mapping unit that estimates an angular displacement, wherein the kinematic-mapping unit is configured for: providing a tension value of the tendon to obtain a desired angular displacement wherein the tension has a nonlinear relationship with the desired angular displacement based on information of friction where the tension is greater that would be calculated without including the effect of friction. The friction coefficient may be determined as it changes over time.

Control apparatus and tendon-driven device

A linear-member-driven manipulator is provided that includes a bendable member that is bendable along a bending plane and includes a plurality of bendable portions; a linear member used to bend at least one of the bendable portions; a plurality of guiding members that guide the linear member that is driven; and a plurality of support members, each support member extending from one of the guiding members to the bendable member, wherein each guiding member is swingable with respect to the bendable member; and wherein, for each support member, a projection distance between the linear member and the support member on the bending plane is greater than or equal to a projection distance between the linear member and a bending neutral line of the bendable member on the bending plane.

Wire-driven manipulator

A sheath apparatus includes, a plurality of node rings configured to be tilted with respect to each other, each node ring defining a substantially cylindrical wall and having at least one hole passing through said cylindrical wall, the plurality of node rings being arranged next to each other along a linear axis such that consecutive node rings contact each other at a contact plane; a manipulating wire going through the holes in said stacked node rings; and a position restoring component configured to restore said stacked node rings from a tilted position to an original position, wherein said position restoring component is located inside or outside of the stacked node rings.

Mechanical structure of articulated sheath

First position information formed on a conveyance body is read by an information detecting portion, and second position information formed on a second image carrier is read by the information detecting portion. Control is made such that a position of an image on the second image carrier matches with a position of an image on the conveyance body from information read by the information detecting portion in transferring the image from the second image carrier to the conveyance body. The information detecting portion is held by a hold member and is disposed at a transfer region.

Image forming apparatus

Electrostatic image graduations inclined by a first angle in a main scanning direction are formed on a photosensitive drum and transferred to an intermediate transfer belt, and electrostatic image graduations inclined by a second angle in the main scanning direction are formed on the photosensitive drum and transferred to the intermediate transfer belt so as to overlap with the electrostatic image graduations inclined by the first angle. The electrostatic image graduations inclined by the first angle are detected by a conducting wire having a linear conductive member inclined by the first angle in the main scanning direction of the intermediate transfer belt. The electrostatic image graduations inclined by the second angle are detected by a conducting wire having a linear conductive member inclined by the second angle in the main scanning direction of the intermediate transfer belt.

There is provided a robot apparatus that can rapidly obtain an ellipse indicating a stiffness characteristic, even if lengths of two links are different from each other.

Robot apparatus

An image forming apparatus includes a first index forming unit that forms a plurality of first electrostatic latent image indexes at positions adjacent to a toner image to be formed on a recording material in a width direction of a first image bearing member and a second index forming unit forms a plurality of second electrostatic latent image indexes at positions adjacent to a toner image to be formed on the recording material in a width direction of a second image bearing member. A control unit controls operation of at least a second image forming unit so as to maintain a set positional relationship between the first electrostatic latent image indexes transferred to an intermediate transfer member and the second electrostatic latent image indexes based on detection results by first and second detection units.

Image forming apparatus having a plurality of latent image indexes

An image forming apparatus includes first and second image bearing members, a belt member contacting the first and second image bearing members, first and second electrostatic image forming portions for respectively forming electrostatic images on the first and second image bearing members, first and second developing portions for forming toner images on the basis of the electrostatic images formed on the first and second image bearing members, first and second transfer portions for transferring onto the belt member the toner images formed on the first and second image bearing members and/or electrostatic image indices formed by the electrostatic image forming portions, first and second detecting portions for detecting the electrostatic image indices which are formed by the electrostatic image forming portions, and an adjusting portion for adjusting a forming operation of an image to be formed on the belt member on the basis of outputs of the first and second detecting portions, and a belt member charging portion for electrically charging the belt member before transfer of the electrostatic image indices.

Image forming apparatus using electrostatic image registration control

A first and second electrostatic image code is located outside a developing zone. A transfer belt provided with an electrostatic image recording track capable to transfer the electrostatic code between the first drum and second drum. A transferring voltage applies to a side of the transfer belt for the first drum to transfer the first electrostatic image code onto the electrostatic image recording track. An electroconductive member is in parallel with the electrostatic image code and a surface of the electrostatic image code detected within a predetermined gap. An induced current generated in the electroconductive member relative to the lines of the electrostatic image codes which control the first drum or the second drum on the basis of a detection result of the detecting means such that the toner image on the second drum transferred onto a recording material on the transfer belt and overlaid on the toner image transferred onto the recording material from the first drum.

An image forming apparatus which is capable of detecting the direction and amount of an image shift in the main scanning direction without wasting toner, to thereby provide a higher-quality image with reduced running costs. A conductor is disposed such that the conductor partially overlaps an electrostatic latent image line formed on a photosensitive drum in a manner extending in a main scanning direction of the photosensitive drum, while moving relative to the electrostatic latent image line. The conductor generates induced current by the relative motion. An image shift in the main scanning direction is detected based on a result of measurement of the induced current generated by the conductor.

Image forming apparatus that detects image shift in the main scanning direction without wasting toner

An image forming apparatus includes an image bearing member; a transfer portion that transfers a toner image; a conveying member that conveys a recording material; a conveying member position index sensing member that senses a conveying member position index fixed to the conveying member in the transfer portion; a toner image position index sensing member that senses a toner image position index fixed to the image bearing member in the transfer portion; a drive member that can control a position of the conveying member in a moving direction of the conveying member and a rotating speed of the conveying member; and a control portion that controls the drive member to position the conveying member position index with respect to the toner image position index reaching the transfer portion based on the sensing results of the conveying member position index and the toner image position index.

Image forming apparatus controlling the position of a convey member with respect to the toner image position based on sensed indicies

An image forming apparatus includes first and second image bearing members on which toner images are to be formed, a conveying member, and a conveying member position index detecting device for detecting a conveying member position index provided on the conveying member. The apparatus also includes an image bearing member position index detecting device for detecting image bearing member position indices provided on the second image bearing member, an adjusting device for adjusting a rotational speed of the second image bearing member, and a controller for controlling the adjusting device so as to adjust a position of an image bearing member position index correspondingly to the conveying member position index, on the basis of detection results of the conveying member position index detecting device and the image bearing member position index detecting device.

Image forming apparatus with image bearing member adjustment

According to this invention, there is provided a manipulator which can be suitably used as a compact manipulator apparatus which manipulates a minute target object. A manipulator of this invention includes, for example, a plurality of arm members whose attitudes can be changed and a manipulation target object manipulating hand mounted on the plurality of arm members through a connecting portion. Rotation of the hand or similar motion is caused by changing the attitudes of the plurality of arm members.

Manipulator having arm mechanism for hand

A manipulator includes a spherical shell movable member, a manipulating member integrally mounted on the spherical shell movable member, and a vibration member in contact with the spherical shell movable member and vibrating so that the spherical shell movable member rotates about a plurality of axes. The manipulating member has a manipulation distal end portion placed near a center of the spherical shell movable member, and all of the axes intersect at one point near the center of the spherical shell movable member.

Manipulator

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Abiko, Japan

Ichiro Okumura