Other

Sunlighten, Inc.

Tyco Electronics Corporation

Peloton Technology, Inc.

James Thomas O'Keeffe

Aaron Michael Zack

Martin C Ku

Ian Richard Kuklenski

Steven J Murray

Joshua P Switkes

Charles A Price

Thomas Dean Ratzlaff

Thomas J Birnbaum

Peter J Dutton

Paul Craig Tally

Erling Hansen

Bruce R Conway

Hyo Chang Yun

Ganymed B Stanek

A smart speaker is disclosed with an interactive speaker grille. In one embodiment a smart speaker comprises a housing with a speaker grille comprising a plurality of openings. Circuitry coupled to the speaker grille is configured to sense direct user interaction with one or more of a plurality of regions of the speaker grille and to generate corresponding electrical signals indicative of the one or more regions of the speaker grille experiencing direct user interaction. The circuitry can include portions in the path of sound transmission to detect user interaction with regions of the grille and portions outside the path of sound transmission for controlling aspects of the smart speaker (e.g. speaker volume, radio station or media stream selection) based on the particular regions touched.

Smart speaker with sensing through the speaker grille

Systems and methods are provided for controlling infrared radiation (IR) sources of a sauna including tuning IR wavelength-ranges and radiated power-levels of IR sources, and directing IR to locations on a user's body. In one illustrative embodiment, a sauna may be provided having adjustable IR emitters to emit IR at any wavelength resulting in a desirable radiation treatment for the sauna user. In another illustrative embodiment, a method is provided for tuning IR emitters in a sauna.

Dynamic sauna

In one embodiment a LIDAR can comprise two similar photodetector arrays and a malfunction indicator circuit operable to generate a malfunction signal when a measure of difference between range data from similar directions reported by each of the photodetectors exceeds a threshold value. A challenge associated with LIDARs is malfunction detection and failsafe operation in the event of a malfunction. Embodiments provide for two photodetectors in a shared remote ranging subassembly to address the challenges of malfunction detection. The two photodetector arrays can each receive light reflections from overlapping angular ranges in one or more FOVs (e.g. transferred using CFOBs) and thereby function to provide redundancy and confirmation of reflection distances. Within embodiments a reflection splitter can serve to uniformly distribute laser reflections from a common field of view among two photodetectors, thereby providing each with a half-resolution image for range comparison.

LiDAR with malfunction detection

Vehicle-based distributed LIDAR apparatuses and methods. These apparatuses may include coherent fiber optic image bundles (CFOBs) that transfer laser reflections from several fields of view (FOVs) around the vehicle to a shared remotely located detector array, thereby enabling correlation of the original reflection directions with fiber locations within a bundle. These apparatuses may operate with a remotely located mirror (e.g. a convex roadside mirror); the apparatus and methods can track the mirror region as it moves in the local environment with an increased density of outgoing laser pulses and thereby interrogate the remote mirror for reflection data from a wide indirect field of view.

Distributed lidar with fiber optics and a field of view combiner

Smart speaker with interactive speaker grille

With the proliferation of laser ranging systems (e.g. LIDAR) there is a need to avoid transmitting high power laser pulses towards certain objects such as people's eyes. Recently, advancements in electronically-steerable lasers have made it possible to dynamically steer a laser in 2-D. In one embodiment a LIDAR can identify a portion of an object to be avoided with laser pulses e.g. a persons head or a car windshield. The LIDAR can compute a keepout region or portion of the field of view that will be avoided by a subsequent laser scan. The LIDAR can dynamically steer a laser beam around the keepout region. In another embodiment a laser range finder can use sensor date form the local environment to track an object to be avoided and dynamically update laser steering instructions to avoid the dynamic keepout region of the field of view.

LIDAR with a dynamic keepout region

LIDAR measurements can be sparse in comparison to camera measurements. Hence, dynamically steering a LIDAR to regions of a field of view with more information (e.g. the detailed boundaries of objects) is beneficial. In one embodiment, a LIDAR system performs a non-uniform laser scan of a field of view based on sensor data. Data from an on-going or previous scan can be used to define dense scan regions within the field of view. The shape of dense scan regions can be iteratively improved (e.g. narrowed) based on localization of time-of-flight boundaries. Dense scan regions can be expressed in term of a set of laser steering parameters operable to dynamically steer a LIDAR. Within embodiments complex-shaped dense scan patterns can be selected or adapted based on an object classification (e.g. person or vehicle) or LIDAR location (e.g. an urban environment).

Dynamically steered laser range finder

Dynamically steering a LIDAR to regions of a field of view with more information (e.g. the detailed boundaries of objects) is beneficial. Within embodiments a time target to complete a LIDAR scan of a FOV can be combined with sensor data from the local environment to generate laser steering parameters operable to configure a LIDAR to dynamically steer a laser beam within the course of a laser ranging scan. In this way, laser steering parameters based in part on a target time for a scan can function to tailor the density of laser ranging measurements to ensure that important objects are densely scanned while completing the laser ranging scan within the target time.

System and method to perform a lidar scan within a time target

In one embodiment a LIDAR generates high-intensity laser pulses with intensities above a threshold intensity (e.g. above an eye-safe intensity) in a 2-D angular range in a field of view. The LIDAR further generates low-intensity (e.g. eye-safe) laser pulses in a protective guard region (e.g. a guard ring) that surrounds the high-intensity laser pulses. In response to detecting an aspect of an object using reflections from the low-intensity laser pulses (e.g. a person on a trajectory that will intersect the high-intensity laser pulses) the LIDAR modifies the angular range of subsequent high-intensity laser pulses. In this way the LIDAR can adapt or steer the angular range of the high-intensity laser pulses to avoid an object detected within the low-intensity guard region.

LIDAR with an adaptive high-intensity zone

In one embodiment an imaging system (e.g., a LIDAR or camera) contains a micromirror array that is configured in response to sensor data to dynamically enhance a complex shape region of interest in a field of view (FOV). The micromirror array functions as like an electronically controllable transfer function for light, between an input FOV and a detector array, thereby providing dynamically defined resolution across the detector array. Data from various configurations of the micromirror array is then combined in a 2D or 3D output image. In one aspect the imaging system begins with a first uniform resolution at the detector array and subsequently reconfigures the micromirror array to enhance resolution at a first portion of the detector array (e.g., spread an interesting object across more pixels) reduce resolution from in a less interesting part of a scene and thereby sample all of the original FOV with anisotropic resolution.

Micromirror array for feedback-based image resolution enhancement

A central controller for device automation can control output devices (e.g. automated lights and speakers) based on calculating the indoor location of a person. In familiar surroundings (e.g. homes), people may leave their favorite wireless devices unattended (e.g. smartphones and tablet PCs) and in general people exhibit varying proximity to their mobile wireless devices. Hence, the indoor locations of mobile wireless devices are of variable importance when calculating indoor occupant locations. (e.g. exhibiting highly-correlated locations when handheld). In one embodiment, the central controller aggregates wireless signals from mobile wireless devices. The central controller calculates one or more mobile device location estimates and person-to-device proximities from the wireless signals. The central controller uses each person-to-device proximity to weight the corresponding mobile device location in a calculation to estimate the occupancy of the region of the building and controls an output device based on the occupancy estimate.

System and method for user profile enabled smart building control

A LIDAR can encounter a remotely located mirror as it moves through a local environment (e.g. a convex roadside mirror). The remote mirror can occupy a small portion of the LIDAR field of view but offer a wealth of reflection data regarding a larger indirect field of view (e.g. around a corner). In one embodiment a LIDAR can learn the location of the remote mirror and then can dynamically increase the density of laser ranging measurements in an associated mirror region of the field of view. The LIDAR can track the mirror region as it moves in the local environment with an increased density of outgoing laser pulses and thereby interrogate the remote mirror for reflection data from a wide indirect field of view.

Growing community of inventors

Newark, CA, United States of America

James Thomas O'Keeffe