Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha Corporation

Nobuhisa Watanabe

Hideo Wada

Takayuki Taminaga

Hajime Kashida

An optical wireless communication device mounted in electronic equipment includes: a light-receiving element for receiving an optical communication signal; and a control unit that monitors a received light output of the light-receiving element. When the control unit determines that the received light output represents the optical communication signal, it selects and executes communication mode for the optical communication signal. When the control unit determines that the received light output does not represent the optical communication signal, it selects and executes charge mode in which the received light output is used as a charge power.

Optical wireless communication device

In an optical distance measuring apparatus, a transmitter has a light-emitting device emitting an optical signal synchronized with a modulating signal having a predetermined repetition frequency, and a modulating signal generator outputting the modulating signal to the light-emitting device. A receiver has a photodetector receiving an optical beam reflected by an object to be measured and converting it to an electrical signal, a switch receiving the signal from the modulating signal generator and alternately choosing two channels for the electrical signal with a predetermined timing, and first and second storage sections storing electrical signals on the two channels. A signal processing section has a differential operation section performing a differential operation on electrical signals stored in the first and second storage sections, and a distance determining section determining a distance to the object on the basis of the result of the differential operation of the differential operation section.

Optical distance measuring apparatus

The optical object discriminating device includes a light projecting part which applies light, which is emitted from a semiconductor light emitting element, to a measuring object which is an object to be measured, and a light receiving part which receives reflected light reflected by the measuring object. Between the light receiving part and the measuring object is placed a polarization-state selector part which permits polarized light of a specified polarization direction to pass therethrough. A signal processing part processes a signal outputted by the light receiving part, and measures intensity of light of the polarization direction permitted by the polarization-state selector part to pass therethrough.

Optical object discriminating device

In an optical movement information detector, light emitted from a laser diode () is split into a first beam (), a second beam () and a third beam () by beam splitters (). The first, second and third beams are converged by a condenser lens () upon a surface of an object to be measured () to form a beam spot () thereon. Diffused light from the beam spot () is received by a photodiode () and an output signal of the photodiode () is processed by a signal processing circuit () including an analog-digital converter () and a Fourier transforming unit (). A detecting section () obtains, for example, a moving velocity and a moving direction of the object based on spectrum peak frequencies obtained by the Fourier transform.

Optical two-dimensional velocity and/or movement detector

Two different phase components obtained by splitting interference light of light from an object by a diffraction grating are guided to first and second PD's by a second optical system. A first signal is outputted from a first signal processing circuit section that receives light reception signal from first PD, and a second signal is outputted from a second signal processing circuit section that receives a light reception signal from the second PD. A third signal of an interference light signal whose noise component is removed is outputted by a third signal processing circuit section using the first signal and the second signal. Then, the frequency of the third signal is detected, and the movement velocity of the object is detected by a movement velocity detection section on the basis of the frequency.

Growing community of inventors

Katsuragi, Japan

Nobuhisa Watanabe