Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha Corporation

Tadashi Kawamura

Yuichiro Yamada

Akiyoshi Fujii

Masanobu Mizusaki

Hiroshi Hamada

Yutaka Ishii

Yoshitaka Yamamoto

Michael John Towler

Hiromi Katoh

Naofumi Kimura

Akihito Jinda

Emma Jayne Walton

Harry Garth Walton

Hiroshi Nakanishi

Martin David Tillin

Craig Tombling

Takashi Shibatani

Elizabeth Jane Acosta

Brian Henley

A liquid crystal display deviceincludes a pair of substrates, a vertical alignment type liquid crystal layerprovided between the pair of substrates, and electrodesandfor applying a voltage to the vertical alignment type liquid crystal layer. At least one of the pair of substrates has a rugged structure on a surface which is in contact with the vertical alignment type liquid crystal layer. The surface having the rugged structure formed thereon has a region in which the height of the rugged structure varies along a first direction with a first period and varies along a second direction perpendicular to the first direction with a second period different from the first period. The first period is no less than 0.1 &#x3bc;m and no more than 10 &#x3bc;m, and the second period is no less than 0.1 &#x3bc;m and no more than 10 &#x3bc;m. The vertical alignment type liquid crystal layerhas a pretilt due to the rugged structure with no voltage applied thereacross.

Vertically-aligned liquid crystal display device having a rugged structure which is in contact with the liquid crystal layer

A light source, an image display panel including multiple pixel regions, each of which modulates light, light control means for focusing light from the light source onto associated pixel regions according to their wavelength ranges, and optical systems that form an image on a projection plane by the light that has been modulated by the panel are provided. A circuit for generating data representing multiple image subframes from data representing each image frame as a component of the image and getting the subframes displayed by the panel time-sequentially, and an image shifter for shifting a selected one of the subframes on the projection plane are further provided. The same area on the projection plane is sequentially irradiated with light rays that have been modulated by different pixel regions of the panel and that fall within respectively different wavelength ranges.

Projection type image display device

A liquid crystal display device includes a first substrate, a second substrate placed to face the first substrate, and a liquid crystal layer interposed between the first and second substrates. The liquid crystal layer further includes: a splay-aligned region in which a transformation from splay alignment to bend alignment or from bend alignment to splay alignment occurs according to a voltage applied; and a nucleation region serving as a nucleation site for initiating the transformation to occur in the splay-aligned region. A plurality of first splay-aligned regions include two first splay-aligned regions connected to each other via one of a plurality of second splay-aligned regions.

Liquid crystal display device

A liquid crystal display device includes two substrates, a liquid crystal layer sandwiched between the substrates and two alignment films, each being provided on one surface of associated one of the substrates so as to face the liquid crystal layer. The device defines multiple picture elements. At least one of the two alignment films is made of a polymer material that includes a main chain, an atomic group having a bond that is selectively cut when exposed to an actinic ray and a side chain bonded to the main chain via the atomic group. The polymer material with the side chain can give a pretilt angle of greater than 85 degrees but 90 degrees or less to liquid crystal molecules. The polymer material without the side chain can give a pretilt angle of 2 degrees to 15 degrees to the liquid crystal molecules.

Liquid crystal display device, optical element, method of fabricating the liquid crystal display device and method of making the optical element

A liquid crystal display device comprises: a layer of a chiral liquid crystal material disposed between first and second substrates; and means for applying a voltage across the liquid crystal layer. A first region of the liquid crystal layer is an active region for display and a second region of the liquid crystal layer is a nucleation region for generating a desired liquid crystal state in the first region when a voltage is applied across the liquid crystal layer. The ratio of the thickness d of the liquid crystal layer to the pitch p of the liquid crystal material has a first value (d/p) in the first region of the liquid crystal layer and has a second value (d/p) different from the first value in the second region of the liquid crystal layer. The value (d/p) of the ratio of the thickness d of the liquid crystal layer to the pitch p of the liquid crystal material in the second region of the liquid crystal layer is selected such that, when no voltage is applied across the liquid crystal layer, the liquid crystal state stable in the second region of the liquid crystal layer is topologically equivalent to the desired liquid crystal state.

A non-volatile memory device according to the present invention includes: a substrate; a storage medium provided above the substrate; a writing unit having a heating unit provided above the substrate, for heating the storage medium by the heating unit to write data in the storage medium with a thermal change of a physical value of the storage medium; and a reading unit having an electrical reading unit provided above the substrate, for reading the change of the physical value of the storage medium as data written in the storage medium by the electrical reading unit.

Non-volatile memory device and a method for producing the same

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Tenri, Japan

Tadashi Kawamura