Canon Kabushiki Kaisha

Kyowa Hakko Kirin Co., Limited

Mitsubishi Denki Kabushiki Kaisha

Renesas Technology Corp.

The University of Tokyo

Takao Nakajima

Kazuhiko Fukutani

Yasufumi Asao

Noriaki Uesaka

Yoshisuke Nakasato

Yuji Nomoto

Masamori Sugawara

Tetsuji Ohno

Shin-ichi Uchida

Katsumi Nakagawa

Ayatomo Okino

Toru Den

Takeshi Uchida

Manabu Jimba

Toshinobu Tokita

Tatsuyuki Yamamoto

Ryuichi Nanaumi

Hiroshi Matsumoto

Kenichi Nagae

Yushi Oka

Daisuke Aruga

Jun Araki

Shinichi Takata

Yasuhiro Someda

Hiroshi Nishihara

Shunji Ichikawa

Kentaro Tamura

Ryou Sakaguchi

Kazuyuki Iwamoto

Tetsuro Washida

Kohzo Ito

Nobuhiro Kato

Takako Suga

Masaaki Kusui

Daisuke Fujii

Tetsurou Tsuji

Shin-Ichi Uchida

Sadaki Samitsu

A belt feeding device includes an endless belt, stretching rollers including a tension roller, a bearing member supporting the tension roller, a beating support member supporting the bearing member, an urging member urging the tension roller, a supporting member supporting the bearing supporting member, and a locking member. The locking member is movable between a first position where an engagement between the locking member and one of the bearing support member and the bearing member is released and the bearing member is permitted to move so as to apply the tension to the belt, and a second position where the locking member locks the bearing member by engaging with the bearing support member and the bearing member and the bearing member is restricted to move. The bearing member, the bearing support member, the urging member, and the locking member constitute a unit to be integrally dismountable from the supporting in the second position.

Belt feeding device and image forming apparatus

A control portion controls a change mechanism so as to pass through a third stretched form in switching a stretched form of a belt member from a second stretched form to a first stretched form. The first stretched form is a stretched form enabling a toner image to be transferred from a photosensitive drum to the belt member by positioning a transfer member at a first position and a separation roller at a second position. The second stretched form is a stretched form of separating each of the transfer member and the separation roller from a transfer surface toward an opposite side of the photosensitive drum. The third stretched form is a stretched form in which the transfer member is positioned at the first position, and the separation roller is positioned at a third position away from the transfer surface toward the opposite side of the photosensitive drum.

Monochrome image forming apparatus

An image forming apparatus includes an image forming portion, a transfer belt, a secondary transfer portion, a cleaning member contacting a surface of the transfer belt for cleaning the surface of the transfer belt, a fixing device, an exhausting device, a duct portion and a sheet member. The sheet member is provided on the exhausting device so as to project toward the transfer belt from the exhausting device, the sheet member being opposed to transfer belt and separated by a predetermined space downstream of the transfer portion and upstream of the cleaning member with respect to a rotational direction of the transfer belt, and being configured to prevent air flow between the exhausting device and the transfer belt from flowing downstream with respect to the rotational direction.

Image forming apparatus including sheet member containing flow of exhaust air

Monochrome image forming apparatus capable of suppressing increase of torque in changing stretched form of intermediate transfer belt

An image forming apparatus includes an image bearing member, an image forming unit, a belt conveying device including an intermediate transfer belt, a pair of restriction portions provided in the belt conveying device, and restriction engagement portions. The image forming unit forms a toner image on the image bearing member and the toner image is transferred to the intermediate transfer belt. The pair of restriction portions and the restriction engagement portions cooperate to restrict an orientation of the intermediate transfer belt. One restriction portion of the pair of restriction portions is supported to be movable to a first position where at least a part of the one restriction portion is placed outside a stretching area defined by the intermediate transfer belt in a stretched state, and a second position where the one restriction portion is inside the stretching area as viewed from a width direction of the intermediate transfer belt.

Image forming apparatus to address intermediate transfer belt replacement

A developer supply container includes a developer accommodating portionfor accommodating toner, a developer supply openingfor discharging the toner accommodated in the developer accommodating portionfrom the developer supply container, a feeding portionfor feeding the toner in the developer accommodating portiontoward the developer supply opening, a rotatable drive receiving portionfor receiving a rotational force for rotating the feeding portion, and a holding projectionheld by a holding mechanism 304 provided in the developer supply containerto determine a position of the developer supply container, wherein the developer supply openingis disposed between the drive receiving portionand the holding projection. By this, a stability of connection between the discharge opening of the developer supply container and the receiving port of the image forming apparatus side is improved.

Developer supply container and developer supplying apparatus

An inadvertent swing of a steering roller is restricted with a versatile configuration. A belt conveying device includes a belt member configured to be stretched around a steering roller and a roller member, and a movement mechanism configured to move the roller member. The roller member is movable to a first position and a second position where the roller member is moved further inward on an inner peripheral side of the belt member than the first position by the movement mechanism. In the movement mechanism, a restriction portion capable of restricting a swinging range of the steering roller more in a case where the roller member is at the second position than in a case where the roller member is at the first position is provided.

Belt conveying device and image forming apparatus

There are included a first grip portion provided on a first end side of a belt conveyor device, in a width direction intersecting a rotational direction of the belt, and a second grip portion and an electrical contact portion provided on a second end side of the belt conveyor device. A center of gravity position of the belt conveyor device is provided on a downstream side of a center of the belt conveyor device and a range where the center of gravity position of the belt conveyor device is provided in a range where the contact portion and the first grip portion are provided. The second grip portion is provided on an upstream side of the center of gravity position of the belt conveyor device in an insertion direction of the belt conveyor device.

Belt conveyor device and image forming apparatus provided with the same

A photoacoustic apparatus includes a light source configured to generate a plurality of light beams having wavelengths different from each other, a conversion element configured to receive a photoacoustic wave that is generated in a subject in response to being illuminated with the respective light beams having wavelengths different from each other and output a signal for each wavelength, an information acquisition unit configured to acquire information in terms of a concentration of a substance existing in the subject by using the signal for each wavelength, and a specifying unit configured to specify a coefficient and instruct the information acquisition unit to use the specified coefficient in acquiring the information in terms of the concentration, wherein the specifying unit specifies, as the coefficient, a value representable by a formula including an amount of light having each wavelength, and wherein the information acquisition unit acquires information in terms of the concentration by using the coefficient specified by the specifying unit and the signal for each wavelength.

Photoacoustic apparatus, method of acquiring subject information, and non-transitory computer readable medium

An image forming apparatus includes an image forming portion, an endless belt and a plurality of stretching rollers. The stretching rollers includes a tiltable steering roller, a sliding member, a first stretching roller having a smallest diameter, and a second stretching roller having a largest diameter of the diameters. With respect to rotational axis directions of the stretching rollers, lengths of contact portions of the stretching rollers with the belt are shorter than a width of the belt, the length of the contact portion of the first stretching roller with the belt is a first length, the length of the contact portion of the second stretching roller with the belt is a second length shorter than the first length, and end positions of the contact portions of the first and second stretching rollers with respect to the rotational axis direction are different from each other.

Image forming apparatus

An intermediate transfer unit, which is supported by an image forming apparatus, includes a moving mechanism which is capable of moving to an abutting position at which a first transfer member abuts against an intermediate transfer belt and a separating position at which the first transfer member is separated from the intermediate transfer belt; and a changing mechanism which changes a biasing force for abutting a second transfer member against the intermediate transfer belt. The biasing force is changed such that the biasing force when the first transfer member is at the separating position becomes weaker than the biasing force when the first transfer member is at the abutting position.

Intermediate transfer unit and image forming apparatus

A developer supply container includes a developer accommodating portionfor accommodating toner, a developer supply openingfor discharging the toner accommodated in the developer accommodating portionfrom the developer supply container, a feeding portionfor feeding the toner in the developer accommodating portiontoward the developer supply opening, a rotatable drive receiving portionfor receiving a rotational force for rotating the feeding portion, and a holding projectionheld by a holding mechanismprovided in the developer supply containerto determine a position of the developer supply container, wherein the developer supply openingis disposed between the drive receiving portionand the holding projection. By this, a stability of connection between the discharge opening of the developer supply container and the receiving port of the image forming apparatus side is improved.

An acoustic wave acquiring apparatus is used that includes: an array light source including a plurality of elements emitting measurement light; a controller controlling the wavelength of the measurement light, for each of or the plurality of elements; a Fabry-Perot interferometer including a first mirror upon which the measurement light is incident and a second mirror upon which an acoustic wave from a subject is incident; an optical sensor measuring a light quantity of reflected light by the first and the second mirror; and a processor acquiring an intensity of the acoustic wave on the basis of a change of the light quantity of the reflected light, which is a distance between the first mirror and the second mirror, occurring due to the incidence of the acoustic wave.

Acoustic wave acquiring apparatus and control method therefor

A toner supply unit for use in an image forming apparatus includes a bottle gear provided on a toner bottle to receive a driving force when the toner bottle is mounted to a mounting portion, and a discharging mechanism provided on the toner bottle to discharge a predetermined amount of toner from a discharging portion with the rotation of the bottle gear. A controller controls the driving force inputted to the bottle gear in a period from input of the driving force to the bottle gear to a predetermined number of rotations of the toner bottle to be smaller than the driving force inputted to the bottle gear at a time when the discharging mechanism first discharges the predetermined amount of toner from the discharging portion after the predetermined number of rotations.

Image forming apparatus having controlled driving force

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Tokyo, Japan

Takao Nakajima