The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Jun. 28, 2022
Filed:
Feb. 26, 2020
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA (US);
Kenneth Schultz, Lexington, MA (US);
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA (US);
Abstract
Amplitude-modulated (AM) signals spanning a spatial wide area can be efficiently detected using a slowly scanning optical system. The system decouples the AM carrier from the AM signal bandwidth (or carrier uncertainty), enabling Nyquist sampling of only the information-bearing AM signal (or the known frequency bandwidth). The system includes a staring sensor with N pixels (e.g., N>10) that searches for a sinusoidal frequency of unknown phase and frequency, perhaps constrained to a particular band by a priori information about the signal. Counters in the sensor pixels mix the detected signals with local oscillators to down-convert the signal of interest, e.g., to a baseband frequency. The counters store the down-converted signal for read out at a rate lower than the Nyquist rate of AM signal. The counts can be shifted among pixels synchronously with the optical line-of-sight for scanning operation.