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:
Jul. 28, 2026
Filed:
Apr. 01, 2025
Microsoft Technology Licensing, Llc, Redmond, WA (US);
Simo Kaarlo Tapani Tammela, Espoo, FI;
Anton Viljami Autere, Järvenpää, FI;
Esa Tapani Räikkönen, Espoo, FI;
Microsoft Technology Licensing, LLC, Redmond, WA (US);
Abstract
An off-axis lighting system for optical storage media comprises a Gaussian laser illumination source and illumination optics including collimating and cylindrical lenses. The system generates an illumination beam that propagates through the optical storage medium at angles different from the optical axis of a line scanning camera system. A collimating lens shapes the beam, adjusting characteristics such as beam waist diameter and location. A cylindrical lens further shapes the beam, creating an elliptical two-dimensional profile across its cross-section. The combination of off-axis propagation and elliptical profile restricts illumination to the voxels in the field of view of the line scanning camera at a specific layer in the optical storage medium. The off-axis lighting system enhances an ability of an optical read system to read voxels by improving the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) of the voxel images captured by the line scanning camera used to decode symbols stored by the voxels.