10500 results about "Light wave" patented technology

An integrated endoscopic image acquisition and therapeutic delivery system for use in minimally invasive medical procedures (MIMPs). The system uses directed and scanned optical illumination provided by a scanning optical fiber or light waveguide that is driven by a piezoelectric or other electromechanical actuator included at a distal end of an integrated imaging and diagnostic/therapeutic instrument. The directed illumination provides high resolution imaging, at a wide field of view (FOV), and in full color that matches or excels the images produced by conventional flexible endoscopes. When using scanned optical illumination, the size and number of the photon detectors do not limit the resolution and number of pixels of the resulting image. Additional features include enhancement of topographical features, stereoscopic viewing, and accurate measurement of feature sizes of a region of interest in a patient's body that facilitate providing diagnosis, monitoring, and/or therapy with the instrument.

Small, rugged scanners micro-fabricated from commercial optical fibers to form waveguides or other structures. The scanning waveguide has a distal portion on which is formed a non-linear taper with a diameter that decreases toward a distal end. Optionally, a hinge portion having a reduced diameter can be formed in the distal portion, improving the scanning properties of the waveguide. A micro-lens can be integrally formed at the distal tip of the waveguide with either a droplet of an optical adhesive, or by using an energy beam to melt the material of the waveguide to form a droplet. The droplet is shaped with an externally applied force. When mechanically driven in vibratory resonance, the tip of the optical waveguides moves in linear or two-dimensional scan patterns of relatively high amplitude and frequency, and large field of view. The scanner can be used either for image acquisition or image display.

The noninvasive measurement system provides a technique for manipulating wave data. In particular, wave data reflected from a biological entity is received, and the reflected wave data is correlated to a substance in the biological entity. The wave data may comprise light waves, and the biological entity may comprise a human being or blood. Additionally, a substance may comprise, for example, a molecule or ionic substance. The molecule may be, for example, a glucose molecule.

Furthermore, the wave data is used to form a matrix of pixels with the received wave data. The matrix of pixels may be modified by techniques of masking, stretching, or removing hot spots.

Then, the pixels may be integrated to obtain an integration value that is correlated to a glucose level. The correlation process may use a lookup table, which may be calibrated to a particular biological entity. Moreover, an amplitude and phase angle may be calculated for the reflected wave data and used to identify a glucose level in the biological entity.

The glucose level may be displayed on a monitor attached to the computer. The computer may be a portable, self-contained unit that comprises a data processing system and a wave reflection capture system. On the other hand, the computer may be attached to a network of other computers, wherein the reflected wave data is received by the computer and forwarded to another computer in the network for processing.

A tactile touch-sensitive device for use as an electronic input device for indicating a position of an electronic document on a display device is described. The illuminable document position indicator aspect of the device provides a relative location of the electronic document on the display. The device may be included as part of a keyboard or an electronic book device. The illuminable document position indicator may be one or more static illuminable LEDs and/or a moveable light source and pivotable translucent elements which act as light wave guides. A controller may be used to control the illuminable document position indicator. The controller may change the color and/or intensity of LEDs based upon a displayed location of the electronic document relative to a beginning and an end of the electronic document.

Opto-electrical systems having electrical and optical interconnections formed in thin layers are disclosed. In one set of preferred embodiments, optical signals are conveyed between layers by respective vertical optical couplers disposed on the layers. In other preferred embodiments, optical signals are conveyed by stack optical waveguide coupling means. Yet other preferred embodiments have electrical via means formed in one or more layers to covey electrical signals between two or more layers.

The present invention discloses simple and yet highly efficient configurations of optical coherence domain reflectometry systems. The combined use of a polarizing beam splitter with one or two polarization manipulator(s) that rotate the returned light wave polarization to an orthogonal direction, enables one to achieve high optical power delivery efficiency as well as fixed or predetermined output polarization state of the interfering light waves reaching a detector or detector array, which is especially beneficial for spectral domain optical coherence tomography. In addition, the system can be made insensitive to polarization fading resulting from the birefringence change in the sample and reference arms. Dispersion matching can also be easily achieved between the sample and the reference arm for high resolution longitudinal scanning.

A system for treating a selected dermatologic problem and a head for use with such system are provided. The head may include an optical waveguide having a first end to which EM radiation appropriate for treating the condition is applied. The waveguide also has a skin-contacting second end opposite the first end, a temperature sensor being located within a few millimeters, and preferably within 1 to 2 millimeters, of the second end of the waveguide. A temperature sensor may be similarly located in other skin contacting portions of the head. A mechanism is preferably also provided for removing heat from the waveguide and, for preferred embodiments, the second end of the head which is in contact with the skin has a reflection aperture which is substantially as great as the radiation back-scatter aperture from the patient's skin. Such aperture may be the aperture at the second end of the waveguide or a reflection plate or surface of appropriate size may surround the waveguide or other light path at its second end. The portion of the back-scattered radiation entering the waveguide is substantially internally reflected therein, with a reflector being provided, preferably at the first end of the waveguide, for returning back-scattered light to the patient's skin. The reflector may be angle dependent so as to more strongly reflect back scattered light more perpendicular to the skin surface than back scattered radiation more parallel to the skin surface. Controls are also provided responsive to the temperature sensing for determining temperature at a predetermined depth in the patient's skin, for example at the DE junction, and for utilizing this information to detect good thermal contact between the head and the patient's skin and to otherwise control treatment. The head may also have a mechanism for forming a reflecting chamber under the waveguide and drawing a fold of skin therein, or for providing a second enlarged waveguide to expand the optical aperture of the radiation.

A tapered rib waveguide tapering from a large, multi-mode optical waveguide to a smaller, single-mode optical waveguide, the tapered rib waveguide comprising two portions (4,5) formed of the same material: a lower portion (4) which tapers laterally from the large waveguide to the smaller waveguide and an upper portion (5) formed on the lower portion (4), which tapers to a point (or other form of termination), the dimensions of the two portions (4,5) being such that substantially all of a fundamental mode propagated in the large multi-mode waveguide is coupled to the smaller, single-mode waveguide.

Several systems and a method are taught for rapid modulation of a light beam in lidar and other imaging. Most of these involve micromechanical and other very small control components. One such unit is a light-switching fabric, based on displacement of liquid in a tube that crosses a junction of two optical waveguides. In some forms, the fabric is preferably flexible to enable folding or coiling to form a two-dimensional face that interacts with optical-fiber ends an opposed fiber bundle. The rapid operation of the switch fabric enables it to be used as a beam-splitter, separating incoming and return beams; and also to form pulses from supplied CW light. Other control components include micromechanical mirrors (e. g. MEMS mirrors) operated in arrays or singly, liquid-crystal devices, and other controlled-birefringence cells. Some of these devices are placed within an optical system for directional light-beam steering.

The invention relates to an optical device (50) for manipulating a light wave (λ) using a diffractive grating structure (G). According to the basic idea behind the invention a prior art type diffractive grating structure having a permanently shaped surface relief is substituted with an electrically deformable diffractive grating structure (G), where a preformed, basic surface relief of the grating is composed of dielectric and deformable viscoelastic material, which can be electrically and sequentially fine tuned in shape to adjust the diffraction properties of said grating individually for different wavelengths. The invention permits manufacture of virtual display devices with a significantly larger exit pupil diameter than prior art solutions without degrading the color uniformity of the display device.