System for determination of a location in three dimensional space
US6141104A · kind A · utility
Assignee
Inventors
Key dates
| Filing date | Sep 9, 1998 |
| Grant date | Oct 31, 2000 |
| Priority date | — |
| Expiry date | Sep 9, 2018 |
Classification
- Technology area (CPC G)Physics
- CPC primaryG06F3/0346
- WIPO fieldMeasurement
- WIPO sectorInstruments
Abstract
An optical improvement for angular position sensors, which may be used to determine the spatial coordinates of a small source of light (or other energy) in a 3-dimensional volume. Such sensors normally include a linear photosensitive image detector such as a photodiode array or a charge-coupled device (CCD). An irregular pattern of parallel slits is described which increases the amount of light gathered while avoiding the undesirable characteristics of lens optics for this application. One optimal type of irregular pattern is the uniformly redundant array. A mathematical correlation function together with a polynomial interpolation function can determine the displacement of the image on the detector and thereby the location of the source relative to one angular dimension. Given the locations and orientations of several sensors in a 3-dimensional coordinate system and given the angles measured by each, the location of the point source can be computed.
Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.