DETAILED ACTION
This Action addresses the communication received on 5 Sep 2026. Applicant has amended Claims 1, 8-9, and 15-16; and cancelled Claims 3-4, 6-7, 11-12, and 14. The Office rejects pending Claims 1-2, 5, 8-10, 13, and 15-18 as detailed below.
Response to Amendments
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 112
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 112(b):
(b) CONCLUSION.—The specification shall conclude with one or more claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
Claims 1, 9, 16, and any corresponding dependent claims are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 112(b) as being indefinite for failing to particularly point out and distinctly claim the subject matter which the inventor or a joint inventor regards as the invention.
The claims recite "demodulating the integrated reflected light signal based on the plurality of demodulated signals, wherein demodulating comprises sampling the integrated reflected light signal based on the plurality of demodulated signals.” As written, it is not clear how demodulating the integrated reflected light signal can be based on the plurality of demodulated signals. It seems to be a recursive definition, which is indefinite.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
+_+_+ Claims 1-2, 5, 9-10, 13, and 16-18 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Klemme - U.S. Pub. 20220413140 and Banzhaf - Banzhaf et al.; "Phase-Coded FMCW Lidar"; 29th European Signal Processing Conference (EUSIPCO), Dublin, Ireland, pp. 1775-1779; 2021 - in view of Ovsannkov et al. - U.S. Pub. 20130176550 +_+_+
As for Claim 1, Klemme teaches a light signal generator configured to generate a plurality of light signals having different phases based on a reference light signal by delaying a phase of the reference light signal at least one time according to a regular interval (Fig. 4, Emitter 400, Time Delay 428, ¶41|1: “The emitter 400 includes a digital signal processor (DSP) 402 which provides selected inputs to a local oscillator 404, which is configured to output different outputs and different frequencies and phases. The local oscillator 404 drives two separate and parallel emission channels 406, 408. These two channels 406, 408 are sometimes referred to as a first channel and a second channel, respectively. While two separate channels 406, 408 are shown in the embodiment of FIG. 4, in other embodiments the operations described below can be accomplished using a single emission channel that operates successively in different time frames. Conversely, other embodiments can be configured to use three or more separate emission channels.”);
a demodulated signal generator configured to generate a plurality of demodulated signals based on the reference light signal (¶49|1: “FIG. 6 shows a detector circuit 600 constructed and operated in accordance with various embodiments. The detector circuit 600 forms at least a portion of the detector 106 of FIG. 1 in some embodiments. The detector 600 operates to detect and decode [i.e., demodulate] the pulses generated and emitted by the emitter 400 of FIG. 4 to derive range information regarding the downrange target.”);
a light source configured to sequentially output each of the plurality of light signals to an object in a time division method by temporally dividing a single integration time into a plurality of time intervals (Fig. 4, Emitter 400, Time Delay 428, ¶41|1: “The emitter 400 includes a digital signal processor (DSP) 402 which provides selected inputs to a local oscillator 404, which is configured to output different outputs and different frequencies and phases.”) such that each of the plurality of light signals is output in a corresponding one of the plurality of time intervals (¶66|1: “As noted previously, a pulse set cycle can be generated as a succession of pulse sets that are sent as a unit [The Office interprets a succession of pulse sets sent as a unit within a pulse set cycle to be equivalent to the time division method as claimed], after which the cycle is repeated continuously. Some embodiments begin with a first phase differential for the first pulse set and then slowly increase or decrease the phase in each subsequent pulse set in the pulse set cycle. The elapsed time between pulse sets can be set to an appropriate interval. This intervening interval between successive pulse set pairs should be of sufficient length to enable the system to distinguish among the respective pulse sets. The interval between the pulse sets can remain nominally constant at a fixed value or can be varied by a selected amount for each successive pairs of pulse sets in the cycle.”);
a light receiver configured to receive, during the single integration time, a plurality of reflected light signals corresponding to the plurality of light signals and to generate an integrated reflected light signal by summing the plurality of reflected light signals received during the single integration time [..1..] [..2..] (Fig. 6, Detection and Analysis Circuit 608, ¶53|3: “The processing carried out by the circuit 608 can include a variety of functions including averaging, weighting, subtraction, comparison, and/or other combinatorial operations [i.e., summing].” That is, the 608 circuit combines and then decodes and analyzes the received signal to determine distance information.) Klemme does not explicitly teach integrating the received signal before demodulating.
But Banzhaf teaches integrating light signals [1] before demodulating the integrated reflected light signal (Fig. 1c showing received light signals being first coupled and combined by a balanced detector before proceeding to an ADC and then to demodulation and distance and velocity calculating.)
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains to combine Klemme and Banzhaf because the approach in Banzhaf “avoids estimation ambiguities without the need of a costly quadrature demodulator. (Banzhaf, P-1776, Sec. III (A))”
Klemme and Banzhaf do not explicitly teach [2] receiving the LiDAR signal using a pixel array.
But Ovsannkov teaches [2] a pixel array configured to generate a plurality of pixel signals (¶45|6: “Referring to FIG. 4, each of the depth pixels PXd may receive a demodulation signal, for example SIGD0, and illumination by four modulated signals SIGD0 through SIGD3 whose phases are shifted respectively by 0, 90, 180, and 270 degrees from the output light OLIG, and output corresponding depth pixel signals POUTd.”)
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains to combine Klemme and Banzhaf with Ovsannkov because using a pixel array is a well-known way to receive reflected light from a pulse emitting LiDAR.
As for Claim 2, which depends on Claim 1, Klemme teaches wherein the plurality of light signals include the same amplitude and period (¶47|1: “As represented in FIG. 5, the [uniform] pulses will have various tuned waveform characteristics including amplitude (e.g., pulse height), frequency (pulse width), phase (in terms of separation distance/time between pulses), shape (sinusoid, square, trapezoidal, triangular, irregular, etc.), and substantially any other characteristic as desired.”)
As for Claim 5, which depends on Claim 1, Ovsannkov teaches wherein the demodulated signal generator delays a phase of the reference light signal by 0°, 90°, 180°, and 270° to generate the plurality of demodulated signals (¶45|6: “Referring to FIG. 4, each of the depth pixels PXd may receive a demodulation signal, for example SIGD0, and illumination by four modulated signals SIGD0 through SIGD3 whose phases are shifted respectively by 0, 90, 180, and 270 degrees from the output light OLIG, and output corresponding depth pixel signals POUTd.”)
Claims 9 and 16 recite substantially the same subject matter as Claim 1 and stand rejected on the same basis accordingly.
Claims 10 and 13 recite substantially the same subject matter as Claims 2 and 5, respectively, and stand rejected on the same basis accordingly.
Claims 17 and 18 recite substantially the same subject matter as Claims 2 and 5, respectively, and stand rejected on the same basis accordingly.
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+_+_+ Claims 8 and 15 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Klemme, Banzhaf, and Ovsannkov in view of Lehmann - U.S. Pub. 20160299218 +_+_+
As for Claim 8, which depends on Claim 1, Klemme and Ovsannkov do not explicitly teach that the duty cycle of the signals is less than 50%. The duty cycle is not explicitly discussed in the disclosure and the modulated/demodulated signals illustrated in the drawings appear to be the standard 50% duty cycle (half on, half off).
But Lehmann teaches wherein the plurality of light signals and the plurality of demodulated signals have the same duty cycle less than 50% (¶28|1: “Illumination can be controlled, for example, by signals from the control unit 28 that modulate the light source 22 (i.e., turn the light source 22 on and off). In accordance with an aspect of the present disclosure, the light pulses [modulated/demodulated signals] are compressed (i.e., shortened) such that the duty cycle of the light pulses is less than 50% (i.e., the light pulses are ON less than fifty percent of the time).”)
It would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains to combine Klemme, Banzhaf, and Ovsannkov with Lehmann because generating compressed light pulses (i.e., lower duty cycle) can result in an increased demodulation contrast (Lehmann, ¶29|1).
Claim 15 recites substantially the same subject matter as Claim 8 and stands rejected on the same basis accordingly.
Response to Arguments
Applicant's arguments filed 5 Sep 2026 relate to newly amended claims and are not addressed in this section; the rejections above, however, address the latest version of the claims in detail.
Conclusion
Applicants should direct any inquiry concerning this or earlier communications to CLINT THATCHER at phone 571.270.3588. Examiner is normally available Mon-Fri, 9am to 5:30pm ET and generally keeps a daily 2:30pm timeslot open for interviews.
If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, Examiner’s supervisor, Yuqing Xiao, can be reached at (571) 270-3603.
Though not relied on, the Office considers the additional prior art listed in the Notice of Reference Cited form (PTO-892) pertinent to Applicant's disclosure.
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/Clint Thatcher/
Examiner, Art Unit 3645
/HOVHANNES BAGHDASARYAN/Examiner, Art Unit 3645
