DETAILED ACTION
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Priority
Applicant is advised of possible benefits under 35 U.S.C. 119(a)-(d) and (f), wherein an application for patent filed in the United States may be entitled to claim priority to an application filed in a foreign country. Should applicant desire to obtain the benefit of foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. 119(a)-(d) prior to declaration of an interference, a certified English translation of the foreign application must be submitted in reply to this action. 37 CFR 41.154(b) and 41.202(e).
Failure to provide a certified translation may result in no benefit being accorded for the non-English application.
Claim Objections
Claim 8 objected to because of the following informalities:
Missing comma after “resonant cavity”
Missing comma after “second reflecting portion”
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim 11 objected to because of the following informalities:
Missing comma after “collimating unit”
Appropriate correction is required.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
4. 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.
5. The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
a. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
b. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
c. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
d. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or non-obviousness.
6. Claim(s) 1-4, 6-7, 15, 18-19 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nakao (US 2014/0293237 A1) in view of Daniel (EP 4113054 A1).
7. Regarding Claim 1, Nakao teaches an emitting device comprising:
a light source configured to emit a light beam ([0028], Fig. 1 #105);
a scanning unit ([0028]), comprising a driving portion and a scanning portion ([0028], Fig. 1 #145, 120), wherein the driving portion is configured to control the scanning portion to produce vibration according to a preset rule ([0034], Fig. 4), and the scanning portion is configured to reflect the light beam emitted by the light source ([0028], Fig. 1 a light ray from light source 105 is depicted reflecting off mirror 120);
a rectifying unit ([0028], Fig. 1 #131), configured to rectify an emission angle of the light beam reflected by the scanning portion ([0038]), so that a plurality of points included in a point cloud picture formed by projecting the light beam rectified by the rectifying unit on a preset plane is arranged at equal intervals in at least one direction ([0038], Fig. 6 showing an evenly distributed luminance in the horizontal direction with first lens present);
wherein the preset plane is a plane perpendicular to a projection optical axis of the light beam which is rectified ([0032, 0034], the plane containing projection area #150 of Fig. 2 is perpendicular to optical axis #300 rectified by lens 131).
Nakao does not explicitly teach the emitter applied in a depth camera, but Daniel teaches a similar emitter with a light source unit ([0040], Fig. 6), reflecting unit ([0072], #3 of Fig. 2 and 6), and refracting lens ([0081], Fig. 6 #41) implemented in an optical distance-measuring device ([0001, 0022]).
It would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to implement the emitter of Nakao in a depth camera such as the device taught by Daniel in order to obtain three-dimensional contour data of an object (Daniel, [0001]).
8. Regarding Claim 2, Nakao, as modified, teaches … wherein
the rectifying unit comprises a lens ([0028], Fig.1 #131), the lens comprises a first surface and a second surface which are oppositely arranged (Fig. 2 Lens #131 is depicted having a first concave surface opposite a second convex surface), and the light beam reflected by the scanning portion enters the rectifying unit from the first surface and exits from the second surface (Fig. 2 light rays are depicted entering and exiting each surface of lens #131 respectively).
9. Regarding Claim 3, Nakao does not explicitly teach - but Daniel teaches that the first surface and the second surface are free-form surfaces… which also diffracts the beam from the scanner ([0044, 0081], Fig. 6 #41).
It would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to use a free form lens taught by Daniel in the rectifying unit of the emitter taught by Nakao, to assign beams different focal lengths (Daniel, [0044]).
10. Regarding Claim 4, Nakao as modified, also teaches wherein
at least one of the first surface or the second surface is an aspheric surface. The free-form surfaces of Daniel are also aspheric ([0044, 0081], Fig. 6 #41).
11. Regarding Claim 6, Nakao, as modified, also teaches, wherein
the vibration comprises a first simple harmonic vibration in a first direction ([0034]).
12. Regarding Claim 7, Nakao, does not explicitly teach – but Daniel teaches the light source comprising a vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser ([0012,0040]).
It would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the emitter with light source of Nakao with the vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser of Daniel, mutatis mutandis. Daniel teaches that vertical-cavity surface-emitting lasers are monochromatic, have a small divergence angle, and are sometimes already linearly polarized ([0040]) and would thus optimize optical performance ([0039]).
13. Regarding Claim 15, Nakao also teaches wherein
the scanning unit comprises a MEMS scanning unit ([0006, 0028]).
14. Regarding Claim 18, Nakao, does not teach – but Daniel teaches a depth camera ([0001, 0022]), comprising a receiving module and an emitting module ([0020])
wherein the light beam rectified by the rectifying unit of the emitting module is configured to be projected onto a target to be detected ([0027]), and the receiving module is configured to receive the light beam reflected by the target to be detected ([0033]).
It would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the receiving module of Daniel with the emitter of Nakao in order to detect and measure the target.
15. Regarding Claim 19, Nakao also teaches a head mount display device [0059], but does not explicitly teach the device comprising a housing connected to the depth camera.
It would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention that a depth camera would be connected to a housing, and that a head mount display device might consist of housing for its optical elements.
16. Claims 5, 16-17 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nakao (US 2014/0293237 A1) and Daniel (EP 4113054 A1) as applied to claim 2 above, and further in view of Sun (WO 2019192038 A1).
17. Regarding Claim 5, Nakao and Daniel do not explicitly teach— but Sun does teach wherein, the rectifying lens comprising a first convex portion and a second convex portion disposed at opposite sides, respectively ([0048, 0050], Fig. 3);
a surface of the first convex portion away from the second convex portion forms the first surface ([0048], Fig. 3 surface A), and a surface of the second convex portion away from the first convex portion forms the second surface ([0048], Fig. 3 surface B);
the first convex portion extends into a first column along a first extending direction ([0048], Fig. 3), the second convex portion extends into a second column along a second extending direction ([0048], Fig. 3), and the first extending direction is perpendicular to the second extending direction ([0048], Fig. 3).
It would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the emitter of Nakao with perpendicular convex lens of Sun in order to shape the light beam ([0050]).
18. Regarding Claim 16, Nakao does not explicitly teach – but Sun does teach wherein
the first convex portion and the second convex portion are attached to each other or an integrated structure (Sun, [0050], Fig. 3).
It would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to attach two convex portions of the rectifying unit to one another in order to form two independent optical systems in order to make light beams with a fast and slow axis have an equalized and close radiation angle (Sun, [0050]).
19. Regarding Claim 17, Nakao does not explicitly teach – but Sun does teach
a size of the first convex portion in the first extension direction is equal to that of the second convex portion in the first extension direction (Sun Fig. 3), and a size of the first convex portion in the second extension direction is equal to that of the second convex portion in the second extension direction (Sun Fig. 3).
It would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to make the convex portions fit together into the simplest embodiment of the beam shaper, a continuous double cylindrical lens piece as taught in Sun for efficient coupling with other optical elements (Sun, [0048]).
20. Claim 8 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nakao (US 2014/0293237 A1) and Daniel (EP 4113054 A1) as applied to claim 7 above, and further in view of Padullaparthi (VCSELs Design Engineering 2021, Appendix A).
21. Regarding Claim 8, Nakao does not explicitly teach but Padullaparthi does teach wherein a vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser comprising
a first reflecting portion ([p. 207, A.1.2], Figure A.2 (a) “n-DBR”), a resonant cavity ([p. 207, A.1.2], Figure A.2 (a) “Active Optical Cavity”) and a second reflecting portion ([p. 207, A.1.2], Figure A.2 (a) “p-DBR”) which are sequentially arranged along a light exiting direction of the light source ([p. 207, A.1.2], ”top emitting”);
the first reflecting portion and the second reflecting portion both comprise a plurality of first material layers and a plurality of second material layers which are alternately stacked along the light exiting direction of the light source ([p. 208, A.1.2.2], “high and low index materials”).
It would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the laser structure of Padullaparthi with the laser and emitter of Nakao as Padullaparthi teaches a standard vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser structure which is known in the art.
22. Claim 9 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nakao (US 2014/0293237 A1), Daniel (EP 4113054 A1), and Padullaparthi (VCSELs Design Engineering 2021, Appendix A) as applied to claim 8 above, and further in view of Burroughs (US 10522973 B2).
23. Regarding Claim 9, Nakao does not explicitly teach – but Burroughs does teach further specifications on the quantity of material layers or light-exiting hole size…
a vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser with two reflecting portions of alternating material layers, where the thicknesses of these portions and refractive indices of each material provide wavelength-selective reflectance at a certain emission wavelength ([Col. 7, ln. 24-30]), and a diameter of a light exiting hole of the laser is greater than 12µm ([Col. 8, ln. 6-8], #210 of Fig. 2A, 2B.).
It would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to combine the laser of Nakao and the specifications of Burroughs to create a vertical-cavity surface-emitting laser with a number of alternating material layers chosen to provide conditions for reflectance at a needed emission wavelength; it would also be obvious to further combine with the 12µm light exiting aperture of Burroughs in order to accommodate the dimensions of other parts of the laser ([Col. 8, ln. 38-51]).
24. Claims 10-12, 14 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nakao (US 2014/0293237 A1) and Daniel (EP 4113054 A1) as applied to claim 2 above, and further in view of Lim (WO 2017/217800).
25. Regarding Claim 10, Nakao does not explicitly teach – but Lim does teach…
a collimating unit ([144]), configured to collimate the light beam emitted by the light source ([144]).
It would be obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to add the collimating unit of Lim to the emitter of Nakao in order to improve outcomes when projecting light from the emitter to an external object ([11]).
26. Regarding Claim 11, Nakao also teaches
the rectifying unit located at one end of the scanning portion along a preset direction ([0034], the lens is configured to refract light from the MEMS unit and therefore must be set up in some preset direction relative to the scanner), and the preset direction is perpendicular to the light exiting direction ([0040], Fig. 2, Nakao teaches a theoretical vertical line L which can be drawn from the MEMS unit, through the center of the rectifying lens, to the center of light projection screen).
Nakao does not explicitly teach the placement of the collimating unit within the emitter. However, Lim discloses an emitter wherein
the light source ([144], Fig. 10 #1010B), the collimating unit ([144], Fig. 10 #1010B) and the scanning portion are sequentially arranged at intervals along a light exiting direction of the light source ([127, 133-134], Fig. 10 #1005), and a reflecting surface of the scanning portion has a preset included angle with the light exiting direction ([60, 70-71]);
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to place the collimating unit, scanner, and light source in this order within the emitter of Nakao in order to make the device more compact ([153]). Further, it would have been obvious to configure the reflecting surface of the scanning portion with a preset angle to prevent a deterioration in quality of the light projected from the emitter ([70-71]).
27. Regarding Claim 12, Nakao does not explicitly teach - but Lim does teach an emitter including
a turning unit ([177-178]);
the scanning portion located at one end of the light source along a preset direction ([142, 147]), and the preset direction is perpendicular to a light exiting direction of the light source ([137, 142, 147] the light source 1010B and MEMS unit 1005 are both mounted on the same “first” surface of base unit 1000, meaning that a laser emitting light towards the top “second” surface would be emitting perpendicular to scanner 1005);
the collimating unit is disposed at one end of the light source along the light exiting direction ([144]), and a rectifying unit is located at one end of the scanning portion along the light exiting direction ([180-181]);
the turning unit is located between the collimating unit and the rectifying unit ([184, 193]), and is configured to change a propagation direction of the light beam collimated by the collimating unit ([178-179]), so that the light beam which is collimated is incident on the scanning portion ([178]), and the light beam reflected by the scanning portion is directed to the rectifying unit ([180-184]).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to include a turning unit before the scanner in the emitter of Nakao to change the optical path of light beams and increase the amount of light incident to the surface of the scanner ([178]). Further, it would be obvious to position the collimating and scanning units as described to make the device more compact ([153]) and to position the rectifying unit as described in order to alleviate a pincushion distortion before projection ([204]).
28. Regarding Claim 14, Nakao does not explicitly teach
a circuit board, wherein the light source is installed on the circuit board;
or a supporting piece, wherein the supporting piece and the circuit board enclose an accommodating cavity for accommodating the collimating unit, the light source and the scanning portion;
and the supporting piece is provided with an installation hole, and the rectifying unit is installed at the installation hole.
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention that a laser light source would be configured to circuitry such as a circuit board such as the one discussed in Sun (Sun, [0012-13]), that an emitter device would be connected to supporting housing which accommodates its optical elements (Lim, [0135-0137]), and that such housing would include structure at which to install a lens (Lim, [0135, 0183, 0194]).
29. Claim 13 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Nakao (US 2014/0293237 A1), Daniel (EP 4113054 A1), and Lim (WO 2017/217800) as applied to claim 12 above, and further in view of Hu (CN 111442715 A).
31. Regarding Claim 13, Nakao does not explicitly teach— but Hu does teach this structure, wherein—
the turning unit comprises a first right-angle prism and a second right-angle prism ([pg. 3, ln. 33-34]);
a hypotenuse surface of the first right-angle prism faces toward the light source and a scanning element (Fig. 2 the hypotenuse of RAP1 faces light source f2 and mirror M2), a first right-angle surface of the first right-angle prism is attached to a hypotenuse surface of the second right-angle prism ([pg. 3, ln. 36-43], Fig. 2 the hypotenuse of RAP3 is connected to a right-angle side of RAP1), and the second right-angle prism is located between the scanning portion and the rectifying unit;
a reflective layer is disposed on a second right-angle surface of the first right-angle prism ([pg. 5, ln. 36], Fig. 2 PBS1), and a transflective layer is disposed between the first right-angle surface of the first right-angle prism and the hypotenuse surface of the second right-angle prism (Fig. 2 PBS2).
It would have been obvious to a person of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to use the turning unit structure of Hu for simplicity, thermal stability, ease of assembly, and to provide precise and high-resolution measurements ([pg. 1, ln. 9-12]). It would also be obvious to position the collimating unit as described in Lim to make the device more compact ([153]).
Conclusion
32. Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to DORIAN EYRE BALDWIN-BOTT whose telephone number is (571)270-0450. The examiner can normally be reached Monday-Friday 9:30 a.m.-6:00 p.m..
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Helal Algahaim can be reached at (571) 270-5227. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is 571-273-8300.
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/DORIAN EYRE BALDWIN-BOTT/Examiner, Art Unit 3645
/JAMES R HULKA/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3645
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