A 64×32 liquid-crystal-on-silicon (LCOS) backplane with a novel framebuffer pixel array has been designed and fabricated using the AMI Semiconductor 0.5-µm double-poly triple-metal CMOS process. The pixel circuit described herein increases the brightness significantly without sacrificing image contrast ratio. Characteristics of various liquid-crystal modes applicable to field sequential color displays have been investigated. The LCOS microdisplay, employing an optimized optically compensated birefringence mode, demonstrates fast response times (OFF=0.3 ms, ON=1.2 ms) enabling a frame rate of 720 Hz, with a potentially high contrast ratio of up to 1600:1.
The fabrication and characterization of thin film optical retarders using liquid crystal polymer (LCP) material is presented. The advantages of LCP are high optical birefringence, high optical clarity, good surface quality, the possibility for large aperture applications, flexibility in orienting the crystal and low cost. An additional advantage over conventional liquid crystals is the processing on a single substrate as opposed to confinement between two hermetically sealed substrates, thus the prospect for compact multilayer stacks. Experimental result for single layer LCP thin films and numerical modeling of multilayer stacks are presented for on- and off-axis incident light.
A polarization-insensitive, tunable nematic liquid crystal Fabry-Perot filter incorporating polymer liquid crystal waveplates within the Fabry-Perot cavity is presented. The performance of the filter is evaluated experimentally, and theoretically verified using computational modeling techniques. Fabrication tolerance parameters are considered through theoretical experiments using the numerical model. A typical experimental filter yielded 12 nm tuning range with 13 VAC of applied voltage, with a finesse of 7 at the design wavelength 1550 nm.
Rare event applications are characterized by the event-of- interest being hidden in a large volume of routine data. The key to success in such situations is the development of a cascade of data elimination strategies, such that each stage enriches the probability of finding the event amidst the data retained for further processing. Automated detection of aberrant cells in cervical smear slides is an example of a rare event problem. Each slide can amount to 2.5 gigabytes of raw data and only 1 in 20 slides are abnormal. In this paper we examine the use of template matching, artificial neural networks, integrated optical density and morphological processing as algorithms for the first data elimination stage. Based on the experience gained, we develop a successful strategy with improves the overall event probability in the retained data from 0.01 initially to 0.87 after the second stage of processing.
This paper reviews the assembly and packaging of miniature liquid-crystal-on-silicon (LCOS) displays. Reflective-mode LCOS displays require thin cell gaps with strict tolerances - a difficult optoelectronics assembly problem. Important assembly and packaging considerations include the substrate thermal properties, substrate flatness and packaging chronology. Two approaches are described: spatial light modulator assembly using self-pulling solder reflow and wafer scale display assembly using photo-definable resins. Simulation and experimental results are summarized.
A solid-state broad band beam deflector is described. This non-mechanical system steers spatially coherent broad band light to a common location in the far field. The components include a liquid crystal grating and achromatic Fourier transformer. The liquid crystal grating employs a polarization modulation scheme which produces a wavelength independent phase shift. The achromatic Fourier transformer eliminates grating dispersion. The modulation theory for the liquid crystal grating is introduced. Observations of the far field patterns for white light illumination of a binary liquid crystal grating and the design for the achromatic Fourier transformer are presented. Future research, including mid- infrared implementation is discussed.
We report on recent progress in the development of anew liquid crystal color shutter technology that provides high throughput and saturated color. These devices, when combined with high frame rate displays or imagers, convert monochrome to color using the sequential color technique. The current focus is on designs that are compatible with low cost nematic liquid crystal switches.
An optoelectronic detection system using two electrically addressed spatial light modulators in an optical correlator has been constructed to find regions of interest in cervical smear slides using the hit/miss transform algorithm. The purpose of the detector is to locate abnormal cells in the cervical smear and mark the region of interest for further classification by a second stage to the overall system. In addition, an image database of characteristic monolayer cervical smear images has been constructed for testing the system. The optoelectronic processing of cytological specimens can in theory provide both an improvement in the speed of scanning a slide for a region of interest and also a decrease in current manual screening errors. Results of the optoelectronic correlator and corresponding computer simulations will be discussed as well as further means of improving the system. Conclusions about further steps in the implementation of a complete medical diagnostic system including classification of regions of interest and improvements for automation will also be addressed.
A self-pulling soldering technology has been demonstrated for assembling liquid crystal on silicon (LCOS) spatial light modulators (SLMs). One of the major challenges in manufacturing the LCOS modules is to reproducibly control the thickness of the gap between the very large scale integrated circuit (VLSI) chip and the cover glass. The liquid crystal material is sandwiched between the VLSI chop and the cover glass which is coated with a transparent conductor. Solder joints with different profiles and sizes have been designed to provide surface tension forces to control the gap accommodating the ferroelectric liquid crystal layer in the range of a micron level with sub- micron uniformity. The optimum solder joint design is defined as a joint that results in the maximum pulling force. This technology provides an automatic, batch assembly process for a LCOS SLM through one reflow process. Fluxless soldering technology is used to assemble the module. This approach avoids residues from chemical of flux and oxides, and eliminates potential contamination to the device. Two different LCOS SLM designs and the process optimization are described.
Field-sequential color displays and digital color cameras require tunable filters with high- throughput, saturated colors, and rapid switching between bands. ColorLink has developed a new digital tunable filter technology that provides > 37% average transmission of unpolarized light in each primary band, saturated colors, sub-millisecond transition times between colors, and view-angles exceeding +/- 30 degree(s). Performance improvements are derived from proprietary color polarizer and achromatic liquid crystal switch technologies.
An optoelectronic system has been designed to pre-screen pap-smear slides and detect the suspicious cells using the hit/miss transform. Computer simulation of the algorithm tested on 184 pap-smear images detected 95% of the suspicious region as suspect while tagging just 5% of the normal regions as suspect. An optoelectronic implementation of the hit/miss transform using a 4f Vander-Lugt correlator architecture is proposed and demonstrated with experimental results.
In this paper we consider the formation of morphological templates using adaptive resonance theory. We examine the role of object variability and noise on the clustering of different sized objects as a function of the vigilance parameter. We demonstrate that the fuzzy adaptive resonance theory is robust in the presence of noise but that for poor choice of vigilance there is a proliferation of prototypical categories. We apply the technique to detection of abnormal cells in pap smears.
In this paper we describe our recent work developing automated methods for generation of kernels or structuring elements for use in the hit-or-miss transform. We show how a neural network algorithm (Fuzzy Adaptive Resonance Theory) generates hit and miss structuring elements that can be used with a fuzzy morphology to detect a class of objects and we illustrate with computer simulations.
Automation of the Pap-smear cervical screening method is highly desirable as it relieves tedium for the human operators, reduces cost and should increase accuracy and provide repeatability. We present here the design for a high-throughput optoelectronic system which forms the first stage of a two stage system to automate pap-smear screening. We use a mathematical morphological technique called the hit-or-miss transform to identify the suspicious areas on a pap-smear slide. This algorithm is implemented using a VanderLugt architecture and a time-sequential ANDing smart pixel array.
We present the design and test results of an optoelectronic feature detector array for use in a fingerprint ridge extraction system. The system comprises a microlens array for taking multiple Fourier transforms and an array of detectors. Each detector is composed of a set of wedge photodetectors with associated winner-take-all circuitry and encoders for reporting the maximally stimulated wedge element.
This paper details a compact two-dimensional optical correlator based on 128 X 128 ferroelectric liquid crystal spatial light modulators in both the image and filter planes. A complete description of this compact correlator is given. The correlator is fully programmable and performs automatic pattern recognition functions at 500 frames per second. Key design parameters and results of performance analysis are presented.
An optical processor for zero-crossing edge detection is presented which consists of two defocused imaging systems to perform the Gaussian convolutions and a VLSI, ferroelectric liquid crystal spatial light modulator (SLM) to determine the zero-crossings. The zero-crossing SLM is a 32 X 32 array of pixels located on 100 micrometers centers. Each pixels contains a phototransistor, an auto-scaling amplifier, a zero-crossing detection circuit, and a liquid crystal modulating pad. Electrical and optical characteristics of the zero-crossing SLM are presented along with experimental results of the system.
We demonstrate and characterize the use of an optically addressed ferroelectric liquid crystal (FLC) spatial light modulator (SLM) as a spatial filter. The photosensor associated with the liquid crystal is a PIN photodiode made of hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H). Both the amplitude and the phase of the reflection coefficient are observed to be modulated by the write beam. The filter function can be reconfigured at a submillisecond rate with incoherent illumination.
Noise in an optoelectronic neural network alters the performance of the network. The shortest distance from a pattern to a decision plane limits the amount of system noise the network can tolerate. In this paper the noise model of a neural network implemented in optoelectronics is given, as well as an upper limit on the noise the network can tolerate and still classify patterns.
Nonlinear multilayer neural networks have been successful in solving problems in object recognition and decision making, which cannot be solved with nonlinear decision functions. These problems require the construction of a one-to-one or many-to-one mapping of input vectors to output vectors. If a finite training set is used, this mapping is a transformation between the set of values for the input elements to the set of values for the output elements. If the set of values for the input elements lies in the same subspace as the set of values for the output vectors, then a linear transformation can be made. Otherwise, either a neural network or some other nonlinear function is needed to construct the transformation. Nonlinear decision functions can make the transformation to sets of values for the output elements that are in a different subspace, but not an arbitrary subspace. The nonlinear multilayer neural network can make any transformation between sets of values of input elements and output elements, if enough hidden units are available. An explanation for the neural network's power to access any space, including the null space, is presented, along with some examples of the applicability of this result.
Optical implementations of neural networks utilize the inherent parallelism of optics to form the large number of interconnections required by neural networks. By carrying out computations in parallel, the processing speed of such systems can be substantial, despite the relatively slow response times of the optical devices. In this paper, a single-layer neural network is presented, which uses ferroelectric liquid crystal (FLC) spatial light modulators (SLM) to represent input patterns and weighted interconnections. The learning example for the network is handwritten character recognition. The experiment shows that this network successfully recognizes 58 of the handwritten patterns from the training set, when the synaptic weights have five grey levels and a dynamic range from -1 to +1. Computer simulations of networks indicate that by increasing the grey levels to eleven, and the dynamic range from -12.5 to +12.5, this net easily learns to recognize all the handwritten patterns in the training set. It also correctly recognizes 60 of the test patterns.
We demonstrate both nematic and ferroelectric liquid crystal SLM's in two separate optical connectionist
machines on which two layer neural network algorithms are executed. An analysis of their system
performance with respect to non-ideal operation of the component parts is presented; the analysis being
carried out with the aid of a computer simulation. A direct comparison between the two machines is then
made demonstrating the improved performance of the compact ferroelectric liquid crystal based machine.
In this paper, a dynamic information routing architecture, which uses fixed volume holograms accessed by a ferroelectric liquid crystal spatial light modulator (SLM), is presented. The interconnects are therefore reconfigurable at the SLM frame rate. The design of two routing networks is presented, and experimental results are given for each network. Since multiple-exposure holographic recording is necessary to implement these networks, results demonstrating maximum diffraction efficiency holographic recording in LiNbO3 are presented.
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