Object identification system
First Claim
1. A system for remotely identifying an object including a transponder associated with the object to be identified and containing information identifying said object and an interrogator for determining the identification of said object, the improvement wherein:
- said interrogator is operative to transmit an interrogator signal having a predetermined clock frequency and to detect signals from said transponder representative of said identifying information; and
said transponder includes resonating means adapted to resonate at said clock frequency and to provide an output signal which at least initially increases in amplitude as pulses are repetitively received at said clock frequency, said resonating means being relatively non-responsive to pulses at frequencies other than said clock frequency, said transponder also including threshold means being responsive to a predetermined amplitude of said resonating means output signal attained only after a plurality of said repetitive pulses at said clock frequency are received by said resonating means to cause said transponder to transmit at said clock frequency in response to the receipt of said interrogator signal a sequence of transponder pulses representing in signal form said identifying information.
0 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A transponder/interrogator system for remotely identifying objects. The interrogator emits infrared pulses to activate and remotely clock the transponder. Upon such activation, the transponder emits a unique code in the form of infrared pulses in accordance with a program stored in a recirculating shift register. The interrogator receives the infrared pulses from the transponder and decodes them. The decoded information is then supplied to a controller which runs various status checks on the object identified.
66 Citations
145 Claims
-
1. A system for remotely identifying an object including a transponder associated with the object to be identified and containing information identifying said object and an interrogator for determining the identification of said object, the improvement wherein:
-
said interrogator is operative to transmit an interrogator signal having a predetermined clock frequency and to detect signals from said transponder representative of said identifying information; and said transponder includes resonating means adapted to resonate at said clock frequency and to provide an output signal which at least initially increases in amplitude as pulses are repetitively received at said clock frequency, said resonating means being relatively non-responsive to pulses at frequencies other than said clock frequency, said transponder also including threshold means being responsive to a predetermined amplitude of said resonating means output signal attained only after a plurality of said repetitive pulses at said clock frequency are received by said resonating means to cause said transponder to transmit at said clock frequency in response to the receipt of said interrogator signal a sequence of transponder pulses representing in signal form said identifying information. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51)
-
-
52. A system for remotely identifying objects comprising:
-
a transponder associated with said object and operative to transmit a sequence of transponder pulses representing in signal form information identifying said object; and an interrogator for identifying said object including detector means for detecting said sequence of transponder pulses and providing a detector signal correlative of said detected sequence of transponder pulses, and interrogation means for interrogating said detector signal to determine said identifying information including ambiguous pulse rejection means for causing said interrogator to repeat the process of identifying said object whenever said detector signal has a preselected signal characteristic associated therewith which is deemed to be indicative of the possibility that said detector signal may be correlative of a random signal detected by said detector means rather than one of said transponder pulses. - View Dependent Claims (53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64)
-
-
65. For a remote object identification system including a transponder associated with the object to be identified and an interrogator for determining the identification of said object, the improvement wherein:
-
said interrogator is operative to transmit a sequence of interrogating pulses at a predetermined clock frequency; and said transponder includes a first stage including receiver means for receiving said sequence of interrogating pulses and providing an output signal correlative of said received sequence of interrogating pulses, a second stage including resonating filter means adapted to resonate at said clock frequency for filtering signals received from said receiver means having a frequency other than said clock frequency, a third stage including clocking means for providing a clock signal at said clock frequency in response to signals received from said resonating filter means, a fourth stage including storage means containing data identifying said object adapted to sequentially output said stored data in response to the receipt of said clock signal from said clocking means, and a fifth stage including transmitting means for receiving said sequence of data from storage means and transmitting a correlative sequence of transponder pulses. - View Dependent Claims (66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78)
-
-
79. A system for remotely identifying an object including a transponder associated with the object to be identified and containing information identifying said object and an interrogator for determining the identification of said object, the improvement wherein:
-
said interrogator includes transmission means for transmitting an interrogating signal at a predetermined clock frequency; and said transponder includes input circuit means for receiving said interrogating signal and output circuit means for transmitting a transponder signal containing said identifying information in response to the receipt by said input circuit means of said interrogator signal, said output circuit means being inverted with respect to said input circuit means to permit said input circuit means and said output circuit means to be located within relatively close physical proximity of one another without causing extraneous interaction between said input circuit means and said output circuit means of the type which can create instabilities in said transponder. - View Dependent Claims (80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88)
-
-
89. A system for remotely identifying an object comprising:
-
a transponder associated with said object and operative to transmit a sequence of transponder pulses at a predetermined frequency containing information identifying said object; and an interrogator including detector means for detecting said sequence of transponder pulses and providing an output signal correlative of said detected sequence of transponder pulses and also containing background noise at a frequency substantially lower than said predetermined frequency, and signal processing means for receiving said output signal and substantially removing from said output signal said relatively low frequency background noise, said signal processing means including delay means responsive to said output signal for providing a delayed signal representative of said output signal but delayed relative thereto by a period substantially corresponding to the period of one of said transponder pulses, and subtraction means for subtracting one of said output signal and said delayed signal from the other of said signals so that said low frequency background noise is effectively cancelled by said subtraction yet said detected transponder pulses are not subtracted since said detected transponder pulses are temporally displaced by said delay means whereby a resultant signal is provided which is related to said output signal but from which said low frequency background noise has been substantially removed. - View Dependent Claims (90, 91, 92)
-
-
93. A system for remotely identifying an object including a transponder associated with the object to be identified and containing information identifying said object and an interrogator for determining the identification of said object, the improvement wherein:
-
said interrogator is operative to transmit an optical interrogating signal and to detect signals from said transponder representative of said identifying information; and said transponder includes input means for receiving said optical interrogating signal and producing a correlative clocking signal, and output means responsive to said clocking signal for transmitting a transponder signal representing said identifying information;
said input means including optical transducer means connected to a portable electrical power source for converting said optical interrogating signal to a corresponding electrical signal, and circuit means connected to said optical transducer means for preventing substantial current drain from said portable electrical power source through said optical transducer means when said optical transducer means is exposed to direct sunlight. - View Dependent Claims (94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120, 121, 122, 123, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128, 129, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137)
-
-
138. A system for remotely identifying an object including a transponder associated with the object to be identified and an interrogator for determining the identification of said object, the improvement wherein:
-
said transponder includes means for transmitting a transponder signal containing information identifying said object in response to the receipt of an enabling signal; and said interrogator includes transmission means for transmitting said enabling signal, detector means for detecting said transponder signal to permit said interrogator to identify said object, and suppression means responsive to the receipt of signal information from said transponder sufficient to identify said object for preventing said interrogator transmission means from transmitting said enabling signal after said interrogator has determined the identification of said object. - View Dependent Claims (139, 140, 141)
-
-
142. For a vehicle identification system including a transponder associated with the vehicle to be identified and containing numerical information identifying said vehicle, and an interrogator for determining the identification of said vehicle and providing an output signal correlative of said numeral information;
a controller including a memory unit containing information pertaining to said vehicle at the memory address location corresponding to said numeral information identifying said vehicle so that the numerical information identifying said vehicle need not be separately stored in a memory in order to associate said information pertaining to said vehicle with said vehicle, address accessing means for receiving said output signal from said interrogator and accessing said memory address location, and output control means for providing at least one output control signal correlative of the information contained in said memory unit at said memory address location. - View Dependent Claims (143)
-
144. For a transponder comprising receiver means including an optical transducer responsive to a remote optical clocking signal for producing a correlative electrical clock signal, storage means adapted to provide a data output signal correlative of information stored therein in response to the receipt of said electrical clock signal, and optical transmitting means for producing an optical output signal representative of said data output signal;
- a transponder programmer including;
optical transmission means in optical communication with the optical transducer of said transponder for transmitting said remote optical clocking signal, programming means operatively associated with said transponder for programming new information into the storage means of said transponder as said storage means is clocked by the clock signal produced by the receiver means of said transponder, and detection means including optical detector means in optical communication with the optical transmitting means of said transponder for detecting the optical output signal produced by said optical transmitting means to check the operation of said transponder and to insure that said new information has been properly programmed into said transponder. - View Dependent Claims (145)
- a transponder programmer including;
Specification