Abstract:
The present embodiments provide methods and systems for use in providing enhanced illumination. Some embodiments include at least two light sources and one or more smoothly rotating wheels, where the one or more wheels comprises at least one mirror sector, the circumferential portion of the mirror sector is the inverse of the number of said sources, a first source of the sources is so disposed that the mirror sector reflects light from the first source into a common output path, where the first source pulsing such that a duty cycle of the first source corresponds to a time the mirror sector reflects light from the first source into the common output path.

Description:
PRIORITY CLAIM 
       [0001]    This application is a Continuation of Internation Patent Application No. PCT/US07/75780 filed Aug. 13, 2007, entitled LED LUMINANCE-ENHANCEMENT AND COLOR-MIXING BY ROTATIONALLY MULTIPLEXED BEAM-COMBINING, which claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/822,209, filed Aug. 11, 2006, entitled LED LUMINANCE-ENHANCEMENT AND COLOR-MIXING BY ROTATIONALLY MULTIPLEXED BEAM-COMBINING, both of which are incorporated herein by reference in their entireties. 
     
    
     FIELD OF THE INVENTION 
       [0002]    The present invention relates to enhancing luminance, and more particularly to luminance enhancement and color mixing. 
       BACKGROUND 
       [0003]    The use of light emitting diodes (LED) has increased dramatically over the last few decades. Numerous applications for LEDs have been identified and continue to be identified. 
         [0004]    LEDs alone typically emitted relatively low light emissions as compared with many other types of light sources. As a result, the use of LEDs for some implementations has been limited. 
       SUMMARY OF THE EMBODIMENTS 
       [0005]    The present invention advantageously addresses the needs above as well as other needs through the provision of the methods and systems for use in providing enhanced illumination. Some embodiments provide lighting systems. These systems comprises at least two light sources and one or more smoothly rotating wheels, said one or more wheels comprising at least one mirror sector, the circumferential portion of said mirror sector being the inverse of the number of said sources, a first source of said at least two sources is so disposed that said mirror sector reflects light from the first source into a common output path, said first source pulsing such that a duty cycle of the first source corresponds to a time said mirror sector reflects light from the first source into said common output path. 
         [0006]    A better understanding of the features and advantages of the present invention will be obtained by reference to the following detailed description of the invention and accompanying drawings which set forth an illustrative embodiment in which the principles of the invention are utilized. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         [0007]    The above and other aspects, features and advantages of the present invention will be more apparent from the following more particular description thereof, presented in conjunction with the following drawings wherein: 
           [0008]      FIG. 1  shows a simplified schematic view of a light system with sectored mirror that alternates two light sources onto a receiver. 
           [0009]      FIG. 2  graphically shows non-overlapping LED spectra. 
           [0010]      FIG. 3  shows a dichroic-mirror design for overlaying spectra, such as the spectra of  FIG. 2 . 
           [0011]      FIG. 4  graphically shows overlapping LED spectra. 
           [0012]      FIG. 5  shows a simplified schematic view of a light system that overlays spectra. 
           [0013]      FIG. 6  shows a perspective view of a triconic color wheel. 
           [0014]      FIG. 7  shows a nonimaging relay lens. 
           [0015]      FIG. 8A  is a side view of a multi-wheel 4-LED system. 
           [0016]      FIG. 8B  is a perspective view of the multi-wheel system of  FIG. 8A . 
           [0017]      FIG. 9  is a perspective view of a two-color variation of a multi-wheel system according to some embodiments. 
           [0018]      FIG. 10  is a perspective view of a three-color view of a multi-wheel system according to some embodiments. 
           [0019]      FIG. 11  is a side view of a more compact version of a multi-wheel system according to some embodiments. 
       
    
    
       [0020]    Corresponding reference characters indicate corresponding components throughout the several views of the drawings. 
       DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS 
       [0021]    In spite of decades of progress in making LEDs brighter, there are still light sources that greatly outshine them, such as HID filaments and arc lamps. LED luminance is typically limited by the LED chip&#39;s maximum operating temperature, which often will be exceeded unless cooling means match the chip&#39;s heat load. When input current is pulsed and heat load is intermittent, higher luminance can be temporarily attained. This effect is limited in many blue and green chips to only about a 50-100% increase. Some present embodiments provide methods to in part pulse multiple chips out of phase, to have their output combined into a temporally constant light with enhanced luminance. 
         [0022]    Another problem with LEDs is color mixing while retaining the high luminance of the individual chips. The typical RGB LED configuration has three LED chips situated side-by-side in a diffusive medium that mixes the colors over a much larger emission area than that of the three chips. Some present embodiments in part overlay the separate chips into a common output. Conventional dichroic mirrors can do this, but generally only for collimated light and only for LEDs having spectra without substantial overlap. This typically precludes the addition of more colors to an illuminant to improve its gamut and its color rendering over the standard three. 
         [0023]    Some systems utilize a rotating fold mirror to reflect successive radially ingoing collimated beams, down a rotational axis to a single receiver. One potential drawback with this approach is the requirement for a very rapid stepper motor to quickly rotate between the different incoming beams and then stop rotating for the on-time each is allotted. An ordinary rotating mirror is typically not possible because of the very short dwell time of each input beam to fully occupy the output beam. 
         [0024]    Some present embodiments utilize a smoothly rotating mirror that generally limit and in some instances substantially alleviate inevitable vibrations produced by the rapid and intermittent rotations of a stepper motor and a scan mirror. 
         [0025]    Another problem in putting the light onto a rotational axis of a scanning mirror makes the system sensitive to errors in its tilt or centering relative to the axis, which could occur during assembly and/or develop over time due to the inherently high vibration levels from stepper motors. Also, a stepper motor typically has very high torque, increasing its size and the weight of the support structure. Some present embodiments alleviate these shortcomings utilizing rotation of a sectored mirror, array of lenses, and/or combinations thereof. 
         [0026]    Further, some present embodiments provide temporal mixing of the light from multiple light-emitting diodes that are intermittently pulsing with out-of-phase duty cycles. These duty cycles can be short enough to take advantage of initially high efficacy that some LEDs have immediately after power-on. Additionally, some embodiments use smoothly rotating mirror-wheels to interleave beams from different LEDs with sufficiently short on-duration as to have enhanced luminance. 
         [0027]    Light emitting diodes typically suffer from rapid non-radiative recombination of electron-hole pairs in the active layer, but millisecond-scale pulses can be used that are short enough that this is not fully in effect. Instead, high transient currents are rewarded with up to double the luminance of steady-state operation. A duty cycle of approximately 25% enables this high luminance to be achieved about a fourth of the time. Some present embodiments enable four such sources to be interleaved into a steady luminance-doubled output. 
         [0028]      FIG. 1  shows a light system  10  the utilizes a sectored mirror  13 M that alternately directs light from two light sources  11  and  12  onto a receiver  15 , according to some embodiments. Luminance-enhanced light system  10  comprises first collimated light source  11  and second collimated light source  12 . Source  11 , in some instances, is boresighted directly onto receiver  15 , while source  12  is positioned to reflect off of semicircular mirror  13 M, which rotates about axis  14 . Semicircular transparent sector  13 T allows first source  11  to illuminate receiver  15  during half the rotational period of wheel  13 . Mirror  13 M enables second source  12  to take over for the other half of the period. 
         [0029]      FIG. 2  depicts a graphical representation of how a dichroic mirror can act upon spectrally separate light beams. Graph  20  has horizontal axis for wavelength λ and vertical axis L R  for normalized spectral intensity. Curves L 1  and L 2  represent the separate spectra of two LEDs. Curve F T  is the normal-incidence transmittance of a suitable selective filter. 
         [0030]      FIG. 3  shows color mixer  30  comprising first LED  31  and second LED  33 , with respective spectra L 1  and L 2  of  FIG. 2 . They are optically coupled to collimators  32  and  34 , respectively. Dichroic filter  35 , with curve F T  of  FIG. 2 , enables second beam  39  to be overlaid on first beam  38 . This method is typically inapplicable in the case of two LEDs with overlapping spectra. 
         [0031]      FIG. 4  shows graph  40  of relative spectral intensity S as a function of wavelength λ for four overlapping LEDs L 1 , L 2 , L 3 , &amp; L 4 . The use of dichroic filters would in this case typically entail substantial losses. 
         [0032]      FIG. 5  shows four-LED system  50  with LEDs L 1 , L 2 , L 3 , &amp; L 4  having the overlapping spectra shown in  FIG. 4 . The LEDs are configured as in  FIG. 3 , with a mirror arrangement including mirror  53 M that is the same as the mirror arrangement in  FIG. 1 . 
         [0033]      FIG. 6  shows an alternative mirror wheel design that is multi-conic with multiple sectors that in some embodiments correspond to a number of light sources. System  60  comprises trisectored mirror-wheel  61 , and LEDs  62 ,  63 , &amp;  64 , each with a collimator as  64   c . The three sectors are differently inclined along a perimeter so as to reflect in turn each of the collimator outputs into common output path  66 . The mirrors profiles can have many shapes such as flat, spherical or even aspheric to correct the astigmatism caused to the reflected beam. Since those profiles are rotationally symmetric, they remain invariant with the rotation. In some embodiments that may enhance performance, the collimators  64   c  concentrate the light into a small spot inside the sector, thereby reducing the transition time between outputs from one LED to the next. In some implementations, for example, the system  60  could be the basis for an RGB television illuminator for a digital micromirror device. 
         [0034]    The system  60  of  FIG. 6  could comprise a different number of sectors (two, four or more) to produce the multiplexing of the corresponding number of light sources. 
         [0035]    Alternatively, instead of the mirrors of the system  60  in  FIG. 6 , a sectored lens-wheel could be used, so the light is transmitted instead of reflected. Another embodiment comprises the combination or refractive and reflective sectors. 
         [0036]      FIG. 7  shows aperture  71  admitting edge rays  71   r  that are such as to form a tube entirely illuminating nonimaging relay lens  72 , which in turn sends the edge rays through second aperture  73 . Such a lens enables multiple light sources to be temporally interleaved. 
         [0037]      FIG. 8A  is a schematic side view of multi-wheel system  80 , showing LEDs  81 L,  82 L,  83 L, &amp;  84 L coupled to their respective nonimaging collimators  81 C,  82 C,  83 C, &amp;  84 C and sectored mirror-wheels  81 M,  82 M, and  83 M, and fixed mirror  84 M. The mirror-wheels  81 M,  82 M, and  83 M rotate about common axis  85 . 
         [0038]      FIG. 8B  is a perspective view of system  80  showing how the rotation of the sectored mirror-wheels  81 M,  82 M, and  83 M gives the overlaid output. LED  81 L is on when mirrored sector  81 M is under it. Likewise for LED  82 L and mirrored sector  82 M, on the next 90° of wheel rotation, and LED  83 L and mirrored sector  83 M. On the final 90° of rotation, the transparent sectors  81 T,  82 T, &amp;  83 T allow LED  84 L to reflect off stationary mirror  84 M and pass up through the transparent sectors  81 T,  82 T, &amp;  83 T and the lenses  81 N,  82 N,  83 N and  84 N to provide the output beam  86 . 
         [0039]      FIG. 9  is a perspective view of multi-wheel two-color system  90 , according to some embodiments, with color sectored mirror-wheels that are substantially the same as those of  FIG. 8B  that have mirror sections (e.g.,  93 M) and the transparent sections (e.g.,  93 T) and rotate about an axis  95 . The two-color system  90  includes a first bank, set or system of LEDs  91 -L 1 ,  92 -L 1 ,  93 -L 1  and  94 -L 1  with an associated system of lenses, a second bank, set or system of LEDs  91 -L 2 ,  92 -L 2 ,  93 -L 2  and  94 -L 2  with an associated system of lenses. The two systems of LEDs and lenses operate 180° out of phase and are overlaid by dichroic mirror  97 . The light from both stacks of LEDs comes out as a combined output  96 . 
         [0040]      FIG. 10  shows three-color system  100 . The three-color system  100  includes three sectored mirror-wheels each with mirrored sections (e.g.,  100 M) and optically transparent sections (e.g.,  100 T) at least for the wavelengths of light emitted from the respective LEDs. The three-color system  100  further includes dual dichroic mirrors  107  forming common output beam  106  from three LEDs and associated lens systems  101 ,  102  and  103 . 
         [0041]      FIG. 11  shows a side view of a multi-wheel system according to some embodiments that is more compact than the system of, for example,  FIGS. 8A and 8B . The system includes LED sources  11 L,  112 L,  113 L and  114 L with associated lenses  114 C, and sectored mirror-wheels that rotate about an axis  115 . The system of  FIG. 11 , in part, shows how the larger wheels of, for example,  FIGS. 8A and 8B  can be made smaller, utilizing more compact collimators having a different optical architecture. 
         [0042]    The present embodiments provide methods, systems and apparatuses for use in enhancing light and/or mixing light. Some embodiments provide multiple LED systems that interleave phased pulses through the use of a sectored mirror wheel that is smoothly rotating. Rapid rotational rates are utilized in at least some embodiments that give short pulse times that enable enhanced luminance to be attained. Multiple wavelengths can also be interleaved. Further, some embodiments provide spot-focusing that can minimize the transition time between phases. Some embodiments provide color mixing, enhanced luminance and/or both color mixing and enhanced doubled luminance are attained. For example, some embodiments provide a doubling of luminance. 
         [0043]    While the invention herein disclosed has been described by means of specific embodiments and applications thereof, numerous modifications and variations could be made thereto by those skilled in the art without departing from the scope of the invention set forth in the claims.