PATENT CLAIM ANALYSIS

Application Number: 15903135
Application Type: Utility
Filing Date: 2018-02
Publication Date: 2018-08
Patent Classification: ["399", "004000"]

Abstract:
Scanning optical unit includes: light source; incident optical system including one coupling lens for converting light from the light source into a light beam; optical deflector having a reflecting surface and configured to reflect and deflect the light beam in main scanning direction; and scanning optical system for focusing the deflected light beam on an image surface. The incident optical system converges the light beam on the reflecting surface in sub-scanning direction. Further, 0.01≤(βs/βm) 2 ≤0.27 and βs2<1 are satisfied, where βm is a lateral magnification of the entire optical system from the light source to the image surface in the main scanning direction, βs is a lateral magnification of the entire optical system in the sub-scanning direction, and βs2 is a lateral magnification of the scanning optical system from the reflecting surface of the optical deflector to the image surface in the sub-scanning direction.

Claim (Index 15):
An image forming apparatus comprising:\n a plurality of photoconductors; a scanning optical unit configured to expose the plurality of photoconductors to light to form electrostatic latent images on the plurality of photoconductors; and a plurality of development units configured to develop the respective electrostatic latent images formed on the plurality of photoconductors; wherein the scanning optical unit includes:\n a plurality of light sources; \n a plurality of incident optical systems each having one coupling lens configured to convert light emitted from one of the plurality of light sources into a light beam; \n a single optical deflector having a reflecting surface and configured to reflect and deflect a plurality of light beams from the plurality of incident optical systems in a main scanning direction; and \n a scanning optical system configured to focus the plurality of light beams deflected by the optical deflector each on a corresponding photoconductor, \n wherein each of the incident optical systems is configured to converge the light beam on the reflecting surface of the optical deflector in a sub-scanning direction orthogonal to the main scanning direction, and is disposed such that in the sub-scanning direction, the light beam is incident obliquely on the reflecting surface of the optical deflector, and wherein the following conditions are satisfied:\n 0.01\u2264(\u03b2 s/\u03b2m ) 2 \u22640.27 and \n \u03b2 s 2<1 \n where \u03b2m is a lateral magnification of an entire optical system from each of the plurality of light sources to the corresponding photoconductor in the main scanning direction, \u03b2s is a lateral magnification of the entire optical system in the sub-scanning direction, and \u03b2s2 is a lateral magnification of the scanning optical system from the reflecting surface of the optical deflector to the corresponding photoconductor in the sub-scanning direction.

Metadata:
- Claim Count in Document: 4.0
- Percentile: 88.0
- Lexical Diversity: 2.51562
- Patent Class: 399.0
- Transitional Phrase Type: open
- Component Type: 1
- Foreign Priority: True
- Related Applications: ['11006640', '11543212', '11423017', '11773076', '12923365']

Analysis Scores:
- 35 USC 101 Eligibility (BERT): 0.8329766455822972
- 35 USC 102 Novelty (BERT): 0.5183388969316813
- Combined Prediction Score: 0.8015128707172356
- Mean Citation Score: 316.039762
- Max Citation Score: 363.92923
- Similarity Product: 323.36477771084185

Labels:
- Claim Label 101: 1
- Claim Label 102: 1
- Claim Label 103: 1
- Claim Label 112: 1
- Combined Label: 1
- Label 101 Adjusted: 1

Dataset: test