US 11,897,337 B1
Systems and methods for improving the brightness of a transparent display using supplemental light sources that include ambient light collected by an array of Fresnel lenses
Ercan Mehmet Dede, Ann Arbor, MI (US); Sean P. Rodrigues, Ann Arbor, MI (US); Frederico Marcolino Quintao Severgnini, Ann Arbor, MI (US); Danny J. Lohan, Northville, MI (US); Masaaki Kawauchi, Chita County (JP); Kojiro Tachi, Nagakute (JP); and Hiroshi Ando, Nagoya (JP)
Assigned to Toyota Motor Engineering & Manufacturing North America, Inc., Plano, TX (US)
Filed by Toyota Motor Engineering & Manufacturing North America, Inc., Plano, TX (US)
Filed on Nov. 30, 2022, as Appl. No. 18/071,964.
Int. Cl. G02F 1/13357 (2006.01); B60K 35/00 (2006.01); H01L 31/054 (2014.01); G02B 5/18 (2006.01)
CPC B60K 35/00 (2013.01) [G02B 5/1885 (2013.01); G02F 1/133615 (2013.01); H01L 31/0543 (2014.12); B60K 2370/1438 (2019.05); B60K 2370/1526 (2019.05); B60K 2370/25 (2019.05); B60K 2370/332 (2019.05); B60K 2370/349 (2019.05); B60K 2370/785 (2019.05)] 20 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A system for improving the brightness of a transparent display, the system comprising:
an array of Fresnel lenses disposed on an external surface of a vehicle to collect ambient light;
an adjustable transmission and reflection filter that controls how much light is collected as internal light from headlights of the vehicle;
optical color filters to produce filtered ambient light from the ambient light and filtered internal light from the internal light, the filtered ambient light and the filtered internal light including red, green, and blue color components;
a processor;
a light-emitting-diode (LED) light source that, under control of the processor, produces primary-source light by outputting, in a predetermined alternating manner, red, green, and blue light; and
a memory storing machine-readable instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to control injection, into a transparent edge-lit liquid crystal waveguide display deployed in at least a portion of a window of the vehicle, the primary-source light, the filtered ambient light, and the filtered internal light, wherein the red, green, and blue color components of the filtered ambient light and the filtered internal light are time-synchronized with the red, green, and blue light, respectively, of the primary-source light and the filtered ambient light and the filtered internal light improve the brightness of the transparent edge-lit liquid crystal waveguide display.