ADJUSTABLE ELECTRONIC WAVELENGTH BAND PASS SENSOR FOR SOFT X-RAY THROUGH IR SPECTRAL BANDS

Abstract

Exemplary aspects of the present invention are directed to a sensor that uses the spectral sensitivity of detectors, the spectral properties of optical filters, and mathematical addition and or subtraction to isolate the desired spectral band. The sensor includes a downconverter member for converting the high energy beam to easily detectable visible or NIR light, and optical filter elements and relay optics for directing the visible light to the sensing members. The sensing members transmit an electronic signal proportional to the power of the light in the passband to amplifiers wherein multiple sensing members convey optical power of selected wavelength bands through an amplifier to a microprocessor with an algorithm to determine the power in the desired band of interest and then to a displaying member. The system may be used in a vacuum, in ambient non-vacuum conditions or a purged environment. The techniques described herein can be used across the X-ray, UV, visible, near IR, IR and other electromagnetic regions to isolate desired bands.

Claims

1. A power sensor for a beam, comprising: a downconverter for converting the beam to visible light; one or more detectors for sensing an power of the visible light thereon; wherein each of the one or more detectors is a band specific detector and in communication with the other band specific detectors for conveying information regarding comparative power of the visible light in multiple channels to the other band specific detectors.

2. The power sensor according to claim 1, wherein the one or more detectors are a silicon detector or other sensor configured to detect the energy in the emission spectrum of the resulting energy from the downconverter.

3. The power sensor according to claim 1, wherein an algorithm is used to separate multiple channels to calculate the desired resulting band(s) of interest.

4. The power sensor according to claim 3, wherein the bands of interest are one or more of UVA, UVB, UVC bands.

5. The power sensor according to claim 3, wherein electronic subtraction or addition of individual channels from a reference channel result in the band of interest.

6. The power sensor according to claim 5, wherein the number of channels can be any number N plus reference channel N+1.

7. The power sensor according to claim 1, wherein the power sensor is further configured to measure the power/energy in the visible or NIR bands and correlate that measurement to the power in the UV beam.

Description

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS

[0021] For a fuller understanding of the nature and object of the present invention, refer to the following detailed description taken in connection with the accompanying drawings, in which:

[0022] FIGS. 1 and 2 show schematic illustrations of exemplary sensor apparatus according to the present invention.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0023] The present invention now will be described more fully hereinafter with reference to the accompanying figures, in which exemplary embodiments of the invention are shown. The invention may, however, be embodied in many different forms and should not be construed as limited to the embodiments set forth herein. Like reference numerals refer to like elements throughout.

[0024] Referring now to FIGS. 1 and 2, therein illustrated are schematics of exemplary apparatuses, which may be sensors, according to an aspect of the present invention. The sensor according to the present invention includes one or more downconverters 14 which advantageously converts the ultraviolet beams 12, which may be beams from one or more of the ultraviolet wavelength bands, such as UVA, UVB and/or UVC, to visible or IR light, optional vacuum window 13, optical filters 15 with selective band-passes, may be combined with relay optics along two or more channels 16, which are advantageously conveyed to detectors 20 (sensing members) such as a silicon or other types of detectors. The sensor includes the one or more downconverters 14 for converting the beam 12 to easily detectable visible or near IR light. The optical filters 15 and relay optics direct the visible or near IR light to the detectors 20. The detectors 20 then transmit an electronic signal proportional to the intensity of the light in the desired passband to an electronic amplifier and interface 22, which then conveys the electronic signal to a microprocessor 24 containing an algorithm and configured to perform with program code on a non-transitory computer readable medium a mathematical procedure that compares the signals from channels 1, 2 and/or 3 and calculates the desired signals, and results in the power in the desired bands and conveys resulting values from detectors 20, which is advantageously communicated through suitable electronics 22, so as to provide information or feedback as desired to display 8. The sensor may be used in a vacuum, in ambient non-vacuum conditions or in a purged environment.

[0025] For example, for a 3-channel calculation plus reference channel the use of multiple detectors with differing band passes allows for addition and subtraction of the values electronically. As a result, bandpasses are selected by either subtraction or adding the signals together to get a full range. This is especially useful to the method when measuring discrete bands such as UVA, UVB and UVC and compare them to a reference signal. An exemplary equation of this calculation is provided below:

[(N+1(Ref))−(N1+N2)=N3]

[0026] It is understood that the apparatus in accordance with the present invention advantageously avoids direct incidence of ultra-violet beams 12 on detectors 20, which, as set forth above, would rapidly damage or destroy or change the sensitivity of detectors 20. Rather, beam 12 is advantageously converted to visible or near IR light and incident on detectors 20 such that the power of the visible light on detectors 20 can be detected, and correlated to the power of beam 12, so as to advantageously provide accurate, and long-term, reliable, information regarding power of beam 12 in multiple channels 16.

[0027] It should be noted that the display 8, vacuum window 13, downconverter 14, optical filter 15, detector 20, amplifier 22 and microprocessor 24 are all devices which themselves are well known to a person of ordinary skill in the art. Further the conveyance of the light energy collected from the downconverter may be collected with fiber optics, or lenses or other optical transfer devices and then relayed to a sensing detector.

[0028] This apparatus, in addition to general UV, germicidal, UVC, UVB and UVA applications, can advantageously be used in numerous industrial, medical and like procedures wherein the accurate power of UV beams is critical and the long-term degradation of the monitoring sensor can result in inaccuracies that could be harmful or undesirous. Specific examples of various applications wherein the apparatus of the present invention can find useful application include band specific power monitoring in: water purification, sanitization, solar power, (UVA, UVB, UVC), germicidal, bilirubin (jaundice, therapy), tanning bed lamps, and the like.

[0029] It is understood that while discussion was directed to the XUV and UV regions, the techniques and sensor described herein can be used across the X-ray, UV, visible, near IR, IR and other electromagnetic regions to isolate desired bands.

[0030] In accordance with various embodiments of the present invention, certain aspects of the invention may be implemented by one or more processors of a processing system executing software. The software comprises one or more sets of executable instructions stored or otherwise tangibly embodied on a non-transitory computer readable storage medium. The software can include the instructions and certain data that, when executed by the one or more processors, manipulate the one or more processors to perform one or more aspects of the techniques described above. The non-transitory computer readable storage medium can include, for example, a magnetic or optical disk storage device, solid state storage devices such as Flash memory, a cache, random access memory (RAM) or other non-volatile memory device or devices, and the like. The executable instructions stored on the non-transitory computer readable storage medium may be in source code, assembly language code, object code, or other instruction format that is interpreted or otherwise executable by one or more processors.

[0031] A computer readable storage medium may include any storage medium, or combination of storage media, accessible by a computer system during use to provide instructions and/or data to the computer system. Such storage media can include, but is not limited to, optical media (e.g., compact disc (CD), digital versatile disc (DVD), Blu-Ray disc), magnetic media (e.g., floppy disc, magnetic tape, or magnetic hard drive), volatile memory (e.g., random access memory (RAM) or cache), non-volatile memory (e.g., read-only memory (ROM) or Flash memory), or microelectromechanical systems (MEMS)-based storage media. The computer readable storage medium may be embedded in the computing system (e.g., system RAM or ROM), fixedly attached to the computing system (e.g., a magnetic hard drive), removably attached to the computing system (e.g., an optical disc or Universal Serial Bus (USB)-based Flash memory), or coupled to the computer system via a wired or wireless network (e.g., network accessible storage (NAS)).

[0032] It will thus be seen that the objects set forth above, among those made apparent from the preceding description, are efficiently attained and, since certain changes may be made in the above article without departing from the scope of this invention, it is intended that all matter contained in this disclosure or shown in the accompanying drawings, shall be interpreted, as illustrative and not in a limiting sense. It is to be understood that all of the present figures, and the accompanying narrative discussions of corresponding embodiments, do not purport to be completely rigorous treatments of the invention under consideration. It is to be understood that the above-described arrangements are only illustrative of the application of the principles of the present invention. Numerous modifications and alternative arrangements may be devised by those skilled in the art without departing from the scope of the present invention.