Sharp introduces color charge-coupled-device area scanner

Sharp Corporation (Tokyo, Japan) developed a color charge-coupled-device (CCD) area sensor that uses mosaic filters for high-quality reproduction of the primary colors. The company claims that the device features the industry's highest pixel count of 1.09 million pixels in a 0.33-in. unit and is optimized for use in digital still cameras. Samples were shipped in April. Conventional digital still cameras use CCD area sensors that are designed for video cameras with counts of 270,000 to 410,000 pixels.

Sharp also opened a research facility for Sharp Laboratories of America (Mahwah, NJ). The $13 million multimedia R&D laboratory is the company's largest such facility outside of Japan. Research will focus on digital video, multimedia communications, and digital imaging.