A lithium ion-conductive solid electrolyte including a freestanding inorganic vitreous sheet of sulfide-based lithium ion conducting glass is capable of high performance in a lithium metal battery by providing a high degree of lithium ion conductivity while being highly resistant to the initiation and/or propagation of lithium dendrites. Such an electrolyte is also itself manufacturable, and readily adaptable for battery cell and cell component manufacture, in a cost-effective, scalable manner. An automated machine based system, apparatus and methods assessing and inspecting the quality of such vitreous solid electrolyte sheets, electrode sub-assemblies and lithium electrode assemblies can be based on spectrophotometry and can be performed inline with fabricating the sheet or web (e.g., inline with drawing of the vitreous Li ion conducting glass) and/or with the manufacturing of associated electrode sub-assemblies and lithium electrode assemblies and battery cells.

The continuity of a functional layer of a web (32, 60, 78) is assessed by forwarding the web, detecting (42, 63) the presence of the functional layer and a discontinuity and/or a thin region in the functional layer, and generating a signal in response to the discontinuity and/or thin region. The functional layer comprises a detectable component (360) in a thermoplastic composition. The detecting is carried out by a machine vision system capable of detecting the detectable component (360) in the functional layer. The detectable component (360) can be active or passive. Also included are systems for carrying out the process.

A lithium ion-conductive solid electrolyte including a freestanding inorganic vitreous sheet of sulfide-based lithium ion conducting glass is capable of high performance in a lithium metal battery by providing a high degree of lithium ion conductivity while being highly resistant to the initiation and/or propagation of lithium dendrites. Such an electrolyte is also itself manufacturable, and readily adaptable for battery cell and cell component manufacture, in a cost-effective, scalable manner. An automated machine based system, apparatus and methods assessing and inspecting the quality of such vitreous solid electrolyte sheets, electrode sub-assemblies and lithium electrode assemblies can be based on spectrophotometry and can be performed inline with fabricating the sheet or web (e.g., inline with drawing of the vitreous Li ion conducting glass) and/or with the manufacturing of associated electrode sub-assemblies and lithium electrode assemblies and battery cells.

An optical scanning system, including: a radiating source that outputs a light beam, a first time varying beam reflector that reflects the light beam through a scan lens towards a transparent sample, a second time varying beam reflector that reflects the light beam reflected from the transparent sample, a focusing lens that focuses the light beam reflected from the transparent sample, a blocker, and a detector that is irradiated by the one or more selectable portions of the light beam reflected from the transparent sample that pass the blocker. The blocker can be configured to block one or more portions of the light beam reflected from the transparent sample so that one or more selectable portions of the light beam reflected from the transparent sample can pass the blocker.

Provided are a foreign material detecting device and method for detecting only a foreign material on a surface of a substrate except for a foreign material on a lower surface of the substrate in a manufacturing process of a transparent substrate passing light therethrough, such as a glass substrate used in a flat panel display (FPD) such as a liquid crystal display (LCD), an organic light emitting diode (OLED), a plasma display panel (PDP), etc., a sapphire wafer used in some of semiconductors, or the like, and in a pattern forming process in a manufacturing process of the FPD and the semiconductor using the transparent substrate. More particularly, provided are a foreign material detecting device and method for detecting only a foreign material on a surface of an ultra-thin transparent substrate having a thickness of 0.3 T or less.

A lithium ion-conductive solid electrolyte including a freestanding inorganic vitreous sheet of sulfide-based lithium ion conducting glass is capable of high performance in a lithium metal battery by providing a high degree of lithium ion conductivity while being highly resistant to the initiation and/or propagation of lithium dendrites. Such an electrolyte is also itself manufacturable, and readily adaptable for battery cell and cell component manufacture, in a cost-effective, scalable manner. An automated machine based system, apparatus and methods assessing and inspecting the quality of such vitreous solid electrolyte sheets, electrode sub-assemblies and lithium electrode assemblies can be based on spectrophotometry and can be performed inline with fabricating the sheet or web (e.g., inline with drawing of the vitreous Li ion conducting glass) and/or with the manufacturing of associated electrode sub-assemblies and lithium electrode assemblies and battery cells.

Methods for detecting defects on the surface of a sheet of material include collimating a beam of light and intersecting the collimated beam of light with a beam splitter. The beam splitter directs a first portion of the intersected beam of collimated light to illuminate a first surface of the sheet, wherein a first portion of the light illuminating the first surface is reflected and a second portion of the illuminating light is scattered by a defect. The reflected and scattered light is received with a first lens element that directs the reflected and scattered light to an inverse aperture. The reflected light is blocked by the inverse aperture and the scattered light is transmitted by the inverse aperture. The scattered light transmitted by the inverse aperture is directed with a second lens element to an imaging device.

A method and apparatus to measure specular reflection intensity, specular reflection angle, near specular scattered radiation, and large angle scattered radiation and determine the location and type of defect present in a first and a second transparent solid that have abutting surfaces. The types of defects include a top surface particle, an interface particle, a bottom surface particle, an interface bubble, a top surface pit, and a stain. The four measurements are conducted at multiple locations along the surface of the transparent solid and the measured information is stored in a memory device. The difference between an event peak and a local average of measurements for each type of measurement is used to detect changes in the measurements. Information stored in the memory device is processed to generate a work piece defect mapping indicating the type of defect and the defect location of each defect found.

An optical scanning system including a radiating source capable of outputting a source light beam, a de-scan lens that is configured to output a de-scanned light beam, the de-scanned light beam is created by focusing light reflected from the sample and the de-scan lens is located approximately one focal length of the de-scan lens from an irradiation location where the light beam irradiates the sample, a focusing lens that is configured to output a focused light beam, a collimating lens that is configured to output a collimated light beam, a polarizing beam splitter that is configured to be irradiated by the collimated light beam, and a detector that is configured to be irradiated by at least a portion of the collimated light beam that is not reflected by the polarizing beam splitter.

An optical scanning system including a radiating source that outputs a light beam, a time varying beam reflector that reflects the light beam through a scan lens towards a transparent sample at an incident angle of plus or minus ten degrees from Brewster's angle, a focusing lens configured to be irradiated by light scattered from the transparent sample, and a detector that is irradiated by the light scattered from the transparent sample. The detector outputs a signal that indicates an intensity of light measured by the detector. None of the light scattered from the transparent sample is blocked. The light scattered from the transparent sample is scattered from the top surface of the transparent sample, the bottom surface of the transparent sample, or any location in between the top surface of the transparent sample and the bottom surface of the transparent sample.