Image pickup element and system utilizing magnetic bubbles

An image pickup system comprising

• an image pickup element including
• a thin film of magnetic material capable of having magnetic bubbles formed therein where the intensity of the magnetic-bubble collapse field varies with temperature;
• first conductor pattern disposed on one side of said thin film;
• and
• a second conductor pattern disposed either on said one side or on the other side of said thin film, said first and second conductor patterns being so disposed with respect to one another as to form a lattice shape on said thin film;
• said first and second conductor patterns being orthogonal with respect to one another and each comprising a plurality of parallel conductor elements disposed in a first direction, the pitch between successive elements alternately being P.sub.1 and P.sub.2 where pitch P.sub.2 is substantially greater than pitch P.sub.1 ;
• means for respectively applying first and second current pulses to said first and second conductor patterns to establish insular magnetic domains having a predetermined direction of magnetization only where said P.sub.2 pitch portions of said first and second conductor patterns overlap;
• means for applying a bias magnetic field to said thin film, the direction of said bias magnetic field being opposite to said magnetication of said insular magnetic domains to thereby create a magnetic-bubble lattice in said thin film and (H.sub.CO)K.sub.1 >H.sub.bias >(H.sub.CO)K.sub.2 where H.sub.bias is the intensity of said bias magnetic field, (H.sub.CO)K.sub.1 is the field intensity required to collapse magnetic-bubbles in said thin film at temperature K.sub.1 and (H.sub.CO)K.sub.2 is the field intensity required to collapse said magnetic-bubbles at temperature K.sub.2 where K.sub.2 >K.sub.1 ;
• and
• means for projecting an image of light and dark on one face of said thin film to thereby selectively raise the temperature at the light irradiated portions from K.sub.1 toward K.sub.2 and thus selectively annihilate the light irradiated bubbles to form a magnetic-bubble pattern in the thin film corresponding to said image.