A computer implemented system and method for determining the most profitable distribution policy for a single period inventory system subject to a stochastic metric constraint that utilizes an optimization application, and including a Decision Support Tool for facilitating user determination of a distribution policy for a single period inventory system.

One computer implemented approach for calculating a demand forecast involves defining a so-called demand forecast tree capable of being graphically represented by a single top level node with at least two branches directly emanating therefrom, each branch having at least one further node. The demand forecast is computed on the basis of historical sales data typically associated with bottom level nodes of a demand forecast tree by a forecast engine capable of determining a mathematical simulation model for a demand process. One such forecast engine employing statistical seasonal causal time series models of count data is commercially available from Demantra Ltd, Israel, under the name Demantra™ Demand Planner.
Demand forecast applications include determining the optimal draw matrix D* to maximize the expected total profit (ETP) realizable by a distribution policy for a single period inventory system given by:
                    ETP        =                                            ∑                              i                                                                                j                                                                Ep                                            (                                  D                                      i                                                                                j                                                  )                                              =                                    ∑                              i                                                                                j                                                                                [                                                                            (                                                                        p                                                      i                                                                                j                                                                          -                                                  c                                                      i                                                                                j                                                                                )                                                                                D                                              i                                                                                j                                                                              -                                                            (                                                                        p                                                      i                                                                                j                                                                          -                                                  g                                                      i                                                                                j                                                                                )                                                                                ER                                                                    (                                                                              λ                                                          i                                                                                j                                                                                ,                                                      D                                                          i                                                                                j                                                                                )                                                                              -                                                            b                                              i                                                                                j                                                                                EST                                                                    (                                                                              λ                                                          i                                                                                j                                                                                ,                                                      D                                                          i                                                                                j                                                                                )                                                                                ]                                                                        Eqn        .                                                    (          1          )                    where pij is the unit retail price of an ith consumer item at a jth location of the single period inventory system, cij is its unit production cost, gij is its unit return cost when unsold, and bij is its unit stockout cost. Derived from Eqn. (1), the optimal draw matrix D* for a single period inventory system is calculated using optimal availabilities Aij* where:
                              A                      i                                                                          j                    *                =                              F                                      (                                                λ                                      i                                                                                j                                                  ,                                  D                                      i                                                                                j                                    *                                            )                                =                                                                      p                                      i                                                                                j                                                  -                                  c                                      i                                                                                j                                                  +                                  b                                      i                                                                                j                                                                                p                                      i                                                                                j                                                  -                                  g                                      i                                                                                j                                                  +                                  b                                      i                                                                                j                                                                        .                                              Eqn        .                                                    (          2          )                    In the case of the above-mentioned "newsvendor" and the "knapsack" problems, Eqn. (1) respectively degenerates to:
                    ETP        =                                            ∑              j                                                  EP              j                                =                                    ∑              j                                                  [                                                                    (                                                                  p                        j                                            -                                              c                        j                                                              )                                                                          D                    j                                                  -                                                      (                                                                  p                        j                                            -                                              g                        j                                                              )                                                                          ER                                                              (                                                                        λ                          j                                                ,                                                  D                          j                                                                    )                                                                      -                                                      b                    j                                                                          EST                                                              (                                                                        λ                          j                                                ,                                                  D                          j                                                                    )                                                                                ]                                                      and                          ETP        =                                            ∑              i                                                  EP              i                                =                                    ∑              i                                                                  [                                                                            (                                                                        p                          i                                                -                                                  c                          i                                                                    )                                                                                D                      i                                                        -                                                            (                                                                        p                          i                                                -                                                  g                          i                                                                    )                                                                                ER                                                                    (                                                                              λ                                                          i                                                                                ,                                                      D                                                                                i                                                                                )                                                                              -                                                            b                      i                                                                                EST                                                                    (                                                                              λ                            i                                                    ,                                                      D                            i                                                                          )                                                                                ]                            .
A distribution policy for a single period inventory system is often subject to one or more deterministic metric constraints, for example, a maximum total draw, a maximum budget, and the like, which necessitate an optimal constrained draw matrix denoted D^ whose total draw is typically less than the total draw of the optimal draw matrix D*. Two common approaches for solving such types of problems in the field of single-period inventory systems are the Lagrange multiplier approach as described in Silver, E., D. Pyke, and R. Peterson: Inventory Management and Production Planning and Scheduling, 3d ed., Wiley, NY, 1998, pgs. 406-422, and the one-by-one allocation or removal of draw units as discussed in Hadley, G., and T. M. Whitin, Analysis of Inventory Systems, Prentice-Hall, 1963, pgs. 304-307, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.

Computer implemented system and method for determining the most profitable distribution policy


A high current direct current switch which has no significant arcing and which is capable of high rate repetitive operation. A collector member has a plurality of electrically conductive leaves which are arranged in a stack. All of the leaves in the stack have substantially the same outside area and the same thickness. However, leaves in the stack have various resistance-conductive paths and values. The leaves are arranged progressively so that leaves in the top portion of the stack have greater resistance values than leaves in the lower portion of the stack. The various resistance values are obtained by providing the leaves with openings therethrough which establish resistance-conductive paths through the leaves. Some of the leaves are electrically insulated from all of the other leaves. A rotor is positioned in engagement with the stack of leaves. The rotor is provided with an electrically conductive section and an electrically insulative section. As the rotor rotates the insulative section first engages the leaves of least resistance and then progressively engages the leaves of greater resistance. Thus, as the insulative section of the rotor covers all of the leaves, current between the rotor and the collector member is reduced to zero without significant arcing therebetween.

In some types of electrical circuits it is necessary to repetitively energize and deenergize a portion or all of the circuit by means of a switch. In a direct current circuit of large current magnitude switch opening of the circuit usually results in switch arcing. Of course, switch arcing is objectionable for numerous reasons. For example, deterioration of the switch occurs with arcing in the switch.
The following U.S. Pat. Nos. pertain to attempts to solve the problem of arcing when a switch is opening in a circuit in which large magnitudes of direct current flow: 276,233, 1,743,682, 2,125,027, 3,456,143, 3,590,300, 4,760,769, and 4,777,720. However, none of these patents shows the effective, low-cost progressive conductive-resistive structure of this invention.
It is therefore, an object of this invention to provide switching means which is capable of opening a direct current circuit of large current magnitude without significant arcing.
It is another object of this invention to provide such switching means which is capable of repetitive operation at a relatively high rate.
It is another object of this invention to provide such switching means which can be employed in a brush commutating direct current motor or generator.
Another object of this invention is to provide such switching means which can be constructed in quantities at relatively low cost.
It is another object of this invention to provide such switching means which is long-lived.
Other objects and advantages of this invention reside in the construction of parts, the combination thereof, the method of production and the mode of operation, as will become more apparent from the following description.

High current repetitive switch having no significant arcing


A control device manages an electronically actuated device for the purpose of ejecting liquids onto a substrate in a controlled manner.

Conventional digital printers are designed for an office printer market. Using digital printers for volume/industrial printing is new. The volume/industrial printing market has different requirements than the office market. Some of the features required from an industrial printer include printing the same image repeatedly; printing an image at a high rate of speed; being able to incorporate elements in the print image that changes (i.e. a barcode or other quality control marks); being able to describe regions where no printing is to take place; high reliability; minimizing ink wastage; and maximizing overall productivity of the print production process.
How well these requirements are met affects commercial cost of operating the industrial printer to produce a finished product. This invention provides a device that can used in a printing system to satisfy these requirements and that will allow for the commercial development of a digital press.
Conventional printing presses typically use a mirror image impression of a required print out. This impression is combined with a printing fluid and is then xe2x80x9cpressed ontoxe2x80x9d a substrate to produce a desired printout. This process has the advantage of speed; presses can be created that produce printouts at a rate limited only by the mechanical operations required to physically press an impression onto a substrate.
To be of value in the volume/industrial printers marketplace a digital press has to offer print speeds that are comparable to those of conventional printing presses. One way a digital press can match the speed of a conventional printing press is to use many print heads in parallel.
This application discloses a control device that can be used in conjunction with any type of electronic printhead to create a printing system that is optimally fast and can be extended to support an unlimited number of printheads, thus allowing the device to print onto any size, shape or type of media and at speeds comparable to conventional presses that already exist in the marketplace.
One advantage that digital presses offer over conventional presses is that of digital control over the images being printed. This offers the operator flexibility to manage the image in a number of beneficial ways. The image may be modified digitally between each print out. This allows the operator to customize each printout with specific information, such as quality control marks. With conventional presses this facility can only be achieved by providing additional printing stages to the printing process. This adds to cost and production times.
A second advantage that digital presses offer over conventional presses is that setup and changeover time is reduced. When using a conventional press, the image impression has to be created and placed upon the printing press. The creation time for an impression may be several days or weeks. Once the impression has been created the time required to remove the previous impression from a press and replace it with the new impression is many minutes and can be more than an hour. The economics of printing operations using conventional presses is that it is usually uneconomic to do print runs of less than 5,000 items. With a digital press, no physical impressions are used. This reduces the image creation cost and removes the overhead of setting up a press. As a result print runs of one item are economic, this is beneficial as it reduces printing costs, it reduces lead times required to set up a print run, and it reduces waste.
Still other benefits and advantages will become apparent to one skilled in the art upon reading and understanding the following detailed description.


Methods and systems for identifying depth data associated with an object are disclosed. The method includes capturing, with an image capturing device, a plurality of source images of the object. The image capturing device has a sensor that is tilted at a known angle with respect to an object plane of the object such that the image capturing device has a depth of field associated with each source image, the depth of field defining a plane that is angled with respect to the object plane. An image processor analyzes the plurality of source images to identify segments of the source images that satisfy an image quality metric. Position data is assigned to the identified segments of the source images, the position data including depth positions based on the plane defined by the depth of field.

Improvements in computer processing power have led to the availability of ultra high resolution digital images, including gigapixel images and terapixel images. These ultra high resolution images can be used to depict various objects or locations in intricate detail for observation by interested parties.
Current high resolution imagery is typically captured by compositing a single image from a large number of individual shots captured by a camera. For instance, the Google Art Project services provided by Google Inc. provide access to high resolution images of various works of art from worldwide galleries. However, such composited images fail to completely represent certain types of artwork. In this regard, photographic images do not reveal depth information about the object being captured. For instance, texture information from paintings is lost when relying on conventional photography techniques. Such texture information can reveal characteristics of the base material and the paint, such as brushstrokes, thicknesses, and the like.
Light detection and ranging (LIDAR) has been used to create depth maps. However, many curators of galleries containing high-value artwork have concerns about incident laser radiation that the use of LIDAR can impose on artwork.

Method and system for identifying depth data associated with an object


A skinning machine for removing a layer of predetermined thickness from a body. The skinning machine comprising a downwardly sloping first table with feeding means to feed the body to a cutting station where a blade removes the layer from the body and a discharge station.

A. Field of Invention
This invention relates to skinning apparatus for removing a layer from a body, and particularly but not exclusively, relates to skinning apparatus for removing the skin from a fish.
B. Description of the Prior Art
One known method of removing the skin from a fish is simply to tear it off, either manually or by machine, The known tearing machines have a tendency to damage the body of the fish and also to leave on them some greyish nerves which can interfere with further processing and, above all, look unsightly which reduces the acceptability of the fish to the customer.
It is also known to remove the skin manually with a knife but this is a time consuming, and inevitably expensive, procedure.


Methods, functional data, and systems for logically representing a storage environment are provided. A target storage environment having one or more storage data objects is mapped to a data structure. Any subsequent disparate or remote but similar storage environment has direct or indirect access to the data structure such that one or more of the data objects are permissibly directly/indirectly referenced or replicated within the disparate or remote but similar storage storage environment. Changes to the data structure are communicated, thereby ensuring the reliable use of the representation for the target storage environment.

Storage networking is the practice of connecting storage devices to computing devices (e.g., clients, servers, and the like) by using Fibre Channel networks instead of traditional point-to-point small computer system interface (SCSI) channels. A network used to connect servers to storage devices is referred to as a storage area network (SAN). Within a SAN environment, all computing devices have access to the available storage devices. This presents a wide variety of benefits, including server platform fail-over wherein a failed storage device is automatically recovered by another operational server platform without requiring any recabling of the storage devices themselves. As will be apparent to those skilled in the art, connectivity among the computing devices and the underlying storage devices within the SAN environment is shared.
Prior to the development of SAN technology, local and wide area networks provided connectivity between computing devices that did not include storage devices. Connections were established with network protocols such as Transmission Communication Protocol (TCP), Unreliable Datagram Protocol (UDP), and others. These protocols ensure that message ordering is preserved and that messages are not lost. Distributed File Systems such as network file system (NFS) and Common Internet file system (CIFS) are layered on top of network protocols. Distributed File Systems organize access to files and correspondingly data storage elements across a network consisting of heterogeneous computing devices. The computing devices are typically organized as clients and servers, in a client-server architecture. Access to files or data storage elements is transparent to any particular computing device, such that access is consistent across the distributed file system without the need to have any private information about the physical locations or details associated with any particular file or data element.
The convenience of distributed file systems comes with an expense, since every byte of data exported by a file server managing a distributed file system must pass through the file server's memory, through the communications stack, and through a network interface controller before it reaches the application. Accordingly, the low performance and low throughput of operation associated with distributed file systems prohibit the implementation of many high performance data-sharing applications such as large scale distributed database applications, backup applications and the like. SAN environments present the opportunity to alleviate this issue by elevating storage devices within the network to peers of the clients and the servers, thereby in theory providing the opportunity of improving throughput of operation.
Yet, SAN technology has not produced advances in throughput of operations as one would anticipate. This is due to the fact that shared access to data among several compute platforms must be mediated by distributed file systems. Consequently, while the speed of connections between platforms has scaled upward with the introduction of SAN, the basic method of using distributed file systems to share data has not changed. Distributed file systems are innately restricted in the level of performance that can be achieved due to the computing overhead introduced by the communication protocol. Consequently, application writers are motivated to find strategies other than distributed file system in order to share data at speeds that are consistent with SAN technology. These strategies typically employ sharing information about files and volumes with remote application components. Using this information, an application can know everything about a file without having access to the file through a distributed file system. Additionally, the application can use this information to reference data directly on the SAN-connected storage device.
For these strategies to succeed, applications need to be able to discover sufficient information about files and volumes that a component on another platform can access the data associated with the file or volume. Customarily, this type of information is not externalized by either file systems or distributed file systems. As used herein this is referred to as private information. Private information differs from one file system operating on one computing device within the SAN and another file system operating on another computing device within the SAN. Correspondingly, data storage element portability is difficult to achieve within the confines of present SAN technology.
Furthermore, the very purpose of file system and volume manager function within an operating system is to hide the private information related to data storage elements located on one or more data storage devices. Accordingly, operating system vendors, file system vendors or volume manager vendors do not reveal or provide any useful interfaces that provide access to private information. Moreover, storage environment software stacks are complex and trying to extract the private information from existing stacks is not readily achievable without intervention from the file system software or volume manager software itself.
Moreover, private information about data storage elements is in a continual state of flux in modern data storage architectures, since at any moment in time data storage elements are moved during storage device failure, device reorganization to reduce fragmentation, and the like. Therefore, any ability to acquire private information must also entail notification that private data has been changed. Otherwise, the acquired private information may be stale or inaccurate.
In addition to performance bottlenecks, many disparate operating systems housing particular file systems can not seamlessly interact with one another since the private information about data storage elements remains largely unobtainable to application software programs. Therefore, when an organization migrates from one operating system, file system or volume manager to a different operating system, file system or volume manager an expensive data storage migration also ensues.
In an effort to address some of these problems some industry associations have been initiated in an attempt to standardize data storage device communication. For example, the Storage Network Industry Association (SNIA) and the National Committee for Information Technology Standards (NCITS) technical committee T11 have been established. Yet, these associations are attempting to gain voluntary standardization for storage device manufacturers to adhere to when developing storage devices, and therefore the work of these associations will not assist with existing storage devices, existing operating systems, existing file systems or existing volume managers. Accordingly, the success of these associations is limited in scope and has yet to be demonstrated even with newly released products and services.
Therefore, what is needed are methods, functional data and systems for providing more flexible representations of data storage objects and correspondingly data storage environments which are located on storage devices, thereby improving the ability to share information about storage objects across storage networks and permitting the development of distributed applications that operate on data that is shared by virtue of the connectivity afforded by SAN.

Methods, functional data, and systems to represent a storage environment


A kitchen tool integrally formed in one piece made of a polyetherimide, having a capacity for withstanding high temperatures and facilitating microwave use.

Kitchen tools relate generally to turners, spatulas, spoons, cake cutters, forks, ladles and those other utensils that are used in the kitchen for the various functions dealing with the handling of food.
In the early days, kitchen tools were typically formed with wooden handles and metal work ends, the work end being the surface of a turner used to turn a hamburger or an egg; the bowl section of the spoon; the prongs of a fork, etc. In addition, the kitchen tools required a shank section to connect the handle to the work end. Later, with the advent of plastics, plastic handles became common for kitchen tools and soon nylon, other plastics and teflon coated products were used to form the work end section. Still, the handles were formed of different material from the work ends and metal shanks were and are still used to connect the handle and work end. After repeated use, the shanks can become loose thus causing the work end to dislodge from the shank, often during use.
As in the past, the current kitchen tool must also necessarily be able to withstand high temperatures and, of course, must be attractive. It is important that the handle not conduct heat so that the kitchen tool can be touched during use.
In addition, the materials used must be compatible with food. This generally means that the material of the kitchen tool and, in particular, the work end must be sufficiently stable to avoid migration of any of the material from the work end to the food being handled by the kitchen tool and must be approved for use with food by the United States Food and Drug Administration.
Due to the fact that the elements that comprise the kitchen tools are made from different materials, the configuration of kitchen tools often have sharp corners. These sharp corners make cleaning of the kitchen tool difficult. After repeated use, food can become trapped in the corners.
In addition, continued use of the kitchen tools often results in discoloration of the tools from repeated contact with food dyes, acids and cleaners.
It has recently become necessary to provide kitchen tools with the capability to operate in the microwave environment. Microwave ovens have become common kitchen appliances and it is apparent that the use of microwave ovens will increase.
Recently, polyetherimides have been developed. Polyetherimide is available commercially under the trademark ULTEM.RTM., a trademark of the General Electric Company ULTEM.RTM. has been found to have application in electrical and electronics service, automotive, aerospace, and other areas wherein ductility for snap fit capability and elevated temperature warp resistance, high electrical insulation, and flame resistant properties are desirable. It is believed that polyetherimides also have application as pin connectors, flame resistant plenum connectors, high temperature bobbins, coils, fuse box, and wire coatings.
However, surprisingly it has been discovered that polyetherimides and, in particular, polyetherimide bearing the grade designation ULTEM.RTM.-1,000 and ULTEM.RTM.-1,010 are virtually unaffected by microwave radiation.


A device for improving the use efficiency of a content delivery network (CDN) service and an operating method of a service distribution device are provided. The operating method includes receiving a service request signal from one or more electronic devices, determining an available domain for the service request signal based on the amount of idle traffic of one or more service domains in response to the reception of the service request signal, and transmitting a service response signal that includes the available domain information to the one or more electronic devices.

Content delivery network (CDN) services may refer to services that, in order to efficiently deliver the content such as websites, videos, or firmware files to a plurality of users in the Internet-based environment, deliver the corresponding content to the user who requires the content by using one or more servers (e.g., edge servers) that are distributed. For example, in the case of providing the CDN service, an origin server (or, content provider (CP) server) may pre-cache the content in one or more edge servers (or, cache servers) that are distributed at key points in the Internet, and may efficiently transmit the content to a plurality of users.
Content delivery network (CDN) service providers may charge a fee for using the CDN service according to a data throughput-based charging method or a traffic-based charging method. For example, according to the data throughput-based charging method, the fee is charged based on the amount of data that is downloaded by the user through the CDN service. According to the traffic-based charging method, the fee is charged based on a traffic value of a given time (e.g., the time when the amount of traffic reaches 95%) by using traffic values (the amount of traffic) that are collected in a reference time unit (e.g., 5 minutes).
In the case of the traffic-based charging method, since the charges are made based on the traffic value at a given time, the amount of traffic used daily may not reach the billing reference value, so there may be unused traffic.
In addition, in the case of providing a new CDN service, the provision of the new service may be delayed because a content provider is required to attend to a variety of procedures, such as a contract with a CDN service provider, the addition of a new domain, the addition of a new account, the establishment of an origin server, or cost negotiations.
The above information is presented as background information only to assist with an understanding of the present disclosure. No determination has been made, and no assertion is made, as to whether any of the above might be applicable as prior art with regard to the present disclosure.

Method for providing content delivery network service and electronic device thereof


The present invention teaches a backlight module and the LCD device. The backlight module includes a light guide plate and a light source located at a distance to a side of the light guide plate. The light source includes a substrate, multiple LED chips disposed on the substrate, multiple primary lenses disposed on the substrate corresponding to the LED chips, and multiple condenser lenses disposed on the substrate corresponding to the primary lenses. Each primary lens is disposed correspondingly to a LED chip, focuses light from the LED chip, and prevents the light emission face of the LED chip from being higher above the light guide plate, thereby enhancing the light coupling efficiency and reducing leakage of the backlight module. Each condenser lens is disposed correspondingly to a primary lens to further narrow light emission angle of the LED chip, enhancing light utilization efficiency.

Thin film transistors (TFTs) are the major driving components in existing LCD devices and active matrix organic light-emitting diode (AMOLED) devices. TFTs directly affect the performance of these devices.
Existing LCD devices are usually back-lighted display devices, and include a LCD panel and a backlight module. The principle behind a LCD panel is to fill liquid crystal molecules between a TFT array substrate and a color filter (CF) substrate, and to alter the alignment of the liquid crystal molecules by the electrical field formed between the substrates as the substrates are applied with pixel and common voltages. As such, light from the backlight module is refracted to produce images.
Ultra-thin LCD devices are currently the mainstream product, and there are already LCD panels having thickness 5.9 mm and 9 mm. To support these LCD panels, their light guide plate (LGP) also should have reduced thickness. Existing LGPs already have their thickness reduced from previous 3 mm to below 2 mm. Their material is also switched from polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) to glasses. It is expected that, in the future, glass-LGP would have thickness lower than 1 mm. As LGPs are becoming thinner, the width of light-emitting diodes (LEDs) also has to be thinner. Previously most LEDs has thickness 2.0 mm or 1.6 mm, but these days most of them have thickness 1.4 mm or 1.0 mm. When these LEDs are inserted unto printed circuit boards (PCBs), due to the precision of the workstation, some LEDs are not aligned and some have their light emission face above the LGP, causing severe light leakage. The backlight module therefore suffers low light coupling efficiency and low power utilization. On the other hand, the number of configured LEDs is also limited due to the dimension of their lead frames. The driving power to each LED is also limited by the lead frame's light fastness and heat resistance properties.

HUIZHOU CHINA STAR OPTOELECTRONICS TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD.


An electric motor with two or more stator sections, each possessing at least two salient pole projections having power windings, and two or more armature sections on a common shaft. The armature sections are at an angle to each other: e.g. 90 degrees for two armatures, 120 degrees for three armatures. Each armature has a lamination stack or ferrite core. The armature sections form a constant air gap with the field poles, and have an elliptical profile with respect to the output shaft. The armature sections have no electrical windings, or conductors and require no slip rings, rotor coils or permanent magnets. The power windings are energized by pulses of electric current. Said pulses are automatically supplied to the salient pole nearest the longest rotor flux path available, as determined by a shaft position sensor.

Notwithstanding the increased interest in energy conversion over the last decade, no substantial advance has been made in increasing the conversion efficiency of electric motors. Rather, the art has made incremental advances relating to improved magnetic materials, more powerful permanent magnets, and sophisticated electronic switching devices. Such improvements, at best, relate to very small increases in overall efficiency, usually gained at very considerable expense.
Patents in this area include: U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,917,699; 3,132,269; 3,321,652; 3,956,649; 3,571,639; 3,398,386; 3,760,205; 4, 639,626 and 4,659,953. Also in this area are EPO patent no. 0174290 (March 1986); German patent no. 1538242 (October 1969); French patent no. 2386181 (October 1978) and UK patent no. 1263176 (February 1972).
U.S. Pat. No. 4,780,632, entitled "Alternator Having Improved Efficiency," issued to the applicant on Oct. 25, 1988, describes an alternator having a single rotor canted at an angle.
The basic concept employed in earlier motor art is the interaction between a current carrying conductor (s) and a magnetic field of some kind. This fact is true regardless of motor type. This basic concept appears in DC motors, single phase AC motors, Poly Phase Induction Slip motors, which utilize a rotating magnetic field, and in Polyphase Synchronous Motors with externally excited electromagnetic cores, or permanent magnet cores as the case may be.
The only exceptions to this rule may be found in the design of stepper motors, which utilize a magnetic "ratcheting" action upon magnetic material in the armature, in response to applied pulses of current, and various types of reluctance motors in which the rotor moves with respect to a salient pole piece, experiencing a large variation in air gap during its motion.
The prior art has not produced a multiple phase, multiply segmented stator with individual, obliquely disposed, laminated armatures devoted to each stator section, such that each stator/rotor combination employs a continuous air gap of constant dimension, regardless of the elliptical profile of said armatures, but not employing any current carrying conductors, coils, windings or bars within or upon the armatures, as a means of producing torque upon the output shaft.

Pulsed multi-rotor constant air gap switched reluctance motor


A crossbar assembly is provided for a cargo rack configured for mounting on top of a vehicle. A crossbar assembly may include a pair of brackets, each bracket having a crossbar housing, for receiving and engaging one end of a crossbar. The housing may also include a pair of jaws adapted to clamp a rail on top of a vehicle.

Roof racks are well known and are manufactured in a variety of configurations. One conventional roof rack assembly includes first and second roof rails mounted in a spaced apart and substantially parallel arrangement on opposite sides of the roof of a vehicle. Often, such rails are attached to a vehicle roof during manufacture and assembly of the vehicle. One or more crossbars, usually two, typically extend substantially perpendicularly between the roof rails and attach to the roof rails.
According to conventional designs, crossbars are configured to be positioned perpendicular to the roof rails to which they connect. The brackets used to couple or attach the crossbars to roof rails provide for no flexibility or variation in this configuration. However, in practice, roof rails sometimes deviate from being parallel. This may be as a result of manufacturing imperfections or tolerances and/or any damage to the roof rails, such as through bending of the rails. These problems are exacerbated when crossbars are positioned at different points along the lengths of the roof rails, such as by moving the crossbars from one point along the length of the roof rail to another point by sliding the crossbars along the roof rails. Thus, although the ability to move the crossbars along the length of the roof rails provides improved flexibility for users, a crossbar of fixed length will not be able to attach to a point on a roof rail that is spaced too far apart from, or too close together to, the opposing roof rail.
Such requirements have previously restricted vehicle designers to arrangements in which the rails are substantially parallel, which may not always be desired, at least for aesthetic reasons.
Furthermore, conventional designs have been somewhat difficult to fit to a vehicle, and are sometimes not only time-consuming, but are also frustrating for users. This, is particularly the case where it is desired to install or remove crossbars for a roof rack on a regular basis. Generally, prior art arrangements require a first step of fixing a bracket to a roof rail and then a second step of fixing a crossbar to the bracket.

Bracket and a crossbar assembly for a roof rack


A LAYERED BENDING ELEMENT LIGHT SWITCH will be used to turn on or off the light signal in one of two adjacent fiber optic channels by the action of the electric field of the light passing through the channels. LAYERED BENDING ELEMENT LIGHT SWITCH can be made adjacent to each other so that the bending elements will latch together and stay in the state required by means of the shape of the ends of the elements. The bending is accomplished by the response of piezoelectric material to the electric field of light in the fiber optic channel. This will allow information of be stored by the LAYERED BENDING ELEMENT LIGHT SWITCH that are made to latch. Light of different frequencies may travel in a light channel of appropriate dimensions together without hindering each other. The light that actuates the light switching or latching may be a different frequency than the light signal that is switched on or off. This switch holds the latched position required until light signals of the appropriate wavelength and power in the proper sequence are applied to the LAYERED BENDING ELEMENT LIGHT SWITCH to cause the unlatching.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a method for switching light signals in an optical wave-guide on or off at speeds faster than 10−11 seconds using light to trigger the switch in which a layered element bends to close the channel. These switches can be arranged to stay latched until unlatched.
2. Description of the Prior Art
As technology advances communication of three-dimensional drawings, video, and software applications require more information to be communicated taster than ever. Fiber optical channels can handle much more information than wires can. The slowest part of a fiber optic communication channels at present are the fiber optic switching devices. At present fiber optic signals are switched using various methods that are actuated by transistors. U.S. Pat. No. 6,594,411 issued to Yueh Liang Chung et al, on Jul. 15, 2003, which teaches OPTICAL SWITCH, makes mention of a piezoelectric element. The piezoelectric element is actuated by an electrical signal, which is bound to the 10−9 seconds speeds that transistors can accomplish. U.S. Pat. No. 5,703,975 issued to William Miller et al, on Dec. 30, 1997 that teaches INTERFEROMETRIC SWITCH are physically long for the present need for miniaturized components. The components are more than a centimeter in length in William Miller's device. Finally, U.S. Pat. No. 7,072,536 issued to Gary Poovey on Jul. 4, 2006 which teaches LIGHT TRIGGERED LIGHT SWITCH, here included by reference, is as fast as the present invention because it is light triggered, but lacks the latching function.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.


An endoscope device includes a flexible insertion portion; a flexible tube portion; a first bending portion; a second bending portion; an observation portion; a first drive portion bending the first bending portion; a second drive portion bending the second bending portion; a position detection portion detecting a position of a rigid distal end portion of a medical instrument; first and second bending detection portions detecting radii of curvature of axes of channels formed in the first and second bending portions and directions in which the channels are bent when an input signal generated by the position detection portion is received, respectively; and a control portion configured to control generating a second drive signal driving the second drive portion based on a first drive signal driving the first drive portion, and sending the second drive signal to the second drive portion while sending the first drive signal.

Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an endoscope device that is used to observe a treatment target.
Description of Related Art
In the past, an endoscope device has been used to observe a treatment target in a body cavity or the like and to perform a treatment. For example, a device disclosed in PCT International Publication No. WO2012/014532 is known as this kind of endoscope device.
The endoscope device disclosed in PCT International Publication No. WO2012/014532 includes an endoscope that images a treatment target, a control unit that is detachably connected to the endoscope, and a monitor that is connected to the control unit and displays the treatment target imaged by the endoscope.
The endoscope includes an insertion portion that is elongated and flexible and an operation portion that is disposed at a proximal end portion of the insertion portion. The insertion portion includes a rigid distal end portion, a bending portion, and a flexible tube portion that are arranged in an order from a distal end portion side toward a proximal end portion side.
The rigid distal end portion includes an imaging surface of an imaging unit (an observation portion) and a distal opening portion of a treatment tool-insertion channel (a channel).
The bending portion includes a first bending portion, a second bending portion, and a third bending portion that are arranged in an order from the rigid distal end portion side toward the flexible tube portion side. For example, the first bending portion is bent vertically and laterally. The second bending portion is bent vertically, and the third bending portion is bent laterally.
An operation portion main body of the operation portion includes a first bending operation portion that bends the first bending portion. The operation portion main body is provided with a second bending operation portion that bends the second bending portion. First and second bending operation mechanisms, which include pulleys and the like, are connected to the first and second bending operation portions, respectively.
The operation portion main body is provided with a third bending operation portion, a drive portion, and a lateral third bending operation mechanism. The third bending operation portion operates to bend the third bending portion. The drive portion has a drive force that allows the third bending portion to be bent laterally by electric power, and is disposed in the operation portion main body. The drive portion is, for example, a motor. The drive force of the drive portion is transmitted to the third bending operation mechanism.
The control unit includes a bending angle calculation portion and a control portion. The bending angle calculation portion calculates bending angles of the first bending portion, the second bending portion, and the third bending portion. The control portion controls the drive portion based on the calculation result calculated by the bending angle calculation portion so that the third bending portion is bent and a distal end portion of the insertion portion approaches a target point (a treatment target).
When a control operation portion included in the operation portion main body is operated, the control portion sets a point, which is distant from the imaging surface of the imaging unit toward, for example, the inside of the body cavity by a desired distance, as a target point. At this time, the control portion calculates the position of the target point.
When the third bending portion is bent, the control portion determines whether or not the target point is positioned in an image surface (an imaging angle of view) imaged by the imaging surface, based on the calculation result (a bending angle) calculated by the bending angle calculation portion.
If the target point is positioned in the image surface, the control portion controls the drive portion based on the calculation result calculated by the bending angle calculation portion so that the third bending portion is bent and the distal end portion of the insertion portion approaches the target point.
When the drive portion is controlled by the control portion so that the target point continues to be positioned in the image surface, the target point continues to be displayed on the monitor. Accordingly, an operator can easily operate the endoscope device.


The excitation overcurrent detection unit for the doubly-fed electric machine is provided with a function to determine an excitation current magnitude relationship among three phases. The firing pulse is held to on-state or off-state to cause the largest-current phase and the second-largest-current phase to charge the DC capacitor by the operation of diodes. The conduction ratio of the third-largest-current phase or minimum current phase is controlled according to the detected current value to protect against a possible short-circuit across the DC capacitor. When the voltage of the DC capacitor exceeds a preset value, the voltage is suppressed by operating active or passive power devices.

The present invention relates to a doubly-fed motor/generator using an excitation power converter or to a doubly-fed electric machine.
A doubly-fed generator using an excitation power converter, or a doubly-fed variable-speed electric machine is able to control a reactive power output, as does a conventional synchronous generator/motor, and also to realize a high-speed torque control or a high-speed active power control within a rotation speed range around a synchronous speed. This gives the doubly-fed electric machines an advantage of being able to optimally operate prime movers, such as hydraulic power plants and wind power generation systems, in a wider range of conditions than can the conventional synchronous machines. They have another advantage of being able to contribute to stabilizing the frequency of the utility power system or power grid by temporarily releasing or absorbing energy of a rotating flywheel to and from the power grid.
As to the power converter for secondary excitation, not only does it have a far larger capacity than that of the excitation power converter for the conventional synchronous machine, though its capacity can be made smaller than that of an armature of the generator, its circuit is more complex. Therefore an overcurrent capability and an exciter ceiling voltage, equivalent to those of the excitation power converter of the conventional synchronous machine, are both economically difficult to secure.
For this reason, in the event of a fault occurring in a power grid, it is general practice to activate a short-circuit unit to allow an excitation winding overcurrent to bypass the excitation power converter, minimizing the overcurrent capacity. Where a resistor is inserted to reduce the current flowing through the short-circuit unit, in particular, the torque of the doubly-fed electric machine changes rapidly to that of the wound-rotor induction machine shorted with a secondary resistor and also wildly varies depending on the rotation speed. As a result, even if the generator can be managed to remain in operation, the large and rapid changes in the torque cause significant disturbances in the power grid, making it impossible to sustain the continued supply of electricity to consumers.
As one method to deal with this drawback, Hitachi Review, 1995 Vol. 44, describes a procedure whereby, when an excitation overvoltage is detected by a cycloconverter made up of anti-parallelly connected thyristors, a power converter unit of a polarity opposite to an excitation current command is turned on to continue its operation. Another method is also practiced which involves computing a loss from current values of power devices, calculating junction temperatures of the power devices from cooling water temperatures at all times and providing an overcurrent protection with a desired time delay by using the junction temperatures for protection in order to allow for a continued operation until a limit on the power device junction temperature is reached. This minimizes the activation of a short-circuit unit as practically as possible.
As self-turn-off power devices have been making remarkable technological advances in recent years, self-commutated converters are moving toward larger capacity and higher voltage by employing power devices such as IGBTs (Insulated Gate Bipolar Transistors). The self-commutated converters have advantages not found in externally commutated converters, such as capabilities to adjust a converter power factor and optimize the outflow of generated harmonics by adjusting a pulse-width-modulated (PWM) frequency. On the other hand, when used on doubly-fed generators that are required to continue their operation even during abnormalities on the power grid side, the power converters using the self-turn-off power devices have difficulty securing a short-time overcurrent capability economically. This is because, while the conventional power devices, such as thyristors, are able to provide a short-time overcurrent capability up to the junction temperature upper limit, the self-turn-off devices' current rating is determined by an instantaneous current interrupting capacity.

Doubly-fed generator and doubly-fed electric machine


Systems and methods for managing media playback are described. In one embodiment, a third party media request is received from a third party application. A native media request is sent to a native media player in response to the third party media request. The native media request causes the native media player to access content or metadata. Metadata is returned to the third party application if the third party media request requested data. The native media player performs a content operation on the content if the third party media request requested a content operation.

A media player subsystem or device is capable of allowing a user to perform one or more of the following: store, access, play back, view, edit, filter, catalog, identify, or transfer media content to different types of data stores. Other services and functionality related to media content can be provided by a media player subsystem. Media player content may include audio, video, spoken, audiobook, podcast, and other forms of user experience that may be stored in a digital format. Examples of a media player system include iPod devices, Zune devices, iPod functionality on an iPhone or iPod Touch, the iTunes program, Windows Media Player, VLC, WinAmp, and many others.
As is known in the art, a framework includes a public interface (e.g., application programmer's interface (API)) usable by a programmer to create an application program or other program objects such as a daemon, a library function, a secondary framework, etc. The public interface provides access to an underlying set of data and functional services. A framework may, for example, allow a programmer using the framework to instantiate objects in a provided class, call functions, monitor framework defined events, and so on. Frameworks may be provided in many different forms, such as via a C++, ObjectiveC, or C programming language or a JavaScript, Perl, or Python scripting language interface among many others. Examples of frameworks include the iPhone SDK, the Windows SDK, the OpenGL framework, among many others.


A positive-working radiation-sensitive mixture is disclosed which contains as essential constituents:. a) an .alpha.-carbonyl-.alpha.-sulfonyl-diazomethane, which forms a strong acid on irradiation, of the general formula I ##STR1## in which R.sup.1 and R.sup.2, independently of one another, denote an alkyl-, cycloalkyl-, aryl- or heteroaryl radical PA1 b) a compound having at least one C--O--C or C--O--Si bond which can be cleaved by acid, and PA1 c) a water-insoluble binder which is soluble or at least swellable in aqueous-alkaline solutions.. The radiation-sensitive mixture according to the invention is notable for a high sensitivity over a wide spectral range. It also exhibits a high thermal stability and does not form any corrosive photoylsis products on exposure to light.

The present invention relates to a positive-working radiation-sensitive mixture which contains as essential constituents:
a) a compound which forms a strong acid on irradiation, PA1 b) a compound having at least one C--O--C or C--O--Si bond which can be cleaved by acid, and PA1 c) a water-insoluble binder which is soluble or at least swellable in aqueous-alkaline solutions. PA1 a) a compound which forms a strong acid on exposure to actinic radiation, PA1 b) a compound having at least one C--O--C or C--O--Si bond which can be cleaved by acid, and PA1 c) a water-insoluble binder which is soluble or at least swellable aqueous-alkaline solutions. PA1 a) those containing at least one orthocarboxylic acid ester and/or carboxylic acid amide acetal grouping, the compounds also being capable of having a polymeric nature and the groupings mentioned being capable of occurring as linking elements in the main chain or as lateral substituents, PA1 b) oligomeric or polymeric compounds containing repeating acetal and/or ketal groupings in the main chain, PA1 c) compounds containing at least one enol ether or N-acyliminocarbonate grouping, PA1 d) cyclic acetals or ketals of .beta.-keto esters or .beta.-keto amides, PA1 e) compounds containing silyl ether groupings, PA1 f) compounds containing silyl enol ether groupings, PA1 g) monoacetals or monoketals whose aldehydes or ketone components have a solubility in the developer of between 0.1 and 100 g/l, PA1 h) ethers based on tertiary alcohols, and PA1 i) carboxylic acid esters and carbonates of
The invention also relates to a radiation-sensitive copying material produced from this mixture which is suitable for producing photoresists, electronic components, printing plates or for chemical milling.
In UV-lithography, the limit of resolution is governed by the wavelength of the radiation used. The continuous miniaturization of structural dimensions, for example, in chip production, therefore requires modified lithographic techniques in the submicron region. Owing to their short wavelength, high-energy UV light or electron beams and X-ray beams, for example, are used. This modification of the lithographic techniques changes the requirements imposed on the radiation-sensitive mixture. A summary of these requirements is given, for example, in the treatise by C.G. Willson entitled "Organic Resist Materials-Theory and Chemistry" (Introduction to Microlithography, Theory, Materials, and Processing, edited by L. F. Thompson, C. G. Willson, M. J. Bowden, ACS Symp. Ser., 219: 87 (1983), American Chemical Society, Washington). There is therefore an intensified requirement for radiation-sensitive mixtures which are preferably sensitive in a wide spectral range and can accordingly be used in conventional UV lithography or, without a loss in sensitivity, in advanced technologies such as, for example, mid-UV or deep-UV, electron or X-ray lithography.
Mixtures containing acid donors and acid-cleavable compounds are described, for example, in DE 23 06 248 (= U.S. Pat. No. 3,779,778), DE 26 10 842 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,101,323), DE 27 18 254 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,247,611), DE 27 18 259 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,189,323), DE 29 28 636 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,311,782), DE 31 51 078 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,506,006), DE 35 44 165 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,786,577), DE 36 01 264 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,840,867), DE 37 30 783, 37 30 785 and 37 30 787, EP 0 006 626 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,250,247), EP 0 006 627 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,248,957), EP 0 042 562 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,506,003), EP 0 202 196 and 0 302 359, and also U.S. Pat. No. 4,491,628 and 4,603,101. Upon irradiation of these materials, photolysis of the compound (a) forms an acid which brings about a cleavage of the C--O--C or C--O--Si bond of the compound (b) so that the irradiated regions of the photosensitive layers become soluble in an aqueous-alkaline developer.
Compounds (a) are characterized as photolytic acid donors and include, in particular, onium salts such as diazonium-, phosphonium-, sulfonium- and iodonium salts of non-nucleophilic acids, for example, of HSbF.sub.6, HAsF.sub.6, or HPF.sub.6 (J. V. Crivello, Polym. Eng. Sci., 23:953 (1983), halogen compounds (EP 0 232 972, DE 15 72 089 (= GB 1 163 324), DE 18 17 540 (= U.S. Pat. No. 3,615,455), DE 19 49 010 (= U.S. Pat. No. 3,686,084), DE 23 17 846 (= GB 1 381 471 and 1 381 472), U.S. Pat. No. 3,912,606), in particular, trichloromethyl triazine derivatives (DE 12 98 414 (= GB 1 234 648), DE 22 43 621 (= GB 1 388 492), DE 23 06 248, DE 27 18 259, DE 33 33 450 (= ZA 84/7165) and DE 33 37 024 (= U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,619,998 and 4,696,888) and also U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,515,552, 3,536,489 and 3,615,630) or trichloromethyl oxadiazole derivatives (DE 28 51 472 (= U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,212,970 and 4,232,106), DE 29 49 396 (32 U.S. Pat. No. 4,279,982), DE 30 21 590 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,371,607), DE 30 21 599 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,371,606) and DE 33 33 450), o-quinonediazidesulfochlorides or organometal/organohalogen combinations.
The use of such photolytic acid donors, however, involves certain disadvantages which drastically restrict their possible uses in various fields of application. For example, many of the onium salts are toxic. Their solubility in many solvents is inadequate, which results in a limitation of the choice of resist-coating solvents. If the onium salts are used, some undesirable foreign atoms are introduced which may result in processing troubles, in particular in microlithography. Furthermore, during the photolysis they form Bronstedt acids with very strong corrosive action which render the use of radiation-sensitive mixtures containing them unsatisfactory on sensitive substrates.
The halogen compounds and also the quinonediazide sulfonyl chlorides form hydrohalic acids with strong corrosive action. On certain substrates, such compounds have only a limited storage life. According to the teachings of DE 36 21 376 (= U.S. Pat. No. 4,840,867), this was improved in the past by introduction of an intermediate layer between substrate and radiation-sensitive layer containing compounds of the type (a), but this resulted in an undesirable increase in defects and a reduction in the process reproducibility. In addition, it was generally believed that compounds of the type (b) can be cleaved only by the acid types described above which have good mobility in the photosensitive layer.
Recent work by F. M. Houlihan et al., SPIE 920: 67 (1988) has shown that, in addition to the above-mentioned acid donors, nitrobenzyl tosylates, which form sulfonic acids of low mobility on exposure to light, can be used in certain acid-labile resist formulations. The sensitivities achieved in such cases and the thermal stabilities of the photoresists have, however, proven inadequate.
Owing to the disadvantages cited there is therefore a need for further acid donors which act photolytically, which do not have the disadvantages described above as constituents of radiationsensitive mixtures and which consequently have sufficient reactivity and acid strength to convert compounds of the type (b) into their cleavage products even with short exposure times.

Positive-working radiation-sensitive mixture and copying material produced therefrom comprising an .alpha.-carbonyl-.alpha.-sulfonyl diazomethane, a water-insoluble binder and an acid cleavable compound


A complementary thin film transistor and manufacturing method thereof are provided. The complementary thin film transistor has a substrate, an n-type semiconductor layer, a p-type semiconductor layer, a first passivation layer, a first electrode metal layer, and a second electrode metal layer. The n-type semiconductor layer is disposed above the substrate, and comprises a metal oxide material. The p-type semiconductor layer is disposed above the substrate, and comprises an organic semiconductor material. The first passivation layer is disposed between the n-type semiconductor layer and the p-type semiconductor layer, and formed with at least one contacting hole. The first electrode metal layer and the second electrode metal layer are electrically connected with each other through the contacting hole.

Complementary Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor (CMOS) is a design of an integrated circuit process which can make components of n-type MOSFET (NMOS) and p-type MOSFET (PMOS) from a silicon wafer template. CMOS means that physical characteristics of NMOS and PMOS are complementarity. SRAM, microcontrollers, microprocessors, CMOS image sensing devices, or other digital logic circuitry can be made from a CMOS process. CMOS is formed from NMOS and PMOS, and CMOS is a basic circuit construction of an integrated circuit. A CMOS transmission gate is formed by connecting a p-type channel MOSFET and an n-type channel MOSFET in parallel, which can be a switch for transmitting analog signals or a basic unit of logic circuits.
A substrate of a display panel is a glass or plastic substrate. Refer to FIG. 1, which is a schematic circuit diagram of a transmission gate of a Continuous Time Fourier Transform (CTFT transmission gate). The CTFT transmission gate connected to pulse trigger signal terminals CP, CN, and has a p-type thin film transistor 11, and an n-type thin film transistor 12, wherein the p-type thin film transistor 11 connects to the n-type thin film transistor 12 in parallel.
However, in the technology of low temperature poly-silicon (LTPS), the p-type thin film transistor 11 and the n-type thin film transistor 12 are formed by different types of doping from the channel. The preparation process of CTFT circuit has a complex process with a high manufacturing cost.

Complementary thin film transistor and manufacturing method thereof

SHENZHEN CHINA STAR OPTOELECTRONICS TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD.


A detection element includes an exposed electrode on the first surface of an insulating substrate, the exposed electrode including first exposed electrode, second exposed electrode, third exposed electrode, and fourth exposed electrode provided; a first electrode pattern provided on a side opposite to the first surface, the first electrode pattern including a pattern connected to the first exposed electrode and the second exposed electrode, a pattern connected to the third exposed electrode and the fourth exposed electrode, a second electrode pattern having a first exposed portion and a pattern provided along the second direction, and a third electrode pattern having a second exposed portion and a pattern provided along the third direction, provided so as to sandwich the third electrode pattern between the first electrode pattern and the second electrode pattern.

Research on a radiation detection device of the gas electron amplification type by a pixel-type electrode is proceeding. Such a radiation detection device detects radiation by using the pixel-type electrode. At this time, a track of charged particles can be detected (for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2002-6047). The radiation detection device using this technique is used as an imaging device for nuclear medicine to diagnose and treat diseases using a medicine (radioisotope) as a mark, which emits very small amounts of radiation, such as PET (Positron Emission Tomography) examination and SPECT (Single Photon Emission Computed Tomography) examinations. In other fields, this technique is expected to be applied as a device for monitoring radiation dose in the environment.

Detection element, radiation detection device, and compton camera


A power supply circuit for use with a RF power amplifier in a communications device includes a battery; a low impedance capacitor connected in series with the battery; a discharge blocking mechanism to prevent discharge of the capacitor until the occurrence of a triggering event; and a summing mechanism to combine the voltage from the battery with the voltage from the capacitor to power the RF power amplifier.

The prior art utilizes multiple-cell batteries to develop voltage required for operation of RF power amplifier, or provides a switching power supply to increase lower cell count battery voltage to RF power amplifier required operating voltage, with a capacitor to store the full voltage for use by the RF power amplifier.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,768,115, to Pascucci et al., for Voltage booster with an acceleration circuit, granted Jun. 16, 1998 describes a charge pump and a control system therefor.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,767,735, to Javanifard et al., for Variable stage charge pump, granted Jun. 16, 1998 describes a charge pump having the ability to generate a number of different output voltages.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,742,196, to Fronen et al., for Level-shifting circuit and high side driver including such a level-shifting circuit, granted Apr. 21, 1998 describes a circuit having a parasitic transistor therein.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,734,279, to Berezen, for Charge pump circuit, granted Mar. 31, 1998 describes a low-noise, relatively constant output circuit.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,717,581, to Canclini, for Charge pump circuit with feedback control, granted Feb. 10, 1998 describes a multiple stage charge pump circuit having a control portion that senses bias current of the switch circuit.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,680,300, to Szepesi et al., for Regulated charge pump DC/DC converter, granted Oct. 21, 1997 describes a charge pump circuit having a switch driver that generates a modulated drive voltage in response to the voltage output of the circuit, which drive voltage operates a switch, producing a regulated output voltage.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,646,563, to Kuo, for Charge pump with near zero offset current, granted Jul. 8, 1997 describes a charge pump which is less sensitive to jitter in the supply voltage and reference voltage.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,635,776, to Imi, for Charge pump voltage converter, granted Jun. 3, 1997 describes a circuit for boosting voltage by four or eight times the input voltage.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,627,460, to Bazinet et al., for DC/DC converter having a bootstrapped high side driver, granted May 6, 1997 describes a circuit for temporarily increasing the duty cycle of a low-side nMOS switch, thereby maintaining a minimum level charge on a bootstrap capacitor.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,612,921, to Chang et al., for Low Supply voltage Negative Charge Pump, granted Mar. 18, 1997 describes a charge pump for generating a relatively high negative voltage to control gates of selected memory cells.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,543,750, to Oh, for Bootstrap Circuit, granted Aug. 6, 1996 bootstrap circuit for use with binary signals.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,514,994, to Sawada, for Bootstrap circuit, granted May 7, 1996 describes a bootstrap circuit applicable to semiconductor memories.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,512,845, to Yuh, for Bootstrap circuit, granted Apr. 30, 1996 describes a circuit for enhancing the operating speed of a semiconductor memory device.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,493,245, to Kao et al., for Low power high speed level shift circuit, granted Feb. 20, 1996 describes a circuit having three sets of CMOS transistors to provide low power consumption at a high operating rate.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,481,221, to Gariboldi et al., for Charge pump circuit for low supply voltage applications, granted Jan. 2, 1996 describes a high-efficiency circuit that operates with a low supply voltage and without a high-current voltage regulating device.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,384,570, to Dedic, for Voltage storage circuits, granted Jan. 24, 1995 having a discharge block.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,381,051, to Morton, for High voltage charge pump, granted Jan. 10, 1995 describes a circuit that is operable over a range of low input voltages.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,155,670, to Brian, for Bootstrap modified topologies for wide-input range switchmode DC to DC converters, granted Oct. 13, 1992 describes a circuit wherein an input voltage is converted to an augmented voltage, and wherein the DC to DC converter then operates from the augmented voltage.
Although a large number of bootstrap/charge pump circuits exist in the prior art, none are as suitable for providing power to a RF power amplifier as the power supply of the invention.

Bootstrap capacitor power supply for low voltage mobile communications power amplifier


A datum is created in an axle housing. A finished brake flange is welded to the axle housing with reference to the datum to make an axle sub-assembly. The axle sub-assembly is fixed to a first part of a machine. A finished spindle is supplied to a second part of the machine. The spindle is welded to the axle sub-assembly with reference to the datum. A dial indexing table is rotated to a first position. An axle is placed on the dial indexing table with its longitudinal axis oriented vertically. The dial indexing table is rotated to a second position, wherein the axle aligned with a CNC machine. A machining operation is performed on the axle with the CNC machine. The dial indexing table is rotated to a third position. The axle is removed from the dial indexing table. An axle and an apparatus for manufacturing an axle are described.

Referring to FIG. 1, an axle 10 for a truck or other vehicle is typically assembled in a series of welding and machining steps shown in FIG. 2A, beginning at step 100. At step 105, two housing halves 12 are welded together to form an axle housing. At step 110, a carrier ring 14 is welded to the housing. At step 115, a cover 16 is welded to the housing. At step 120, the ends 18 of the axle housing are machined. At step 125, rough spindles 20 are welded to the machined ends 18. At step 130, rough brake flanges 22 are welded to the machined ends 18. At step 135, the axle housing is straightened, to compensate for any distortion that may have occurred during the various welding steps. At step 140, brackets 24 are welded to the axle housing. At step 145, the ring 14 is machined, including drilling one or more holes (not shown) that act as datums or precise reference points for the machining and positioning of other parts of the axle 10. At step 150, the spindles 20 are machine finished, with reference to the datums. At step 155, the flanges 22 are machine finished, with reference to the datums, so that the finished spindles 20 and flanges 22 are precisely aligned relative to each other. This alignment must respect tolerances on the order of a few thousandths of an inch, so that the brake drum (not shown) that will be mounted on the spindle 20 will be properly aligned with the brake shoe (not shown) that will be mounted on the flange 22 when the axle 10 is installed in the vehicle. At step 160, additional operations may optionally be performed on the finished axle, such as load testing of the welds, washing, painting and packing the axle for shipping. The process ends at step 165.
While this process is adequate for producing axles, it has a number of drawbacks. The multiple welding operations impart a large quantity of heat to the parts, resulting in distortion and possible misalignment of the spindles 20 and flanges 22. This distortion can be partially compensated for by straightening the axle 10 at step 120. However, the straightening operation causes metal fatigue and reduces the useful lifetime of the axle 10.
The distortion can also be partially compensated for by finishing the spindles 20 and flanges 22 after the welding operations are complete, based on the location of the datums. While this produces a satisfactory alignment between the parts, it is difficult to manipulate the fully-assembled axle in order to machine the spindles 20 and flanges 22, due to the large size and weight of the assembled axle 10. In particular, the mass of the cover is offset from the longitudinal axis of the axle 10, and causes the axle 10 to be unbalanced, making it even more difficult to manipulate and machine. In addition, machining a part as large as an assembled axle 10 requires a large amount of floor space, particularly when several machining operations are performed at several different stations within the assembly area, and the assembled axle is machined in a horizontal orientation, resulting in a high cost of manufacture. In addition, machining a large part requires large and expensive machinery, further adding to the cost of manufacture.
In addition, the added machining required to finish the spindles 20 and flanges 22 after the axle 10 is assembled results in increased manufacturing time, further increasing the cost of manufacture.
Therefore, there is a need for a method of manufacturing an axle that does not require straightening of the axle.
There is also a need for a method and apparatus for manufacturing an axle requiring a reduced amount of floor space.

Method and apparatus for manufacturing an axle for a vehicle


One or more atmospheric propagation effects are estimated by using a phase comparison between and upper sideband and a lower sideband of a modulated signal. In one embodiment, one or more propagation effects are estimated by using a phase comparison between an upper sideband and a lower sideband of a satellite navigation signal. In one embodiment, one or more ionospheric propagation effects are estimated by using a phase comparison between an upper sideband and a lower sideband of a GPS M-code signal.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to measurement of ionospheric propagation effects on Radio Frequency (RF) signals by comparing carrier phase between signals of different frequency, such as, for example, upper and lower sidebands of a GPS M-code signal.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the upper regions of the earth's atmosphere, ultraviolet and X-ray radiation coming from the sun interact with the atmospheric gas molecules and atoms. These interactions result in ionization giving rise to large numbers of free "negatively charged" electrons and "positively charged" atoms and molecules. The region of the atmosphere where gas ionization takes place is called the ionosphere. It extends from an altitude of approximately 50 km to about 1,000 km or higher (the upper limit of the ionospheric region is not clearly defined).
The electron density within the ionosphere is not constant. It changes with time and altitude. The ionospheric region is typically divided into sub-regions, or layers, according to the electron density. These layers are named D (50-90 km), B (90-140 km), F1 (140-210 km), and F2 (210-1,000 km), respectively, with F2 usually being the layer of maximum electron density. The altitude and thickness of these layers vary with time, as a result of the changes in the sun's radiation and the earth's magnetic field. For example, the F1 layer largely disappears during the night and is more pronounced in the summer than in the winter.
The ionosphere is a dispersive medium, which means that RF waves with the same origination point, but different frequencies, will travel at different speeds and along different ray paths as they pass through the various ionospheric layers. In the case of satellite navigation systems, such as, for example, the Global Positioning System (GPS), bending of the signal propagation path causes a relatively small range error, particularly if the satellite elevation angle is greater than 50 degrees. However, the change in the propagation speed causes a significant range error, and therefore should be accounted for. The ionosphere speeds up the phase velocity of the RF wave. The ionosphere also slows down the group velocity. The code frequency is the fundamental parameter used to determine the space vehicle (SV) range from the receiver while the carrier frequency is primarily used to maintain tracking of the SV signal and to help determine vehicle movement.
The ionospheric delay is proportional to the number of free electrons, called the Total Electron Content (TEC), along the signal path. TEC, however, depends on a number of factors, such as: the time of day; the time of year; the 11-year solar cycle; and the geographic location (electron density levels are minimum in mid-latitude regions and highly irregular in polar, auroral, and equatorial regions). As the ionosphere is a dispersive medium, it causes a delay that is frequency dependent. The delay is greater for lower frequencies than for higher frequencies. Thus, for GPS signals, the ionospheric delay is greater at the L2 carrier frequency than that of the L1 carrier frequency. Generally, ionospheric delay is of the order of 0.5 meters to 15 meters, but can reach over 150 meters under extreme solar activities, at midday, and near the horizon.
Taking advantage of the ionosphere's dispersive nature, the ionospheric delay can be determined with a relatively high degree of accuracy by measuring the "time of flight" between two RF signals of different frequencies that travel along similar paths. In GPS this dual frequency measurements may be accomplished by comparing the P(Y)-code pseudorange measurements between the L1 and L2 frequency bands.
Single frequency band receivers cannot take advantage of the dispersive nature of the ionosphere. They can, however, use an empirical ionospheric model to correct some portion of the error introduced by dispersion. The most widely used model is the Klobuchar model, whose coefficients are transmitted as part of the navigation message. Another solution for users with single-frequency GPS receivers is to use corrections from regional networks. Such corrections can be received in real time through other communication links.

Ionosphere delay measurement using carrier phase