A photoplethysmographic system and method is provided for filtering a photoplethysmographic (pleth) signal to reduce the effects of noise in the signal. The system and method utilize a combination of frequency, time and/or magnitude information, to identify and separate transient signal components within a pleth signal from repeating signal components within the pleth signal. Typically, signal components of interest repeat over a period that corresponds with a patient's heartbeat. Such periodically repeating signals may be identified as stationary signals/objects within a frequency and time-based analysis. In contrast, motion artifacts or other sources of noise are often isolated (i.e., non-repeating) transient events and may be identified as non-stationary objects in a frequency and time-based analysis. Data associated with identified transient events may be filtered from or otherwise removed from a given signal. In this regard, a pleth signal may be cleansed prior to its use for, e.g., blood analyte determinations.

Pulse oximeters determine an oxygen saturation level of a patient's blood, or related analyte values, based on transmission/absorption characteristics of light transmitted through or reflected from a patient's tissue. In particular, pulse oximeters generally include a probe for attaching to a patient's appendage such as a finger, earlobe or nasal septum. The probe is used to transmit pulsed optical signals of at least two wavelengths, typically red and infrared, through the patient's appendage. The transmitted signals are received by a detector that provides an analog electrical output signal representative of the received optical signals. By processing the electrical signal and analyzing signal values for each of the wavelengths at different portions of the patient's pulse cycle (i.e., pulsatile signal), information can be obtained regarding blood oxygen saturation and/or other parameter values such as pulse rate, or blood pressure/blood volume related values.
Extraction of patient physiological conditions from the plethysmographic signals can be quite effective using a well positioned sensor and when the patient or subject is resting. However, motion artifacts can easily swamp the desired information (i.e., the signal of interest) included in the plethysmographic signals when the patient is moving around and/or performing muscular contractions. Other sources of artifact or 'noise' that can occlude the signal of interest in a plethysmographic signal include power line noise, electrical noise from other medical equipment and light contamination. Some artifacts can severely impair the signals, whereas other types can be filtered out or do not significantly effect the desired information included in the plethysmographic signals. Furthermore, depending upon the severity and type of artifacts present in the plethysmographic signals, some techniques for extracting the desired patient physiological conditions may not be appropriate and alternative techniques may need to be employed.
Filtering techniques including low pass, band pass, and high pass filtering can be used to remove noise signal components from the signal of interest where the noise signal component occupies a frequency range outside the signal of interest. More sophisticated techniques for conventional noise filtering include multiple notch filters, which are suitable for use where the noise signal component exists at multiple, distinct frequencies, all outside the frequency band of the signal of interest.
The pass band(s) of such filters are often set in relation to a fundamental frequency of the plethysmographic signal. Generally, this fundamental frequency corresponds to the heart rate of the patient. The fundamental frequency is sometimes determined by performing a Fourier transform on the time-based plethysmographic signal to generate a frequency spectrum of the signal. As may be appreciated, in the frequency spectrum, periodic signals such as a heart rate are represented as spectral peaks. Often, noise is randomly dispersed across the spectrum such that the fundamental may be determined. However, in high motion conditions, the noise signal may overwhelm the periodic signal of the heart such that the fundamental cannot be effectively determined by simple Fourier analysis.
Further, it is often the case that the frequency spectrum of the noise signal components overlaps the frequency spectrum of the signal of interest such that even if a fundamental frequency of the plethysmographic signal could be determined, high levels of artifact/noise co-exist within the frequency band of interest. That is, some sources of noise may include frequency components in the frequency band of interest. In such cases, conventional filtering techniques based solely on frequency information may be ineffective in extracting the signal of interest from noise signals.

Wavelet transform of a plethysmographic signal


A control unit controls driving of a motor by controlling a first inverter unit and a second inverter unit, specifically by controlling on/off operations of FETs. The control unit functions as an abnormality detection device. The control unit detects a short-circuit abnormality between a first winding set and a second winding set or between the first inverter unit and the second inverter unit, before starting to control driving of the motor, based on phase current values detected by current detectors when a high-side FET of the first inverter unit and a low-side FET of the second inverter unit are turned on.

It is known conventionally that a rotary electric machine control apparatus detects an abnormality of a rotary electric machine such as an electric motor or the control apparatus itself before starting to control driving of the rotary electric machine.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 8,248,010 B2 (JP-A-2011-135692) discloses a rotary electric machine control apparatus, which is capable of detecting a short-circuit failure, that is, a short-circuit abnormality, of a switching element in an inverter unit and a short-circuit failure of a pre-driver at the time of initial check operation, which is performed before driving of the rotary electric machine is started. The control object of this rotary electric machine control apparatus is a rotary electric machine having two winding sets. For this reason, two inverter circuits are provided in correspondence to the two winding sets.
A short-circuit abnormality is caused sometimes by a conductive foreign particle, which is affixed between two winding sets or two inverter units. However, it is not possible to accurately detect the short-circuit abnormality by the above-referred rotary electric machine control apparatus. As a result, it is likely to be necessitated sometimes to disable both of the two inverter units even when each of the two inverter units is not abnormal. Since the rotary electric machine control apparatus controls the rotary electric machine as a control target, a driver's steering operation cannot be assisted if the rotary electric machine cannot be driven.

Rotary electric machine control apparatus and electric power steering apparatus using the same


The bearing device has a support ring positioned around a rotating shaft and a plurality of bearing pads provided between the rotating shaft and the support ring and configured to support the rotating shaft. Some of the plurality of bearing pads are positioned at a lower side of the rotating shaft, and a key member is installed between the support ring and a carrier ring supporting the plurality of bearing pads. The key member is inserted therebetween in a tangential direction of an outer circumference of the carrier ring and is configured to perform positioning of the plurality of bearing pads and the support ring in a radial direction.

Conventionally, a bearing device having a plurality of partial pads (that is, tilting pad bearing, and journal bearing) is known as a bearing device applied to support a rotor of a large rotary machine such as a steam turbine, gas turbine, a nuclear power turbine and the like.
As shown in FIG. 4, in the bearing device 101, a bearing body 103 is supported by a support ring 102, and a rotor 4 of a rotary machine is supported by a plurality of bearing pads 109 interspatially positioned along a circumferential direction of the rotor 4 so as to be swingable.
A key member 110 for restricting movement of the bearing body 103 in the radial direction is inserted between the support ring 102 and a carrier ring 108 which forms an outer circumference of the bearing body 103.
For example, the centering of the rotor 4 in the steps of installation, disassembly, and reassembly of the steam turbine, and the readjustment to fix a misalignment of the axis of the rotor 4 due to an external factor such as ground subsidence are performed by changing the thickness of the key member 110 in the rotor radial direction.
Specifically, the positional adjustment of the bearing body 103 is performed by ejecting the bearing body 103 temporarily from the bearing device 101 and adjusting the liner member interposed between the key member 110 and the carrier ring 108. This adjustment operation is performed in an installed state of the rotor 4, and thus, the operation is difficult because the bearing body 103 needs to be elevated while rotating around the rotor 4. In addition, it is necessary to perform a bedding-in of a contacting surface between the support ring 102 and the key members 110 for each adjustment in order to avoid a so-called partial contact where the support ring 102 and the key member 110 are locally in contact with each other.
Patent Document 1 discloses a bearing device provided with a key member configured to be freely insertible and removable in the rotor axial direction in order to facilitate the centering of the rotor 4 (adjusting the alignment of the rotor axis).


A gamma voltage generator adapted in a source driver and a source driver adapted in a display panel are provided. The source driver comprises a DAC and a gamma voltage generator comprising a first and a second arithmetic circuit and a gamma voltage string. The first arithmetic circuit receives a first gamma reference voltage and at least one first tuning voltage to supply a first reference voltage. The second arithmetic circuit receives a second gamma reference voltage and at least one second tuning voltage to supply a second reference voltage. The gamma resistor string has two ends coupled to the first and the second arithmetic circuits to receive the first and the second reference voltages respectively to generate a plurality of gamma voltages. The DAC receives digital pixel data and the gamma voltages to generate a plurality of driving voltages to a pixel array of the display panel.

1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to a gamma voltage generator adapted in a source driver. More particularly, the present invention relates to a gamma voltage generator adapted in a source driver and a source driver adapted in a display panel.
2. Description of Related Art
A liquid crystal display (LCD) is a device that displays images by controlling transmittance of incident light emitted from a light source using optical anisotropy of liquid crystal molecules and polarization characteristics of a polarizer. Recently, the application of LCD has expanded since lightweight, slim size, high resolution and large screen size can be implemented in LCD which have low power consumption.
In general, LCD has a narrow viewing angle as compared to other display devices because light is transmitted only along a light-transmitting axis of liquid crystal molecules to display images. Some technologies form a plurality of pixels regions in a sub-pixel, driving them independently, and applying different voltages to the respective divided pixels. Thereby side-visibility can be improved, since each pixel region is charged with different levels of voltage and the light transmitting axis of the liquid crystal molecule is controlled in various directions. Therefore, a gamma voltage generator is required for generating different gamma voltages.

Gamma voltage generator and source driver


A portable, safety, play furniture assembly with a relatively lightweight chair body (10) and a chair base (12) for supporting the chair body (10) against rolling or tipping. The chair body (10) has a smooth, closed, concave, preferably cylindrical interior surface (14) and a depth (10) which is approximately no less than half of the width or diameter (18) of the body (10). The chair base 12 has legs (24A, 24B) with feet (26A, 26B) that are part of a single planar foot (26C) which substantially underlies the entire chair body (10) and spans the depth (16) to reduce the risk of tipping. The bottom of the foot has a roughened surface (26D) to reduce the risk of sliding across a floor (28). In an alternate embodiment, cavities (36A, 36B) are provided to hold ballast and empty buffer zones (40) are provided in the upper part of the chair body (10) to increase stability. The assembly is molded as a single integrated piece, preferably using rotational molding.

My invention relates to a portable, safety, play furniture assembly and, more particularly to such an assembly having a closed, concave, preferably cylindrical, glass-like chair body for sliding support of a person reposed therein.
Various types of play structures or devices are known which include a cylindrical body within which children may crawl, scramble or otherwise interactively play. In U.S. patent No. 3,730,522, issued May 1, 1973 to Paczkowski, a child's amusement toy is shown with a rocking base, a hollow center and circular holes or tunnels through which a child can crawl into and out of the center. An A-shaped playground climber is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,369,965, issued Jan. 25, 1983, to Ahrens to which cylindrical tubes, as well as a slide and climbing stairs, are attached. A brochure of Playscape Incorporated, dated Dec. 11, 1968, disclosed a segmented outdoor tube with openings for walking and playing in, and in the June 1983 issue of Popular Science at page 104 a swingset with playhouse is shown with an elongate cylindrical tunnel mounted on a hill. In both Sweets Architect Catalog, Section 2.15/mi, 1977 file, and in Miracle Recreation Equipment Catalog 773, copyright 1972, page 51, rotatable cylindrical bodies are shown within which a child may walk.
Other cylindrical or other tubular slides, tunnels and clamber toys in U.S. Pat. No. 2,170,935 issued Aug. 29, 1939 to Whiteley; 2,465,187 issued Mar. 22, 1949 to Barrabee; 3,928,701 issued Dec. 23, 1975 to Roehner; 3,497,024 issued Mar. 30, 1976 to Slater; 3,949,985 issued Apr. 13, 1976 to Stampfil; 4,379,551 issued Apr. 12, 1983 to Ahrens; Des. 244,556 issued May 31, 1977 to Burgess et al., Des. 269,104 issued May 24, 1983 to Brown; Des. 291,717 issued Sept. 1, 1987 to Brooks; and German Pat. No. 566,161 dated Sept. 15, 1975.
While these various playground toys appear to be useful for play, they generally lack the combined qualities of safety, portability, and small size needed for indoor use as a toy or as a child's chair.
I have discovered through observation of children, particularly those in age group 3-8, that they particularly enjoy sitting within relatively narrow arcuate, concave, closed structures which are sufficiently small that they can lie on their backs and slide around a smooth interior surface by pushing against the interior surface with their feet or by "walking" with their knees in a raised position to pull themselves along the cylindrical surface. In this way, they can both easily shift the position of their torso from horizontal to upright to head over heels through unorthodox methods of sliding which they enjoy. At the same time, it is observed that they enjoy reposing within a partially enclosed surface with respect to surfaces immediately in front of and above them but which are not so enclosed as to block light or peripheral vision.
The known structures discussed above fail to provide these capabilities. Many are too rough for sliding while others rotate to defeat sliding movement. Others of the known structures are elevated off the ground and they create a risk of injury, while still others present safety problems due to possible tipping or due to crevices into which a child's limb or neck can become wedged.

Portable, safety, play furniture assembly


The present disclosure relates to method and apparatus for multiple panel and/or multiple beam codebook based PUSCH transmissions. The method includes receiving, at a User Equipment (UE), Downlink Control Information (DCI) including two or more sets of parameters; and performing codebook based Physical Uplink Shared Channel (PUSCH) transmission for transmitting the two or more codewords according to the two or more sets of parameters, respectively; wherein each of the two or more sets of parameters includes at least one of a Sounding Reference Signal Resource Indicator (SRI), a Transmitted Precoding Matrix Indicator (TPMI), a Modulation Coding Scheme (MCS), a New Data Indicator (NDI) and a Redundancy Version (RV).

Codebook based Uplink (UL) transmission is supported in New Radio (NR) Release 15, where only transmission from a single panel using a single beam is supported. Single panel based codebook transmission on Physical Uplink Shared Channel (PUSCH) can be supported in Release 15 by using only one Sounding Reference Signal Resource Indicator (SRI) and one Transmitted Precoding Matrix Indicator (TPMI) indicated by the Downlink Control Information (DCI). Protocol of multiple panel and/or multiple beam UL Multi-input Multi-output (MIMO) transmission will be introduced in NR Release 16.
In Long-Term Evolution (LTE) radio access network, multiple Tx/Rx Point (TRP) UL transmission is provided as UL Coordinated Multi-Point (CoMP) transmission. However, LTE radio access network only uses low frequency band, and performs PUSCH transmission to all CoMP Node with omni-directional beams. NR radio access network may use directional UL beams to perform transmission over Frequency Range 2 (FR2), which ranges from 6 GHz to 52.6 GHz. Thus, a new mechanism is required to implement UL multiple panel and multiple beam transmission in FR2.

Method and apparatus for multiple panel and/or multiple beam codebook based PUSCH transmissions


An optical element includes an optical waveguide layer. The optical waveguide includes a periodic structure of grooves. The optical waveguide layer has a layer-thickness equal to or greater than 1.5 μm and is made of material selected from a group consisting of Ta2O5, Al2O3, LiNbO3, LiTaO3, AlN, GaN, SiC, and Yttrium aluminum garnet (YAG). (D/0.5Λ)≥2.5 is satisfied where D indicates the depth of groove; and Λ indicates the pitch of the arranged grooves in the periodic structure. The unit of Λ is identical to the unit of D.

International publication No. 2016/133161 (hereinafter referred to as a Patent Literature 1) discloses, in order to etch an optical material layer with hard-processing property, providing a base layer between a resin layer and the optical material layer, forming an opening at the resin layer using a nanoimprint technique, etching the base layer through the opening at the resin layer, and etching the optical material layer through the opening at the base layer formed by the etching, so that a deeper recess is formed in the optical material layer.

Optical element and method for manufacturing optical element


Described is a technology for performing unsupervised learning using global features extracted from unlabeled examples. The unsupervised learning process may be used to train a log-linear model, such as for use in morphological segmentation of words. For example, segmentations of the examples are sampled based upon the global features to produce a segmented corpus and log-linear model, which are then iteratively reprocessed to produce a final segmented corpus and a log-linear model.

Morphological units are the smallest units of meaning in a language. A general goal of morphological segmentation is to segment words into morphemes, the basic syntactic/semantic units. For example, the English word "governments" may be properly segmented into govern-ment-s. Such segmentations are useful in helping natural language processing technologies, including in machine translation, speech recognition, question answering and web search.
Dictionaries exist for these segmentations for common words in some languages. However, they do not exist for new vocabulary words and some languages.
Past morphological segmentation approaches include rule-based morphological analyzers and supervised learning. While generally successful, these require deep language expertise and a relatively long, costly and labor-intensive process in system building or labeling.

Unsupervised learning using global features, including for log-linear model word segmentation


A Dual Tone Multi Frequency (DTMF) circuit for relaying DTMF digits includes a communication interface, a storage system configured to store a sampling window size, a DTMF test sequence, a returned DTMF sequence, and one or more DTMF digits, with the one or more DTMF digits to be transferred to a second DTMF circuit by the DTMF circuit, and a processing system. The processing system receives the one or more DTMF digits via the communication interface and an input sampling window, generates the DTMF test sequence and transmits the DTMF test sequence to the second DTMF circuit, compares the DTMF test sequence to a returned DTMF sequence received back from the second DTMF circuit, and if the returned DTMF sequence is not the same as the DTMF test sequence, adjusts the sampling window size of the input sampling window.

Dual Tone Multi Frequency (DTMF) tones comprise tones developed for the Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN), wherein each telephone key produces a unique DTMF tone when pressed. A DTMF tone comprises two tones of specific frequencies. The DTMF system uses eight different frequency signals that are transmitted in pairs to represent 16 different numbers, symbols, and letters.
The DTMF system was originally developed to be included in-band with the telephone voice signal. However, in current systems the DTMF tones may be included in-band, along with a voice call or audio, or may be transmitted out-of-band.
A DTMF circuit may receive an audio signal including DTMF tones or digits. The DTMF circuit may need to relay the DTMF digits, such as to other communication devices or components. In some circumstances, when the DTMF device transfers a DTMF digit to a receiving DTMF device, the DTMF device may incorrectly receive more than one DTMF digit. This may be more likely if the received DTMF digit has been previously transcoded or otherwise processed. The incorrect reception of a DTMF digit or digits may lead to incorrect operation of the device or devices receiving the DTMF digits.

DTMF circuit and method of relaying DTMF digits in a DTMF circuit


A device for holding a photoreceptor sheet onto a drum of an electro-photography printing device comprises first and second holding surfaces that are configured to hold an edge of the photoreceptor sheet from opposite directions by pressing against the sheet in a substantially perpendicular direction with respect to the surface of the sheet, wherein at least the second holding surface is pre-loaded.

Electro-photography printing devices including photoreceptors for creating a latent image that may be subsequently developed and printed are known in the art. Typically, the photoreceptor is made up of a thin photoreceptor sheet attached to a rotatable drum. Typically, the photoreceptor sheet is periodically replaced due to damage. During operation, a charger uniformly charges the photoreceptor. The drum is rotated and a laser writer discharges the photoreceptor in selected areas to create a latent image. Continued rotation of the drum brings the selectively charged photoreceptor into contact engagement with a developer roller for developing the latent image. The developed latent image is then transferred to a desired substrate. Alternatively, there may be provided an intermediate transfer member, which may be a drum or belt and which is in operative engagement with the photoreceptor bearing the developed image
One system is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,508,790 to Belinkov et al. entitled "Photoreceptor Sheet and Imaging System Utilizing Same" which is incorporated herein by reference.
It will be appreciated that for simplicity and clarity of illustration, elements shown in the figures have not necessarily been drawn to scale. Further, where considered appropriate, reference numerals may be repeated among the figures to indicate corresponding or analogous elements.

Device for holding a photoreceptor sheet

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.


An impulse response of a channel is estimated by correlating a received signal with a stored vector. The received signal contains a training sequence having a length Ltr, the stored vector has a length Lsv, Ltr/n=Lsv, and n is greater than two. The signal is received by a device. The vector is determined based on the training sequence and an ideal channel. The ideal channel is an idealized form of a channel through which the device receives the signal. A plurality of correlations may be performed where each correlation provides a substantially noise-free estimate of the impulse response of a different portion of the channel. The correlations are combined to provide an estimate of the impulse response of the channel.

Linear adaptive equalizers having a plurality of taps are widely used in digital communication receivers in order to provide correction for multipath channel distortion. Adaptive algorithms, such as the least mean squares (LMS) algorithm, are typically implemented in order to determine the weight values for the taps of the equalizer. Such adaptive algorithms are easy to implement and provide reasonably good performance. However, under difficult channel conditions, these algorithms may fail to provide tap weights that converge to the desired values.
It is well known that this failure may be at least somewhat mitigated if the tap weights, instead of being initialized to values of zero as is often done, are instead initialized close to their final desired values based on a knowledge of the impulse response of the channel. An estimate of this channel impulse response (CIR) may be derived from an a priori known training sequence periodically transmitted prior to, and/or along with, the unknown data. One such system with this feature is specified in the ATSC 8VSB standard for digital terrestrial television broadcasting.
The channel impulse response is typically estimated in a receiver by cross-correlating the a priori known training sequence as received with a representation of the transmitted known training sequence stored in the receiver as a correlation reference. The Z-transform of the estimated channel impulse response is then derived and inverted. From the inverted Z-transform, a vector is formed having a plurality of elements, and these elements are used to initialize the corresponding tap weights of the equalizer.
More specifically, if s[k] is defined as the stored known training sequence for k=0 . . . (L−1), and if x[k] is defined as the received signal sampled at the symbol rate, with x[0] being the first received training symbol in the received signal, the cross-correlation h[m] is given by the following equation:
                                          h                                      [              m              ]                                =                                    ∑                              k                =                0                                            L                -                1                                                                                s                                                  [                  k                  ]                                                                          x                                                  [                                      k                    +                    m                                    ]                                                                    ,                              for                                                              -                          L              chan                                ≤          m          ≤                      L            chan                                              (        1        )            where Lchan is the length of the channel over which the correlation is taken. Lchan, for example, is typically set at 576. The Z-transform of h[m] is determined and is inverted in order to determine the tap weights for the taps of the equalizer.
This procedure addresses channel related noise. However, there are other sources of noise. For example, noise due to the finiteness of the cross-correlation as described in copending U.S. Pat. No. 7,110,447 and in copending U.S. Pat. No. 7,190,447 is present in the channel impulse response and can cause errors in the determination of the tap weights. As described in these applications, this noise due to the finiteness of the cross-correlation may be removed by cross-correlating a known stored training sequence with the received training sequence to produce a cross-correlation vector, by estimating a correction vector related to the finiteness noise component, and by iteratively subtracting truncated representations of the correction vector from the cross-correlation vector so as to produce a succession of cross-correlation outputs of increasing accuracy.
The channel impulse response can also contain data related noise. Data related noise arises in the channel impulse response because the stored version of the known training sequence is not only correlated with the received training sequence, but is also correlated with data received before and/or after the received training sequence.
The training sequence, for example, may be based on the frame sync segment of a digital television signal as specified in the ATSC digital television standard. As shown in FIG. 1, such a frame sync segment 10 comprises a first portion 12 containing four segment sync symbols, a second portion 14 containing 511 frame sync symbols, a third portion 16 containing a 63 pseudorandom symbol sequence replicated three times for a total of 189 symbols where the middle sequence is inverted in alternate fields, and a fourth portion 18 of reserved space for 24 symbols. The known training sequence (or reference), according to the example, may comprise the first 704 symbols in the frame sync segment 10. Thus, this training sequence comprises the four segment sync symbols of the first portion 12, the 511 frame sync symbols of the second portion 14 of the frame sync segment 10, and the 189 symbols in the three 63 pseudorandom symbol sequences for a total of 704 symbols.
As shown in FIG. 2, a cross-correlation based on this training sequence is implemented by shifting a training sequence 20, such as the 704 symbol training sequence described immediately above, over a received signal 22 that includes first data 24, the frame sync segment 26, and second data 28. As can be seen from FIG. 2 and as will be understood from equation (1) above, the resulting correlation h[m] contains some terms that involve only the training sequence and many terms that involve unknown data.
A representation of the correlation h[m] is shown in FIG. 3, where the noise related to the finiteness of the correlation has been removed. A peak 50 represents the single path received signal in the channel impulse response. As can be seen from FIG. 3, in the case where the stored reference sequence is shorter than the received training sequence, a portion 52 is the portion of the correlation involving only the training sequence, and portions 54 and 56 are portions of the correlation involving unknown data symbols. The portion 52 contains little or no noise and the portions 54 and 56 contain data related noise.
When a transmitted signal is received over multiple paths, this data related noise may be enhanced to the point where one or more of the multipath components (sometimes referred to as ghosts) are undetectable in the correlation. If so, the tap weights computed from such a channel impulse response will be unreliable.
The present invention is directed to the removal of this data related noise from the channel impulse response.

Channel estimator using one or more correlation reference vectors to eliminate data related noise


In a cluster where multiple database nodes are synchronized by a distributed lock manager, a process that includes one or more messages that are sent from one or more nodes to a distributed lock manager, wherein one or more of said messages are asynchronous lock taken messages.

Two commonly used methods to scale a database are by a shared nothing approach and a shared disk approach.
To scale by a Shared Nothing Approach, the data is partitioned to multiple partitions, each partition contains a portion of the data and each partition is managed by a single dedicated database server. Scaling is achieved as partitioning reduces the data size for each server, and the usage of additional servers for the new partitions.
As within each server, multiple threads may operate concurrently, the server maintains a lock manager that coordinates between the threads. For example, if two threads are to update the same resource (such as a row or a block), the lock manager may grant update permission to the first thread, when the update of the first thread is done, the lock manager may provide the permission to the second thread. Without the coordination of the lock manager, both threads may update the same resource at the same time whereas these simultaneous updates may lead to erroneous result. If two threads are reading the same data, the lock manager may grant both threads read permission while at the same time prevent a third thread from updating the data. When the two threads complete the read process, the lock manager can provide the third thread the permission to update the data.
Within a database, locks can be granted over different database resources. Examples of such resources are database, table, partition, segment, block and row. In addition, locks can be of different types. For example:                Read Lock—to allow reading the content of a particular resource. This lock is sometimes called a Shared Lock meaning that multiple threads (or processes) can read (share) the resource data concurrently. This lock may prevent a different thread (or process) to update the content of the resource. For example, two threads receive a Read Lock on the same Row such that both threads are provided with the permission to examine the content of the Row concurrently. However, the third thread that requests a Write Lock on the Row is denied, or is being placed on wait until the reading threads released their Read Lock.        Write Lock—it may be provided to allow updating a particular resource or add a new resource to the database. A Write Lock may be provided to a particular thread (or process) such that other threads (or processes) are prevented from acquiring conflicting locks over the same resource. Examples of locks that conflict a Write Lock are a Read Lock and a different Write Lock. A Write Lock is also referred to below as a lock for update as it allows changing the content of a particular resource or adding a new resource to the database. A non limiting example for the usage of a Write Lock is the update of the content of a particular row in the database. Another non limiting example is adding a new row to the database, the process may involve a Write Lock over an empty row (first) and updating the content of the empty row with the new data (second).        Exclusive Lock—to allow a single thread (or a single process) the permission to operate (read and or write) on a resource. For example, a grant of an exclusive lock over a table would let only a single thread the permission to operate with the table data. Even if the thread is reading data, no other thread (or process) may read the data as long as the exclusive lock is granted.
A request for a lock may be issued by a thread or a process that operates over a particular resource and with the purpose of maintaining the integrity of the data and avoiding the corruption of the data.
A thread or a process requesting a lock request can represent a user using the database, a session of the database, a particular Node in the cluster or any other type of process or object that operates over the database data or over a resource of the database.
A request for a lock over a resource by said thread or process can be done when there is a need to operate using the resource data and the type of the lock requested depends on the type of operation. Some non-limiting examples are as follows:                a) When a resource is read, a Read Lock may be used to prevent an update of the resource data while the resource data is being retrieved.        b) When a resource is updated, a Write Lock may be used to prevent other processes from reading or updating the resource data at the same time.        c) When a new resource is added, a Write Lock may be used to prevent other processes from adding or using the same resource at the same time. For example, users are adding data to a database, the database is organized such that the new data is placed in rows, and a Write Lock over an empty row may be used to prevent the usage of the particular empty row for different new data by a different thread or process. In this example, only the process that holds a grant for a Write Lock over an empty row in the database can use the empty row for new data. Once the data is placed in the row, the row is not empty and thus it cannot be considered as an empty row by a different process and even if the Write Lock is being released.
When the thread or process completes operating the resource data, or when the thread or process determines that there is no need to maintain a lock over a particular resource, they may release the lock to allow other conflicting locks of other threads and processes to be acquired.
An explanation of locking types and compatibility is available from C. J. Date, An Introduction to Database Systems, Volume 1, Fourth Edition, Pages 422-424, section 18.5 Locking.
Within the database server software, the Lock Manager is the process that receives the lock requests (from the different threads or processes), analyzes the requests and provides (or denies) the grants.
In addition, the Lock Manager can place a request which can't be granted on a wait list and provide the grant later in time when the request is not conflicting with granted requests. For example, a thread receives a grant for a Write Lock request and a different thread that requests a Read Lock is placed on a wait list. When the first thread releases the lock, the Lock Manager grants the Read Lock to the second thread.
Within this application, we call the executing database server software with its virtual or physical machine a Database Node (or simply a Node). Note—we hereon use the term Node and "server" interchangeably.
A discussion on a Shared Disk Machines and a Shared Nothing Machines is also available by Hector Garcia-Molina, Jeffrey D. Ullman, Jennifer Widom at Database Systems The Complete Book, Second Edition, pages 986-989.
In a Shared Nothing system, all the threads operate within the same Node, and therefore share the same memory space. The locking requests of each thread may utilize the shared memory in the Node. For example, the request can be placed by the threads on a linked list which is processed by the Lock Manager.
In a Shared Disk Approach, the data is not partitioned. Multiple Nodes are connected to a shared storage and each of the servers can access (read and/or write) the shared data. A shared disk solution is implemented as a cluster of Nodes that share the same data. Scaling is achieved by adding computing power by means of adding Nodes which operate concurrently over the data. If more computing power is needed, additional database servers (Nodes) can be added to the cluster.
Compared to a Shared Nothing Approach, scaling is provided inherently by the database cluster—the database cluster is built such that more computing power can be added (by adding more database servers to the cluster). With a Shared Nothing Approach, scaling is done by the developer, as the data partitioning needs to be tailored by the developer. The partition of the data needs to achieve even distribution of the data among the servers, as well as even distribution of users among the servers. It also needs to consider the composition of the queries. For example, the partitioning should be done such that most queries would be satisfied on a single server. These are difficult tasks, as sometimes there is no good partitioning approach and it involves considerations which are different for each application. In addition, the type of queries may not be known in advance.
An example of the complexity imposed by a Shared Nothing approach is the following: (1) the database contains customers and catalog information. (2) Many of the queries are joining customers and catalog information. (3) To scale, the customer data is partitioned to multiple partitions. However, the developer is now facing the question of where to store the catalog. If the catalog is to be stored on a dedicated server—the queries that join the customers and the catalog info would need to retrieve information from two separate servers—from the server managing the customer information and the server managing the catalog information. If the catalog information is duplicated on each server, every update to the catalog information needs to be executed on each of the servers that maintain the catalog information.
For the developer, the Shared Disk Approach offers a simple automated way to scale. When large data sets are managed by a Shared Disk database, there is no need to partition the data. Multiple servers have read and write access to the data. To scale, more servers are added to the cluster. As each of the Nodes in the cluster may have concurrent processes, each of these servers may have a local lock manager similar to the lock manager described above with respect to the Shared Nothing Approach server. However, a database system that provides a Shared Disk Approach solution needs (in addition to synchronization of multiple threads within each server) to synchronize the lock requests at a cluster level as different nodes may have processes that are processing the same data at the same time. To synchronize the requests of different servers, a Distributed Lock Manager is used. This lock manager synchronizes requests from multiple nodes in a cluster. As the different servers don't have a shared memory space, the lock requests and grants are done by messages that are sent over a network. This process is by far slower than the process of the Local Lock Manager within a server that is based on a shared memory—a process of the lock manager based on a shared memory may run in nanoseconds whereas messages over network may be even measured in milliseconds (depending on the speed of the network).
There is accordingly a need in the art to reduce the time needed to satisfy lock processes that are done to manage a shared disk (and similar) database systems.
Glossary of Terms:
For clarity of explanation, there follows a glossary of additional terms used frequently throughout the description and the appended claims. Some of the terms are conventional and others have been coined:
Database and Database Management System (DBMS) is explained by: Hector Garcia-Molina, Jeffrey D. Ullman, Jennifer Widom at Database Systems The Complete Book, Second Edition. See also C. J. Date, An Introduction to Database Systems, Volume 1, Fourth Edition. See also http://endotwikipediadotorg/wiki/Database and http://endotwikipediadotorg/wiki/Database_management_system (database and Database Management System from Wikipedia).
Node—the Database Management System (DBMS) server software with its virtual or physical machine. We hereon use the term Node and "server" interchangeably. The Node executes the database management software. Two non limiting examples would be a computer server executing the Oracle database software and a computer server executing the IBM DB2 software. A Node provides management of data such that users are provided with the methods and tools (among others) to update and query the data. For example, a Node, executing an Oracle database software such that data manipulation requests (such as Insert, Update, Delete and Select) issued by users trigger processes that update and query data. Cluster (or a Database Cluster)—Multiple Database Nodes that provide management of the data. These Nodes may be connected via a network and may provide management of Shared Data. Shared Data—Data which is being managed by multiple Nodes.
A relational database is a database that conforms to relational model theory. The software used in a relational database is called a relational database management system (RDBMS). In a relational database, data is logically partitioned into tables and is organized as rows within the tables. The physical implementation may be different, for example, rows may be physically stored within blocks within files. Some of the resources of the database may be indexes which are not part of the relational model theory and which may be organized in blocks within files. The examples below may be provided using the logical organization of rows within tables or may be provides using some physical organization such as rows within blocks. However, the processes of the invention are not bound to a particular logical or physical organization.
Lock Manager—a process that receives lock requests from different processes or threads analyzes and manages the requests such that the integrity of data is maintained. In the context of the invention, a Lock Manager may issue particular locks, without explicit lock requests, when it determines that a particular process or a particular Node is interested with the particular lock.
Local Lock Manager (LLM)—a Lock Manager that analyzes and manages the lock requests of different threads (or processes) by utilizing a shared memory space. This Lock Manager and the requesting threads (or processes) exist within the same Node.
A discussion on locking is also available by Hector Garcia-Molina, Jeffrey D. Ullman, Jennifer Widom at Database Systems The Complete Book, Second Edition, Chapter 18, Concurrency Control, section 18.4 Locking Systems with Several Lock Modes pages 905-913.
Distributed Lock Manager (DLM)—a Lock Manager that analyze and manage lock requests of different threads (or processes) of different Nodes. This Lock Manager and the different threads communicate by sending messages over a network. The DLM manages a Cluster of Nodes. The management of a Local Lock manager or a Distributed Lock Manager (together with other processes) maintains the integrity of the data. Some databases maintain compliance to the ACID set of rules. ACID (atomicity, consistency, isolation, durability) is a set of properties that guarantee that database transactions are processed reliably. More details on ACID properties of a database are available at http://endotwikipediadotorg/wiki/ACID (From Wikipedia).
A DLM operates by monitoring the processes in the different Nodes. It analyzes lock requests that are issued from different processes (or Nodes), provides grants to non conflicting requests (for example multiple processes may read the same data at the same time) and sets an order among conflicting requests. For example, a Write Lock is provided to process A, a grant (for read or write request) for process B is delayed until the lock of process A is released.
SQL (from Wikipedia)—sometimes referred to as Structured Query Language is a programming language designed for managing data in relational database management systems (RDBMS). SQL was one of the first commercial languages for Edgar F. Codd's relational model, as described in his influential 1970 paper, "A Relational Model of Data for Large Shared Data Banks". http://endotwikipediadotorg/wiki/SQL-cite_note-codd-relational-model-4
SQL became the most widely used database language. SQL is used also as a data manipulation language (DML) which is a family of syntax elements similar to a computer programming language used for inserting, deleting and updating data in a database. Storage Engine (from Wikipedia)—A Database Engine (or "storage engine") is the underlying software component that a database management system (DBMS) uses to create, read, update and delete (CRUD) data from a database. Most database management systems include their own Application Programming Interface (API) that allows the user to interact with their underlying engine without going through the user interface of the DBMS.
Many of the modern DBMS support multiple database engines within the same database. For example, MySQL supports InnoDB as well as MyISAM and other Storage Engines.


An optical system includes, in order from the object side, an aperture, a first lens having a positive refractive power, a second lens having a negative refractive power, a third lens having a positive refractive power, a fourth lens having a positive refractive power and having a meniscus shape with a convex surface facing the image side, and a fifth lens having a negative refractive power. The optical system satisfies a certain condition.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming optical system, an image pickup apparatus using the same, and an information processing apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
With slimming of cellular phones, portable digital assistances, and notebook computers in these years, camera modules with an optical system having an extremely short length along the optical axis are demanded. Moreover, with a progress in the technology of image pickup elements and growing needs in the market, image pickup element with a large number of pixels are used, and taking lenses with high resolution are demanded.
To meets such demands, many single focal length optical system composed of five aspheric lenses have been developed.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Nos. 2010-237407 and 2010-262270 disclose optical systems having five lenses that is short in overall optical length while having high image forming performance. The optical systems disclosed in these patent documents are composed of five aspheric lenses and having high performance.

Image forming optical system, image pickup apparatus using the same, and information processing apparatus


A patterning process includes (1) forming, on a body to be processed on which a titanium-containing hard mask is formed, an organic underlayer film; (2) forming, on the organic underlayer film, a titanium-containing resist underlayer film having a titanium content of 10% to 60% by mass; (3) forming a photoresist film on the titanium-containing resist underlayer film; (4) forming a photoresist pattern by exposing the photoresist film and developing; (5) pattern-transferring onto the titanium-containing resist underlayer film by using the photoresist pattern as a mask; (6) pattern-transferring onto the organic underlayer film by using the titanium-containing resist underlayer film as a mask; and (7) removing the titanium-containing hard mask and the titanium-containing resist underlayer film by wet stripping method. A patterning process including removing a resist underlayer film using a wet stripper having a milder condition than the conventional stripper without causing damage to a body to be processed.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a patterning process by a multilayer resist method used for microfabrication in a step of producing a semiconductor device.
2. Description of the Related Art
As exposure light used for formation of a resist pattern, light exposure using g-beam (436 nm) or i-beam (365 nm) from a mercury lamp as a light source was widely used in 1980s. A method for shifting to a shorter wavelength of exposure light was considered to be effective as the means for further miniaturization. As a result, in the mass production process after DRAM (Dynamic Random Access Memories) with 64 MB (processing feature size: 0.25 μm or less) in 1990s, the exposure light source of i-beam (365 nm) was replaced by a KrF excimer laser having a shorter wavelength of 248 nm. However, for production of DRAM with an integration degree of 256 MB and 1 GB or more requiring miniaturized process technologies (processing feature size: 0.2 μm or less), a shorter wavelength light source was required. Over a decade, photolithography using an ArF excimer laser (193 nm) has been fully investigated. At first, it was expected that the ArF lithography would be applied to the production of 180-nm node devices. However, the KrF excimer lithography lived long to the mass production of 130-nm node devices. The full-fledged application of ArF lithography started from the 90-nm node. Further, the ArF lithography combined with a lens having an increased NA of 0.9 has been applied to the mass production of 65-nm node devices. The next 45-nm node devices has required an advancement to shift to a shorter wavelength of exposure light, and the F2 lithography having a wavelength of 157 nm has become a candidate. However, there are many problems in an F2 lithography; an increase in cost of a scanner due to the use of a large quantity of expensive CaF2 single crystals for a projector lens, extremely poor sustainability of a soft pellicle, which leads to a change of an optical system due to introduction of a hard pellicle, a decrease in an etching resistance of a resist film, and the like. For these various problems, the development of F2 lithography has been stopped and ArF immersion lithography has been introduced.
In the ArF immersion lithography, the space between a projection lens and a wafer is filled with water having a refractive index of 1.44 by a partial filling manner. This enables high-speed scanning. A lens having a NA of 1.3 is applied to mass production of 45-nm node devices.
One of the candidates for 32-nm node lithography technique is extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography having a wavelength of 13.5 nm. Then, exemplary objects accompanying to the EUV lithography are to increase an output of laser, enhance a sensitivity of resist film, enhance a resolution, decrease a line edge roughness (LER), achieve a defect-free MoSi laminate mask, lower aberrations of a reflecting mirror, for example, thereby leaving a pile of objects to be attained. The development of a high refractive index liquid immersion lithography which is another candidate for the 32-nm node lithography has been stopped since the transmittance of LUAG which is a candidate for a high refractive index lens is low and the refractive index of liquid does not achieve a desired value of 1.8. As described above, light exposure used as the general purpose technology approaches the limit of essential resolution introduced by the wavelength of a light source.
One of miniaturized process technologies that draw attention in recent years is a double patterning process involving performing a first set of exposure and development to form a first pattern and performing a second set of exposure and development to form a pattern between features of the first pattern (Non-patent document 1). A large number of processes are proposed as the double patterning process. For example, there is a process involving performing a first set of exposure and development to form a photoresist pattern having line-and-space at intervals of 1:3, processing the underlying hard mask by dry etching, applying another hard mask thereto, performing a second set of exposure and development of a photoresist film to form a line pattern in the spaces of the first exposure, and processing the hard mask by dry etching, thereby forming a line-and-space pattern at a half pitch of the first pattern. An another process involves performing a first set of exposure and development to form a photoresist pattern having spaces and lines at intervals of 1:3, processing the underlying layer of hard mask by dry etching, applying a photoresist film thereto, performing a second set of exposure and development to form a second space pattern on the remaining hard mask portion, and processing the hard mask by dry etching. While the former process requires two applications of hard mask, the latter process uses one layer of hard mask but requires to form a trench pattern which is difficult to resolve as compared with the line pattern. In both the processes, the hard mask is processed by two dry etchings.
As the other finer patterning technology, a process involving forming a line pattern in the X direction on a positive resist film by dipole illumination, hardening the resist pattern, applying a resist composition thereto, exposing the line pattern in the Y direction to dipole illumination, and forming a hole pattern from gaps of a lattice line pattern (Non-patent document 2) is proposed.
As one of methods for transferring a lithography pattern onto a substrate using a hard mask as described above, there is a multilayer resist method. The multilayer resist method involves interposing an middle layer film having a different selectivity, for example, a silicon-containing resist underlayer film, between a photoresist film, that is, a resist upper layer film, and a substrate to be processed, forming a pattern on the resist upper layer film, transferring the pattern onto the resist underlayer film using the resist upper layer film as an etching mask, and transferring the pattern onto the substrate to be processed using the resist underlayer film as an etching mask.
As a composition for an underlayer film used in such a multilayer resist method, a composition for forming a silicon-containing film is well known. Examples thereof include a silicon-containing inorganic film, a SiO2 film (Patent document 1) and a SiON film (Patent document 2), which are obtained by CVD, and a spin on glass (SOG) film (Patent document 3) and a crosslinkable silsesquioxane film (Patent document 4), which are obtained by spin-coating.
The lithography characteristics and stability of a composition for forming a silicon-containing resist underlayer film have been investigated. Patent document 5 discloses that when a composition for forming a resist underlayer film containing a thermal crosslinking accelerator is prepared, a resist underlayer film having good etching selectivity and storage stability is provided. However, as the finer patterning of a semiconductor device is promoted, the line width of the pattern is reduced, and the film thickness of a resist upper layer film is reduced to prevent pattern fall. Therefore, improved adhesion and etching selectivity in the finer pattern than the conventional patterns are required in performances needed in a resist underlayer film.
Most of a coating film practically used in the conventional multilayer resist method has been an organic film and the silicon-containing film as described above. However, in a process for producing a semiconductor device in a marginal domain of lithography by the recent light exposure, a complicated process such as the double patterning process has been proposed. Therefore, it is difficult to construct a reasonable production process using only the conventional organic film and a silicon-containing film. In order to construct a more reasonable production process of a semiconductor device, it is required that a coating film which has an etching selectivity to both film components of an organic film and a silicon-containing film, and can be separated under a mild condition without causing damage to the substrate after exhibiting an etching mask function which is one of functions of the underlayer film, that is, after pattern-transferring from the underlayer film.

International Business Machines Corporation


A method of forming an annular part includes forming a conical or frusto-conical preform with at least one open end, initiating an actuation means to cause relative coaxial movement only between a punch, a clamping means and a gripping means, thereby clamping a large diameter end of the preform in the clamping means and gripping a second small diameter end of the preform in the gripping means and the external surface of the punch to engage the internal surface of the preform, and causing relative co-axial movement between the gripping means and the punch so that the portion of the wall of the preform between the punch and the gripping means is formed over the leading edge of the punch.

A lip skin is the mechanical component surrounding the inlet opening of an aircraft nacelle. The nacelle generally has a thin, aerodynamically shaped metal skin covering the jet engine of the aircraft. The lip skin is generally comprised of a single piece or multiple sectors and the main features of the lip skin are a smooth outer trailing edge which must be free from irregularities and discontinuities to reduce drag and to avoid the creation of turbulence. An inner inlet edge may guide the flow of air into the engine, and a leading edge or lip, may provide a smooth transition between the outer trailing edge and the inner inlet edge.
The complex three dimensional compound curvature shape of the lip skin coupled with material selection typically requires a complex multi-stage forming process, often requiring intermediate heat treatments. Typically lip skins are produced by multiple stage deep drawings or spin forming processes, requiring complex and costly tooling. Due to aerodynamic considerations, it is desirable to extend the outer trailing edge of the lip skin, known as extended trailing edges wherein the axial length of the outer trailing edge of the lip skin is greater than axial length of the inner inlet edge. Known deep drawing processes are unsuitable for the manufacture of such extended trailing edges.

Annular part and a method and apparatus for forming an annular part


Extraction and purification of recombinant proteins rendered difficult to extract from transgenic plants by using an extraction solution containing reducing agents and surfactants or an extraction solution containing reducing agents and organic solvents.

Recombinant proteins have been manufactured conventionally by the recombinant technologies using microbes such as E. coli, etc., cultured mammalian cells, or the like Windsor, et al., Biochemistry 32, 8807-15 (1993); Bondoc, et al., Anal. Biochem. 246, 234-8 (1997); Ball, et al., Eur. Cytokine Netw. 12, 187-93 (2001).). However, in cases where cultured mammalian cells are used as the host cells, it has become enormously costly to manufacture a large scale of recombinant proteins. Furthermore, in such cases using microbes and cultured mammalian cells there exists inevitably a serious risk of contamination of pathogens such as human-infectious viruses, prions, endotoxins etc (Schillberg, et al., Naturwissenschaften 90, 145-55 (2003).).
The gene expression of recombinant proteins in the rice seeds is reported (Takaiwa, et al., Plant Biotechnology 5, 84-92 (2007).). The rice seeds are known as sites for the accumulation of proteins and a small number of different storage proteins are accumulated in their special organelles called "protein granules". Vectors using a storage protein promoter are reported for the recombinant proteins in the rice seeds. (Yang, et al, Plant Biotechnology 5, 815-26 (2007).).
IL-10 is a cytokine produced mainly by varieties of lymphocytes such as type-2 helper T cells (Th2), regulatory T cells and the like. Although its biological activity varies widely, the foremost characteristic differentiating it from other cytokines is a suppressive activity. IL-10 suppressively controls immune function by inhibiting the production of inflammatory cytokines such as interferon-γ″ (IFN-γ) and the like (Moore, et al., Annu. Rev. Immunol. 19, 683-765 (2001).). Thus, it is expected that IL-10 may be used as a drug for treatment of inflammatory diseases, allergic diseases, and autoimmune diseases (Asadullah, et al., Pharmacol. Rev. 55, 241-69 (2003).).
A biologically inactive form of IL-10 is a monomer with a molecular weight of 18.5 kDa, and its active form is a non-covalent homodimer with a molecular weight of 37 kDa (Syto, et al., Biochemistry 37, 16943-51 (1998).). The monomer has two sets of intra-molecular disulfide bonds, and the disulfide bonds are necessary to maintain the spatial protein structure. However, the monomer cannot exist stably only by itself. On the other hand, biologically active IL-10 consisting of two monomers connected each other by inter-molecular non-covalent bonds can exist stably only by itself. In other words, the disulfide bonds in the monomer and the non-covalent bonds connecting the sub-units of two monomers are necessary to maintain the spatial protein structure and the biological activity of IL-10, and IL-10, when these either bonds are destroyed, is irreversibly denatured and loses its biological activity. IL-10 is denatured and deactivated at high temperature or in acidic conditions (pH 6 or less). There are several reports on IL-10 refolding methods (Bondoc, et al., Anal. Biochem. 246, 234-8 (1997); Ball, et al., Eur. Cytokine Netw. 12, 187-93 (2001).) in order to obtain a biologically active form of IL-10 from its denatured monomers. However, highly efficient refolding methods of IL-10 have not been developed.
Furthermore, bioactivity assay methods are used for detecting a biologically active form of IL-10. However, such methods require a technical skill and a long time. The highly efficient and conventional methods for refolding IL-10 and detecting a biologically active form of IL-10 have not been developed.
There are cases that recombinant proteins can not be extracted from transgenic plants by commonly known extraction buffer solutions containing a buffer agent, for example tris(hydroxymethyl)aminomethane (Tris) and phosphoric acid, and a surfactant, for example a non-ionic surfactant. However, practical and highly efficient extraction methods for such recombinant proteins, without losing their native structures and biological activities, have not been developed.

Method for extraction and purification of recombinant proteins from transgenic plants

National Institute of Agrobiological Sciences


Provided is an electromagnetic wave shielding sheet including: a substrate that is formed in a nano-web form by spinning a polymer material into fiber strands by a spinning method; a conductive metal layer that is formed on one surface of the substrate for shielding electromagnetic waves; and an adhesive layer formed on the other surface of the substrate, to thereby make a thickness of the electromagnetic wave shielding sheet thin, and improve electromagnetic wave shielding performance.

Recently, portable electronic devices and electronic devices for displays tend to be light, thin, short, and compact, speedily, signal transfer speeds between components in the electronic devices become high, and circuit boards are in progress with high-integration microcircuits, to thereby have a tendency of increasing damage of EMI (Electromagnetic Interference) of signals due to electromagnetic noise generated between the adjacent circuits.
In addition, if electromagnetic waves generated from electronic devices are exposed to the human body for a long time, the human body may suffer from disorder such as glaucoma, and lowering of fertility.
Accordingly, in order to block electromagnetic waves, the portable electronic devices and electronic devices for displays, mainly use a type of shielding electromagnetic waves by attaching electromagnetic wave shielding sheets onto the inner surface of a case, circuit components that directly generate electromagnetic waves, or the surface of a built-in antenna.
As disclosed in Korean Patent Application Publication No. 10-2009-0078620, on Jul. 20, 2009, a conventional electromagnetic wave shielding sheet includes: a substrate sheet formed of a synthetic resin film; and a metal deposition layer that is sputtered on the surface of the substrate sheet, wherein the metal deposition layer is made of at least one selected from the group consisting of copper (Cu), nickel (Ni), zinc (Zn), aluminum (Al) and manganese (Mn).
However, the conventional electromagnetic wave shielding sheet becomes thick since the substrate sheet is formed of a synthetic resin film, and thus the overall thickness of a portable electronic device using the conventional electromagnetic wave shielding sheet is increased.
Further, when depositing a conductive metal on the surface of the synthetic resin film, the conductive metal layer may cause peeling to thereby cause a problem of degrading electromagnetic wave shielding performance.

Electromagnetic wave shielding sheet, manufacturing method thereof, and built-in antenna having the same


A wave cable transceiver system is disclosed incorporating an air-core or noble gas filled hollow plastic waveguide. The system may include a transmitter receiver, in-antennas and a tubular plastic waveguide with the inner air-core. The hollow plastic waveguide is a low loss and low dispersion guiding channel for the electromagnetic radiation.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention pertains generally to communication systems, and more particularly to systems and methods for interconnecting data center inter-server communications.
2. Description of Related Art
There are generally two types of links commercially available for data center communications: fiber optics and copper based active cable. However, fiber optic and active cable transceivers dissipate powers on the order of a few milli-watts.
A recent work presented the feasibility of using a solid rectangular plastic waveguide for high speed (26 Gbps) data link over 0.12 m at 57 GHz and 80 GHz, of which the distance was limited by the dielectric loss and dispersion characteristics of the solid rectangular plastic medium.

Waveguide having a hollow polymeric layer coated with a higher dielectric constant material

THE REGENTS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA


A fiber optic canister (14) is tested by drawing an optical fiber (12) from a generally cylincrical bobbin (16) upon which is is wound, in a direction parallel to the longitudinal axis (18) of the bobbin (16). The optical fiber (12) is directed toward the drawing location (30) of the payout drive (20), and transverse vibrations in the optical fiber (12) are damped, by a guide (40) formed as a series of spaced-apart guide rings (42) having their centers aligned along a common axis (50) that is preferably coincident with the axis (18) of the bobbin (16). The guide rings (42) have central apertures (44) that decrease in diameter from the guide rings (42) nearest the canister (14) toward the payout drive (20), defining a converging locus (36) for the optical fiber (12) as it travels from the bobbin (16) to the payout drive (20).

This invention relates to the testing of optical fibers, and, more particularly, to the apparatus used to mechanically test the payout characteristics of optical fibers from bobbins.
Optical fibers are strands of glass fiber processed so that light beams transmitted therethrough are subject to total internal reflection. A large fraction of the incident intensity of light directed into the fiber is received at the other end of the fiber, even though the fiber may be hundreds of meters long. Optical fibers have shown great promise in communications applications, because a high density of information may be carried along the fiber and because the quality of the signal is less subject to external interferences of various types than are electrical signals carried on metallic wires. Moreover, the glass fibers are light in weight and made from a highly plentiful substance, silicon dioxide.
Glass fibers are typically fabricated by preparing a preform of glasses of two different optical indices of refraction, one inside the other, and processing the preform to a fiber. The optical fiber is coated with a polymer layer termed a buffer to protect the glass from scratching or other damage. As an example of the dimensions, in a typical configuration the diameter of the glass optical fiber is about 125 micrometers, and the diameter of the fiber plus the polymer buffer is about 250 micrometers (approximately 0.010 inches).
For such very fine fibers, the handling of the optical fiber to avoid damage that might reduce its light transmission properties becomes an important consideration. The fibers are typically wound onto a cylindrical or tapered bobbin with many turns adjacent to each other in a side by side fashion. After one layer is complete, another layer of fiber is laid on top of the first layer, and so on. The final assembly of the bobbin and the wound layers of fiber is termed a canister, and the mass of wound fiber is termed the fiber pack. When the optical fiber is later to be used, the fiber is payed out from the canister in a direction parallel to the axis of the bobbin.
It has been found by experience that, where the fiber is to be payed out from the canister in a rapid fashion, as for example over a hundred meters per second, the turns of optical fiber must be held in place on the canister with an adhesive. The adhesive holds each turn of fiber in place as adjacent turns and layers are initially wound onto the canister, and also as adjacent turns and layers are payed out. Without the use of an adhesive, payout of the fibers may not be uniform and regular, leading to snarls or snags of the fibers that damage them or cause them to break as they are payed out.
It is important to test the procedures for winding the optical fiber onto the bobbins, the effectiveness of the adhesive, and any environmental degradation, under realistic payout conditions. A standard test to evaluate an optical fiber canister is to draw the optical fiber from the bobbin, parallel to its longitudinal axis using a payout drive. Payout occurs at a very high linear rate that is typically over one hundred meters per second.
To prevent excessive transverse vibration of the optical fiber and ensure that its movement uniformly converges on the location where it is pulled at this high rate, there is typically provided a conical guide between the canister and the payout wheel that pulls the optical fiber from the bobbin. This guide dampens any excessive transverse vibrations of the optical fiber during the test. Without such a guide, it is virtually impossible to pay out any substantial length of optical fiber without the fiber becoming misaligned. If misalignment occurs, the optical fiber fails.
While the guide works well for relatively short lengths of optical fiber and the testing is successful, it has not been possible to test longer lengths of optical fiber using this approach. It has been found that, when the length of the optical fiber paid out exceeds about 5 kilometers, the optical fiber almost invariably breaks, even when the conical guide is used.
Consequently, it has not been possible to conduct payout tests of optical fibers from canisters in long test lengths, typically greater than about 5 kilometers. For same current applications, much longer payout test lengths, at least about 20 kilometers, are required to validate winding procedures, adhesive type and application; and any adverse effects of extended storage on the payout characteristics. Accordingly, there exists a need for a better testing approach for evaluating the payout characteristics of optical fibers from canisters. The present invention fulfills this need, and further provides related advantages.

Multiple ring guide for payout testing of optical fibers


A folding camping trailer includes a trailer body having an end wall. An expandable bed is movable between a closed position retracted within the trailer body and an opened position extended outward from the end wall. The expandable bed includes a bed support mechanism attached to an underside of the expandable bed. The bed support mechanism is configured to connect to the end wall of the trailer body or to a towing frame of the folding trailer for supporting the expandable bed in a vertical direction when the expandable bed is in the opened position.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to folding camping trailers having expandable beds and, more particularly, to a bed support mechanism for expandable beds in a folding camping trailer.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Folding camping trailers typically have a trailer body with an extendable hard-shell top portion. In addition, the trailer body usually includes two expandable beds that extend slidably outward from end walls of the trailer body. The expandable beds provide a usable sleeping area that is larger than the living area defined by the trailer body alone. Prior to the use of expandable beds in folding camping trailers, the sleeping area of the beds in folding camping trailers was generally constrained by the living area defined by the trailer body. The expandable beds, when extended outward from the end walls of the trailer body to their opened position, typically each require a support structure that extends between the expandable beds and the trailer body.
One known support structure for supporting expandable beds in the opened position is detachable poles. The detachable poles each connect at one end to an underside of the expandable beds and connect at the other end to the trailer body. However, this arrangement has significant disadvantages. First, the detachable poles must be housed within the trailer body until it is time to set up the expandable beds. Because the poles are not attached to the expandable beds or to the trailer body, they can easily become misplaced or damaged. In addition, the detachable poles are difficult to install. After extending one of the expandable beds, the user of the folding camping trailer connects one end of the detachable pole to a bracket or other connecting structure located on the underside of the expandable bed. After one end of the detachable pole is in place, the user of the folding camping trailer must position himself or herself underneath the expandable bed and push upward with his or her back or head so that the second end of the detachable pole may be attached to a connecting structure located on the trailer body. This step in the set up process is particularly labor intensive and requires a significant degree of muscle strength. In addition, a similar labor intensive procedure must be followed in reverse to disassemble the expandable bed.
Another known prior art solution also utilizes poles or posts as the support structure for the expandable beds, but permanently attaches both ends of the poles to the folding camping trailer. The first end of each of the poles is connected to the underside of the expandable beds and the second end of each of the poles is connected to the trailer body. Specifically, in this prior art arrangement, the first end of each of the poles includes a roller that is rotatably received in a groove or track formed in the underside of the expandable beds. The second end of the each of the poles is pivotally connected to the trailer body. An advantage of this arrangement is that the poles are always attached to the expandable beds whether the expandable beds are in the closed or opened position. Thus, the poles cannot be misplaced and set up of the expandable beds is simplified. However, the roller-track configuration by which the "roller" end of the poles is connected to the expandable beds is expensive to manufacture. In addition, the roller end of the poles often jams in the track formed in the underside of the expandable beds.
In view of the foregoing, it is an object of the present invention to provide a folding camping trailer with expandable beds having a simplified and cost-effective bed support apparatus for supporting the expandable beds in the opened position. In addition, it is an object of the present invention to provide a bed support apparatus for expandable beds in a folding camping trailer that makes set up of the expandable beds easier and less labor intensive. It is a further object of the present invention to generally overcome the disadvantages present in prior art bed support arrangements.

Folding trailer with bed support mechanism operated from a standing position


A battery pack system and a liquid leakage detection method thereof are provided. The battery pack system comprises battery cells, a isolated liquid and a battery box containing the isolated liquid. The battery cells are soaked in the isolated liquid. The battery box is formed with a isolated liquid outlet and a isolated liquid inlet. The outlet is connected together with the inlet via a circulation pump and a liquid separation device to form a circulation passage. When electrolyte leakage occurs to any of the battery cells, the electrolyte is separated into the liquid separation device and detected by a detection component. The present disclosure encloses the leaked electrolyte into the fire-retardant isolated liquid to prevent the electrolyte from contacting with the air so as to improve the safety of the battery box body.

Currently, battery-driven electric vehicle and electric buses are gradually replacing conventional vehicle and buses. Battery cells act as a main energy storage device in an electric vehicle. A battery box, as a device for containing the battery cells, is a key component of the electric vehicle, and has a direct influence on the performance of the battery cells and thus on the performance of the electric vehicle. As lithium-ion\batteries have advantages such as the excellent power output performance and a long service life, they have been widely applied in the electric vehicle.
The battery cells, as a main energy storage device in the electric vehicle, is generally consists of a plurality of batteries connected in series or in parallel. The batteries may be subject to liquid leakage after being used for a period of time due to defects or unreasonable installation and fixation structures of the batteries. The leaked electrolyte is a flammable organic material, and is easy to ignite due to sparks or electrostatic discharges when being exposed to the air. This will reduce the safety of the battery pack and endanger the vehicle.
The conventional practice is to detect the liquid leakage through gas detection. The detection principle is generally as follows: due to the battery box is a relatively hermetic space, some gases are often formed and released when the electrolyte is leaked from the battery pack, and these gases can be detected by a gas detector. If these gases are detected by the detector, it represents that an accident of leakage occurs to the battery pack. However, this detection method has some shortcomings: 1. the gas detector is relatively expensive, and cannot deliver a good detection effect when the concentration of the gases is relatively low; and 2. the gas detector cannot work effectively until the gases in the battery box reach a certain concentration and, at this time, a relatively large amount of the electrolyte has been leaked. Because the flammable electrolyte is exposed to the air, this makes accidents of fires and combustion likely to occur.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Battery pack system and liquid leakage detection method thereof


A method of optimizing the frequency response of an interconnect system of the type which conveys high frequency signals between bond pads of separate integrated circuits (ICs) mounted on a printed circuit board (PCB) through inductive conductors, such as bond wires and package legs, and a trace on the surface of the PCB. To improve the interconnect system, capacitance is added to the trace and inductance is added to the conductors, with the added trace capacitance and conductor inductance being appropriately sized relative to one another and to various other interconnect system impedances to optimize the interconnect system impedance matching frequency response.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to systems for interconnecting integrated circuits mounted on a circuit board and in particular to an interconnect system that provides a filter and impedance matching function.
2. Description of Related Art
Each node of an integrated circuit (IC) that is to communicate with external circuits is linked to a bond pad on the surface of the IC chip. In a packaged IC a bond wire typically connects the bond pad to a conductive leg extending from the package surrounding the IC chip. When the IC is mounted on a printed circuit board (PCB), the package leg is soldered to a microstrip PCB trace on the surface of the PCB. When bond pads of one or more other ICs mounted on the PCB are linked to the PCB trace, the bond pads, bond wires, package legs, and the PCB trace form an interconnect system for conveying signals between nodes of two or more ICs.
In high frequency applications the interconnect system can attenuate and distort signals. The conventional approach to reducing the amount of signal distortion and attenuation caused by the interconnect system has been to minimize the series inductance and shunt capacitance of the interconnect system. Much of the inductance comes from the bond wire and the package leg, and such inductance can be minimized by keeping the bond wire and package leg as short as possible. The capacitance of the bond pads can be reduced to some extent by minimizing the surface area of the bond pads. The capacitance of PCB traces can be reduced by appropriately choosing physical characteristics of the board including the size of the PCB traces, their spacing from ground planes and dielectric nature of the insulating material forming the circuit board. Vias, conductors passing vertically through a circuit board to interconnect PCB traces on various layers of the PCB, can be a source of capacitance at the PCB trace. Designers often avoid the use of vias in high frequency applications because vias can add substantial capacitance to the interconnect system. When vias are unavoidable, designers typically structure them so as minimize their capacitance. Minimizing the bond wire and package leg inductance and capacitances of the bond pad and PCB can help increase the bandwidth, flatten frequency response and reduce the signal distortion, but it is not possible to completely eliminate interconnect system inductance and capacitance. Thus some level of signal distortion and attenuation is inevitable when signal frequencies are sufficiently high.
What is needed is a way to substantially improve the frequency response of the interconnect system so as to reduce distortion and attenuation of high frequency signals.

Filter structures for integrated circuit interfaces


A display system utilizes a tilting sensor in a viewing device to transmit a wireless signal containing tilting information to a display device when a person who puts on the viewing device has tilting movements about an axis that connects between the viewing device and the display device. The display device adjusts a multimedia content displayed on a panel according to the tilting information by physically rotating the panel about the same axis or rotating the multimedia content about the same axis before the content is displayed on the panel to synchronize with the tilting angle of the viewing device.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a display system, and more particularly, to a 3D tilting adjustable display system where a display device rotates the display content according to a viewing device's tilting angle.
2. Description of the Prior Art
3D displaying technology is getting popular in multimedia market as it is earning more and more opportunity to be visible in movies, video games, or any present multimedia applications. Due to the particular 3D built-up technology, 3D applications requires a dedicated goggle with shutter component in order to transform the presented two partially overlapped images into a simulated three dimensional object that can be recognized by human eyes and brain.
And since the multimedia content is made and presented for the display device that the two parts of the uncombined images, for the left eye and for the right eye respectively, are always horizontally aligned, people who wear the 3D dedicated goggle and watch the 3D multimedia content should always keep their heads upright, or their eyes horizontal, so that the two parts of the uncombined images can be correctly shuttered and processed by the 3D goggle. Without such standard and required position, people will no longer enjoy the 3D effect, even when they do put on the 3D goggle. It means that any none horizontal position of the 3D goggle can not function properly, given the 3D display device is, in a most common way, placed or presents the multimedia content on a horizontal basis.

Display system adapting to 3D tilting adjustment


Techniques associated with energy storage devices are generally described. An example energy storage device includes a battery integrated with a sensor such as an optical waveguide. The sensor can be arranged in contact with an outer wall of the battery and can be configured to detect a safety condition associated with the battery.

Unless otherwise indicated herein, the materials described in this section are not prior art to the claims in this application and are not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
There are many electronic devices available in the market today that can perform many different tasks. Some electronic devices, such as smart phones, can be used for voice communication as well as written communications such as email. Other electronic devices are used for entertainment purposes such as listening to music or watching movies and television shows. Still other electronic devices such as laptop computers can be used for word processing, spreadsheets, email, and the like. While the specific abilities of any given electronic device may vary, these devices typically have a common requirement that they all require power and many of them operate using battery power.
Lithium batteries are often used as a power source for these types of electronic devices for various reasons. Lithium batteries are light and can store a relatively large amount of energy, which allows them to be used for extended periods of time. The use of lithium batteries is also expected in electric vehicles and other applications that may require more energy than smaller handheld devices.
The present disclosure contemplates that while lithium batteries have significant advantages over other battery technologies, lithium batteries also have issues that need to be addressed. In particular, the safety of lithium batteries is an ongoing concern. Organic electrolyte is often used in lithium batteries. Unfortunately, organic electrolyte is volatile and flammable. When a battery is overcharged or if impurities have become mixed in the anode or cathode material, binder, conductive agent or other battery component, the battery often gets hot. When the lithium battery becomes hot, the internal pressure rises and the safety of the battery can be an issue. For example, the battery may swell and burst or catch fire. These potential safety issues can cause serious injury.


A method, apparatus and computer program product for providing challenge protected user queries on a local system is presented. A query is presented to a user. A response to the query is received and a determination is made whether the response is administratively less desirable than a threshold. When the response is administratively less desirable than said threshold, then a challenge is provided to the user. The response is accepted when the user responds correctly to the challenge and the response is not accepted when the user fails to correctly respond to the challenge.

Computer systems, networks and data centers are exposed to a constant and differing variety of attacks that may compromise the security and/or operation of the system. Examples include various forms of malicious software program attacks such as viruses, worms, Trojan horses and the like that computer systems can obtain over a network such as the Internet. Quite often, users of such computer systems are not even aware that such malicious programs have been obtained within the computer system. Once resident within a computer, a malicious program that executes might disrupt operation of the computer to a point of inoperability and/or might spread itself to other computers within a network or data center by exploiting vulnerabilities of the computer's operating system or resident application programs. Virus attacks, worm attacks, and Trojan horse attacks are variants of each other that generally involve the execution of a program, for which a user often is unaware of its existence, that performs some undesired processing operations to comprise a computer's proper operation.
Other malicious programs operate within a computer to secretly extract and transmit information within the computer to remote computer systems for various suspect purposes. As an example, spyware is a form of software that can execute in the background (e.g., unbeknownst to users) of a computer system and can perform undesirable processing operations such as tracking, recording and transmitting user input from the spyware-resident computer system to a remote computer system. Spyware can allow remote computers to silently obtain otherwise confidential information such as usernames and passwords required to access protected data, lists, contents of files or even a remote web site's user account information.
Computer system developers, software developers and security experts have produced many types of conventional preventive measures that operate within conventional computer systems in an attempt to prevent operation of malicious programs from stealing information or from compromising proper operation of the computer systems. As an example, conventional virus detection software operates to periodically download a set of virus definitions from a remotely located server. Once the virus detection software obtains the definitions, the security software can monitor incoming data received by the computer system, such as email messages containing attachments, to identify viruses defined within the virus definitions that might be present within the data accessed by the computer. Such data might be obtained over a network or might be unknowingly resident on a computer readable medium, such as a disk or CD-ROM, which a user inserts into the computer. Upon detection of inbound data containing a virus or other malicious program, the virus detection software can quarantine the inbound data so that a user of the computer system will not execute code or access the data containing the detected virus that might result in compromising the computer's operation.
Other examples of conventional malicious attacks, intrusions, or undesirable processing that can cause problems within computer systems or even entire computer networks include denial-of-service attacks, buffer overflow operations, execution of malformed application data, and execution of malicious mobile code. A denial-of-service attack operates to provide an intentional simultaneous barrage of packets (e.g., many connection attempts) emanating from many different computer systems to one or more target computer systems, such as a web site, in order to intentionally cause an overload in processing capabilities of the target computer resulting in disruption of service or a business function provided by the target computer. Denial of service attacks may also seek to crash the targeted machine, rather than simply consume resources. Buffer overflow attacks occur when programs do not provide appropriate checks of data stored in internal data structures within the software that result in overwriting of surrounding areas of memory. Attacks based on buffer overflows-might allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code on the target system to invoke privileged access, destroy data, or perform other undesirable functions. Malformed application data attacks might result in an application containing a code section that, if executed, provides access to resources that would otherwise be private to the application. Such attacks can expose vulnerabilities due to an incorrect implementation of the application, for example by failing to provide appropriate data validity checks or allowing data stream parsing errors.
Many of the conventional malicious programs and mechanisms for attack of computer systems, such as viruses and worms, include the ability to redistribute themselves to other computer systems or devices within a computer network, such that several computers become infected and experience the malicious processing activities discussed above. Some conventional attempts to prevent redistribution of malicious programs include implementing malicious program detection mechanisms such as virus detection software within firewalls or gateways between different portions of networked computer systems in order to halt propagation of malicious programs to sub-networks.
Another conventional methodology used to control behavior in a system is through the use of an access control list (ACL). The access control list is a concept in computer security, used to enforce privilege separation. It is a means of determining the appropriate access rights to a given object given certain aspects of the user process that is requesting them, principally the process's user identity. An ACL typically comprises a table that tells a computer operating system which access rights each user has to a particular system object, such as a file directory or individual file. Each object has a security attribute that identifies its access control list. The list has an entry for each system user with access privileges. The most common privileges include the ability to read a file (or all the files in a directory), to write to the file or files, and to execute the file (if it is an executable file, or program). Each ACL has one or more access control entries (ACEs) including the name of a user or group of users. For each of these users or groups roles, the access privileges are stated in a string of bits called an access mask. Generally, the system administrator or the object owner creates the access control list for an object.