An injection-molding machine cooling tube, which cools molded plastic parts, includes a porous cooling tube having an outer surface and an inner surface. Preferably, the porous cooling tube has a porosity in the range of 3-20 microns. A cooling fluid passageway is preferably disposed adjacent the porous cooling tube outer surface and is configured to carry a cooling fluid to extract heat from the porous cooling tube. Fluid flow structure, preferably a vacuum, is configured to cause a molded plastic part inside the porous cooling tube to expand into contact with at least a portion of the inner surface of the porous cooling tube.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates, in general, to cooling tubes and is particularly, but not exclusively, applicable to cooling tubes used in a plastic injection-molding machine to cool plastic parts, such as plastic parisons or preforms. More particularly, the present invention relates to a structural configuration of these cooling tubes, and also to method of manufacturing and using such tubes, for example in the context of a manufacturing process for preforms made from polyethylenetetraphthlate (PET) or the like.
2. Related Art
In order to accelerate cycle time, molding machines have evolved to include post mold cooling systems that operate simultaneously with the injection molding cycle. More specifically, while one injection cycle is taking place, the post mold cooling system, typically acting in a complementary fashion with a robotic part removal device, is operative on an earlier formed set of molded articles that have been removed from the mold at a point where they are still relatively hot, but sufficiently solid to allow limited handling.
Post mold temperature conditioning (or cooling) molds, nests or tubes are well known in the art. Typically, such devices are made from aluminum or other materials having good thermal conductivity properties.
To improve cooling efficiency and cycle time performance, EP patent 0644 describes a multi-position take-out plate that has a capacity to store multiple sets of preforms for more than one injection cycle. In other words, each set of preforms is subjected to an increased period of accentuated conduction cooling by retaining the preforms in the cooling tubes for more than one injection cycle. With increased cooling, the quality of the preforms is enhanced. At an appropriate point in time, a set of preforms is ejected (usually by a mechanical ejection mechanism) from the take-out plate onto a conveyor to allow a new set of preforms to be inserted into the now vacant set of cooling tubes. EP patent 0644 is incorporated herein by reference.
In many other cooling tube arrangements, the preform (at some point, if not from the point of introduction) looses contact with the internal side walls of the cooling tube, which loss of thermal contact lessens cooling efficiency and causes uneven cooling. As will be understood, uneven cooling can induce part defects, including deformation of overall shape and crystallization of the plastic (resulting in areas that are visibly hazed). Furthermore, lack of contact can cause ovality across the circumference of the preform, while the loss of the cooling effect can mean that a preform is removed from the cooling tube at an excessively high temperature. In addition to causing surface scratching and overall dimensional deformation, premature removal of a preform at an overly high temperature can also result in the semi-molten exterior of preform sticking either to the tube or another preform; all these effects are clearly undesirable and result in part rejection and increased costs to the manufacturer.
European patent EP 0 266 804 describes an intimate fit cooling tube that is held within an end-of-arm-tool (EOAT) of a robot. The intimate fit cooling tube is water cooled and is arranged to receive a preform shortly after it has attained the glass-transition temperature that allows handling of its form without catastrophic deformation. More particularly, after the preform has undergone some cooling within the closed mold, the mold is opened, the EOAT extended between the cavity and core sides of the mold and the preform off-loaded from a core into the cooling tube that then acts to cool the exterior of the preform by a conduction process. However, as the preform cools it will shrink and therefore may loose contact across its entire circumference with the cooling tube yielding an uneven cooling effect.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,102,626 and 4,729,732 are further typical of prior art systems in that they show a cooling tube formed with an external cooling channel machined in the outer surface of the tube body, a sleeve is then assembled to the body to enclose the channel and provide an enclosed sealed path for the liquid coolant to circulate around the body.
WO 97/39874 discloses a tempering mold that has circular cooling channels included within its body.
EP 0 700 770 discloses another configuration that includes an inner and outer tube assembly to form cooling channels therebetween.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,208,177 discloses an injection mold cavity containing a porous element that communicates with a cooling fluid passageway subjecting the cooling fluid to different pressures to vary the flow of fluid through the porous plug.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,047,873 discloses an injection blow mold in which the cavity has a sintered porous sidewall that permits a vacuum to draw the parison into contact with the cooling tube sidewall.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,295,811 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,304,542 disclose an injection blow core having a porous metal wall portion.
A xe2x80x9cPlastics Technology Onlinexe2x80x9darticle entitled xe2x80x9cPorous Moldsxe2x80x9d Big Drawxe2x80x9d, by Mikell Knights, printed from the Internet on Jul. 27, 2002, discloses a porous tooling composite called METAPOR(trademark). The article discloses the technique of polishing this material to close slightly the pores to improve the surface finish and reduce the porosity.
An article from International Mold Steel, Inc., entitled xe2x80x9cPorous Aluminum Mold Materialsxe2x80x9d, by Scott W. Hopkins, printed from the Internet on Jul. 27, 2002, also discloses porous aluminum mold materials. The materials and applications disclosed in the above two articles refer to vacuum thermoforming of plastics in the mold itself, in which preheated sheets of plastic are drawn into a single mold half via a vacuum drawn through the porous structure of the mold half.
According to a first aspect of the present invention, structure and/or steps are provided for a tube assembly for operating on a malleable molded plastic part. The tube assembly comprising a porous tube having a profiled inside surface, and a vacuum structure configured to cooperate with the porous tube to provide, in use, a reduced pressure adjacent the inside surface. The reduced pressure causes an outside surface of the malleable molded plastic part, locatable within the tube assembly, to contact the inside surface of the porous insert so as to allow a substantial portion of the outside surface of the malleable part, upon cooling, to attain a profile substantially corresponding to the profile of the inside surface. In an embodiment of the invention, the porous tube is cylindrically-shaped, and the vacuum structure is provided by locating the porous tube in a tube body and by providing at least one vacuum channel adjacent the outside surface of the porous tube, in use, for connection to a vacuum source.
The inside surface of the porous tube having an internal profile that is substantially (if not highly and accurately toleranced to) the final dimensions of the molded part, the porous tube of the various embodiments of the present invention effectively causes, under cooling, a re-shaping of the molded part to its exact final shape defined by the profile of the insert. Indeed, the reduced pressure/effective vacuum acting through the porous material essentially acts to draw the malleable preform into the final shape whilst ensuring that cooling is optimized by continuous surface contact with a thermally efficient heat dissipation material and path.
According to a second aspect of the present invention, injection molding machine structure and/or steps are provided with a molding structure that molds at least one plastic part. Furthermore, at least one porous cooling cavity is configured to hold and cool the at least one plastic part after it has been molded by the molding structure. At least one vacuum channel is respectively configured to provide a lower-than-ambient pressure to the at least one porous cavity to cause the at least one plastic part to contact the inside surface of the at least one porous cavity.
According to a third aspect of the present invention, a method for shaping a malleable molded plastic part including the steps of: (i) receiving the molded plastic part into a porous tube; (ii) providing a reduced pressure adjacent a profiled inside surface of the porous tube causing a substantial portion of an outside surface of the molded plastic part to move into contact therewith and thereby attain a substantially corresponding shape; and (iii) extracting heat from the molded plastic part through a heat dissipation path to solidify the molded plastic part at least to the extent required to ensure that the shape of the outside surface of the molded plastic part is preserved; and (iv) ejecting the molded plastic article; wherein the outer surface of the molded plastic part is provided with a final shape that is defined by the profiled inside surface profile of the porous tube.
According to a fourth aspect of the present invention, structure and/or steps are provided for a tube assembly for operating on a malleable molded plastic part. The tube assembly comprising a tube body, and a porous insert located in the tube body. The porous insert includes an inside surface and an outside surface, the inside surface profiled to reflect at least a portion of the profile of the molded plastic part. The tube assembly further includes at least one vacuum channel in fluid communication with the porous insert. The vacuum channel configured for connection, in use, with a vacuum source to provide a reduced pressure adjacent the inside surface to cause an outside surface of the malleable molded plastic part, locatable within the tube assembly, to contact the inside surface so as to allow a substantial portion of the outside surface of the malleable part, upon cooling, to attain a profile substantially corresponding to the profile of the inside surface. The tube assembly also includes a cooling structure configured for connection, in use, with a heat dissipation path for cooling the molded plastic part in contact with the inside surface of the porous insert. Preferably, the porous insert has porosity in the range of about 3-20 microns. A cooling fluid passageway is disposed in the tube body adjacent the porous insert and is configured to carry a cooling fluid to extract heat from the porous insert.
According to another aspect of the present invention, structure and/or steps are provided for a tube assembly. The tube assembly comprising a tube with an inside surface provided on a porous substrate, and a fluid flow structure. The fluid flow structure is configured to cooperate with the porous substrate to cause, in use, a malleable molded plastic part, locatable within the tube assembly, to be drawn into contact with the inside surface so as to allow a substantial portion of an outside surface of the malleable part, upon cooling, to attain an outside profile substantially corresponding to the profile of the inside surface.
According to an embodiment of the invention, the porous substrate includes an inside surface and an outside surface, the inside surface profiled to reflect at least a portion of the profile of the molded plastic part; and a vacuum channel located adjacent the outer surface, the vacuum channel supporting, in use, an initial establishment of a differential pressure from the outside surface of the porous substrate to the inside surface thereof, to induce contact, in use, between the received molded plastic part and the inside surface.
According to yet another aspect of the present invention, structure and/or steps are provided for an end-of-arm tool. The end-of-arm tool comprising a carrier plate for mounting, in use, to a robot in a molding system, and at least one tube assembly arranged on the carrier plate. The tube assembly is configured for receiving, in use, a molded plastic part. The tube assembly comprising a porous tube having an inside surface and an outside surface, the inside surface profiled to reflect at least a portion of the profile of the molded plastic part, and a vacuum structure. The vacuum structure is configured to cooperate with the porous tube to provide, in use, a reduced pressure adjacent the inside surface to cause an outside surface of a malleable molded plastic part, locatable within the tube assembly, to contact the inside surface of the porous insert so as to allow a substantial portion of the outside surface of the malleable part, upon cooling, to attain a profile substantially corresponding to the profile of the inside surface.
The present invention advantageously provides a cooling tube structure that functions to cool rapidly and efficiently a just-molded plastic part located within the cooling tube, thereby improving robustness of the preform and generally enhancing cycle time. Moreover, in the context of cooling PET and the unwanted production of acid aldehyde arising from prolonged exposure of the preform to relatively high temperatures, the rapid cooling afforded by the present invention beneficially reduces the risk of the presence of unacceptably high levels of acid aldehyde in the finished plastic product, such as a drink container. Beneficially, the present invention seeks to maintain a required and defined shape of the molded part, such as a preform.


An amplifier system includes a follower-type output stage that is driven by a pre-driver circuit. The follower-type output stage that is operated from VCC and GND (or VEE) power supplies. The pre-driver circuit for the follower output stage is operated from local power supplies corresponding to VHI and VLO. A charge-pump circuit generates the VHI power-supply such that VHI is above VCC. Another charge-pump circuit generates the VLO power-supply such that VLO is below GND (or VEE). The output stage delivers current to a load from the VCC and GND (or VEE) power supplies such that the output stage has increased power efficiency.

Computer systems are often connected to a communication network via telephone lines. A popular means for connecting computer systems to a network is over a digital subscribed line (DSL). DSLs come in many varieties including asymmetric (ADSL), symmetric (SDSL), rate-adaptive (RADSL), and very high bit-rate (VDSL).
The DSL shares the same physical wire as a common telephone line. The telephone wire is a twisted pair of copper wires, which has a maximum signal bandwidth from 300 kHz-10 MHz., depending on the length of the line. Since a typical voice communication requires only a portion of the total bandwidth (e.g., around 4 kHz) available on the telephone line, the additional unused bandwidth is available on the line for the DSL communication without interfering with telephone communication.
A subscriber device such as a computer communicates with a service provider via a DSL modem. The DSL modem is physically connected between the subscriber device and the telephone wire, and includes a DSL line driver. The DSL line driver includes a power amplifier that delivers a signal to the telephone line.

Amplifier with charge-pump generated local supplies


A 3D printer head comprises a chamber that is configured for receiving liquid or solid print material through an inlet. The chamber has an outlet opening on one surface, and a spiral feed screw is associated with the chamber and is configured for supplying the outlet opening with print material that passes from the inlet into the chamber, by coupling the spiral feed screw or the chamber to a drive that is configured for rotating the spiral feed screw or the chamber in such a way that the spiral feed screw rotates at a distance from the surface of the chamber and relative thereto. The spiral feed screw has at least one conveyor that is configured for conveying print material between a radially outwardly situated inlet area and a radially inwardly situated outlet area, toward the latter, and at least one discharge conveyor that is arranged and configured for conveying print material, together with gas present therein, away from at least one section of a radially outer border zone of the outlet area.

A 3D printer, a 3D printer head for use in such a 3D printer, a method for operating such a 3D printer, and a printed product produced with such a 3D printer are disclosed herein. This 3D printer is configured for processing granular, powdered, or liquid plastic or components of two- or multi-part plastic systems (thermoplastics, epoxides, acrylates, polylactides, acrylic ester-styrene-acrylonitrile, polymethyl methacrylate, polyethylene (PE), polyvinyl chloride (PVC), polyethylene terephthalate (PET) or glycol-modified polyethylene terephthalate (PETG), polyethylene naphthalate (PEN), acylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (ABS) copolymer, polyvinyl butyral (PVB), polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA), polyamide (PA), polyimide (PI), polyvinyl alcohol (PVA), polystyrene (PS), polyvinylphenol (PVP), polypropylene (PP), polycarbonate (PC), or the derivatives thereof, etc.), as well as low-melting metals or metal alloys as print material. It is also possible to output liquid plastics that react to light or heat, using the printer head disclosed herein, and to immediately cure them with a source of light or heat associated with the printer head. In the 3D printer disclosed herein, aggregates such as particles or fibers made of textile material, glass, carbon, metal, or the like may be added to the print medium in order to influence the material properties (density [g/cm3], modulus of elasticity [MPa], elongation at break [%], tensile strength [MPa], melting point [° C.], etc.). Details in this regard are defined in the claims; however, the description and the drawings contain relevant information concerning the structure and mode of functioning, and concerning variants of the method and the device components.

3D printhead for use in a 3D printer, 3D printer with such a 3D printhead, method for operating such a 3D printer, and product produced by a 3D printer


A method and apparatus for use in generating and imparting a low frequency, directed energy wavefield are disclosed. In a first aspect, the presently disclosed technique includes a low frequency directional array, comprising: a plurality of array elements capable of generating a low frequency, directed energy wavefront; and a canceling element capable of actively canceling a spurious lobe of the wavefront. In a second aspect, the presently disclosed technique includes a method, comprising: imparting a low frequency, directed wavefront; and actively canceling a spurious lobe of the wavefront.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention pertains to low frequency directed energy applications, and, more particularly, to shielding used in such applications.
2. Description of the Related Art
This section of this document is intended to introduce various aspects of the art that may be related to various aspects of the present invention described and/or claimed below. This section provides background information to facilitate a better understanding of the various aspects of the present invention. As the section's title implies, this is a discussion of related art. That such art is related in no way implies that it is also prior art. The related art may or may not be prior art. It should therefore be understood that the statements in this section of this document are to be read in this light, and not as admissions of prior art.
One type of system with a long history is known as an "area denial" or "active area denial" system. These weapons typically prevent people from occupying a selected area. Many of these types of systems are commonly recognized in popular culture. In a combat context, these include sharpened stakes, razor wire, and land mines. However, area denial systems also find many civilian contexts. For example, barbed wire is commonly used to control livestock and secure businesses. Thus, many of these types of systems are "nonlethal".
Some kinds of area denial systems include directed energy of a low frequency radiating from an array of energy sources. To protect the personnel deploying and using these systems, the array includes shielding that blocks the energy from radiating in the direction of the personnel. Current shielding approaches include shielded loops with laminated discs to provide low frequency radiation with directional fields.
The present invention is directed to resolving, or at least reducing, one or all of the problems mentioned above.


A method is presented for back-end-of-the-line (BEOL) metallization with lines formed by subtractive patterning and vias formed by damascene processes. The method includes depositing a dielectric layer over a conductive layer formed over a substrate, forming spacers surrounding mandrel sections formed over the dielectric layer, selectively depositing gap fill material adjacent the spacers, selectively removing the spacers, etching the dielectric layer and the conductive layer to expose a top surface of the substrate, depositing and planarizing an interlayer dielectric, selectively forming openings in the dielectric layer, and filling the openings with a conductive material to define metal vias.

The present invention relates generally to semiconductor devices, and more specifically, to achieving back-end-of-the-line (BEOL) metallization with lines formed by subtractive patterning and vias formed by damascene processes.
Semiconductor devices are fabricated by sequentially depositing insulating (dielectric) layers, conductive layers and semiconductor layers of material over a semiconductor substrate, and patterning the various layers using lithography to form circuit components and elements thereon. A common conductive material used in the past for conductive lines was aluminum, which can be directly etched. However, as performance demands of integrated circuits ("ICs") continued, aluminum was lacking both because its resistivity became unacceptable, and the challenge of making smaller, reliable interconnects with aluminum.
Accordingly, aluminum interconnects were replaced with the lower resistivity copper. In contrast to aluminum, copper interconnects are made by a metal polishing process (dual damascene) rather than direct etching because of copper corrosion during the etch process, and the challenge of overlay of separate via, line lithography steps. However, as dimensions continue to shrink, especially beyond 7 nm node, filling aggressive dual damascene openings and the liner occupying much of the interconnect space compels a search for alternative methods of making interconnects.

INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION


The present invention provides a method of printing a digital image on a textile including the steps of selecting 8 to 16 inks to form an ink set, calibrating the ink set to create an ink set profile, using the ink set profile to calculate hue and shade-based look-up tables directly correlating the inks with the color space coordinates of the pixels of the digital image. The present invention also is a system and an apparatus providing means for performing the calibration of the ink set and direct correlation of the color space coordinates. The printed fabric has a first plurality of dots having 8 to 16 differently colored inks per dot and a second plurality of dots having one color per dot. Significantly, the present invention produces printed textiles having a high detail, deep color, and broad shading, as well as a combination of dyes heretofore considered incompatible.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention generally relates to methods of ink printing and, more particularly, to multicolor ink printing on textiles. This invention also relates to systems and apparatus for multicolor ink jet printing on textiles, as well as multicolor ink printed textiles, per se.
2. Description of the Prior Art
As defined herein, the term xe2x80x9ccolor spacexe2x80x9d is a mathematical definition for colors. Well known color spaces include CIE lab, CIE xyz, CIE luv, CIE xyY, CIE uvY, Cyan-Magenta-Yellow-Black (CMYK), and Red-Green-Blue (RGB). For example, the RGB triplet divides each color into an amount of red, green, and blue, such as (50,40,220) for a blue dominant color.
The simple act of printing a color image on textiles is well-known. In fact, the history of dying cloth may go back as far as 2600 B.C.
Nonetheless, numerous technical difficulties remain in attempting to accurately print an image or design on a textile. For example, refraction and internal reflection caused by the chosen textile results in color interference, which is perceived as a muddy or blurry image. Moreover, each textile fabric has a different set of refraction and internal reflection characteristics, and different weights and weaves of the same fabric will have different sets of refraction and internal reflection characteristics. The high level of variation of refraction and internal reflection often necessitates custom preparation of color separations for each type of fabric in order to avoid color interference. Yet, custom preparation of color separations takes a great deal of time and effort on the part of the textile colorist. Of course, the technical difficulties of printing multicolor images on textiles increases as the image or design becomes more complex.
Overall changes in the printing and imaging industries compound the traditional problems, especially as digital technology becomes the norm rather than the exception. For example, digital images are routinely coded in RGB for display on a computer monitor. However, printers typically use CMYK and textile colorists traditionally use CIE lab. Thus, an image initially in RGB will be routinely converted into a different color space before being printed. However, data can easily be lost or corrupted in the conversion to a different color space. Software correction may be applied in an attempt to recover lost or corrupted data, but such software correction may actually increase the errors.
Many prior art methods for non-textile printing attempt to overcome the disadvantages inherent in multiple color space transformations, such as U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,450,217 to Eschbach et al. and 5,953,499 to Narendranath et al. These patents rely on artificial blending or filtering color space data to xe2x80x9cenhancexe2x80x9d or xe2x80x9cimprovexe2x80x9d the subsequently rendered image. Yet, clearly, such forced techniques are not ideal.
Printed images on textiles can be blurry because the colors bleed into or blend with one another. Color correction is often accomplished using gray replacement with undercolor addition or using undercolor removal. However, as stated above, it is preferable to achieve appropriate color separation without resorting to color correction. Bleeding and blurriness may also be reduced by manipulating the size of the individual ink dots deposited on the textile. U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,051,036 to Kusaki et al. and 6,142,619 to Miura et al. disclose recent attempts to increase printing accuracy by adjusting the size of the ink dots deposited on the textile. Yet, while overall sharpness may be enhanced, subtle blending and shading risk being attenuated, which would detrimentally affect the fidelity of the printed image or design.
Improvements in hardware and software make it possible to use more than three dyes to make a color. Current systems and method usually do not utilize current technology to its full potential. Currently, gray scales are usually made with a dithered black, a dithered gray, or a combination of both dithered black and gray. Yet, dithered blacks and grays generally do not reproduce deep and true blacks and grays. It has been found that, using multiple overlapping sets of complementary colors, a composite shading scale can be built that provides a robust shading scale without visible dithering patterns and also allows for subtle casts to color renderings.
The aforementioned Kusaki et al. and the Miura et al. patents disclose ink jet printing using a maximum of eight colors. The ink jet printing art is generally directed to printing with sets of 4 to 8 differently colored inks. This direction of the art is further discussed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,833,743 to Elwakil.
It is also a long accepted practice, as underscored in the Kusaki et al. patent that different types of dyes (e.g., acid and fiber-reactive) may not be intermixed for printing on fabrics other than silk. In other words, fiber-reactive dyes are used on cotton, silk, and wool, while acid dyes are used on nylon and silk.
There is a need in the art for a system that provides both a broad range of shading and vivid, bright, and true colors, wherein complex digital images can be faithfully printed on a range of fabrics.
In light of the foregoing, it is an object of the present invention to provide a method for printing an image on a textile directly from a digital image with specific user-defined inks.
It is also an object of the present invention to provide such a method for printing an image on a textile, wherein the user selects 8 to 16 inks to create a user-defined high-multiplicity ink set. The user-defined ink-set is linearized with user-defined calibration curves.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide such a method for printing an image on a textile, wherein the pixels of the digital image are directly correlated with the ink set using hue and shade values, without transformation into conventional color spaces, such as CIE lab, CIE xyz, CIE luv, CIE xyY, CIE uvY, or CMYK.
In addition, it is an object of the present invention to provide a system for selecting inks for printing on a textile, in which a user-defined ink set profile is used to correlate an amount of inks with hue and shade values derived directly from the pixels of a digital image defined in the RGB color space.
Moreover, it is an object of the present invention to provide an apparatus for textile printing having a plurality of inks calibrated as a user-defined ink profile that prints an amount of selected inks on a fabric based on hue and shade values from the pixels of a digital image.
Furthermore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a printed textile having a high dpi (dots per inch) count, and a broad range of color density and shading.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a printed textile with different types of dyes (e.g., acid and fiber-reactive), and yet achieve faithful reproduction of complex pictorials and images.
These and other objects of the present invention are preferably achieved by a method of reproducing a digital image on a textile including the steps of the user selecting 8 to 16 inks to form an ink set, calibrating the ink set to create an ink set profile, using the ink set profile to calculate hue-based and/or shade-based look-up tables (LUTs) that directly correlate the inks with the color space coordinates (e.g., RGB values) of the pixels of the digital image. By directly correlating the inks and the color space coordinates using hue and shade, the present method faithfully reproduces the digital image on the textile. The method may be practiced using a system and/or apparatus that provides means for performing the calibration of the ink set and direct correlation of the color space coordinates. The printed fabric has a first plurality of dots having 8 to 16 differently colored inks per dot and a second plurality of dots having one color per dot. The 8 to 16 differently colored inks are user-defined and avoid certain conventional art directed ink jet ink-set colors, particularly including gray. Significantly, the method, system, and apparatus produce a printed textile having a high level of detail, depth of color, and broad range of shading. The printed textile also has a combination of dye types that heretofore were considered incompatible. One preferred embodiment has 12 inks, which includes or provides 7 true colors, 4 pseudo-colors (i.e., a mix of two or more true colors), and black, and wherein 8 colors are fiber-reactive inks and 4 colors are acid inks.

Method for ink jet printing a digital image on a textile, the system and apparatus for practicing the method, and products produced by the system and apparatus using the method


The GCL sequence index of each cell/sector is assigned so that a difference of the indices between adjacent cells/sectors is more than N, where N≧1. During GCL index detection, the adjacent N−1 indices of an index with the largest magnitude can be deleted from handoff candidate cell indices.

In a mobile cellular network, the geographical coverage area is divided into many cells, each of which is served by a base station (BS). Each cell can also be further divided into a number of sectors. When a mobile station (MS) is powered up, it needs to search for a BS to register with. Also, when the MS finds out that the signal from the current serving cell becomes weak, it should prepare for a handover to another cell/sector. Because of this, the MS is required to search for a good BS for communication. The ability to quickly identify a BS for initial registration or handover is important for reducing the processing complexity and thus lowering the power consumption.
The cell search function is often performed based on a cell-specific reference signal (or preamble) transmitted periodically. A straightforward method is to perform an exhaustive search by trying to detect each reference signal and then determine the best BS. There are two important criteria when determining reference sequences for cells or sectors. First, the reference sequences should allow good channel estimation to all the users within its service area, which is often obtained through a correlation process with the reference of the desired cell. In addition, since a mobile will receive signals sent from other sectors or cells, a good cross correlation between reference signals is important to minimize the interference effect on channel estimation to the desired cell.
Just like auto-correlation, the cross-correlation between two sequences is a sequence itself corresponding to different relative shifts. Precisely, the cross-correlation at shift-d is defined as the result of summing over all entries after an element-wise multiplication between a sequence and another sequence that is conjugated and shifted by d entries with respect to the first sequence. "Good" cross correlation means that the cross correlation values at all shifts are as even as possible so that after correlating with the desired reference sequence, the interference can be evenly distributed and thus the desired channel can be estimated more reliably. Minimization of the maximal cross-correlation values at all shifts, which is reached when they are all equal, is refer to as "optimal" cross correlation.
Prior-art techniques, such as those described in US Patent Application Publication No. 2006/0039451 A1, (which is incorporated by reference herein) describe the use of reference sequences that are constructed from distinct "classes" of a Generalized Chirp-Like (GCL) sequence. By assigning a base station a particular index of a GCL sequence, the identification of a sequence index will therefore provide the identification of the base station.
While the above-described technique allows for a desirable reference signal, multi-path fading and inter-cell-interference may cause a detector to show an abnormally high correlation for GCL sequences having index values close to the index values being transmitted by base stations. Thus, for example, if a base station is transmitting a GCL sequence index of 25, a detector may have high correlation values to sequences 23 and 27, simply due to multi-path fading and inter-cell interference. This will lead the detector to falsely believe that there exist base stations utilizing index values 23 and 27. Therefore, a need exists for a method and apparatus for a fast cell search technique that utilizes GCL reference sequences and reduces abnormally high correlations due to multi-path fading and inter-cell interference.

Method and apparatus for fast cell search


A bus bar module is located on one end of each battery of a group of batteries that have terminals at their ends. The bus bar module includes a bus bar, which is made of a conductive metal, and electrically connects the terminals of the respective batteries in the battery group, and an insulating laminate portion that is laminated, at least on an inner surface of the bus bar facing the ends of the batteries and an outer surface, which is opposite to the inner surface of the bus bar. The insulating laminate portion has an insulating material that includes thermoplastic elastomer and/or rubber.

Electric vehicles that run on driving power of electric motors and hybrid vehicles that run on both internal combustion engines and electric motors are each mounted with a battery module, as its power source device, in which a large number of batteries are provided. As the battery module, an example thereof is disclosed in JP 4815026 B. FIG. 12 shows a cross sectional diagram of the battery module disclosed in JP 4815026 B. As shown in FIG. 12, the battery module includes a housing 950 with a lid 920, a plurality of batteries 940 housed inside the housing 950, and a bus bar module 930 disposed at one end side of the plurality of batteries 940. The bus bar module 930 is disposed between a housing chamber 990 for housing the batteries 940 within the housing 950 and a gas discharging chamber 924 in the lid 920 so as to seal the housing chamber 990. The plurality of batteries 940 is connected in parallel by the bus bar module 930 with their positive electrode caps 916 oriented toward the one end side where the bus bar module 930 is disposed. The bus bar module 930 includes a laminated plate 931 in which a heat resistant member 930a and an elastic member 930b are laminated, and a conductive connector 932 formed on a surface of the laminated plate 931. The positive electrode caps 916 are inserted in through holes 936 formed in the laminated plate 931. The positive electrode caps 916 are connected to the connectors 932.
In a lithium ion battery, sudden heat generation may take place by overcharging, over-discharging, short circuiting, and the like. In this case, an internal pressure inside the batteries may rise due to air expansion inside of the battery or generation of volatile gas from electrolytic solution, and there is a fear of resulting in a breakage. Due to this, the lithium ion battery is provided with a valve for releasing the gas upon when the internal pressure rises. In a case where the lithium ion battery has a cylindrical shape, the valve is provided at an end of this cylindrical-shaped battery in an axial direction. In an in-vehicle battery module, the housing chamber 990 is communicated with a vehicle compartment, and the gas discharging chamber 924 is communicated with outside of the vehicle. While the gas generated from the battery is caused to flow into the gas discharging chamber 924, the interval between the end of the battery 940 and the bus bar module 930 is sealed so that no gas leaks out to a driver's seat, and the housing chamber 990 is isolated from the gas discharging chamber 924.
However, the bus bar module 930 described in JP 4815026 B has a two-layer structure in which the heat resistant member 930a and the elastic member 930b are laminated, and the structure is thereby complicated.
Thus, the inventor has conducted keen investigation to develop a bus bar module with a simple configuration. During the development of the bus bar module, it was considered to insert molding a bus bar formed of a metal thin plate with a polymeric material. However, a thermal expansion coefficient of the metal bus bar is smaller than a thermal expansion coefficient of the polymeric material. Due to this, the polymeric material may shrink after the molding and an entirety of the bus bar module may warp, and the interval between the end of the battery and the bus bar module may not be sealed surely. In such a case, if the battery generates gas due to overcharging, over-discharging, internal short circuiting, or external short circuiting, the gas is discharged from the end of the battery 940 into the gas discharging chamber 924. If there is a gap between the end of the battery 940 and the bus bar module 930, the gas may leak out to the housing chamber 990 and the external periphery of the housing 950 from the gas discharging chamber 924 through the gap, and the gas may be directed into the vehicle compartment.
Further, there also is a desire to be able to absorb assembly discrepancy of the battery and the like by the bus bar module 930 by preventing the warping of the bus bar module.
To solve this problem, JP 2012-236325 A proposed fitting a stainless sheet in which a slit is formed into a cavity of a molding die and pouring molten resin therein, so that the shrinking upon the cooling of the molten resin can be alleviated by the slit.
However, the rigidity of the stainless sheet lowers due to the slit.

Bus bar module with insulating laminate portion


A router circuit for selectively connecting an input terminal of the router circuit to either a specified output terminal of the router circuit (crossbar personality) or to any of a group of output terminals of the router circuit associated with a single output channel (hyperbar personality). The router circuit is made configurable as either a crossbar switch or a hyperbar switch by dividing the router chip into sections, where each section is associated with a group of input terminals, and wherein various grant circuits within each of the sections have enable/disable input terminals connected by controllable switches to either enable/disable output terminals of grant circuits in an adjacent section (hyperbar personality) or to fixed logic levels (crossbar personality). In the crossbar configuration, for each input terminal of a section, only one grant circuit per channel is enabled. Each of the sections has a different set of grant circuits enabled per channel so that no two sections can access a same output terminal of the router chip. In the hyperbar configuration, the sections are made transparent, and grant circuits are enabled or disabled depending on output wire availability. Additionally, the router circuit contains novel routing address bit and protocol bit circuitry as well as novel diagnostic circuitry for detecting broken wires between router circuits.

Parallel processors have been developed that are based on the concurrent execution of the same instruction by a large number of relatively simple processor elements operating on respective data streams. These processors, known as single instruction, multiple data (SIMD) processors, are useful in such applications as image processing, signal processing, artificial intelligence, data base operations, and simulations.
Typically, a SIMD processor includes an array of processor elements and a routing network. The routing network selectively switches the respective outputs of the processor elements to the inputs of other processor elements or to the inputs of input/output (I/O) devices. A typical routing network may be required to selectively connect any of 1024 input terminals to any of 1024 output terminals.
The operations of the processor elements and of the routing network are controlled by a separate control processor in response to instructions and data furnished from a computer subsystem.
One switching method to selectively connect N input terminals to N output terminals uses an N.times.N crossbar switch, in which there are N.times.N switches, each of which are controllable to connect one of N horizontal input wires to one of N vertical output wires. For a 1024.times.1024 switching requirement, this would require over one million switches within the crossbar switch. A much more economical and reliable switching network, which is used in a SIMD processor, is described in International Publication Number WO 88/06764, dated Sep. 7, 1988, based on Application Number PCT/US 88/00456, filed Feb. 16, 1988, which names Grondalski as the inventor. This publication is incorporated by reference. In the SIMD processor described in the Grondalski publication, an array of 32 processor elements are located on a chip and the chips are grouped in pairs. Each processor element includes a processor and an associated memory. Each processor element is capable of processing data one bit at a time (bit mode) or four bits at a time (nibble mode).
A local interconnect network implements a nearest neighbor mechanism whereby a mesh interconnects each processor element within an array with four other processor elements within the array in order to provide rapid communications with one of the four processor elements at any given time.
In the Grondalski device, global routing network implements a random transfer mechanism whereby any processor element in a processor element array can send a message to any other processor element within another or the same array. FIG. 1 shows the routing network described in the Grondalski publication. The routing network comprises three stages 10, 20, and 30, where FIG. 1 shows one of four identical groups of the three stage routing network which operate in parallel. Each of the four groups of the routing network has the capability of switching 1024 processor element chip pair outputs to 1024 processor element chip pair inputs. In the group of switching elements shown in FIG. 1, the outputs of 1024 processor element chip pairs are applied to each of 1024 input terminals of the 16 chips comprising the first stage 10.
In the Grondalski SIMD processor, the message data generated by a processor element within a processor element chip pair is routed through the routing network of FIG. 1 by the use of routing address bits also generated by the processor element. The routing address bits control each of the routing chips in the three stages to route the message data following the router address bits to a specific processor element chip pair input. The format for the router address bits and message bits is shown in FIG. 2.
In FIG. 2, a data stream begins with a header 40 of 23 bits, namely bits (0) through (22), which identify the intended recipient processor element within the processor element chip pair, followed by the message data bits beginning with the bit (23). The header 40 includes three router control fields identified by reference numerals 42, 44, and 46, which control the routing through the switching stages 10, 20, and 30, respectively. Each switching stage 10, 20, and 30 retires one router control field, that is, it does not pass the bits in that field on to the next switching stage or to the recipient processor element chips.
Each router control field begins with protocol bit P which, when asserted, indicates that message bits follow. Special circuitry is described in the Grondalski publication to process this protocol bit P. If the protocol bit P is not received at an input terminal, the switching chips ignore succeeding signals at that input terminal during the message transmit cycle. The four RTR ADRS bits following each protocol bit are the router address bits which are used by the router to establish a switching path through the stage. As an example, assuming the first four RTR ADRS bits of header 40 outputted by a processor element connected to an input of a router chip in the first stage 10 was 0000, as shown in FIG. 1, these four RTR ADRS bits would connect that particular input to the top chip (0) of the second stage 20.
If a switching path is established through all of the three switching stages, a final protocol bit (bit 15) is received by a processor element chip pair connected to an output line of stage 30. In response, the receiving processor element chip pair generates an ACK acknowledgment signal (bit 16), which is transmitted back over the switching path established through the routing network and received by the processor element chip pair which originated the data stream. The processor element chip pair originating the data stream then uses the received ACK signal to clear a flag associated with the processor element chip pair which transmitted the ACK signal so that the message data may then be transferred.
After the flag is cleared, a 6-bit PROC ID processor identification is transmitted over the switching path. The first bit identifies one of the two processor element arrays in the chip pair which contains the processor element to receive the message, and the last five bits identify one of the 32 processor elements on the identified chip. The next bits are the message bits, which are coupled by the processor element chip's internal router control circuit to the receiving processor element.
Referring back to FIG. 1, each of the chips of the first stage 10 retires the first four RTR ADRS bits (1-4) of header 40 to select one of 16 output channels. Each of the 16 output channels, each comprising four wires, is coupled to one of 16 chips comprising the second stage 20. Thus, as many as four inputs to a particular chip in the first stage 10 may be connected to a single chip in the second stage 20.
The next four RTR ADRS bits (6-9) are retired by the second stage 20 to determine to which of the 16 output channels of the second stage chip to route the remaining data stream. Each of the 16 output channels of the second stage 20 is coupled to a 16.times.16 crossbar switch, a plurality of which comprise the third stage 30, shown in FIG. 1. Each crossbar switch has 16 inputs connectable to 16 outputs. Each of the output terminals of the crossbar switches is coupled to a processor element chip pair containing a total of 64 processor elements. The Grondalski crossbar switching chips are identical to the chips used in the first and second stages except that, in the crossbar chips, three wires in each channel are disabled. Thus, in the Grondalski crossbar switching chips, three-quarters of the chip is effectively disabled and wasted. This inefficient use of the router chips in the third stage requires Grondalski to use four times as many chips in the third stage as are used in the first or second stages.
It would be highly desirable in the field of switching networks for a switching network to not require additional circuitry for processing a protocol bit and for each router chip comprising the switching network to be efficiently configurable as either a switch having 64 inputs and 16 output channels (each channel having 4 wires each) or a crossbar switch comprising four 16.times.16 crossbar switches so as to not require any more chips in the third stage as is used in either the first stage or the second stage.

Router chip with quad-crossbar and hyperbar personalities


Compositions containing quaternary ammonium compounds in which the nitrogen atom is substituted by at least one alkyl group having at least 12 carbon atoms, where composition includes at least 20% in weight by weight of the total composition, of ammonium halides in which the nitrogen atom is substituted by at least one alkyl group having at least 14 carbon atoms and more than 5%, preferably more than 7% in weight by weight of the total composition, of ammonium halides in which the nitrogen atom is substituted by at least one alkyl group having at least 16 carbon atoms. Ophthalmic oil-in-water emulsions containing such compositions, and the ophthalmic emulsions being are useful for eye care or for the treatment of eye conditions.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to pharmaceutical, ophthalmic or cosmetic compositions containing quaternary ammonium compounds, more preferably to ophthalmic emulsions being useful for eye care or for the treatment of eye conditions. This invention also relates to compositions including at least one quaternary ammonium compound as a cationic agent.
2. Description of the Related Art
Quaternary ammonium compounds are organic compounds usually used as antiseptic or antimicrobial agents. For example, benzalkonium chloride is a nitrogenous cationic surface-acting agent belonging to the quaternary ammonium group. Benzalkonium chloride is generally defined as a mixtures of compounds of general formula C6H5CH2N(CH3)2RCl, where R is a C12-C24 alkyl group.
Benzalkonium chloride, as usually provided by the manufacturers wanting to comply with the European and/or American Pharmacopeia, is a mixture of n-alkyl dimethyl benzyl ammonium chlorides of various alkyl chain lengths. For example, FeF Chemicals A/S (Denmark) supplies, under reference 8100301U (BAK USP/NF), a mixture of three alkyl dimethyl benzyl ammonium chlorides including: (1) 60-70% of C12-alkyl dimethyl benzyl ammonium chloride (2) 30-40% of C14-alkyl dimethyl benzyl ammonium chloride, and less than 5% of C16-alkyl dimethyl benzyl ammonium chloride
Benzalkonium chloride, as a mixture of alkyl dimethyl benzyl ammonium having various alkyl chain lengths is used as preservative agent in topical ophthalmic products. Benzalkonium chloride also has cationic agent properties, and was used as cationic agents for emulsions, especially ophthalmic emulsions.
When mixtures of benzalkonium chlorides having various alkyl chain lengths are used in emulsions, they may act both as preservative agents and cationic agents. However, the toxicity of these materials renders their use problematic.


A system and method is provided which suppresses relative intensity noise in a fiber optic gyroscope by taking advantage of the frequency response of erbium fiber. In operation, the gain provided by the erbium fiber is added to the gain of the other components in the feedback loop to provide for stable loop performance up to about 250 kHz. The frequency response of the erbium fiber of about 3 kHz also provides a 6 db per octave roll-off, which, when used in a negative feedback control loop for controlling the current flowing to the gyroscope light source, allows for a relative intensity noise control loop with a bandwidth much greater than 3 kHz; this may be used in high performance gyroscope applications.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention generally relates to fiber optic gyroscopes, and methods of making and operating fiber optic gyroscopes.
2. Description of the Related Art
Fiber-optic gyroscopes are included in a powerful class of sensors which bring to measurement systems many of the advantages that optical-fiber technology has brought to communications systems. For example, the very high bandwidth of optical fibers used in fiber optic gyroscopes allows the fiber optic gyroscope to convey a large amount of measurement information through a single fiber. In addition, because optical fiber is a dielectric, it is not subject to interference from electromagnetic waves that might be present in the sensing environment. Furthermore, fiber-optic gyroscopes typically can function under adverse conditions of temperature and pressure, and toxic or corrosive atmospheres that generally erode metals at a rapid rate.
The problem inherent in many conventional fiber optic gyroscopes, however, is that they can be sensitive to excess noise disturbances at low rotation rates. For example, the well known Raleigh scattering (i.e., scattering of light due to inhomogeneities in material density smaller than a wavelength in size), polarization noise (i.e., polarization fluctuations observed via voltage fluctuations), and zero rotation drift due to the Kerr effect (i.e., the development of birefringence when an isotropic transparent substance is placed in an electrical field) are typical problems which often reduce the accuracy of the optical gyroscope output by introducing errors in rotation rate sensing.
To minimize the errors in rotation rate sensing resulting from excess noise disturbances, fiber optic gyroscope system designers typically use broadband optical sources in gyroscope system construction. More particularly, fiber optic gyroscope designers typically use broadband optical sources with a stable spectra, such as, for example, super luminescent diodes (SLDs) or super luminescent fiber sources (SLSs), etc. The downside to using these sources, however, is that due to their finite bandwidth, these broadband sources introduce an additional excess noise term into the gyro output. This, in turn, causes a reduction in performance and satisfaction of the fiber optic gyroscope systems. It is, therefore, desirable to eliminate the excess noise component introduced by the broadband source in the gyro output to achieve optimum gyroscope performance.
Unfortunately, where SLDs are implemented in fiber optic gyroscopes, the fiber optic gyroscope generally suffers from a high wavelength sensitivity to temperature, inefficient coupling to single-mode fibers, and a lack of immunity to optical feedback. Consequently, in recent years, fiber optic gyroscope designers have focused less on fiber optic gyroscope systems using SLDs and more on super luminescent fiber sources (SLSs), which do not typically exhibit most of the problems inherent in the SLDs.
For example, where SLSs are used the fiber optic gyroscope will have a more stable response over temperature ranges inside the SLS spectrum. That is, the temperature stability of the SLS spectrum (in particular, its center wavelength) is far superior to that of the SLDs, whose emission wavelength typically varies by about 0.05 nm/deg C. Furthermore, by designing with SLSs, the fiber optic gyroscope designer is capable of generating more power in an SLS than is available in an SLD. For example, in a typical SLD, the available power is approximately 30 mW, of which probably no more than a few milliwatts can be coupled to a single mode fiber. On the other hand, where a typical SLS is used, the fiber optic gyroscope designer is capable of generating approximately 40 mW to 200 mW of power. Additionally, in a practical system, unwanted spurious reflections from the source/system interface can greatly reduce the power which can be coupled to the system fiber. These reflections can be minimized in the SLS fiber device by splicing the source and system fibers with a fused glass-to-glass splice, which typically can not be realized with SLDs. Finally, the high conversion efficiency of the SLS fiber source and its broad character pump band make SLSs a beneficial choice over SLDs for many compact, laser-diode-pumped configurations.
Super luminescent fiber sources (SLSs) typically consist of a single-mode fiber with a core doped with an ionictrivalent rare earth element, such as model HG980 from Lucent Technologies in Chesterfield, Mo., a pump laser such as FLD148G3NL-S from Fujitsu of Japan, and a wavelength division multiplexer (WDM) such as model WS1415-LW from JDS Uniphase in Bloomfield, Conn. SLS""s are well known in the art, and have been advantageously used to provide broadband (e.g., on the order of 10-30 nanometers) laser-like (highly directional) light beams for multiple applications, particularly in the communications field. For a description of an exemplary super luminescent fiber source, see xe2x80x9cAmplification of Spontaneous Emission in Erbium-Doped Single-Mode Fibers,xe2x80x9d by Emmanuel Desuvrie and J. R. Simpson, published by IEEE, in xe2x80x9cJournal of Lightwave Technology,xe2x80x9d Vol. 7, No. 5, May 1989, incorporated herein by reference.
As noted, an SLS typically includes a length of single-mode fiber, with a core doped with an ionic trivalent rare earth element. For example, neodymium (Nd3+) and erbium (Er3+) are rare earth elements that may be used to dope the core of a single-mode fiber so that the core acts as a laser medium. During operation, the fiber receives a pump input signal at one end, which is provided by a pump laser. The pump input signal is typically a laser signal having a specific wavelength xcexp. The ions within the fiber core absorb the input laser radiation at wavelength xcexp so that electrons in the outer shells of these ions are excited to a higher energy state of the ions. When a sufficient pump power is input into the end of the fiber, a population inversion is created (i.e., more electrons within the ions are in the excited state than are in the ground state), and a significant amount of fluorescence builds up along the fiber in both directions. As is well known, the fluorescence (i.e., the emission of photons at a different wavelength xcexs) is due to the spontaneous return of electrons from the excited state to the ground state so that a photon at a wavelength xcexs is emitted during the transition from the excited state to the ground state. The light which is emitted at the wavelength xcexs from the fiber is highly directional light, as in conventional laser light. One main characteristic of this emission which makes it different from that of a traditional laser (i.e., one which incorporates an optical resonator), however, is that the spectral content of the light emitted from the super luminescent fiber sources is generally very broad (between 1 and 30 nanometers). Thus, the optical signal output by the fiber will typically be at wavelength xcexp +/xe2x88x92 about 15 nanometers.
The construction and operation of conventional fiber optic gyroscopes is well known, and as such, will not be discussed in detail. A typical discussion of fiber optic gyroscopes may be found in U.S. Pat. No. 5,465,149 issued Nov. 7, 1995 to Strandjord, et al., and incorporated by reference herein. For illustrative purposes, FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary fiber optic gyroscope system 100, which may be found in the prior art. In general, the optical portion of the system 100 contains several features along the optical paths to assure that this system is reciprocal. That is, when considering the system, substantially identical optical paths occur for each of the opposite direction propagating electromagnetic waves except for the specific introductions of non-reciprocal phase difference shifts, as is described below. In general, the features along the optical paths include a fiber optic light source 112, a fiber (tap) coupler 116, a multifunctional processing chip (e.g., integrated optics chip) 120, and a fiber optics coil 110, which are all variously connected by optical fiber portions 114, 118, 124 and 126.
Coiled optical fiber forms the coil 110 about a core or spool using a single mode optical fiber wrapped about the axis around which rotation is to be sensed. The use of a single mode fiber allows the paths of the electromagnetic or light waves to be defined uniquely, and further allows the phase fronts of such a guided wave to also be defined uniquely. This greatly aids maintaining reciprocity.
Light source 112 may be any broadband light source for propagating electromagnetic waves through the fiber optics system 100. This source 112 is typically a semiconductor super luminescent diode or a rare earth doped fiber light source which provides electromagnetic waves near the infrared part of the spectrum, over a range of typical wavelengths between 830 nanometers (nm) and 1550 nm. In general, source 112 will have a short coherence length for emitted light to reduce the phase shift difference errors between these waves due to Rayleigh and Fresnel scattering at scattering sites in coil 110.
Between light source 112 and fiber optic coil 110 is an optical path arrangement formed by the extension of the ends of the optical fiber forming coil 110 to some optical coupling components which separate the overall optical path into several optical path portions. As shown, optical fiber portion 114 is positioned against light source 112 at a point of optimum light emission from it, and, additionally, extends to the optical directional coupler 116 (also referred to as a optical light beam coupler or wave combiner and splitter), in which the optical fiber portion 114 ensures that the light source 112 and coupler 116 are in constant communication.
Coupler 116 has light transmission media inside which extend between four ports a, b, c, and d, which are shown on each end of coupler 116. Port a is connected to light source 112 via optical fiber 114 positioned against it. At port b, on the sense end of optical directional coupler 116 is a further optical fiber 136 which extends to be positioned against a photodetector 138.
Photodetector 138 detects electromagnetic waves, or light waves, impinging on it from optical fiber portion 136 positioned against it and provides a photo current in response to a signal component selector (not shown). This photocurrent, as indicated above, in the case of two nearly coherent impinging light waves, follows a raised cosine function in providing a photocurrent output which depends on the cosine of the phase difference between such a pair of substantially coherent light waves. This photodetector device will operate at a very low impedance to provide the photo current which is a linear function of the impinging radiation, and may typically be a p-i-n photodiode.
Also positioned against coupler 116 is an optical fiber 134, which may typically not be used in the operation of the gyroscope. Abutting against port c of coupler 116 is yet another optical fiber 118 extending to multifunctional integrated optics chip 120, including a phase modulator 128, and integrated optics waveguides 122 and 130 which form a y-junction 132. Leading from multifunctional processing chip 120 are optical fibers 124 and 126, which are connected to fiber coil 110 via waveguides 122 and 130 respectively.
Between port b of fiber coupler 116 and the gyroscope output are various photosensitive and electrical components designed to sense and generate an output corresponding to the rotational speed of fiber coil 110. This includes a photodetector 138, an analog signal conditioning device 140, an analog to digital converter (A/D) converter 142, a digital demodulator 144, and a square wave bias modulator 146, where each element is maintained in electrical communication during the processing of the fiber optic gyroscope system output. The function of each of the previously mentioned elements is well known in the art. Consequently, the elements are only briefly discussed below to aid in the understanding of the operation of the fiber optic gyroscope system 100.
Optical directional coupler (e.g., fiber coupler) 116, in receiving electromagnetic waves, or light, at any of its ports, transmits this light so that approximately half of the transmitted light appears at each of the two ports of the coupler 116 on its end opposite that end having the incoming port. On the other hand, no such waves or light is transmitted to the port which is on the same end of coupler 112 as is the incoming light port. For example, light received at port a will be transmitted to ports c and d, but not to port b. Similarly, light received at port c will be transmitted to ports a and b, but will not be transmitted to port d, and so on.
Therefore, during operation, light source 112 transmits a broadband light wave to port a of coupler 116 via optic fiber 114. Fiber coupler 116 splits the transmitted light and provides the light to ports c and d, where the light provided to port d typically may not be used by the gyroscope. The light provided to port c, however is further transmitted to multifunctional integrated optics chip 120 via optic fiber 118, where the light wave is further split at y-junction 132 and provided to waveguides 122 and 130.
The light provided to waveguide 122 is transmitted to fiber coil 110, via optic fiber 124, where it propagates clockwise around the length of fiber coil 110 (hereinafter, xe2x80x9cthe cw wavexe2x80x9d). Similarly, the light wave in waveguide 130 is provided to fiber coil 110 via optic fiber 126, where the light wave propagates counterclockwise around the length of fiber coil 110 (hereinafter, xe2x80x9cthe ccw wavexe2x80x9d).
After being transmitted from fiber coil 110 to multifunctional integrated optics chip 120 via optic fibers 124 and 126, respectively, the ccw and cw wave are combined at y-junction 132 before being further provided to port c of fiber coupler 116 via optic fiber 118. As noted above, once the two light waves are provided to port c, the waves are then provided to ports a and b, but not provided to port d.
Port b is further connected to photodetector 138 via optic fiber 136 such that the ccw and cw light waves are received at the photodetector 138, which in turn, provides an output photocurrent i to analog signal conditions unit 140. The value of photocurrent i is proportional to the intensity of the two electromagnetic waves or light waves impinging on the photodetector 138. Therefore, the photocurrent i is expected to follow the cosine of the phase difference between the two waves which impinging on the detector 138.
In the prior art arrangement depicted, the output signal from photodetector 138 may be converted to a voltage and amplified at analog signal conditioning unit 140 (ASC). The output voltage signal may then be further provided to an analog to digital converter 142 where it is converted to a digital signal prior to being passed to PSD/digital demodulator 144. PSD/digital demodulator 144, serving as part of a phase demodulation system, is a well known device. Such a PSD/digital demodulator 144 extracts the amplitude of the fundamental frequency fb of the photodetector 138 output signal, or the fundamental frequency of modulation signal generator 146 plus higher odd harmonics, to provide an indication of the relative phase of the electromagnetic waves impinging on photodetector 138. This information is provided by PSD/digital demodulator 144, as the output of the gyroscope.
Typically, gyroscopic designers seeking to minimize excess noise (e.g., xe2x80x9crelative intensity noisexe2x80x9d) employ techniques which seek to phase modulate the light counterpropagating within the fiber coil so that the working point for signal measurement is always in the characteristic range of maximum measuring signal change per rotation rate change. That is, designers seeking to maximize the sensitivity of the gyroscope to sensing angular rotations must consider the maximum modulation which can occur for a particular gyroscope configuration, in order to maximize the gyroscope""s sensitivity. Various conventional relative intensity noise or excess noise suppression techniques are described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,204,921 issued Mar. 20, 2001 to Strandjord et al., and incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
One type of excess noise reduction technique found in the prior art, called the xe2x80x9csubtractionxe2x80x9d technique, is illustrated with reference to FIG. 2, in which like character references as that of FIG. 1 indicate similar components of similar operation. Unlike what is depicted in FIG. 1, the portion of the light source 112 directed to port d of coupler 116 is utilized. That is, the light signal which is directed to optical fiber portion 134 is further provided to a second photodetector 250, where the signal is converted into a second photocurrent. The second photocurrent generated by photodetector 250 is further provided to a variable gain amplifier 251, where it is amplified prior to being provided to an analog adder 253.
In similar manner, coupler 116 provides a light signal to a first photodetector 138 via port b and fiber optic fiber portion 136. First photodetector 138 then converts the signal into a first photocurrent which is then provided to analog adder 253. Analog adder 253 may be any conventional adder for combining analog signals. Therefore, at analog adder 253, the first photocurrent and second photocurrent are summed to produce a summed photocurrent for providing to ASC 116.
For ideal optical components, the excess noise observed at first and second photodetectors 138 and 250, respectively, is correlated. That is, for a fiber optic gyroscope operating with a bias modulation at the coil eigen frequency, the excess noise at photodetector 138 occurring at the eigen frequency including odd harmonics will be 180 degrees out-of-phase with the noise at photodetector 250 occurring at the same frequencies. Therefore, by adding a properly gain adjusted signal from photodetector 250 to the signal from photodetector 138, the noise at the output of the adder 253 associated with excess noise will be reduced to zero at the eigen frequency and odd harmonics for a gyro employing ideal components. However, imperfections in real optical components such as polarization crosstalk will limit how much the excess noise is actually reduced.
An additional disadvantage of the xe2x80x9csubtractionxe2x80x9d technique is that, in order to have a high level of excess noise reduction, the amplitude adjustment of the signal from photodetector 250 must be relatively accurate. In particular, the amount of amplitude adjustment depends on many system parameters, such as, the responsivity of photodetectors 138 and 250, the gain of the amplifier 251, the bias modulation amplitude and optical loss in the wave propagating path from fiber coupler 116 through multifunction chip 122 and fiber coil 110 and back through the fiber coupler 116 to photodetectors 138 and 250. Moreover, it is important to note that these systems"" error in amplitude adjustment will increase as the system parameters change over time with the aging of the gyro.
The change in system parameters becomes even more pronounced in systems employing high performance fiber optic gyroscopes, such as space applications which are exposed to radiation or submarine navigation applications which encounter an aging mechanism in the coil fiber that causes increased optical loss over time. In those systems, the amplitude adjustment made on the signal from detector 250 must typically be updated in order to track the drift which often readily occurs with regard to the noted system parameters. Consequently, the updating of the parameters is typically done by using a variable gain amplifier where the gain control 252 is adjusted based on a ratiometric measurement of the light detected at the photodetectors 138 and 250. As should be understood, the variable gain amplifier and circuits used to perform the ratiometeric measurements adds undesirable complexity to the design and operation of the gyroscope.
It should be noted, however, that the disadvantages inherent in the xe2x80x9csubtractionxe2x80x9d technique may typically be overcome by implementing an excess noise servo. In general, employing an excess noise servo typically involves providing a portion of the superfluorescent fiber light source to the servo, which, in turn, uses the provided light to control the light source pump current (e.g., negative feedback). In this way, the light output intensity of the superfluorescent fiber light source becomes a function of the pump current, such that, random fluctuations in the intensity of the light output may be cancelled by applying the appropriate changes in pump current levels.
However, where a high performance fiber optic gyroscope used erbium fiber, it was believed that using the subtraction technique with servo control was impracticable. That is, it should be understood that the typical bias modulation frequency fb of conventional high-performance fiber optic gyroscopes may be around 20 kHz to 50 kHz. In addition, one skilled in the art will understand that the fundamental demodulation frequency of a conventional high-performance fiber optic gyroscope may be the same as the bias modulation frequency. As shown by equation (1) below, the demodulator output noise depends on the input noise at the fundamental frequency and odd harmonics. Therefore, a careful inspection of equation (1) reveals that to reduce the effect of excess noise on angle random walk, the excess noise is typically reduced at the demodulation frequency fundamental, 3 rd and 5 th harmonics.                               σ          out                =                              R            f                                          G            A                              B                                                              ∑                                  i                  =                  0                                ∞                                                          xe2x80x83                                                                            (                                                                                G                        f                                                                                [                                                                              (                                                                                2                                                                i                                                            +                              1                                                        )                                                                                f                            b                                                                          ]                                                                                1                                                                        2                                                    i                                                +                        1                                                                                i                        n                                                                                [                                                                              (                                                                                2                                                                i                                                            +                              1                                                        )                                                                                f                            b                                                                          ]                                                                              )                                2                                                                        (        1        )
For high performance erbium fiber optic gyroscopes, however, it was believed that reducing the excess noise of the gyroscopic system at the demodulation fundamental, 3 rd and 5 th harmonics was impracticable because the upper state lifetime of the erbium fiber (e.g., erbium atoms) would limit how fast the output light could be controlled. That is, previously, fiber optic gyroscope designers thought that after about 100 hertz, the frequency response of the erbium fiber would be ineffectual for controlling the excess noise output of the gyroscope via the pump current. Moreover, it was believed that the light output of the erbium fiber light source couldn""t be controlled fast enough to manage intensity variations in the 20 kHz to 50 kHz range. Furthermore, the designers believed that the bandwidth within which an excess noise servo could operate in a system using erbium doped optical fiber would be limited to less than 100 Hz.
Recent experimentation on the frequency response of erbium fiber, however, has yielded different and unexpected results. Namely, it was discovered that the frequency response of the erbium fiber after the cutoff frequency was suitable for use in fiber-optic gyroscope technology in that the roll off after the cutoff frequency permitted increased control of the relative intensity noise servo. For example, it was discovered that after the cut-off frequency of the erbium fiber (e.g., the 3 kHz cutoff frequency, when a pump intensity power was provided from the pump at a wavelength of 1480 nm, and this was provided to the erbium fiber which emitted light at a wavelength of 1550 nm), the intensity rolloff of the pump-erbium fiber combination was only 6 db/octave, which made it manageable to construct a stable control loop. If the rolloff was too high, then the control loop would not be useable. Consequently, it was discovered that the unexpected characteristics of the erbium fiber allows construction of a relative intensity noise servo with a bandwidth of at least 100 KHz to 500 kHz. This, in turn, provides a noise reduction realization of a factor of 4 at the output of the fiber optic gyroscope demodulator.
Until now, the use of the properties of the erbium fiber to enhance the gain in the fiber optic system has gone untried because of the erroneous belief that the relatively long upper-state life-time of the erbium atoms would limit any control of light intensity to well below 1 kHz. Hence, a need existed for a system for use in reducing the excess noise of gyroscopic system at the demodulation fundamental, 3 rd and 5 th harmonics which allows additional control of the angle random walk and relative intensity noise by capitalizing on the gain provided the gyroscope by the erbium fiber. Presently known control methods for controlling excess noise gyroscopes using erbium remain inadequate, particularly in their ability to limit excess noise and provide pump current control at low frequencies.
Various embodiments of methods and systems are provided for reducing relative intensity noise in a high performance fiber optic gyroscope, which addresses many of the shortcomings of the prior art. Particularly, various methods and systems are provided for reducing the excess noise present in a erbium-doped fiber optic gyroscope by manipulating the intensity of the light provided by an erbium-doped light source in response to the gain attributable to the gain characteristics of the erbium-doped fiber.
In accordance with various aspects of the system, the present invention provides a system for suppression of relative intensity noise in a fiber optic gyroscope in which the system takes advantage of the frequency response of an erbium fiber to control variations in pump current, and thus control fluctuations in the gyroscopic light source. Particularly, various embodiments use the erbium fiber frequency response to facilitate a stable control loop feed back design for controlling the pump current. More particularly, the invention takes advantage of the recent discovery that the frequency response of erbium fiber above 3 kHz closely mimics an integrator with a 6 dB/octave rolloff, which allows for a relative intensity noise control loop with a bandwidth much greater than 3 kHz. With this type of frequency response, a stable loop with positive gain in the frequency range of 20 kHz to 200 kHz, or higher, is provided.
In accordance with one exemplary aspect, a portion of the erbium fiber light source (e.g., xe2x80x9clight signalxe2x80x9d) is provided to a photodetector for detecting the fluctuations in the light intensity of the erbium light source. The photodetector converts the light signal into an electrical signal prior to the signal being amplified. A constant direct current (dc) signal is impressed upon the amplified signal and then the combined signal is further provided to the current control input of a pump injection current driver, the output of which is the injection current supplied to the pump laser for conversion into optical power. The optical power is then provided to the erbium fiber light source which, in turn, causes the erbium fiber to emit light at a wavelength representative of a nominal intensity level.
In accordance with another aspect of the invention, the fluctuations in light intensity caused by the existence of excess noise or relative intensity noise is reduced via a control loop in which the amount of reduction is a function of the open loop gain of the control loop. The open loop gain of the control loop is enhanced by the additional gain provided to the loop due to the erbium fiber.
In accordance with yet another aspect of the invention, a servo control is provided to facilitate the control of the intensity fluctuations of an erbium-doped light source in response to the gain to the overall system attributable to the erbium-doped light source.

Relative intensity noise controller with maximum gain at frequencies at or above the bias modulation frequency or with second order feedback for fiber light sources


The dispenser of a solid or paste product to be spread includes a reservoir (1) containing the product (P), which is made available by a drive mechanism manually controlled by the user, the reservoir (1) being a tube the interior of which is cylindrical, the tube including a dispensing opening (4), and a product (P) being disposed in the tube between the dispensing opening (4) and a displaceable piston (5), the translation of the piston (5) being obtained by means of the drive mechanism, the drive mechanism including a rod (6) at the end of which the piston (5) is engaged, the piston (5) being pierced, from its face (10) closest to the product (P) to its face facing the drive mechanism, by at least one conduit (11). The edge of the dispensing opening (4) are at least partly covered with a layer of an air-permeable material that serves to apply the product (P), the layer (8) being positioned over the edge.

Dispensers of this kind are already known and have been available to consumers for a long time. The piston that drives the product to be ejected translationally is generally mounted at the end of a threaded rod that cooperates with a nut integrally attached to the dispenser. The rod is in turn driven to rotate incrementally via a pushbutton actuated by the user (see U.S. Pat. No. 4,624,594, for example and U.S. Pat. No. 4,954,000, Granted Sept. 4, 1990.
Filling such a dispenser presents practical problems at the present time. The part of the dispenser including the drive mechanism has a relatively high production cost. To prevent improper handling during filling from making the dispenser unusable and hence unsaleable, it is generally kept separate from the reservoir portion at the moment it is filled. The two parts of the dispenser are then assembled later. It is in this assembly that the difficulty arises, particularly when the piston carried by the rod must be threaded into the tube of the reservoir. When the piston engages the rear end of the reservoir, the layer of air between the end of the product and the face of the piston facing the product is trapped. To expel this layer of air from the reservoir through the spaces existing between the piston and the wall of the reservoir, major effort must be exerted on the piston, with the risk of damaging the dispenser and crushing the product. Moreover, if a layer of air remains between the product and the piston, the action of the piston will necessarily be damped, and its response to manual actions by the user will be altered. Moreover, in the case of a cosmetic product, contact with the trapped air tends to alter the product.

Piston dispenser for paste or solid products


Energy-saving drive apparatus for DC loads including a blocking oscillator, an amplifier, an AC-DC-converter, a voltage comparator, a current comparator, and a signal feedback circuit. The DC power produced by all kinds of batteries pass through the blocking oscillator and the amplifier to obtain an amplified signal voltage that is then converted into DC voltage and current. Meanwhile, the voltage comparator and the current comparator are connected at an output terminal of the AC-DC-converter. The signal feedback circuit obtains a load signal voltage from the load. After a feedback operation, a comparison voltage and a comparison current are transmitted to the input terminal of the voltage comparator and the current comparator. After the different signal voltages and currents are compared, analyzed, edited and sorted, a constant voltage circuit between the load and the voltage comparator as well as a constant current circuit between the load and the current comparator give out a corrected constant voltage value and a corrected constant current value, respectively, for re-driving the load. Therefore, the voltage and current impedance of the load can be matched to each other by the correcting process of the signal voltage and current for achieving an optimal and efficient power-saving output state.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to an energy-saving drive apparatus for DC loads, and more particularly to an energy-saving drive apparatus that ensures a full use of power by the control of an energy converter for achieving the energy-saving effect.
2. Description of the Related Art
Both the light energy and the electric energy are indispensable for the modern life. For example, the outdoor Christmas lamps require an electric cord for transmitting the electric energy to the lamps for lighting purpose. Moreover, many objects in our daily life also require electric energy. They are ready and practical for indoor use when they are connected via electric cords to mains socket. To the contrary, they can be problematic when used outdoors since they require a very long extension cord. Among these objects, they may require a mini motor as drive source. It is a time-wasting and labor-wasting task to establish an electric connection between the mini motor and the mains socket by the electric cord. Besides, the electric cord will destroy the appearance of the environment.
Therefore, many products are designed in such a way that they are driven by batteries. However, the batteries have the restricted service life. When they are used as power source for feeding current to loads like the outdoor lighting source, mini motor, etc. the battery will rapidly be exhausted. This does not meet the economic benefit. However, there are many loads that are used outdoors and driven by low voltage and current. To fit them with an energy-saving drive circuit for minimizing their loss and achieving the power-saving effect will meet the requirement of economic benefit no matter if primary, secondary or solar batteries are used as power source. In this way, a convenient, safe, and eco-friendly use is guaranteed.
For example, the semiconductor diode is one of the basic components in the electronic system. Its application scope can range from simple to complicated field. The rectifying function of the household appliances, for instance, is achieved by the one-way on-state function of the diode. Besides, the back light module of mobile phones and LCDs, the outdoors Christmas light, advertising board, traffic light, etc. make use of LEDs. Therefore, the LED becomes a very important light-emitting apparatus. In addition, LEDs have the advantages of small volume, low power consumption and prolonged service life. In near future, the LEDs may replace the conventional bulbs as lighting source.
However, high temperature will be created when LEDs light up for a long time, thereby affecting the luminance (Lu). Previously, the way to light up the LEDs is to directly feed the DC current to the LEDs. Thereafter, the LEDs give out visible light when excitated. LEDs are mainly made of GaAsP or GaP. The wavelength and the color of the emitting light is different depending upon material used. For example, the LEDs made of GaAsP emit the red light while the LEDs made of GaP emit light in color between yellow and green. As shown in FIG. 1A, the luminous intensity of the light emitted by LEDs is directly proportional to their on-state current. Thus, as shown in FIG. 1B, the luminance (Lu) is adjustable according to the input low (L) DC current (I) or the input high (H) DC current (I). However, high temperature will be created in a short time by lighting up LEDs for a long time. Accordingly, the luminance of LEDs will be lessened when a suitable cooling device is not available, thereby reducing their operational reliability.
Furthermore, some DC loads like mini-motors used as power source for certain products don't achieve the expected power efficiency since the DC power source can't ensure a voltage and current impedance matching of the load at the output terminal according to the load features for minimizing the loss.
How to resolve the problems of the above-mentioned DC loads like lighting sources or mini-motors is the main topic of the invention.


The present invention relates to a demounting device comprising a support member translatable along a movement axis (y-y), drive means for the support member, a tool-holder arm (3) borne by the support member (2), an abutment element (4) and a hook-like extraction member (5) both supported by the tool-holder arm (3), the abutment element (4) having a substantially flat work surface (4a), whereas the hook-like extraction member (5) is suitable for being moved in a substantially transverse direction with respect to the rotation axis (x-x) of a rim (W).

Normally, in order to demount a tire from a rim, the bead breaking of the beads of the tire is first carried out. Then, a first bead of the tire is demounted by forcing it to be gradually brought beyond or outside the edge of the rim adjacent thereto; the rim is then turned until the first bead is completely demounted. At this point, in order to complete the demounting, it is necessary to move the second bead close to the edge of the rim (from which the first bead was demounted), bring the second bead beyond the bead itself, and then proceed in a manner analogous to that carried out for the first bead.
To perform the above, tire mounting-demounting machines have been proposed which are equipped with a rotatable disc designed to push the second bead of the tire from the outside in the direction of the rotation axis of the tire itself, the first bead of such tire having already been demounted. The second bead is pushed until it is brought to abut from the inside against the edge of the rim from which the first bead was demounted. With the rotatable disc, it is not possible to complete the demounting of the second bead by simply rotating the rim, since such disc has its rotation axis substantially parallel to the rotation axis of the rim and thus of the tire, so that during the rotation of the rim, the disc tends to move away from the rim due to the tangential force applied thereto. In order to complete the demounting of the second bead, therefore, an operator must manually intervene. This of course involves considerable physical force for the operator, with the risk of ruining the rim or the tire in case of imprecise or incorrect handling.
Demounting heads or devices have also been proposed that are capable of carrying out all the demounting operations of the second bead of a tire in an automatic manner, hence without requiring the manual intervention of the operator. The European patent EP-1 314 584 teaches a working head comprising a bead breaking roller and a curved tool which can be moved with respect to the roller by means of an actuator along a substantially curved trajectory. More particularly, the tool has a free working end and can be moved between a rest position that is retracted with respect to the roller and a work position in which its free end projects with respect to the roller.
The working head can be used for bead breaking and demounting both the first and the second bead of a tire from a respective rim. With particular reference to the demounting of the second bead, after having bead broken and demounted the first bead, i.e. after having brought it beyond the respective edge of the rim, the head is brought outside the other bead of the tire, and then brought close thereto, in a manner such that the roller is abutted against a portion of the latter bead and pushes it substantially in axial direction up to the level of the first bead of the rim.
At this point, the tool is commanded to come out, in a manner such that its free end is inserted between the free end of the roller and the first edge of the rim in a direction substantially parallel to the rim axis, and it grips a portion of the second bead of the tire. Then, in order to complete the demounting of the second bead of the tire, it is sufficient to rotate the rim.
Such solution, even if it allows demounting the tire from the respective rim in a very efficient manner, is rather complex and costly to obtain.

Device for demounting the second bead of a tire from a rim and respective demounting method