The present disclosure provides an additive system for use in protein PEGylation. The additive system includes p-aminobenzoic hydrazide used either alone or in combination with aromatic amines, such as 3,5-diaminobenzoic acid, or with ammonium salts such as ammonium chloride or ammonium acetate. The disclosed additive combination provides several benefits including increased reaction rates, higher yields and reduction in the aminoxy-PEG equivalents required to complete the conjugation reaction. Typical reactions can be run by combining the additive or additive system with a solution of a protein and aminoxy-PEG reagent. The solution is adjusted to pH 4 and held at 20-25° C. without stirring until completion, typically within 24 hours.

The PEGylation of proteins is a conjugation process that involves the attachment of a polyethylene glycol derivative to a therapeutic protein to improve its stability and pharmacokinetics by reducing clearance rates and providing a steric shield from proteolytic enzymes and immune system recognition (Roberts, M. J. et al., Adv. Drug Delivery Rev, 54:459 (2002)). In general, the PEGylation technologies can be classified into two types, namely random and site-specific conjugations. Random PEGylations arbitrarily link the PEGylating reagent to reactive amino acids such as lysine or cysteine to afford a mixture of PEGylated products. In contrast, site-specific conjugations exploit the unambiguous reactivity of a native functionality (e.g., the N- or C-terminal groups) or an unnatural amino acid (e.g., p-acetylphenylalanine—pAcF) to control the location and number of PEG residues attached to the protein. Site specific conjugation reaction involving ketoxime formation between a PEGylating reagent and a pAcF residue is incorporated in the substrate protein via expansion of the genetic code (Liu, C. C. et al., Annu. Rev. Biochem., 79:413 (2010); Tian, F. et al., "Accelerants for the modification of non-natural amino acids and non-natural amino acid polypeptides", U.S. Pat. No. 7,468,458 (Dec. 23, 2008)). Despite their and demonstrated utility, conjugations based on the formation of ketoximes suffer from slow rates and incomplete conversions (Crisalli, P. et al., J Org. Chem., 78:1184 (2013)). Attempts to improve ketoxime formation include the use of excess PEGylating reagent, high temperatures, or high concentrations of toxic catalysts. These solutions, however, introduce additional steps to eliminate the excess PEGylating reagent or toxic catalyst from the product and often compromise the stability of the protein. Additionally, the old methods do not use additives, use a denaturant (urea), and/or use acetylhydrazide (AcNHNH2) as the additive. AcNHNH2 and related structures have been defined in PCT Publication No. WO 2007/056448.
What is now needed in the art are new methods to upgrade the yield and rates for the PEGylation of proteins (Relaxin and FGF21) containing a pAcF residue by examining the mechanistic principles that effect stalling and by identifying new additives that accelerate the reaction and promote high conversions at low PEG: protein molar ratios. The methods should be economical, promote higher conversions with considerably lower amounts of PEGylating reagent, promote faster reactions that circumvent the need for high reaction temperatures and elimination of genotoxic material.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Additive systems for use in protein PEGylation


A method of accessing local applications when roaming on a NFC mobile device may include creating a first partition and a second partition on a secure element (SE) of a subscriber identification module (SIM) of a near field communication (NFC) enabled device. The home TSM separates the first partition and the second partition by public key encryption. The home TSM generates cryptographic keys in response to a request by a roaming TSM for access to the second partition of the SIM. Following the exchange of security keys, the home TSM delegates to the roaming TSM access to the second partition of the SIM.

In a Near-Field Communications (NFC) mobile device ecosystem, a Trusted Service Manager (TSM) acts an intermediary between an application or services provider, the Managed Network Operator (MNO), and the MNO's customer, who is the user of the NFC mobile device. Upon request from the user, the TSM installs an application on the NFC mobile device so long as the user's MNO shares the cryptographic keys with the TSM and allows the access. However, a user traveling outside his home MNO, such as in another country, will not be able to take advantage of local NFC-enabled services since the local MNO and TSM will not have security access to the Secure Element (SE) on the user's NFC mobile device.
It may therefore be desirable, among other things, for a user to be able to access local applications when roaming using a NFC mobile device.

Accessing local applications when roaming using a NFC mobile device

International Business Machines Corporation


Disclosed are methods, assemblies and devices useful for identifying the location and/or motion of a mobile device in a specified area, for assisting in mapping a specified area and also to methods, assemblies and devices for determining a location of anchors found at fixed locations in a specified area.

The invention, in some embodiments, relates to the field of mapping and location determination, and more particularly, but not exclusively, to methods, assemblies and devices useful for identifying the location and/or motion of a mobile device in a specified area, for assisting in mapping a specified area and also to methods, assemblies and devices for determining a location of anchors found at fixed locations in a specified area.
There is often a need to determine the location of an object found in a specified area with great accuracy. For example, in the field of Location-Based Services (LBS), it is often required to known the location of a person with great accuracy.
An inertial navigation system (INS) is a navigation aid that uses a processor and various sensors to continuously calculate the position, orientation, and velocity of a moving object without the need for external references. INS is often used on vehicles such as ships, aircraft, submarines, guided missiles, and spacecraft.
Simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM), is a technique used to generate a map of an unknown environment, or to update and improve a map of a known environment, while at the same time keeping track of the current location of a device generating the map. In typical known implementations of SLAM, landmarks are used to identify a relative position of the device within the area, and optionally then calculate the distance of the device from such landmarks. The utility of known SLAM techniques is limited in an indoor environment due to the lack of suitable landmarks.

Ariel-University Research and Development Company Ltd.


In order to eliminate unwanted crystal defects generated by an ion implantation, a semiconductor substrate or an epitaxial layer, which is selectively subjected to an impurity ion implantation, is heat-treated in an inert gas atmosphere at 850.degree. to 1050.degree. C. to recrystallize the implanted region. Thereafter, the semiconductor substrate is heat-treated at 900.degree. to 1250.degree. C. in an atmosphere containing oxygen. For eliminating abnormal growth of grain boundaries in a polycrystalline semiconductor layer deposited on an insulating film the semiconductor layer is heat-treated at 900.degree. to 1100.degree. C. in an atmosphere containing oxygen. By applying at least one of these processes to usual fabrication methods, semiconductor devices with high reliabilty such as power MOSFETs will be provided.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of manufacturing a semiconductor device, and more particularly to a method of manufacturing a semiconductor device including at least one of processes containing a process for heat-treating an impurity region provided by implanting impurity ions into a semiconductor substrate and a process for activating a polycrystalline semiconductor layer deposited on an insulation film.
2. Description of the Related Art
When a semiconductor region of a predetermined conductivity type is formed in an epitaxial layer or a semiconductor substrate of single crystal by an ion-implantation technique, the epitaxial layer is subjected to damage, and the ion-implanted region becomes amorphous. For diffusing the implanted impurity into the epitaxial layer, a heat treatment is usually performed in a nitrogen gas atmosphere at about 1200.degree. C. for three hours. During this treatment, there occurs a damage recovery phenomenon wherein the amorphous region is restored to a single crystal state. However, inventors have found that since the heat treatment requires a high temperature and a long time, high density crystal defects are generated in the epitaxial layer or semiconductor substrate, depending upon unwanted nuclei caused by the damage due to the ion-implantation and by contamination in the manufacturing process. The crystal defects may decrease the breakdown voltage of semiconductor devices such as power MOSFETs (power MOS field effect transistors), or may increase an undesirable leakage current.
A polycrystalline semiconductor layer, such as a polysilicon layer provided on an insulation film, has been used as an electrode or an interconnection layer in various semiconductor devices including integrated circuits. Though, the polysilicon layer has been activated in a nitrogen atmosphere, the grain boundaries of the polysiicon layer are abnormally grown according to conditions of treating time and temperature. The abnormally-grown grain boundaries are very easily oxidized and, for example, they are easily oxidized in a thermal diffusion process. When the polysilicon layer having the oxidized grain boundaries is subjected to etching after the activation treatment, the grain boundaries are removed by an etchant and unwanted pin-holes are formed in the insulation film provided under the polysilicon layer. In a MOS semiconductor device, when the polysilicon layer is used as a gate electrode, pinholes are provided in an underlying gate oxide film, thereby bringing unwanted insulation deterioration between the gate electrode and the source or drain region.
At any rate, the problems described above may reduce the reliability and the yield of semiconductor devices.

Method of manufacturing semiconductor device


A printed wiring board includes a board body that includes a signal line embedded at a predetermined wiring position and a through hole electrically connected to the signal line, and a connector that includes a connector plate including a connection terminal electrically connected to the signal line via the through hole, and electrically connects the connection terminal to the signal line by insertion of the connection terminal of the connector plate into the through hole in a direction of one of a front surface and a rear surface of the board body according to a wiring position of the signal line so that a transmission path of the connection terminal on a stub side is shorter than a transmission path of the connection terminal on an input and output side.

In recent years, printed wiring boards configured highly densely by a multi-layer structure have been used. A connector for high-speed transmission is mounted on an end of a printed wiring board. Thus, by mounting the connector for high-speed transmission on the printed wiring board, high-speed transmission is enabled between the printed wiring board and another board via the connector.
Hereinafter, an overview of the configuration of a connector will be described with reference to FIGS. 11 to 13. FIG. 11 is a perspective view illustrating the outer appearance of a printed wiring board. FIG. 12 is a plan view illustrating a connector in FIG. 11. FIG. 13 is a sectional view taken along the line A-A of FIG. 12.
As illustrated in FIGS. 11 to 13, a connector 10 is mounted on the end of a printed wiring board 1 and is configured by joining and combining a plurality of connector plates 11 (six connector plates in FIGS. 11 and 12) with a blade shape. When the plurality of connector plates 11 is joined to each other, the joined connector plates 11 are integrally fixed by fixing plates 25.
The connector plate 11 is formed of a resin plate that has an entire thin plate shape and a substantial L shape and includes an upper-side plate 12 and a lateral-side plate 13. A connector pin 20 that is electrically connected to a signal line 4 embedded in a board body 2 of the printed wiring board 1 is installed inside the connector plate 11.
The connector pin 20 includes a plurality of a pin members 21 (three pin members in FIG. 13). The pin member 21 includes connection pins 22 that extend in a predetermined direction (the lower side in FIGS. 11 and 13) and pin terminals 23 that are disposed in concave portions 14 of the lateral-side plate 13. The connection pins 22 of the connector pin 20 serve as input/output terminals of an electric signal transmitted from the signal line 4 of the printed wiring board 1. The pin terminals 23 of the connector pin 20 serve input/output terminals that input and output an electric signal transmitted from the connection pins 22 to connector pins of another connector (not illustrated).
As illustrated in FIG. 13, the connector 10 is press-fitted and fixed to a predetermined position (an end in FIG. 13) of the printed wiring board 1. That is, an electric signal transmitted from the signal line 4 of the printed wiring board 1 is transmitted to another connector via the connection pins 22 and the pin terminals 23 of the connector pin 20 of the connector 10. An electric signal from another connector is transmitted to the signal line 4 of the printed wiring board 1 via the connection pins 22 and the pin terminals 23 of the connector pin 20 of the connector 10.    Patent Document 1: Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2003-283093    Patent Document 2: Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 11-251539
However, the connector plates 11 included in the connector 10 use a method of press-fitting and fixing the connector pins 20 from one side (the front surface L side in FIGS. 11, 12, and 13) to the printed wiring board 1. Therefore, there is a problem that an electric signal transmitted from the signal line 4 of the printed wiring board 1 or an electric signal transmitted through another connector may be attenuated due to the influence of a stub to be described below, and thus transmission quality or transmission efficiency of the electric signal may deteriorate.
That is, as illustrated in FIG. 13, the signal line 4 provided in the printed wiring board 1 is embedded in the board body 2 in the horizontal direction (traverse direction in FIG. 13). Further, through holes 3 formed in the printed wiring board 1 are through holes that penetrate the board body 2 in the vertical direction (the longitudinal direction in FIG. 13).
Therefore, when the connector 10 is press-fitted and fixed to the printed wiring board 1, the through holes 3 of the printed wiring board 1 are connected to the connection pins 22 of the connector pins 20 of the connector plates 11, and thus signal transmission paths between the signal line 4 and the connector 10 are formed. In this case, however, the transmission paths of an electric signal transmitted from the signal line 4 or an electric signal transmitted from another connector are branched in two directions.
Specifically, one transmission path (transmission path branched to the lower side in FIG. 13) of the transmission paths branched in two directions becomes a stub. As illustrated in FIG. 13, when the signal line 4 of the printed wiring board 1 is embedded at a position close to the front surface L side of the board body 2, the length of the stub is longer than the length of the transmission path directly transmitted from the signal line 4 via the connection pin 22.
That is, due the influence of the stub, the electric signal transmitted from the signal line 4 by the stub or the electric signal transmitted from another connector is reflected at the front end of the stub via the transmission path by the stub. Then, an attenuation phenomenon in which the electric signal is attenuated occurs due to the resonance of the signal reflected in this way. Thus, the deterioration in the transmission quality or transmission efficiency of the electric signal of the signal line 4 may cause deterioration in high-speed of signal transmission.
Further, when the transmission path of the stub side is long and the transmission speed is high, the electric signal is easily attenuated. That is, there is a problem that the attenuation phenomenon of the electric signal caused due to the stub may easily occur in a high-speed transmission path.
In recent years, as an LSI (Large Scale Integration) has a high function, the number of signal lines 4 embedded in the printed wiring board 1 increases and the plate thickness of the board is thickened, and thus the length of the stub side is lengthened. For this reason, a connector suppressing an adverse influence caused due to the stub is preferably realized.
Accordingly, to resolve the adverse influence caused due to the stub, a back drill process of scraping off a part of the stub is performed through counter-boring by a back drill. However, when the back drill process is performed, there are problems that a working process may become complicated, a yield ratio may be reduced due to an extra work, and a manufacturing cost of the printed wiring board may increase.

Printed wiring board and connector, and method for manufacturing printed wiring board


In an embodiment of the invention, a host or other controller writing to multiple DRAMs in a DIMM configuration determines whether there is full write request to at least one of the multiple DRAM's and a partial write request to at least another one of the multiple DRAM's. If so, then the host parses data associated with the full write request into a first portion and a second portion. The host then outputs a first partial write command associated with the first portion and a second partial write command associated with the second portion to the DIMM. Other embodiments are described.

In the interest of data transfer efficiencies, it is sometimes desirable to perform partial data writes from a host to a DRAM or other memory device. Conventional approaches require the addition of a data mask or other signal line between the host and the memory device, however, which is counterproductive to achieving high-density packaging. Moreover, known methods are not well-suited for writing data to DRAM devices in a DIMM configuration. Improved systems and methods are therefore needed for executing full and partial data writes to a DIMM.

System and method for executing full and partial writes to DRAM in a DIMM configuration


Mapping tasks to physical processors in parallel computing system may include partitioning tasks in the parallel computing system into groups of tasks, the tasks being grouped according to their communication characteristics (e.g., pattern and frequency); mapping, by a processor, the groups of tasks to groups of physical processors, respectively; and fine tuning, by the processor, the mapping within each of the groups.

As the high performance computing systems scale up, mapping the tasks of a parallel application onto physical processors to allow efficient communication becomes one of the challenging problems. Many mapping techniques have been developed to improve the application communication performance. First, graph embedding has been studied and applied to optimize very large scale integrated (VLSI) circuits. See, e.g., John A. Ellis. Embedding rectangular grids into square grids. IEEE Trans. Comput., 40(1):46-52, 1991; Rami G. Melhem and Ghil-Young Hwang. Embedding rectangular grids into square grids with dilation two. IEEE Trans. Comput., 39(12):1446-1455, 1990. The graph embedding for VLSI circuits tries to minimize the longest path.
Second, space filling curves (See, e.g., Space-Filling Curves. Springer-Verlag, 1994) are applied to map parallel programs onto parallel computing systems. The use of space filling curves to improve proximity for mapping is well studied and has found useful in parallel computing. The paper, Masood Ahmed and Shahid Bokhari. Mapping with space filling surfaces. IEEE Trans. Parallel Distrib. Syst., 18:1258-1269, September 2007, extends the concept of space filling curves to space filling surfaces. It describes three different classes of space filling surfaces and calculates the distance between facets.
There are methods using graph-partitioning and search-based optimization to solve the mapping problem. For example, G. Bhanot, A. Gara, P. Heidelberger, E. Lawless, J. C. Sexton, and R. Walkup. Optimizing task layout on the blue gene/l supercomputer. IBM Journal of Research and Development, 49(2):489-500, March 2005, uses an off-line simulated annealing to explore different mappings on Blue Gene/L™.
The work in Hao Yu, I-Hsin Chung, and Jose Moreira. Topology mapping for blue gene/l supercomputer. In SC '06: Proceedings of the 2006 ACM/IEEE conference on Supercomputing, page 116, New York, N.Y., USA, 2006. ACM, developed topology mapping libraries. The mapping techniques are based on folding heuristics. The methods based on folding heuristics require the topologies for guest and host are known already.
Recently, new mapping techniques have been developed. See, e.g., Abhinav Bhatel´e, Eric Bohm, and Laxmikant V. Kal´e. A case study of communication optimizations on 3d mesh interconnects. In Euro-Par '09: Proceedings of the 15th International Euro-Par Conference on Parallel Processing, pages 1015-1028, Berlin, Heidelberg, 2009. Springer-Verlag.
In terms of supporting message passing interface (MPI) topology functions, there are works done for specific systems: Jesper Larsson Tr{umlaut over ( )}aff. Implementing the mpi process topology mechanism. In Supercomputing, pages 1-14,2002, uses graph-partitioning based for embedding and Sangman Moh, Chansu Yu, Dongsoo Han, Hee Yong Youn, and Ben Lee. Mapping strategies for switch-based cluster systems of irregular topology. In 8th IEEE International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Systems, Kyongju City, Korea, June 2001, describes embedding techniques for switch-based network.


A system and method dynamically allocate memory to a RAM disk. Upon a file transfer to the RAM disk, a device driver determines an amount of memory required by the RAM disk then requests the required amount of memory from a memory manager. As files are deleted from the RAM disk, the memory is released from the RAM disk by informing the memory manager of the addresses of the memory to be released. Sector freelists tracks each cluster of memory allocated to the RAM disk. When a sector becomes inactive, a corresponding bit in a sector freelist indicates the inactive status of the sector. When all of the sectors in a cluster are inactive, the cluster is released for the RAM disk.

Static (conventional) RAM disks have been in use in computing devices for some time. A RAM disk is random access memory (RAM) that has been configured to simulate a disk drive. Files are accessed on a RAM disk just as they are on a physical disk. RAM disks are also known as RAM drives, virtual disks, and virtual drives.
Static RAM disks must be configured at system startup. After startup, the configuration of the static RAM disk cannot be changed. Once RAM has been allocated to a static RAM disk, it cannot be used by the system for processing. The memory allocated to the static RAM disk may only be used by the static RAM disk.
Additionally, static RAM disks require the user to configure the amount of memory that will be set aside for data storage. In many environments this makes the static RAM disk difficult to use, and requires frequent reconfiguration depending on changing patterns of system use.


A travel control unit of a working vehicle includes an HST which is a hydraulic continuously variable transmission having a hydraulic pump and a hydraulic motor, a pedal sensor which is an operator sensor which detects a position of an acceleration pedal which is an acceleration operator, and a controller which changes a displacement of the hydraulic pump based on the position of the acceleration pedal. The controller increases the displacement of the hydraulic motor as the displacement of the hydraulic pump is reduced due to a displacement of the acceleration pedal to a low-velocity side.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a travel control unit of a working vehicle having a hydraulic continuously variable transmission including a hydraulic pump which is driven by an engine and a hydraulic motor which is fluidly connected to the hydraulic pump, and a controller.
2. Related Art
In the related art, a structure is known in which an engine and a hydraulic static continuously variable transmission (HST) are equipped in a working vehicle such as a farm tractor, a lawnmower, a wheel loader, or the like, wherein the hydraulic static continuously variable transmission includes a hydraulic pump and a hydraulic motor fluidly connected to the hydraulic pump. In this structure, the hydraulic pump is driven by an engine, and motive power of a rotational shaft of the hydraulic motor is speed-varied by a gear apparatus or the like and transmitted to a wheel of the vehicle. In addition, the hydraulic pump is of a variable displacement swash plate type in which an angle of the swash plate is changed to increase an amount of discharge of the hydraulic pump, to enable increase of a rotational velocity of the rotational shaft of a fixed displacement hydraulic motor.
JP 2001-71769 A discloses a hydraulic continuously variable transmission integrally constructed by a hydraulic pump and a hydraulic motor, wherein the capacities of the hydraulic pump and the hydraulic motor can be continuously adjusted. With a servo mechanism provided on a side of each of the hydraulic pump and the hydraulic motor, the swash plate angle of the movable swash plate of each of the hydraulic pump and the hydraulic motor is set to be rotatable. A rotation of a speed-varied operation arm of the servo mechanism is realized by manually operating through a link mechanism, an operation lever, or the like, or using a hydraulic piston.
JP 2006-64011 A discloses a hydraulic continuously variable transmission including a hydraulic pump and a hydraulic motor, wherein a variable displacement, movable swashplate type structure is employed for one or both of the hydraulic pump and the hydraulic motor. In this apparatus, a load control mechanism is provided which forms a hydraulic servo mechanism which controls the swash plate angle of the movable swash plate, which has an actuator for moving a pin for inclining the movable swash plate to a side of deceleration, and which guides pressure fluid of the main fluid path of a closed circuit which connects the hydraulic pump and the hydraulic motor to the actuator. The hydraulic motor is maintained at a maximum swash plate angle when stopped, and as the vehicle travels, the swash plate angle is reduced. In addition, a control is applied to reduce the swash plate angle by the load control mechanism.
During acceleration of a working vehicle equipped with the above-described hydraulic continuously variable transmission, when an acceleration pedal which is an acceleration operator is operated, the inclination angle of the movable swash plate of the hydraulic pump is increased with the operation of the acceleration pedal, and the rotational velocity of the hydraulic motor is increased. Because of this, the rotational velocity of the wheel linked to the rotational shaft of the hydraulic motor via a gear mechanism or the like in a manner to allow transmission of the motive power is increased, and the vehicle is accelerated. On the other hand, during the deceleration of the vehicle, when the acceleration pedal is not being operated, that is, the amount of depression of the accelerator pedal becomes 0 and the acceleration pedal is displaced to the side of low velocity, because the displacement of the hydraulic motor is fixed, the supply of the hydraulic oil from the hydraulic pump to the hydraulic motor is rapidly suspended, and the supply of the hydraulic oil from the hydraulic motor to the hydraulic pump is also rapidly suspended. Because of this, there will be no place for the hydraulic oil of the hydraulic motor to move to, causing a rapid deceleration of the hydraulic motor, and consequently, a rapid deceleration of the working vehicle. Therefore, it is desired to make the change of the velocity during deceleration of the working vehicle gradual, to reduce the change in the behavior of the vehicle, and to lessen a feeling of shock experienced by the driver during deceleration. In the vehicles having the hydraulic continuously variable transmission disclosed in JP 2001-71769 A and JP 2006-64011 A, there is still room for improvement from the viewpoint of lessening rapid deceleration of the vehicle when the acceleration operator is displaced on the side of low velocity.
When the rotational velocity of the wheel linked to the rotational shaft of the hydraulic motor through a gear mechanism or the like in a manner to allow transmission of motive power is increased as described above and the vehicle is accelerated, some users may wish to prevent the feeling of shock due to rapid acceleration regardless of the operation of the acceleration pedal when the vehicle starts to travel. In addition, the user may wish to change the travel starting performance between a work state where a working implement is used and a normal travel state where the working implement is not used. For example, when the working vehicle is a farm tractor, if the vehicle rapidly starts to travel while the working implement such as a tiller is working on the ground, an unfavorable state of the ground, such as a rough field, may result, and the user may wish to prevent such an unfavorable state. JP 2001-71769 A and JP 2006-64011 A do not disclose a means to facilitate provision of a travel starting performance according to the user's desires. For example, although JP 2006-64011 A discloses that the hydraulic motor of the HST is maintained at the maximum swash plate angle when stopped and the swash plate angle is reduced as the vehicle travels, the document does not disclose under what conditions such an operation is employed.


A medication formulation and method of use for treating migraine having a combination of active ingredients including: nicotine, phenylalanine, tyrosine, and caffeine in an aqueous solution.

The present formulation relates to the field of pharmaceutical treatments for pain and in particular to severe headache such is produced by a migraine episode. The term "migraine" is used herein to mean both common migraine headache and classic migraine headache, and also any human severe headache condition although some such conditions may be referred to by other terminology in the field of medicine or by the general public.
Migraine is a painful, sometimes debilitating disorder, which is frequently associated with various neurological symptoms. Its prevalence in the population is higher than that of any other neurological disorder, thus the burden of this disease on society is considerable. Although the introduction of triptans nearly two decades ago revolutionized the treatment of the disease there is still a strong need for a more effective pharmacology. Formerly, migraine therapy primarily aimed at treating the pathological alterations of meningeal blood vessels that are thought to directly initiate migraine. Now, it has been increasingly recognized that abnormal neural function may be a greater cause in the development of the disease and also in triggering an episode. Migraine is now believed to be associated with an increased neuronal excitability and episodes of cortical spreading depression.
A migraine may include intense throbbing pain, nausea, and sensitivity to light (aura) and sound. The condition is relatively common in adults aged 25 through 55 and is more prevalent in women. Triptans have been used in medications for the treatment of migraine. Included are: Sumatriptan®, Rizatrptan®, Naratriptan®, Zolmitriptan®, Eletriptan®, Almotriptan®, Frovatriptan®, and Avitriptan®. While effective in treating the occurrence of migraine, they have not proven effective for preventive treatment and do not provide long term relief. They act by temporarily constricting the brain's blood vessels relieving swelling. The etiology of migraine is not yet fully understood although a body of scientific research shows that certain biochemical mechanisms are repeatedly found in the pathophysiology of migraine including migraine with and also without aura.
Homeopathic remedies have included preparations having magnesium, ginger, ginkgo-biloba, feverfew, and melatonin, to name only a few. The amino acid tryptophan, in tablet or capsule form, is a commonly accepted method for the administration of tryptophan, and remains an available and effective way to elevate the level of serotonin within the brain. Also known is the prophylactic use of tryptophan in treating stress. In the treatment of migraine, however, clinical evidence shows that it is usually only moderately effective. Tests indicate that the primary benefits of tryptophan lie in its routine, daily use as a preventive. It has been found to minimize migraine frequency and in some cases, also headache intensity and duration. Repeatedly however, tryptophan has been shown to be ineffective in aborting or significantly mitigating pain after the onset of a migraine episode.
Therefore, a medication is needed that can be taken orally, and which allows accelerated delivery of medication to the central nervous system so as to reduce or eliminate the pain associated with migraine. An effective remedy, described herein, has been found to be effective in treating migraine headache from onset to completion.


Even when captions of a plurality of objects use an identical anchor expression, the present invention can associate an appropriately explanatory text in a body text as metadata with the objects.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing apparatus, an image processing method, and a storage medium by which electronic document data for searching an object in a document is generated.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, an approach has been considered to provide a search of an object included in a document, such as a photograph, a drawing (line drawing), or a table. (The term "object" is used herein to include an object other than characters such as a photograph, a drawing (line drawing), or a table.)
For example, a method exists by which, in the vicinity of an object extracted from a document, a character string describing the object (caption) is added and this is associated as metadata so that the object can be searched.
When a caption in a general document includes an expression for identifying the object, such as a drawing number (e.g., "photograph 1", "first drawing" or "table 1") (hereinafter referred to as "anchor expression"), a more detailed description of the object is also described in a body text using the anchor expression. The anchor expression as described above has been also used as a means for identifying an object in a document. According to the invention disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. H11-025113 (1999), an explanatory part of a body text including an anchor expression (hereinafter referred to as "explanatory text in body text") is extracted and is associated as metadata for the object. When a caption adjacent to an object of a drawing includes an anchor expression "Fig. 1" and a body text includes the explanation "the Fig. 1 is AAA" for example, an anchor expression "Fig. 1" is associated as identification information of the object of the drawing. At the same time, the explanatory text in the body text of "the Fig. 1 is AAA" is also associated as metadata, thereby providing a search by the metadata of the object of the drawing.
In recent years, some word processors, for example, have an editing function such as a function to automatically generate an anchor expression and a function to associate an object existing in a document with an explanatory text in a body text. The information given through these functions (metadata) can be stored in an electronic document to thereby realize the efficient editing of the document.
Scanners in recent years have a function such as an auto document feeder and thus can read many pages of papers easily. Thus, such scanners also can simultaneously read a plurality of types of documents. When such a scanner must read a mixture of different documents on the other hand, there is a possibility that a plurality of objects are read that have captions using an identical anchor expression. For example, there may be a case where one of the simultaneously-read documents has a table object having the caption "the table 1 is YYY" and another document thereamong has a table object having the caption "the table 1 shows ZZZ." If the above-described association processing is simply performed in such a circumstance, the anchor expression for the same "table 1" is associated with the two table objects, thus failing to provide an explanatory text in a body text that appropriately corresponds to the anchor expression for "the table 1."
Due to the above situation, such a method has been desired by which, even when a plurality of types of documents must be read and a plurality of captions use an identical anchor expression, a caption or an explanatory text in a body text can be appropriately associated as metadata with the object.

Image processing apparatus, image processing method, and storage medium


An apparatus determines the properties of a medium in the form of a fluid or soft material. An acoustic waveguide has two opposing guide elements delimiting an interior space to be filled with a medium. The guide elements, upon filling the interior space with a medium, form an interface with the medium with an inner surface. A transmitter generates acoustic surface waves in the waveguide, which are received by a receiver. The waveguide can be coupled with an evaluation unit for determining physical properties of the medium based on a signal generated by the receiver. A housing accommodates the guide elements, transmitter and receiver. On the respective inner surface, at least a part of the acoustic surface waves can be converted into volumetric sound waves of the medium and at least a part of the volumetric sound waves can be converted into acoustic surface waves of the waveguide.

The present invention relates to an apparatus for determining the properties of a medium in the form of a fluid or a soft material, in particular a highly viscous, dough-like or pasty medium.
A generic apparatus is described in WO 2008/034878 A2. It includes an acoustic waveguide which is formed by at least two opposing guide elements in the form of two plates and encloses an interior space which is filled with the medium to be measured. For filling the interior space and for carrying out measurements, in order to determine the properties of the medium, the waveguide for example is immersed into the medium or the medium is filled into the interior space of the waveguide or guided through the same.
Via a transmitter, acoustic surface waves are generated in the waveguide, wherein at least a part of the energy of the acoustic surface waves is coupled into the medium, so that a part of the energy of the acoustic surface waves is converted into volumetric sound waves of the medium.
Due to the reciprocity of this coupling process between a plate of the waveguide sensor and the medium, a part of the volumetric sound waves propagating in the medium is again coupled back into one or both of the plates of the waveguide, so that acoustic surface waves are generated therein. By measuring and evaluating certain characteristics of these acoustic surface waves, such as their velocity or their amplitudes, chemical and/or physical properties of the medium can be determined.
In principle, the volumetric sound waves are coupled out into the medium under an angle δ relative to a vertical reference line of a plate of the waveguide:δ=arcsin(cM/cS).
Herein, cM is the sound velocity of the volumetric sound waves inside the medium and cS is the sound velocity of the acoustic surface waves propagating along a plate of the acoustic waveguide.
In the apparatus described in WO 2008/034878 A2, the (carrier) plates or guide elements of the waveguide sensor are arranged separate from each other at a housing carrying the same. The plates as guide elements of the waveguide each form a sealing cover for a cavity opposite the interior space to be filled with the medium. In this cavity, a transmitter and/or a receiver for generating or receiving the acoustic surface waves are arranged and possibly are directly attached to an outer surface of a guide element facing the cavity.
This form of construction, however, is relatively expensive to manufacture, as it must be ensured that the guide elements guiding the acoustic surface waves seal the cavity associated to them against the entry of the medium. In addition, the design of the separately mounted guide elements with regard to the occurring mechanical loads and for a desired long-term stability of the waveguide formed therewith only can be ensured in a relatively expensive and cost-intensive way.

Apparatus for determining the properties of a medium in the form of a fluid or a soft material


A ceramic comprising a matrix of Al.sub.2 O.sub.3, ZrO.sub.2 (partially or fully stabilized) or mixtures of Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 and ZrO.sub.2 with strontium aluminate plate-shaped grains distributed throughout the matrix results in a ceramic with high toughness, high strength and good hardness. SrO/Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 molar ratios between 0.02 and 0.20 result in in-situ formation of plate-shaped grains approximately 0.5 .mu.m in thickness and 5.0 .mu.m in breadth in tetragonal zirconia polycrystalline ceramic matrices. The in-situ formation of strontium aluminates allows high volume loading of platelets to occur and high toughness is achieved without the loss of strength. High alumina compositions have the added benefit of higher strength, lower thermal expansion, higher modulus and higher thermal conductivity than zirconia ceramics with comparable toughness.

1. Field of the Invention: This invention relates to the field of ceramics and particularly to alumina-zirconia composite (Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 -ZrO.sub.2) ceramics.
2. Description of the Prior Art: High toughness ZrO.sub.2 ceramics have been fabricated by taking advantage of the volume increase which accompanies the change from tetragonal to monoclinic transformation. This "transformation toughening" (F. Lange, J. Mater. Sci., 17 225-263 (1982)) increases the energy required for crack propagation. U.S. Pat. No. 4,316,964 to Lange increased the fracture toughness of Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 -ZrO.sub.2 ceramics by dissolving a rare earth oxide such as Y.sub.2 O.sub.3, CeO.sub.2, La.sub.2 O.sub.3 and/or Er.sub.2 O.sub.3 in the ZrO.sub.2 so as to stabilize metastable tetragonal ZrO.sub.2 at low temperatures.
Hafnium Oxide (HfO.sub.2) undergoes a martensitic transformation similar to that of ZrO.sub.2 except that the monoclinic to tetragonal transformation temperature increases and the volume expansion for the tetragonal to monoclinic transformation decreases. Due to the lack of commercially available HfO.sub.2 powders, ZrO.sub.2 -based ceramics are used in applications such as insulators, values, die-liners, cutting tools and wear parts. Since ZrO.sub.2 and HfO.sub.2 form a solid solution, mixtures of zirconia and hafnia can be used to control the transformation temperature.
Two of the most commonly used additives for stabilizing tetragonal ZrO.sub.2 are Y.sub.2 O.sub.3 and CeO.sub.2. ZrO.sub.2 -based ceramics stabilized with Y.sub.2 O.sub.3 generally have higher strength but lower toughness than ZrO.sub.2 -based ceramics stabilized with CeO.sub.2. Such ceramics are generally classified as tetragonal zirconia polycrystals "TZP" due to their fine-grained microstructure which is nearly all tetragonal at room temperature.
The strength of yttria TZP (Y-TZP) and ceria TZP (CeTZP) ceramics increases with alumina additions and the fracture toughness correspondingly decreases (K. Tsukuma and T. Takahata, "Mechanical Property and Microstructure of TZP and TZP/Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 Composites," Advanced Structural Ceramics, Vol. 78, ed. by P. F. Becher, M. V. Swain and S. Somiya (Materials Research Society, Pittsburgh, PA, 123-135, 1987)).
The maximum in fracture toughness for both Y-TZP/Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 and Ce-TZP/Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 composites occurred at approximately 30 volume percent (vol. %) Al.sub.2 O.sub.3. In the case of Y-TZP/Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 ceramics, Tsukuma add Takahata found that strength increased from 1.5 gigapascals(GPa) to 2.4 GPa while fracture toughness simultaneously decreased from 11 MPa.ml/.sup.1/2 to 6 MPa.ml/.sup.1/2 with increasing Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 up to 30 vol. %. The same investigators found similar results with Ce-TZP/Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 ceramics in that strength increased from 200 MPa to 900 MPa while fracture toughness simultaneously decreased from 32 MPa.ml.sup.1/2 to 14 MPa.m.sup.1/2 with increasing Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 up to 30 vol. %. While absolute numbers are not crucial since testing methods may influence the data, the general trends are important and show the strength fracture toughness trade-off which exists in ZrO.sub.2 -based ceramics.
Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 has low strength and toughness as compared to ZrO.sub.2 ceramics. Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 /ZrO.sub.2 ceramics are attractive, as compared to ZrO.sub.2 ceramics, for high temperature applications since alumina has better retention of mechanical properties (i.e., strength and toughness) as a function of temperature than zirconia. The strength and toughness of TZP materials decrease rapidly with temperature, since the stability of the tetragonal polytype is increased, thereby making transformation toughening more difficult. Additionally, alumina additions to zirconia are beneficial in applications where creep resistance is required and certain applications where the erosion or wear resistance of the ceramic is not controlled by the fracture toughness. The higher hardness of Al.sub. O.sub.03/ ZrO.sub.2 composites in these applications generally relates to improved wear or erosion resistance. Alumina has higher thermal conductivity and lower thermal expansion than zirconia which is advantageous in limiting thermal shock. It would therefore be an improvement in the art if fracture toughness could be maintained while adding alumina to TZP ceramics and if high toughness Al.sub.2 O.sub.3/ ZrO.sub.2 ceramics could be made with increasing amounts of Al.sub.2 O.sub.3. Furthermore, it would be an improvement in the art if Al.sub.2 O.sub.3/ ZrO.sub.2 ceramics could be made without the traditional strength-fracture toughness trade-off. In the following summary of the invention it is given that HfO.sub.2 (or HfO.sub.2. ZrO.sub.2 solid solutions) can be substituted for ZrO.sub.2.

Ceramics with high toughness, strength and hardness


A system for using sound to display data which includes the capability of storing, manipulating and retrieving data and data-to-sound parameter mappings for the purposes of controlling a sound generator with the data such that auditory reference beacons result. These beacons may be used to compare to sound resulting from the incoming data and/or to other beacons to orient a system user within a complex data set, and to enhance comprehension of system status and trends in the data. Incoming data to become the data component of the beacon generator is stored in memory, then, when recalled, is injected into a sonic map. The sonic map formats the data for control of the sound generator and routes it to selected parameters of a sound generator. By manipulating the beacon data and the sonic map, a flexible means of data inspection and reference are obtained.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to the field of measuring and testing and data comprehension and, particularly, to a technique for using sound to identify particular states of a system by storing, manipulating and retrieving data that indicates the status of the system being monitored and using this data as a control source for sound.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A. Introduction
In the fields of measuring and testing and of data comprehension, the primary tools used for user feedback have been visual displays. This includes alphanumeric readouts, dials, indicator lights, computer graphic displays, and so forth. Additionally, auditory feedback has been employed primarily in the form of alarms which sound when certain thresholds are crossed. The purpose of these visual displays has been to provide detailed information about the system being monitored. However, auditory feedback has not been widely employed to provide detailed and continuous information.
As the systems being monitored become increasingly complex, with more individual variables to attend to, a means of integrating the displays may be desirable. This integration allows the system user to make sense of the data he or she is receiving. To this end, color coded meters, 2 and 3 dimensional charts, complex computer displays, and other visual feedback means have been developed (E. Tufte, "Visual Display of Quantitative Information" Connecticut: Cheshire Press, 1983).
In many applications where there are more variables than can be easily integrated into a single visual display, and/or in systems where visual monitoring of displays is not always practical, such as while driving a car or operating machinery, or when the system is being monitored by a vision impaired individual, it may become desirable to use sound as the "display" medium for monitoring the system. We will refer to this use of sound as sonification.
A simple example of sonification might involve controlling a sound's intensity, pitch, harmonic content (brightness), and spatial location to indicate the state of four distinct variables in a system or process being monitored. In order to represent higher dimensions, more complexity is required of the sound. This complexity can be obtained by creating simultaneous auditory streams (polyphony) or by generating a single sound stream with many variables of the sound changing simultaneously.
The use of increasingly complex variables and manipulating variables on different time scales to convey high dimensional information are salient features of sonification. In order to create such complex and multi-variate sounds, the data streams of the system to be displayed auditorially must be translated into a suitable format for controlling a sound generating unit. These formatted control streams are then routed, or `mapped` to selected auditory variables such as pitch, brightness, etc. In this way, a single auditory stream may display multiple data streams.
When a complex auditory stream is used to convey the data, an important perceptual process comes into play. In addition to the system user's ability to scan his or her attention through the sound, relationships between variables and entire system states are perceived `at a glance`. Which is to say, without attention directed effort, all of the auditory variables are perceived as a whole. In addition to a sound being, for example, bright in timbre, high in pitch, pulsing quickly, and loud, it is all at once recognizable as a whole entity.
B. Prior Sonification Work
In the early 1950's Pollack and Ficks (I. Pollack and L. Ficks, "Information of Elementary Multidimensional Auditory Displays", Journal of the Acoustical Society of America, Vol. 26, Number 2, pp. 155-158, March 1954.) published a paper on the use of sound to display data which used a simple binary display technique. They took eight variables and had the test subjects determine whether each variable was in one of two states, e.g. loud or soft, long or short, etc. They concluded that this was an effective technique for conveying data but that "extreme subdivisions of each stimulus dimension does not appear warranted." Later works by E. Yeung (E. S. Yeung, Pattern Recognition by "Audio Representation of Multivariate Analytical Data", Analytical Chemistry, vol. 52, pp. 1120-1123, 1980) and S. Bly (S. Bly, "Sound and Computer Information Presentation", Unpublished dissertation, U. of California, Davis, 1982.) have since explored different techniques, including continuous variation of audible parameters. For an overview of work done to date, the reader is referred to S. Frysinger's "Applied Research in Auditory Data Representation", (Proceedings of the SPIE, E. J. Farrell, Ed; Vol. 1259, pp. 130-139, Bellingham, Wash., 1990). Another example of sonification is the auditory element of "Exvis". a data visualization and sonification software program from the University of Mass. at Lowell.
In a related development, a number of coinposers are using mathematically generated complexity to create compositional forms and/or synthesize sounds. The works of Truax (B. Truax: "Chaotic Nonlinear Systems and Digital Sound Synthesis: An Exploratory Study", Proceedings of the ICMC, Glasgow, 1990), Chareyron (J. Chareyron, "Digital Synthesis of Self-modifying Waveforms by Means of Linear Automata", Computer Music Journal, S. Pope, Ed., vol. 14, #4, MIT Press, 1990., and many others can be cited as examples. The primary difference between sonification and composition as regards embedding information in an audio stream is that in sonification the subsequent extraction of the data for the purposes of understanding the generating system is a primary consideration. In composition this is usually not the case.
In addition to the above cited research, two patents of importance to the present invention are referenced. The first, a patent of W. Kaiser and H. Greiner, ("Warning System for Printing Presses", U.S. Pat. No. 4,224,613), teaches the use of multiple auditory streams to monitor multiple independent data streams. The second, an invention by E. Fubini, A. De Bono, and G. Ruspa, ("System for Monitoring and Indicating Acoustically the Operating Conditions of a Motor Vehicle", U.S. Pat. No. 4,785,280), teaches the use of several parameters of a single auditory stream generated by a sound synthesis system to monitor several data streams.
C. Similar Data Structures for Musical Applications
There are developments in computer music software and hardware that mirror the developments in sonification software. The similarities in file types do not reflect a similarity in function.
In music software, it is common to store data representing musical information such as notes, musical dynamics, tempos, and so on. It is also common in music software and hardware to have files which represent the values of sound parameters which, when retrieved, cause a sound synthesizer to produce a certain timber (sound quality) when played. The musical data file type, commonly found in software `sequencers` (see the "User's Manual for Vision", by Opcode Systems, Menlo Park, Calif.), and the second, commonly accessed via the front panel of music synthesizers as `sound presets` (see "User's Manual for the Korg 01W", Korg U.S.A., Westbury, N.Y.), may roughly correspond to the data component and the sonic map component of auditory beacons, respectively. However, these systems were not designed to be used as described in this disclosure, nor is there any description in any known existing publication of how they may be used to create auditory beacons for data monitoring and comprehension.

Sonification system using auditory beacons as references for comparison and orientation in data


An electrographic sensor unit and method for determining the position of a user selected position thereon. The electrographic sensor unit includes a layer of a conductive material having an electrical resistivity and a surface, at least three spaced apart contact points electrically interconnected with a layer of conductive material, a processor connected to the spaced apart contacts and disposed to selectively apply a signal to each of the contact points, and a probe assembly, that includes either a stylus of a flexible conductive layer spaced apart from the layer, coupled to the processor with the stylus disposed to be positioned by a user in vicinity of a user selected position on the surface of the layer, or that position being selected with a user's finger on the flexible layer and to receive signals from the layer when the contact points have signals selectively applied thereto. The user selected position is determined by the processor from signals received from the stylus, or flexible layer, each in relation to a similar excitation of different pairs of the contact points under control of the processor. The conductive layer may be either two or three dimensional and may be closed three dimensional shape. There may also be multiple layers with the processor being able to discern on which of those layers the user selected position is located. Further, provision is made to correct the calculated coordinates of the selected position for variations in contact resistance of each of the contact points individually. Additionally, a nonconductive skin having selected graphics printed thereon, such as a map, can be placed over the layer and the proces-sor further convert the calculated coordinates of the selected position to coordinates that relate to the graphical information printed in the skin, and even electro-nically (e.g., audio or visual) present information to the user relative to the graphical location selected as the selected position.

A variety of technologies exist to determine the position of a stylus, or even a finger, placed on a surface. One technology is a grid of horizontal and vertical wires that are placed below the surface of a flat tablet or over the surface of a display device and emit position indicating signals which are detected by a stylus. Two devices using this type of technology are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,149,919 and 4,686,332 to Greenias, et al. Applications using these devices are computer input drawing (or digitizing) tablets, and touch-screen display devices.
In another technology, surface acoustic waves are measured at the edges of a glass plate and are used to calculate the position on the plate that was selected by a finger or a stylus. Applications include high use touch screen kiosk displays where a conductive overlay technology would wear out.
Yet other technologies include the use of light pens as optical detectors. Additionally a frame around a flat display with an array of light emitters and detectors around the edge of the frame, may be used to detect when a finger or stylus is near the display surface. These technologies are limited to displays or flat surfaces.
Position detectors such as the devices disclosed in the Greanias patents, that use many conductors arranged in a grid, are not well suited to a complex shaped surface of either two or three dimensions. There are, at a minimum, difficulties in positioning and shaping the conductors to fit the contours of a complex shape.
Another similar device is a grid of horizontal and vertical wires placed over or beneath the surface of a flat display device that uses capacitive coupling of a stylus or finger. In this device, the capacitive coupling transfers position indicating signals from one wire to another which can be used to calculate the position of the coupling. Computer input tablets, as well as finger pointing mouse replacement tablets, use this technology.
In another technology, a rectangular homogeneous transparent conductor is placed over the surface of a display device and bar contacts on the edges of the transparent conductor charge the conductor. Capacitive coupling of a stylus or a finger to the transparent conductor causes the conductor to discharge while sensors attached to the bar contacts measure the amount of current drawn through each of the contacts. Analysis of the ratios of the currents drawn from pairs of contacts on opposing sides of the rectangle provide an X-Y position on the panel that was selected by the user. A device of this type is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,853,498 to Meadows, et al. An application of this device is a touch-screen display.
A similar technology uses a rectangular piece of extremely uniform resistive material with a series of discrete resistors along the edge and is mounted on a flat surface. A voltage differential is applied to the row of resistors on opposing sides of the rectangle and in a time-division manner the voltage differential is applied to the row of resistors of the other two opposing sides. The position indicating signals are either received by a stylus, or by a conductive overlay which can be depressed to contact the surface of the resistive material. One variety of this device is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,798,370 to Hurst.
The devices described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,853,498 (Meadows, et al.) and 3,798,370 (Hurst) drive a homogenous rectangular resistive overlay with bar contacts or a string of resistors along each edge. These approaches rely upon the regular shape of a rectangle in order to work. The shape and placement of the contacts provide the means to detect portions of the surface within a rectangular subsection of the resistive material of the surface. Other simple shapes may also be feasible with bar and resistor string contacts but in complex shapes they can create areas that cannot be distinguished (e.g., shapes with concave edges such as a circle or ellipse can not be accommodated by either the Meadows or the Hurst approaches). The use of bar contacts or strings of resistors along substantially the entire edge of an object limits their usefulness on objects where the position on the entire surface needs to be detected. The locations directly beneath each bar electrode and between each bar or spot electrode and the edge of the object are not detectable in these devices.
The devices described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,853,499 (Meadows, et al.) and 3,798,370 (Hurst) do not take into consideration the effects of contact resistance. The resistance between the contacts and the homogenous resistive material may be substantial relative to the resistance of the homogenous material. Additionally the contact resistance may vary from electrode to electrode or change due to mechanical or environmental stress. The Meadows and Hurst devices rely on contacts of known, or constant resistance, which constrains the use of materials and contact approaches. Any variation in contact resistance or changes in contact resistance due to environmental factors are not accounted for and result in detection errors.
Further, Meadows loads the surface with a capacitively coupled stylus and determines position by measuring the current drawn from the driving circuits. The Meadows device requires four receiver circuits to accomplish this.
The Meadows device is susceptible to the effects of unwanted phantom styluses coupling to the surface. Phantom styluses such as rings or fingers may couple to the active surface instead of, or in addition to, the actual stylus. These phantom styluses cause detection errors because the changes that they also produce cause changes in the driving circuit.
In applications where the object containing the grid needs to be rotated, or the electronics and the object are physically spaced-apart from each other, a large number of conductors must be coupled to the system, or between the elements of the systems, through connection mechanisms that may allow rotation or other movements. Such cables for the systems of the prior art would be rather large and cumbersome. Further, connectors with a large number of contacts are expensive and reduce the overall reliability of any system that requires them. Contacts that allow rotation, such as slip rings or commutators, become prohibitively complex and expensive as the number of connections rises above a small number. Additionally, the multiple circuits required to drive grid arrays are complex and costly to manufacture. Acoustic wave detectors provide a rugged position detection mechanism but are costly to implement. Light wave detection mechanisms are limited to flat surfaces and are susceptible to dust and insects blocking the light paths. It is believed, however, that the present invention solves these problems.
In today's modern environment there are many sources of electro-magnetic energy, both naturally occurring and man-made. Some examples of the sources of such energy in the earth's atmosphere are static electricity, electrical storms, heat lightning, radiation from outer space, and man-made radio waves. Each of these acts and interacts with each other causing interference and background noise to each other, depending on the intensity of the background or interfering signal. Thus, as is well known in devices that utilize an antenna as a device to detect an input signal, these atmospheric signals may interfere with the ability to detect and receive a signal of interest. It is also known that in systems with a hand-held antenna probe, the human body acts as a larger antenna with a signal from the person holding that probe added to the signal of interest detected by the hand-held probe. That added signal, and the multiple frequencies that it includes is also known to potentially add a level of inaccuracy in such a system, if the desired signal can be detected at all. To overcome that unwanted interference many elaborate circuits have been devised to suppress those interference signals "picked-up" by the human user from impacting the performance of the system.

Surface position location system and method


Disclosed herein is a liquid pharmaceutical formulation substantially free of water, comprising: (i) amlodipine or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof, (ii) at least one pharmaceutically acceptable excipient, and (iii) a sufficient amount of a vehicle comprising glycerin. Also disclosed herein is a liquid pharmaceutical formulation substantially free of water and ethanol, comprising: (i) amlodipine or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof, (ii) at least one pharmaceutically acceptable excipient, and (iii) a sufficient amount of a vehicle comprising glycerin.

High blood pressure or hypertension is a common condition in which the long-term force of the blood against artery walls is high enough that it may eventually cause health problems, such as heart disease. Blood pressure is determined both by the amount of blood pumped by the heart and the amount of resistance to blood flow in arteries. Pumping blood through narrowed arteries may result in high blood pressure or even hypertension. Although a hypertensive patient may be asymptomatic, long-lasting vascular and heart damage may occur. Uncontrolled high blood pressure increases the risk of serious health problems, including heart attack and stroke. Hypertension generally develops over many years, and it affects nearly everyone eventually. Fortunately, hypertension may be detected easily, and once detected, one can work with your doctor to control it.
Many blood pressure medications, known as antihypertensives, are available by prescription to lower high blood pressure or hypertension. There are a variety of classes of high blood pressure medications and they include a number of different drugs and can be broadly classified by the following classes: Diuretics, Beta-blockers, ACE inhibitors, Angiotensin II receptor blockers, Calcium channel blockers, Alpha blockers, Alpha-2 Receptor Agonists, Combined alpha and beta-blockers, Central agonists, Peripheral adrenergic inhibitors, and Vasodilators.
Amlodipine is an angioselective calcium channel blocker and inhibits the movement of calcium ions into vascular smooth muscle cells and cardiac muscle cells which inhibits the contraction of cardiac muscle and vascular smooth muscle cells. Amlodipine is available in different salts like amlodipine besylate, amlodipine maleate, amlodipine orotate, amlodipine adipate, amlodipine camsylate, amlodipine nicotinate, and many more. Amlodipine is referred to by the chemical name 3-ethyl-5-methyl (±)-2-[(2-aminoethoxy)methyl]-4-(2-chlorophenyl)-1,4-dihydro-6-methyl-3,5-pyridinedicarboxylate with a CAS No. of 88150-42-9, and with the following chemical structure.

Amlodipine besylate is a white crystalline powder with a molecular weight of 567.1, is slightly soluble in water, and sparingly soluble in ethanol.
Amlodipine is commercially available as NORVASC® (amlodipine besylate) Tablets in strengths of tablets equivalent to 2.5, 5, and 10 mg of amlodipine for oral administration. In addition to the amlodipine besylate, each tablet contains the following inactive ingredients: microcrystalline cellulose, dibasic calcium phosphate anhydrous, sodium starch glycolate, and magnesium stearate. The 10-mg dosage strength for NORVASC® is the reference listed drug (or reference product).
Amlodipine undergoes extensive metabolism and none of the metabolites have significant calcium antagonist activity relative to amlodipine. See, e.g., Stopher at S56. One of the amlodipine metabolites, known as Amlodipine Related Substance A (or "Impurity A" (alternatively referred to as Amlodipine Besylate EP Impurity D″ or "Dehydro Amlodipine") having a CAS No. of 113994-41-5), may form from amlodipine via oxidation of the pyridine ring. Ragno at 20. The chemical structure of Amlodipine Related Substance A (viz., Impurity A) is shown below.
The Impurity A related substance does not show any significant calcium antagonist activity relative to amlodipine. Stopher at S59. Additional amlodipine degradation impurities have been reported in the literature. See, e.g., Rapolu at 61 (reporting rearrangement products) and Murakami at 75 (reporting Maillard reaction product between amlodipine and a reducing disaccharide).
Amlodipine itself is not satisfactory in photostability and preservation stability, and various salts are formed to improve them. For example, Davison teaches that besylate salt and maleate salt are preferable from among various salts of amlodipine, including tosylate, succinate, salicylate, maleate, acetate, and hydrochloride.
Nahata reports the stability of amlodipine besylate in two suspension dosage forms. Particularly, Nahata reported stabilities of extemporaneous dosage forms prepared from crushed NORVASC® tablets in two different vehicles. Based on the results presented therein, Nahata found that the prepared amlodipine suspension dosage forms were stable for 91 days under refrigerated conditions (4° C.) or 56 days at room temperature (25° C.).
Another salt form, amlodipine benzoate, is also commercially available in the United States under the brand name KATERZIA® (amlodipine) oral suspension. KATERZIA® contains 1.30 mg/mL amlodipine benzoate, equivalent to 1 mg/mL amlodipine, as well as the following inactive ingredients: citric acid, colloidal silicon dioxide, hypromellose, maltodextrin, polysorbate 80, simethicone, sodium benzoate, sodium besylate, sodium citrate, sodium hydroxide, sucralose, and water as inactive ingredients. See KATERZIA® Label; see also Brauer. KATERZIA® is a white to off-white oral suspension. The KATERZIA® Prescribing Information states that KATERZIA® "should be stored refrigerated (2° C. to 8° C./36° F. to 46° F.). Avoid freezing and excessive heat. Protect from light." Because KATERZIA® is a suspension product, the KATERZIA® Label states that the end user should shake before using.
Tatsumi describes an aqueous oral preparation (jelly preparation) of amlodipine, which is reportedly stable and rapidly disintegrable. The amlodipine stability may be improved by using an anionic surfactant having a sulfuric acid group or a sulfonic acid group (e.g., sodium lauryl sulfate) as a stabilizer in an aqueous solution of amlodipine, preparing a liquid stable in the range of pH 5-7 as the liquid property, and adding and mixing a gelling agent, a fine powder solid and a gelling regulator.
Davison reports a sterile aqueous solution containing amlodipine besylate for parenteral administration that includes 10 to 40% by volume of propylene glycol and about 1% w/v of sodium chloride.
Noburu describes a solution of amlodipine besylate having propylene glycol and a sugar alcohol as essential components, as well as water in an amount that ranges from 10% to 60% by weight. Stability tests (at 60° C. for 14-days) of compositions disclosed therein showed that amlodipine besylate is incompatible with glycerin showing discoloration, precipitation, and an increased impurity level.
Mandal describes amlodipine liquid formulations containing glycerin, maltitol, butylated hydroxy toluene, a flavoring agent, water, and optionally ethanol. The amount of water in the Mandal amlodipine liquid formulations is about 11% w/w. Results show that the Mandal formulations provide for unacceptable impurity levels. Results presented herein provide a basis for better understanding the unacceptable impurity levels of Mandal's amlodipine formulations.
Presently, there is no commercial product of amlodipine available in liquid oral solution form. As stated above, amlodipine is available in solid tablet dosage form (Norvasc®). The currently marketed amlodipine tablet may be difficult to swallow by the pediatric and geriatric populations, as well as by patients with swallowing impediments and blockages and is in critical condition.
Also as stated above, amlodipine is available in a suspension dosage form (KATERZIA®), but KATERZIA® requires strict storage conditions including refrigeration. One may appreciate that a suspension dosage form may be disadvantageous with respect to dose uniformity because of sedimentation and poor dispersibility. The lack of dose uniformity may result in an incorrect dosage amount, and thus, may be problematic for the treatment of a patient with hypertension and/or coronary artery disease at least because a satisfactory therapeutic effect may not be achieved.
Despite a market demand for alternative oral formulations, there is no commercially available amlodipine-containing oral solution dosage form. The oral solution dosage form addresses patients that have difficulty swallowing tablets. Further, an oral solution dosage form addresses potential problems associated with a suspension product because it provides assurance of dosage uniformity upon administration to patients and eliminates difficulty of administration.
While investigating amlodipine-containing oral solution dosage forms, it was discovered that amlodipine stability depends on the inactive ingredients present in the formulation. The liquid formulations disclosed herein serve to solve the above-mentioned drawbacks of prior amlodipine-containing formulations.


An internal combustion engine including a crankcase (1) and including a cylinder head is described, including at least one cylinder block, at least one planar flange surface for accommodating at least one cooler (2), at least one cooler (2), at least one coolant inlet to the cooler (2), at least one coolant outlet (8) from the cooler (2), at least one exhaust gas inlet to the cooler (2), at least one integrated exhaust gas feedthrough from the cooler (2), and at least one internal cooling section (3).

Such an internal combustion engine is known from DE 691 30 976 T2. This internal combustion engine includes an exhaust gas recirculation system including a distribution line, which extends in parallel to a fresh gas line. The fresh gas line includes branching fresh gas channels, which each lead to the two intake valves of a cylinder unit. The distribution line, including individual feed lines, opens into the fresh gas channels. In known exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) coolers, the flow through the cooler of the engine takes place transversely, and the cooler is situated in a kind of pocket directly in the crankcase of the engine without a dedicated housing. The transverse through-flow allows the total water quantity of the engine to be provided to the EGR cooler as a result of the large cross-section through which the flow takes place. In addition, in contrast to a longitudinal through-flow, the water experiences a considerably lower temperature increase. Due to its operating principle, this system is ideal with respect to the cooling action and the pressure loss on the part of the water.
The problem with such systems is that the EGR cooler insert is not completely enclosed by the contour of the water pocket in the crankcase. As a result, a lot of water flows around the EGR cooler, which reduces the flow velocities through the cooler lamellae, thereby decreasing the cooling action.

Internal combustion engine including exhaust gas recirculation


At a collaboration computing device, a method for selecting a subset of audio streams for delivery to a client device includes receiving a plurality of audio streams from a plurality of source devices, each source device associated with a different spatial position within a virtual environment. For each audio stream, the collaboration computing device determines a source audio energy value and computes a client-centric audio energy value by modifying the source audio energy value using a corresponding source attenuation value associated with the source device that transmitted the audio stream. The collaboration computing device generates a source prioritization list by sorting the plurality of source devices by their client-centric audio energy values. A subset of the audio streams are selected and delivered to the client device.

A plurality of networked computing devices may each render a shared virtual environment for display to users of the computing devices, where each computing device corresponds to a different spatial position within the virtual environment. Each computing device may receive one or more audio streams originating from other computing devices of the plurality, where each audio stream may correspond to, for example, audible speech of the users of the other computing devices.

Virtual environment audio stream delivery


An image forming apparatus in which a medium container is installed includes a main body, an image forming unit, a medium container a container body at least partially formed of a deformable material, a drawer to hold the medium container thereon and movable between a first position and a second position, a medium transport unit including a medium outlet port provided on a distal end of the medium container, and a medium receiving unit disposed at the second position of the drawer and connected to the medium transport unit provided on the medium container, and a medium transport facilitator mounted on the drawer to contact the medium container set in the drawer from below to move the medium contained in the medium container toward the medium transport unit at the second position.

1. Field of the Invention
Exemplary embodiments of the present invention relate to an image forming apparatus and a deformable medium container that can be installed in the image forming apparatus.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
Related-art image forming apparatuses are known to form an image with powder toner (hereinafter, simply "toner") which is a powder-type medium for image formation. For example, electrophotographic image forming apparatuses develop an electrostatic latent image into a visible toner image by using a developing unit. The image forming apparatuses include copiers, printers, facsimile machines, and multi-functional machines having a combination of these capabilities. Direct recording-type image forming apparatuses form an image by spraying liquid toner in dot shape from a toner jetting unit onto a recording medium and so forth. These image forming apparatuses include a medium supplying unit from which fresh toner is supplied to a developing unit and the toner jetting unit.
The new toner is contained in a medium container. Medium containers formed using a deformable material as proposed in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2004-198703 (JP-2004-198703-A1) are now increasingly used.
It is advantageous to form the medium container with deformable material because deformable material that includes a resin sheet material, such as nylon resin, or a paper sheet material, is light-weight and easy to fold, and therefore is easy to collect, transport, and recycle after use. However, such a medium container formed of deformable material has less rigidity and is difficult to set in an image forming apparatus properly. In particular, the very flexibility of material hinders the medium container from setting a medium supply opening thereof to a predetermined position in the toner supplying unit and to a correct position capable of transporting toner properly.
Further, it is also difficult to increase the size of the medium container for storing more toner therein. Generally, an image forming apparatus is assembled by a large number of units and components extending horizontally and its layout is designed accordingly. Assuming that the medium container is disposed vertically, it should avoid interference with these units and components. As a result, it may be unavoidable to dispose the medium container projecting outward from the body of the image forming apparatus, which is undesirable.
In addition, if a flexible medium container needs to supply toner to a developing unit provided in the image forming apparatus, it is not preferable that the flexible medium container includes a rigid member such as a toner transport screw. If it does, it is likely that the rigid member can cause damage to the flexible medium container by breaking through the walls of the flexible medium container and/or can be bulky when folding the flexible medium container.
One approach is to use the weight of toner itself so that the toner can fall due to gravity to the developing unit. However, placing the flexible medium container in any plane other than the horizontal can adversely affect the entire layout of the image forming apparatus.

Image forming apparatus and medium container installed therein


A system for providing awareness of an interactive surface is disclosed. The system may include a processor that is communicatively linked to an interactive surface. The processor may determine a position and a velocity of an object that is within range of the interactive surface based on one or more of media content, vibrations, air movement, sounds and, global positioning data associated with the object. Additionally, the processor may determine if the object has a trajectory that would cause the object to collide with the interactive surface based on the information associated with the object. If the processor determines that the object has a trajectory that would cause the object to collide with the interactive surface, the processor can generate a notification.

In today's technologically-driven society, interactive glass surfaces and displays are at the forefront of innovation and, while not yet ubiquitous, will become increasingly popular with users in the coming years. This is particularly true considering the very rapid commercial acceptance of products that utilize touchscreen technologies such as touchscreen phones, tablets, computers, televisions, and displays. As a result, users will have many more opportunities to interact with such interactive glass surfaces or other similar surfaces. For example, network-connected computers can display computer interfaces on a glass table for users sitting at the table during a meeting; glass walls can have interfaces that users can interact with to perform a variety of functions; sliding glass doors in homes can have computer displays that users can interact with, and patient bedrooms in hospitals can have glass walls that doctors can use to view medical information.
As interactive glass surfaces become more widespread, the chances of users or objects colliding with such glass surfaces will increase substantially. Unfortunately, glass surfaces can be quite dangerous to those who do not see them. A user that collides with an interactive glass surface can incur significant injuries or even cause the glass to shatter or malfunction. For example, if an interactive glass surface is used in a hospital, two doctors discussing and walking at the same time may collide with a clear interactive glass display. Also, kids running around a household may accidentally run into interactive glass doors or other displays and sustain serious injuries. Additionally, users may accidentally place inappropriate materials on a computer display that may ultimately damage the display. Furthermore, when a person is walking in the dark in the middle of the night to get a glass of water, the person may walk right into an interactive glass display. Although the future of interactive displays is exciting, there are many unique nuances associated with the use of interactive displays.

Notification system for providing awareness of an interactive surface


Disclosed is an engine mount apparatus for mounting an engine on the chassis of a vehicle. An engine mount body adapted to be fixed to the chassis is provided with stud bolts extending vertically downwardly thereof. A bracket having through holes corresponding to the stud bolts disposed on the engine to be mounted is secured to the engine at a predetermined position thereof. To mount the engine on the chassis, the engine is lifted up from below the chassis, the stud bolts are inserted through the through holes, the engine mount body and the bracket are fitted with each other and secured by means of nuts.

The present invention relates to an engine mount apparatus for mounting an engine on the chassis of an automobile.
Generally, in the process of mounting an automobile engine, (in this specification, the mounting of an engine means mounting on a chassis an engine as a single unit or a power train incorporating an engine, a transmission, etc.), the engine is lifted up to a specific height from below a chassis, and in this state the chassis and the engine are coupled with each other via a plurality of mount bodies.
Conventionally, the mounting of an engine is carried out by attaching mount bodies 2 at specified positions of an engine 1 and coupling the mount bodies 2 with a chassis 3 by the use of bolts or the like that are tightened from various directions.
Although the structure of an engine mount apparatus and a method of attaching the same to a chassis vary depending on the position of installation and the difference in the structure of the engine itself, there is a case where a portion of the engine 1 on the rear-side of the chassis 3 is supported by the chassis 3, as shown in FIG. 10 and 11. The engine mount 2 used for this portion is arranged such that a rubber material 5 is fitted inside a casing 4 and a shaft 6 is inserted into the rubber material 5 so as to form the mount body 2, and then the shaft 6 of the mount body 2 is fixed to the engine 1 by bolting or the like via a bracket 8. Then, an arm 9 fixed to an outer peripheral surface of the casing 4 is secured to the chassis 3 by bolting or the like.
Furthermore, depending on a type of automobile, there is a case where the engine mount body 2 is fixed to a dash panel 10, and this dash panel 10 is used to support the engine 1 (FIG. 12).
Conventionally in such a case, as shown in FIG. 12, a bracket 11 having a projecting distal end is formed by sheet metal processing, a proximal portion of this bracket 11 is welded to the dash panel 10, and a distal end thereof is coupled with the mount body 2 or an unillustrated engine mount bracket.
With the above-described conventional engine mount apparatus, however, the bolting work has to be carried out in a horizontal direction in view of the relationship in configuration between the mounting portions on the engine 1 side and the chassis 3 side. Therefore, there has been a problem in that the operation of fixing the mount body 2 to the chassis 3 is made extremely difficult. This is because the operator must carry out the positioning of the mount body 2, fixed in advance to the engine 1 side, with respect to the chassis 3 within the limited space of the engine room between the engine 1 and the chassis 3.
Furthermore, if a bracket is used, since it is formed of sheet metal and has a structure in which a projecting distal end projects, there has been a drawback in that the bracket is weak in terms of its mechanical strength and is not only disadvantageous in terms of the mechanical strength of the chassis but also liable to cause the vibrations of the engine to be transmitted to the compartment of the automobile. Furthermore, there has been an additional problem in that the work efficiency is poor since the bracket must be fixed to the mount body 2 in the horizontal direction.


An aircraft brake assembly container having a base or container portion with feet extending therefrom. A further base portion is provided and mounted atop the base portion. A spacing is provided between the base and further base portions and this spacing is filled by a spacing container portion or member. The spacing container portion allows for lower profile base and further base portions while accommodating larger diameter new and used brake assemblies. A method of using same is also provided.

Field of the Invention
The invention relates to an aircraft brake assembly container, more specifically an aircraft brake assembly container having a variable internal geometry and a method of using the container in securing aircraft brake assemblies, more specifically a method of integrating the container in the method of securing the new and used aircraft brake assemblies with provision for a spacing member between two halves of the container.
Background of the Invention
A unique difficulty exists in the aircraft industry in that frequent maintenance service is required to maintain serviceable vehicles. Maintenance is one of the principal costs in operating airlines, and, therefore, the airline industry and industries similar to it with vehicle fleets are frequently looking for ways to increase productivity in servicing these fleets. In servicing airplanes, airplane brakes frequently require replacement. This type of service requires disassembly of the existing brake assembly from the undercarriage and removal of the assembly, typically requiring wincing or manhandling of the components due to the heavy weight of the components, and then storage and transport of the used assembly. Similarly, during servicing, the new brake assembly must be loaded, moved, winched, and mounted to the undercarriage of the airplane. The packaging of the brake is, therefore, important in facilitating this service. Several configurations of specialized containers have been conceived in the past to address increased productivity in various activities involving shipping containers.
Further developments in aircraft have led to larger brake assemblies, requiring larger containers and lower profiles to best fit under a used brake assembly do to design changes in the assemblies and the aircraft undercarriages. A need for an oversized container to contain the larger brake assemblies with a lower profile in the section being used in removal and storage of the used brake assembly and installation of the new brake assemblies is needed. In addition, additional transformative aspects of the improved container are needed in the process of using the brake container in replacing an aircraft brake assembly with lower profile requirements due to undercarriage design.
In the search for increased productivity, numerous design improvements in specialized containers have been utilized. Many designs for shipping containers have, in the past, utilized various design elements, for instance mirror image container halves, in attempts to provide for a more convenient container. For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 2,728,581 shows an ammunition transport container with a box structure having two halves each formed of two open-ended sections. Included are rigid cradle-like units 23 as shown in FIG. 2 having a semi-circular seat of a size and shape adapted to accommodate the normally outwardly projecting end of the cylindrical hollow core of the ammunition containers contained in the box. Similarly, several designs have provided containers for cradling delicate materials with inserts for transport. German Patent DE4136268A1 describes a container for transporting and storing wire spools. The container has two halves (1, 21), with two supports guides (3) for supporting the spools and allowing them to be played out with guide bars, as described. In this instance, the structure also facilitates spooling out wire. However, none of these addresses the complexities of aircraft brake assembly servicing and the containers used in this servicing. These designs do not provide for integration of the container as a tool in servicing procedures, much less in servicing aircraft brake assemblies.
Even in the special case of transporting aircraft components, for example, aircraft brake assembly components, there are examples of using specially accommodating containers, such as designs incorporating specially shaped halves. For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 6,036,007, shows a transportation case for heavy objects and provides for accommodating halves, with the top lid and base that are distinct for supporting the brake assembly in a vertical position. The design has two equal portions, a top portion and a mating bottom portion. Additionally, the components are supported by cushions. The bottom portion employs a substantially frusto-conically shaped cushion projecting upwardly therefrom, toward the top portion. The top portion employing a similar frusto-conically shaped cushion projecting downwardly therefrom, toward the bottom portion. The cushions are substantially aligned to hold the brake assembly in a vertical position.
However, no accommodation was made for making the container more useful in the process of servicing the brake assembly. Until Applicants' development of the aircraft brake assembly container of U.S. Pat. No. 7,690,506. Applicants' identified an increase in productivity by utilizing a variable internal geometry container with halves containing the new brake assembly and providing access through one side of the container to the aircraft brake assembly mounting. This allows for the used brake to be slid into one half of the delivered aircraft brake container that is removed from the new brake assembly container after delivery and then use of the remaining half to be slid with the new brake assembly onto the aircraft and installed. This process is outlined in Applicants' U.S. Pat. No. 7,954,220.
However, further developments in aircraft design and increased size of the aircraft disks have led to a need for a lower profile container to move into position under the aircraft undercarriage while still providing a container with sufficient dimensions to contain a larger aircraft brake disc.
As noted in Applicants' previous filings, increased productivity can be achieved through an improved container that facilitates service methods for brake assembly servicing. Specifically, a brake container that facilitates transport of the brake assembly to the aircraft undercarriage and removal of the used brake all on the axle of the aircraft without the need for additional slinging or wincing or manhandling of the assembly on and off the axle. This both improves efficiency and, potentially, reduces injuries from manhandling of brake assemblies during servicing. However, in some models of airplane, a lower profile side of the container with the void space to provide penetration of the aircraft axle is required than that available to accommodate the dimensions of the brake in a final transport position or configuration when the brake container is reassembled. Thus an improved container is necessary. Additionally, this improved container accommodates an even wider variety of brake assemblies, reducing the costs of manufacture of the containers and facilitating easy accommodation of changes in the design and geometry of the brake assemblies.
Furthermore, several models of these types of containers are required to accommodate the several models of brake assembly. This lack of flexibility necessitates use a wide variety of container sizes and shapes that house a particular brake assembly series or are similarly specific to an aircraft component or series of components. The design specific containers add costs for aircraft maintenance companies and require special accommodations by container manufacturers in manufacturing the specific container lines. This results in frequent line changes to produce the wide varieties of different shapes, sizes, and geometries in these containers, thus driving up costs. Similarly, the failure to integrate the container shape to fit into the method of servicing the aircraft brake increases the time required to perform maintenance, further adding costs.
To date, only the existing container design of the Applicant has been supplied that both aids in removal and in the installation of the brake assembly in lower profile applications, provides for the ability to vary internal geometry to accommodate a wide variety of aircraft brake assemblies, and provides for reassembly for container storage and/or transport of the used brake assembly. This has provided for a cost effective aircraft brake assembly container that provides for both durable and stable transport of the brake assembly and ease of use as well as better integration of the container into the maintenance processes of the lower installation profile undercarriage aircraft and provides a container that is also flexible enough to accommodate variations in the size, shape, and geometry of existing aircraft and spacecraft brake assemblies and allows for transport of the brake assembly in a horizontal orientation.
However, a need exists for an even greater flexibility and range in accommodating ever larger brake assemblies and to provide for enhanced, lower clearance at the lip of the container during service procedures, and improved load spreading and support during transport. Thus, further modification of the basic container assembly has resulted in an even greater ability to adapt the existing container and lower the profile of the container as it is used in service.

Method of using a three-piece aircraft brake assembly container