An electronic equipment, comprising: a battery receiving chamber for receiving a battery, a battery lid arranged to be rotatable to open and close an opening portion of the battery receiving chamber, a locking member arranged to engage with the battery receiving chamber to lock the battery lid so that the opening portion of the battery receiving chamber is closed, a contact terminal connectable to a terminal of the battery received in the battery receiving chamber, the contact terminal being arranged to be build in the battery lid movably in a thickness direction of the battery lid, wherein the contact terminal is arranged to protrude into the inside of the battery lid in accordance with the locking member engaging with the battery receiving chamber with the battery lid is closed and the contact terminal is retracted into the battery lid in accordance with the locking member being released from engagement with the battery receiving chamber.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a battery receiving device receiving a battery and an imaging device using the battery receiving device.
2. Related Background Art
A double A battery, for example, constituting a power source of the device main body is cylindrical, has a plus terminal portion 11 at a top portion and a minus terminal portion 12 in a bottom portion, and supplies a power to the device main body (FIG. 6).
FIG. 6 is a cross sectional view showing a schematic structure of a conventional battery receiving chamber, and shows a battery lid in a closed locked state.
In FIG. 6, the device main body (not shown) has a battery receiving chamber 2 for receiving a battery 1, and the battery receiving chamber 2 has a battery lid 3 at its top portion for opening and closing an opening portion of the battery receiving chamber 2 through a hinge pin 7.
The battery lid 3 has a cavity in its inside, and has a built-in plus contact terminal 4 in its cavity. The plus contact terminal 4 has, at its lower end, a plus contact portion 41 which contacts the plus terminal portion 11 of the battery 1.
The battery receiving chamber 2 has, at its bottom portion, an internal contact terminal 5 comprising an U-shaped spring engaged to the top portion side and the internal contact terminal 5 has a minus contact portion 51 to contact the minus terminal 12 of the battery 1 on its top end.
The battery receiving chamber 2, when the battery lid 3 is in an open state, is capable of being loaded with and unloaded from the battery 1, and when the lid is in a closed state, is capable of supplying a power to the device main body.
The battery receiving chamber 2 has a lock engaging concave portion 21 directly under the inside portion of the battery lid 3, and the battery lid 3 has a built-in lock member 6, and this lock member 6 can move forward and backward in a longitudinal direction of the battery lid 3 for the lock engaging concave portion 21 in a closed state of the battery lid 3. The lock member 6 is in the shape of a L-character to constitute an operating portion 61 whose one end is engaged with the lock engaging concave portion 21 while the other end is sticking out from the battery lid 3.
In FIG. 6, the battery lid 3 is closed and at the same time, it is in a locked state by the engagement of the lock member 6 with the lock engaging concave portion 21 (closed locked state), and the plus contact terminal 4 and a minus contact terminal 5 abut against the plus terminal portion 11 and the minus terminal portion 12, respectively. Hence, when a circuit inside the device main body is closed, the power can be supplied to the device main body.
In FIG. 6, when the operating portion 61 of the lock member 6 is operated in a direction of an arrow mark C (direction reverse to a lock direction), as shown in FIG. 7, the battery lid 3 swings to a direction of an arrow mark D (open lock release state), and eventually as shown in FIG. 8, the opening portion of the battery receiving chamber 2 can be made fully open (into an open state). In this state, the user can load and unload the battery 1.
The plus contact portion 41 of the plus contact terminal 4 is "flat" in the shape of its top end portion, and the top end portion of the minus contact portion 51 of the minus contact terminal 5 has a "convexo-concave shape having the triangle cross section".
The reason why the shape of the top end portion of the minus contact portion 51 is made into the "convexo-concave shape having the triangle cross section" is that, depending on the maintenance state of the battery 1, a foreign matter and an oxide film adhered and formed in the plus terminal 11 and the like are required to be scraped away to decrease a contact resistance value, thereby increasing the operating time of the battery 1.
However, since the plus contact portion 41 of the plus contact terminal 4 is accessed every time the user exchanges the battery 1, the plus contact portion 41 is not of the "convexo-concave shape having the triangle cross section" but "flat" in the shape of its top end portion for safety sake of the user. Hence, it is difficult to favorably maintain a contact state between the plus contact portion 41 of the plus contact terminal 4 and the plus terminal portion 11 of the battery 1.

Electronic equipment having a battery receiving chamber and battery lid with a movable contact terminal


A die for die-casting a V-block for an internal combustion engine may be operated by a wide range of die-casting machines, including those with inadequate capacity to operate the normally heavy dies for large cast parts. Such a die includes, in addition to a stationary die element for the stationary platen of a die-casting machine, only a single movable die element carried by the tie bars and slides of a die-casting machine and carrying the cylinder-forming die core pieces, means for locking the die core pieces in their extended cylinder-forming positions, and the plurality of cavity-forming slides.

This invention relates to die-casting methods and apparatus, and more particularly, to methods and apparatus for die-casting V-blocks for internal combustion engines.
Die-casting is being used for the manufacture of larger and larger articles. Such large automotive parts as internal combustion engine blocks and the housings for automatic transmissions are now commonly manufactured with die-casting as the first step in formation of the part. Such parts have extensive and complex surfaces with close tolerances; and die-casting permits their formation in high production, eliminating costly machining operations and saving metal. Die-casting requires extreme pressures exerted on the liquid metal and large amounts of heat are released from the molten metals as they change state. Massive dies are required to maintain dimensional tolerances within the limits making such operations economically attractive and to provide the strength to withstand the stresses resulting from high pressures and forces. The die-casting molds for such large automotive parts as automatic transmission housings are, for example, frequently seven to eight feet (2.1-2.5 meters) tall, seven to eight fee (2.1-2.5 meters) wide, and six to seven feet (1.8-2.1 meters) thick when closed, and must be manufactured from high-grade, high-tensile strength steel. (The words xe2x80x9cmoldxe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9cdiexe2x80x9d are used interchangeably herein.)
Such molds frequently include one stationary element, one movable element operated by the die-casting machine to close the mold, and several slidable elements referred as xe2x80x9cslidesxe2x80x9d that move transversely of the direction of movement of the die-casting machine to provide a mold cavity with intricate and re-entrant surface configurations. The mold slides, which slide transversely of the direction of movement of the die-casting machine, are generally moved by hydraulic cylinders to their proper positions.
Die-casting has become desirable as a manufacturing method for parts such as automobile engine blocks and transmission housings because it can produce intricately shaped parts to close tolerances. Die-casting can provide such parts with strength and intricately shaped surfaces without extensive and expensive machining operations. Such parts have wall thicknesses designed to take advantage of the economy of die-casting operations. Misalignment of the mold parts due, for example, to warping of the mold, misalignment of the mold on the molding machine, or non-parallelism in the molding machine platen surfaces or their direction of the movement, can vary wall thicknesses and distort part surface dimensions to unacceptable limits and result in a substantial waste of die-cast parts.
The die-casting of V-blocks for internal combustion engines poses a difficult problem because the formation of the cylinders of a V-block requires a plurality of cylinder-forming die core elements that must be moved in the die at the acute angle on which the internal combustion engine""s pistons will operate, and because the V-blocks are large and heavy and are subject to close tolerances in their dimensions.
In the die-casting of such engine blocks, a plurality of movable die parts are registered in a die-closed position to form a die cavity, and are subsequently retracted to permit removal of the cast part from the die. These die parts must be held in place in the closed position against extremely high molten metal injection forces, sometimes up to 500,000 to 1,000,000 pounds. The die parts, which are movable in a direction coinciding with the principal or longitudinal direction of movement of the die-casting machine, are locked in place by the closing mechanism of the die-casting machine itself. The die parts, or slides, which move in a direction parallel to the parting plane, which is perpendicular to the axis of movement of the die-casting machine, are locked in place when the die is closed by interacting surfaces on the slides and the die cover and the closing mechanism of the die-casting machine. Even though substantial force builds up during the metal injection step in die-casting, movable die members can be satisfactorily locked in a die-closed position by the forces imposed thereon by the closing mechanism of the die-casting machine when they move only in these two directions. However, the locking of die core elements which are movable at an acute angle with respect to the longitudinal axis of the die-casting machine has presented a different and difficult problem.
Wherever the descriptions herein refer to die core pieces or die core elements, or cylinder-forming die core pieces, the references refer to those die elements that move on an acute angle with respect to the direction of movement of the die-casting machine and can carry and position cylinder-forming sleeves in the V-block casting or can otherwise form the cylinders of the V-block casting.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,433,292 discloses a die in which the die core elements have been locked in die-closed positions by engagement of a back-up plate with the piston rods of the separate hydraulic cylinder means used for moving the die core elements. This locking mechanism has not been satisfactory because the large angular forces imposed on the piston rods by the injection pressure of the molten metal adversely affect the packings of the hydraulic cylinders, and cause rapid wear in the area of contact between the piston ends and the back-up plate because of sliding action and relatively small contact areas.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,206,799 discloses a further development in the die-casting of V-blocks by providing in a die an ejector die assembly comprising, in addition to a plurality of slides, a plurality of die members including die core elements movable relative to the die assembly in a direction at an acute angle to the longitudinal axis of movement of the die-casting machine, and a separate back-up plate means connected with the die-casting machine and attached to the back side of the ejector die assembly by a lost motion connection. In this die assembly, when the machine is in the closed position, the die members of the ejector die assembly, including the angularly movable die core elements, register in the die-closed position to define a cavity therebetween, and in this position, the back-up plate means is held against the rear side of the ejector die assembly and against the rear sides of the angularly movable die core elements by the closing mechanism of the die-casting machine. The integrity of the cavity in the die-closed position is thus maintained. As the die is opened by the die-casting machine, the back-up plate means is withdrawn from the ejector die assembly to the limit of the lost motion connection, and the movable die core elements are retracted. Further withdrawal of the back-up plate means by the die-casting machine moves the ejector die assembly to the full die-open position.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,868,241 discloses an alleged improvement on the V-block die of U.S. Pat. No. 4,206,799 to provide cast V-blocks with closer tolerances. The die disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,865,241 differs from the die disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,206,799 by the addition of complementary male and female surface on the back-up plate (referred to as xe2x80x9cthe ejection boxxe2x80x9d) and the ejector die assembly (referred to as xe2x80x9cthe ejector holder blockxe2x80x9d) to more precisely locate the ejector die assembly (the ejector holder block) with respect to the back-up plate (ejection box) when the two parts are moved into abutment by the die-casting machine, and by the addition of an actuator, in addition to die-casting machine actuator, for moving the back-up plate (ejection box) and the ejector die assembly (the ejector holder block) into abutment.
Thus, recent developments of dies for die-casting V-blocks for internal combustion engines have included a first movable die element (referred to above as an xe2x80x9cejector die assemblyxe2x80x9d and an xe2x80x9cejector holder blockxe2x80x9d), which is carried by the slides and tie bars of the die-casting machine, and which carries the cylinder-forming die core elements reciprocatably, between their extended cavity-forming positions and their retracted part-ejection positions, along axes lying at acute angles with respect to the direction of the die closing and opening movement of the die-casting machine, and a plurality of cavity-forming slides and their hydraulic cylinder actuators. Such recent dies have also included a second movable part connected to the movable platen of the die-casting machine (referred to above as a back-up plate and an ejection block), which is also carried by the slides and tie bars of the die-casting machine separately from the first movable die element to provide a gap between it and the first movable die element for access to the cylinder-forming die core pieces and to provide forward surfaces to abut the cylinder-forming die core pieces in their extended cavity-forming positions to hold, with the closing mechanism of the die-casting machine, the cylinder-forming die core pieces in their extended cylinder-forming positions against the high pressures that are imposed by the injection pressure of the molten metal. Such dies include not only the movable die elements described above, but also a stationary die element (frequently referred to as the xe2x80x9cdie coverxe2x80x9d). Such dies are expensive and frequently too massive and heavy for use with many smaller capacity die-casting machines.
Accordingly, a less expensive and less massive die for die-casting V-blocks for internal combustion engines is needed and will be advantageous.
The invention provides an inexpensive die for die-casting a V-block for an internal combustion engine, which may be operated by a wide range of die-casting machines, including those with inadequate capacity to operate heavy dies for large cast parts. Dies of the invention include, in addition to a stationary die element for the stationary platen of a die-casting machine, only a single movable die element carried by the tie bars and slides of a die-casting machine, carrying the cylinder-forming die core pieces, means for locking the die core pieces in their extended cylinder-forming positions, and the plurality of cavity-forming slides.
The invention provides a die for forming a die cavity for casting a V-block for an internal combustion engine, comprising, in addition to a stationary die element for mounting on the stationary platen of a die-casting machine, a movable die element for mounting on the movable platen of a die-casting machine for movement into cavity-forming engagement with the stationary die element, said movable die element including a cavity-forming surface portion, and carrying a plurality of slides including cavity-forming surfaces for movement transversely with respect to the movement of the movable platen, a plurality of cylinder-forming die core pieces reciprocatable at acute angles in said movable die element between extended positions in the die cavity and retracted positions substantially within said movable die element, and die core locking means, carried by the movable die element, between a first position engaging and locking the die core pieces in their extended cavity-forming positions and a second position free of contact with the die core pieces. The die core locking means preferably comprises a die core locking member having forward die core engaging portions and reciprocatable within the movable die element between a first forward position where its forward die core engaging portions engage rear portions of the die core pieces in their extended positions and a second rearward position out of contact with the die core pieces, and a pair of locks carried by the movable die element for movement transversely of the movement of the die core locking member between first positions between the die core locking member and an internal surface of the movable die element, thereby locking the die core pieces in their extended positions and second positions free of engagement with the die core locking member.

Method and apparatus for die-casting a V-block for an internal combustion engine


A portable electronic device includes a body, a casing, and a resilient element. The casing accommodates the body such that the body can slide within the casing. The casing has an opening through which an electrical connection unit connected to the body protracts out of, or retracts into, the casing. The resilient element has an end connected to the casing and another end abutting against the body. The resilient element exerts a resilient restoring force upon the body in response to the sliding of the body. The casing has a stop structure configured to operate in conjunction with an engagement structure of the body and thereby limit the range of the sliding of the body. The engagement structure can be disengaged from the stop structure to separate the body from the casing. Accordingly, the portable electronic device has multiple uses, namely quick maintenance, easy assembly, body protection, and automatic accommodation.

With memory devices becoming more popular with people and memory capacity becoming larger, portable plug-and-play (PnP) electronic products are in wide use. Conventional portable electronic devices each comprise a casing and a body enclosed therein. The body of the conventional electronic device comprises a storage unit and an electrical connection unit protruding out of the casing. The storage unit can be connected to an external electrical connection end via the electrical connection unit so as to enable data transmission. The external electrical connection end is exemplified by a USB flash drive or a USB stick.
As mentioned earlier, the electrical connection unit is exposed from the casing. The casing consists of an upper cover and a lower cover. Due to the two aforesaid features, conventional portable electronic devices are vulnerable. The electrical connection unit is likely to be hit and damaged, because it is exposed from the casing. The upper and lower covers can be crushed as a result of a hit on the casing. To overcome the aforesaid drawbacks of conventional portable storage devices, protection for the electrical connection units of recently developed portable storage devices is improved. For example, the electrical connection unit of a portable storage device is covered with a protective cover whenever the portable storage device is idle. Alternatively, the electrical connection unit is retractable into the casing. Normally, the retraction of the retractable electrical connection unit is performed manually by means of a manually operated rod. Nonetheless, it is not uncommon for the portable electronic device to become inoperable after the manually operated rod has severed under an inappropriate force.
Taiwan Patent No. M360428, entitled Connector Retractable Device for USB Flash Drive, discloses two bilaterally disposed spring structures for use with a USB flash drive such that a push exerted on the rear end of the body of the USB flash drive by the user is followed by automatic retraction and resultant positioning of the body of the USB flash drive under the reaction of the springs abutting against the body of the USB flash drive. However, the spring structures of Taiwan Patent No. M360428 have the following drawbacks: failure to demonstrate ease of use, user-based operation-dependent retraction function, and the likelihood of damaging the body, or crushing the upper and lower covers, of the USB flash drive as a result of a hit thereon. Similar drawbacks are found in Taiwan Patent No. M376871 entitled Flash Drive Having Retractable Connector.
Accordingly, it is imperative to provide a portable electronic device advantageously characterized by enhanced protection for its body and a electrical connection unit, a reinforced casing structure for protecting the received electrical connection unit and body, automatic accommodation of the electrical connection unit in the casing without requiring a user to touch a driving rod, and a structure conducive to easy separation of the body and the casing so as to facilitate maintenance.


An impact damper or an energy absorbing device having at least two tubes which telescope one into the other and are configured especially for motor vehicles for the dampening of forces on a vehicle which crashes into an obstacle. In the inner space or interior of the impact damper, there may be included at least one dampening fluid which is filled through a filling device; a throttling point; and at least one component which confines the at least one dampening fluid in the inner space.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an impact damper and, more specifically, to an energy absorbing device having at least two tubes which telescope one into the other and being configured especially for motor vehicles for the dampening of forces on a vehicle which crashes into an obstacle. In the inner space or interior of the impact damper, there may be included at least one dampening fluid which is filled through a filling device; a throttling point; and at least one component which confines the at least one dampening fluid in the inner space.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Energy absorbing devices of this general type have been disclosed, for example: German patent Nos. 22 29 954, and 22 18 952 and German Laid Open patent appln. No. 34 19 165. In such devices of the prior art, two telescoping tubes were employed to include at least one fluid chamber which was filled with a dampening fluid and/or a ga cushion of high pressure design to be contained in a gas chamber. With these types of energy absorbing devices, it has been found that, with an additional heating of the gases and/or the liquid, the energy absorbing devices would explode from heat expansion. The explosion can be caused by the fact that the metallic components and the metallic safety elements may be made of steel, which softens or melts, so that they either no longer provide their safety function or cause the tubes to become useless through bursting or ripping. During the uncontrolled expansion, the bumpers and a portion of the energy absorbing devices to which they are fastened can be thrown together from the vehicle. This type of accident is possible if a particular vehicle or a stock pile of vehicles catches fire. In practice, it has been found that the seals, such as O-rings, which are made from rubber do not burn, but may decompose at 560.degree. C. and turn into ash at 850.degree. C. The steel components would have ceased to properly function at a lower temperature. On the other hand, some plastic components, such as pistons or seals, have been made of particular plastic material which becomes doughy or more pliable at 270.degree. C. and, therefore, seal better than in their original condition, at normal, lower operating temperatures.
It is disadvantageous, therefore, that, in such a dangerous situation, the prior art devices include no opening through which the liquid or the gas could respectively escape. As a result, there can occur a destruction of the metallic components. The energy absorbing device or the components of the energy absorbing device are respectively capable of exploding because of the resulting high internal pressure above 200.degree. C.
Furthermore, safety valves, such as fusible links for the pressure containers, are shown, for example, in German Utility Model No. 75 21 957.7 and German Patent Publication Published for Opposition Purposes No. 27 44 898. With such valves, the pressurized system will experience a fast pressure drop during elevated temperatures. Such devices include separate arrangements for providing flow routes to the pressure container which ar closed off either by means of a soldered in plug or by means of a soldered plug which is installed with a nipple. These devices include the disadvantage of requiring additional components which have no relationship to the actual function or operation of the pressure system. Such additional components are not only costly but, because of the compact structure of such energy absorbing systems for a motor vehicle, are hard to install.


An apparatus and method to deposit a MgO film on a large substrate area. The method includes applying a voltage to one or more magnesium targets; applying an electric current to the one or more magnesium targets when the voltage stops increasing so that a power with a negative square wave, which does not cause mutual interfere, is applied to the one or more magnesium targets; and forming a MgO film on a substrate using magnesium particles emitted from the one or more magnesium targets by the power applied. The disclosed apparatus to deposit a MgO film on a large substrate area includes a magnetron part having at least one magnesium target and a permanent magnet; a power control part to apply power to the at least one magnesium target and separately provide control for each of the at least one magnesium target; a flow control part to supply gases for the at least one magnesium target; a substrate control part to control a substrate; a vacuum control part to control a vacuum state in a chamber; and a heater control part to maintain temperature in the chamber.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for depositing a magnesium oxide film on a substrate, and more particularly, in order to increase the deposition speed of a magnesium oxide (MgO) film using magnetron sputtering discharge developing a new power supply system and its utilizing process to form a MgO film on a plasma display panel (PDP) of 40 to 100 inch in size.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the field of PDP technology, MgO is commonly used as a protective film or an electron release medium. The MgO film is formed by means of physical deposition such as sputtering, thermal deposition, and electron beam evaporation, or metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) by chemical reaction between gaseous reactants. The Korean Patent Publication No. 2002-0088127, Lee and Park, discloses a method of forming a film through MOCVD. MOCVD allows very rapid film formation but has problems such as a comparatively complicated process and a rather high incidence of defective quality.
With deposition using a sputtering method, the deposition process is relatively simple and impurity content in the formed film is very low compared to the MOCVD although the film growth speed is slow. Therefore, if the film growth speed can be increased, the deposition by sputtering may provide a MgO film with good quality and higher productivity.
The Korean Patent Publication No. 2001-0025739, Choi et al., discloses an apparatus and method for depositing MgO film using magnetron-sputtering discharge. The power supply used in the above-mentioned patent publication provides high-frequency waves oscillating from plus polarity to minus polarity. The used frequency is normally between 10 kHz and 13.56 MHz. However, the power supply has a limitation on the increase of MgO film growth speed because ions colliding with magnesium targets cannot obtain enough energy due to wave characteristics of oscillating from plus polarity to minus polarity and self-bias by electrons on the surface of the magnesium targets.
In addition, when a plurality of magnesium targets are arranged in parallel and power is applied to the magnesium targets to generate discharge, the generated discharge may disappear during the operation because power oscillation from plus polarity to minus polarity causes interference between magnesium targets. Therefore, an auxiliary equipment is required to prevent the disappearance of the discharge.

Apparatus and method to deposit magnesium oxide film on a large area

Korea Electrotechnology Research Institute


In a beam filter assembly, a base filter is employed to modify a beam quality of a radiation beam of a base energy level and a first filter slice is stacked with the base filter to modify a beam quality of a radiation beam of a first energy level higher than the base energy level. In a beam filter positioning device, a base stage carries a base filter and a first stage carries a filter slice. The base stage is provided with a first engagement site and a second engagement site. The first stage is provided with a first engagement site, a second engagement site, and an open port. The first stage and the base stage are each independently movable relative to the beamline. The first stage is engageable with the base stage when at least one of the first and second engagement sites of the first stage is aligned with at least one of the first and second engagement sites of the base stage, and is further movable with the base stage in unison when engaged.

Linear accelerators (LINACs) are used to produce high energy radiation beams useful in radiation therapy and imaging of patients and in other applications such as safety inspection. A linear accelerator includes various devices operable to produce, condition, or monitor radiation beams. By way of example, an x-ray target produces x-rays upon impingement by energetic electrons. A beam filter such as a photon flattening filter conditions x-rays to provide a desired energy or dose distribution profile across the radiation field. In an electron mode operation of a linear accelerator, a scattering foil and button is used to scatter incident electrons to provide a broadened, uniform beam profile.
In conventional linear accelerators, full sized beam filters are used in filtration of x-ray beams of different energy levels. For x-ray beams of high energy levels such as 18 MV, 20 MV or higher, a beam filter may be composed of multiple materials to create a desired filtration. The use of full sized beam filters for radiation beams of different energy levels requires greater filter material volumes and sizes and increases manufacturing costs.
Conventional beam filter positioning devices include exchangers which are designed to carry full sized beam filters and allow switching of individual filters for beams of different energy levels. For example, a conventional carousel exchanger is designed to carry five full sized individual filters for filtration of beams of five different energy levels. This kind of positioning device design requires more space or clearance for full sized filters' movement and more complicated motion axes for positioning and retracting beam filters in and/or out of the beam path.

Beam filter assembly and beam filter positioning device


A program product and method of compiling a computer program to optimize performance of a computer program. First, after initialization, a profiling run is done on computer code which may include program code blocks and program data. Execution of each computer program step is monitored and each occurrence of each individual code unit is logged, e.g. each instruction block or block of data. Frequently occurring code units are identified periodically as hot blocks. An initial snapshot of hot blocks is logged, e.g., when identified hot blocks exceed an initial block number. Profiling continues until the profiling run is complete, updating identified hot blocks and logging a new current snapshot whenever a current set of identified hot blocks contains a selected percentage of different hot blocks. Snapshots are selected as representative to different program modes. The program is optimized according to program modes.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to optimization of computer programs and more particularly, the present invention relates to ordering portions of a computer program and data used therein for improved execution order.
2. Background Description
A typical state of the art computer, whether a large mainframe computer or small personal computer (PC), includes a hierarchical memory system. The memory system may include nonvolatile storage, main memory and cache memory. Non-volatile storage, typically is disk storage or a hard disk. Main memory is typically relatively low cost, dense dynamic random access memory (DRAM). Usually cache memory is faster, more expensive, less dense static random access memory (SRAM). Typically, cache memory is a small portion of the entire memory system, e.g., 1-10%.
Memory paging systems are designed to exploit spatial and temporal locality. Temporal locality refers to the tendency of programs to execute instructions repeatedly; thus the performance of fetching instructions from main memory can be improved by saving recently executed instructions in a small high-speed cache. Instructions are said to exhibit good spatial locality in a program if execution of an instruction tends to be followed quickly by execution of instructions packaged nearby. A program with poor spatial locality will cause unneeded instructions to be fetched into the cache, preventing cache operation at its full potential. For these hierarchical memory systems, volatile memory may be thought of as a medium-speed cache for low-speed persistent memory, such as a disk. Recently used pages are kept in memory to take advantage of temporal locality. Again, good spatial locality is required to avoid bringing unneeded instructions and data into memory. Poor spatial locality thus reduces the efficiency of memory paging.
Further, processor performance is increasing much more rapidly than the performance of their attached memory subsystems. So, it is increasingly difficult to feed data and instructions to processors rapidly enough to keep the processors utilized to their maximum capacity. As a result, a great deal of ingenuity has been expended on hardware solutions to improve the access time and memory reference throughput, including caches, prefetch buffers, branch prediction hardware, memory module interleaving, very wide buses, and so forth. Also, software may be optimized to take the best possible advantage of these hardware advances.
Unfortunately, xe2x80x9cnaivexe2x80x9d code generation often results in programs that have poorer spatial locality than is achievable. It is typical, for example, to generate code that branches around infrequently executed error paths. This results in poor utilization of the instruction cache, since some of the error path code will usually be fetched into the cache along with the branch that bypasses it. It is also typical for computational procedures to be packaged without consideration for locality, so that although procedure A frequently calls procedure B, A and B are located in different memory pages. Accordingly, it is becoming more common to use profiling information (profiling) to analyze program behavior during execution.
Optimization procedures have been developed to optimize program code selecting segments that are most likely to be used. Those selected code segments are typically stored in cache memory. Also, large data sets may be used by a program which itself fits in cache, but the large data sets may be so large as to not fit completely into a cache memory. Program execution from each of these examples can be improved by more efficient segment caching.
With the introduction of instruction caches, which have been designed to exploit temporal and spatial locality, profiling focus was shifted to reordering code at a finer granularity. Most successful approaches to improving instruction cache performance have used profile data to predict branch outcomes. In contrast to most of the foregoing work on virtual memory performance, these techniques were implemented within the framework of optimizing compilers. Profiling gathers data about the frequencies with which different execution paths in a program are traversed. These profile data can then be fed back into the compiler to guide optimization of the code. One of the proven uses of profile data is in determining the order in which instructions should be packaged. By discovering the xe2x80x9chot tracesxe2x80x9d through a procedure, the optimizer can pack the instructions in those traces consecutively into cache lines, resulting in greater cache utilization and fewer cache misses. Similarly, profile data can help determine which procedures call other procedures most frequently, permitting the called procedures to be reordered in memory to reduce page faults. Thus, profile information has been used to reduce conflict misses in set-associative caches, for example. Also a reduction in conflict misses has been achieved using only static analysis of the program. Further, basic blocks have been traced to reduce the number of unexecuted instructions brought into the instruction cache (cache pollution), and to order basic blocks. It also is known that infrequently executed traces can be separated entirely from the main procedure body for additional efficiency. Other methods of reordering instructions are based on the presence of loops, branch points, and join points in the control flow graph, as well as based directly on the control dependence graph.
Thus, it is a goal of a good cache management procedure to take advantage of locality properties. Ideally, blocks of instructions or data that are expected to be used together are stored together within the cache memory. Program slow downs occur when code currently being executed by the computer need code that is outside of the cache or, even worse, outside of main memory, stored in non-volatile storage, e.g. on disk. This can happen for example with a branch or a call or when the calculation being done on data in a database that may be partially stored in cache requires data from that database that is not stored in the cache. Each branch to code out of the cache and, even more so, to code out of the main memory slows execution.
Accordingly, optimizing compilers have been developed which convert source code into object code and to what is hoped to be an optimum instruction order such that execution is maintained within code in cache at the particular point in time. These optimizing compilers typically attempt to group code into manageable groups that are compartmentalized or contained within a reasonably sized segment such that the segment may be maintained in cache memory while it is being executed.
However, the cache optimization program cannot improve the code itself, i.e., if blocks of instructions are not organized such that related blocks are in close execution proximity to each other, the cache optimization program cannot guess which blocks are more likely to be executed and what is the optimum execution order. R. R. Heisch in xe2x80x9cFDPR for AIX Executables,xe2x80x9d AIXpert, No. 4 (August 1994), pp. 16-20 and xe2x80x9cTrace-Directed Program Restructuring for AIX Executables,xe2x80x9d IBM Journal of Research and Development 38, No. 5, 595-603 (September 1994) teaches that instruction cache performance can be maximized by considering it as a whole-program optimization. Heisch""s methods differ from previous approaches by operating as a post-processor on executable program objects and by allowing basic blocks to migrate without being constrained by procedure boundaries. The reordered code was appended to the original executable program objects, resulting in reported growth in executable file size of between 5 and 41 percent. This growth had negligible impact on performance. I. Nahshon and D. Bernstein, xe2x80x9cFDPR-A Post-Pass Object Code Optimization Tool,xe2x80x9d Proceedings of the Poster Session of CC ""96xe2x80x94International Conference on Compiler Construction, Sweden (April 1996), pp. 97-104 produced an improved algorithm that required less code growth. A FDPR (feedback-directed program restructuring) tool by IBM Corporation embodies the teachings of Heisch and Nahshon et al. W. J. Schmidt, R. R. Roediger, C. S. Mestad, B. Mendelson, I. Shavit-Lottem and V. Bortnikov-Sitnitsky, xe2x80x9cProfile-directed restructuring of operating system codexe2x80x9d, IBM Systems Journal, Vol. 37, No. 2, teach a profiling system for restructuring the code, based on observed frequencies of calls to basic blocks and the usage of particular branches within the code. Such systems collect execution statistics, run on typical applications, count the number of times each basic block (B) is executed and, optionally, the number of times each sibling block (B1, B2, . . . ) is expected to execute after B, where B1, B2 . . . are all the possible successors of B according to the code. Blocks that are executed substantially more often than others are considered xe2x80x9chotxe2x80x9d and their positions within the code are then revised with respect to the profile information, so that the restructured code is expected to run more efficiently on typical applications. Similarly, data sets can be restructured with respect to affinities that are induced by execution patterns, so that blocks of data that tend to be executed closely together, are placed in proximity to each other.
Unfortunately, a typical application may be running in several different modes and, therefore, a xe2x80x9chotxe2x80x9d block may be dependent on the mode. For example, an application may have two modes of execution, an equation solving mode and a simulation mode. Naturally, blocks that are related to equation solving are hot when the system is solving an equation, while those related to simulation are hot while the system is in its simulation mode. However, deriving global block statistics may result in deeming that none of the blocks are hot since, on the average, none is used significantly more often than any other. Thus, even though programmers may have designed the source code in a way that promotes locality of these two modes, significant portions of the code, very likely are placed in a structure that does not take advantage of this modality and the instruction cache.
Thus, there is a need for a method of organizing programs for optimal block placement under all operating conditions.
The present invention is a program product and method of compiling a computer program to optimize performance of a computer program. First, after initialization, a profiling run is done on computer code which may include program code blocks and data in a database. Execution of each computer program step is monitored and each occurrence of each individual code unit is logged, e.g. each instruction block or block of data. Frequently occurring code units are identified periodically as hot blocks. An initial snapshot of hot blocks is logged, e.g., when identified hot blocks exceed an initial block number. Profiling continues until the profiling run is complete, updating identified hot blocks and logging a new current snapshot whenever a current set of identified hot blocks contains a selected percentage of different hot blocks. Snapshots are selected as representative to different program modes. The program is optimized according to program modes.

Restructuring of executable computer code and large data sets

International Business Machines Corporation


An electronic camera according to the present invention includes: an image pickup part for picking up a subject image to produce image data; a processing part for processing the image data outputted from the image pickup part to produce a quickview image for monitor display and also produce image data for record on a recording medium; and a monitor part for displaying the quickview image. The processing part commences displaying the quickview image on the monitor part prior to the production of the image data for record. This processing allows the display of the quickview image to be commenced without waiting for completion of the production of the image data for record. Therefore, it is possible to shorten the time lag occurring at displaying the quickview image, thereby improving the convenience of the electronic camera.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electronic camera that internally processes image data obtained by picking up subject images. More particularly, the present invention relates to an electronic camera that produces image data for record to be recorded on a recording medium and quickview images for monitor display.
2. Description of the Related Art
In conventional electronic cameras, the following procedures are performed to process image data.    1) Image Capture
An electronic camera reads image data from its internal image sensor. The electronic camera implements signal processings on the image data, such as A/D conversion, defective pixel correction, optical black-level correction, gain adjustment, white balance adjustment, tone correction and so on. The signal-processed image data are stored in a buffer memory within the electronic camera.    2) Image Processing
The electronic camera implements image processings on the signal-processed image data, such as color interpolation, color coordinate transformation, color correction, special frequency filtering and so on, and thereby produce image data for record.    3) Production of Quickview
The electronic camera reduces the image size of the image data for record to produce a quickview image.    4) Production and Compression of Thumbnail
The electronic camera reduces the image size of the image data for record to generate a thumbnail image for a display list. The electronic camera compresses the thumbnail image by use of a hardware or software processing.    5) Image Compression
The electronic camera image-compresses the image data for record by use of a hardware processing or the like.    6) Recording
The electronic camera implements file recording of the image-compressed resultants on a recording medium.
The inventor of the present invention recognizes the following problems existent in the above-described processings.    (1) First Problem
In general, a user or operator of the electronic camera displays a quickview image on its monitor screen after capturing a subject image. He or she may use this quickview image on the photo-taking spot to determine whether the captured result is good or not. It is preferable that the user or operator can check the quickview without delay at the time of photographing. It is, therefore, desirable that the quickview image be produced as soon as possible after the capturing of the subject image.
In the foregoing example of the prior art, however, the image size of the image data for record has to be reduced for generation of the quickview image. In such a case, quick generation of the quickview image is difficult because there is a need for waiting for a completion of generation of the image data for record.
For the generation of image data for record, in general, it is necessary to process full-sized image data. Additionally, in order to improve the picture quality of the electronic camera, those image processings have to be high-level, complicated processings. This tends to elongate the time taken for the processings on the image data for record, and the generation of the quickview image delays accordingly.
For the reason above, the above-described example of the prior art is disadvantageous in terms of availability that a time lag is likely to occur from photographing to displaying the quickview image, so that the user cannot check the captured image smoothly.    (2) Second Problem
Reusing the quickview image during image reproduction can shorten the time required for the image reproduction on the monitor. To prepare for such reuse during image reproduction, it is necessary, when the image data for record is recorded, to record the quickview image together with the image data for record.
In the above-described example of the prior art, the electronic camera must additionally compress and recode the quickview image after completing the image compression of preceding image data for record. This elongates the time required for photographing by a time needed for performing the additional processings accordingly. Consequently, disadvantages such as a reduction in the speed of a continuous shooting are likely to arise.

Electronic camera for producing quickview images


An image forming apparatus is provided with a body; a developing unit formed inside the body; a toner accommodation unit mounted inside the body and provided with at least two or more cartridges; and a toner supply unit for supplying toner discharged from each cartridge of the toner accommodation unit to the developing unit, such that a user can easily change the toner.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus whereby a user can easily change toner.
2. Related Art
Generally, a small-sized image forming apparatus, such as a laser printer, a compact photo-copier, a facsimile machine or a multi-functional product, utilizes a developing unit provided with toner. However, in case of an image forming apparatus that needs a large quantity of toner, a toner container is separately installed to accommodate the toner.
FIG. 1 is a schematic drawing of an engine part of an image forming apparatus such as a printer equipped with a large capacity toner container. Referring to FIG. 1, an image forming apparatus includes a paper cassette 10, a paper feeding unit 20, a developing unit 30, a transfer unit 40, a fixing unit 50 and a toner cartridge 60. The toner included in the toner cartridge 60 is supplied to the developing unit 30 by a toner convey unit 70.
The paper cassette 10 accommodates many sheets of printing paper, and the paper feeding unit 20 supplies the individual sheet of printing paper to the developing unit 30 and the transfer unit 40. The developing unit 30 forms a predetermined toner image, and the transfer unit 40 transfers the toner image on the printing paper.
The fixing unit 50 applies heat and pressure to an image electrostatically attached to the transfer unit 40 and fixes an electrostatic image on the printing paper. The toner cartridge 60 is accommodated with toner supplied to the developing unit 30, and the toner is supplied to the developing unit 30 by the toner convey unit 70.
However, the toner cartridge 60 used in conventional image forming apparatuses is bulky due to accommodation of a large quantity of toner for printing many sheets of printing paper. As a result, a user often has difficulty in changing the toner cartridge 60 due to heavy weight of the toner cartridge 60. Moreover, there is another disadvantage in that a large space is required inside an image forming apparatus due to the size of the toner cartridge 60, as shown, for example, in FIG. 1.


The present invention relates to a high voltage connector in which an interlock terminal and a power connection terminal to which a high voltage is applied are sequentially connected or disconnected by rotation, thereby minimizing the size of the connector and allowing a user to check whether each of the terminals is connected or not. The high voltage connector of the present invention comprises: a plug housing inside which is installed a power connection terminal and an interlock connection plug; a cap housing inserted into the inside of the plug housing, and inside which are installed an interlock connecting tab which is capable of connection with the interlock connection plug, and a power connection terminal tab which is capable of connection with the power connection terminal; and a cover housing installed on the top of the cap housing for connecting or disconnecting the power connection terminal tab and the interlock connecting tab with the power connection terminal and the interlock connection plug by inserting or withdrawing the cap housing from the inside of the plug housing by rotation.

Generally, a connector installed at a wire to which a high-voltage current is applied has a double cutoff structure for safety. Particularly, for a hybrid vehicle to which high-voltage current is applied, this double cutoff structure is essential.
More specifically, since high-voltage current is applied to the connector, connection or disconnection of terminals of a power switch can cause arcing between the terminals, each of which acts as an electrode in this case. To prevent possible damage to a product due to the arc, an interlock switch, to which an electric current is applied at a voltage lower than that for the power switch, is further installed.
For such connector, the interlock switch to which a low-voltage current is applied is first connected or disconnected to apply or cut off power and then the power switch to which a high-voltage current is applied is connected or disconnected to prevent arcing between the terminals which is caused by application of a large amount of high-voltage current at a time.
Such connector has a first housing provided with a first power terminal and a first interlock terminal and a second terminal inserted into the first terminal. A second power terminal and a second interlock terminal to be connected respectively to the first power terminal and the first interlock terminal are installed inside the second housing such that the lengths of the first and second interlock terminals are shorter than those of the first and second power terminals.
In the connector having the above structure, when the second housing is inserted into the first housing, the first and second power terminals are first connected and then as the second housing is further inserted into the first housing the first and second interlock terminals having shorter lengths than the power terminals are connected. When the second housing is removed from the first housing, the first and second interlock terminals are first disconnected and then the first and second power terminals are disconnected.
Accordingly, the first and second interlock terminals are connected only after the first and second power terminals are connected, and thus application of supplied power is allowed only when the first and second interlock terminals are connected. Therefore, occurrence of arc due to the high-voltage current is prevented by the pre-connection of the first and second power terminals. Also, when the first and second power terminals are disconnected, arcing is prevented as the first and second interlock terminals are already disconnected and thus the power is disconnected.
However, for the conventional connector as above in which application and disconnection of power depends on whether or not the first and second interlock terminals are connected when the second housing is inserted into or removed from the first housing, it is difficult for an operator to know if the first and second interlock terminals are connected or disconnected according to insertion or removal of the second housing, and therefore it is difficult to check if high-voltage power is applied to the first and second interlock terminals.


According to one embodiment, an X-ray tube includes an anode including a target surface, and a cathode including a first filament and a focusing electrode. The focusing electrode includes a valley bottom portion, a first inclined plane sloping up from the valley bottom portion in a direction of the anode, a first focusing groove, and a first storage groove. θ1 is greater than 0°. The first focusing groove has a longitudinal axis. One end portion on the first extension line side of the first focusing groove is closer to a first reference surface than the other end portion of the first focusing groove.

In general, X-ray tubes are used for image diagnosis, etc. A cathode of such an X-ray tube comprises two electron guns. Each of the electron guns comprises a filament coil which emits electrons and a focusing groove which focuses the emitted electrons. The two electron guns share one focusing electrode. The electrons that have been emitted from each of the electron guns and have been focused collide with a target surface of an anode target, and focuses are thereby formed on the target surface. The two electron guns are located with the focuses sandwiched therebetween and are each inclined so that the focuses can be formed at the same position on the target surface.
The target surface is inclined at an angle referred to as a target angle in a main emission direction. In a direction orthogonal to both the main emission direction and the axis of the X-ray tube, the target surface and surfaces opposite to the target surface of the electron guns are inclined approximately at the target angle. Because the flight distance of electrons emitted from one end and that of electrons emitted from the other end of both the ends in a longitudinal direction of the filament coil are different, the focuses have distorted shapes. Thus, in order to correct such distortion of the shapes of the focuses, a technique of inclining the whole electron guns at a proper angle with respect to the main emission direction has been known.

CANON ELECTRON TUBES & DEVICES CO., LTD.


An imaging system including a transmitter configured to transmit a signal in a direction of a scene of interest. The transmitted signal is spatially and temporally incoherent at a point where the transmitted signal reaches the scene of interest. The system includes a receiver set including at least a first receiver and a second receiver. The first receiver and the second receiver are configured to receive a reflected signal. The reflected signal is a reflection of the transmitted signal from the scene of interest. The system further includes an active incoherent millimeter-wave image processor configured to obtain the reflected signal and reconstruct a scene based on the reflected signal. The system also includes a display device configured to display the scene.

Electromagnetic imaging sensors operating in the millimeter-wave (mm-wave) band are a solution for a variety of current and emerging applications, including autonomous vehicle navigation, contraband detection, helicopter landing assist, medical imaging, and other general imaging techniques. The mm-wave band is typically understood to range from 30 GHz to 300 GHz. Electromagnetic imaging sensors can generate two-dimensional representations of objects, allowing for the automated extraction of information through traditional image processing techniques. Due to the short wavelengths associated with mm-wave radiation, imaging systems operating within this band provide sufficient spatial resolution to produce images which are recognizable by humans.
Moreover, materials which are opaque to radiation in the infrared and visible portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, such as clothing, limited building materials, smoke, and fog, are effectively transparent to mm-wave propagation. Obviating potentially obstructive materials when imaging offers tremendous value for the aforementioned applications, enabling all weather sensing of the environment surrounding a vehicle for autonomous navigation, as well as empowering through-material sensing for security applications, such as contraband detection.
Electromagnetic imaging sensors are classified as either active or passive. An imaging sensor is active when the sensor first transmits a signal and then measures the corresponding reflection and passive when the sensor only receives a signal either emitting or reflecting from the object of interest. Imaging sensors are further classified as either scanning or staring. An imaging sensor is scanning when the sensor's field of view is transitioned through the region of interest using mechanical or electrical steering and staring when variations of the sensor's directivity are not required. In steered approaches, mechanical systems offer simplistic implementation at the expense of often infeasible size and power requirements. While electronic steering eliminates the motorization requirement which drives these limitations, along with allowing for the more rapid generation of images, the complexity required to achieve the requisite complex beamforming weights at each module is often excessive.
Additionally, microwave imaging systems are used in many applications, including security sensing and medical imaging, due to the ability of microwave radiation to penetrate materials that otherwise block optical and infrared sensors, including clothing and baggage materials. Recently, there has been interest in using spatial frequency sampling to generate images using a subset of the modules required in a filled microwave phased array. Spatial frequency sampling was developed in radio astronomy to synthesize large antenna apertures using a small number of physical modules, and recent efforts have developed passive interferometric imaging systems based on these techniques and the fact that humans emit incoherent thermal radiation. In the microwave region, the radiated power is proportional to the physical temperature of the source for most sources of interest, thus thermal radiation is of particular utility. However, the thermal power received in the microwave region is exceedingly small, necessitating very high sensitivity receivers.
Imaging capability is critical for automobile safety and for future semi-autonomous and autonomous driving. Light detection and ranging ("LIDAR") systems provide excellent resolution but are severely hindered by obscurants, such as fog, smoke, dust, which render them unusable. Further, current automobile radars cannot provide imaging capability. Instead, current automobile radar only provides range, angle and velocity information.
The background description provided here is for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure and are neither expressly nor impliedly admitted as prior art against the present disclosure.

Methods and systems for distributed radar imaging

Board of Trustees of Michigan State University


Described herein are compounds that are useful as ERK2 inhibitors. These compounds, and pharmaceutically acceptable compositions thereof, are useful for treating or lessening the severity of a variety of disorders, including proliferative disorders such as cancer.

The present invention relates to heteroaryl compounds that are protein kinase inhibitors, compositions containing such compounds, and methods for their use. The compounds and compositions of the invention are useful for treating cancer, neurological disorders, autoimmune disorders, and other diseases that are alleviated by protein kinase inhibitors.
Mammalian cells respond to extracellular stimuli by activating signaling cascades that are mediated by members of the mitogen-activated protein (MAP) kinase family, which include the extracellular signal regulated kinases (ERKs), the p38 MAP kinases and the c-Jun N-terminal kinases (JNKs). MAP kinases (MAPKs) are activated by a variety of signals including growth factors, cytokines, UV radiation, and stress-inducing agents. MAPKs are serine/threonine kinases and their activation occur by dual phosphorylation of threonine and tyrosine at the Thr-X-Tyr segment in the activation loop. MAPKs phosphorylate various substrates including transcription factors, which in turn regulate the expression of specific sets of genes and thus mediate a specific response to the stimulus.
ERK2 is a widely distributed protein kinase that achieves maximum activity when both Thr183 and Tyr185 are phosphorylated by the upstream MAP kinase, MEK1. Upon activation, ERK2 phosphorylates many regulatory proteins, including the protein kinases Rsk90 and MAPKAP2, and transcription factors such as ATF2, Elk-1, c-Fos, and c-Myc. ERK2 is also a downstream target of the Ras/Raf dependent pathways and relays the signals from these potentially oncogenic proteins. ERK2 has been shown to play a role in the negative growth control of breast cancer cells and hyperexpression of ERK2 in human breast cancer has been reported. Activated ERK2 has also been implicated in the proliferation of endothelin-stimulated airway smooth muscle cells, suggesting a role for this kinase in asthma.
Overexpression of receptor tyrosine kinases such as EGFR and ErbB2, as well as activating mutations in the Ras GTPase proteins or B-Raf mutants are major contributors to human cancer. These genetic alterations are correlated with poor clinical prognosis and result in activation of the Raf-1/2/3-MEK1/2-ERK1/2 signal transduction cascade in a broad panel of human tumors. Activated ERK (i.e., ERK1 and/or ERK2) is a central signaling molecule that has been associated with the control of proliferation, differentiation, anchorage-independent cell survival, and angiogenesis, contributing to a number of processes that are important for the formation and progression of malignant tumors. These data suggest that an ERK1/2 inhibitor will exert pleiotropic activity, including proapoptotic, anti-proliferative, anti-metastatic and anti-angiogenic effects, and offer a therapeutic opportunity against a very broad panel of human tumors.
Many diseases are associated with abnormal cellular responses triggered by protein kinase-mediated events, such as, for example, autoimmune diseases, inflammatory diseases, bone diseases, metabolic diseases, neurological and neurodegenerative diseases, cancer, cardiovascular diseases, allergies and asthma, Alzheimer's disease, and hormone-related diseases. Accordingly, there has been a substantial effort in medicinal chemistry to find protein kinase inhibitors that are effective as therapeutic agents and there is still a need for new therapeutic agents that inhibit these protein targets.

Selective inhibitors of ERK protein kinase and uses thereof


To avoid any lens breakage when a small and wide-angle optical imaging unit is assembled, an optical imaging unit is provided and has a glass lens, a plastic lens, a washer and a lens barrel having a first lens housing groove and a second lens housing groove of larger diameter than the first lens housing groove. The glass lens is mounted in a front side of the lens barrel, a washer is fitted in the second lens housing groove so that the washer contacting with an outer edge of the glass lens, and the plastic lens is mounted in the second lens housing groove behind the washer. The washer or the plastic lens has a recess in a contact side with each other except an outer edge thereof, so that the washer and the plastic lens contact each other along their outer edges.

While a cellular phone or personal computer having an imaging device has recently become popular, an optical imaging unit used in such a device has been required to be small and yet cover a wide angle of view. A three-lens unit composed of a first lens having a positive refractive power, a second lens having a negative refractive power and a third lens having a positive refractive power, which are arranged in this order from the object side, is known as a small and wide-angle optical unit (see JP-A-2001-75006 (FIG. 1)).
As the disclosure of JP-A-2001-75006 is unsuitable for a reduction in the overall length of the imaging lenses, a still smaller unit has been developed (see JP-A-2004-4566 (FIG. 2)).
In order to make a small and wide-angle unit with two lenses, it has been usual to employ a scratch-resistant glass lens as a first lens 100 on the object side and a second plastic lens 101 behind the first lens 100 and install them in a lens barrel 102, as shown in FIG. 3. The first lens 100 has a small outside diameter and the second lens 101 has a large outside diameter to spread light sharply on the rear side of the first lens 100. Due to the use of the first and second lenses 100 and 101 as described, it has been likely that the forcing of the second lens 101 into the lens barrel 102 may cause moment to occur about the point of its contact with the first lens 100, and that stress may be concentrated on areas designated as A and B in FIG. 3 and cause the second lens 101 to crack or break.


An apparatus for a transluminal procedure includes: a case composed of a front case part formed in the shape of a pipe and having a locking groove at a rear end, a central case part combined with the front case part and having a button hole at a rear end, and a rear case part combined with the central case part and having a through-hole formed ahead of a button groove coming in contact with the button hole at a center; a locking member having a button and a locking end; an operation member formed in the shape of a pipe and moving up and down in the case; an inner wire in live operation member and locked to the case; and an outer tube fitted on the inner wire and fixed ahead of the operation member.

In general, stricture of organs or blood vessels may be caused and internal secreting fluid cannot smoothly flow due to a disease in a human body and operations, and several parts of a human body cannot normally work due to stricture of organs and blood vessels.
When internal secreting fluid cannot smoothly flow, various kinds of plastic stents are used, and particularly, when stricture of the bile duct and ERBD (Endoscopic retrograde Biliary Drainage) occurs, an operator inserts a plastic stent through an endoscope so that bile and secretion are smoothly discharged.
Further, ERCP (Endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography) is an examination that inserts an endoscope into the duodenum and examines diseased parts of the bile duct and the pancreatic duct through a small hole called the ampulla of Vater. However, the ampulla that is cut by a knife called Sphinctenotome through EST (endoscopic sphincterectomy) after an endoscope is inserted for examining the bile duct and the pancreatic duct may be inflamed or may be in danger of secondary complications (cholangitis or pancreatitis).
A procedure of inserting a plastic stent is performed to prevent such secondary complications.
There are various kinds of plastic stents, including the shapes in which both ends are rolled in the same direction or different directions or barbs are formed at both ends in accordance with the usage or the procedure places, and the bodies are cylindrical in most cases.
According to the common way of the related art that inserts a plastic stent into a body for a procedure, a double pipe of a guide catheter and a push pipe moving forward/backward along the guide catheter is used, in which a plastic stent is fitted in the guide catheter partially exposed and inserted into a lumen and then the push pipe is moved forward to operate on a desired portion.
An operation tool such as specific forceps, which pushes or pulls the plastic stent, is used to adjust, the position of the plastic stent.
However, when a guide catheter is used, its size should be changed in accordance with the kind or size of a plastic stent and it is difficult to adjust the position after an operation.
In order to solve this problem, a way of coupling a plastic stent to the front of a guide catheter with a suture, inserting the stent into a lumen of a body and moving the guide catheter to the accurate operation position, and then separating the plastic stent from the guide catheter by untying the suture has recently been proposed.
However, this operation type of coupling a plastic stent to a guide catheter with a suture can ensure stability because the guide catheter and the plastic stent are coupled in a single unit, but there is a problem in that it is required to untie the suture to perform an operation and readjust the position of the plastic stent after removing the suture.
There is a strong need of an operation tool that can adjust the position for an operation of a plastic stent, adjust the position after the operation, remove a portion of a tissue like forceps, and excise a tissue like a snare, using an operation mechanism moving forward/backward.


The invention provides intradialytic parenteral nutrition (IDPN) solutions with low carbohydrate for the treatment of malnutrition in dialysis patients. The IDPN solutions of the invention are particularly advantageous for the treatment of malnutrition in patients who are diabetic or suffer from other glucose management related pathologies or patients who require strict fluid management.

Severe malnutrition remains a problem for patients receiving maintenance hemodialysis (MHD). Dialysis patients often have poor appetites and low energy. This malnutrition is reflected in low serum albumin concentrations, a strong predictor of increased morbidity and mortality. (Moore and Lindenfield, Support Line 29(5):7-16 (October 2007)). Patients are often treated using diet liberalization, oral supplements and enteral feeding. When these methods are not effective intradialytic parenteral nutrition (IDPN) may be utilized for more aggressive nutrition repletion efforts.
IDPN is infused during the hemodialysis procedure. IDPN has been used for decades and has resulted in weight gain and improved protein levels in patients. (U.S. Publication No. 2005/0148647). The typical IDPN treatment delivers 4-6 mg/kg/minute of glucose for patients in need of carbohydrate control and 6-8 mg/kg/minute for patients who do not need carbohydrate control. Blood glucose must be monitored to avoid problems associated with insulin resistance, hyperglycemia and hypoglycemia. In some cases, insulin is also administered either in the IDPN solution or more typically separately administered subcutaneously to modulate blood glucose levels. IDPN generally contains 1.2-1.4 g/kg of amino acids. However, these amounts can be lowered for patients who do not tolerate protein well. Monitoring of serum bicarbonate and carbon dioxide levels must be monitored to check for acidosis caused by administration of amino acids. Lipids are provided in IDPN at a rate between 4 mg/kg/minute and 12-12.5 g/hour depending on tolerance of the lipids by the patient. Generally, these lipids are emulsions of purified vegetable oil from soybean (Intraliipid® from Kabi Vitrum or Travamulsion® from Travenol) or safflower oil (Liposyn® from Abbott). (Powers, Contemporary Dialysis and Nephrology:29-31 (February 1990).
IDPN is usually administered in one liter of solution, and occasionally micronutrients, like vitamins and minerals are co-administered in or with IDPN. IDPN has proved effective in decreasing morbidity and mortality in MHD patients, leads to increased levels of serum albumin and creatine levels, and increased body weight. (Moore and Celano, Nutrition in Clinical Practice, 20(2):202-212 (2005)). Hypoglycemia is another potential dangerous result of the administration of insulin during IDPN with symptoms of nervousness, sweating, intense hunger, trembling, weakness, palpitations, and trouble speaking.
Problems associated with IDPN include hyperglycemia, complications in patients with insulin resistance or other problems associated with glucose management, as well as complications in patients who require strict fluid management. The glucose concentrations administered with IDPN can cause hyperglycemia and hypoglycemia in some patients. The administration of insulin can sometimes successfully treat this hyperglycemia, but some patients demonstrate insulin resistance, and may not respond to insulin treatment. (Goldstein and Strom, Journal of Renal Nutrition 1(1):9-22 (January 1991)). Hyperglycemia is a major barrier to effective nutrition support even outside the context of hemodialysis. Many studies report associations between hyperglycemia and increased morbidity and mortality. McCowen and Bistrian, Nutrition in Clinical Practice, 19(3):235-244 (June 2004)). Moreover, the amount of fluid in typical IDPN treatment is a barrier to use in patients with strict fluid management. Thus, a need exists for an improved IDPN composition for administration to patients that diminishes hyperglycemia associated with IDPN administration and decreases the need for the administration of insulin with IDPN. Moreover, a need exists for a lower volume IDPN dosage form.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Intradialytic parenteral nutrition compositions


An electronic device includes a front-surface touch screen, a plurality of side-surface touch sensors that receive a user-command, and a body that includes a processor for processing the user-command, where the body is combined with the front-surface touch screen and the side-surface touch sensors. Here, the user-command includes an operation in which at least one of the side-surface touch sensors is touched by a user for more than an activation time and an operation in which a touched point of the at least one of the side-surface touch sensors is moved by the user.

1. Field
Example embodiments relate generally to an electronic device. More particularly, embodiments of the present inventive concept relate to an electronic device including a touch screen.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, electronic devices including a touch screen (e.g., a mobile device such as a cellular phone, a smart phone, a smart pad, etc.) are widely used. In addition, an interest in a watch-shaped mobile device (e.g., referred to as a smart watch) increases, where the smart watch interworks with the mobile device, or independently performs a function of the mobile device. However, since a user wears the watch-shaped mobile device on a wrist, the size of a front-surface touch screen included in the watch-shaped mobile device has limits, unlike the mobile device such as the cellular phone, the smart phone, the smart pad, etc. Generally, compared to a front-surface touch screen included in the mobile device such as the cellular phone, the smart phone, the smart pad, etc., the front-surface touch screen included in the watch-shaped mobile device has a relatively small size (e.g., about 1.3 inches). Thus, when a conventional method in which a user inputs a user-command by touching and/or dragging on the front-surface touch screen of the mobile device is employed in the watch-shaped mobile device, the user-command may not be accurately and precisely input to the mobile device. As a result, the user-command may be erroneously input to the mobile device.

Electronic device having side-surface touch sensors for receiving the user-command


Aspects of the present disclosure relate to packaging apparatuses and methods adapted to wrap absorbent paper product in a continuous sheet of film formed into tube shape with an asymmetric opening. A former may include a plurality of forming members, wherein each forming member includes an outer surface connected with an inner surface along an edge. In operation, a continuous sheet of film advances around the edges of the forming members and forms an opening. In addition, opposing longitudinal edges of the continuous sheet are guided into an overlapping arrangement that forms the plastic film into a tube shape that extends downstream from the opening in the machine direction. The opening is symmetrical about a first axis and is asymmetrical about a second axis. Absorbent paper product to be packaged advances in the machine direction through the opening and into the tube.

Rolled products, rolled absorbent products, and rolled fibrous products such as paper towels, toilet tissue, disposable shop towels, and wipes, for example, are sometimes packaged and shipped in bundles of a plurality of rolls. Packages are sometimes formed from a continuous sheet of plastic film. As such, some packaging apparatuses may include a former adapted guide the film such that opposing longitudinal edges of the continuous sheet are overlapped to form the plastic film into a tube shape that extends downstream from an opening in a machine direction. In turn, the rolled products may advance in the machine direction, through the opening, and into the tube shaped film that surrounds the rolled products to be wrapped. The overlapped longitudinal edges of the sheet may be sealed together and the tube shaped film may then be cut between consecutively bundled products and sealed into individual packages.
Some manufacturers may endeavor to create packages with relatively tightly wrapped film and relatively few wrinkles. As such, these manufactures may take various measures to configure packaging apparatuses and/or operations to manipulate the continuous sheet of film to achieve such desired results. For example, some packaging operations may: pre-stretch films prior to wrapping; utilize preformed bags; and/or force products through relatively smaller formers to help increase tightness of the film on the wrapped products.
In some configurations, the film may be guided around forming surfaces that help ensure equal tension and path length along a direction of travel to help reduce wrinkling. In addition, the former may be configured to create an opening that helps ensure equal film path across the forming surfaces to help prevent wrinkling and provide aesthetic bag forming. For example, in some configurations, the former may be configured to create an opening that is specifically shaped and sized to correspond with a shape and size of the particular product arrangements advancing through the opening and into the tube shaped film. In turn, such formers may include four corner edges about which the film is advanced, wherein the four corner edges are configured to form an opening that is symmetrical about a horizontal axis and a vertical axis extending perpendicular to the machine direction. Thus, the four corner edges of the former are also symmetrically shaped with respect to the two axes.
In some configurations, packaging devices may also be configured to compress products in a cross direction as the products advance through the tube shaped film to help increase bag tightness. For example, packaging devices may include a sealing member that extends in the machine direction that is configured to press advancing products in a cross direction as the products advance through the tube shaped film. In addition, the overlapped longitudinal edges of the film may be sealed together against a surface of the sealing member opposite a surface that presses against the advancing products. As such, the shape and/or size of the advancing products that engage the sealing member may be temporarily compressed and/or deformed so as to not correspond with the size and/or shape of the symmetrically formed opening. Therefore, in such an arrangement, the sheet of film may travel in a relatively longer distance to form an opening that is symmetrical about two axes than otherwise may be necessary to wrap around products that are compressed with the sealing member. With such packaging processes and apparatuses, relatively larger quantities of film may be used to wrap rolled products and/or the resulting packages may have relatively lower film tightness.
Consequently, there remains a need to apply plastic film to package rolled products while at the same time reducing the amount of film used; reducing wrinkles; and increasing film tightness.

Packaging apparatus and method for wrapping absorbent paper product


A fixed carbon production device is provided with: a quench chamber for collecting fixed carbon; a dry distillation furnace which is erected and fixed in the quench chamber and into which raw material coal is fed; a dry distillation unit which is polygonal in horizontal cross-section and is partitioned by a separating wall which partitions the inside of the dry distillation furnace in the vertical direction; a dry distillation mini-furnace which is polygonal in horizontal cross-section and which is partitioned by a partition which partitions the inside of the dry distillation unit in the vertical direction; a pipe heating means which is arranged on the separating wall of the dry distillation unit and the partition of the dry distillation mini-furnace and which dry-distills the raw material coal; and a collection path for collecting fixed carbon collected in the quench chamber.

The low rank coal, such as subbituminous coal or brown coal, which has a moisture content higher than about 20 mass % is limited to use within a coal-producing region. This is because, for example, the low rank coal has a low calorific value resulting from its high moisture content and generates a small amount of heat by combustion. On the other hand, when dried, the low rank coal becomes more spontaneously combustible and more hygroscopic, resulting in transportation costs being relatively expensive, etc.
However, the low rank coal has advantages that are not found, e.g., in the bituminous coal that is considered to be a high rank coal. For example, brown coal found in Australia and Indonesia is low in sulfur content and produces less ash. Thus, using the brown coal as a fuel would make it possible to prevent air pollution due to sulfur dioxide gas, etc., as well as to reduce hazardous ash waste.
In this context, such techniques have been suggested which are adopted to carbonize the low rank coal by dehydration reform or thermal reform, thereby compensating for the drawbacks thereof. For example, disclosed in Patent Literature 1 and Patent Literature 2 is a technique by which oil and low rank coal are mixed to obtain raw material slurry; the resulting slurry is heated and dehydrated in the oil, and then further heated to decompose or detach the carboxyl radical or the hydroxyl radical, etc., in the raw material coal by a decarboxylation reaction or a dehydration reaction, thereby reforming the raw material coal. Also disclosed is a technique by which heavy oil, etc., is penetrated into pores of the low rank coal so as to prevent spontaneous combustion.
Further, disclosed in Patent Literature 3 is a method for manufacturing reformed coal and hydrocarbon oil by thermally decomposing brown coal into reformed coal and tar under an inert gas atmosphere or steam atmosphere and catalytically cracking the tar in a steam atmosphere and in the presence of an iron-based catalyst so as to obtain hydrocarbon oil.
Disclosed in Patent Literature 4 is a fixed carbon recycle device in which a plurality of lines are arranged for recycle in recycling the fixed carbon, whereby the flows of the powder materials serve to complement each other, thereby eliminating clogging.


A method for depositing tungsten nitride uses a source gas mixture having a silicon based gas for depositing the tungsten nitride to overlie a deposition substrate. A non-planar storage capacitor has a tungsten nitride capacitor electrode.

The invention relates to processes for fabricating dynamic random access memories, and more particularly to the deposition of tungsten nitride.
Tungsten nitride has been shown to be an extremely promising material for planar capacitor and gate electrode applications. Tungsten nitride is stable at high temperatures and prevents dielectric degradation in capacitor applications and acts as a barrier between polycrystalline silicon and tungsten when used as a low resistivity strapping layer in a gate electrode. In one fabrication method Alex Lahav, Karen A. Grim, and Ilan A. Blech, as described in their article, xe2x80x9cMeasurement of Thermal Expansion Coefficients of W, WSi, WN, and WSiN Thin Film Metallizations,xe2x80x9d Journal of Applied Physics 67(2), Jan. 15, 1990, page 734, prepare tungsten nitride using reactive sputtering and obtain good film properties.
Although sputtering can provide high quality films, surface step coverage is inadequate for many applications. It would be preferred to have an improved step coverage process such as chemical vapor deposition (CVD).
Nakajima et al. in an article entitled xe2x80x9cPreparation of Tungsten Nitride Film by CVD Method Using WF6xe2x80x9d appearing in the December 1987 edition of the Journal of Electrochemical Society: SOLID-STATE SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY, has demonstrated chemical vapor deposition of tungsten nitride from NH3 and WF6 source gases in a conventional hot wall CVD system. Although hot wall CVD systems offer an advantage with respect to wafer throughput, process control and cleanliness are typically not adequate for state-of-the-art applications. Rather, single wafer cold wall deposition systems are preferred.
For a CVD process WF6 and NH3 offer the advantages of being readily available and providing high deposition rates. However, WF6 and NH3 form an adduct at low temperatures ( less than 50xc2x0 C.), and even with a cold wall system there is a minimum acceptable wall temperature to prevent adduct formation. Furthermore, byproducts of the deposition reactions can cause encroachment into silicon or polycrystalline silicon substrates and therefore the process must be modified to reduce encroachment without compromising adhesion or resistivity.
Thus, there exists a need for a CVD tungsten nitride process having good adhesion and high deposition rates while providing conformal, low resistivity films with minimal silicon encroachment.
The invention is a method for depositing tungsten nitride using chemical vapor deposition. The method uses a source gas mixture having a silicon based gas for depositing the tungsten nitride to overlie a deposition substrate.
The method is useful in the fabrication of a capacitor electrode, a contact plug, and a gate electrode due to the good adhesion, minimal silicon encroachment and low resistivity of the tungsten nitride deposited according to the method of the invention.
The invention is a non-planar storage capacitor having a tungsten nitride capacitor electrode.

Method of depositing tungsten nitride using a source gas comprising silicon


A communication method for a terminal in a wireless communication system and a terminal using the method are provided. The method comprises: a first downlink subframe receiving a downlink grant; and a plurality of downlink subframes receiving a plurality of data channels that are scheduled by the downlink grant, wherein the plurality of downlink subframes belong to a predetermined downlink subframe group.

Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to wireless communication, and more particularly, to a communication method for a terminal in a wireless communication system and a terminal using the same.
Related Art
In a future wireless communication system, machine type communication (MTC), carrier aggregation using different time division duplex (TDD) UL-DL (uplink-downlink) configurations, and the like may be used and various types of services may be provided. As a result, in the future wireless communication system, an increase in the number of terminals which are simultaneously scheduled is anticipated. Accordingly, it may be difficult to perform smooth scheduling on an existing control channel scheduling a data channel.
In long term evolution (LTE), a control channel transmitting control information is a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH). In order to solve a resource shortage phenomenon of the PDCCH, bundled scheduling for scheduling physical downlink shared channels (PDSCHs) transmitted through a plurality of subframes or a plurality of CCs through one PDCCH, cross-subframe scheduling for flexibility of PDCCH application, and the like have been considered. Further, unlike the existing PDCCH, introduction of an enhanced-PDCCH (e-PDCCH) configuring the control channel in the PDSCH region has been also considered.
However, which subframe the bundled scheduling or the cross-subframe scheduling is to be applied needs to be prescribed.
Meanwhile, in the related art, in an uplink, synchronous hybrid automatic repeat request (HARQ) in which a transmission time of ACK/NACK corresponding to a data receiving time is fixed and determined is adopted. When the bundled scheduling or cross-subframe scheduling is adopted, which method the ACK/NACK transmission time is determined by needs also to be prescribed.

Communication method for terminal in wireless communication system and terminal using same


A thermal image forming apparatus is provided. A platen roller supports a recording medium having first and second sides opposite to each other. A recording head includes a heating part that applies heat to the recording medium for image formation. The recording head rotates around the platen roller to move the heating part to first and second locations respectively facing the first and second sides of the recording medium. A conveying part conveys the recording medium. When the recording head is positioned at the first and second locations, locations of the heating part are symmetrical with each other with respect to a reference line, which passes through the conveying part and a center of the platen roller.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus. More particularly, the present invention relates to a thermal image forming apparatus capable of forming good quality and uniform images on both sides of a recording medium.
2. Description of the Related Art
In order to print an image on both sides of a recording medium, typically two recording heads are provided at positions which face both sides of the recording medium. In this case, however, such an image forming apparatus becomes relatively expensive. In another method for double-sided printing, one recording head is provided and the recording head is designed to face the first and second sides of the recording medium in turn. In this case, two approaches may be considered. A first approach is to fix the recording head and invert the recording medium. A second approach is to move the recording head to the positions facing the first and second sides of the recording medium. However, these two approaches are also expensive, have complicated transfer path, and often do not print uniform images on both sides of the medium.
Accordingly, there is a need for an improved thermal image forming apparatus having a simplified transfer path capable of forming good quality and uniform images on both sides of a recording medium which is relatively inexpensive.


A process for preparing a diamond particle/silver metal matrix composite ucture by coating diamond particles with molten silver nitrate, decomposing the silver nitrate to form a silver metal coating on the surfaces of the diamond particles, consolidating the silver metal coated diamond particles into a composite structure having continuous pores between the silver metal coated diamond particles, infiltrating the continuous pores of the composite with molten silver nitrate and decomposing the silver nitrate to form silver metal which fills the continuous pores of the composite structure.

This invention relates to composites and more particularly to metal/carbon composites having high thermal conductivities.
Up to the present, certain metals and alloys of aluminum and magnesium have been used to fabricate the heat sinks which are employed successfully to carry away the heat generated by solid state electronics. Their high thermal conductivity and low density (aluminum: 2.37 W/cm/K, 2.70 g/cc) provided the necessary combination of physical properties for heat sink cooling of lightweight electronic packages.
The very large scale integration (VLSI) of the most recent generation of electronics has put increased demands on the cooling system. Heat must be conducted rapidly away from ever smaller solid state chips. More efficient heat sinks are needed. It has been proposed, for example, to use continuous graphite fiber/aluminum composites for this purpose. The graphite fiber axial thermal conductivity of 300-500 W/m-K can provide a significant unidirectional performance improvement, provided that the continuous fibers remain undegraded and unbroken. While fiber materials costs are reasonable for applications envisioned, fabrication of continuously reinforced MMCs in complex geometry is difficult.
Accordingly it would be desirable to provide a new material having high heat conductivity and which can be fabricated into complex shapes.

The United States of America as represented by the Secretary of the Navy