An acoustic wave generation unit oscillates working fluid of 35 atm or less so as to generate acoustic waves with a frequency in a range from 50 Hz or more and 500 Hz or less. A heat/acoustic wave conversion component has a partition wall of 5.0 W/mK or less between two end faces which defines a plurality of cells of 620 cells/cm2 or more and 3100 cells/cm2 or less. A heat exchanger disposed close to one end face receives heat from a first external air flowing into the heat exchanger and gives the heat to the one end face so as to flow out a cold air. Another heat exchanger disposed close to the other end face receives heat from the other end face and gives the heat to a second external air flowing into the another heat exchanger so as to flow out a warm air.

Society as a whole has been recently becoming more demanding in reducing of greenhouse gases, such as carbon-dioxide. In response to such a demand, techniques have been developed actively also in the field of vehicles to replace fossil-powered vehicles with electric vehicles.
Electric vehicles do not burn fossil fuels and so can reduce emissions of greenhouse gas, such as carbon-dioxide. Electric vehicles, however, may fail to obtain waste heat from the engine as the heat source. For instance, unlike vehicles that burn fossil fuels, waste heat from the engine is not available as the heat source for heating a cabin in electric vehicles. Electric vehicles therefore need to have another heat source for heating the cabin. A simple method to obtain the heat for heating may be heat generation by passing the electricity as the driving source of electric vehicles through a heating wire, for example. This method is not favorable because it requires a considerable amount of electricity for heating, and so has very low energy-efficiency.
The sector of electric vehicles therefore typically uses a method of drawing heat from the external air with a heat pump to generate air warmer than the external air, and heating the cabin with this warm air (see Patent Document 1, for example). Such a method of drawing heat from the external air actually generates warm air for heating with less electricity than the method of directly generating heat by passing electricity through a heating wire. A heat pump generates cool air that is cooler than the external air as well as the warm air. This cool air may be used instead of warm air for cooling.
Such a heat pump typically is configured to compress or expand working fluid so as to allow the working fluid to release and absorb heat. A complex mechanism is typically required to compress or expand the working fluid, and this method including a heat pump therefore has a problem of increasing the size of the heat pump device as a whole. Many of working fluids used for such a heat pump are gases which are suitable for the viewpoint of energy efficiency, but have a high global warming potential and so adversely affect global warming. A heat pump including such a gas therefore does not meet the need of reducing greenhouse gases from society as a whole. As a result, there is an additional problem that it is difficult to select working fluid so as to improve the energy efficiency while meeting the need of reducing greenhouse gases.
Meanwhile, there has been known a heat pump based on a thermoacoustic effect, as another type of heat pumps which is different in the method of drawing heat from the above-stated heat pump for heating electric vehicles (see Patent Document 2, for example). A thermoacoustic effect refers to a phenomenon that a temperature gradient at both ends of a thin tube causes an acoustic-wave transmitting medium (working fluid) in the thin tube to oscillate so that acoustic waves are transmitted, or its converse phenomenon that a temperature gradient at both ends of a thin tube is formed by acoustic waves transmitted in the thin tube. Particularly the latter phenomenon in which a temperature gradient is formed by acoustic waves can be considered as a phenomenon in which heat is transmitted from one end to the other end of a thin tube, and it is possible to form a heat pump based on this phenomenon. Such a heat pump based on a thermoacoustic effect does not need a mechanical device to compress and expand the working fluid. This heat pump therefore is suitable for decreasing the size of the heat pump as a whole as compared with a heat pump configured to compress and expand the working fluid. In addition, in such a heat pump based on a thermoacoustic effect, it is not necessary to use a gas having a high global warming potential as the working fluid. On the contrary, a working fluid having low responsiveness (e.g., rare gas), rather than a gas having a high global warming potential, can achieve higher energy-efficiency. A heat pump based on a thermoacoustic effect therefore is suitable to improve the energy efficiency without adversely affect the environment. Considering these advantages of the heat pump based on a thermoacoustic effect, such a heat pump based on thermoacoustic effect may be used as the heat pump for heating (and cooling) for electric vehicles as well.


A crane for lifting and transporting loads includes a base frame, capable of transferring the loads onto a support surface. A sliding element is slidably constrained to the base frame. An arm capable of moving the loads is hinged to the sliding element. A connection element has a first end hinged to the sliding element, and a second end constrained to the base frame in a mobile manner. Each of a pair of rod elements is hinged to the base frame and to the connection element to form an articulated quadrilateral. A first linear actuator is hinged to the base frame and to the connection element and capable of causing sliding movement of the sliding element relative to the base frame. A second linear actuator is hinged to the sliding element and to the arm capable of causing mutual rotation movement between the arm and the sliding element.

In the industrial field, as well as in the craft industry, the need to pick up, move and position loads, even considerably heavy ones, to/at substantial heights and distances from the pick-up point is well known.
However, due to the considerable weight of the load to be moved, as well as the distance between said load and the crane, the crane is in danger of rolling over, consequently posing risks to the people in its vicinity and to the goods. Furthermore, during the moving of loads, there is a high risk of dynamic roll-over due to the abrupt movements of certain parts of the crane itself.
Therefore, the need is felt to provide cranes for lifting and moving loads, which are equipped with an implemented roll-over protection system and are able to intervene in a prompt, precise and safe manner.

Crane for lifting and transporting loads comprising a roll-over protection system


A hydrocarbonaceous fuel additive, fuel composition, and method all lower both carbon particulate emissions and improve slag properties in combustion systems including, for instance, utility furnaces and boiler systems. The mixed metal catalyst may include a transition metal-containing compound, an alkali metal compound, and a magnesium-containing compound.

Utility furnaces and industrial boiler systems operating with atmospheric burners, like all hydrocarbonaceous fuel combustion systems, are concerned with the amount and quality of the emissions that result from the combustion of fuel in those systems. Particulate emissions are a byproduct of incomplete combustion. This carbon-containing particulate is an environmental issue, and to solve it, fuel compositions are constantly being modified and combustion methods designed to minimize the amount of particulate emitted into the environment. Other emission constituents can form deposits on various parts of the combustion system, for instance, the water wall pipes, economizer tubes, and/or super heater tubes of utility furnaces and industrial burner systems. The deposits, typically referred to as slag, may build up and, over time, significantly reduce the efficiency of the combustion system.
Metal-containing additives have been used in fuel formulations to catalyze carbon burn out, and thereby reduce particulate emissions, by either inhibiting particulate agglomeration (alkali metals), enhancing carbon oxidation at peak combustion temperatures by increasing hydroxyl radical concentration (alkaline earth metals), or by increasing the rate of catalytic oxidation by lowering the particulate light-off temperature (transition metals). It is recognized, however, that use of these specific metal-containing additives may adversely affect the type and/or quantity of slag that may build up in a combustion system.
In one example, the prior art discloses a method for reducing emissions which include the use of a mixture of calcium and either alkali metals, alkaline earth metals other than calcium or mixtures thereof. See U.S. Pat. No. 5,919,276.
It is also known that adding magnesium compounds to fuels extends the time between combustion turbine maintenance when burning ash-containing fuel. See, e.g., U.S. Pat. No. 6,632,257. However, magnesium does not impact carbon burnout. Magnesium compounds, therefore, positively affect the type and/or quantity of slag, but do not impact carbon burnout.

Mixed metal catalyst additive and method for use in hydrocarbonaceous fuel combustion system


Disclosed is an optical fiber formed from a preform that includes a clad component and a core component. The core component includes one or more precursor core materials. The precursor core materials and the clad materials are selected such that that the photoelastic constants of at least one precursor core material and the clad material are of opposite sign resulting in a final glass optical fiber of tailored Brillouin performance. The clad material may include an oxide glass having a positive photoelastic constant and the core component may include a precursor core material that has a negative photoelastic constant. During formation, the precursor core material can melt and interact with clad material that precipitates into the core to form a glass of at least one tailored Brillouin property, such as very low Brillouin gain.

Typical optical fibers include a core material and a cladding material, with each of the core and the cladding traditionally being fabricated largely from fused silica and having dissimilar refractive indices. A fiber can be formed by drawing a preform, which is a large mass that includes the core and cladding materials arranged in a shape that can resemble the cross-section of the finished fiber, but is much larger. The preform can be drawn in a fiber drawing tower during which the preform is heated and stretched from one end to form the optical fiber.
Optical fibers need to be able to operate at progressively higher power levels as performance demands continue to grow. A leading impairment to high power systems, and particularly high-power-per-unit-bandwidth systems, is stimulated Brillouin scattering (SBS), which is an acousto-optic interaction that manifests noise in low power applications and acts as a highly-efficient power reflector in high power applications. While there are optical fiber-based applications that do not have strict requirements on the laser spectrum, many systems such as spectroscopic lidar systems and coherently-phased fiber laser arrays rely principally on the ability to achieve a desired wavelength and spectral purity. SBS remains a serious stumbling block to the improvement of such systems.
In an attempt to decrease SBS, a variety of silica-based fibers possessing unconventional core compositions have been developed. Exemplifying such silica-based novel fibers are those derived using yttrium aluminum garnet (YAG) crystals. Unfortunately, while these materials show promise in decreasing SBS, such core compositions are very difficult if not impossible to realize using the chemical vapor deposition methods conventionally employed to manufacture optical fiber. Fiber designs including tailored acoustic velocity profiles of the fiber core and cladding that spread the SBS interaction over multiple acoustic frequencies have also been employed to lessen SBS. With careful fiber design, pure silica clad fibers with alumina-doped silica cores have also been formed to increase the acoustic wave loss, thereby decreasing the nonlinear interaction time and the Brillouin gain coefficient. While each of these complex and costly fabrication methods have been proven to partly suppress SBS or offer moderate enhancements in power levels, sufficient narrow-linewidth power scaling will remain impossible without a paradigm shift in the approach to the management of SBS.
What are needed in the art are optical fibers that exhibit extremely low, even zero, Brillouin scattering. In addition, what are needed in the art are facile, economical methods for forming such fibers.

Low brillouin scattering optical fibers and formation methods thereof

Board of Trustees of the Univ. of Illiniois—Urbana


A method and apparatus in WCDMA communication system includes extracting pilot symbols (462-5) of (2-M) plurality of communication channels of (1-M) plurality of communication channels based on corresponding 2-M assigned codes (405-436) to produce a plurality (2-M) of extracted pilot symbols (482-96), and combining a first (1) extracted pilot symbol (420) of a first (1) communication channel of (1-M) plurality of communication channels and the plurality (2-M) of extracted pilot symbols (482-96), to produce a combined extracted pilot symbol (498) which is used to produce a combined channel estimate (417) for decoding a first (1) extracted data symbol (414) of first (1) communication channel of (1-M) plurality of communication channels.

In code division multiple access (CDMA) communication systems, such as the well known system based on the IS-95 standard, a pilot signal, considered a pilot channel, transmitted from a base station contains data that are known by all mobile stations compatible with the system. Each mobile station communicating with the base station receives the pilot signal to extract important information about phase rotation, channel gain estimation, signal-to-noise plus interference ratio estimation, and others. Such important information collectively or individually are referred to as the channel estimate. A mobile station decodes a data signal considered a data channel, also transmitted from the base station to the mobile station uses the channel estimate to perform coherent demodulation of the data channel symbols. The transmitted signal carries information data such as voice. The mobile station performance of decoding the data symbols directly depends on the accuracy of the channel estimate.
In another well-known system based on the Wideband CDMA (WCDMA) standard, the pilot signal is embedded with the data signal. Therefore, each signal, considered a communication channel, transmitted from a base station to a mobile station contains pilot and data symbols. The terms: bits and symbols are used interchangeably. A mobile station receives a burst of symbols that contains the pilot and data, and other controlling data information. The burst of data containing the pilot and data symbols spread over a wide frequency spectrum according to a predefined code sequence known to all mobile stations compatible with the system. All mobile stations compatible with the system also know the content of the pilot data. A mobile station receiving a burst of data decodes the pilot data bits by knowing the spreading code and processes the pilot data symbols to determine the channel estimate. The channel estimate is used for coherently demodulating the data symbols. One ordinary skilled in the art may appreciate that the number of pilot data symbols in the transmitted signal directly effects the accuracy of the channel estimation, however, the data burst is of a limited duration and its time limit can not be used to transmit large number of pilot symbols in comparison with the number of data symbols in the same burst in order to improve the accuracy of the channel estimate. The pilot data symbols are considered overhead data and affect the throughput efficiency of the communication system. The communication system operating based on the IS-95 standard may not have such a problem because the pilot signal is transmitted separately at a relatively high power level and the mobile station may decode as many pilot data bits as it may require to assure an adequate and accurate channel estimate.
Therefore, there is a need for a method and apparatus for decoding data information based on accurate channel estimation derived from a limited number of pilot data bits in a data burst in a WCDMA communication system.

Method and apparatus for producing channel estimate of a communication channel in a CDMA communication system


A motorized rotary blade snowblower is used for the removal of snow. This snowblower has a housing which covers the rotary blades and a drift cutting arm that is fastened to and extends p from the sides of the housing. The drift cutter is fastened to the housing so that it can be locked in a working position and retracted to a storage position.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to motorized rotary snowblowers, and more particularly to drift cutter attachments that extend up from a rotor housing for use and are retractable to a storage position.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Snowblowers disclosed in the prior art include drift cutting arms fastened to and extending up from the sides of the snowblower housings, but none of these drift cutters are retractable for the purpose of storage.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,498,253 illustrates a snowblower device that has short drift cutter blades extending from the upper edges of the sides of the housing. These blades are removable but not retractable.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,977,695 shows an adjustable drift cutter on a hand snow remover. However, only the length of the drift cutter is adjustable, rather than the entire cutter arm being retractable.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,610,414 shows a rotary snowblower which has a cutter blade that is spring-loaded in a working position and will retract when it hits an obstacle, but this cutter arm is of a different type than the outwardly extending arm of the present invention in that it is integral with a bottom scoop blade and not retractable for storage.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,198,237 shows an oscillating slicer bar that is mounted on side arms and extends across the front of the rotor housing. The arm and base pivot or oscillate up and down as the snowplow moves forward. A plurality of stationary cutters are positioned on the end plates of the rotor housing but they do not retract.
U.S. Pat. No. 1,837,087 shows a bar which can be adjusted lengthwise or removed but does not pivot to a retracted storage position.


A method, in certain embodiments, includes providing a metal alloy, annealing the metal alloy, and contacting the metal alloy with vapors of selenium, or sulfur, or a combination thereof. The metal alloy having a uniform first bulk composition and a first surface composition on annealing provides an annealed metal alloy having a non uniform second bulk composition and a second surface composition which on being contacted vapors of selenium, or sulfur, or a combination thereof, produces a selenized or a sulfurized metal alloy. Further the metal alloy may have a layer formed in situ from a low melting point metal within the alloy via diffusion rather than sequential deposition and co-evaporation.

The invention relates generally to the field of photovoltaics. In particular, the invention relates to a method for preparing an absorber layer used in solar cells and a solar cell made therefrom.
Solar energy is abundant in many parts of the world year around. Unfortunately, the solar energy is not used efficiently to produce electricity. The cost of solar cells and its generated electricity is generally very high. For example, a typical thin film solar cell achieves a conversion efficiency of less than 20 percent. Solar cells typically include multiple layers formed on a substrate. Unfortunately, the efficiency of these solar cells decreases with an increasing number of layers and associated interfaces, which can result in greater electrical loss opportunities. Existing manufacturing techniques are also inefficient. For example, solar cell manufacturing typically requires a significant number of processing steps. As a result, the high number of processing steps, layers, interfaces, and complexity increases the amount of time and money required to manufacture these solar cells.

Absorber layer for thin film photovoltaics and a solar cell made therefrom


A method and apparatus for tensioning a continuous loop, such as a cutting blade installed on a band saw having a frame, a manually rotatable tensioner, a first pulley rotatably connected to the manually rotatable tensioner, a second pulley spaced away from the first pulley, and a cutting blade strung between the first pulley and the second pulley, generally including the steps of positioning an adjustable body, such as a reciprocally actuated rod, between the manually rotatable tensioner and the second pulley, extending the adjustable body in a direction away from the second pulley and toward the manually rotatable tensioner so that the manually rotatable tensioner and the first pulley move in direction away from the second pulley, withdrawing the adjustable body in a direction toward the second pulley so that the manually rotatable tensioner and the first pulley move in a direction toward the second pulley.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to tensioners and, more particularly, to tensioners for band saw cutting blades and the like.
2. Brief Description of the Prior Art
As shown in FIG. 1, band saws A generally include a frame B, a first pulley shroud C connected to the frame B, a manually rotatable tensioner, such as a screw-type tensioner D, removably and slideably attached to the frame B by slots E, a first pulley F (shown in phantom) rotatably attached to the screw-type tensioner D, a second pulley G (shown in phantom) lying in the same plane as the first pulley F and rotatably attached to the frame B, a second pulley shroud H connected to the frame B, a continuous cutting blade I attached to the first pulley F and the second pulley G, a blade guide attachment bar J, and a motor O connected to the second pulley G.
In normal operation, the cutting blade I must be tensioned to make the cutting blade I taut. Conversely, when the cutting blade I is worn or replacement is desired, the cutting blade I must be detensioned so that the cutting blade I can be removed from the first and second pulleys F,G.
Tensioning the cutting blade I is normally accomplished by positioning the cutting blade I on the first and second pulleys F,G and then moving the first pulley F, which lies in substantially the same plane as the second pulley G, directly away from the second pulley G. Detensioning is accomplished by moving the first pulley F toward the second pulley G. Movement of the first pulley F is facilitated by the screw-type tensioner D shown in FIG. 1. As shown in FIG. 2, the screw-type tensioner D includes a tension body K that receives, usually in a common thread arrangement, a rotatable shaft L. The tension body K is fitted into the slots E formed by the frame B so that the tension body K is moveable with respect to the frame B, as illustrated by the arrows Y1 and Y2. The tension body K further includes a shaft N that receives the first pulley F shown in FIG. 1.
With continuing reference to FIG. 2, a first end M of the rotatable shaft L contacts the frame B, so that when the rotatable shaft L is rotated in a tightening direction, shown by arrow Z1, the tension body K and the first pulley F move in the Y1 direction. This tightens the cutting blade I. When the rotatable shaft L is rotated in a loosening direction, shown by arrow Z2, the tension body K and the first pulley F move in the Y2 direction. This creates slack in the cutting blade I.
Another type of manually rotatable tensioner is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 769,497 to Seymour (hereinafter xe2x80x9cthe Seymour patentxe2x80x9d). The Seymour patent discloses a tensioner having a rack and pinion arrangement actuated by a rotatable handwheel.
One drawback of the prior art manually rotatable tensioners, such as the screw-type and the handwheel-type discussed above, is that they are rotated incrementally by hand. Therefore, each time the cutting blade is retensioned, the correct number of turns of the rotatable shaft L or the handwheel must be approximated. This involves a process of trial and error, which is inaccurate and time consuming.
To help eliminate some of the drawbacks of the prior art rotatable tensioners, it is an object of the present invention to provide a tensioner which is easily operated and does not require significant amounts of trial and error manipulation during retensioning of the cutting blade.
The present invention generally includes a method and apparatus for tensioning a belt, saw blade, or other continuous loop. One method to adjust the tension of a cutting blade installed on a band saw having a frame, a manually rotatable tensioner positioned adjacent to the frame, a first pulley rotatably connected to the manually rotatable tensioner, a second pulley spaced away from the first pulley, and a cutting blade strung between the first pulley and the second pulley includes the step of positioning an adjustable body between the manually rotatable tensioner and the second pulley. This step is followed by one or more of the following steps, including extending the adjustable body in a direction away from the second pulley and toward the manually rotatable tensioner so that the manually rotatable tensioner and the first pulley move in direction away from the second pulley or withdrawing the adjustable body in a direction toward the second pulley so that the manually rotatable tensioner and the first pulley move in a direction toward the second pulley. The adjustable body is preferably a rack, and the manually rotatable tensioner is preferably a screw-type tensioner having a manually rotatable shaft with opposing ends. Additional steps may include positioning the rack adjacent to an opposing end of the manually rotatable shaft, extending the rack in a direction away from the second pulley to tension the cutting blade, and withdrawing the rack in a direction toward the second pulley to detension the cutting blade.
Another method to adjust the tension of a cutting blade installed on a band saw having a frame, a screw-type tensioner positioned adjacent to the frame, the screw-type tensioner having a rotatable shaft with opposing ends, a first pulley rotatably connected to the screw-type tensioner, and a second pulley spaced away from the first pulley generally includes the steps of positioning a rack and a rotatable pinion gear between the screw-type tensioner and the second pulley, wherein the rack and pinion gear are connected by an intermeshed relationship, and the rack is movable by the pinion gear, extending the rack in a direction away from the second pulley to tension the cutting blade, and withdrawing the rack in a direction toward the second pulley to detension the cutting blade.
A band saw according to the present invention generally includes a frame having a motor connected to the frame, a first pulley and a second pulley, with the first pulley rotatably connected to the manually rotatable tensioner and the second pulley rotatably connected to the motor, a pull-type tensioner positioned between the manually rotatable tensioner and the second pulley, and a cutting blade strung between the first pulley and the second pulley. The manually rotatable tensioner is preferably a screw-type tensioner. The pull-type tensioner may include a mount defining a pivot shaft receiving orifice, a pivot shaft received in the pivot shaft receiving orifice, the pivot shaft having a first end and a second opposite end, a pinion gear positioned adjacent to the first end of the shaft, a handle positioned adjacent to the second opposite end of the shaft, and a rack connected by an intermeshed tooth relationship with the pinion gear. In operation, the handle is rotated in a first direction with respect to the mount, and the pinion gear acts to extend the rack in a direction away from the mount. When the handle is rotated in a second direction, opposite to the first direction, the pinion gear acts to withdraw the rack in a direction toward the mount.
These and other features of the present invention will be clarified in the Detailed Description of the Preferred Embodiments taken together with the attached drawings in which like reference numerals represent like elements throughout.

Quick release device for band saws or the like


An oil passage structure in a transmission casing of an automotive automatic transmission, comprises, at an outer peripheral abutting surface between the transmission casing and the oil pump cover, an opening defined in the transmission casing which is exposed to the abutting surface of the transmission casing and is communicated with the inlet port of the valve assembly provided in the bottom section of the transmission through a single vertical oil channel formed in the transmission casing by machining to provide the shortest distance between the inlet port of the valve assembly and the opening. The oil passage structure also comprises an oil groove which is integrally formed on the abutting surface by die-casting and includes a point connecting the outlet port of the oil pump through an oil passage defined in the oil pump cover, to intercommunicate the opening and the connecting point.

1. Field of The Invention
The present invention relates to an oil passage structure in the transmission casing of an automotive automatic transmission in which oil passages intercommunicating the oil pump, provided for supplying operating oil, a valve assembly having a control valve for controlling flow paths of the operating oil from the oil pump and an oil pressure regulator valve for regulating the oil pressure from the oil pump are integrally formed.
2. Description of The Prior Art
As is generally known, the conventional automotive automatic transmission includes an oil pump assembly which is traditionally disposed in the vicinity of the abutting portion between the transmission casing accommodating the gear train and the torque converter housing containing the torque converter assembly therein.
FIG. 1 is a partial sectional view illustrating a conventional automatic transmission having an oil pump assembly including an oil pump housing 20, an oil pump cover 21, an inner gear (drive gear) 17, an outer gear (driven gear) 18, and a stationary crescent 19 integrally formed with the oil pump housing 20. Also referring to FIG. 1, reference numeral 1 designates a torque converter assembly which includes a converter cover 2, a pump impeller 3, a turbine runner 4, and a stator 5. The pump impeller 3 is fixed to the outer periphery of the converter cover 2 by welding. The turbine runner 4 is secured to a turbine hub 6 at a flange portion thereof by riveting. The turbine hub 6 is splined to the end of the transmission input shaft 11. The stator 5 is provided between the pump impeller 3 and the turbine runner 4 to form a torque converter. The stator 5 is mounted in a hollow stationary sleeve 8 via a one way clutch 7. The stationary sleeve 8 permits the transmission input shaft 11 to extend therethrough while maintaining an annular space therearound.
The torque converter assembly 1 is accommodated in a torque converter housing 14 which is firmly secured to the transmission casing 15 by means of bolts 25. The oil pump cover 21 extends radially from the stationary sleeve 8. Within the pump housing 20, oil pump elements including an inner gear 17 and an outer gear 18 are operatively disposed. The oil pump cover 21 is secured to the pump housing 20 by means of bolts 23 in such a manner as to accommodate the oil pump body 16 in conjunction with the pump housing 20. A pump driving sleeve 9 extends into the pump housing 20 and is journalled through a bushing 10 fixed on the inner peripheral surface of the pump housing 20. The pump driving sleeve 9 permits the stationary sleeve 8 to extend therethrough. The pump driving sleeve 9 includes one axial end drivingly connected to the pump impeller 3 and the opposing end splined to the inner gear 17. Since the pump driving sleeve 9 is spaced from the stationary sleeve 8, an annular oil passage 12 is defined between the two sleeves 8 and 9. This passage 12 at its one end communicates with the inside of the pump impeller 3 and at its opposite end communicates with the outlet port of the oil pump body 16 through a pressure regulator valve (not shown) via an oil passage structure including a plurality of oil passages formed in the pump cover 21. Oil in the inside of the pump impeller 3 flows out of the turbine runner 4. The oil discharged from the turbine runner 4 flows to an annular oil passage 13 and thereafter the oil is fed from the passage 13 to the pressure maintaining valve (not shown) for maintaining the oil pressure within the torque converter assembly 1 at a certain determined level. Although not shown in FIG. 1, after flowing through the oil maintaining valve, the oil will flow to the oil cooler mounted within the radiator of the vehicle. After being cooled by the oil cooler, the oil will be distributed in the transmission to the various portions to be lubricated and thereafter flow back to the oil reservoir (not shown). In this manner, the torque converter performs its torque multiplying function because oil maintained at a certain pressure will transmit the required torque through the action of the stator 5 from the pump impeller 3 to the turbine runner 4.
The rotation of the crankshaft (not shown) of the internal combustion engine is always delivered to the pump impeller 3 through the converter cover 2. The rotation of the pump impeller 3 is delivered through the pump driving sleeve 9 to the inner gear 17 engaging with the outer gear 18. In this manner, the oil pump operates as long as the engine operates.
As clearly seen in FIG. 1, the pump cover 21 mates the transmission casing 15 at the outer perimeter thereof, in such a manner that the pump cover 21 is firmly secured to the transmission casing 15 at the mating surface 22 between the casing 15 and the cover 21 by means of bolts 24. As previously described, the operating oil is supplied from the outlet port of the oil pump body 16 to the valve assembly including an oil pressure regulator and a control valve through the oil passage structure formed in the pump cover 21. There have been proposed and developed various oil passage structures for communicating the oil pump with the valve assembly.
One such oil passage structure is shown in FIG. 2. Referring to FIG. 2, reference numeral 26 designates an opening formed on the mating surface 22 of the transmission casing 15. The opening 26 is connected through the oil passage defined in the oil pump cover 21 to the outlet port of the oil pump body 16. The opening 26 is communicated with the inlet port of the valve body 27 through a substantially T shaped communication passage which includes a horizontal channel 28 and a vertical channel 29. The horizontal channel 28 at one end communicates with the opening 26 and at an opposite end is closed by a plug (not shown) in an air tight fashion.
Another oil passage structure has been disclosed in Japanese Utility Model (Jikkai) Showa No. 60-7360. This oil passage structure includes a plurality of oil passages formed in a torque converter housing at the outer peripheral section of the converter housing which is sandwiched between the outer perimeter of the oil pump housing and the outer periphery of the transmission casing.
In these conventional oil passage structures, complicated machining of high accuracy is required and in addition auxiliary parts, such as plugs are required. Furthermore, due to the placement of the oil pump and valve assembly, the positioning options for the opening 26 and the two channels 28 and 29 are severely limited, resulting in a low degree of freedom of design with regard to the oil passages of the transmission casing 15.

Oil passage structure in transmission casing of an automatic transmission for automotive vehicles


An apparatus includes: an image display unit including a display device having an image display surface that displays a two-dimensional image and a microlens array disposed in spaced-apart relation to the image display surface, the image display unit that displays a stereoscopic two-dimensional image by allowing the light emitted from the image display surface to form an image on an image forming plane in a space located on a side opposite to the display device with respect to the the microlens array; at least one switch; at least one illumination device that illuminates the space when the switch is turned on; and a controller that controls the display device to change the two-dimensional image displayed on the image display surface in accordance with an illuminating state of the illumination device.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and a method for displaying stereoscopic two-dimensional image and an image.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, various attempts have been made to stereoscopically reproduce image information by various methods for the purpose of improving visibility and amusement features. Generally, binocular parallax is one physiological factor allowing a human being to view an object stereoscopically. As a method of reproducing a stereoscopic image on the basis of the binocular parallax, a polarization method is known in which a viewer wears polarized glasses and views left and right disparity images based on mutually different polarized states. However, the wearing of the polarized glasses constitutes a troublesome drawback to the viewer.
As a method of displaying a stereoscopic image which does not use polarized glasses, a lenticular lens method is known. The is a technique in which a plurality of screens are formed as latent images on one screen, the plurality of screens are viewed through a translucent screen in which semicylindrical lenses of fixed widths are connected in the horizontal direction, so as to enable stereoscopic representation or representation of moving images. Namely, images which are obtained by dividing each of the plurality of images into stripes in the vertical direction in correspondence with the pitches of the semicylindrical lenses are arrayed regularly, and stereoscopic vision is realized on the basis of the focal position of each lens which changes due to the direction in which the screen is viewed and the distance and on the basis of how the image disposed there is viewed. Specifically, for the reproduction of a stereoscopic image, alternately arrayed stripe images are supplied to both eyes of the viewer from two left and right disparity images corresponding to both eyes of the viewer by using the lenticular lenses, so as to allow a stereoscopic image to be recognized.
A conventional apparatus for displaying stereoscopic two-dimensional image using the method described above is disclosed in JP-A-10-221644.

Apparatus and method for displaying stereoscopic two-dimensional image


A continuous polymerization method for laurolactam which has three stages. A prepolymerization process include steps of preliminarily heating laurolactam with 1 to 10% weight of water added, thereafter continuously feeding and passing the laurolactam from the upper part of the lower part of the longitudinal-type polymerization reaction zone, arranging a temperature decreasing gradient of 10.degree. C. or more than the upper part to the lower part directions at a polymerization temperature of 250.degree. and 300.degree. C. in the polymerization zone, and polymerizing the laurolactam under vapor pressure up to a conversion rate of 99.5% or more. A intermediate process has a step of releasing pressure from the prepolymerization product from the prepolymerization process for conversion into an intermediate product at atmospheric pressure. A post polymerization process includes the steps of continuously feeding the intermediate product at atmospheric pressure from the intermediate process in the direction from one end of the lower end to the other lower end of the traverse-type polymerization zone, polymerizing the intermediate product with agitation and air discharge in the presence of inert gas under reduced pressure or atmospheric pressure to a final relative viscosity of .eta..sub..tau. of 1.9 to 3.3.

The present invention relates to a continuous polymerization method of laurolactam (dodecanoic lactam) and the apparatus therefor. More specifically, the present invention relates to a continuous polymerization method of laurolactam (dodecanoic lactam), comprising continuously polymerizing laurolactam as a raw material monomer by using water as a catalyst, thereby producing a desired high quality Nylon 12 with a wide range of molecular weight, and the apparatus therefor.
Nylon 12 has conventionally been produced by heating and polymerizing laurolactam (dodecanoic lactam) or 12-aminododecanoic acid. By the method using 12-aminododecanoic acid as a raw material monomer, 12-aminododecanoic acid is continuously heated and melted under atmospheric pressure for polycondensation. Alternatively, the ring opening reaction of laurolactam progresses very slowly, which rate is 1/10 or less that of the rate of hydrolysis and polymerization of relatively easily ring opening caprolactam under atmospheric pressure as a raw material of Nylon 6. Therefore, the process using laurolactam as a raw material monomer generally comprises effecting a prepolymerization process wherein laurolactam is firstly heated along with water or an acid catalyst or the like under pressure, thereby promoting the ring opening reaction following a high-temperature/high-pressure system, rendering the pressure to atmospheric pressure, and polycondensing the resulting product under atmospheric pressure or reduced pressure to prepare a high molecular weight Nylon 12.
If it is intended to produce Nylon 12 by continuous polymerization using laurolactam as a raw material monomer, a large-scale, complex apparatus for high temperatures and high pressures is therefore inevitable due to the prepolymerization process, causing problems such as high equipment cost. Thus, a batch polymerization system (discontinuous two-step polymerization system) has conventionally been employed primarily for industrial polymerization of laurolactam.
However, such a batch system has the following drawbacks; the operational procedure is complex with a low productivity; when drawing out a generated polymer after the termination of the post polymerization process, the adhesion of the generated polymer onto the polymerization vessel and the retention thereof in the vessel is unavoidable; if the prepolymerization and post polymerization are repeated in the same container, the residual polymer is deteriorated through thermal hysteresis, thereby reducing the quality of the product polymer. In order to prevent these drawbacks, the vessel should necessarily be washed periodically, resulting in a far lower productivity.
In producing Nylon 12 having a high polymerization degree from laurolactam as the raw material monomer, the most serious problem in either one of the continuous polymerization or the batch polymerization is a laurolactam polymerization-conversion rate at the prepolymerization process under pressure. For the ring opening polymerization of laurolactam, the conversion rate obtained by the prepolymerization process influences the final polymerization product. While the prepolymerization process is conducted under pressure, the procedures in the prepolymerization process thereafter are conducted under atmospheric pressure or reduced pressure, and because it cannot be expected to increase the conversion rate at the prepolymerization process by a much greater degree though it is sometimes possible that the rate slightly increase. If the prepolymerization process is insufficient, disadvantages may develop such as the occurrence of contamination of a nozzle or a mold during the molding process, so it is important for laurolactam polymerization that the polymerization-conversion rate (ring opening reaction) at the prepolymerization process under pressure should be facilitated to a nearly equilibrium value (about 99.7%).
In order to promote the conversion rate at the prepolymerization process up to at the equilibrium value in such case, water conventionally employed as a single catalyst is generally added to laurolactam at 1 to 10% by weight under a pressure of about 10 to 50 kg/cm.sup.2 G and a higher temperature above 300.degree. C. But at a higher temperature above 300.degree. C., thermal deterioration, namely, partial gelation or discoloring or the like, is likely to occur due to the occurrence of undesirable secondary reactions, so that a high-quality polymer cannot be obtained. At a temperature below 300.degree. C., alternatively, a prepolymerization time period of at least 10 hours or more is required, resulting also in the deterioration of the quality of a polymer due to the factor of thermal deterioration via a prolonged polymerization at a high temperature and a high pressure.
If the water addition rate is less than 1% by weight, the ring opening polymerization of laurolactam is extremely difficult to occur, whereby the polymerization addition rate is lowered. On the other hand, if above 10% by weight, the dehydration from a reaction product occurs involving bubble, so that the plug flowability of a reaction solution inside a reaction column is lowered, resulting in the variation of the conversion rate, unfavorably.
Furthermore, when intending a high conversion rate by a prepolymerization at a temperature below 300.degree. C. and for 10 hours or less, acid or alkali catalysts are required besides water. When these catalysts are used, the molecular weight is hard to adjust at post polymerization, and hence, it is difficult to obtain a Nylon 12 with a desired molecular weight. Also, the viscosity change and the like at the molding process (at remelting) are remarked as problems, so that the industrial practice thereof is difficult.
As has been described above, the method comprising continuously polymerizing laurolactam employing water as a catalyst thereby industrially producing a high-quality Nylon 12 with a predetermined molecular weight has a variety of problems, so further improvement thereof has been desired.
It is the object of the present invention to overcome the problems in polymerizing laurolactam as a raw material monomer, and to provide a method for continuous polymerization of laurolactam, comprising industrially producing a high-quality Nylon 12 with a desirable molecular weight at a lower polymerization temperature and for an extremely short period of time, and the apparatus therefor.

Continous polymerization method of laurolactam and apparatus therefor


Provided are a circuit, a method of driving the panel, and a display device. The driving circuit includes a plurality of scanning lines, a plurality of clock signal connecting lines, a time controller and a multiple shift register unit. The input end of the shift register unit is correspondingly connected to the other end of the clock signal connecting line to receive clock signals of the time controller, and the output ends of the shift register units are connected with the scanning lines in one-to-one correspondence; Starting from the first shift register unit, the adjacent two shift register units are taken as a shift register group, and the clock signals sent by the time controller to the two shift register units in the same group via the clock signal connecting line have the same waveform.

The statements herein merely provide background information related to the present application and do not necessarily constitute prior art.
Gate Driver On Array (GOA) technology is a technology that uses the existing thin film transistor liquid crystal display Array (array) process and make the gate row scanning drive signal circuit on the array substrate to drive the scanning of the gate in rows.
However, signal delay is large with regards to the scanning signal output by the GOA circuit, which increases the time for driving the gate to scanning line by line, resulting in an increase in panel resolution.

Circuit, method of driving panel, and display device

BEIHAI HKC OPTOELECTRONICS TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD.


Systems and methods are disclosed for providing wireless communications between on-board components of a machine, In one embodiment, a system is disclosed that includes a first on-board component associated with a first transducer for wirelessly transmitting first data signals from the first on-board component, and a second on-board component associated with a receiver for receiving the wirelessly transmitted first data signals from the first on-board component. The system may also include a second transducer for wirelessly transmitting second data signals from the second on-board component, wherein the second on-board component generates the second data signals based on the received first data signals and wirelessly transmits the second data signals through the second transducer. In one embodiment, the machine includes a third on-board component that wirelessly transmits third data signals to the second on-board component via the first transducer.

An important feature in modem work machines (e.g., fixed and mobile commercial machines, such as construction machines, fixed engine systems, marine-based machines, etc.) is the on-board network and associated machine control modules. An on-board network includes many different modules connected to various types of communication links. A machine control module may monitor and/or control one or more components of the work machine. The control module may also receive data from and transmit data to external systems.
Current conventional vehicle control systems include on-board computer modules that collect information from a plurality of sensors during operation of the vehicle. Based on the collected information, an on-board computer module may adjust the operation of one or more on-board modules, such as braking systems, vehicle display devices, etc. As current vehicle systems continue to grow in complexity, additional on-board components are added that require wired data links to communicate. As such, the number of data links implemented in a single vehicle may result in a complex wiring architecture that is difficult to design, manufacture, and/or maintain.
To address some of the concerns associated with wired communications, some vehicle control systems implement wireless communication devices to enable the on-board control system to wirelessly communicate data with off-board systems. One such system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,112,152 ("the '112 Patent"), which discloses a vehicle on-board computer that is connected to a plurality of vehicle sensors that provide different types of vehicle operations, such as fuel level, engine temperature, engine speed, throttle positions, etc. The '112 patent includes wireless communication circuitry that is in serial communication with the vehicle on-board computer. The circuitry may transmit and receive data from transponders that are positioned externally to the vehicle. Through this arrangement, vehicle information may be wirelessly passed from the on-board computer to an external transponder. The '112 patent also discloses an arrangement where the external transponder may operate as a transmitting device that provides data to the vehicle on-board computer via wireless communication circuitry.
Although the system described in the '112 patent provides means for wirelessly transmitting and receiving data from a remote system, such as gas stations, toll booths, etc, the '112 patent does not provide an arrangement where data is wirelessly communicated between on-board modules of the vehicle. Methods, systems, and articles of manufacture consistent with certain disclosed embodiments may solve one or more of the problems set forth above.

Wireless communications system for work machine components


A single-handed overspeed trainer system that detachably tethers an athlete to a trainer through a substantially quiet, non-hook and loop material, release structure is disclosed. In one embodiment, the athlete wears a belt with a substantially rigid loop extending therefrom. The trainer holds one end of a tether that contains a retractable pin toward its opposite end. The pin holds the rigid loop of the belt until the pin is retracted by the trainer, preferably when the tether's handle is released by the trainer.

Despite the benefits offered by these known overspeed trainers, they have several drawbacks. For example, the person holding the tether must use both hands to activate their release mechanisms. Also, these known release mechanisms usually are quite noisy and frequently force the athlete to retain a "tail" portion of the tether. Such a tail is undesirable because it can catch on items or become entangled in the athlete's legs during training.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.


The present invention generally relates to an apparatus and method for efficiently summing the partial product bits produced by a multiplier. Briefly described, in architecture, the apparatus includes a first array of odd/even summation circuitry, a second array of odd/even summation circuitry, and a linear array of adders. The apparatus is configured to add a row of partial product bits produced by a multiplier in multiplying a first operand with a second operand. The first array of odd/even summation circuitry produces a first summation of a portion of the partial product bits. The second array of odd/even circuitry produces a second summation of the other partial product bits. The linear array of adders then adds the first summation and the second summation to produce a carry save representation of a product bit (i.e., a bit of the product produced by multiplying the first operand by the second operand).

1. Technical Field
The present invention generally relates to a multiplication apparatus and method for increasing the efficiency of multipliers, and more particularly, to an apparatus and method for increasing the performance of a low radix multiplier such that high radix performance can be achieved without a significant increase in wiring circuitry.
2. Description Of Related Art
Currently, the speed of many arithmetic operations in present processor implementations is increased by utilizing a floating-point processor. A floating-point processor usually includes carry save adders to increase the performance of multiplication operations.
Generally, there are two popular stages of radix multiplication for microprocessors. High radix multiplication (radix 8 or greater) has the advantage of requiring fewer partial products to be generated and summed, as compared with low radix multiplication (radix 4 or lesser). However, high radix multiplication requires that complex multiples of the X operand to be generated. An example of this is illustrated in FIG. 1B with regard to the 3X and -3X operands required for radix 8 multiplication applications.
FIG. 1A depicts the radix 4 multiplication table, the 3 multiplier bits, and X operand multiples. As can be seen for radix 4 multiplication, only the simple multiples of zero, 1X, and 2X are required for the operand. As it is known in the art, a multiple of a number can be easily generated for the zero, one, and two multiples. A zero multiple requires only that the value be reset, zeroed out, or cleared out. A xe2x88x921X multiple requires that the complement of the operand be obtained. A 2X multiple of a number is easily generated for the number by performing a left shift by one position on the number. A xe2x88x922X multiple of a number is obtained by acquiring the complement of the 2X multiple times.
FIG. 1B depicts the radix 8 multiplication table, the 4 multiplier bits, and X operand multiples. As can be seen by referring to FIG. 1B, radix 8 multiplication requires the multiples of the zero, 1X, 2X, 3X, and 4X. As noted above, the zero, 1X, and 2X multiples are fairly straightforward and easy to compute. However, the 3X and xe2x88x923X multiples required for radix 8 multiplication are quite complex and require special circuitry, such as carry look ahead adders, to compute. The 3X and xe2x88x923X operand multiples are computed by using a carry propagation adder that adds the 1X and 2X multiples to generate the 3X multiples and by acquiring the complement of the 3X multiple. The 4X and xe2x88x924X multiples are fairly straightforward and easy to compute. The 4X and xe2x88x924X multiples are computed by performing a left shift by two positions for the binary number and by acquiring the complement of the 4X multiple.
As stated above, a major problem with radix 8 multiplication is the generation of the 3X and xe2x88x923X operand multiples.
While the simplicity of radix 4 multiplication is often preferred to radix 8 multiplication there are some advantages of radix 8 multiplication. First, radix 8 multiplication generates fewer partial products that must be dealt with.
In this regard, radix 4 multiplication often requires many more carry save adders as compared to radix 8. For example, for a 64-bit array, radix 4 multiplication usually requires 33 rows of carry save adders to compute the product. For a 64-bit array, radix 8 multiplication requires only 22 rows of carry save adders to compute the product. This is computed utilizing the formula xe2x80x9c(number of bits manipulated+number of bits of the multiplier)/number of bits of the multiplierxe2x80x9d. For radix 4 multiplication the formula equals [(64+2)/2]=33 rows, and for the radix 8 application the formula equals [(64+3)/3]=22 rows. This reduction of 11 rows for computing the multiplication product reduces the delay of the multiplier by the speed of at least one gate delay per row.
Illustrated in FIG. 1C is a table for illustrating the levels of carry save adders required for K operands using the optimal Wallace tree architecture in the prior art. This table was obtained empirically by drawing tree structures for various word sizes. The Wallace tree summation network utilizes the fewest number of carry save adder delays.
FIG. 1D depicts a diagram of an example of a Booth-2 (radix 4) multiply with partial products for multiplying two 16 bit numbers. As can be seen by referring to FIG. 1D, there are nine rows of partial products to be added together to compute a final product for the two operands. To this end, the partial products form columns of partial product bits, and as known in the art, each of the bits in one column should be added together to produce one of the bits of the product. The least significant bit of the sum of all of the bits in the column represents the product bit for the bit position corresponding to the column. The other bits of the sum are shifted to the adjacent column for inclusion into the summation of the adjacent column. By summing each of the columns in this way, the product can be determined. Note that the additional 1""s (xe2x80x9c+1xe2x80x9d) on the right side of the partial product depicted by FIG. 1D are needed to complete the 2""s complement for cases when a negative booth multiple is selected.
FIG. 1E depicts a diagram of an example of a Booth-3 (radix 8) multiply with partial products. As can be seen in this example, there are only six rows of partial products to be added together to compute a final product for the two 16 bit operands. This is accomplished because the radix 8 multiplier generates fewer partial products by generating 3X and 4X multiples. As can be seen in FIG. 1E, the partial products generated by the radix 8 multiplier contain an offset of three extra bits per partial product as compared to the partial products generated by the radix 4 multiplier (FIG. 1D), thereby requiring a larger shift per partial product row. This larger shift per partial product row leads to increased wiring complexity.
FIG. 1F depicts a block diagram of a prior example of a linear summation array multiplier 7 for partial products. As can be seen, each of the carry save adders (CSA) receives a partial product term (P). Each of the carry save adders also receives a sum (S) and carry (C) term from two previous carry save adders. This is a simple architecture to implement and has a regular structure. The linear summation array multiplier 7 may be utilized to compute a final product for the two operands of FIG. 1D. The nine rows of partial products (FIG. 1D) are added together one bit at a time. Although this structure is one of the simplest and most regular of all known summation structures, it also exhibits one of the highest delays making it impractical for adding a large number of partial products.
FIG. 1G depicts a block diagram of a prior example of an odd/even summation array 8 for partial products in a multiplier. As can be seen by referring to FIG. 1G, each of the carry save adders (CSA) receives a partial product term. Each of the carry save adders also receives a sum and carry term from two previous carry save adders. However, in this odd/even summation implementation, the sum and carry terms from previous carry save adders skip every other row. While this architecture is more complex to implement, it has the advantage of having approximately one-half the number of adder delays as the linear summation array multiplier 7 (FIG. 1F).
FIGS. 2A and 2B illustrate an example of conventional linear summation circuitry 30 that may be utilized to add the partial product bits in a column of partial products to produce a bit of the product of two operands. In this regard, the circuitry 30 depicted in FIGS. 2A and 2B may be utilized to add a column of partial product bits for up to eighteen rows of partial products. Since the circuitry 30 adds a bit from each row of the radix 4 partial products, the circuitry 30 depicted by FIGS. 2A and 2B may add up to 18 bits of information.
The linear summation circuitry 30 utilizes a linear array of 16 carry save adders 31-38 and 41-48. A linear array of adders is an array of adders in which each of the adders transmits each of its outputs to the same next adder. As shown by FIGS. 2A and 2B, the configuration of the linear summation circuitry 30 has a regular and efficient layout. This configuration provides for light loading and simple interconnections for the carry save adder cells. However, the linear summation has a problem in that it produces a large number of carry save adder delays (in this case 16 delays) in the critical path.
FIG. 3 depicts a block diagram of conventional odd/even summation circuitry 50 that may be utilized to add the partial product bits in a column of partial products to produce a bit of the product of two operands. In this regard, the circuitry 50 depicted in FIG. 3 may be utilized to add a column of partial product bits for up to eighteen rows of partial products. Since the circuitry 50 adds a bit from each row of the partial products, the circuitry 50 depicted by FIG. 3 may add up to 18 bits of information.
As can be seen by referring to FIG. 3, the odd/even summation circuitry 50 utilizes a first linear array of carry save adders 51, 53, 55, 57, 61, 63, and 65 and a second linear array of carry save adders 52, 54, 56, 58, 62, 64, and 66. Approximately half of the partial product bits 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13, 15, and 17 are added by the first linear array of carry save adders, and the remaining bits 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 12, 14, 16, and 18 are added by the second linear array of interconnected carry save adders. The results produced by the first and second linear arrays of carry save adders are then added via carry save adders 67 and 68 to produce the appropriate results for the circuitry 50.
In this example of eighteen partial product bits depicted by FIG. 3, the configuration of the odd/even summation circuitry 50 causes only nine carry save adder delays. When the odd/even summation circuitry 50 is utilized to the fullest extent, the layout produces seven fewer carry save adder delays, as compared with the linear summation circuitry 30 (FIGS. 2A and 2B). Utilizing the odd/even summation circuitry 50 usually requires more complex wiring than a simple linear array with increased loading on the carry save adders, but the odd/even summation circuitry 50 is substantially faster than linear summation circuitry 30 because the odd/even summation circuitry 50 performs parallel summations. This parallelism achieves much of the speed benefits but requires somewhat more complex wiring, as mentioned above.
FIG. 4 depicts a block diagram of a prior example of circuitry 70 utilizing a full Wallace tree summation configuration that may be utilized to add the partial product bits in a column of up to 18 rows of partial products. The full Wallace tree summation circuitry 70 shown by FIG. 4 utilizes 16 carry save adders 71-78 and 81-88. In this example for 18 bits, the configuration of the full Wallace tree summation circuitry 70 causes only six carry save adder delays, as shown by FIG. 4. When a full Wallace tree summation configuration is utilized to the fullest extent, the layout produces ten fewer carry save adder delays as compared with linear summation circuitry 130 (FIGS. 2A and 2B) and three fewer carry save adder delays as compared with the odd/even summation circuitry 50 (FIG. 3). However, utilizing a full Wallace tree summation configuration requires the most irregular and complex wiring of the three summation configuration types.
For illustrative purposes, assume that the circuitry 30 and 50 is implemented in a radix 4 multiplier. If a radix 8 multiplier is used instead, then the number of carry save adders can be reduced since the number of partial products is reduced. In this regard, the circuitry 50 of FIG. 3 can be reduced to the circuitry 110 of FIG. 5 when a radix 8 multiplier is used instead of a radix 4 multiplier. Therefore, the odd/even summation circuitry 110 may be implemented with only 10 carry save adders (111-118, 121 and 122), resulting in only six carry save adder delays, as shown by FIG. 5. When the odd/even summation circuitry 110 is utilized to the fullest extent, the circuitry 110 produces the same number of carry save adder delays as the full Wallace tree summation circuitry 70 (FIG. 4), which uses very irregular and complex wired carry save adders. However, utilizing radix 8 partial products requires the much more complicated implementation of radix 8 partial product generators and the generation of the 3X operand multiple.
Thus, a heretofore unaddressed need exists in the industry for summation circuitry having a simple and regular pattern that is capable of achieving near the performance of Wallace tree summation circuitry without requiring the use of high radix multipliers.
The present invention provides an apparatus and method for utilizing regular summation circuitry to optimally sum the partial products produced by a multiplier in terms of speed and wiring complexity.
Briefly described, in architecture, the apparatus includes a first array of odd/even summation circuitry, a second array of odd/even summation circuitry, and a linear array of adders. The apparatus is configured to add a row of partial product bits produced by a multiplier in multiplying a first operand with a second operand. The first array of odd/even summation circuitry produces a first summation of a portion of the partial product bits. The second array of odd/even circuitry produces a second summation of the other partial product bits. The linear array of adders then adds the first summation and the second summation to produce a carry save representation of a product bit (i.e., a bit of the product produced by multiplying the first operand by the second operand).
In accordance with another feature of the present invention, the adders within an array of odd/even summation circuitry can be configured to receive inputs from adders outside of the array to further increase performance. For example, the first array of odd/even summation circuitry described above may include a first linear array of adders and a second linear array of adders. The first linear array of adders may include a first adder and a second adder. The first adder receives output from the second adder and from another adder outside of the first linear array of adders. This other adder receives and adds a plurality of partial product bits from the portion of partial product bits set forth hereinabove. As a result, a larger number of partial products can be added via the first linear array of adders.
The present invention can also be viewed as providing a method for summing partial product bits in a multiplier, the multiplier for producing a plurality of partial products based on a first operand and a second operand multiplied together by the multiplier to produce a product. In this regard, the method can be broadly summarized by the following steps: adding, via an array of odd/even summation circuitry, a first plurality of partial product bits, each of the first plurality of partial product bits from a different one of a portion of the partial products to produce a first plurality of sum and carry bits; adding, via another array of odd/even summation circuitry, a second plurality of partial product bits, each of the second plurality of partial product bits from a different one of the remaining partial products to produce a second plurality of sum and carry bits; adding the first and second pluralities of sum and carry bits; and producing a third plurality of sum and carry bits via the adding the first and second pluralities of sum and carry bits step, the third plurality of bits forming a carry save representation of a product bit of the product.
Other features and advantages of the present invention will become apparent to one with skill in the art upon examination of the following drawings and detailed description. It is intended that all such additional features and advantages be included herein within the scope of the present invention.

Apparatus and method for increasing performance of multipliers utilizing regular summation circuitry

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.


The description relates to user control gestures. One example allows a speaker and a microphone to perform a first functionality. The example simultaneously utilizes the speaker and the microphone to perform a second functionality. The second functionality comprises capturing sound signals that originated from the speaker with the microphone and detecting Doppler shift in the sound signals. It correlates the Doppler shift with a user control gesture performed proximate to the computer and maps the user control gesture to a control function.

Computers are ubiquitous in everyday life. However, instead of having 'a computer', users tend to have, or interact with, lots of different computers. For instance, a typical user may have a desktop computer at work, a laptop at home, a Smartphone, a pad computer, a video game console, and/or an electronic book, among others. Further, the user tends to interact with other computers that are integrated into other devices. For example, the user's car likely has a computer that the user interacts with to get directions, listen to music, etc. Various user controls have been developed for these different types of computers. For instance, a mouse and a physical keyboard tend to be the most common way of interacting with and controlling a desktop computer. Mice were not convenient with notebook computers which tend to use a trackpad-type device instead. Neither mice nor trackpads were feasible with Smartphones and pad type computers which instead tend to have touch sensitive screens (e.g. virtual keyboards) which the user can contact to control the device.
Each of these control technologies has disadvantages. For instance, controlling devices by contacting the touch screen tends to make smudges all over the screen and/or is rendered inoperable if the user is wearing gloves. Potentially more importantly is that these control technologies do not lend themselves to use across all of the device types. As a result the user has to learn different techniques for controlling his/her different devices. For example, assume that in the course of a day the user listens to music on each of his/her computing devices and wants to turn off the music. When listening on the desktop the user likely uses the mouse to turn a music playing application from 'play' to 'stop'. The user may use the notebook's trackpad in a similar manner. In the car, the user may use a specific hardware switch to stop the music. On the Smartphone of the pad-type computer, the user may touch the 'stop' icon on the touch screen. This lack of continuity is inconvenient. Further, this inconvenience is magnified when the user tries to control a computer with which the user is unfamiliar. The present concepts relate to techniques that can be utilized to control a computer and can be readily applied to any (or all) computers, such as those listed above.


A media transport apparatus including a supply of recording medium, collecting means for the recording medium, a drive roller for moving the recording medium from the supply to the collecting means along a transport path, and a cutter for severing the recording medium into sections. The cutter is located between the drive roller and the collecting means and is moved in a direction substantially transverse to the direction of movement of the recording medium during severing. Deflectable fingers define a portion of the transport path in interference relationship with the cutter and are readily displaced by the cutter while continuing to provide a rigid guide for the recording medium.

The electrographic recording process, for which the apparatus of this invention is particularly applicable, includes the steps of forming an electrostatic latent image upon a recording medium and subsequently making the latent image visible. The recording medium, usually provided in web form, has a dielectric surface and may be a coated paper, a polyester based transparent film, or other suitable material on which an electrostatic latent image is formed by means of a plurality of writing electrodes or stylii physically positioned on one side thereof to electrically address the dielectric surface as the medium travels therepast through a recording station. On the opposite side of the recording medium there are disposed a series of backup electrodes. When the potential difference between these recording elements is raised to a threshold level, on the order of several hundred volts, an electrostatic charge is deposited on the dielectric surface of the recording medium as the medium passes through the gap between the stylii and the backup electrodes.
Subsequently the latent image is made visible during the development step by applying liquid or dry toner to the recording medium. Normally such electrographic apparatus includes a liquid development system comprising a roller applicator movable through a bath of toner particles suspended in a carrier liquid, or a fountain over which a marking liquid flows. In each case, the recording medium is contacted by a thin film of developer material out of which the toner particles are electrostatically attracted to the regions of electrostatic charge on the medium.
Electrostatic plotters of this type have been commercially successful for many years in a monochrome mode, including a single recording station and a single development station dispensing a single color toner, usually black. More recently, electrostatic color plotters have been available to produce full color plots by the sequential overlaying of a series of separate color images (yellow, cyan, magenta and black) to produce a full spectrum of colors. It is clearly imperative that each color separation image must be in registration with the preceding images so as to prevent color fringes and color errors, and to provide high resolution color prints.
There are two basic approaches to color separation imaging. In one, a series of images are formed each by means of a dedicated recording head and development station. In the other, a single recording head forms each color separation image on the recording medium which is then advanced past one of the development stations. Then the recording medium is returned to the recording head for receiving the next color separation image and is advanced to the next development station. This process of advancing and returning the recording medium through the apparatus minimizes the number of recording heads and obviates the need for their critical alignment with respect to one another. On the other hand, it is very important that great care be taken during shuttling of the recording medium back and forth to insure that it does not mistrack or skew in the apparatus, resulting in color-to-color mismatch.
The web of recording medium, in each case, is dispensed from a supply roller to the image processing stations. In the single pass method, handling of the recording medium is greatly simplified as compared with the multiple pass method, since although a completed plot may be wound onto a take-up spool, it is also possible to feed it out of the machine with no provision for output storage, i.e. feeding onto the floor. This is not the case with the multiple pass method since the recording medium must be under positive control in two directions of movement before a completed plot may be achieved. As illustrated and described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,569,584 advancing and rewinding of the recording medium, in a multicolor electrographic plotter, is accomplished by feeding the medium for a supply roller to a take-up roller and by driving it with an intermediate main drive roller. The supply roller and the take-up roller each are continuously biased in opposite directions by individual drive motors so as to maintain the medium in a taut state of equilibrium which may be overcome by the drive motor applied to the main drive roller. Winding the completed plots onto a take-up spool, as taught in the '584 patent, is satisfactory for may applications but it requires that numerous completed plots be serially wound upon the take-up spool, prior to separating them into the individual plots and delivering them to their respective recipients.
One form of an output spooling station is shown and described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,784,345. In the single pass apparatus described therein, cut sheets of recording media are transported through a document reproduction apparatus and are delivered into a device for automatically rolling the sheets into tubular form. No provision is made for maintaining the medium taut as it is moved into the device.
Often it is desired to obtain an output plot of one's work shortly or immediately after it has been printed on a centralized plotter at a remote location. In such case it would be most convenient if the plotter apparatus had the capability to automatically sever individual plots from the supply web and to deliver them in roller up, tubular form for ease of handling.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a segment of the media transport path wherein the recording medium may be severed by a traversing cutter wherein that traversed zone nonetheless remains spanned by a rigid guide for the recording medium.

Deflectable media guides for assisting in media transport


Video encoding or decoding utilizing a spatial transform operating on rows and columns of a block, with a set of transform skip modes including: transform on rows and columns; transform on rows only; transform on columns only; no transform. An indication of the selected mode is provided to the decoder. Coefficients are scaled by a factor dependent upon the norm of the transform vector of the skipped transform to bring the untransformed image values to the same level as transformed coefficients.

Transmission and storage of video sequences are employed in several applications like e.g. TV broadcasts, internet video streaming services and video conferencing.
Video sequences in a raw format require a very large amount of data to be represented, as each second of a sequence may consist of tens of individual frames and each frame is represented by typically at least 8 bit per pixel, with each frame requiring several hundreds or thousands of pixels. In order to minimise the transmission and storage costs video compression is used on the raw video data. The aim is to represent the original information with as little capacity as possible, i.e., with as few bits as possible. The reduction of the capacity needed to represent a video sequence will affect the video quality of the compressed sequence, i.e. its similarity to the original uncompressed video sequence.
State-of-the-art video encoders, such as AVC/H.264, utilise four main processes to achieve the maximum level of video compression while achieving a desired level of video quality for the compressed video sequence: prediction, transformation, quantisation and entropy coding. The prediction process exploits the temporal and spatial redundancy found in video sequences to greatly reduce the capacity required to represent the data. The mechanism used to predict data is known to both encoder and decoder, thus only an error signal, or residual, must be sent to the decoder to reconstruct the original signal. This process is typically performed on blocks of data (e.g. 8×8 pixels) rather than entire frames. The prediction is typically performed against already reconstructed frames or blocks of reconstructed pixels belonging to the same frame.
The transformation process aims to exploit the correlation present in the residual signals. It does so by concentrating the energy of the signal into few coefficients. Thus the transform coefficients typically require fewer bits to be represented than the pixels of the residual. H.264 uses 4×4 and 8×8 integer type transforms based on the Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT).
The capacity required to represent the data in output of the transformation process may still be too high for many applications. Moreover, it is not possible to modify the transformation process in order to achieve the desired level of capacity for the compressed signal. The quantisation process takes care of that, by allowing a further reduction of the capacity needed to represent the signal. It should be noted that this process is destructive, i.e. the reconstructed sequence will look different to the original
The entropy coding process takes all the non-zero quantised transform coefficients and processes them to be efficiently represented into a stream of bits. This requires reading, or scanning, the transform coefficients in a certain order to minimise the capacity required to represent the compressed video sequence.
The above description applies to a video encoder; a video decoder will perform all of the above processes in roughly reverse order. In particular, the transformation process on the decoder side will require the use of the inverse of the transform being used on the encoder. Similarly, entropy coding becomes entropy decoding and the quantisation process becomes inverse scaling. The prediction process is typically performed in the same exact fashion on both encoder and decoder.
The present invention relates to the transformation part of the coding, thus a more thorough review of the transform process is presented here.
The statistical properties of the residual affect the ability of the transform (i.e. DCT) to compress the energy of the input signal in a small number of coefficients. The residual shows very different statistical properties depending on the quality of the prediction and whether the prediction exploits spatial or temporal redundancy. Other factors affecting the quality of the prediction are the size of the blocks being used and the spatial/temporal characteristics of the sequence being processed.
It is well known that the DCT approaches maximum energy compaction performance for highly correlated Markov-I signals. DCT's energy compaction performance starts dropping as the signal correlation becomes weaker. For instance, it is possible to show how the Discrete Sine Transform (DST) can outperform the DCT for input signals with lower adjacent correlation characteristics.
The DCT and DST in image and video coding are normally used on blocks, i.e. 2D signals; this means that a one dimensional transform is first performed in one direction (e.g., horizontal) followed by a one dimensional transform performed in the other direction. As already mentioned the energy compaction ability of a transform is dependent on the statistics of the input signal. It is possible, and indeed it is also common under some circumstances, for the two-dimensional signal input to the transform to display different statistics along the two vertical and horizontal axes. In this case it would be desirable to choose the best performing transform on each axis. A similar approach has already been attempted within the new ISO and ITU video coding standard under development, High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC). In particular, a combination of two one dimensional separable transforms such as a DCT-like [2] and DST [3] has been used in HEVC standard under development.
While previous coding standards based on DCT use a two-dimensional transform (2D DCT), newer solutions apply a combination of DCT and DST to intra predicted blocks, i.e. on blocks that are spatially predicted. It has been shown that DST is a better choice than DCT for transformation of rows, when the directional prediction is from a direction that is closer to horizontal then vertical, and, similarly, is a better choice for transformation of columns when the directional prediction is closer to vertical. In the remaining direction (e.g. on rows, when DST is applied on columns), DCT is used.
For implementation purposes, in video coding it is common to use integer approximations of DCT and DST, which will in rest of this text be simply referred to as DCT and DST. One of solutions for integer DCT-like transform uses 16-bit intermediate data representation and is known as partial butterfly. Its main properties are same (anti)symmetry properties as of DCT, almost orthogonal basis vectors, 16 bit data representation before and after each transform stage, 16 bit multipliers for all internal multiplications and no need for correction of different norms of basis vectors during (de)quantisation.

Video encoding and decoding using transforms


A real-image variable-magnification viewfinder substantially consists of, in order from the object side: an objective lens system substantially consisting of a positive first lens, a negative second lens, a positive third lens, and a positive fourth lens; an erect optical system formed by a plurality of optical members; and a positive eyepiece lens system. The first lens and the third lens are fixed relative to the optical axis direction during magnification change, and the second lens and the fourth lens are moved in the optical axis direction during magnification change. All optical surfaces of all the optical members forming the erect optical system are planar surfaces. At least one of the optical members forming the erect optical system is made of a glass material. A predetermined conditional expression is satisfied.

Conventionally, a so-called real-image viewfinder, where an image formed by an objective optical system is inverted into an erect image by an erect optical system, and the erect image is observed via an eyepiece optical system, is used as a viewfinder. Further, with a digital camera including an imaging optical system and a viewfinder which are separately formed where the imaging optical system has a magnification changing function, a viewfinders having a magnification changing function is often used so as to be able to accommodate an imaging angle of view and a zoom ratio of the imaging optical system. In recent years, high-quality digital cameras provided with a this type of real-image variable-magnification viewfinder are being introduced into the market. As a real-image variable-magnification viewfinder having a relatively high zoom ratio, those disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication Nos. 8(1996)-122856, 2009-002991 and 2010-039339 (hereinafter, Patent Documents 1, 2 and 3, respectively), for example, are known.

Real-image variable-magnification viewfinder and imaging apparatus


A weld bead cutter mechanism continuously planes weld beads projecting from the seam weld zone of an electric seamed steel pipe. The weld bead cutter mechanism fits into an assembly line for manufacturing electric seamed steel pipe right after equipment which continuously molds sheet metal and welds the seam. The weld bead is planed off from the steel pipe by a planing blade, bent by a guide shoe fixed to the planing blade holder, and automatically guided through a groove in a bead guide to a rotary bead chopper. The weld bead is then chopped into small pieces as the rotary bead chopper chops it against a stationary blade. The distance between the planing blade and the rotary bead chopper is minimized by the use of the guide shoe and bead guide, which ensures a stable weld bead movement. The weld bead cutter mechanism operates without requiring manual guidance of the weld bead, which greatly reduces the risk of a labor accident. The chopped pieces of weld bead fall into a disposal bucket or onto a waste discharge conveyor, so the invention does not need to be stopped periodically to remove accumulated weld bead. As a result, the invention and the electric seamed steel pipe assembly line can be run continuously for long periods of time.

Conventionally, bead winders similar to the one shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 have been used to plane weld beads from a weld zone of manufactured metal pipe. The conventional bead winder operates as follows: A planing blade 1 planes a weld bead C from a pipe A. A guide roller R guides the planed weld bead C upward and laterally away from pipe A and planing blade 11 towards a take up reel W rotated by a motor M. Motor M is typically a pneumatic drive, which rotates take up reel W in weak torque. When steel pipe is first fed into the bead winder, an operator must manually guide the first portion of weld bead C planed from the pipe above the guide roller R and wind it onto take up reel W using a tool such as pincers. Weld bead C which is thereafter planed is guided over guide roller R to take up reel W by means of the winding force applied by motor M. Because take up reel W has a limited capacity, the electric seamed steel pipe manufacturing equipment must be stopped at periodic intervals to allow the operator to remove the wound up weld bead C from take up reel W and dispose of it.
The above described method of using equipment with a take up reel to plane weld bead has several problems. The operator is required to manually manipulate the initially planed off weld bead using pincers or a similar tool. The planed off weld bead is sharp and hot, and manual handling could cause a labor accident, such as an incision wound or a burn. Furthermore, the take up reel has a finite capacity. As a result, the whole assembly line must be stopped periodically in order to remove the wound weld beads from the take up reel.
The present invention improves upon the prior method in several ways. It does not require manual handling of the planed off weld bead. Furthermore, it continuously chops and disposes of the weld bead and as it is planed off, so the assembly line does not need to be stopped in order to unload and dispose of the weld bead.


A call center system in which agents are geographically dispersed based on agent skill-set, agent location and caller location that results in a call being delivered to the best available agent. The system chooses the best available agent to service a customer call based on the agent rankings. In the case where the customer has a preference for proximity of the agent to the customer, the system adjusts the agent rankings according to the agent's distance from the customer prior to making a selection.

The present invention relates to the general field of routing agents from call centers and in particular to a system for optimally routing such agents.
The present invention is a system for routing a call or other communication to a best available individual, such as a call center agent, customer service representative, and the like, who has a certain relationship with a caller, such as, for example, a physical proximity between the individual and the caller.
Currently, many businesses utilize call centers, each with multiple agents, to provide customer service. Typically, businesses employ multiple physical call centers to enable around-the-clock call handling and to utilize cheaper labor markets. Current call center applications enable call routing by a number of methods including time-of-day (TOD), agent availability, caller location and agent skill-set. In some cases, these methods can be combined to form a routing plan. There are limitations to this approach however, including the need to group agents at certain physical locations and the strict prioritization of one routing method over another. These limitations may result in a customer who is not very comfortable with his agent due to accent, lack of local knowledge, etc.
Therefore, what is needed to overcome the aforementioned limitations, is a call center system in which agents are geographically dispersed and a call routing method, based on agent skill-set, agent location and caller location, that results in call delivery to the best available agent, while allowing a certain preference towards agents who are geographically closer to the caller.