An impedance matching circuit may be used to adjust for manufacturing and design tolerances in a surgical instrument. The matching circuit may match the load of a thermal element with the impedance of a power source used to deliver electrical energy to the surgical instrument. The matching circuit may include capacitors, inductors, coaxial cables, varactors, transformers, resistors, and/or combinations thereof. The matching circuit may also comprise a circuit board or flex board layers which may be modified to adjust the impedance of the load.

Circuits may be designed with maximum voltage to load, maximum power to load or, sometimes, no thought to power or voltage transfer. In many situations, maximum power transfer is desirable, as it provides maximum power to the load. It is believed that maximum power transfer may be achieved by matching the impedance of the source to the load (and any intermediate lines or components). Circuits may use a matching network on the source side and load side (see FIG. 1A) or on one side only.
In general, impedance has a complex value; this means that loads (symbolized as Z) generally have a resistance component (symbolized as R) which forms the real part of Z and a reactance component (symbolized as X) which forms the imaginary part of Z. Power transfer theory dictates that for maximum power to be transferred, the source impedance (ZS) should equal the complex conjugate of the load impedance (ZL) such that the following equation holds true: RS+jXS=RL−jXL (see FIG. 1B). As reactance X is variable with frequency, the matching network is generally tuned to one frequency.
Matching the load to the characteristic impedance (Z0) of the transmission line allows reflectionless matching, minimizing reflections from the load. Thus, a transmission line connecting the source and load together would ideally be the same impedance: ZL=Z0=ZS.
While in an ideal world, Z1, Z0 and ZL would be immutable and the same for every product produced, the impedances may be variable due to tolerances and design in manufacturing. Therefore, there is a need to customize each circuit to match impedances in a cost efficient manner.


Under the present invention, item verification is automated and expedited. Specifically, items to be purchased can be scanned by the shopper using a barcode reader (e.g., a scanner) attached to or positioned near the shopping receptacle. As items are scanned, they are identified based on their barcode and added to an item list. Item verification can then performed at checkout using imaging technology. For example, the shopping cart or shopping basket can be brought into the field of view of a computer-connected camera. The camera and computer can, working from the customer's item list developed when the items are scanned, observe each product in the receptacle and “ring it up”. If all products can be accounted for, the customer is free to leave; otherwise the customer is denied egress, informed of the problem, etc. A store employee can also be signaled to investigate. The total time required to make the decision is the time to take a picture and process it, which by human standards is very fast; faster than existing verification methods.

Shopping checkout (e.g., retail supermarket, etc.) is a process by which most everyone is familiar. Typical checkout involves a shopper navigating about a store collecting items/items for purchase. Often the shopper will utilize a shopping receptacle such as a shopping cart and/or shopping basket. Upon completion of gathering the desired items, the shopper will proceed to a checkout station for checkout (e.g., bagging and payment). In recent years, many stores have become equipped with self-checkout stations whereby a shopper will scan and bag the items his/herself, and then make payment via the self-checkout station.
A recent trend has been to allow the shopper to perform some of these functions as he/she navigates about the store. Unfortunately, none of the existing approaches provides a way to prevent device (e.g., scanner error) and/or theft (e.g., switching barcodes, not scanning items placed in the cart, etc.). Moreover, many of the existing approaches require expensive retrofitting of shopping receptacles, which themselves provide an increased security risk. In view of the foregoing, there exists a need for an approach that solves at least one of the deficiencies in the existing art.
It is desirable, when shoppers in supermarkets and other large retail stores self-check out, that the process be both as rapid as possible, to make the customer happy, and as secure as possible, to make the store happy. The more this process can be both instantaneous and 100% secure, the better. No existing process achieves these desired goals simultaneously. Self-checkout typically includes three separate functions that today are mostly lumped together at a single point of sale (POS) station: (1) enumerating each item to be purchased, and determining its price (typically, by presenting it to a bar code scanner); (2) verifying that each item is what it was claimed to be; and, (3) paying for all the items. With the advent of smart shopping carts that are already coming into service and similar devices, step 1 is being done at the time of item-pickup in the store aisles, and step 3 follows immediately, if the bill is charged against a credit card. This leaves step 2 as an area of potential bottleneck and security risk.

Toshiba Global Commerce Solutions Holding Corporation


In one illustrative example disclosed, a method for use in making a magnetic head involves forming a thermal-assist heater for the magnetic head; forming a plurality of coil layers of a write coil using a damascene process; and simultaneously forming an electrical connection to the thermal-assist heater in the same damascene process used to form the write coil. Advantageously, fabrication steps are reduced using a parallel process that provides for relatively small dimensions and reduces the possibility of electrical shorting. The method may be alternatively used to form an electrical connection to any other suitable electrical device for the magnetic head, such as an electrical lapping guide (ELG) or other component.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to methods of making magnetic heads of disk drives, and more particularly to a method involving a simultaneous damascene-based fabrication of a write coil and an electrical connection to an electrical device (such as a thermal-assist heater).
2. Description of the Related Art
The data storage industry continues to improve or increase the amount of data that can be stored on magnetic disks and to more easily design magnetic heads which can adequately read from and write data to these disks. One promising technique to increase the disk storage capacity is heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR), which may also be referred to as optically-assisted magnetic recording or thermally-assisted magnetic recording. Such a technique utilizes a recording medium that can store relatively more data since it has a higher coercivity than other types of conventional media. A higher coercivity, however, means that the platter tends to resist reacting to magnetic fields at typical operating temperatures. Therefore, it is difficult to write data to such media at typical operating temperatures. To sufficiently write data to such high coercivity media, a disk drive needs to heat up a portion of the disk to lower its coercivity as the write head writes data to it.
Techniques to provide a thermal heater in a magnetic write head for assisting in the writing of data, referred to in the present application as a "thermal-assist heater", have been devised. However, a robust process and design for fabricating an electrical connection to such thermal-assist heaters should not add additional processing steps if possible. A suitable electrical connection process should reduce the possibility of shorting and damage to neighboring components of the magnetic head. As design-points in magnetic heads are in sub-micron dimensions, the available spacing becomes limited accordingly. Thus, the ability to reduce or minimize such undesirable occurrences is important because it will translate into higher device yields during manufacturing. A thoughtful design should consider the path, the location, and the effects of the electrical connection to nearby components during its fabrication and to itself during subsequent processes. Finally, an electrical connection should be fabricated such that it can be incorporated into the fabrication of existing components to minimize increasing the number of processing steps.
Accordingly, what are needed are methods of forming electrical connections in magnetic heads (e.g. connections to thermal-assist heaters) which overcome the shortcomings inherent in present-day methods.

Methods of forming an electrical connection in a magnetic head using a damascene process

Hitachi Global Storage Technologies Netherlands B.V.


A method for range scanning consists of projecting a sequence of radiation patterns onto a scene, capturing images of the scene, determining correspondences between image features and projection pattern features, and computing a range image of the scene by triangulation of the correspondences. Novel projection patterns allow tracking of pattern features between images, so that range images can be computed for moving scenes in real time. Global assumptions about surface continuity or reflectivity of the scene are not required for successful range scanning. Projection patterns may be based on two-stripe codes, parallel stripes of bright and dark intensity. In two-stripe coded patterns, pattern features are the boundaries between stripes, which take on values of either on-on, on-off, off-on, or off-off. A particular boundary""s value over the entire pattern sequence defines its code, used to determine correspondences between the boundary image and its location in the projection pattern. The method is also useful for obtaining three-dimensional models of static objects. The object is slowly rotated while being imaged, and all resulting range images are aligned and merged to form the three-dimensional model. A system implementing the method can be mounted on a robot or vehicle for navigation in unknown environments.

This invention relates generally to non-contact methods for obtaining three-dimensional or range measurements of objects. More particularly, it relates to a structured light (or other radiation) range scanner using projected patterns that permit real-time range measurements of moving scenes with minimal surface continuity and reflectivity assumptions.
The ability to determine the distance to objects or surfaces in a three-dimensional spatial scene is becoming increasingly important in many fields, such as computer graphics, virtual and augmented reality, robot navigation, manufacturing, object shape recognition, and medical diagnostics. A large variety of non-contact techniques have been developed to obtain range images, two-dimensional arrays of numbers that represent the distance or depth from the imaging instrument to the imaged object. A range image measures the location of each point on an object""s surface in three-dimensional space. Active range scanning methods include time-of-flight, depth from defocus, and projected-light triangulation. Triangulation-based methods, such as structured light range scanning, are applicable to a wider range of scene scales and have lower hardware costs than other active methods.
Devices that obtain range images by triangulation methods are known as range scanners. A typical prior art structured light range scanning system 10 is illustrated in FIG. 1. A light projector 12 projects a plane of light 14 onto a three-dimensional object 16 to be imaged, creating a narrow stripe. The image of each illuminated point of object 16 is detected by a camera 18 at a particular two-dimensional location on the camera image plane 20. The intersection of the known illumination plane 14 with a camera line of sight uniquely determines a point on the object surface. Provided that the relative geometry of the camera and projector is accurately known, the three-dimensional locations of surface points of object 16 can be determined through triangulation. Obtaining a range image of the entire scene requires scanning of the light plane 14 in time, a relatively time-consuming process, and currently not feasible for moving scenes or real-time data acquisition.
In order to speed up the imaging process and eliminate mechanical scanning, two-dimensional projected light patterns have been used. Rather than a single plane, a number of distinct planes are projected onto the scene; the image obtained therefore contains range information for the entire scene, and not just a small slice of it. Such illumination patterns introduce a new problem: identifying correspondences between image positions and pattern positions. When only a single light plane is projected, an illuminated part of the image must correspond to the projected plane. If a number of planes are projected, however, a camera pixel receiving light originating from the projector may correspond to any one of the projected planes, and it is necessary to determine the responsible plane.
Highly reliable identification of light planes with minimal assumptions about the nature of the scene can be achieved by time multiplexing, i.e., by sequentially projecting several different illumination patterns. The sequence of intensity values received at each camera pixel defines a unique code that identifies a location of the projection pattern, therefore allowing triangulation to be performed. Range data can be computed after the full sequence of projection patterns has been captured by the camera. A large number of pattern systems have been developed for a variety of scene constraints, each one having different advantages applicable to different types of scenes. Two constraints applicable to static scenes are the surface continuity and reflectivity of the scene. A surface reflectivity assumption refers to the similarity of reflectivity of adjacent surface regions in the scene. If the scene is of uniform color, then it is much easier to obtain information from the reflected intensities. Spatially varying reflectivities require different decision thresholds for different pixels of the detector. For example, consider a pattern that contains three different projected light intensities. The same projected intensity results in different reflected and imaged intensities when reflected from different scene locations, and a decision about the detected intensity level requires at least some knowledge of the reflectivity of the corresponding scene surface. Similar considerations apply to the surface continuity of a scene. Scenes with high surface continuity, i.e., smoothly changing surfaces, such as human forms, allow correlation of pattern features across large distances. Low-surface-continuity scenes, however, require that codes be ascertained from nearby pixels, without requiring information from far-away detector pixels.
One well-known system of time-modulated illumination patterns uses binary Gray codes, projecting a series of stripes that decrease in width in sequential patterns. An early use of Gray codes is described in K. Sato and S. Inokuchi, xe2x80x9cThree-Dimensional Surface Measurement by Space Encoding Range Imaging,xe2x80x9d J. Robotic Systems, 2, 27-39, 1985, and a large number of variations are available in the art. A sequence of Gray coded patterns, each projected at a particular time ti, is shown in FIG. 2. Each pattern can be thought of as a bit plane for a Gray code, considering a shaded stripe as a 0 bit and a white stripe as a 1 bit. For example, the scene surface that receives light at the location marked with the center of an X sees the bit code 1 1 1 0 1. As long as the scene does not move, a particular camera pixel (or multiple pixels) receives light reflected from this particular scene surface over the duration of the projection sequence, and the detected 1 1 1 0 1 code is used to determine the projector location corresponding to this camera pixel. The number of patterns needed is determined by the desired resolution, which may itself be determined by the camera or projector. For a maximum of N distinguishable horizontal positions, a Gray coded pattern requires log2 N patterns.
Structured light patterns based on Gray codes are very robust and widely used. They require virtually no assumptions about the scene reflectivity or surface continuity. Correspondences are determined using only single-pixel information, and pixel thresholds can be determined initially by projecting all-dark and all-bright patterns. However, a relatively large number of patterns is needed, demanding that the scene remain static for the duration of the pattern sequence. Thus if real-time range data is needed, or moving scenes are imaged, a different pattern system is required.
One approach for imaging moving scenes is to use a xe2x80x9cone-shotxe2x80x9d system of projection patterns. A single pattern is continually projected, and range information is obtained for each camera image. Provided that the scene movement is not so rapid as to cause motion blur in the captured images, one-shot systems can be used to obtain range data for moving scenes. The drawback of one-shot systems is that they are limited to scenes having relatively constant reflectivity and a high amount of continuity. For example, color projector patterns have been used in which each projector pixel transmits light with a distinct ratio among the red, green, and blue (RGB) or hue, saturation, and intensity (HSI) color components. The detected RGB or HSI value at each camera pixel determines the correspondence between the camera pixel location and projector pixel location. In a different system, the pattern consists of a continual fade from black to white, with detected gray-scale intensity values used to determine the responsible projector pixels. Both of these patterns require a relatively constant and known reflectivity for all locations within the scene. An alternative one-shot system projects a repetitive pattern such as a grid. An example of such a method is described in M. Proesmans et al., xe2x80x9cOne-Shot Active 3D Shape Acquisition,xe2x80x9d Proceedings of the International Conference on Pattern Recognition, 336-340, 1996. Assuming a relatively smooth scene surface, distortions of the grid angles and lines on a global scale are used to determine correspondences. However, the projected grid must remain connected in the image of the illuminated scene in order to allow accurate correspondences to be determined.
There is still a need, therefore, for a triangulation-based structured light range scanner that can obtain real-time image data of moving scenes without assuming global surface continuity or uniform reflectivity of the scene.
Accordingly, it is a primary object of the present invention to provide a range scanning method that produces real-time range images of moving scenes.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a range scanning method that uses a minimal number of projection patterns while making only local assumptions about the continuity or reflectivity of a scene surface.
It is an additional object of the invention to provide a range scanning method for generating complete three-dimensional models of rigid objects.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a range scanning method that uses commercially-available, inexpensive hardware.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a range scanning method that can be adapted to a wide variety of scene constraints and computational requirements.
It is to be understood that not all embodiments of the present invention accomplish all of the above objects.
These objects and advantages are attained by a method for real-time range scanning of a scene, possibly moving, containing the following steps: projecting a sequence of N radiation patterns onto a scene; capturing a current image of the scene with an image detector; identifying features of the current image with matching features in a distinct image, for example, the previous image; determining fixed projection positions within the radiation pattern that correspond to current image features; and computing a range for each current image feature by geometrical analysis, such as triangulation, based on the corresponding fixed projection position. The method may also include a step of estimating a spatially varying surface reflectivity of the scene.
Each radiation pattern contains a set of pattern features at fixed projection positions. The sequence of N matching pattern features at each fixed projection position defines a code, which is preferably unique and permits identification of the image feature with its corresponding projection position. In the current image, the position of each image feature may be different from the position of its matching image feature in the distinct image, because at least part of the scene may have moved between the distinct and current images. Preferably, the distance between matching image features in sequential images is below a threshold distance. The code for each image feature is determined from the current image and differently-timed images, preferably images corresponding to the Nxe2x88x921 preceding or succeeding patterns, and is used in determining corresponding projection positions.
The radiation used to generate the patterns may be electromagnetic radiation, such as visible light, infrared light, or x-ray radiation, in which case feature values may be light intensity values or RGB values. Features are preferably uniformly spaced in the projection pattern, with the spacing in part determined by a resolution of the image detector. The value of N is preferably the minimum number of patterns required to provide unique codes, given a specific number of features. The patterns may be selected in part in dependence on a computational efficiency of the various computation steps of the method. In one embodiment, the pattern features are stripe boundaries.
While the method is particularly advantageous for moving scenes, it can also be used for static scenes. In this case, the position of matching image features does not move between images. The pattern consists of a set of parallel stripes defining projected stripe boundaries that are identified by stripe values on each side of the boundary. A sequence of N stripe boundaries defines a code, preferably unique, for each fixed projection position. Preferably, the stripe boundaries are uniformly spaced, as determined by a resolution of the detector or projector.
The present invention also provides a system of implementing the above methods containing a radiation projector for projecting the patterns, an image detector for capturing the images, and a data processor for performing computations to obtain a range image for each captured image.
Also provided is a program storage device accessible by a computer in communication with an image detector. The program storage device tangibly embodies a program of instructions executable by the computer to perform the method steps discussed above for real-time range scanning of moving scenes.

Real-time structured light range scanning of moving scenes

The Board of Trustees of The Leland Stanford Junior University


In a non-volatile phase change memory, information is recorded by utilizing a change in resistance of a phase change portion. When the phase change portion is allowed to generate Joule's heat and is held at a specific temperature, it goes into a state of a low resistance. When the gate voltage of a memory cell selection transistor QM is controlled to afford a low resistance state, the maximum amount of current applied to the phase change portion is limited by the application of a medium-state voltage to the control gate, thereby avoiding overheating of the phase change portion.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a semiconductor integrated circuit device and more particularly to a technique applicable effectively to a high-density integrated memory circuit formed by using a phase change material, a logic mixed memory having a memory circuit and a logic circuit on one and same semiconductor substrate, or a semiconductor integrated circuit device having an analog circuit. Particularly, the present invention is concerned with a non-volatile high-speed random access memory.
2. Description of Related Art
The growth of the non-volatile memory market under the demand for mobile devices typified by portable telephones is remarkable. Typical of the non-volatile memory is FLASH memory, which, however, is used as a programmable ROM because the speed thereof is essentially low. On the other hand, as memory for works, a high-speed RAM is needed and both FLASH and DRAM memories are mounted on portable devices. If an element having the features of those two memories can be implemented, the impact thereof is extremely strong because not only it becomes possible to integrate both FLASH and DRAM memories into a single chip but also all the semiconductor memories are substituted thereby.
One candidate for implementing the said element is a non-volatile memory using a phase change film, which is described in detail, for example, in Patent Document 1. The phase change memory is sometimes called PRAM, OUM, or ovonic unified memory. In this memory, a crystal phase of a memory element changes in accordance with Joule's heat which is generated by an electric current flowing in the memory element itself, whereby storage information is written. Chalcogenide is used as the material of the storage element. Chalcogenide is a material containing at least one of sulfur, selenium, and tellurium.
Next, an operation principle of the phase change memory will now be described briefly. For amorphization of a phase change portion, as shown in FIG. 2, such a reset pulse as causes heating to a temperature above the melting point Tm of the chalcogenide material and subsequent quenching is applied to the phase change portion. The melting point Tm is, for example, 600° C. A quenching time t1 is, for example, 2 nsec. To crystallize the phase change portion, the temperature of the phase change portion is maintained locally at a temperature in the range from a crystallization temperature Tc to the melting point Tm. At this time, the temperature is, for example, 400° C. The time required for the crystallization differs depending on the composition of chalcogenide material used, but is 50 nsec for example. Crystallizing the phase change portion of the phase change memory cell will hereinafter be referred to as setting operation, while amorphizing the phase change portion will hereinafter be referred to as resetting operation.
The phase change memory is characteristic in that the resistance value of the phase change portion changes two to three orders of magnitude in accordance with the crystal phase and that since this resistance value is used as a signal, a read signal is large and a sensing operation becomes easier, thus resulting in the speed of read being high.
The following patents are here mentioned as documents related to a phase change memory rewrite method. First, the thinking that a constant current pulse is used for the rewrite of a phase change memory is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,883,827 and Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2002-541613. Further, in Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 2003-100085, it is described that a sample state is read before rewrite and then rewrite is performed with an appropriate electric signal based on the result of the read and that the wave form of the electric signal is adjusted and the fall time of the electric signal is delayed for allowing the phase change portion to be cooled slowly at the time of crystallization, thereby permitting crystallization to take place stably.
To make the phase change memory perform its setting operation, the temperature of the phase change portion must be held in a constant range from its crystallization temperature to its melting point. However, if a constant voltage source is used, as shown in FIG. 3, the phase change portion crystallizes into a state of low resistance and a large current flows in accordance with the Ohm's law, so that the phase change portion is overheated. As a result, the temperature of the phase change portion exceeds its melting point and thereafter the phase change portion is quenched, whereby there again arises the possibility of amorphization. Thus, with the constant voltage source, it has so far been difficult to set the phase change memory stably.


A programmable impedance controller and a method of operating to prevent or substantially reduce internal noise and an influence from external noise lasting for a long time. The programmable impedance controller for comparing a pad voltage of a pad connected to an external determination impedance with a reference voltage, and for outputting an impedance control signal, and for performing a digital coding to an impedance code corresponding to the impedance control signal, includes a clock controller and a counter. The clock controller outputs a first clock signal in a reset mode and outputs a second clock signal in an operating mode, in response to an applied clock signal. The counter sequentially updates code data, one code step per clock period, in response to the first clock signal in the reset mode, and outputs update code data. In an operating mode, the counter outputs the update code data updated in the reset mode in response to the second clock signal.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a programmable impedance controller and a method of operating the same, which is capable of substantially reducing influence of internal and external noise.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various semiconductor devices such as microcomputers, memory devices, etc. provide various kinds of electrical appliances. Most semiconductor devices have input/output pins for transmitting data from outside input and output circuits for providing internal data to the outside, etc.
Internal data in such a semiconductor device may be provided to another semiconductor device through a transmission line. To appropriately transmit an output signal, an output impedance and an impedance of the transmission line should be matched mutually, and to receive an input signal without distortion, an impedance of transmission line and an input impedance should be matched with each other. In general, the former is referred to as output impedance (ZQ) control, and the latter is referred to as chip termination (ZT) control. Generally, output impedance control is performed on an output driver and chip termination control is performed on an input terminator circuit.
One method to realize impedance matching is to design a system so that an output impedance of the system coincides with an impedance of transmission line used in the system, and to use a termination in an input terminal to substantially reduce a reflected wave. This method is susceptible to temperature change or process change, etc. between an actually operating environment of the system and a design environment. Thus, a system to provide accurate impedance matching regardless of external environmental change is required. A programmable impedance controller (PIC) capable of sensing a characteristic impedance of a transmission line and transferring information to an output circuit has been proposed. The PIC can match the impedance with an impedance value, and update digital codes for a predetermined period actively against a voltage and temperature change, to match internal impedance with external impedance, when a user connects impedance with an outer side of the system. One example of the programmable impedance controller having such a programmable impedance control operation is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,307,424.
Another example of such a programmable impedance controller is described referring to a block diagram of FIG. 1 according to the prior art. Referring to FIG. 1, a programmable impedance controller according to the prior art includes an I/O pad having an external impedance RQ, RT; a detector 10 that is constructed of an array of transistors that are programmed to have the same impedance with the external impedance RQ, RT); a selector 40 for comparing an output of the detector 10 with a reference voltage (½VDDQ) and controlling an output of counter 30; a counter 30 for generating a digital impedance code; a code register 50 for storing an impedance code; and a code transmitter 60 for transmitting the impedance codes in series.
The programmable impedance controller according to the prior art is configured so that an external impedance is connected to an external pin and a semiconductor device has an output impedance value desired within specification of about 35 to 70Ω.
A general operation of the programmable impedance controller will be described as follows.
For example, a matching external impedance RQ, RT having an impedance value corresponding to about 5 times the impedance value of an external device is connected between an external pad ZQ, ZT PAD and a ground. The comparator 20 compares a pad voltage of external pad ZQ, ZT PAD connected to the external impedance RQ, RT with a reference voltage ½VDDQ, and outputs an impedance control signal. The counter 30 detects the impedance control signal, performs an up/down counting in response to the impedance control signal, and outputs control code data A for turning on or turning off P-channel and N-channel MOS (Metal Oxide Semiconductor) transistors within an impedance matching transistor array. The counter 30 increases or decreases the control code data A until a level of the reference voltage ½VDDQ becomes equal to a level of the pad voltage. Hence, a selected transistor within a P-channel and N-channel transistor array is turned on or off and the level of reference voltage ½VDDQ and the level of the pad voltage become equal. In this case, the detector 10 has the same impedance as the external impedance RQ, RT.
The selector 40 senses a dithering effect and outputs a sense signal. The code register 50 stores an impedance code having a code value equal to the external impedance RQ, RT, in a register, in response to the sense signal. The dithering effect denotes that output voltage of the detectors 10 controlled by a digital code outputted from the counter 30 is not exactly formed as a voltage level equal to reference voltage ½VDDQ, and has an amplitude having a quantization error on the basis of the reference voltage ½VDDQ, and thus has vibration. The dithering effect is called an impedance locking effect. The dithering effect designates that an impedance of the detector 10 of the impedance controller becomes a value most similar to the external impedance RQ, RT. Thus, the value is detected and is stored in the code register 50.
Impedance codes B stored in the code register 50 by a sense signal of the selector 40 are transmitted in series through the code transmitter 60, and so an impedance update is performed.
FIG. 2 is a timing diagram for control code data A as an output signal of the counter 30 having a dithering effect, and for an updated impedance code B as an output signal of the code register 50. As shown in FIG. 2, after a dithering effect is generated on control code data A, several impedance codes B are changed rapidly at one time, in an updating operation. This rapid change momentarily causes many changes on impedance of an output driver or input terminator, and causes a signaling interference with internal noise of circuits.
FIG. 3 is a timing diagram of control code data A as an output signal of the counter 30, and an updated impedance code B as an output signal of the code register 50, in case external noise lasts for a fairly long time. As shown in FIG. 3, if external noise lasts for a longer duration than a dithering pattern, the noise is reflected through the impedance controller and an impedance updating operation is performed. In general, a conventional impedance controller was provided with a method of removing noise of mostly high frequency, instead of a method for removing lower frequency noise. Thus, if noise having low frequency lasts for a fairly long time, there are problems in that impedance code is again updated by control code data A changed by external noise, and the updated impedance code B has a value different from a desired impedance code.

Programmable impedance controller and method for operating


A pre-glued, flat folding box contains a section of tubular film (5) glued to the box to form an inner bag. The tubular film section has bending lines (8,9) in all four corners of the body of the folding box which extend to the edges of the section of tubular film. This makes it easier to erect the folding box containing the section of tubular film and to fill and close the package.

The invention relates to a pre-glued, flat folding box, consisting of a body portion comprising flaps connected to the open sides of the body portion and a tubular foil section having open ends and arranged in the body portion which, when erected, has a cross section corresponding to the inner cross section of the body portion. Folding boxes of this kind are generally known.
These folding boxes are used for packaging pourable products, especially liquids. They are delivered to the filler of the pourable product in flat condition for saving space. At the filler, these folding boxes are erected in a filling and packaging machine, are sealed and closed first at one end, filled with the product and then sealed and closed at the other end.
Experience has shown that the erection of the folding box has caused certain difficulties in the packaging machine. These difficulties result from the fact that the tubular foil is very flat in the flat folding box, so that its walls contact each other and a certain lip effect develops at its edges during erection, since no air can flow into the interior of the tubular foil section due to the close contact of the tubular foil walls. On the contrary, the vacuum generated during the erection of the folding box in the interior of the tubular foil section even increases this lip effect. After erection it can be seen that at the open cross section of the tubular foil section only two opposite corners are present in a more distinct form, i.e. the corners at which the tubular foil section was located in folded form in the flat folding box. This insufficient formation of the desired rectangular form of the cross section opening of the tubular foil section causes difficulties in filling the erected folding box as well as in sealing the tubular foil section.
It is the object of the invention to provide a folding box of the above mentioned kind, which is easier to erect, to fill and to seal.

Folding box with inner bag and process for manufacturing same


One embodiment includes receiving distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) data for responses associated with seismic excitations in an area of interest. The area of interest includes a sea surface, the water column, a seafloor, and a subseafloor. The seismic excitations are generated by at least one seismic source in the area of interest. The responses are detected by at least one fiber optic sensing apparatus configured for DAS that is in the water column, on the seafloor, in a wellbore drilled through the seafloor and into the subseafloor, or any combination thereof. The embodiment includes determining a function of speed of sound in water using the DAS data, and correcting a digital seismic image associated with the area of interest using the function of speed of sound in water to generate a corrected digital seismic image.

Seismic exploration involves surveying subterranean geological media for hydrocarbon deposits. An active survey typically involves deploying seismic sources and seismic sensors at predetermined locations. The seismic sources generate seismic waves, which propagate into the geological medium creating pressure changes and vibrations. Variations in physical properties of the geological medium change the properties of the seismic waves, such as their direction of propagation and other properties. The two main types of seismic waves are P waves (also referred to as compressional waves) and S waves (also referred to as shear waves). P waves relate to pressure and pass through liquids and solids. S waves relate to shear and pass through solids. P waves typically travel faster than S waves.
In addition to active surveys, passive surveys make use of naturally occurring and ambient seismic sources. For example, ambient seismic sources, such as ocean waves, passing ships, etc., may generate seismic waves that travel through the geological medium. In the case of passive surveys, seismic data may be recorded for days or months.
Portions of the seismic waves reach the seismic sensors. Some seismic sensors are sensitive to pressure changes (e.g., hydrophones), others to particle motion (e.g., geophones), and industrial surveys may deploy one type of sensor or both. Some methods use fiber optic point sensors and/or fiber optic cables as seismic sensors. In response to the detected seismic waves, the seismic sensors generate corresponding electrical signals, known as traces, and record them in storage media as seismic data. The seismic data will include a plurality of "shots" (individual instances of the seismic source being activated), each of which are associated with a plurality of traces recorded at the plurality of seismic sensors.
The seismic data is processed to create seismic images that can be interpreted to identify subsurface geologic features including hydrocarbon reservoirs. The processing is dependent on the survey design, the quality of the seismic data, and the complexity of the subsurface. The processing may include data conditioning methods (e.g., deghosting, noise attenuation, spectral enhancement, etc.), velocity estimation (e.g., semblance analysis, etc.), and seismic imaging (e.g., time migration, depth migration, reverse time migration, etc.). The seismic images that are produced are a representation of the physical subsurface and can be used to identify hydrocarbon reservoirs. For example, the seismic images may be used to control well drilling in order to drill wellbores that will produce hydrocarbons from the hydrocarbon reservoirs.
The ability to define, at high granularity, the location of rock and fluid property changes in the subsurface is crucial to our ability to make the most appropriate decisions for purchasing materials, operating safely, and successfully completing projects. Project cost is dependent upon accurate prediction of the position of physical boundaries within the Earth. Decisions include, but are not limited to, budgetary planning, obtaining mineral and lease rights, signing well commitments, permitting rig locations, designing well paths and drilling strategy, preventing subsurface integrity issues by planning proper casing and cementation strategies, and selecting and purchasing appropriate completion and production equipment.
Thus, there exists a need for improved seismic imaging that may aid in identifying and producing hydrocarbon reservoirs.

Correcting a digital seismic image using a function of speed of sound in water derived from fiber optic sensing


WDM demultiplexers are provided utilizing, for example, cascaded asymmetric MZI filters, wherein the (asymmetric) differential delay is such that at the output of the first stage MZI demultiplexes the WDM channels in groups of two at its output. The result is a relaxed specification for the frequency response of the filters.

The present invention relates to wave division multiplexing (WDM) and dense WDM (DWDM), and particularly to demultiplexers for WDM and DWDM multiplexed optical signals. More particularly still, it relates to demultiplexers utilizing cascaded asymmetric Mach-Zehnder Interferometers (MZI).
WDM is the current favorite in optical communications. In this technology, data channels are multiplexed on different wavelengths. The number of available wavelength channels is growing rapidly as the technology improves. Currently, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) specification is considering channel spacing as low as 50 GHz. This new generation of WDM is usually referred to as DWDM. On the other hand, data communication speeds have also increased significantly, so that OC-192 with around 10 Giga-bits per second is used in current optical network designs.
In WDM, devices are needed to multiplex and demultiplex different data channels. These devices are, however, very expensive and hard to manufacture. MZIs may be used as building blocks to build the optical multiplexer and demultiplexer. It should be noted that each of the input ports of the MZIs might be used. In the following descriptions, only one of the input ports, say input port 1, of the MZIs is used. It is also possible to use three-port combiner/splitter Y-junctions instead of four-port couplers in an MZI.
In a typical configuration, a number of MZIs are cascaded in a tree to separate all the WDM channels. For example, assume that there are 16 WDM channels (xcex1, . . . , xcex16) to be demultiplexed. The first level MZI11 separates the odd and even channels into different output ports sent to MZI21 and MZI22, respectively. In the second stage, MZI21 and MZI22 redirect every other input to one of the outputs. For example, in the upper path, MZI21 redirects channels 1, 5, 9, 13 to MZI31, and channels 3, 7, 11, 15 to MZI32, and so on. In the final stage all the channels are demultiplexed to different output ports. In this scheme, the additional (or differential) delay required in one of the asymmetric MZI arms is half of the delay in the previous demultiplexing stage.
Methods are effective when the numbers of channels and the data rates are low. This is mainly because of the fact that MZI filtering characteristics change based on its differential delay or equivalently length difference of the two limbs of the MZI. The length difference (xcex94l) needed to separate channels with channel spacing can be calculated through xcex94l≅xcex02/(2xcex7xcex94xcex), where xcex0 is the central wavelength and xcex7 is the refractive index of the waveguide (e.g. optical fiber). As an example, for 100 GHz spacing (wavelength spacing of 0.8 nm) and refractive index of 1.5, the length difference needed for the first stage filter (MZI11) is around 1001 micrometers. The length difference for the second stage filters (MZI21 and MZI22) is around 500.5 micrometers, 250.25 micrometers for the third stage MZI31, MZI32, MZI33, MZ134) and finally 125.12 micrometers for the last stage.
As technology moves towards higher data rates, such as the one for the OC-192 standard, the long delay caused by one of the limbs of the MZI might be comparable to the optical pulse width in the time domain. As a result, the MZI can cause dispersion or pulse widening of the data signals. Consequently, the MZI tree structure cannot be used.
It should be noted that this problem might also exist in other filtering techniques. For example, design of sharp filters is usually very difficult no matter what technique is used. The novel technique may be successfully applied to filters/demultiplexers utilizing other than MZIs.
In this invention, a technique is introduced which relaxes the requirement of having very sharp frequency response in the first stage of the tree structure as used at present. In the novel approach, the channels are separated in pairs rather than singly. As a result, the filter frequency response for the first stage not need to be as sharp as in the prior art. This means that the delay can be kept in the range that does not cause any deterioration of the high-speed signal in the time domain. The channels are separated in pairs in the first stage, i.e. channels (1,2), (5,6), (9,10), (13,14) in one port and (3,4), (7,8), (11,12), (15,16) in the adjacent port. The same filtering is used with a small shift in the frequency response to separate the channels in the pairs. This technique, however, causes some attenuation to the signal that may be compensated by amplification.

Mach-zehnder based filter demultiplexers and method


Disclosed herein are methods of preparing thermoplastic gels and dry silicone gels with an alkyl ester polydimethylsiloxane having a formula (I): (I) Also disclosed are thermoplastic gels and dry silicone gels prepared by the disclosed methods. In the formula (I), n is about 60% to about 90% of the formula (I); m is about 10% to about 40% of the formula (I); R is —(C═O)—OR1; and R is a C2-C20 alkyl group. The alkyl ester polydimethylsiloxane has a weight average molecular weight of about 10,000 g/mol to about 50,000 g/mol. The hardness of the thermoplastic gels is less than 120 g peak load. The hardness of the dry silicone gels is less than 100 g peak load.

Gel seal arrangements for fiber optic cables apply pressure to gel contained therein causing the gel to conform to the fiber optic cables and overcome any penetrating fluid pressure (e.g., from air or water). Softer gels used in cable gel seal arrangements as well as for sealing enclosures are subject to significant tackiness. For example, dry silicone gels suffer from an extremely high level of tackiness/stickiness which increases the softer the gel becomes. Consequently, handling of the gels becomes difficult. For example, the gels are difficult to handle and cut. Also, re-entry of fiber optic closures in the field after first installation is not possible in view of the tackiness/stickiness, although re-entry is key in some applications as a fiber optic network is constantly changing and additional customers need to be added over time.
For both thermoplastic gel formulations and dry silicone gel formulations, there is a need for improved soft gel formulations having a lower hardness that also exhibit a sufficiently low tack. There is also a need for improved soft gel formulations that can be more easily handled (e.g., more easily cut during manufacturing, and suitably used for re-entry operations).

Methods of preparing low tack soft gel compositions and such gel compositions prepared therefrom


An optical fingerprinting method extracts high quality latent fingerprints from a surface without any invasive chemical or physical contact with the examined object, and requires no cooperation of the subject. Rather than employing extraneous material, the optical properties of the latent fingerprint are used to generate one or more images with sufficient contrast to distinguish the latent fingerprint or some other deformation in the surface. The system includes a light source oriented to apply light at an angle of incidence to the surface at the position to be examined for the latent fingerprint or deformation, a camera oriented to receive light specularly and diffusely reflected from the surface and/or by the fingerprint or deformation on the surface, and a processor that performs the computation for digital contrast enhancement and/or reprojection of the recovered fingerprint image to a frontal view if necessary. The technique uses optical polarization properties to enhance the images by placing a linearly polarized filter(s) in front of the observing camera. At least two pictures of the same scene with the same lighting and view angle arrangement are taken whereby each of the pictures differ only in that the orientations of the polarization filter are different. At least two light polarization parameters for each pixel are computed from the two or more images taken with different polarizer orientations. An image with each pixel value representing the value of one of the polarization parameters or a function of the polarization parameters is generated and displayed, with some digital contrast enhancement and/or reprojection applied. The hidden latent fingerprint pattern is revealed in at least one such image with the interfering background pattern significantly suppressed.

Fingerprinting is one of the most widely used biometric methods for identifying and authenticating individual persons. The modem science of fingerprinting started in the second half of the 19th century. There are two types of fingerprint data, distinguished by their formation processes. In forensic science, finger marks left unintentionally by a suspect at a crime scene are referred to as "latent fingerprints," while fingerprints acquired directly from human fingers using ink or scanners in controlled environments are referred to as "exemplar fingerprints." Latent fingerprints differ from exemplar fingerprints in that they are very difficult to detect with unaided human vision under most ordinary viewing conditions (hence their names). Latent fingerprints are usually of lower quality, although it is sometimes possible to find high quality fingerprint marks at a crime scene. These latter fingerprints are called "patent fingerprints." Nonetheless, it is the latent fingerprints that are more common and require greater efforts to render visible. Most techniques employed for this purpose utilize a chemical or physical process that applies some kind of material directly to the surface suspected to bear fingerprints. Once the contrast of the fingerprint mark is sufficiently enhanced by such treatments, the mark is either photographed or "lifted" in order to be permanently archived as evidence. The term "lifting the fingerprint" originates from the oldest, but still widely used fingerprint detection method—powdering—in which the powders applied adhere to the fingerprint material, and then are physically lifted out of the original crime scene object by a sticky tape.
The currently popular latent fingerprint detection and extraction methods used by law enforcement agencies include, but are not limited to, powdering, iodine fuming, ninhydrin and DFO application, silver nitrate development, cyanoacrylate (glue) fuming, gentian violet staining, episcopic coaxial illumination, laser excited luminescence, and RUVIS (Reflected Ultra Violet Imaging System). Despite these options, there is still a need for new methods because every existing method tends to be unsuitable for some surfaces, due either to its inadequacy in lifting the print from, or to its damaging side effects to the surfaces. In particular, the chemical and physical processing involved to extract latent fingerprints can inflict deleterious effects upon the objects being examined. Thus, often valuable and irreplaceable objects cannot be searched for fingerprints at all. Furthermore, the chemicals used to enhance fingerprint contrast or to induce luminescence may need long processing time, are often toxic, environmentally unfriendly, or even radioactive. Several ingredients used in dusting powders are also known to be toxic or posing potential health hazards, e.g. titanium oxide and manganese dioxide. They can be harmful to the operator if not handled correctly because they are designed to react with or adhere to the fingerprint residues, which are the same material found on human skin. Some chemicals require specific solvents that have undesirable side effects (e.g., methanol (in DFO solution) and phenol (in Gentian violet solution) are poisonous); indeed, some solvents used for fingerprint enhancement have actually been banned because of their damage to the environment, e.g. solvent HFE7100.
There have been a two attempts to develop non-contact latent fingerprint detection and lifting methods, but so far each of them has had its specific shortcomings. The episcopic coaxial illumination method uses a semitransparent mirror to project the light source at a right angle to the surface and to observe the surface also from the right angle. However, this arrangement cannot allow adjustment in lighting angle and observation angles, and both are known to greatly affect the resulting contrast of fingerprint patterns. In addition, the reflection seen at a right angle does not show polarization contrast which the method of the present invention utilizes to further enhance the visibility of latent fingerprints.
Lasers have provided an optical method for lifting latent prints, utilizing induced luminescence of the fingerprint material. However, there are limitations to this method as well. In its original non-contact form the natural fluorescence signal is often very weak, thus requiring a very powerful laser at blue/green wavelength. These powerful lasers are very expensive and generally not portable due to bulky size of the power and cooling requirements. More portable lasers and arc lamps have been found useful to substitute for the fluorescence light source only when used with chemical florescence enhancers (and are thus invasive). Also, the laser must operate in the near ultraviolet and have adequate rating. Such laser equipment is fairly expensive and requires trained technicians to be operated safely. The fact that all organic substances can fluoresce when excited by a laser also causes significant background noise. In addition, many commonly found surfaces, e.g. several kinds of paper, will fluoresce even stronger than the fingerprint residue when illuminated by laser. Thus, laser-excited luminescence, like other existing methods, can not be applied to certain types of surfaces and are most often used with the aid of applying fluorescence enhancing chemicals, the use of which negates the non-contact advantage.
RUVIS is another non-contact method that takes advantage of the contrast differences between the fingerprint and the underlying surface. The equipment used is more portable and less expensive than the powerful laser required in the non-contact laser fluorescence method, but the RUVIS equipment is still much more expensive than the ordinary visible band optical equipment used to implement the method of the invention. This method is successful in some cases but not in some other cases. It is found again that pretreatment with fluorescence enhancing chemicals produces better results in many cases. Thus, RUVIS may be more practical when used as an invasive method.
Automated optical fingerprint extraction systems are commercially available. One proposed system utilizes laser light with a polarizer to extract fingerprint images directly from the live human finger. However, most of such systems are designed to take exemplar fingerprints, i.e. from subjects who cooperate with the system during the acquisition of fingerprint images. As explained above, exemplar fingerprint extraction is a very different application field than latent fingerprint extraction. Exemplar fingerprint scanning systems are used primarily for security systems or law enforcement facilities where the users cooperate with the fingerprint extraction devices but would be totally useless for extracting latent fingerprints at a crime scene.
An optical fingerprinting method is desired that extracts high quality latent fingerprints without any invasive chemical or physical contact with the examined object, and requires no cooperation of the subject. Rather than employing extraneous material, a method is needed that takes advantage of the optical properties of the latent fingerprint, which include sweat (salty water), grease, and lipid, all of which are rather transparent dielectric materials, making them difficult to detect under most viewing conditions. The present invention satisfies these needs in the art.

Polarization and reflection based non-contact latent fingerprint imaging and lifting

The Trustees Of The University Of Pennsylvania


An interconnection method, apparatus, and system where a remote Socket invocation client component obtains information about a first socket application programming interface Socket application programming interface (API) function invoked by a service client; encapsulates the information about the first Socket API function to a message structure; and sends the message structure, so that a remote Socket invocation server executes a second Socket API function corresponding to the first Socket API function in the message structure. The interconnection method, apparatus, and system solve the problem of an interconnection on a public network between the service client on a first local area network and a service server on a second local area network.

Two machines are connected by using a switch device, to implement mutual access of more than two machines, that is, a local area network is formed. In the local area network, because the number of machines is small, it is very easy to configure an Internet Protocol (IP) address of each machine, and a conflict occurs rarely. In the local area network, the two machines may directly access each other according to the IP address.
A public network is a global-based, cross-country, or cross-province network. In the public network, a large number of machines are running. If each machine needs to occupy one IP address, a large number of IP address resources are consumed.
Currently, a network address translation (NAT) technology is generally used, to implement support for accessing a public network by a large number of the machines in a case of limited IP resources.
For a source machine and a destination machine for sending and receiving an IP packet, a certain mapping relationship exists between their system layers and a Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)/IP protocol. For example, a physical network adapter correspondingly processes a data-link layer and a physical layer; an operating system is used to process a transport layer and a network layer; the operating system also provides a Socket application programming interface (API) for a service client to develop a specific application protocol; the service client corresponds to an application layer protocol.
The Socket API is a group of functions provided by the operating system for an application program to develop a network application.
In the prior art, a virtual network adapter technology is generally used to implement an interconnection on the public network between the service client on one local area network and a service server on another local area network. The virtual network adapter technology loads an IP packet hook at an operating system layer of a client and a server, and after hooking the IP packet with a specific destination address, sends the IP packet through a tunnel. The virtual network adapter technology adds, between the operating system and the physical network adapter, a virtual network adapter layer, which is used to capture the IP packet delivered by the operating system to a network adapter, and convert a specific IP packet, thereby implementing the interconnection between the service client and the service server.
Using the virtual network adapter technology may implement the interconnection on the public network between the service client on one local area network and the service server on another local area network. However, this technology has the following technical defects.
1. A virtual network adapter is a process that runs in a kernel, a software conflict is severe, and compatibility and stability of a system are not good.
2. When a fault occurs, a serious problem such as a machine blue screen of death is caused.
3. An underlying logic of the operating system is changed, which is easily recognized as a virus by antivirus software.
4. Virtual network adapter technologies for multiple operating systems (Linux, MAC, iOS, and so on) need to be developed.
For the defects of the prior art, the present invention provides a local area network traversal technical solution based on Socket remote invocation, to implement that the service client remotely invokes Socket within a server local area network and communicates with the server as if within the same local area network.

Interconnection method, apparatus, and system based on socket remote invocation


A system and method for determining surface contact fatigue life may use a finite element method to determine when components, such as a power transmission component, may fail in operation. The method may generate a finite element model based on the material parameters related to a power transmission component, generate a surface pressure time history for a loading event based on one or more loading parameters, determine, based on the surface pressure time history for a loading event, a finite element solution that describes stress in the grain structure, calculate damage in the finite element solution using a damage model, and determine whether a damage threshold is exceeded.

Surface contact fatigue may contribute and be the dominant cause of power transmission component failure over time. Contact fatigue differs from classic structural fatigue because it may result from a contact or Hertzian stress state. This localized stress state results when curved surfaces are in contact under a normal load. Subsurface plastic strain may build up with increasing cycles until a crack is generated. The crack may then propagate until a pit is formed. Once surface pitting has initiated, the bearing becomes noisy and rough running. If allowed to continue, fracture of the rolling element and failure occurs. Prediction of surface contact fatigue leading to failure may be expensive and time-consuming due to heavy experimentation that may be required.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Method and system for predicting surface contact fatigue life


An electric machine drive system is described. The system includes an inverter, an electric machine coupled to the inverter by at least one output conductor and including a ground connection, and an active common mode current reducing device coupled between the ground connection of the electric machine and the inverter.

The embodiments described herein relate generally to an electric machine drive system, and more particularly, to reducing a level of common mode current applied to ground by an electric machine drive system.
A three phase inverter may be used to drive an electric machine, for example, an induction motor or a permanent magnet motor. Such an inverter typically provides favorable control and efficiency. However, the switching pattern of power semiconductor devices typically included in the inverter may generate an electromagnetic interference (EMI) current. Using shielded cables to couple the inverter and the electric motor reduces the EMI current, including a common mode current component of the EMI current. Unfortunately, shielded cables are not suitable for use in all applications. Common mode inductors may also be used to reduce common mode current, except that size constraints may prevent use of such inductors. An active circuit that injects a common mode current in a DC input side of the inverter may be used to condition the DC power applied to the inverter. Such a circuit, though, does not reduce the common mode current present at the electric motor, especially when the inverter and electric motor are coupled by a long unshielded cable. Furthermore, a controlled voltage source may be included at the AC output of the inverter to cancel the common mode voltage generated by the inverter, and therefore reduce the common mode current. Reducing the common mode current in this manner, however, requires a transformer in series with the cable that couples the inverter to the electric motor.

Systems and apparatus for reducing electromagnetic interference and methods of assembling the same


A communication system 100 allows for heterogeneous piconets/scattenets 100 where in multiple modes 110, 112 of transmission, one of Bluetooth 110 and one or more other modes of transmission 112 are possible. While at the same time maintaining synchronization between all the different modes of transmission 110, 112 in a given piconet and across a scatternet 100. This allows for a communication device that can communicate using a plurality of transmission modes depending on the communication needs of the device.

Previous communication systems allow for communication between different devices using a single mode of transmission. For example, a device communicating to other electronic devices over a Bluetooth piconet or scatternet (Bluetooth is a protocol for wireless communications over short distances developed by the Bluetooth Special Interest Group), or a portable computer communicating to a computer network using an Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE) 802.11 (a or b) protocol, etc. Given the increased use of wireless communications in many everyday electronic devices (e.g., personal digital assistants (PDAs, portable computers, etc.) and the increased number of different communication protocols being used, a need exists in the art for a method and system which would allow a Bluetooth compliant device to be able to communicate using one or more other modes of communications, thereby allowing the device to communicate to some devices using the Bluetooth protocol, while communicating with other device(s) or the same device using another protocol, such as a higher speed IEEE 802.11 protocol or any one of a number of other communication protocols.


In a liquid chromatograph, the disulfide adsorption of iron atoms in a filter for a column is avoided and thus peak tailing in a chromatogram is prevented to thereby prevent a lowering in the sample recovery rate. A liquid chromatograph column comprising a hollow tubular column body, a bead-shaped packing material which is packed in the hollow part of the column body, a filter provided with a mesh which has a mesh size smaller than the particle diameter of the packing material, and a cap which presses the filter against the packing material to thereby enclose the packing material within the column body, characterized in that the main component of the filter is nickel or hastelloy.

A liquid chromatograph uses a separation column for separating a sample to be analyzed, and a reaction column for mixing a reagent with the sample to cause reaction in the case of amino acid analysis. When a packing material to be packed in the column has a bead-shape, filters are provided at both ends of the column for the purpose of enclosing the packing material within the column. A mesh size of the filter is set to be smaller than a particle diameter of the packing material in the form of a bead.
As a material of the filter, there has been conventionally used stainless steel including iron Fe as a main component, and chrome Cr, manganese Mn, nickel Ni and molybdenum Mo. Depending on the kind of the stainless steel, niobium Nb, and aluminum Al may be included in addition to chrome Cr, manganese Mn, nickel Ni and molybdenum Mo. The stainless steel includes nickel Ni of about 10 to 14%, and iron Fe of about 70% as the main component.
Amino acids, amino acid analogues and proteins composed by those amino acids have a property of adsorbing on a surface of a stainless steel material. Therefore, when analyzing chemical species such as amino acids and proteins by a liquid chromatograph apparatus using a stainless steel material for a flow channel, the chemical species adsorbs on the surface of the flow channel, and therefore may cause an adverse effect on analysis results.
In particular, it is known that peptides and proteins including cystine which is a kind of amino acid show a strong interaction with iron ions. According to Non Patent Literature 1, disulfide having two sulfur atoms specifically adsorbs on an iron atom on a metallic surface, and temporarily forms iron mercaptide. Ultimately, C—S bond is cut, and the surface of the stainless steel material is covered in a state of iron sulfide. This phenomenon is called a disulfide adsorption phenomenon.
Further, in the case that the filter used for the column of the liquid chromatograph is made from a stainless steel material, a peptide containing cystine adsorbs on a surface of the stainless steel material, and therefore may cause a tailing phenomenon in which a peak obtained in a chromatogram which is an analysis result splays out.
Furthermore, in the case that adsorption of a peptide onto the filter is extreme, most of the peptide is not eluted from the column, which causes the problem that a sample recovery rate is lowered.

Liquid chromatograph, liquid chromatograph column and filter for liquid chromatograph column


A product space browser (PSB), which comprises a graphical user interface (GUI) that facilitates insight discovery through exploration and analysis of product space graphs generated by applying a product affinity engine to retailer's transaction data in a market basket context, is disclosed.

1. Technical Field
The invention relates to customer purchase behavior. More particularly, the invention relates to a product space browser.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Retail leaders recognize today that the greatest opportunity for innovation lies at the interface between the store and the customer. The retailer owns vital marketing information on the purchases of millions of customers: information that can be used to transform the store from a fancy warehouse where the customer is a mere stock picker into a destination where customers go because of the value the store gives them. The opportunity is enormous: seventy to eighty percent of buying choices are made at the point of purchase, and smart retailers can influence the choices to maximize economic value and customer satisfaction. Because the retailer is closest to the consumer, he has the unique opportunity and power to create loyalty, encourage repeat purchase behavior and establish high value purchase career paths. However, to optimize the customer interface in this fashion, retailers must be extremely sophisticated with analysis of their purchase data. The sheer volume of purchase data, while offering unprecedented opportunities for such customer centric retailing, also challenges the traditional statistical and mathematical techniques at the retailer's disposal. Retail data analysts frequently find it difficult, if not impossible, to derive concrete, actionable decisions from such data. Most traditional retailers use only limited OLAP capabilities to slice and dice the transaction data to extract basic statistical reports and use them and other domain knowledge to make marketing decisions. Only in the last few years have traditional retailers started warming up to segmentation, product affinity analysis, and recommendation engine technologies to make business decisions. Traditional computational frameworks, such as classification and regression, seek optimal mappings between a set of input features that either cause or correlate-with a target variable. It would be advantageous to provide improved approaches to retail data mining.
A Model of the Retail Behavior of Customers
Customer purchase behavior may be characterized as a mixture of projections of time-elapsed latent purchase intentions. A customer purchases a particular product at a certain time in a certain store with a certain intention, e.g. weekly grocery, back-to-school, etc. An intention is latent, i.e. it is not obvious or announced, although it may be deduced from the context of the products purchased. Each visit by a customer to the store may reflect one or more (mixture of) intentions. Each intention may involve purchase of one or more products. For a multi-product intention, it is possible that the customer may not purchase all the products associated with that intention either at the same store or in the same visit. The transaction data only reflects a subset or a projection of a latent intention for several reasons, for example, maybe the customer already has some of the other products associated with the intention, or he received them as a gift, or he purchased them at a different store, etc. Finally, an intention may be spread across time. For example, certain intentions, such as kitchen remodeling or setting up a home office, may take several weeks and multiple visits to different stores.
A Model of Retail Transaction Data
Retail transaction data may be characterized as a time-stamped sequence of market baskets. The key characteristics of such a transaction data are:                Noisy—both intentional and impulsive purchases;        Incomplete—only projections of intentions present;        Overlapping—mixture of intentions in the same visit;        Indirect—purchase drivers or customer intentions are latent;        Unstructured—customers have different length time histories; and        Time-component—patterns in the data elapse along time.
These characteristics pose challenges in discovering consistent and significant patterns of purchase behavior from transaction data that may be used for making precise, timely, and profitable decisions by retailers.


A muzzle brake has a first forward sloping wall and a second forward sloping wall located between a rear wall and a front wall, the first and second forward sloping walls each being disposed at an angle of from about 50 degrees to about 70 degrees relative to the length axis of the muzzle brake; and a top wall and an opposite bottom wall extending parallel to the length axis of the muzzle brake. A first open-sided blast chamber is defined between the rear wall, the first forward sloping wall and the top and bottom walls; a second open-sided blast chamber is defined between the first forward sloping wall, the second forward sloping wall, and the top and bottom walls; and a third open-sided blast chamber is defined between the second forward sloping wall, the front wall, and the top and bottom walls.

During the firing of a firearm, propellant gases propel a bullet down a barrel and as the bullet exits the barrel the propellant gases also exit the barrel. Associated with the firing of the firearm is a recoil of the firearm and a rise or upward movement of the barrel resulting from the exit of the propellant gases from the barrel. Muzzle brakes are devices locatable on the exit end of a firearm barrel to counter the recoil of the firearm and reduce the rise of the barrel. Improvement is desired for such devices.
The present disclosure provides an improved muzzle brake construction that advantageously counters recoil and reduces the rise of the barrel as compared to prior muzzle brake structures and offers other advantages, including improved aesthetics and versatility.


The present invention provides an image forming apparatus comprising a first developing device for developing a first latent image to form a first toner image, a second developing device for acting on an image bearing member on which the first toner is formed to develop a second latent image thereby creating a second toner image, and an antioxidant material layer provided on a surface of a developing sleeve of the second developing device.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus capable of forming a multi-color image by using a plurality of developing devices.
2. Related Background Art
Nowadays, electrophotographic printers have been widely used as an output equipment for a computer, facsimile, CAD and the like. Those printers have been developed to provide a multi-color image. As an example, an electrophotographic printer for forming a two-color image will be explained with reference to FIG. 1. As shown in FIG. 1, after a surface of an electrophotographic photosensitive drum 1 rotating in a direction shown by the arrow, has been uniformly charged by means of a first charger 2, a first electrostatic latent image is formed on the surface of the drum 1 by exposing the drum surface by means of a laser beam 3' modulated in response to first image information. The latent image is then developed with reversal development in a first developing station D1 by means of a first developing device 6 to form a first color toner image. Incidentally, the toner i.e., developer T1 is carried and conveyed by a sleeve 5.
Then, after the drum surface has been charged again with the same charging polarity as the first charger 2, by means of a second charger 7, a second electrostatic latent image is formed on the drum surface by exposing the drum surface by means of a laser beam 8' modulated in response to second image information. The second electrostatic latent image is developed with reversal development in a second developing station D2, by means of a second developing device 10, to form a second color toner image. The charging polarity of the first color toner, used in the first developing device 6, is the same as that of the second color toner, used in the second developing device 10.
The first and second color toner images on the photosensitive drum 1 are transferred altogether onto a transfer sheet 17 by means of a transfer charger 18. The transferred two-color image is fixed to the transfer sheet 17 by means of a fixing device 19; whereas, after transferring operation, the surface of the photosensitive drum 1 is cleaned by a cleaning device 20.
Incidentally, the laser beams 3' and 8' are emitted, respectively, from exposing devices 3 and 8, each comprising a semi-conductor laser and a rotary mirror for deflecting the laser beam emitted from the semi-conductor laser. The photosensitive drum is scanned by such laser beams with a raster pattern. In this example wherein the reversal development is adopted, the laser beam 3' and 8' expose areas to be visualized by the toner. In this example, the first charger and the exposing device 3 constitute a first latent image forming means 4, whereas the second charger 7 and the exposing device 8 constitute a second latent image forming means 9.
The second developing device 13 acts on the drum surface on which the first color toner image has been formed, thereby developing the second latent image. Accordingly, in the second developing station D2, it is so designed that the thickness of a developer layer formed on a sleeve 11 of the second developing device 13 (i.e., a developer bearing member for carrying the developer and conveying it to the developing station) is smaller than a minimum distance between the photo-sensitive drum 1 and the sleeve 11 at the second developing station, whereby the developer carried by the sleeve 11 is prevented from slidingly contacting the first color toner image. Thus, preventing the scraping of the image from the drum.
In order to improve the developing efficiency of the above-mentioned second developing device 10 of a so-called non-contacting type, the alternate bias voltage may be applied to the sleeve, as described in the U.S. Pat. No. 4,292,387. In this case, the developer is moved reciprocably between the photosensitive drum and the sleeve to thereby apply the developer of the amount corresponding to the potential of the latent image onto the drum eventually.
In this case, the alternating bias voltage applied to the sleeve 11 acts to press the first color toner image against the drum 1 in one phase, but to separate the first color toner image from the drum 1 in the other phase. In order to prevent that the first color toner image is separated from the drum 1 and is entered into the second developing device 10 in the other phase, it is preferable that the peak-to-peak value of the alternating bias voltage (absolute value between the maximum value and the minimum value alternately obtained repeatedly) is smaller.
However, if the peak-to-peak value of the alternating bias voltage is small, it is apt to generate a fine powder layer, which is difficult to be flown toward the photosensitive drum, on the surface of the sleeve, thus making the formation of the latent image difficult. The reason is assumed as follows.
That is to say, in the conventional apparatuses, the developing sleeve is normally constituted by a cylinder made of non-magnetic metal such as stainless steel, aluminum or the like. Such material normally forms, on its outer surface, a high resistance oxidized film when it is exposed to the air, and, when the fine particles having large charge and included in the developer contacts with the oxidized film, the fine particles are strongly attracted to the oxidized film due to the charges thereof, thus forming the fine powder layer on the film. Consequently, the toner applied onto the fine powder layer is not frictionally charged adequately between the toner and the sleeve, with the result that the frictional charge of the toner will be insufficient, thereby lowering the flying force of the toner toward the photosensitive drum. For this reason, it is guessed that the density of the image is reduced. Accordingly, in order to compensate such insufficiency, in the conventional apparatuses, it was necessary to increase the peak-to-peak value Vpp of the alternate voltage applied to the sleeve.
However, in the conventional apparatus, since the peak-to-peak value Vpp of the alternating voltage was large, there arose the problems that the first color toner image formed on the photosensitive drum was disturbed and that the toner separated from the first color toner image was attracted into the second developing device to mix with the second color toner.


An electrically-programmable integrated circuit memory in which the selected memory cell is read by comparing its current output with that of a reference cell, plus a bias current. The bias current is different in test mode than it would be during a normal read operation. The result of this is that, in test mode, cells whose current output is marginal in the unprogrammed state will be detected as faulty, even though those same cells would correctly be read as unprogrammed.

The present inventions relate to memories made in integrated circuit form, and especially electrically nonvolatile memories that are erasable or non-erasable and reprogrammable or non-reprogrammable.
One of the problems encountered in the manufacture of such memories, when they comprise a very large number of cells, is the need to test them completely before delivering them. The memories are tested in their blank state, to ascertain that there are absolutely no flawed cells.
In the electrically programmable cells that are commonly manufactured at present, the cells are constituted by floating-gate transistors. When the cells are blank, there are no charges stored in the floating gate. If the cell is biased with appropriate reading potentials, the cell should let a current through. If, on the contrary, the cell is programmed, it no longer lets any current through under the same conditions of bias.
However, the current that flows through a blank cell is very weak. To detect it in reading mode, the procedure uses differential reading, by comparison with a reference cell identical to the memory cells. If I is used to designate the current that flows in a cell in reading mode, this current I has a value I.sub.1 if the cell is blank and I.sub.2 (practically zero) if the cell is programmed. A comparison is made, in a differential current comparator, of the current I.sub.ref which flows through the (blank) reference cell with a current that is the sum I.sub.+Ibias of the current I in the cell to be read and of a bias current I.sub.bias. The current I.sub.ref is in principle equal to I.sub.1 (the current in a blank cell). The bias I.sub.bias is chosen so as to be substantially equal to (I.sub.2 -I.sub.1)/2, i.e. in practice I.sub.ref /2. In this way, if the current I read in a cell is slightly lower than I.sub.ref /2, the result of the comparison will be in a first direction and the cell will be considered to be in the programmed state. If, on the contrary, the current I is above I.sub.ref /2, the result of the comparison will be in the other direction and the cell will be considered to be blank.
The bias current I.sub.bias will therefore be aimed at facilitating the comparison between the current of the cell to be read and the reference cell.
During the testing of the memories, the memory is read according to the same principle of differential reading.
It has been perceived, according to the invention, that memories may prove to be flawed during use even though the cells have been tested rigorously one by one. These flaws have been attributed notably to faulty contacts which may occur between the memory cells and a conductor (bit line) to which these cells are connected to transmit the current representing the state of the cell. The contact-forming operation is indeed a delicate operation in the manufacturing process. Not only can the contacts be flawed at the outset, but they can also deteriorate through (natural or enforced) aging.
An aim of the invention is to provide for improved memory testing, to achieve more efficient elimination of chips which include flawed cells, notably as regards the contacts.
According to the invention, it is proposed that the memory should be provided with means to give the bias current a lower value in testing mode than in normal reading mode.
Thus, only the cells for which the reading current in the blank state is high enough will successfully pass the test to verify the blank state. Those with a reading current that is excessively low (albeit sufficient in normal reading mode) will be rejected. This excessively low value will be considered to denote the likely presence of a faulty contact which, in the process of aging, risks causing an erroneous operation of the memory. The cell or the memory will therefore be rejected.
Thus, the electrically programmable integrated memory according to the invention, in which the state of a cell is read by comparison between a current absorbed by a reference cell and the sum of the current absorbed by the cell to be read and a bias current I.sub.bias produced inside the integrated circuit, advantageously comprises means for the reduction, in test mode, of the value of the bias current, and for the reading of the state of the cells with this reduced value of the bias current.
The bias current in testing mode is preferably about half the bias current in normal reading mode.

Integrated memory having improved testing means


In a generally known cement kiln plant which incorporates a preheater (1), a calciner (2) having a separation cyclone (3), a rotary kiln (4) and a clinker cooler (5), a decomposition chamber (10) is additionally installed for incineration of waste. Waste is introduced into the chamber at a location (12) and decomposed in the chamber by the heat from calcined raw meal which is conveyed to the chamber from the separation cyclone (3) of the calciner via a splitting gate (13) and a pipeline (14). Gaseous products are conveyed to the calciner (2) and burned there, whereas noncombustible by-products are discharged via an outlet (15) of the chamber (10). By utilizing the heat from preheated or calcined raw meal instead of, for example, hot exhaust gases to incinerate waste, any disturbance of the draught conditions of the cement kiln plant can be avoided, and the overall control of the calcining process is improved.

The invention relates to a method for incinerating waste during the manufacture of cement clinker, in which cement raw meal is preheated in a preheater, calcined in a calciner and burned into a clinker in a kiln, for example a rotary kiln, whereafter the clinker is eventually cooled in a cooler. By this method the waste is introduced into and decomposed in a separate chamber from which gaseous products are charged to and burned in the calciner, whereas noncombustible by-products are discharged from the chamber.
A method of the aforementioned kind is known from the description of U.S. Pat. No. 4,295,823, according to which the exhaust gases from the rotary kiln are utilized for the decomposition of waste, consisting, in the present case, of used automobile tires. However, by using such a method it is difficult to make the kiln gases move up through the chamber in a controlled flow due to the high temperature. Moreover, the utilization of kiln gases for the incineration of automobile tires will have a disturbing effecting on the draught conditions of the kiln system.

Method and apparatus for incinerating waste in a cement kiln plant