A system and method includes steps or acts of receiving and examining a computer program written in an object-oriented language; receiving sequences of accesses that form logical operations on a set of memory locations used by the program; receiving definitions of atomic sets of memory locations, each consisting of pieces of data; providing a message indicating where the synchronization is required.

Data races are intermittent bugs that arise in concurrent programs. They result in incorrect behavior under certain interleavings of the code, and are hard to find and debug. The most common definition of a data race is two concurrent accesses to a memory location with no synchronization between them where at least one of which is a write. This definition has two shortcomings. First, there is a circularity in that synchronization is what we use to prevent data races, so defining races in terms of synchronization is unsatisfying. Second, a program in which every access is protected can nevertheless display problematic interleavings. This is the case when the granularity of locking is not adequate. An example of these "high-level" data races is stale-value errors, local copies of shared variables that are used beyond an appropriate scope. See M. Burrows and K. R. M. Leino. "Finding stale-value errors in concurrent programs". SRC Technical Note 2002-004, May 2002. Therefore there is a need for a system and method of ensuring consistency of data and preventing data races that avoids the shortcomings of prior approaches.

International Business Machines Corporation


Disclosed herein are systems, computer-implemented methods, and tangible computer-readable media for representing media assets. The method includes receiving an original media asset and derivative versions of the original media asset and associated descriptors, determining a lineage to each derivative version that traces to the original media asset, generating a version history tree of the original media asset representing the lineage to each derivative version and associated descriptors from the original media asset, and presenting at least part of the version history tree to a user. In one aspect, the method further includes receiving a modification to one associated descriptor and updating associated descriptors for related derivative versions with the received modification. The original media asset and the derivative versions of the original media asset can share a common identifying mark. Descriptors can include legal documentation, licensing information, creation time, creation date, actors' names, director, producer, lens aperture, and position data.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to representing media and more specifically to storing a tree of related media assets.
2. Introduction
With recent advances in technology, many individuals now possess the necessary tools for creating, editing, and sharing media. Indeed sites such as YouTube.com are based on the concept of users uploading home made videos as well as editing and/or commenting on others' videos. Further, digital media distribution on DVDs and online have allowed for many users to copy and paste sections from others' media, including commercial media, in their own creations. Users also create parodies of existing media which often trigger others to view the parodied media. Due to these and other factors, media is increasingly cross-pollinated. Users create tens of thousands of directly and indirectly derivative works every day. On top of these derivative works, professional studios often revise their work to make different versions or editions, such as a standard full-screen DVD, a widescreen extended edition DVD, a widescreen extended edition with director commentary HD-DVD, etc. These different media versions and derivative versions are currently very disconnected and not uniformly represented, especially when considering descriptors such as user comments, subtitles, alternate audio tracks, formats, metadata, etc. Accordingly, what is needed in the art is an improved way to represent and store related media assets and supplementary descriptive information.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

System and method for representing media assets


Allocating first transmitters of a tire monitoring system, especially of a tire-pressure monitoring system having a wheel unit comprising a sensor, a first transmitter, which can be triggered, and a sending antenna on each of N wheels arranged on L axles of a vehicle according to a predetermined axle formula, further having receiving antenna on the vehicle body associated to the first transmitters and an electronic receiver and evaluation system, connected to receiving antenna by allocating an identifier characteristic of a particular wheel to its respective first transmitter, by emitting data telegrams, which contain the identifier, in response to a triggering action of second transmitters, and passing on such data telegrams to the central electronic receiver and evaluation system. The number n of the trigger transmitters is smaller than the number A of the axle positions, that each axle position is associated to a triggering range of n trigger transmitters.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method for allocating first transmitters, of a tire monitoring system, especially of a tire-pressure monitoring system, having a wheel unit comprising a sensor, a transmitter and a sending antenna, on each of N wheels arranged on L axles of a vehicle according to a predetermined axle formula, further having at least one receiving antenna on the vehicle body associated to the first transmitters, and an electronic receiver and evaluation system, by association to the respective transmitter of an identifier characteristic of a particular wheel, through the emission of data telegrams, which contain the identifier, in response to the triggering action of the trigger transmitters, and by passing on such data telegrams to the central electronic receiver and evaluation system. Further, the invention relates to a device suited for carrying out that method.
The "axle formula" indicates the number of axles provided on the vehicle and the number of wheels at each of the axle positions of the vehicle. "Axle position" is to be understood as the location at which single wheels or a number of wheels, which belong together and are placed side-by-side, are arranged. If there is only a single wheel at a given axle position as is usual with automobiles, then the axle position is identical to the wheel position. In case of trucks, however, there can be provided more than one wheel at a given axle position, e. g. two wheels in case of a truck with twin wheels. In such a case there are two wheel positions at an axle position of twin wheels.
2. Description of Related Art
A method of that kind and a device for carrying out that method have been known and are used for monitoring the wheels of a motor vehicle with respect to certain given values, such as tire pressure, temperature, and the like, for example. Wheel monitoring systems of that kind must be capable of automatically detecting the position of a wheel on the axles, i.e. a mounting position of one or more wheels on a given axle. In the case of passenger cars, normally a single wheel is mounted at each axle position so that the axle position is identical to the wheel position of the respective wheel. In the case of commercial vehicles, however, two wheels (twin tires) may be mounted at one axle position of some vehicles so that two wheel positions are associated to one axle position in that case. For allocating a first transmitter to a defined axle position, one normally uses electronic wheel units that can be triggered and emit their data in response to the receipt of a trigger signal sent out by a second transmitter which is a trigger transmitter.
This is accomplished by the known method and the known device by associating one trigger transmitter to each axle position. During a learn phase, the central electronic receiver and evaluation system drives the trigger transmitters of the respective axle positions so that upon receipt of the trigger signals the electronic wheel unit associated to the driven trigger transmitter sends out its data in the form of a data telegram which is received by the at least one receiving antenna and is passed on to the central electronic receiver and evaluation unit. In order to check the source of that data telegram for plausibility, that process preferably is repeated a number of times. Upon conclusion of that process, the identity of the wheel associated to the triggered electronic wheel unit is known, i.e. its axle position has been learned.
This manner of proceeding allows building-up of a bidirectional transmission path by means of which the transmission time of the electronic wheel units can be determined by a control unit in the central electronic receiver and evaluation system. This clearly reduces the learning times of the tire monitoring system it being now possible to request a plurality of telegrams in rapid succession from each electronic wheel unit, at the beginning of a trip, so that the number of telegrams required for safely determining the correct allocation will be available within a clearly shorter period of time. In addition, when the vehicle is stopped and normal pressure conditions prevail in the tire, the electronic wheel units can remain switched off, which improves the service life of the electronic wheel units.
However, it is a disadvantage of the known method and of the known device that a separate trigger transmitter must be associated to each axle position, i.e. to each single or twin wheel on each of the L axles of the vehicle. Especially with trucks having three or more than three axles this leads to increased costs, which is a disadvantage.
Now, it is the object of the present invention to improve a method and a device of the before-mentioned kind so that the number of trigger transmitters required is smaller than the number of associated axle positions of the vehicle.
The invention achieves this object in that the number n of the trigger transmitters arranged on the vehicle is smaller than the number A of the axle positions,
that each axle position of the vehicle is associated to a triggering range of at least one of the n trigger transmitters,
that the trigger transmitters are so arranged and/or configured that at least one axle position is associated to the triggering range of at least two trigger transmitters,
that the identifiers of the electronic wheel units that respond to a trigger signal of a particular trigger transmitter are registered by the at least one receiving antenna and are passed on to the electronic receiver and evaluation unit, and
that the electronic evaluation unit calculates the axle position of a given electronic wheel unit based on the axle formula of the vehicle.
The invention achieves the objection also by a device for allocating first transmitters, which can be triggered, of a tire monitoring system, especially of a tire-pressure monitoring system, has a wheel unit comprising a sensor, a first transmitter and a sending antenna on each of N wheels arranged on L axles of a vehicle according to a predetermined axle formula, further has at least one receiving antenna on the vehicle body associated to the first transmitters, and an electronic receiver and evaluation system connected to the at least one receiving antenna, wherein allocation of the first transmitters to a defined axle position of the vehicle is effected by allocating to the respective first transmitter an identifier characteristic of the particular wheel, by emitting data telegrams, which contain the identifier, in response to a triggering action of second transmitters of the device which serve as trigger transmitters, and by passing on such data telegrams to the central electronic receiver and evaluation system. The trigger transmitters are so arranged and/or configured that at least one axle position is arranged in a triggering range of each trigger transmitter, that at least one axle position is associated to the triggering range of at least two trigger transmitters, and based on the axle formula of the vehicle, the electronic evaluation system calculates the axle position of a given electronic wheel unit by evaluation of the identifiers of the electronic wheel units responding to trigger signals of a given trigger transmitter.
On vehicles having at least three axles the invention advantageously allows allocating an electronic. wheel unit to a given axle position with the aid of a number of trigger transmitters smaller than the number of the axle positions. Such a feature advantageously leads to a significant reduction in costs.
An advantageous further development of the invention provides for level evaluation of the data telegrams emitted by the individual electronic wheel units. It is an advantage of that feature that it permits easily a spatial resolution of the various wheel positions of any axle position even if multiple tires exist at a given axle position, as is the case for example with twin tire systems.

Method and device for allocating triggered transmitters of a tire monitoring system, especially of a tire-pressure monitoring system


An approach to correcting transcriptions of speech recognition models may be provided. A list of similar sounding phonemes from associated with the phonemes of high frequency terms may be generated for a particular node associated with a virtual assistant. An utterance may be transcribed and receive a confidence score regarding the correctness of the transcription based on audio metrics and other factors. The phonemes of the utterance can be compared to the phonemes of the high frequency terms from the list and a score for the matching phonemes and similar sounding phonemes can be determined. If it is determined the sounds similar score for a term from the high frequency term list is above a threshold, the transcription can be replaced with the term, providing a corrected transcription.

The present invention relates generally to the field of speech recognition, and more specifically to improving the transcription of utterances in speech recognition.
Speech recognition models have long attempted to allow users to interact with computing devices through utterances or spoken commands. The ability of voice assistants to process spoken commands and utterances has experienced a tremendous amount of growth in the past decade with the improvements in the processing capabilities and memory capacity. These improvements have permitted the development of a new user interface, where spoken commands and utterances can provide the computing device with instructions. In some models, speech recognition involves receiving sound waves and identifying phonemes from the soundwaves and assigning a computer understandable meaning to the phonemes.

Improving speech recognition transcriptions


An electronic circuit device is provided which comprises an electronic circuit unit, an ESD protection unit connected in parallel to the electronic circuit unit and configured to clamp a supply voltage of the electronic circuit unit, at least one input clamp unit configured to clamp input voltages applied at at least one input terminal of the electronic circuit unit, and at least one ESD clamp provided at the at least one input terminal and configured to protect the electronic circuit unit against electrostatic discharges.

The present invention generally relates to a protection of an electronic circuit against electrostatic discharges (ESD), and especially relates to a protection device for mixed voltage circuits.
In applications like hard-disk drive read channel units that require maximum speed of an analog processing chain it is advantageous to make use of the fast devices that are available in CMOS technology. These devices are operated in the digital domain and are formed with thin oxides. The operating conditions are limited to specified maximum voltages, especially with respect to the gate-source connection, the gate-drain connection and the drain-source connection.
Thus the supply voltage for thin oxide circuit units is low such that deep sub-micron processes can be applied. Analog front end circuits operating at extreme low supply voltages suffer from the loss of headroom available for biasing these devices. Due to this fact and due to the low drain-source impedance of the core devices the required transistor dimensions increase to allow a biasing of e.g. a current source at a low drain-source voltage operating point. With the increase of transistor size parasitic capacitances also increase which results in parasitic poles that can dominate the signal path. Therefore it is necessary to use higher supply voltages in the signal path in order to obtain an optimum headroom of the devices resulting in smaller device sizes. An appropriate biasing of the thin-oxide circuit units (core devices) ensures that these devices are not damaged. This results in a so-called mixed-voltage circuit unit.

Method and circuit arrangement for protection against electrostatic discharges


Roughly described, a transistor is formed with a semiconductor 2D material layer wrapped conformally on at least part of a 3D structure. The 3D structure can be for example a ridge made of a dielectric material, or made of dielectric material alternating longitudinally with a semiconductive or conductive material. Alternatively the 3D structure can be tree-shaped. Other shapes are possible as well. Aspects also include methods for making such structures, as well as integrated circuit layouts defining such structures and methods for developing such layouts, a machine readable data storage medium storing design entries which include some which define such structures and layouts, methods for developing such design entries. Aspects further include corrugated wafers which are prepared as an intermediate product for use in fabricating integrated circuits having a semiconductor 2D material layer disposed conformally on a 3D structure.

FinFETs can be scaled down to 7 nm design rules and perhaps stretched to 5 nm design rules. Beyond 5 nm design rules, short channel effects degrade FinFET performance such that further scaling does not bring benefits. Some developers are considering Gate-All-Around nanowires, which could enable scaling down to ˜2 nm design rules.
FIG. 1 is a simplified perspective view of a conventional FinFET transistor 100. It comprises a semiconductor "fin" 110 extending in a longitudinal direction L. The fin also has a transverse direction T. The fin has drain and source regions 112 and 114 respectively, separated longitudinally by a channel region (hidden in the drawing). Drain and source contacts 116 and 118, respectively, are connected to the drain and source regions 112 and 114, respectively, and are separated longitudinally by a gate stack 118. The gate stack 118 may be a high-K metal gate (HKMG) layer (metal gate sub-layer separated in a vertical direction V from the channel region of the fin by a thin high-K gate dielectric layer 120. The gate stack 118 is separated longitudinally from each of the drain and source terminals 114 and 116 by dielectric spacer material 122.
One limitation on scaling of FinFETs and nanowires is that Middle-Of-Line (MOL) parasitic capacitance is increasing as 1/x with each technology generation, where x is the spacer width (in the transistor longitudinal direction), scaling as 0.7× per generation. MOL capacitance comes mainly from the gate 118 facing the drain contact 114 across the shrinking spacer 122. See the arrows 124 in FIG. 1. MOL capacitance is expected to overtake interconnect capacitance as the dominant load of the transistor at 5 nm design rules, and will continue increasing with further scaling.
Another limitation on scaling of FinFETs is that fin pitch scaling is limited by the multi-layer High-K dielectric+Metal Gate (HKMG) stack which requires consistent HKMG vertical thickness in order to maintain a consistent threshold voltage. Currently, the minimum HKMG stack thickness between the fins is approximately 14 nm and would require a new technology to shrink beyond that.
Yet another limitation on scaling of FinFETs is cross-sectional fin shape variability. It is difficult to enforce consistent fin shape, and fin shape variations introduce FinFET performance variations. For example, off-state current increases exponentially with increases in fin width. Performance variations lead to lower circuit performance and higher chip area and cost. It seems that new ideas will be needed in order to continue scaling transistors down to smaller and smaller sizes.

Substrates and transistors with 2D material channels on 3D geometries


A book grip comprises a lower grip body formed with a first support projection, and defined with an upper grip body insertion opening; a upper grip body formed with a second support projection, having a lower end slidably inserted into the upper grip body insertion opening of the lower grip body, and defined with a page fastening clip installation hole; a handle installed on a rear surface of the lower grip body; a fastening string having one end supported by the second support projection and the other end extending over a distal end surface of the first support projection and supported by a length adjustment screw; and a page fastening clip having an elastic support part which supports a wide area of a page and a coupling part which is coupled into the page fastening clip installation hole of the upper grip body.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a book grip which allows a book to be conveniently grasped by one hand, and more particularly, to a book grip which allows a person to easily read a book in a comfortable posture while the person moves or sits on a sofa.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, when reading a book, it is not always necessary to place a book on a desk and read the book while sitting in a correct posture. That is to say, it is often the case that the book is held and read using one hand while walking or sitting on a sofa, etc.
However, when the book is opened to be read, since force for causing the book to be closed as in an initial state is applied due to the structure of the book, it is not easy to hold the book with one hand. Further, since the book has sharp edges, it is inconvenient to grasp the book.
Moreover, while the conventional book holder allows the book to be placed and conveniently viewed on a desk, because the book holder must be positioned on a flat surface, it cannot be properly used while moving or sitting on a sofa.


The invention relates to an infrared-reflective material which comprises a transparent sheet material which comprises, on a part-area, an interference pigment which has higher transmission in the visible region of global radiation than in the NIR region, to a method for screening an enclosed area against infrared light, and to the use of the infrared-reflective material for buildings, vehicles and greenhouses while simultaneously maintaining the ability of the human eye to see through the material.

EP 0 548 822 describes a light-transparent, IR-reflective body which consists of a plastic base material and a coating layer adhering thereto. The coating layer comprises from 20 to 40% by weight of a single-layered interference pigment. This body has the disadvantage that, besides the NIR radiation, some of the visible light is also reflected, and that the light passing through is green and the reflected light is red. Furthermore, the translucent coating layer means that the transparency of the base material is lost (milk-glass effect).
DE 2 709 562 discloses a plastic film for shading plants against sunlight which is perforated and is provided with a white or metallic-lustre pigment or with a white or metallic-lustre coating, so that from 10 to 70% of the perpendicularly incident light is allowed to pass through. A plastic film of this type reduces the radiation uniformly over the entire wavelength range, i.e. both in the visible region and in the infrared region. Used on buildings, this would result in darkening of interior rooms, but this may be disadvantageous.
EP 1 059 338 describes a composition for coating transparent surfaces, as used for greenhouses, sheeting structures, domelights, roof windows or roof covers, which has high transparency in the visible region of sunlight and high reflection in the NIR region. The paint consists of a multilayered interference pigment consisting of a transparent support material which is coated with alternating layers of a material of low refractive index and a material of high refractive index, and a polymeric, organic binder. This translucent, NIR-reflective paint also causes the transparency of the base material to be lost.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,887,744 describes a transparent plate which is partly coated on its surface with aluminum, which regulates the percentage transmission of visible light and infrared rays. Either certain areas of the plate are coated with aluminum or the aluminium is applied as an ink by screen printing. Although details from the environment are evident from within the enclosed area in the case of this type of coating, aluminum does not, however, reflect wavelength-selectively with respect to the solar spectrum. This means that aluminium, in contrast to interference pigments, reflects both NIR radiation and visible light, which results in a reduction in brightness in the enclosed area.

Infrared-reflective material comprising interference pigments having higher transmission in the visible region than in the NIR region

Merck Patent Gellschaft MIT Beschrankter Haftung


A method of increasing the bioavailability upon oral administration of a pharmacologically active target agent, particularly an antitumor or antineoplastic agent which exhibits poor or inconsistent oral bioavailability (e.g., paclitaxel or etoposide), comprises the oral co-administration to a mammalian patient of the target agent and an oral bioavailability-enhancing agent, (e.g., cyclosporin A, cyclosporin D, ketoconazole or captopril). The enhancing agent may be administered orally from 0.5-24 hrs. prior to the oral administration of one or more doses of the target agent, substantially simultaneously with the target agent or both prior to and substantially simultaneously with the target agent. A method of treating mammalian patients suffering from diseases responsive to target agents with poor oral bioavailability, as well as oral dosage forms containing such target agents, combination oral dosage forms containing bioavailability-enhancing agents and target agents and kits containing enhancing and target agent dosage forms and dosing information for the co-administration of the same are also disclosed.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to methods, compositions and kits for improving the oral bioavailability of pharmaceutical agents that are poorly absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract, and to methods of treatment of patients through the oral administration of such agents.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Many valuable pharmacologically active compounds cannot be effectively administered by the oral route because of poor systemic absorption from the gastrointestinal tract. All these pharmaceutical agents are, therefore, generally administered via intravenous or intramuscular routes, requiring intervention by a physician or other health care professional, entailing discomfort and potential local trauma to the patient and even requiring administration in a hospital setting in the case of certain IV infusions.
It has been speculated that, in some cases, the poor bioavailability of a drug after oral administration is a result of the activity of a multidrug transporter, a membrane-bound P-glycoprotein, which functions as an energy-dependent transport or efflux pump to decrease intracellular accumulation of drug by extruding xenobiotics from the cell. This P-glycoprotein has been identified in normal tissues of secretory endothelium, such as the biliary lining, brush border of the proximal tubule in the kidney and luminal surface of the intestine, and vascular endothelial cells lining the blood brain barrier, placenta and testis.
The P-glycoprotein efflux pump prevents certain pharmaceutical compounds from transversing the mucosal cells of the small intestine and, therefore, from being absorbed into the systemic circulation. A number of known non-cytotoxic pharmacological agents have been shown to inhibit P-glycoprotein, including cyclosporin A (also known as cyclosporine), verapamil, tamoxifen, quinidine and phenothiazines, among others. In fact, clinical trials have been conducted to study the effects of cyclosporine on the pharmacokinetics and toxicities of paclitaxel (Fisher et al., Proc. Am. Soc. Clin. Oncol., 13: 143,1994); doxorubicin (Bartlett et al., J. Clin. Onc. 12:835-842, 1994); and etoposide (Lum et al., J. Clin. Onc. 10:1635-42, 1992), all of which are anti-cancer agents known to be subject to multidrug resistance (MDR). These trials showed that patients receiving cyclosporine prior to or together with the anti-cancer drugs had higher blood levels of those drugs, presumably through reduced body clearance, and exhibited the expected toxicity at substantially lower dosage levels. These findings tended to indicate that the concomitant administration of cyclosporine suppressed the MDR action of P-glycoprotein, enabling larger intracellular accumulations of the therapeutic agents. For a general discussion of the pharmacologic implications for the clinical use of P-glycoprotein inhibitors, see Lum et al., Drug Resist. Clin. Onc. Hemat., 9: 319-336 (1995); Schinkel et al., Eur. J. Cancer, 31A: 1295-1298 (1995).
In the aforedescribed studies relating to the use of cyclosporine to increase the blood levels of pharmaceutical agents subject to P-glycoprotein mediated resistance, the active agents and the cyclosporine were administered intravenously. No suggestion was made in these publications that cyclosporine or other substances believed to inhibit the P-glycoprotein efflux pump could be orally administered to substantially increase the bioavailability of orally administered anti-cancer drugs and other pharmaceutical agents which are poorly absorbed from the gut without producing highly toxic side effects. Indeed, in the 1995 review paper cited above, Lum et al. showed that concomitant IV administration of MDR inhibitors and chemotherapeutic agents subject to MDR increased toxicity levels and exacerbated the patients' serious side effects. Schinkel et al. briefly adverted to the fact that MDR1 and P-glycoprotein are abundant in the mucosal cells of the intestine, and that this may affect the oral bioavailability of P-glycoprotein substrate drugs, but did not suggest or imply that the oral administration of MDR suppressing agents could improve the bioavailability of the orally unavailable agents. Furthermore, like Lum et al., Schinkel et al. warned that P-glycoprotein inhibitors can dramatically increase toxicity in chemotherapy patients and should, therefore, be used cautiously.
In an earlier publication, Schinkel et al. showed that absorption of orally ingested ivermectin was increased in mice homozygous for a disruption of the MDR1a gene in comparison with normal mice, demonstrating that P-glycoprotein played a major role in reducing the bioavailability of this agent (Cell, 77: 491-502, 1994). In addition, this study also showed that the penetration of vinblastine into various tissues was enhanced in the mutant mice.
None of the published studies provided any regimen for implementing the effective oral administration of poorly bioavailable drugs, e.g., indicating the respective dosage ranges and timing of administration for specific target drugs and bioavailability-enhancing agents or demonstrating which MDR-inhibiting agents are best suited for promoting oral absorption of each target drug or class of drugs.
Methods disclosed in the art for increasing gut absorption of drugs that have until now only been administered parenterally generally focus on the use of permeation and solubility enhancers as promoting agents, or the co-administration by intraluminal perfusion in the small intestine or by the intravenous route of P-glycoprotein inhibitors, e.g., Leu et al., Cancer Chemother. Pharmacol., 35: 432-436, 1995 (perfusion or IV infusion of quinidine suppresses efflux of etoposide into the lumen of the g.i. tract and/or may increase its oral bioavailability). But these methods suffer from numerous drawbacks. The solubility and permeability enhancing agents are often either impractical or ineffective for oral administration in the doses required and may interfere with the pharmacological activity of the target drug. Parenteral administration of P-glycoprotein inhibitors in therapeutic (or near-therapeutic) doses into humans can cause severe clinical consequences. In the case of quinidine, for example, IV administration may cause arrhythmias, peripheral vasodilation, gastrointestinal upset and the like.
A safe yet effective method for increasing the systemic availability upon oral administration of drugs that are currently administered only parenterally because they are not absorbed sufficiently or consistently when administered alone by the oral route, would be extremely valuable and desirable.

Method for increasing the oral bioactivity of pharmaceutical agents


The present invention relates to a soft roll material-translating device for the mechanical apparatus of machining and cutting after severing. The existing pillow type of automatic packing machine can only pack produces using one single roll of film, so the work efficiency is low. Consequently, the present invention aims at improving the work efficiency and it adopts following technical solutions: the soft roll material-translating device includes a frame (1), a right rotating unit (3) with right folding rod pair (5) and a left rotating unit (2) with left folding rod pair (4) are mounted on the frame (1), the right rotating unit (3) and the left rotating unit (2) can both rotate around a rotating center. By adding a few of mechanisms, the work efficiency of the device can be multiplied one times.

At the present, the pillow type automatic packing machines (vertical or horizontal) from all over the world are all using one roll of film to package one series of packing goods, so the working efficiency is quite low. In order to improve the packing speed largely and decrease the occupied space, a double track automatic packing machine is developed by combining a couple of pillow type automatic packing machines back-to-back and sharing a common frame in domestic manufacturer. It is a kind of block structure assembled by two automatic packing machines with one common frame. Except the common frame, all other assemblies, such as transmission system, electric system, electron optic tracking system, vertical proper sealing device and end sealing and cutting device are all two independent set of structures, moreover its adjusting, operating and control system are all independent respectively also. During the operation, a couple of rolls of film should be installed on the two machines separately, and the two machines work independently. Though the occupied space is decreased a little, the cost of manufacture and the number of operators is nearly the same as that of the two separate machines.


Methods and cosmetic compositions for conditioning the skin, utilizing as active ingredients selected compounds structurally related to astragenols, cycloastragenols, and/or protopanaxatriols, are provided. Such compounds include those of formulas (I), (II) and (III) described herein.

Various compounds have been described in the art as active ingredients of cosmetic compositions for conditioning of the skin. These include, for example, vitamin B3 compounds such as niacinamide, natural and synthetic vitamin A derivatives, and estrogens and estrogen derivatives, as well as β-1,3-D-glucan (Ber, U.S. Pat. No. 5,786,343) and piperine derivatives (Raman et al., U.S. Pat. No. 6,346,539).
Compounds of the astragaloside and ginsenoside families have been reported as having various biological effects. References describing astragaloside and ginsenoside compounds and their uses include:    Bedir, E. et al., "Immunostimulatory effects of cycloartane-type triterpene glycosides from Astragalus species", Biol & Pharm Bull 23(7):834-7 (2000).    Binder, B. et al., "Use of triterpensaponins, such as notoginsenoside R1 (NR1) and/or astragaloside (ASIV) for preparing medicaments", U.S. Pat. No. 5,770,578 (June 1998).    Calzada, L. et al., "Effect of tetracyclic triterpenes (argentatins A, B and D) on the estradiol receptor of hormone-dependent tumors of human breast", Medical Scienice Research 23(12):815-16 (1995).    Chen, X. et al., "Protective effect of ginsenoside Rg1 on dopamin-induced apoptotis in PC12 cells", Acta Pharmacol Sinica 22(8):673-678 (2001).    Hashimoto, K. et al., "Skin tissue regeneration promoters comprising ginsenoside Rb1", WO 200192289 (2001); EP 1295893 A1 (2003).    Hong, H.-Y. et al., "Stimulatory effects of ginsenoside-Rg1 on p56lck kinase and cell proliferation in Jurkat T cells", Korean J. Ginseng Sci. 19(2):117-21 (1995).    Huang, Y. et al., "Selected non-timber forest products with medicinal applications from Jilin Province in China", Conference Title: Forest communities in the third millennium: Linking research, business, and policy toward a sustainable non-timber forest product sector; Kenora, Ontario, Canada, 1-4 Oct., 1999; General Technical Report-North Central Research Station, USDA Forest Service (No. NC-217): p. 93-101 (2000).    Kaneko, M. et al., "Accelerated recovery from cyclophosphamide-induced leukopenia in mice administered a Japanese ethical herbal drug, Hochu-ekki-to", Immunopharmacology 44(3):223-231 (1999).    Kinjo, J. et al., "Anti-herpes virus activity of fabaceous triterpenoidal saponins", Biological & Pharmaceutical Bulletin 23(7):887-9 (July 2000).    Khushbaktova, Z. A. et al., "Influence of cycloartanes from plants of the genus Astragalus and their synthetic analogs on the contractive function of the myocardium and the activity of Na, K-ATPase", Chem. Nat. Compounds 30(4): 469-473 (1994).    Lee, Y. J. et al., "Ginsenoside-Rg1, one of the major active molecules from Panax ginseng, is a functional ligand of glucocorticoid receptor", Mol Cell Endocrinol 133(2):13540 (October 1997).    Oda, K. et al., "Adjuvant and haemolytic activities of 47 saponins derived from medicinal and food plants", Biol. Chem. 381(1):67-74 (2000).    Pistelli, L., et al., "Antimicrobial and antifungal activity of crude extracts and isolated saponins from Astragalus verrucosus", Fitoterapia 73(4): 336-339 (2002).    Prince, R. L. and Min, X., "Compositions and method for treating or preventing osteoporosis", PCT Pubn. No. WO 2001/01996.    Sengupta, S. et al., "Pharmaceutically effective compounds and their use", PCT Pubn. Nos. WO 2002/69980 and WO 2002/07732.    Wang, Y-P. et al., "Effect of astragaloside IV on T,B lymphocyte proliferation and peritoneal macrophage function in mice", Acta Pharmacologica Sinica 23(3):263-6 (March 2002).    Yasukawa, K. et al., "Sterol and triterpene derivatives from plants inhibit the effects of a tumor promoter, and sitosterol and betulinic acid inhibit tumor formation in mouse skin two-stage carcinogenesis", Oncology 48(1):72-6 (1991).    Yamamoto, M. et al., "The stimulatory effects of ginseng saponins on proliferation and DNA synthesis of human vascular endothelial cells and skin fibroblasts in relation to cytokines or growth factors", Nissei Byoin Igaku Zasshi 24(1):12-13 (1996).    Zhang W. J. et al., "Regulation of the fibrinolytic potential of cultured human umbilical vein endothelial cells: astragaloside IV downregulates plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 and upregulates tissue-type plasminogen activator expression", Journal of Vascular Research 34(4):273-80 (July-August 1997).    Zi-Pu, L. and Qian, C., "Effects of astragaloside IV on myocardial calcium transport and cardiac function in ischemic rats", Acta Pharmacol Sin 23(10): 898-904 (October 2002).

Compositions and methods for skin conditioning


An optical navigation system having two or more optical pipelines for image acquisition and a single multiplexed optical array. Each of the two or more optical pipelines for image acquisition may include an illuminator that emits optical radiation at a navigation surface where each navigation surface is separate from the other navigation surfaces. The single multiplexed optical array may be configured to receive optical radiation reflected from the respective navigation surfaces. The optical navigation system may further include illuminator drivers that control each of the optical pipelines for image acquisition and an optical sensor that is configured to multiplex the images recovered by the optical pipelines for image acquisition and perform image correlation for the different navigation surfaces.

Non-mechanical tracking devices, such as computer mice, are rapidly growing in popularity worldwide. Many of these non-mechanical tracking devices utilize optical navigation technology that measures the changes in position of the non-mechanical tracking devices by optically acquiring sequential surface images and mathematically determining the direction and magnitude of the movement.
As an example, in a non-mechanical tracking device such as an optical mouse, optical navigation technology involves capturing an image and then analyzing and tracking the motion of microscopic texture or other features on a surface under the optical mouse. In general, these types of optical mice depend on tracking surface detail and most work surfaces are microscopically textured with such tracking surface detail. When these surface textures are illuminated by a light source such as a light emitting diode ("LED"), a pattern of highlights and shadows is revealed. Optical mice then "watch" these surface details move by imaging them onto navigation integrated circuits ("navigation ICs").
As an example, in FIG. 1, a block diagram 100 of an example of a known implementation of an optical navigation device 102 above a navigation surface 104 is shown. The optical navigation device 102 may be a non-mechanical tracking device such as an optical mouse. Generally, optical navigation technology involves capturing an image on the navigation surface 104 and then analyzing and tracking the motion of microscopic texture or other features on the navigation surface 104 under the optical navigation device 102. Thus, the optical navigation device 102 depends on tracking the navigation surface 104 detail because most navigation surfaces 104 are microscopically textured. When these surface textures are illuminated 106 by a light source such as an LED in an emitter module 108, a pattern of highlights and shadows is revealed at a point of illumination 110 on the navigation surface 104. The optical navigation device 102 then "watches" the surface details of the navigation surface 104 move by imaging 112 the navigation surface 104 details at the point of illumination 110 onto a detector module 114 in the optical navigation device 102. The detector module 114 may be part of a navigation integrated circuit ("IC") 116 located within the optical navigation device 102. The navigation IC 116 may also include a navigation engine 118 where the navigation engine 118 is a device capable of receiving imaging information from the detector module 114 and, in response, determining the position of the optical navigation device 102.
The optical navigation device 102 may also be implemented as a laser optical navigation device. As an example of a laser optical navigation device, a vertical cavity surface-emitting laser ("VCSEL") may be utilized as the light source in the emitter module 108 to illuminate the point of illumination 110 on navigation surface 104. A VCSEL is a semiconductor micro-laser diode that emits light in a cylindrical beam vertically from the surface of a fabricated wafer, and offers advantages in both performance and cost when compared to other semiconductor lasers such as edge-emitting lasers. The VCSELs are cheaper to manufacture in quantity because VCSELs may be fabricated efficiently using standard microelectronic fabrication methods, allowing integration of VCSELs on-board with other components without requiring pre-packaging. Additionally, VCSELs are easier to test, and are more efficient. Moreover, VCSELs require less electrical current to produce a given coherent energy output and emit a narrow, more nearly circular beam than traditional edge emitters.
In FIG. 2, a cross-sectional side view of an example of an implementation of a known laser optical navigation device 200 that utilizes a VCSEL is shown above a navigation surface 202. The laser optical navigation device 200 may include a base plate 204 to which is attached a lens 206. In this implementation, the emitter module 108 of FIG. 1 is VCSEL 208 that is attached to and aligned with the lens 206 by VCSEL assembly clip 210. The VCSEL 208 has attached to it a VCSEL printed circuit board ("PCB") 212, which may be customer-supplied and is programmable dependent on the application. The equivalent of the detector module 114 of FIG. 1 is optical sensor 214 that is in signal communication with sensor PCB 218.
In an example of operation, the VCSEL 208 may emit emitted optical radiation 220 at the navigation surface 202 at a predetermined angle. The emitted optical radiation 220 is then reflected by the navigation surface 202, resulting in reflected optical radiation 222 that passes through the sensor aperture 216 of the lens 206. After the emitted optical radiation 220 is focused by the sensor aperture 216, it is received by the optical sensor 214. The optical sensor 214 may include an image acquisition system, a Digital Signal Processor ("DSP"), a two channel quadrature output, and a four-wire serial port. An example of such an optical sensor 214 is the Avago Technologies' ADNS-6000 optical sensor. Output signals from the optical sensor 214 may be read by a microcontroller (not shown) to obtain any horizontal and vertical motion information resulting from movement of the laser optical navigation system 200 relative to the navigation surface 202.
The emitter module, in this case, the VCSEL 208, the lens 206, the optical sensor 214, the sensor aperture 216, and the sensor PCB 218 may be considered as an optical pipeline for image acquisition. Unfortunately, the optical navigation system 200 has only a single image-acquisition optical pipeline that is capable of acquiring images for correlation purposes. There are, however, applications that require sensing the movement of a device relative to two or more different surfaces. One approach to meeting this requirement is to use two or more optical navigation sensors. This approach, however, is inefficient and costly.
Thus, there is a need for an optical navigation system and method that is capable of measuring the movement of two or more surfaces using a single integrated device capable of processing images reflected from the two or more surfaces.

Optical navigation system with multiplexed image processing

Avago Technologies ECBU IP (Singapore) Pte, Ltd.


A surface-mount device attach method for attaching solder ball-grid array or solder column-grid array surface-mount devices to a printed circuit board where the conventional solder mask structure is replaced with a layer of plated nickel to prevent printed circuit board warping caused by the mismatch in the coefficients of thermal expansion between the conventional solder mask and the printed circuit board. A native nickel-oxide layer that forms on the surface of the exposed portions of the plated nickel layer functions as a solder dam.

This invention.relates to an improved method for mounting surface-mount technology (SMT) devices such as solder ball-grid array (BGA) or solder column grid array (CGA) devices onto a printed circuit board.
Among the variety of SMT attach methods available in the electronic packaging industry, BGA and CGA devices are often used for attaching devices with high I/O requirements. In these SMT device attach systems, an array of solder balls or solder columns form both the electrical and structural interconnections between the SMT device and the printed circuit (PC) board.
In a BGA attach system, the PC board is provided with one or more BGA device bonding sites and each site is provided with an array of bonding pads that matches the array of solder ball interconnections on the BGA device. To attach the BGA device onto the PC board, low-temperature solder paste, whose reflow temperature is lower than that of the BGA solder balls, is deposited onto each of the bonding pads on the PC board. Solder paste made from eutectic Pbxe2x80x94Sn solder is typically used for this application. The BGA device is then aligned and placed on a device bonding site so that the array of BGA solder balls is aligned with the array of bonding pads on the PC board. The whole assembly is then heated to a temperature sufficiently high to melt the low temperature solder paste and form metallurgical bonds between the BGA solder balls and the bonding pads. Because the solder paste has a lower melting point than the BGA solder balls, only the solder paste melts during the BGA bonding process step.
In addition to the bonding pads, a PC board typically has surface-wiring structures that provide electrical connections between various points on the surface of the PC board. Many of the bonding pads are connected to other bonding pads within the same surface-mount device bonding site or to various other points on the surface of the PC board through these surface-wiring structures. For example, FIG. 1 illustrates a conventional BGA device assembly system. In FIG. 1, a prior art PC board 20 is shown with a BGA device bonding site 25. BGA device bonding site 25 has an array of bonding pads 23 configured to match the array of solder balls 24 on BGA device 26. And as discussed above, some of the bonding pads are shown as being connected to surface-wiring structures 22a and 22b. Two types of surface-wiring structures 22a and 22b are shown for illustrative purposes. Surface-wiring structure 22a connects those bonding pads to other parts of the PC board and surface-wiring structure 22b connects two bonding pads.
Bonding pads 23 and surface-wiring structures 22a and 22b are typically formed from the PC board""s surface metallurgy generally comprising a layer of copper (Cu) base conductor layer deposited on the PC board""s surface. The Cu base conductor layer is deposited in patterns forming bonding pads 23 and surface-wiring structures 22a and 22b. Then very thin layers of nickel (Ni) and gold (Au) are deposited over the Cu at bonding pads 23. The remaining Cu base conductor layer portions without any additional metal layers form surface-wiring structures 22a and 22b. The metal layers are typically deposited using processes such as electrolytic plating or electro-less plating that are well-known in the electronics industry.
The layer of Ni plated on top of the Cu layer at bonding pads 23 functions as an adhesion promoting layer between the Cu and Au layers and also as a diffusion barrier between the Cu and Au layers. The Au layer provides corrosion protection.
The BGA device bonding site is then coated with a layer of solder mask 28. Solder mask 28 is typically a layer of organic material, such as polyimide and covers the whole BGA device bonding site but has apertures exposing the Au surface of the bonding pads 23 to allow the BGA solder balls to bond to them. Because solder does not wet to the solder mask material, the solder mask functions as a dam around each bonding pad and prevents the molten solder from bleeding out along the surface-wiring structures during the BGA bonding process. And because of its electrically insulating property, solder mask 28 also functions as a passivation layer protecting the surface-wiring structures 22a and 22b.
FIGS. 2 and 3 illustrate the details of a conventional BGA assembly structure using a solder mask. FIG. 2 illustrates a cross-sectional view of BGA bonding site 25 from FIG. 1 before the BGA device is bonded to the PC board. The Cu/Ni/Au multi-layer structure of bonding pads 23 is shown by the reference numbers 34, 32, 30 respectively. As discussed above, surface-wiring structure 22 consists of the Cu layer only and does not have Ni or Au plated over it.
The BGA bonding site is coated with a solder mask layer 28 that has apertures 37. Apertures 37 expose Au layer 30 of the bonding pads for bonding to BGA solder balls. To bond a BGA device to BGA bonding site 25, low-temperature solder paste 29 is first deposited onto the bonding pads using typical solder paste deposition techniques used in the industry. Some examples are an off-contact printing process, such as screen printing, or an on-contact printing process, such as stenciling.
After the solder paste has been deposited, a BGA device is aligned and placed onto the bonding site so that BGA solder balls 24 align with corresponding bonding pads. The whole assembly is then heated to an elevated temperature sufficiently high to melt the low temperature solder paste. Upon cooling, the low temperature solder forms metallurgical bonds with BGA solder balls 24 and the bonding pads. PC board 20 is also shown with a multi-layer internal structure with internal wiring metallurgy 27 such as is found in many PC boards.
FIG. 3 illustrates the cross-sectional view of PC board 20 after BGA device 26 has been bonded to BGA bonding site 25. Solder balls 24 are bonded to bonding pads 23 and form the interconnections between BGA device 26 and PC board 20.
A problem with this conventional BGA attach system is that because the solder masks are formed from materials with relatively high coefficients of thermal expansion (CTE) compared to the CTE of the PC board, the mismatch of CTEs between the solder mask and the PC board causes the PC board to warp after the assembly is exposed to elevated temperature during the BGA bonding process. For example, the CTE of a typical polyimide solder mask is about 500xc3x9710xe2x88x927/xc2x0 C. compared to the CTE of Fr-4, a typical PC board material, which is about 158xc3x9710xe2x88x927/xc2x0 C. Because the solder mask has higher CTE, it expands more than the PC board. But, because the BGA bonding process temperature is above the glass transition temperature (Tg) of the solder mask, there is no stress transmitted to the PC board during the high temperature stage of the bonding process. However, upon cooling down to the room temperature, below the Tg of the solder mask, the solder mask and the PC board shrink at different rates, causing the PC board to warp.
This poses a significant reliability concern. In many electronic devices, the component assemblies undergo many thermal cycles as the devices are turned on and off during their use. These thermal cycles strain the solder interconnections because the solder mask and the PC board expand and contract different amounts and eventually may result in metal fatigue failure of the solder interconnections.
An additional problem associated with the use of a conventional solder mask is that the interface between the solder mask and the Au plated surface-wiring is subject to degradation. The degradation may be in the form of de-lamination or peeling.
The invention provides a PC board with at least one SMT device bonding site for mounting SMT devices comprising: at least one surface for mounting one or more SMT devices; at least one base conductor layer plated on a portion of the surface; at least one plated Ni outer layer deposited on the base conductor layer; and an array of bonding pads formed by selectively plating at least one layer of Au on a portion of the plated Ni outer layer, and leaving a remainder of the plated Ni outer layer exposed to form a layer of native nickel-oxide. This structure, where a plated Ni outer layer covers the base conductor layer, eliminates the need for the conventional solder mask. And because solder does not wet to the layer of native nickel-oxide on the surface of the plated Ni outer layer it serves as a solder dam preventing the molten solder balls from wetting and bleeding out beyond the bonding pads.
A typical conductor material, Cu, may be used for the base conductor layer. Alternatively the base conductor layer may have a multi-layer structure having Cu/Ni/Au layers where Au is the top layer.
The invention also includes a method of forming a PC board for mounting surface-mount devices without utilizing a conventional solder mask. The process includes providing a printed circuit board having at least one surface having at least one surface-mount device bonding site; plating at least one base conductor layer on a portion of said surface; plating at least one plated nickel outer layer on said base conductor layer; and selectively plating at least one layer of gold on a portion of said plated nickel outer layer to form an array of gold bonding pads at said surface-mount device bonding site and leaving a remainder of said plated nickel outer layer exposed to form a layer of native nickel-oxide.
It would be appreciated by one of ordinary skill in the art that the metal layers described above, such as the base conductor layer, the Ni outer layer, and the Au layer may be deposited using electrolytic plating as well as electro-less plating processes.

Apparatus and method for mounting BGA devices


Apparatus and methods for intrusion protection in safety instrumented process control systems are disclosed. An example method of protecting a safety instrumented system includes receiving legitimate information from a component of a process control system wherein the legitimate information is intended for delivery to a safety instrumented system, determining if a signature at least substantially matches the legitimate information, and preventing the legitimate information from reaching the safety instrumented system when it is determined that the signature at least substantially matches the legitimate information.

Process control systems, like those used in chemical, petroleum or other processes, typically include one or more centralized process controllers communicatively coupled to at least one host or operator workstation and to one or more field devices via analog, digital or combined analog/digital buses. The field devices, which may be, for example, valves, valve positioners, switches and transmitters (e.g., temperature sensors, pressure sensors and flow rate sensors), perform functions within the process such as opening or closing valves and measuring process parameters. The process controller receives signals indicative of process measurements made by the field devices and/or other information pertaining to the field devices, uses this information to implement a control routine and then generates control signals that are sent over the buses or other communication lines to the field devices to control the operation of the process. Information from the field devices and the controllers may be made available to one or more applications executed by the operator workstation to enable an operator to perform desired functions with respect to the process, such as viewing the current state of the process, modifying the operation of the process, etc.
Many process control systems also include one or more application stations. Typically, these application stations are implemented using a personal computer, workstation, or the like that is communicatively coupled to the controllers, operator workstations, and other systems within the process control system via a local area network (LAN). Each application station may execute one or more software applications that perform campaign management functions, maintenance management functions, virtual control functions, diagnostic functions, real-time monitoring functions, safety-related functions, configuration functions, etc. within the process control system.
Some process control systems or portions thereof may present significant safety risks. For example, chemical processing plants, power plants, etc. may implement critical processes that, if not properly controlled and/or shut down rapidly using a predetermined shut down sequence, could result in significant damage to people, the environment, and/or equipment. To address the safety risks associated with process control systems having such critical processes, many process control system providers offer products compliant with safety-related standards such as, for example, the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) 61508 standard and the IEC 61511 standard.
In general, process control systems that are compliant with one or more known safety-related standards are implemented using a safety instrumented system architecture. In such a system architecture, the controllers and field devices associated with the basic process control system, which is responsible for the continuous control of the overall process, are physically and logically separate from special purpose field devices and other special purpose control elements associated with the safety instrumented system, which is responsible for the performance of safety instrumented functions to ensure the safe shutdown of the process in response to control conditions that present a significant safety risk. In particular, compliance with many known safety-related standards requires a basic process control system to be supplemented with special purpose control elements such as logic solvers, safety certified field devices (e.g., sensors, final control elements such as, for example, pneumatically actuated valves), data redundancy devices and routines (e.g., redundancy links, cyclical redundancy checks, etc.), and safety certified software or code (e.g., certified applications, function modules, function blocks, etc.). In addition, many known process control systems also provide at least one graphical run-time interface that allows a user or other system operator to monitor processes, change parameter values, issue commands, etc. to one or more devices, control loops, and/or other process control entities.
Safety instrumented systems are periodically updated to download updated software, updated operation parameters, updated control processes, etc. Current safety instrumented systems use usernames and passwords and/or mechanical key switches to prevent unauthorized download access to safety instrumented systems from workstations in a process control system. However, unauthorized access to a safety instrumented system may be gained if keys are not carefully guarded, users leave logged-in workstations unattended, mechanical locks are not re-armed after use, keys are duplicated, etc.


A method for performing automatic valet parking, which includes selecting a road scenario applicable to a roadway; notifying a driver to release manual control elements of a motor vehicle and to leave the motor vehicle; checking whether the control elements have been released and the driver has left the motor vehicle and, in this case, entering an EXPLORE mode in which the motor vehicle is slowly driven autonomously and searches for a free car space or a parking space using the vehicle's own environmental sensors, before the motor vehicle is placed in a parking position; and then to change from the EXPLORE mode to a PARKING mode in which the motor vehicle is parked in the car space or in the parking space from the parking position by means of the longitudinal and lateral controllers and using the environmental data previously obtained from the environmental sensors in the EXPLORE mode.

Automated motor vehicle parking assistants are always acquiring new capabilities. Parking steering assistants are able to take on the lateral control of the vehicle while the driver controls the powertrain. With the next generation of parking assistants, for example the so-called advanced automated parking assistance, the system is able to take on the lateral and longitudinal control of the vehicle, wherein the driver sitting in the car still has to monitor the surroundings.
DE 10 2014 221 920 A1 discloses a parking assistant for automatically carrying out a parking operation after a driver has parked and exited his vehicle in a suitable position near a parking space he/she identified or a free car space. Environmental sensors of the vehicle monitor the vehicle environment, wherein setting values or setpoints for longitudinal control (by means of drive, brake actuation and gear change lever position) and lateral control (by means of steering) are generated. These setting values are stored in chronological order during the maneuvering process to allow an automatic exit of a vehicle position during the maneuvering process on the basis of the stored setpoints, wherein the setting values are retrieved in reverse order.
DE 10 2016 206 757 A1 discloses a parking assistant which also supports the search for a free parking space by having a so-called search or exploration phase before actually parking, in which a parking space suitable for parking the vehicle is detected with sensor assistance and proposed to the driver. After that, the vehicle can park autonomously.
The above-mentioned parking assistants require a certain level of control and monitoring by the driver.
The next generation of parking assistants is an assistant for so-called automated valet parking or automatic valet parking (AVP), in which a driver can, for example, get out at a drop-off point in front of a parking area such as an underground car park, a car park or any parking site, and then, after activation by the driver, the vehicle drives autonomously to a free car space or a parking space and parks there. Conversely, the driver can have his/her parked vehicle returned to the drop-off point.
For example, such an AVP assistant is mentioned in DE 10 2015 208 068 A1. It requires a parking system with an infrastructure which contains elements designed for good detectability by the vehicle's own sensors. Also, with other well-known AVP assistants, the parking area must also have a dedicated infrastructure, which includes a digital parking map and/or localization sensors distributed throughout, for example.
In the context of so-called autonomous driving, automatic valet parking is to be classified as autonomous driving at a relatively low autonomy level. However, more complex situations on roadways with many adjacent parking spaces require more complex parking area infrastructures or/or higher levels of autonomy, wherein the latter are both difficult to implement from both a technical and a legal point of view.

Method for performing automatic valet parking


An organic electroluminescent device is disclosed which includes: first and second pixel regions defined by first and second gate lines and data lines crossing each other; first sub-pixels arranged in the first pixel region close to the first gate line; first driving cells arranged between the first sub-pixels; second sub-pixels arranged in the second pixel region close to the second gate line; and second driving cells arranged between the second sub-pixels.

1. Field of the Disclosure
The present application relates to an organic electroluminescent device. More particularly, the present application relates to an organic electroluminescent device with an improved pixel structure.
2. Description of the Related Art
With the development of information communication, display devices are being rapidly developed. Among the display devices, an organic electroluminescent device corresponding to a self-luminous device does not require a separated backlight unit. As such, the organic electroluminescent device has features of thinner and lower consumption power compared to the other display devices.
An ordinary organic electroluminescent device can basically include an anode electrode, a cathode electrode and an organic light emission pattern interposed between the two electrodes. The ordinarily organic electroluminescent device allows excitons to be formed through recombination of electrons and electric holes, which are applied from the anode electrode and the cathode electrode, in the organic light emission pattern. Also, the ordinarily organic electroluminescent device generates light by transitioning the excitons from an unstable state (or an excited state) into a stable state (a ground state).
The organic light emission pattern, which performs the function of light emission, is formed on a large-sized substrate through an ink-jet printing procedure, in order to form pixels.
Each of the pixels included in an organic electroluminescent device of the related art is configured with red, green and blue sub-pixels and driving cells disposed between the red, green and blue sub-pixels. In order to form the sub-pixels, a nozzle scans sub-pixel regions in a horizontal direction of the substrate and drops ink into sub-pixel regions. However, the vertical lengths of the red, green and blue sub-pixels must be shortened due to the driving cells. As such, the nozzle must repeatedly perform the scanning operation four times, in order to drop 8 drops of ink into each of the sub-pixel regions. Due to this, processing time increases.

Organic electroluminescent device and method of fabricating the same


A belt lock is provided with a state sensor for detection of the locking state of a safety belt system, for example in an motor vehicle. The belt lock includes a locking mechanism which is located in a belt lock housing, which is formed from an upper shell and a lower shell, for an inserted belt tongue which has a component which changes its location from a first end position into a second end position when the locking mechanism is actuated. Actuation of the locking mechanism can be monitored by the state sensor. The state sensor is made as an electronic sensor element which is located in the lower shell.

In technical applications such as, for example, a motor vehicle construction and the like, it is often necessary to quickly and reliably detect the location of a component which can be moved into two end positions relative to a stationary part using measurement engineering. For example, in passenger restraint systems of motor vehicles, it has to be checked whether a passenger is belted or not.
For this reason, the proper locking of the tongue of the safety belt, which tongue has been inserted into the belt lock, must be checked. Knowledge of the locking state of the belt lock is necessary to notify the passengers by a signal to put on and lock the safety belts. Since the introduction of safety airbags, information about the locking state of the safety belts has also been important for activation or deactivation of mechanisms for inflating driver and passenger airbags, as well as side and head airbags.
EP-B-1 585 276 discloses a belt lock whose locking state is monitored by a switch which can be mechanically actuated. The switch consists of a fixed contact sheet and a contact sheet which is made as a spring contact and which projects into the displacement path of a slide which can be moved into two end positions. The slide presses against a middle bent region of the spring contact in the case of locking, as a result of which one contact end which is hammer-shaped comes into contact with the fixed contact sheet. However, this known belt lock switch is susceptible to faults. If the spring contact is made too solid, it can disrupt the displacement motion of the slide and by blocking the slide in the middle position can even lead to a malfunction of the belt lock. Conversely, if the spring contact is made so thin that its inherent spring force cannot hinder the slide in any case, in operation of the motor vehicle it tends to rattle. There is also a certain risk that the middle bent region of the spring contact will deform over time. This can lead to the hammer-shaped contact end no longer coming into contact with the fixed contact sheet, and in this way the locking state of the safety belt will no longer be detected and/or displayed. In the worst case, the spring contact can even break due to continuous vibrations, which likewise leads to the locking state of the belt lock no longer being able to be detected.
DE 10 2010 039 960 A1 (corresponding to US 2011/0094067 A1) has proposed a belt lock for a safety belt system in which a switching arrangement which can be mechanically actuated is located in a lower shell of the belt lock housing which is formed from two housing shells. The switch arrangement has at least one fixed contact part and one switching contact part which can move relative to the fixed contact part and which in one end position of an ejector of the belt lock is acted upon by the fixed contact part. The movable switching contact part is made as a stable spring clip sheet with two axially running side webs and a transverse web and has at least two elbow-like bows which in one end position of the axially movable ejector are pressurized by the latter. In the bottom part of the frame of the belt lock, there are recesses of the elbow-like bows of the movable switching contact part. Due to the especially flat execution of the switching arrangement which can be mechanically actuated with only two interacting flat sheets, the space available in the lower shell is sufficient. Regardless of the fact that the two flat sheets are made very stable and can be mounted relatively easily in the lower shell, this arrangement for ascertaining the closing state of the belt lock is a purely mechanical design.
WO 2008/095320 describes a belt lock in which the closing state of the belt lock is monitored without contact using a solenoid-operated switch. The solenoid-operated switch is located underneath the frame of the belt lock in the region of a recess for the locking body for the belt lock tongue. According to one representation which is not detailed in the document, the solenoid-operated switch can be located on the bottom of the lower shell of the belt lock. The solenoid-operated switch has a magnet which is located in a housing and which is electrically conductive at least in areas and thus can conductively bridge two electrical contacts of two electrical conductors. By changing the location of the locking body, the magnet within the housing can be moved, as a result of which the electrical contact between the two conductors is interrupted or closed. The contactless monitoring of the locking state of the belt lock with a solenoid-operated switch is very efficient, but dictates a separate switching element, specifically a solenoid-operated switch, with a movable magnet which can be moved out of a first end position into a second end position when an attractor element is moved.
Mechanical switches and solenoid-operated switches, depending on their design, are more or less susceptible to vibrations and impacts as can occur especially in a motor vehicle. Mechanical switches, but also the solenoid-operated switch, have wear of the electrical contacts over time. This is a consequence of the mechanical abrasion and a certain erosion during opening and closing of the electrical contacts. Here, the rebound behavior of the mechanical switch and of the solenoid-operated switch also plays a part. Abrasion which occurs in the actuation of the switch can lead to contact difficulties. Fouling from the outside can also occur in mechanical switches.

Belt lock with a state sensor for detection of the locking state of a safety belt system


Length equalization may be provided. First, a plurality of conductors may be paid off from a plurality of pay-off devices respectively corresponding to the plurality of conductors to form a cable. The plurality of conductors comprising the cable may then be wound onto a take-up device. During the winding process, a guide device may be rotated to cause the plurality of conductors to have substantially a same length after the cable has been wound onto the take-up device. The guide device may be disposed between the take-up device and the plurality of pay-off devices. The guide device may have holes respectively corresponding to each of the plurality of conductors. Each of the plurality of conductors may pass through a respective hole in the guide device.

When conductors are manufactured, they may be cut to length. A number of the conductor lengths may be placed together on a same wound package (e.g. a take-up reel) as one cable. This may be referred to as "paralleling" conductors into a cable assembly. For example, three conductors may be placed together, wound on a reel, and considered one cable on the reel.


A blow molded article obtained by blow molding of a preform made via parallel flow coinjection, having a wall formed by 3 layers in at least a region wherein the outside layer is transparent and the inner layer comprises an effect pigment visible through the transparent layer. Articles according to the invention have an improved gloss, low haze and higher resistance to delamination than previous articles. The invention relates also to preforms for making articles as described and to methods for making preforms and articles.

Blow molded articles made of thermoplastic materials such as polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and obtained from stretch blow molding of an injected preform (injection stretch blow molded articles, also called ISBM articles) are popularly used in various industries, including the cosmetic, laundry, and food industries. In particular, containers for such fields and in particular bottles for liquid products are made in this way. For such articles, having a glossy and pearlescent and/or metallic appearance is particularly desirable as it is appealing to users and tends to connote a premium product.
In order to obtain such appearance so called "effect pigments" have been developed. The materials marketed as "effect pigments" are pigments that give additional color effects such as angular color dependence (iridescence, color travel, luster) or texture when applied in an application medium. These pigments are predominantly composed of particles having a platelet like shape which tend to orient in a direction parallel to the surface to which they are applied. The optical effects of these pigment (including luster, pearlescence, iridescence, metallic effect) arises from reflection of incident light from the smooth surface of the pigment platelets.
Effect pigments work well when applied onto a solid surface because their platelet like particles spontaneously orient in a direction parallel to the surface on which they are applied. However the introduction of effect pigments in large scale blow molding operations has been found to be more problematic and in fact effect pigments do not find a broad industrial application in this field, especially when considering containers for liquid products which need to be mass produced quickly and at a low cost.
Effect pigments can be applied on blow molded articles using standard coating application techniques such as painting or printing, however this adds complexity, costs and additional problems such as need for lacquering which are not realistic in the mass production of blow molded articles. One relevant issue in in the introduction of effect pigments within a blow molding manufacturing process is that the pigment particles remain dispersed within the wall of the article in a largely random orientation so that their effect is reduced.
An additional problem (partially connected to the poor orientation of the particles in a blow molded article) is that blow molded articles comprising effect pigments have been found to have poor gloss and high haze. Without being bound by theory it is believed this is due to the unevenness of the external surface of the articles when effect pigments are present possibly due to the random orientation of the platelet particles which in part will be exposed at the surface of the article in all orientations.
One possible solution to the problem of poor gloss can be to produce a preform and resultant container wherein an inner layer comprises a pearlescent agent and an outer layer is transparent and comprises a colorant. The preforms are generally manufactured with two-steps methods i.e. method where the materials making up the various layers are introduced in sequence. One suggested process can include co-molding/overmolding i.e. a process where the various layers are molded one over the other in subsequent steps and two step coinjection wherein the material of an outer layer is injected first into the mold cavity and is subsequently followed by the material of an inner layer. However, we have observed that in certain cases such construction method leads to poor mechanical properties of the finished article, so that the layers may separate during use (delamination).
Thus, there is still a need to find a better way to provide visual benefits to an article produced via blow molding while keeping the process simple, cost effective and scalable to mass manufacture and wherein the resulting article is resistant to delamination.


In a frequency synthesizer, a phase detector receives an externally generated reference clock signal of a constant frequency and a feedback signal to produce an error signal, which is output through a loop filter to a voltage controlled oscillator. A direct digital synthesizer (DDS) receives the reference clock signal and externally generated phase data to produce a DDS output signal whose frequency is precisely controlled by the phase data. The DDS output signal is applied as a carrier to a differential detector where it is modulated with the output of the VCO to produce a signal corresponding to the lower sideband of the modulated carrier. The output of the differential detector is output to the phase detector as the feedback signal.

The present invention relates generally to phase lock loop frequency synthesizers, and more specifically to a direct digital synthesizer driven phase lock loop frequency synthesizer which is particularly suitable for use in applications, such as digital cellular telephony, where communications channels are switched from one channel to another at significantly high speeds.
As shown in FIG. 1a, a typical conventional phase lock loop frequency synthesizer synthesizes a frequency by using a control voltage to drive a voltage controlled oscillator 5 which generates a signal of frequency f.sub.o near the desired frequency. A frequency divider 6 is used to divide the VCO signal output frequency by an integer value N to produce a signal of frequency f.sub.s. The frequency-f.sub.s signal is input along with a signal of reference frequency f.sub.r to a phase detector 3. The phase detector compares the frequencies of the two input signals and outputs a voltage proportional to the difference in frequency of the two input signals. The output of the phase detector 3 is coupled through a loop filter 4, where it is input to the VCO 5 as the control voltage. The reference frequency (f.sub.r) signal is derived by a divide-by-M frequency divider 2 which divides a signal of high accuracy frequency f.sub.x from a master oscillator 1 by a constant integer value M. The integer N of frequency divider 6 is variable by an incremental frequency control voltage so that if the VCO 5 were generating exactly the desired frequency, the resultant frequency-f.sub.s signal would be exactly the same frequency as reference frequency f.sub.r and the following relation holds: EQU f.sub.o =(N)(f.sub.x /M) (1)
As the frequency control voltage is varied, the output frequency f.sub.o varies accordingly from one frequency, or channel, to another, and the minimum channel separation, or frequency step size or resolution, .DELTA.f.sub.o is given by: EQU .DELTA.f.sub.o =f.sub.x /M (2)
To insure loop stability the loop filter needs to have a cutoff frequency much lower than the reference frequency. However, the lock-in time of the frequency synthesizer is inversely proportional to the cutoff frequency. Since the reference frequency is predetermined, the lock-in time cannot be reduced and hence, is a detrimental factor to achieve high speed channel switching.
This slow lock-in operation is overcome by techniques shown and described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,965,533. To provide mathematical analysis of this patent, two embodiments of the prior art PLL frequency synthesizer are shown respectively in FIGS. 1b and 1c of this specification. One of the prior-art embodiment, shown in FIG. 1b, incorporates a direct digital synthesizer (DDS) 7 that is clocked by the master oscillator to serve as the source of the reference frequency for the phase lock loop. The DDS typically comprises a phase accumulator which receives a digital fine frequency control signal .DELTA.X to determine the phase increment for accumulation at the master clock rate. The accumulated phase value is output to a sine lookup table, which stores sine values and provides an output signal, indicative of the digital representation of a periodic waveform, as an input to a digital-to-analog converter. The output of the D/A converter is filtered by a low-pass filter 8 and input to the frequency divider 2, whose output is used as a variable reference frequency input to the phase detector. Thus, frequency divider 6 operates as a constant-value divider. When the accumulated phase reaches a certain threshold, the phase accumulator automatically resets itself to repeat the accumulation process. Thus, the phase accumulator can be said to operate with a modulo value. If this modulo value is represented as L, the reference frequency f.sub.r is given by: EQU f.sub.r =(f.sub.x)(.DELTA.X)/L (3)
and the synthesizer output frequency f.sub.o is expressed by: EQU f.sub.o =(N)(f.sub.r)=(N)(f.sub.x)(.DELTA.X)/L (4)
Since the frequency control is provided by DDS 7 in response to increment .DELTA.X, the minimum frequency step size .DELTA.f.sub.o is equal to a variation in the output frequency f.sub.o that occurs in response to an increment of .DELTA.X=1. Therefore, the following relation holds: EQU .DELTA.f.sub.o =(N)(f.sub.x /L) (5)
From Equations (3) and (5), the relation f.sub.r =(.DELTA.f.sub.o)(.DELTA.X/N) is obtained. This implies that by setting the increment .DELTA.X at a value greater than the integer N, the reference frequency f.sub.r can be set higher than the reference frequency of the FIG. 1a frequency synthesizer for a given minimum frequency resolution. For example, using a minimum frequency step size of 25 kHz, a master clock frequency f.sub.x =12.8 MHz and an integer N=1024, Equation (5) gives a modulo value L=2.sup.19. If the output frequency f.sub.o is chosen at 1 GHz, Equation (4) gives an increment .DELTA.X=40000, a value much greater than the integer N=1024. Thus, a reference frequency of 976.5625 kHz, much higher than .DELTA.f.sub.o =25 kHz, is obtained. While high speed convergence of the phase lock loop can be achieved, variation of the reference frequency causes a control voltage variation at the input of the VCO, a variation known as "reference leak", which would result in the transmission of spurious frequencies. A band rejection filter must be provided as part of the loop filter 4 to eliminate the undesired spurious transmission. However, it is difficult to eliminate the undesirable components uniformly across all channels of the frequency synthesizer.
According to the other prior art technique shown in FIG. 1c, DDS 7 and low-pass filter 8 are provided in the phase lock loop, following the output of divider 6, so that the divided frequency signal f.sub.s is caused to vary in response to phase increment .DELTA.X, while reference frequency f.sub.r remains constant, thus giving the following relations: EQU f.sub.s =(f.sub.o)(.DELTA.X)/(N)(L) (6) EQU f.sub.x /M=(f.sub.o)(.DELTA.X)/(N)(L) (7) EQU Thus, f.sub.o =(f.sub.x)(N)(L)/(M)(.DELTA.X) (8)
While this technique eliminates the reference leak problem, the fact that the output frequency f.sub.o varies inversely proportional to the increment .DELTA.X, as given by Equation (8), makes it impossible to set all channels of the synthesizer at precisely equal frequency intervals.

Frequency synthesis using frequency controlled carrier modulated with PLL feedback signal


A reusable container for storage, transport, and sale of firewood. The container has a rectangular floor panel supporting a plurality of vertically disposed wall panels. The wall panels are connected at a first end to the base so as to provide a container having an open top for loading firewood into the container. One or more handles are secured to a second end of one or more wall panels and a closure mechanism is provided for closing a portion of the second end of one or more of the wall panels around the firewood in the container. The container is a reusable container.

The present disclosure generally relates to containers for sale, storage and transport of bundles of firewood or other goods, and particularly relates to a reusable, open mesh container having a rectangular shape for the firewood or other goods carried therein.
Small bundles of firewood are typically packaged in mesh bags or wrapped in plastic sheeting for transport and retail sale. Such mesh bags are formed from a polymer mesh and are sealed at both ends with firewood secured therein. These bags are not openable without destruction of the bag. Bundles of firewood may also be sealed or wrapped in plastic sheet wrap.
Other forms of known firewood carriers include a mesh sling with an open top and two handles formed from the ends of the mesh sling, adjacent the top, and canvas or fabric-type slings with open ends, having two handles extending from the top.
Plastic mesh packaging is desired for sale, transport and storage of firewood because it is strong and allows the firewood stored therein to "breathe," thereby avoiding the possibility for the retention of water in the wood. The wood thus is more resistant to mold or rot when sold, transported and/or stored in mesh, or breathable, packaging. Wrapping firewood in plastic sheeting allows for moisture retention by the wood within the plastic.
When a handle is added to such a plastic wrap firewood package, the handle is often attached directly to the wood retained therein, with the handle being secured directly to wood within the package by nails or staples driven through the handle ends and into the wood. This adds to the inconvenience of separating the wood from such packaging. The lack of ergonomically designed handles on plastic mesh bags of firewood makes them difficult to hold and carry.
In addition, the lack of defined form that the known packaging provides to the firewood bundle makes stacking those firewood packages problematic, both from a stability standpoint, and from an efficiency standpoint. Each mesh bag secured small firewood bundle takes on a non-standard shape. This makes palletizing such misshapen firewood packaging problematic, as each pallet takes on its own three-dimensional form and requires further packaging constraints for holding the packages on the pallet, either using plastic wrap or other means. This further adds to the packaging cost of the product and, in the case of using plastic sheeting wrap, may cause undesirable moisture retention in the wood product. For shipping, it is always undesirable to "ship air" and thus the most desirable packaging eliminates air pockets and spaces between packages. Small bundles of packaged firewood that are not uniform in shape and size result in inefficient shipping practices and dimensional instability of the shipped firewood packages.


Plutonium, strontium, and cesium found in aqueous waste solutions resulting from nuclear fuel processing are removed by contacting the waste solutions with synthetic zeolite incorporating up to about 5 wt % titanium as sodium titanate in an ion exchange system. More than 99.9% of the plutonium, strontium, and cesium are removed from the waste solutions.

Commercial reprocessing of nuclear reactor fuels results in high-level waste (HLW) which is stored in tanks. The waste must be eventually removed from the tanks and solidified in a form suitable for transportation to a federal repository for final disposition.
The HLW in the tanks typically contains plutonium and other transuranic (TRU) elements in two fractions: an alkaline waste (supernatant) solution, and a sludge layer of iron hydroxide and fission product solids. This alkaline waste solution is first treated to remove .sup.137 Cs by passing a water-diluted solution through a series of ion exchange columns containing aluminosilicate ion exchanger. The resulting effluent is mixed with concrete and stored as low-level waste (LLW).
The TRU content of alkaline supernatant waste stored in tanks at West Valley Nuclear Services Co. (hereinafter West Valley or WV) is approximately 49 nanocuries per gram (nCi/g), and after the above described treatment the content is about 21 nCi/g. It is desired to reduce the TRU content to 10 nCi/g or less. A proposed treatment process for the sludge fraction of stored HLW involves washing with at least 4 batch contacts of water to remove excess sodium sulfate, then to mix with glass formers and vitrify into a final HLW form. The sludge wash solutions will also be processed by ion exchange to recover .sup.137 Cs.
In previous studies, however, it was found that 20% of the plutonium and 95% of the uranium in the sludge transferred to the water phase during washing. These values were substantially reduced by washing with pH 12.5 water, but the plutonium content still represented about 5% of the soluble plutonium, exceeding the required maximum actinide content in the concrete waste form (<100 nCi/g of waste). A method for plutonium removal from sludge water washes was required.
The ion exchange process for recovery of .sup.137 Cs at WV has utilized the inorganic ion exchanger IE-96, a synthetic zeolite available from UOP. This material has been used for cesium recovery because of its high ion exchange capacity and decontamination factor (DF) values (>40,000), and because it can be incorporated with glass formers and washed sludge to form borosilicate glass.
Previous studies by the inventors of the present invention showed that the IE-96 zeolite ion exchanger, when treated with a solution of titanium [4+] salt of isopropoxy [triethanolaminato] dissolved in isopropyl alcohol, extracts traces of plutonium from the WV alkaline wastes. However, use of this material has not been further considered based on safety considerations (volatile organics) and the need for a simple and reproducible large-scale preparation process.

Method for aqueous radioactive waste treatment


The present invention provides a scheduler capable of maximizing aggregate throughput while achieving controlled amount of fairness among users and meeting Quality of Service (QoS) requirements. The scheduler is configured to select the next unit of data to transmit from multiple queues associated with access terminals waiting to receive the data. For each access terminal, a weighting factor is calculated based on a temporal fading factor, a throughput fairness factor, and a delay QoS factor. The unit selected for transmission corresponds to the access terminal having the greatest overall weighting factor. The process repeats for each unit being transmitted.

Wireless communication networks that allocate communication resources, such as time or frequency, require a scheduler to select data to be transmitted. When multiple users are vying for these resources, the scheduler must analyze the incoming data and determine the data having the highest priority for transmission. Priority has traditionally been based on maximizing overall system throughput or maintaining a certain Quality of Service (QoS) level to ensure data is transmitted in a timely fashion. When maximizing throughput, users having better channel conditions are favored over those with worse channel conditions. Thus, the users with the less favorable channel conditions are always given less priority unless time-sensitive data is discovered.
QoS analysis has been provided in existing systems but in a limited manner, for example, by processing only the section of the data that is ready for transmission or utilizing the buffer size. Normally, incoming data is buffered in queues corresponding to the user. If the QoS analysis only encompasses the section of data that is ready for transmission and not the entire queue, the remaining data in the queue does not affect priority. Thus, the scheduler cannot address urgent packets until they are ready for transmission, which results in QoS failures and inefficiencies. On the other hand, a large buffer size does not necessarily mean that all the packets in the buffer are urgent. These failures and inefficiencies typically further impact those users with less favorable channel conditions.
There have been some schemes to achieve a fixed level of fairness and maximize throughput. However, they lack: (a) the ability to control the fairness, including unfairness among users, (b) delay guarantee measures and (c) the ability to consider adequate information for data in the queue. Wireless network operators may want to control the amount of fairness in their systems. Given the inherent fixed level of fairness of the present schedulers, there is a need for a scheduler capable of maximizing the aggregate throughput, achieve the desired level of fairness among users and, at the same time, meet QoS requirements.

Scheduler with fairness control and quality of service support


A content recommendation system including a step which selects some from a plenty of music compositions in accordance with attribute conditions successively generated, a step which further selects a part or all of the selected music compositions in accordance with the similarity degree between the feature vector of each of the selected music compositions and the user preference vector, and a step which presents the selected music composition to the user.

In recent years, a user can enjoy a desired content chosen from among an enormous number of contents using a communication network such as the Internet. Since there are an enormous number of available contents, various kinds of recommendation techniques have been suggested. For example, a technique for calculating a degree of similarity between a preference vector representing a feature of the content preferred by an user, and a feature vector of each of contents while recommending the user the content with the high degree of similarity, so called content-based filtering is one of the examples (see Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2001-160955).

Content recommendation system, content recommendation method, content recommendation apparatus, program, and information storage medium