A shipping base for washers, dryers, and the like appliances. The base is in the form of a frame having top surfaces of outer parts thereof which are set relatively lower than the top surfaces of relative inner portions of the frame. Sockets are provided at the corners, to grip and receive the feet of the appliance. The sockets having radial ribs that deflect to grip the feet of the appliance.

Household appliances, such as washing machines, dryers and the like, need to be delivered from the factory, to the store and to the customer in an undamaged condition. Such appliances are typically large, bulky and/or heavy. The exterior of such appliances commonly consists of a skin of metal panels that, for reasons of weight and economy, are not particularly robust. Also, such appliances often have exposed operable parts or connectors. The positioning of these elements and/or their proximity to the outer periphery of the appliance may place them at risk of damage during shipment and delivery. Delivery of a damaged or inoperable appliance can have a significant effect on customer satisfaction with a brand or a retailer. Even superficial damage to the exterior panels can easily render the appliance unacceptable to the customer and ultimately saleable only at an extremely reduced price. It is therefore desirable to provide for the support and protection of the appliance during shipping and delivery so as to avoid structural and cosmetic damage.
Appliances are sometimes shipped mounted on a base or pallet, which supports the bottom end and which is often slightly larger than the appliance itself. The base is designed to be handled mechanically, such as by a forklift, hand truck or the like. The base serves to protect the appliance by providing a relatively rigid and stable support or engagement surface. When being moved, the lifting mechanism will engage the base, typically without engaging the appliance itself.
One example of a prior shipping base, which was proposed for use with large appliances, is shown in FIGS. 10 and 11 of the drawings. The construction of this shipping base 10 has a relatively flat top 12, and has at each corner a circular socket 14 defining a well for placement of an adjustable leveling foot of the type typically provided at each corner of the appliance (not shown). Each socket 14 has four, essentially rigid, vertical ribs 16, which project radially inward into the well of the socket 14 and which are essentially rigid in use. The ribs are merely used to center the position of the appliance foot within the shipping base and do not assist in maintaining the base attached to the appliance. At the upper rim of the socket 14 are provided four rigid hooks 18 which are intended to retain the foot of the appliance within the well. The base embodiment shown in FIGS. 10 and 11 is made of plastic and formed by injection molding.
Other constructions of shipping bases are known. Such shipping bases are often made of wood and are mechanically attached to the bottom of the appliance by means of screws, bolts or the like. The fasteners for wooden frames are typically secured either to the internal framing of the appliance or to the lower edge of the outer skin panels.


A magnetic disc medium according to an aspect of the present invention includes: a preamble part in a servo area of each of sectors obtained by dividing a surface of the medium in a circumference direction, the preamble part including strip-shaped patterns formed of a plurality of magnetic materials, and each of the strip-shaped patterns formed of the magnetic materials being divided by non-magnetic materials at periodic intervals.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a magnetic disk medium, a reticle for reduction exposure used when manufacturing the magnetic disk medium, and a magnetic recording and reproducing apparatus.
2. Related Art
In the magnetic recording apparatus, magnetic disk apparatus and hard disk drive apparatus, there is a problem that magnetic information recorded by a recording and reproducing head which moves relatively on a magnetic disk medium is apt to exert bad influence upon recording on adjacent tracks because of heat fluctuation, as the recording density on the magnetic disk medium increases with an increase in capacity. Against this problem, it is possible to use means for eliminating the above-described bad influence by physically separating magnetic materials in adjacent tracks included in the magnetic medium. Magnetic disk media thus including magnetic materials each having a shape of a recording track or a recording bit, or magnetic disk media having patterns in which a magnetic material is divided by non-magnetic materials are called patterned media. Since tracks are divided, the media are called discrete tracks as well sometimes. (For example, see U.S. Pat. No. 6,563,673 and JP-A 2004-110896(KOKAI).)
As for a technique for working on magnetic materials of such patterned media, a magnetic disk medium can be generated by drawing desired magnetic material patterns on an original disk by means of, for example, an original disk drawing system, generating an imprint stamper, and utilizing a nano-imprint method using the imprint stamper (see, for example, JP-A 2003-157520(KOKAI)). In fabrication of the original disk, its patterns can be formed by exposing a photosensitive resin to chemical rays such as a mercury lamp, ultraviolet rays, an electron beam or X-rays. In particular, a technique of irradiating directly an electron beam is desirable to form magnetic disk patterns which need fine pattern drawing in order to achieve a high recording density.
For example, if an original disk is fabricated by conducting EB (Electron Beam) irradiating on a positive type resist film, exposed parts become concave parts after development. If this original disk is electroformed to form a stamper, the exposed parts become convex parts. Therefore, an exposed discrete track groove becomes a convex arc when a stamper is formed. In addition, convex parts on the stamper surface are transformed to concave parts on a resist film by a nano-imprint process. In subsequent etching processing, a magnetic film or a substrate on a medium provided under the concave parts is etched. As a result, patterns of magnetic materials and non-magnetic materials or uneven patterns of magnetic materials are formed on the surface of the magnetic disk medium.
When conducting recording or reproducing on the magnetic disk medium by using a magnetic recording and reproducing head, recording or reproducing is conducted on a desired position on the medium surface by relatively moving the magnetic recording and reproducing head on the surface of the magnetic disk medium.
In order to move the recording and reproducing head to a desired position on the magnetic disk medium, a positioning servo area is present on the magnetic disk medium. At the time of recording or reproducing, a position of the recording and reproducing head on the magnetic disk medium is grasped on the basis of a position signal obtained from a reproducing head when the recording and reproducing head crosses the servo area. The recording and reproducing apparatus controls the position on the basis of the obtained position information, and moves the recording head as far as a desired recording position.
In the patterned media, it is desirable to generate a signal in the servo area collectively together with a data area as magnetic material patterns from the viewpoint of holding down the cost when fabricating the medium and obtaining a high position precision by generating the servo positioning signal and the recording patterns collectively.
The magnetic pattern shape in the servo area used in ordinary HDDs (hard disk drives) will now be described. The servo area includes at least a preamble area, an address area and a positioning burst area (or a burst area).
The preamble area functions to adjust an amplification factor of a signal amplifier and make the amplitude constant before reading out servo data. The preamble area precedes the address area and the positioning burst area in the servo area along the head sweeping direction. The preamble area is formed of a plurality of linear patterns which cross the track direction, so as to obtain a similar signal no matter which track position the head lies in.
The address area has information of a track number and a sector number, and the address area indicates a track position in which the head lies. Address information is written in the Gray code so as to make it possible to read data even if the head shifts to an adjacent track during seeking.
The burst area has a structure in which two or more pattern areas are arranged in the track direction. In each of the pattern areas, magnetic patterns are arranged at equal intervals in a direction crossing the tracks. A signal supplied from the burst area has deviation information in the track of the head position.
When conducting recording or reproducing on the patterned medium by using a floating head, an air flow between the head and the medium exerts great influence on the floating stability of the head. When generating a preamble signal by using a patterned medium, a recording area has uneven groove patterns which are parallel to the tracks whereas the preamble patterns are uneven groove patterns which cross the tracks. When the head moves from the recording area to the servo area at the time of recording and reproducing, the medium shape under the head passes from the uneven groove patterns parallel to the track direction to the uneven groove patterns crossing the tracks, the air flow right under the head varies, and the floating stability of the head is lost. Grooves between tracks generate a streamline flow in the circumferential direction, different external forces are given to the left and right of the head, and the floating stability of the head is hampered. Because of them, there is a problem that the head cannot read the servo signal or the data signal properly.
On the other hand, when the original disk is exposed to an electron beam, there is a precision error of the drawing position in the electron beam lithography system. When drawing fine patterns required for high recording density, pattern collapse caused by an error in the drawing precision occurs. As one of techniques for solving this problem, reduction projection exposure using a reticle can be used.
Even if there is position fluctuation to some degree in the patterns on the reticle, the magnitude of the fluctuation is also reduced by the reduction projection. Use of the electron beam reduction exposure brings about such an advantage.
As main electron beam reduction projection exposure techniques, the SCALPEL (Scattering with Angular Limitation in Projection Electron Lithography) technique described in S.D. Berger et al., Applied Physics Letters, 57, 153(1990) and the PREVAIL (Projection Exposure with Variable Axis Immersion Lens) technique described in Japanese Patent No. 2829942 can be mentioned. As masks used in these techniques, there are the stencil type and membrane type. When the stencil mask is used, the electron beam is passed through opening parts, and scattered at non-opening parts. The membrane mask includes a membrane formed of a light element through which the electron beam is transmitted easily, and a heavy metal pattern layer formed on the membrane to scatter the electron beam. As the membrane, silicon, a silicon nitride film or the like is used. As the pattern part, chromium (Cr), tungsten (W) or the like is used.
Since the opening part through which the beam of the stencil mask is transmitted pierces, low scattering or chromatic aberration does not occur unlike the membrane mask. Since an omission occurs in the toroidal patterns because of its structure, however, masking cannot be conducted. Therefore, a complementary mask is used, and a technique of coping with the problem by conducting exposure a plurality of times is used. Such coping poses a problem in position alignment and throughput. Furthermore, cantilever patterns and long and narrow patterns are apt to become low in mechanical strength and be broken. On the other hand, the membrane mask can be formed in the toroidal patterns as well, because there is the membrane part. However, the toroidal patterns and the cantilever patterns tend to become weak in mechanical strength in the same way. Furthermore, in the membrane mask, low scattering is caused even it is slight when the electron beam is transmitted through the membrane, resulting in a drawback of occurrence of chromatic aberration.
When attempting collective projection exposure on preamble patterns in patterned media, it is necessary to prepare a mask having openings of a plurality of parallel continuous strip-shaped pattern portions. However, such slender openings have a problem that mask flexion causes optical hindrance in projection and the mask strength becomes weak.
In the patterned media, the floating stability of the magnetic recording and reproducing head poses a problem as described above.
In addition, in the reduction projection exposure process used when fabricating a patterned medium, there is a problem in strength of long and narrow patterns such as the preamble part of the reticle for exposure.

Magnetic disk medium, reticle and magnetic recording and reproducing apparatus


A method for controlling flows of a logical link layer in a near field communication (NFC) software stack includes steps of: arranging a Send Window and a Receive Window in the logical link layer for controlling flows of transmitted data frames; adjusting the size of the Send Window and the size of the Receive Window according to a transfer rate determined based on upper-layer application, communication delay time determined based on channel quality, and the size of a data frame; and controlling flows of the output terminal according to the size of the Send Window, and controlling flows of the input terminal according to the size of the Receive Window.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of wireless communication technology, and more particularly, to a method for controlling flows of a logical link layer in near field communication (NFC) software stack.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Contactless radio frequency identification (RFID) technology and interconnection and intercommunication technology are integrated and the NFC technology is produced. To improve development and popularity of the NFC technology, an NFC forum is organized by the industry. The NFC forum defines the NFC protocol system where the NFC software stack is a middleware for supporting applying development in the upper layer and for operating an NFC controller in the lower layer. A data connecting layer is arranged in the NFC software stack. The data connecting layer is basically used for transferring transparent and reliable data to a user of its layer. In addition, the data connecting layer is used for framing, error correction, conservation, and flow control.
A traditional NFC Forum Logical Link Protocol does not regulate the size of a Receive Window; instead, the size of the Receive Window is recommended to be zero to 15 in the Protocol. The NFC Protocol has a physical layer, which is a wireless communication protocol, and the physical layer tends to make troubles. The smaller the Receive Window is, the larger the bandwidth needs. The Logical Link Protocol is a Peer to Peer (P2P) business service. This kind of business service has a larger amount of data and a larger corresponding data frame. Thus, a larger buffer zone is required when the size of the Receive Window is much larger. However, the NFC software stack works in an embedded environment, so memory resource of the NFC software stack is relatively limited. Once the buffer zone becomes larger, the performance of the system will be affected.
In addition, a plurality of NFC controller chips support the P2P application only in the passive mode. The mode is a half-duplex working mode, which means that the actions "send" and "receive" take turns. If the size of the Send Window and the size of the Receive Window are too large, one of the communicators is in state of sending and resending all the time, and the other is deprived of sending time, resulting in the struggle between unbalance of bandwidth utilization and consumption of memory resource.
Therefore, the conventional technology has room to be improved.

Method for controlling flows of logical link layer in near field communication software stack

HUIZHOU TCL MOBILE COMMUNICATION CO., LTD.


A point sampling method for improving the images produced by a computer graphics system which uses quality measures together with a hill-climbing technique to generate an optimal rook placement of sample points. Two quality measures are used, the root-mean-square (rms) transition error and the maximal circle size. To derive the optimal rook placement, points are placed initially in any rook placement, such as along the diagonal of the pixel. New rook placements are generated by interchanging the x-coordinates of any pair of points. The optimal placement is determined by in a sequence of steps. At each step, all possible pair interchanges are tested by computing the quality measure for each of the possible interchanges. After all are evaluated, the sequence is concluded by making the interchange that provided the most improvement in the quality measure. The point placement after each interchange is used as the basis for the next step in the process. Each step follows the same procedure until no interchange improves the quality measure, or until the quality measure fails to be improved by at least a predetermined small increment.

Computer graphic systems and real time simulation visual systems construct images of visual scenes. Each image is a rectangular array of pixels, and each pixel represents a small, typically square, region to which a single color or shade of gray is assigned.
Approximating a scene by an array of pixels can result in artifacts that degrade the quality of the resultant image. An important class of these artifacts is called "aliasing effects" , and these effects are commonly known in the computer graphics industry. Aliasing effects result from selecting the wrong color to approximate a pixel due to incorrect sampling of the underlying image.
For example, a pixel area that corresponds to a region that is half white and half black should be approximated as being uniformly gray. Aliasing results if the pixel is colored entirely black or entirely white due to a failure to correctly sample and combine the underlying black and white regions.
Anti-aliasing is the process of reducing the undesirable effects of aliasing. Most methods rely upon "point sampling" , which is the class of methods that involve computing discrete values of both color and intensity within each pixel of an image and, then, combining the samples into values to be displayed for each pixel. The quality of point sampling depends critically upon how the sample points are positioned within the pixel.
A text entitled Principles of Interactive Computer Graphics by Newman/Sproull (McGraw-Hill, 1979, 2nd Edition) provides an overview of the techniques. An article entitled Spectrally Optimal Sampling for Distribution Ray Tracing by Don P. Mitchell (Proceedings of SIGGRAPH '91 in Computer Graphics, 25, 4 of Jul. 1991, ACM SIGGRAPH, New York, 1991, pp. 157-162) provides a more specialized treatment.
Sample point positions are used for occlusion masks (or coverage masks). An "occlusion mask" is a means of summarizing which sample points in a pixel have been covered by one or more graphics primitives while rendering a computer graphics image.
Occlusion masks are used in several different ways in computer graphics systems, but all of the uses relate to improving the quality of the image by keeping track of pixel coverage at a sub-pixel level. Some computer graphics systems write objects into a frame buffer in reverse order of occlusion, i.e., the nearest objects are written first.
Occlusion masks are used also with z-buffering systems. An occlusion mask for a computer graphics system is a bit-map, wherein each bit represents each point in an array of points constrained within a rectangular boundary.
Because point sampling is used for both anti-aliasing and sub-pixel occlusion in a great variety of computer graphics systems, and because the image quality depends directly on the positions of the sample points, the method of point sampling is very important. The problem of finding a good method for selecting point samples is deceptively difficult.
One approach is to put the sample points in a rectangular array. Another approach is to place them at random in the pixel. Both of these approaches have strong drawbacks that degrade image quality.
Arranging sample points in a grid allows a small motion of a polygon between images in a sequence to cover an entire row, column, or diagonal of sample points. Thus, for example, if 16 points are placed in a 4 .times.4 array, for many cases the result will only be as good as if four points were used.
The array is effective in covering small polygons. However, this advantage is strongly outweighed by the disadvantage of polygon edges covering a whole line of point samples at one time.
Placing points at random (or when a computer does the placement by a repeatable but apparently random process, pseudo-randomly), allows some placements to be quite poor, because points can be placed close together. A variation of random placement is to protect each sample with a region, a so-called Poisson Disk, within which no other point can be placed.
The Poisson Disk method does not work if the disks are too large, because placement becomes impossible. However, if the disks are small enough to ensure placement, the disadvantages of random placement reappear.
Another variation of random placement is a method by Cook et al. (U.S. Pat. No. 5,025,400) which is to use sample points that are pseudo-randomly distributed, and the best placement is selected by reference to the spectrum of the sampling frequency. A limitation of this method is that it does not guarantee optimal sampling in the horizontal and vertical directions.
Images typically have many horizontal and vertical edges corresponding to edges of buildings and other man-made structures, the horizon, and other features. Failure to treat horizontal and vertical edges well is a limitation of sampling with a grid and with many methods.
Yet another class of methods, known as rook placement, does guarantee optimal horizontal and vertical sampling. This method is named by analogy to rooks on a chessboard. Eight rooks can be placed on a chessboard so that no two are in the same row or column.
Similarly, "N" sample points can be placed at points within one N .times.N grid within a pixel so that no two are in the same row and column. For example, one rook placement is to put all N samples on the diagonal of the N .times.N grid.
Diagonal placement, like all rook placements, ensures N equally spaced horizontal and vertical samples. However, diagonal placement also is very poor placement for most other cases; polygon edges that happen to fall nearly parallel to the sampled diagonal receive little or no anti-aliasing.
While the rook placement concept has long been known to have great potential as a point sampling method, the problem of selecting specific rook placements has remained unsolved to this day. An overview of the problem is given by Mitchell in the 1991 SIGGRAPH paper, supra. Mitchell cites earlier work by Cook and by Shirley leading up to sampling arrangements in which a pixel is subdivided into an N .times.N mesh, with N points placed in block centers so that no two are in the same row or column.
Mitchell goes on to say, "There seems to remain an important piece of unfinished business. We really do not know much about what constitutes a good sampling design versus a bad one."

Method for point sampling in computer graphics systems


A semiconductor package includes: a core structure having first and second surfaces and having first and second through-holes; a first semiconductor chip embedded in the core structure and having first and second contacts disposed on two opposing surfaces thereof, respectively; a first wiring layer on the surface of the core structure and connected to the first contact; a second wiring layer on the second surface of the core structure and connected to the second contact; a chip antenna disposed in the first through-hole; a second semiconductor chip in the second through-hole and having a connection pad; a first redistribution layer on the first surface of the core structure and connected to the connection terminal, the connection pad, and the first wiring layer; an encapsulant encapsulating the chip antenna and the second semiconductor chip; and a second redistribution layer on the encapsulant connecting to the second wiring layer.

One important factor to consider when designing modules of various forms, such as in smartphones and various automotive components, pertains to integrating various components serving various functions (for example, integrated circuit chips, sensors, passive components, etc.) while reducing the sizes thereof.
Since components including various semiconductor chips are typically unable to afford sufficient mounting space inside a single module, when such components are connected to the surface of a mainboard, it may be difficult to miniaturize modules, while an electrical loss is likely to arise due to extended signal paths between the components. Particularly, semiconductor chips, such as power IC chips that require double-sided connection circuit for connecting contacts disposed on opposing surfaces of the chips, tend to require complicated electrical connections, thus creating an immense challenge to miniaturize package structures.


A collapsible pneumatically operated ambulance cot having a support frame, a wheeled base, a support mechanism disposed therebetween, and a lift mechanism for pneumatically moving the upper frame relative to the lower frame is disclosed. The lift mechanism permits a single attendant to raise the cot from a lowered position to a raised position, and an infinite number of positions therebetween, and to raise the wheeled base relative to the support frame to situate the cot onto an elevated surface such as the transport deck of an ambulance.

In order to situate a conventional non-powered ambulance cot into the back of an ambulance, two or more attendants often must lift the cot from a relatively low height of approximately 15 cm from the ground to a height of almost 1 meter. Unfortunately, lifting or raising a loaded ambulance cot from this low height increases the risk to these attendants obtaining a back injury or exacerbating an existing one. Accordingly, providing a power lift ambulance cot for emergency medical services and ambulance-related services that reduces the physical strain of raising and lowering a loaded ambulance cot is desirable. Such a powered cot would reduce work related injuries and reduce the amount of lost work time as well as therapeutic costs.

Pneumatically powered lift ambulance cot


A "roofshooter" pagewidth printhead for use in a thermal ink jet printing device is fabricated by forming a plurality of subunits, each being produced by bonding a heater substrate having an architecture including an array of heater elements and an etched ink feed slot to a secondary substrate having a series of spaced feed hole openings to form a combined substrate in which said series of spaced feed hole openings communicates with said ink feed slot, and dicing said combined substrates through said ink feed slot to form a subunit. An array of butted subunits having a length equal to one pagewidth is formed by butting one of said subunits against an adjacent subunit. The array of butted subunits is bonded to a pagewidth support substrate. The secondary substrate provides an integral support structure for maintaining the alignment of the heater plate which, if diced through the feed hole without the secondary substrate, would separate into individual pieces, thereby complicating the alignment and assembly process.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to methods of fabricating thermal ink jet printheads, and particularly to methods of fabricating pagewidth "roofshooter" printheads from an array of silicon wafer subunits (or chips).
2. Description of the Related Art
Generally speaking, drop-on-demand ink jet printing systems can be divided into two types; one type using a piezoelectric transducer to produce a pressure pulse that expels a droplet from a nozzle; or another type using thermal energy to produce a vapor bubble in an ink filled channel that expels a drop.
Thermal ink jet printing systems use thermal energy selectively produced by resistors located in capillary filled ink channels near channel terminating nozzles or orifices to vaporize momentarily the ink and form bubbles on demand. Each temporary bubble expels an ink droplet and propels it towards a recording medium. The printing system may be incorporated in either a carriage type printer or a pagewidth type printer. The carriage type printer generally has a relatively small printhead, containing the ink channels and nozzles. The printhead is usually sealingly attached to a disposable ink supply cartridge and the combined printhead and cartridge assembly is reciprocated to print one swath of information at a time on a stationarily held recording medium, such as paper. After the swath is printed, the paper is stepped a distance equal to the height of the printed swath, so that the next printed swath will be contiguous therewith. The procedure is repeated until the entire page is printed. For an example of a cartridge type printer, refer to U.S. Pat. No. 4,571,599 to Rezanka. In contrast, the page width printer has a stationary printhead having a length equal to or greater than the width of the paper. The paper is continually moved past the pagewidth printhead in a direction normal to the printhead length and at a constant speed during the printing process. Refer to U.S. Pat. No. 4,463,359 to Ayata et al for an example of pagewidth printing and especially FIGS. 17 and 20 therein.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,463,359 mentioned above discloses a printhead having one or more ink filled channels which are replenished by capillary action. A meniscus is formed at each nozzle to prevent ink from weeping therefrom. A resistor or heater is located in each channel upstream from the nozzles. Current pulses representative of data signals are applied to the resistors to momentarily vaporize the ink in contact therewith and form a bubble for each current pulse. Ink droplets are expelled from each nozzle from the growth of the bubbles which causes a quantity of ink to bulge from the nozzle and break off into a droplet at the beginning of the bubble collapse. The current pulses are shaped to prevent the meniscus from breaking up and receding too far into the channels, after each droplet is expelled. Various embodiments of linear arrays of thermal ink jet print devices are shown, such as those having staggered linear arrays attached to the top and bottom of a heat sinking substrate for the purpose of obtaining a pagewidth printhead. Such arrangements may also be used for different colored inks to enable multi-colored printing.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,789,425 to Drake et al (the disclosure of which is herein incorporated by reference) discloses a thermal ink jet printhead of the type which expels droplets on demand towards a recording medium from nozzles located above and generally parallel with the bubble generating heating elements contained therein. The droplets are propelled from nozzles located in the printhead roof along trajectories that are perpendicular to the heating element surfaces. Such configurations are sometimes referred to as "roofshooter" printheads.
For example, as illustrated in the isomeric view of the printhead 10 in FIG. 1 hereto, arrows 11 depict the trajectory of ink droplet 13 emitted from nozzles 12. The printhead 10 includes a structural member 14 permanently attached to a heater plate or substrate 28 containing an etched opening or feed slot 20 (shown in phantom) which when mated to the structural member 14, forms an ink reservoir or manifold. The cross-sectional view of the printhead 10 in FIG. 2 taken along lines II--II of FIG. 1 illustrates the ink flow path from the feed slot 20 in the heater plate 28 through the nozzles 12 in the roof 24. The ink flows into a channelled recess 18 defined by a cavity wall 22 and channel walls 17 between the roof 24 and heater plate 28, and then passes over a heating element 34 with its addressing electrode 33 and common return 35 before exiting through the nozzle 12. The plan view of the printhead (FIG. 3; taken along lines III--III of FIG. 1) illustrates the recess 18 having four channel walls 17 which produce three ink channels communicating between the nozzles 12 (shown in phantom because they are in the roof 24) and the feed slot 20. (It is understood that a true view along the lines III--III would show a heating element and associated ink channel density of 300 per inch (25 mm) or more, the reduced number being shown here for clarity.)
Drop on demand thermal ink jet printheads as discussed above are fabricated by using silicon wafers and processing technology to make multiple small heater plates and channel plates. This works extremely well for small printheads. However, for large arrays or pagewidth printheads, a monolithic array of ink channels or heater elements cannot be practically fabricated in a single wafer since the maximum commercial wafer size is generally six inches. Even if ten inch wafers were commercially available, it is not clear that a monolithic channel array or heater array would be very feasible. This is because one defective channel or heating element out of 2,550 channels or heating elements would render the entire channel or heater plate useless. This yield problem is aggravated by the fact that the larger the silicon ingot diameter, the more difficult it is to make it defect free. Also, relatively few 81/2 inch channel plates or heater plate arrays could be fabricated in a 10 inch wafer. Most of the wafer would be thrown away, resulting in very high fabrication costs.
To obviate this problem, it is proposed to create a pagewidth printhead by forming an array of roofshooter subunits butted together to form the pagewidth array. However, in order to produce high quality characters with ink jet printers it is essential to provide a printhead with a high density of precisely aligned nozzles so that each subunit in a pagewidth array must be precisely located relative to an adjacent subunit. As can be seen from FIG. 4A which schematically illustrates only the heater plate 28 of FIG. 3 with the heating element 34, electrode 33 and the feed slot 20, in order to provide a high density arrangement of nozzles on a roofshooter pagewidth printhead, the best location for dicing each heater plate (designated a--a and a'--a') intersects the feed slot 20 causing the heater plate to become two separate pieces 28A, 28B (as illustrated in FIG. 4B) which are difficult to realign with each other, or with the roof 24 to construct the roofshooter printhead. One solution to this problem could be to break up the feed slot into a number of smaller slots F.sub.1, F.sub.2, F.sub.3 as shown in FIG. 5. However, the geometry of anisotropic silicon etching causes the slots to be separated by a minimum of 29 mils at the level of the heater elements 34. This amount of separation is unacceptable because it would be difficult to ensure that ink would flow to the heater elements 34' located between the slots since the fluid feed resistance of the heater elements 34' between slots will likely be substantially greater than that of heater elements 34 adjacent to a slot.
Another difficulty in designing a buttable printhead subunit lies in the fact that it is difficult to make electrical connections to the printhead at the same density as the transducer array. For example, it is possible to make thermal ink jet heater and nozzle arrays at a resolution density of 600 elements per inch. However, typical production wire bond densities are limited to about 100 elements per inch. For small arrays, a limited number of heaters can be directly addressed by fanning out the addressing electrode lines to provide for a lower bonding pad density as shown in FIG. 10. However, this technique consumes more silicon area than is required by the transducer array, and it is not possible to use this design with a large continuous array of buttable printhead subunits.

Buttable subunits for pagewidth "Roofshooter" printheads


The present invention relates to a method for indicating an electric discharge in a non-conducting medium (22) between a rolling element (20) and a raceway (16, 18) in a bearing (12) of an electric drive system (10). The method comprises: remotely detecting radio frequency signals emitted from the electric drive system, which signals comprise a radio frequency signal associated with an electrical discharge in the non-conducting medium, processing the detected radio frequency signals to estimate the electric discharge, and indicating the estimated electric discharge. The present invention also relates to a corresponding device (30, 50, 70, 90) for indicating an electric discharge in a non-conducting medium between a rolling element and a raceway in a bearing of an electric drive system.

The operation of electric drive systems, especially AC systems such as an AC motor or a generator or a driven unit connected to an AC motor, is often hampered by so-called bearing currents. In motors, the internal voltage division of the common mode voltage over the internal stray capacitances of the motor may cause shaft voltages high enough to create high frequency bearing current pulses. This can happen if the shaft is not earthed via the driven machinery while the motor frame is earthed in the standard way for protection. The bearing current pulses, namely electric discharges taking place in the lubricating oil film between the ball and the races of the bearing, cause erosion of the race. As a result, the bearing may need replacing after only a short time in service. This issue is addressed in for example the document 'Technical Guide No. 5—Bearing Currents in Modern AC Drive Systems', ABB Automation Group Ltd., 1999, as well as the document WO2005/034314.
Of course, it is essential to be able to detect and/or measure the bearing currents in order to prevent the bearings of an electric drive system from breaking down and to take measures for avoiding the bearing currents. In the above mentioned document from ABB Automation Group Ltd., it is suggested to measure bearing currents using a specially designed, flexible, air-cored, Rogowski-type current sensor, which sensor is used to measure the current directly at certain measurement points within an AC motor. However, a drawback with this solution is that in order to reach the required measurement points within the AC motor, the AC motor has to be stopped and/or at least partly dismantled, which is cumbersome and time consuming and has to be carried out by experienced and dedicated personnel.

Method and device for indicating an electric discharge inside a bearing of an electric drive system


A wheel adapter to convert a storage container to a wheeled storage container is provided. The wheel adapter comprises a mounting bracket attachable to the storage container. The mounting bracket comprises a first leg configured to engage a bottom surface of the storage container, and a second leg configured to engage a side surface of the storage container. The second leg comprises a wheel coupling. The wheel adapter also includes a wheel rotatably connected to the wheel coupling. The wheel is constructed and arranged for rotation about an axis to provide rolling support of the storage container on the ground.

Food coolers (coolers) may be used to keep perishable foods items cool or cold during outdoor activities, such as hiking, camping and/or hunting. It may be desirable to bring the coolers (full of food) to areas where the coolers will have to be transported by hand. However, many coolers are constructed using heavy durable materials with thick layers of insulation, making the coolers heavy and cumbersome to carry, particularly when full of food items.
Placing the cooler on a dolly takes time, requires the additional transportation of the dolly and allows the cooler to slide off of the dolly in rough conditions such as those often encountered during such activities as hiking, camping and/or hunting.
Traditional methods of attaching wheels to a cooler are not robust enough and may allow the wheels to break off of the cooler and/or the methods do not allow the cooler to safely sit on a flat surface without sliding or scratching the surface when the wheels are not in use.
Thus, what is needed is a system and a method for improving the mobility of the cooler or storage container.

Wheel adapter to convert a storage container to a wheeled storage container


An improved steel cable lock includes of a steel cable, a lock body provided with a lock hole at one side thereof, and a buckle rod provided with an embed rod at one end thereof. The feature of the improved steel cable lock has one end of steel is circled with split ring which is fastened by a steel cable piece. The rod body of buckle rod is run through a hole at the both sides. In addition, at the top end of rod body is protruded with two relative interval fix pieces. Between the two fix pieces have an embed trough providing the rear end of embed rod to insert in then pivoting with the bolt. Another end of the steel cable extends through the hole in the buckle rod and is received by a sheath tube affixed to the lock body. Thus, the lock body and buckle rod can revolve on the steel cable and the buckle rod can move adjustable between the both ends of steel cable, the embed rod of buckle rod can revolve also.

As shown in FIG. 1, the conventional steel cable lock is comprised of a steel cable 10 which connected with a buckle rod 11 and a lock body 12 at both ends thereof. Since the steel cable lock only extends between the buckle rod 11 and the lock body 12, it is therefore just able to lock around the goods that are being locked. Such in design is not able to be properly locked and is limited by the type, model, distance and space of the goods. In addition, after the steel cable 10 is put around on the locked goods, the buckle rod 11 and the lock body 12 will move so that the buckle rod 11 can not insert into lock body 12. Then the user will have to twist the steel cable 10 or force the buckle rod 11 and the lock body 12 to lock together.

No. 73, Tsao Kang Lane, Tsao Chung Li, Lu Kang Township


A data storage device is disclosed comprising a head actuated over a disk, and a spindle motor configured to rotate the disk. A speed of the spindle motor is sampled, and an error signal is generated based on a difference between the sampled speed and a target speed. A sliding mode control signal for controlling a speed of the spindle motor is generated based on a first non-zero gain when the error signal is greater than zero and less than a first positive threshold, and a second non-zero gain when the error signal is greater than the first positive threshold.

Data storage devices such as disk drives comprise a disk and a head connected to a distal end of an actuator arm which is rotated about a pivot by a voice coil motor (VCM) to position the head radially over the disk. The disk comprises a plurality of radially spaced, concentric tracks for recording user data sectors and servo sectors. The servo sectors comprise head positioning information (e.g., a track address) which is read by the head and processed by a servo control system to control the actuator arm as it seeks from track to track.
A spindle motor rotates the disk (or disks) at a high speed so that the head essentially flies over the disk surface on an air bearing. When accessing the disk during write/read operations, it is typically important for the spindle motor to maintain the disk at a target rotation speed so as to maintain a target data rate when writing data to the disk and reading data from the disk. Certain disturbances affecting the spindle motor may cause the rotation speed to deviate significantly from the target rotation speed. For example, tilting the disk drive may cause a large underspeed disturbance due to a gyroscopic effect. A linear controller, such as a proportional/integral or PI controller, may be unable to sufficiently compensate for these large disturbances and may even become unstable due to the controller saturating the digital-to-analog converter (DAC) that generates the control signal (e.g., current) applied to the spindle motor.
FIG. 1 shows a prior art disk format 2 as comprising a number of servo tracks 4 defined by servo sectors 60-6N recorded around the circumference of each servo track. Each servo sector 6i comprises a preamble 8 for storing a periodic pattern, which allows proper gain adjustment and timing synchronization of the read signal, and a sync mark 10 for storing a special pattern used to symbol synchronize to a servo data field 12. The servo data field 12 stores coarse head positioning information, such as a servo track address, used to position the head over a target data track during a seek operation. Each servo sector 6i further comprises groups of servo bursts 14 (e.g., N and Q servo bursts), which are recorded with a predetermined phase relative to one another and relative to the servo track centerlines. The phase based servo bursts 14 provide fine head position information used for centerline tracking while accessing a data track during write/read operations. A position error signal (PES) is generated by reading the servo bursts 14, wherein the PES represents a measured position of the head relative to a centerline of a target servo track. A servo controller processes the PES to generate a control signal applied to a head actuator (e.g., a voice coil motor) in order to actuate the head radially over the disk in a direction that reduces the PES.

Data storage device employing sliding mode control of spindle motor


An oral device for use with a person in which at least one non-toxic gas pulse is delivered to a predetermined location in the mouth via a device conduit. The oral device may be provided as a kit with at least one device for measuring the subject's responses and representing them as feedback to the subject/clinician. A method of creating a gas bolus pulse train, delivering it to a predetermined mouth area, and monitoring the subject's responses to it, is also shown. The oral device and method may be used as a diagnostic tool, or a therapeutic tool, in swallowing or speech rehabilitation of children and adults who have swallowing, speech, salivary, and/or oral sensorimotor impairments.

Swallowing is a complex behaviour in which the output of an integrative brainstem network gives rise to a patterned movement sequence described as the pharyngeal stage of swallowing. While several lines of evidence have demonstrated the importance of oropharyngeal sensory inputs in activating this medullary swallowing network, the range of afferent patterns that are both necessary and sufficient to evoke swallowing has not been fully elucidated. Stimulation of receptive fields innervated by the superior laryngeal nerve (SLN) or the pharyngeal branch of the glossopharyngeal nerve (GPNph) appear to be particularly effective in evoking or modulating the pharyngeal swallow; these "reflexogenic" areas correspond to the laryngeal mucosa, including the epiglottis and arytenoids, the lateral pharyngeal wall, posterior tonsillar pillar and peritonsillar areas.
In humans, the anterior faucial pillar historically has been considered the most reflexogenic site for swallowing. However, the recent finding that the pharyngeal swallow may begin after the bolus head passes the anterior faucial pillars in healthy adults, including geriatric adults, suggests that stimulation of more posterior pharyngeal regions may be required to elicit swallowing. The importance of more posterior oropharyngeal areas in swallowing elicitation is also suggested by anatomic evidence that the human posterior tonsillar pillar, as well as discrete regions of the palate, pharynx and epiglottis are innervated by a dense plexus formed from the GPNph and the vagus nerve. The spatial correspondence between these areas of dual vagal/GPNph innervation and reflexogenic areas for swallowing has lead to the hypothesis that swallowing is elicited most readily by stimulation of areas innervated by both the GPNph and vagus. Dynamic stimuli that excite primary afferents within a number of receptive fields over time appear to elicit swallowing more readily than do static stimuli.
A variety of stimulus modalities have been applied in attempts to evoke swallowing. Repetitive electrical stimulation of the SLN or the GPN, particularly at stimulation frequencies between 30 and 50 Hz, evokes swallowing in a number of animal species. This suggests that the repetitive nature of the stimulus, and the repetition rate, are critical variables in swallowing elicitation. More recently, electrical stimulation of the pharynx has been reported to increase both the excitability and size of the pharyngeal motor cortex representation in humans, and facilitate swallowing in dysphagic patients following stroke. Mechanical and chemical stimuli can evoke swallowing in animal species. In humans, reports on the effects of cold mechanical stimulation of the anterior tonsillar pillar have been variable, some authors reporting decreases in swallowing latency and increases in swallowing frequency, and others failing to find an effect of this type of stimulation on oropharyngeal bolus transit, esophageal coordination, or the temporal pattern of swallowing. Three studies have examined the effects of cold mechanical stimulation applied to the anterior tonsillar pillars in small samples of dysphagic stroke patients. They reported a short-term facilitation of swallowing, measured in terms of reduced delay of the pharyngeal swallow, in some patients, with no related reduction in aspiration. Longitudinal studies, examining the potential long-term effects of oropharyngeal sensitisation on not only swallowing physiology but also on nutritional and respiratory health, have not been reported. Reports on the effects of gustatory stimuli also have been variable. A sour bolus has been reported to facilitate swallowing in stroke patients. Whereas some authors have reported that swallowing latency is significantly reduced by a combination of mechanical, cold, and gustatory (sour) stimulation, others have reported that a cold plus sour bolus reduces the speed of swallowing.
Prior art research shows a novel method for determining laryngopharyngeal sensory thresholds using trains of discrete air pulses delivered endoscopically to the mucosa of the pyriform sinuses and aryepiglottic folds. Sensory thresholds are calculated through psychophysical testing and from elicitation of the laryngeal adduction reflex. The air-pulse train is an interesting stimulus in that it has many of the properties that appear crucial in evoking the pharyngeal swallow. For example, a single air pulse is a dynamic stimulus that could be applied to a number of receptive fields including regions innervated by both the GPNph and SLN. Furthermore, an air-pulse train represents a repetitive stimulus that can be applied at specific frequencies and pressures.
Accordingly, it would be advantageous to provide an oral device that can deliver air-pulse trains to the oral, oropharyngeal or peritonsillar areas. Further it would be advantageous to provide an oral device that facilitates and/or elicits swallowing in adults and children. As well, it would be advantageous to provide an oral device that can provide visual and/or audio feedback responsive to a swallowing attempt. In addition, it would be advantageous to provide an oral device that may be used to improve the motor integrity (e.g., strength, control, tone, accuracy) of the lips, tongue, and/or soft palate, with associated improvements in swallowing, as well as speech production and speech intelligibility.
In addition, recent studies have suggested that the air-pulse train delivered to the oral or oropharyngeal areas results in laryngeal elevation, in some cases associated with a swallow proper. Thus, is would be advantageous to provide an oral device that facilitates or evokes laryngeal movements, such as elevation movements, since laryngeal movement may be a precursor to a swallow proper. It is also clear from previous studies that delivery of an air bolus into the mouth is not the only way in which laryngeal elevation can be achieved. A well-known therapeutic maneuver in swallowing rehabilitation is the 'effortful swallow' in which the patient is simply instructed to swallow effortfully by contracting his/her muscles maximally. This has been shown to result in a more efficient, safer swallow. It has recently been shown that an effortful swallow is associated with increased laryngeal movement. This laryngeal movement can be recorded from a transducer worn around the neck. The amplitude of the output signal from the laryngeal transducer, representing laryngeal movement, is significantly greater in association with an "effortful" swallow, compared to a normal swallow. Other therapeutic maneuvers that also result in increased laryngeal movement include the Mendelsohn Maneuver, supraglottic swallow, super-supraglottic swallow, and the Shaker exercise.
Accordingly it would be advantageous to provide a feedback system that can provide the patient and clinician information about the physiologic correlates of these compensatory swallowing maneuvers, and similar maneuvers that produce laryngeal movement patterns. Certain speech exercises also give rise to laryngeal movement. For example, the pharyngeal squeeze involves producing a vowel sound at a high pitch. This elevates the larynx while at the same time maximally recruiting the pharyngeal muscles. Thus, it is used to strengthen the pharyngeal musculature. Accordingly, it would be advantageous to provide a feedback system that could provide information to the patient and clinician about the laryngeal movement associated with these speech therapy exercises.


An LED lamp specially adapted for use in combination with a concave reflector and to replace the incandescent light sources normally used. The lamp includes two or more light emitting diodes or light emitting diode arrays, each with a specified angle of light radiation, mounted substantially perpendicular to the lamp support and spaced symmetrically around the longitudinal axis of the said lamp support to form a compact consolidated light radiation area with a specified length, width, and height. All of the light radiates outward in a 360 degree radial pattern around and horizontal to the longitudinal axis of the said lamp support and at a specified angle of radiation vertical to the longitudinal axis of the said lamp support. Substantially all of the light emitted impinges on, and is redirected by, the reflector to project a high intensity beam of light with all light rays radiating at the same angle.

This invention relates generally to incandescent illumination systems or fixtures and, more particularly, to light sources adapted for use in combination with a concave reflector in collecting a high proportion of the emitted light and projecting a high-intensity beam with a smooth and even beam pattern.
Lamps of this particular kind are useful in theater, television, architectural, and general purpose lighting fixtures that provide high-intensity beams of light. In such fixtures, it is desirable to collect as high a percentage of the emitted light as possible and to redirect that collected light as a high-intensity beam having a desired intensity distribution. Lamp manufacturers make lamps that can easily and interchangeably be used in these reflector systems and fixtures.
Incandescent lamps of this kind commonly are used in combination with ellipsoid or near-ellipsoidal reflectors. The lamps are positioned with their light-emitting filaments located at or near a general focal point close to the reflector, such that emitted light impinging on the reflector is redirected through a gate to a lens that then projects the high-intensity beam.
Alternatively, such lamps can be used in combination with parabolic or near-parabolic reflectors. The lamp is positioned with its filaments at or near the reflector's general focal point such that emitted light impinging on the reflector is redirected to form the projected beam without the need for a lens. However, a lens sometimes is used to alter the projected beam's divergence or spread or to integrate the beam and thereby provide a desired intensity distribution.
Incandescent lamps used in illumination systems of this kind typically have included a filament having a longitudinal axis. The filament radiates light in all directions and typically is oriented with its longitudinal axis parallel to, or perpendicular to, the longitudinal axis of the lamp and reflector.
It is known that there is a single point in a reflector that is the most efficient point to place the light source and that point is known as the focal point. In theory this point should be a point source or infinitely small point. Cunningham U.S. Pat. No. 5,268,613, and McBride Jr., et al. U.S. Pat. No. 6,034,473 disclosed the need to compact the light source in an effort to make it more efficient.
The incandescent lamps described briefly above have proven to be generally satisfactory for use in combination with concave reflectors in providing high-intensity beams of light. However, it is known that some of the emitted light does not combine with the high intensity beam of light in a positive manner. Systems using a parabolic or an ellipsoidal reflector, as depicted in FIG. 8C and FIG. 8D respectively, also produce a cone of light rays, originating from the light source, and passing unreflected through the front of the reflector; the angle of this cone of rays being determined and defined by the front rim of the reflector. The more widely divergent light rays 17 of the cone of rays, that is, the rays passing relatively nearer to the rim of the reflector, have such a large sideways component of direction so as to fall outside of the desired light pattern or gate and therefore are wasted. Furthermore, the angle of light rays radiating from this cone of rays 16, different than that of the rays reflected by the parabolic reflector or that of the ellipsoidal reflector, causes problems when coupling this combined field of light rays into a lens to project an image or a beam of light toward a distant location.
These incandescent projector lamps are also used in Fresnel lighting fixtures. The Fresnel systems are the most efficient type of light projection system and has very little light loss 17 when used in the flood position, as depicted in FIG. 8A, to produce a desired light beam 11. These systems use a spherical reflector to reflect light back through the incandescent light source and through a fresnel lens mounted at a variable distance from the said reflector and light source to produce a beam of light with a variable angle of radiation 11. This system has the advantage of not producing rays of light with conflicting angles of radiation but has a great deal of light loss 17 when the fixture is in the spot position, as depicted in FIG. 8B, where the fresnel lens is further away from the reflector and lamp.
Light emitting diodes have become popular because of their efficiency but they do not produce high output levels individually, therefore multiple LEDs must be used to produce lighting devices that are useful. This has created the need for lighting fixture designers to make new complicated designs allowing the use of multiple light sources, complex optics systems, electronic circuits to power these sources and means for cooling those light sources. These facts are some of the reasons LEDs have not been adapted as direct replacements for common high output projection lighting fixtures.
It should, therefore, be appreciated that there is a need for a replacement lamp utilizing the means to use the improved, more efficient semiconductor light sources to replace the standard incandescent projector lamp for use with a concave reflector. Also, the means to cool the said lamp and an easy way to replace some of the individual parts that make up this new type of light source. Additionally, a method to compact the light source and an improved means to allow more of the light generated to impinge on the reflector and project a controlled high-intensity beam of light with a higher collection efficiency, a smooth field of illumination with all rays of white light or colored light evenly mixed together and radiating at substantially the same angle, and easiest possible method of manufacture. The present invention fulfills this need.

Illumination system and lamp utilizing directionalized LEDs


A method for reinforcing a weak sealed portion of a multi-chamber medical container by simple processing. The method for reinforcing a weak sealed portion of a multi-chamber medical container includes a multi-chamber container forming step for forming a multi-chamber medical container 10 including a first container portion 11 for containing a medicine, a second container portion 12 for containing a medical solution, an empty container portion 13, a pair of lateral side strong sealed portions 16 for forming both side ends of the container portions, a medical solution side weak sealed portion 17 for forming a partition between the first container portion 11 and the second container portion 12, and a discharge side weak sealed portion 18 for forming a partition between the first container portion 11 and the empty container portion 13; and a weak sealed portion reinforcing step for bonding a reinforcement film 20 for reinforcing the discharge side weak sealed portion 18 so as to cover the surface of the first container portion 11 and so as to be spaced in the discharge direction 14 from a first border 19 with the first container portion 11 on the discharge side weak sealed portion 18.

Medicines to be dosed to a patient by means of intravenous injection include a combination which causes degeneration due to interaction between medicines such as decomposition, discoloration, aggregation, and precipitation if they are stored in a mixed state, such as a combination of amino acid infusion and dextrose infusion, a combination of fat emulsion and electrolyte solution, and a combination of phosphoric acid-containing solution and calcium-containing solution.
For example, medicines supplied as a solid formulation include medicines such as antibiotics which cause degeneration such as decomposition and discoloration if they are stored while dissolved in advance in a solution such as a physiological salt solution.
Therefore, for storing such medicines, to prevent degeneration during storing and realize easy and aseptic mixing when the medicines are used, a multi-chamber container has been used which has a plurality of container portions capable of containing the above-described medicine combination or a combination of the above-described medicine and a solution thereof in a divided manner and capable of communicating these container portions at the time of use.
However, at recent medical care fields, the burden on medical staff is excessively great, so that medical accidents may occur such that the medical staff forgets the process to communicate the container portions of the multi-chamber container in some cases, and there is a possibility that only a part of the medicines contained in the multi-chamber container is administrated to a patient by mistake or a plurality of the medicines that have not been completely mixed are administrated to a patient.
Therefore, to prevent such medical accidents, a multi-chamber container in which container portions reliably communicate with each other and medicines contained in the container portions are reliably mixed has been demanded.
Patent Document 1 proposes a multi-chamber medical container including a plurality of container portions, a partitioning weak sealed portion that partitions the container portions, a medicine discharge port connected to the container portions, and a discharge weak sealed portion that partitions at least one of the container portions and the medicine discharge port, wherein at least one of the plurality of container portions contains a liquid medicine, the partitioning weak sealed portion and the discharge weak sealed portion are opened by increase of the pressure in the container portions, and a pressure necessary for opening the discharge weak sealed portion is higher than a pressure necessary for opening the partitioning weak sealed portion. According to this multi-chamber medical container, to discharge medicines in the multi-chamber container from the medicine discharge port, it is necessary to mix the medicines contained in the plurality of container portions partitioned by the partitioning weak sealed portion once and then open the discharge side weak sealed portion, so that the medicines contained in the container portions can be reliably mixed before they are discharged from the multi-chamber container.    [Patent Document 1] Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2002-136570

Method for reinforcing weak sealed portion of multi-chamber medical container


Representing weather data with elliptical or polygonal representations for transmission or reception. Ellipseticity may be determined, vertex coordinates may be shuffled, or polygons may be continuously fillable or filled based on filling flag values. Sides may be replaced within the polygonal representations. Certain storage requirements or transmission orders may be variable.

Providing an accurate picture of weather conditions in a pilot's area of interest has been proposed to be a highly useful application for ground-to-air data links. A problem with using data links to transmit such weather pictures is the large number of bits required to exactly specify a weather image. In "Weather Map Compression for Ground-to-Air Data Links", Proceedings of the Aeronautical Telecommications Symposium on Data Line Integration, May 15-17, 1990, sponsored by the FAA and Aeronautical Radio Incorporated in Annapolis, Md., herein incorporated by reference, Dr. Jeffrey L. Gertz presents two compression approaches: A Huffman-Type run length and coding scheme, and an approach called the "Polygon Ellipse" (PE) method.
The Polygon-Ellipse encoding method represents weather regions as ellipses, polygons, and exact patterns. The actual ellipse and polygon parameters are encoded and transmitted. The decoder then redraws the shapes from their encoded parameter values and fills in the included weather pixels. The PE method achieves high levels of compression because most weather regions are roughly elliptical or polygonal, and it generally takes fewer bits to specify the shape parameters of the region than to specify each of the pixels making up the region.
For a pilot's purposes, a weather map made up of an array of between 64.times.64 (4096) and 256.times.256 (65,536), pixels is believed to provide sufficient information. Also, such an array is about all that is viewable on a typical aircraft cockpit display. Each pixel can indicate one of the seven National Weather Service weather levels and, thus, may be specified with three bits. A weather map image may therefore consist of between 12,288 and 196,608 bits of information, not counting any data link overhead. The Mode S data link protocols, for example, can only guarantee the transmission of one or two "Extended Length Message" (ELM-1280 bits) per aircraft, per scan. Other data links may be similarly limited. To transmit weather maps using Mode S protocol, for example, could require between a ten-fold and hundred-fold compression.
The present TDWR (Terminal Doppler Weather Radar), ASR-9 (Airport Surveillance Radar), and NEXRAD (NEXt generation weather RADar) radars are designed to provide hazardous weather information to controllers located at the tower or at an enroute center.

Storage and transmission of compressed weather maps and the like


A display device includes: a display panel unit that includes a display screen for displaying information and a light emitting section having a light source for emitting light to illuminate the display screen from back, and that linearly generates heat during light emission; and a radiator that receives the heat generated by the light emitting section and dissipates the received heat. The display device further includes a heat transmission section that transmits the heat generated by the light emitting section to the radiator such that heat generated in the middle of a linear heat generation part of the light emitting section is transmitted faster than heat generated at the end of the linear heat generation part.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a display device which displays information, a display panel unit, and an information processing apparatus which processes information and displays the processed information.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the fields of device such as personal computer, there have hitherto been widely used liquid crystal panels being a slim display screen which displays information. Particularly, in laptop personal computers, mobile telephones and the like for which device thickness reduction is especially required, backlight-type display devices in which light is irradiated from the rear face side to the liquid crystal panel have been widely used.
In the backlight-type display device, a light source extending in a linear shape is arranged at the side of a liquid crystal panel, and a light guide plate is attached to the rear face of the liquid crystal panel. Light emitted by the light source is guided to the liquid crystal panel by the light guide plate and further diffused by the light guide plate, so that the light is irradiated from the back of the liquid crystal panel. In such a backlight-type display device, the light source and the drive board which drives the light source are disposed at a flank of the liquid crystal panel which has a relatively large spatial margin, so that the thickness of the display device can be reduced.
Conventionally, in the backlight-type display device, CFL tube (cold cathode fluorescent tube) has been used as the light source. However, the CFL tube uses mercury to emit light. Thus, from a viewpoint of environmental protection, LED (light emitting diode) light source which does not use mercury has been increasingly used instead of the CFL tube. The LED light source has the advantages that it is more desirable in terms of environmental protection and less expensive than the CFL tube. However, the LED light source has problems that heat generation is large with respect to the amount of luminescence, and its life and luminance efficiency are significantly reduced by heat.
In this regard, in the backlight-type display device, the following measures have been taken: a radiator fin which dissipates the heat generated by the LED light source is provided (for example, refer to Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2006-267936); a radiator plate for dissipating heat is attached to the LED light source (for example, refer to Japanese Patent Laid-Open Nos. 2006-268066 and 2005-135862); a heat transmission plate which receives the heat generated by the LED light source and transmits the heat to the housing and radiator plate is provided (for example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2006-293182). When these techniques are applied, the temperature rise within the display device caused by the heat generated by the LED light source can be suppressed to reduce the degradation of LED light source.
In the backlight-type display device using an LED light source, typically, plural LEDs are arranged linearly along the side surface of the liquid crystal panel. However, heat flows in a different manner in each LED depending on the location of placement, thereby making ambient temperatures of the plural LEDs non-uniform. Accordingly, even when the techniques of the above described patent documents are applied to dissipate the heat generated by the plural LEDs, the degree of degradation is not uniform in the plural LEDs and thus the luminosity of display screen in the liquid crystal panel is very unlikely to be uniform.
This problem occurs not only in the display device using a liquid crystal panel but also in the backlight-type display device in general.

Display device, display panel unit, and information processing apparatus


A shock isolator (30) is provided within the housing (38) of a selective call receiver to substantially increase the natural frequency of vibration of the housing (38) and the printed circuit boards (54, 56) within the housing. The shock isolator (30) is a body of elastomeric material, preferably butyl rubber, which has component receiving apertures (32) molded therein for receiving the components (46, 48, 50) on the printed circuit board while at the same time contacting the printed circuit board. The butyl rubber has a damping of at least 25% (preferably 50%) and a Durometer of between 50 and 70 type A (preferably 60).

Communication systems in general, and paging systems in particular, have attained widespread use. In such paging systems, transmitted call signals are used to call selected receivers for the purpose of transmitting information from a base station to the selected receivers. Modern paging receivers have achieved multifunction capabilities through the use of microprocessors which allow the receivers to respond to information containing various combinations of tone, tone and voice, or data messages in a variety of modes. This information may be transmitted using several paging coding schemes and message formats.
Some considerations governing the successful operation of a paging receiver relate to the portability of the receiver, battery saving, available memory, radio spectrum availability, and fast response time. Equally important, however, is reliability, one aspect of which is the device's ability to continue to function properly after sudden mechanical impacts and shocks (e.g., dropping the unit onto a hard surface).
Modern selective call receiver units generally include relatively thin printed circuit boards, housings which are typically made of a plastic type material, and fragile electronic components. The plastic housing's front and back planes typically have a low frequency response to sudden impact resulting in relatively large deflections which will result in secondary impacts with the internal printed circuit board components. Certain ones of these components are fragile in nature; i.e. some components are constructed of quartz, ceramic, and silicon. Each of these components themselves have a natural frequency response to impact that amplifies the incoming shock.
The relatively thin printed circuit boards themselves have a low frequency response to shock resulting in large deflections. They also have a variable frequency of vibration response across the printed circuit board due to the variation in components' weight across the board. Furthermore, vibrations of the printed circuit board are undamped. The natural vibration frequency response of the housing may be approximately 390 Hz resulting in a deflection of 0.07 inches. The frequency of vibration of the printed circuit board will range from 200-300 Hz resulting in a deflection of 0.14 inches. Modern low volumetric selective call receivers do not permit tolerances of a significant amplitude to accommodate such deflections. As a result, sudden mechanical shocks result in unit failures. Large impacts, whether primary or secondary, create detached or broken solder joints in integrated circuits, ceramic filters, and other components. The excessive printed circuit board deflections overstress and fatigue solder joints resulting in failure.
The current method of providing shock isolation within a selective call receiver is to place one or more pieces of shock isolating material in selected areas. Unfortunately, this approach has provided a limited amount of shock isolation in a single direction only and does not solve all of the problems described above.
Other sources of device failure stem from the fact that the interior of modern selective call receiver housings contains a large volume of air. This may result in the formation of condensation which can adversely affect the electrical operation of the device. Furthermore, it is possible for contaminants such as water to enter the housing and occupy these regions likewise causing device failure.
Thus, what is required is an apparatus for shock isolating the selective call receiver and its constituent parts by occupying the normally void internal portions of the receiver housing and altering the frequency response to mechanical shock of the receiver unit and its constituent parts so as to minimize their deflection.

Shock isolation for selective call receivers


A water-jacket core and slab core for a V-block of an internal combustion engine are assembled into a jacket and slab sub-assembly and are placed on an apparatus for the automatic insertion of staples in the jacket and slab sub-assembly to thereby retain the water-jacket core and slab core together in the jacket and slab sub-assembly. The apparatus automatically positions four automatically operable staple guns so that each of the staples is inserted with one tine of each staple in the water-jacket core and the other tine of each staple in the slab core with the crown of each inserted staple lying across the interface between the assembled water-jacket core and slab core and retaining the water-jacket core and slab core together. As few as two staples per sub-assembly can be used to retain the water-jacket and slab core in their sub-assembly.

The manufacture of castings for internal combustion engines poses difficult manufacturing problems. For example, the manufacture of a V-block for an internal combustion engine frequently requires that large and unwieldy cores be placed together in a sub-assembly, which is then assembled with another core or placed in a casting mold. In one such operation, the water jacket core and slab core for casting a V-block engine must be assembled into a "jacket and slab" sub-assembly that is subsequently assembled in its entirety into a crankcase core. Because of their weight and size, the water jacket core and slab core of the "jacket and slab" sub-assembly are frequently separated and broken in handling, or are damaged since the cores are fragile and easily broken. These mishaps require production delays in which the production line is frequently stopped so that the broken or damaged cores can be removed.
In the past, adhesive and/or screws have been used to fasten core elements together to maintain the integrity of the core assembly during its handling and during pouring of the casting. The use of an adhesive requires an adhesive that can be easily spread on the core elements, that will set within the shortest possible time; that will hold the core elements together as one piece and maintain their position during the casting process, and that may be removed from the casting after the casting metal solidifies. This method results in substantial costs and opportunities for unreliable castings because of a potentially unreliable interface between the core elements. The adhesive materials may separate or otherwise become degraded in storage. It is also necessary that workmen apply the adhesive correctly so that the adhesive reliably maintains the core elements together during casting and is not spread onto an exposed casting surface. Furthermore, this method requires time for applying the adhesive, assembling the core elements together and allowing the adhesive to set before the core elements can be used for casting, and it introduces into the mold an unnecessary foreign element in the form of an adhesive that may evolve gas that may become trapped in the solidified casting and cause areas of possible failure. Because of the difficulties of using adhesive to fasten core elements together, screws have been used to fasten the core elements of core assemblies together. The use of screws requires the installation of accurately sized pins in the mold-form for the core to provide accurately sized holes in the core to accept the screws. Such pins in the mold-form became eroded by the abrasive core sand and bent in use, resulting in holes in the core that are too small or that cannot accept screws from an automatic installation station. As a result, screws frequently fail to properly engage the core sand core elements and to provide holding engagement of the core sand element as a result of core sand stripping during their installation.
Neither adhesive nor screws can satisfactorily fasten together assemblies of core elements, such as water jacket core, and slab cores for V-blocks of internal combustion engines.

Jacket and slab core fastening apparatus

International Engine Intellectual Property Company, LLC


A titling system processes titlework for a plurality of vehicles subject to jurisdiction-specific document requirements. The system receives data that identifies a number of vehicles and indicates specific jurisdictions in which titlework for each vehicle is to be filed. The system includes a database of electronic documents that represent form documents conforming to the requirements of the different jurisdictions. The database is accessed and the system processes the appropriate electronic documents to create the corresponding titlework documents.

State or other jurisdictional regulations often require that certain products or service providers be registered, licensed, titled, or certified in accordance with specific requirements. For example, purchasers of firearms and vehicles are usually required to file appropriate title documents or registration papers with a state agency or licensing bureau. Although burdensome at times, the processing of titling, registration, or licensing documents, and the associated payment of fees, may be inherent in the purchase of certain items.
Titling and registration procedures are typically carried out on an individual basis, i.e., the titlework to a specific vehicle is conventionally processed to completion at the time of sale or shortly thereafter. Although this methodology may be acceptable for a small number of vehicles, it is particularly cumbersome when a large number of vehicles require immediate titling or registration. For example, a nationwide rental car company may purchase thousands of new vehicles each year that require titling and registration in any number of different states or other jurisdictions. Taxi companies, delivery companies, and other businesses may also have the need to purchase and register a large fleet of vehicles in a short period of time.
A number of problems inherent in an individual titling system are exacerbated when the system is overloaded with an abnormally large amount of titlework processing requests. For example, the manual input of data for each vehicle is a time consuming process that can cause a bottleneck in the flow of titlework. Typically, the system operator must have access to the original titles or ownership papers before processing the necessary registration, licensing, or titling paperwork. Consequently, the physical handling of large volumes of paperwork may result in the loss of important documentation, especially when each transaction is individually processed. Unfortunately, conventional titling methodologies do not implement adequate security measures or document tracking features.
In addition, the specific type and amount of titling, registration, and other data can vary drastically from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, and the actual forms utilized for such purposes are typically not standardized. Accordingly, a purchaser of a large fleet of vehicles must be familiar with the various state requirements and must have a supply of the various state forms. Furthermore, individual titlework processing requires the purchaser to provide associated fee payments for each vehicle registered in a particular state. Such individual payments are inconvenient to issue, reconcile, and account for, especially when such payments are distributed to multiple jurisdictions.


In accordance to one aspect of the present disclosure, a driver for a bone screw is provided that includes an inner shaft and a distal drive head of the inner shaft. The drive head is configured to fit in a drive recess of a bone screw to form a mating connection therewith. The driver further includes at least one outer, resilient locking member shiftable along the inner shaft from a proximal, unlocked position to a distal, locked position. The resilient locking member has a locking portion that contacts and is urged outwardly by a proximal ramp surface of the drive head as the locking member shifts distally from the unlocked position to the locked position to secure the bone screw onto the drive head.

Bone plate systems are often used to stabilize vertebrae. Bone plate systems typically include a bone plate and one or more through openings that receive bone screws. Bone screws typically have a head that receives a driver and a threaded shank. During implantation of the bone plate, the bone plate is positioned against vertebrae and holes are formed in the vertebrae aligned with the through openings of the bone plate. The bone plate may be held in place on the vertebrae using pins and the holes may be tapped in some applications.
The surgeon grasps a handle of a driver, connects a distal end of the driver to a bone screw, and manipulates the handle to advance the shank of the bone screw into one of the through openings of the bone plate and into the associated hole in a verterba. The surgeon may utilize a guide to direct the bone screw into the through opening, such as by advancing the screw through a cannula of a tubular guide connected to the bone plate. Alternatively, the surgeon may utilize a freehand approach whereby the surgeon maneuvers the bone screw into the through opening of the bone plate without a guide. The freehand approach may provide the surgeon with greater flexibility in selecting the insertion angle of the bone screw. The surgeon turns the handle of the driver to screw the bone screw into the vertebra. The surgeon repeats the process with other bone screws until the bone plate is secured to the vertebrae.
Drivers often have a retention mechanism for retaining a bone screw on the distal end of the driver. However, bone screws for smaller bones, such as cervical vertebrae, are often very small. For example, the head of a bone screw used in a cervical bone plate may only have an outer diameter of 4 millimeters and the length of the bone screw may only be approximately 12 millimeters. The small size of the bone screw head makes it difficult for the retention mechanism of a driver to adequately engage the bone screw head to secure the bone screw thereon. This issue is magnified when a surgeon elects to utilize a freehand technique because the bone screw may contact tissue or boney structures as the bone screw is advanced into the bone plate through opening. Additionally, some retention mechanisms utilize a drive element that expands in the drive recess of a bone screw to secure the bone screw to the driver. The drive element may be limited in the amount of torque the drive element may apply to the bone screw because a higher torque may contract the drive element and permit the bone screw to disengage from the drive element.


A photodiode includes a first silicon semiconductor layer formed over an insulating layer, a second silicon semiconductor layer formed over the insulating layer, having a thickness ranging from greater than or equal to 3 nm to less than or equal to 36 nm, a low-concentration diffusion layer which is formed in the second silicon semiconductor layer and in which an impurity of either one of a P type and an N type is diffused in a low concentration, a P-type high-concentration diffusion layer which is formed in the first silicon semiconductor layer and in which the P-type impurity is diffused in a high concentration, and an N-type high-concentration diffusion layer which is opposite to the P-type high-concentration diffusion layer with the low-concentration diffusion layer interposed therebetween and in which the N-type impurity is diffused in a high concentration.

The present invention relates to a photodiode which produces current in response to light, particularly ultraviolet light, and a photo IS using the photodiode.
With an increase in the amount of irradiation of ultraviolet light or rays due to the destruction of the ozone layer, the influence of ultraviolet light contained in sunlight on the human body and the environment has been feared in these days.
The ultraviolet light means invisible light in an ultraviolet range of 400 nm or less in wavelength. Since, however, the sunlight contains visible light and infrared rays in addition to the ultraviolet light, it has been required that an ultraviolet-light detecting photodiode separates and detects only the ultraviolet light.
Therefore, an ultraviolet-light penetration filter for allowing only ultraviolet light to pass therethrough is generally provided on the upper surface of a photodiode to separate and detect only the ultraviolet light.
In this type of ultraviolet-light penetration filter, the amount of ultraviolet transmission is reduced due to its deterioration. Therefore, as a conventional photodiode, a horizontal photodiode wherein comb teeth portions of an N+ diffusion layer in which an N-type impurity is diffused in a high concentration and which is shaped in the form of an "E"-shaped comb, and a P+ diffusion layer in which a P-type impurity is diffused in a high concentration and which is shaped in the form of a "π"-shaped comb, are engaged with each other and these comb teeth portions are disposed opposite to each other, is formed in a silicon semiconductor layer with the N-type impurity diffused therein in a low concentration, of a semiconductor wafer of SOI (Silicon On Insulator) structure in which the silicon semiconductor layer is formed on a silicon substrate with an embedded oxide film interposed therebetween. The thickness of the silicon semiconductor layer of the photodiode is set to a thickness of about 150 nm to allow visible light to pass therethrough and absorb only the ultraviolet light [refer to, for example, a patent document 1 (Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. Hei 7 (1995)-162024 (paragraph 0020 in the 3rd page and paragraph 0025 in the 4th page—paragraph 0035 in the 5th page, and FIGS. 2 and 3))].
In the above related art, however, the photodiode is formed wherein the silicon semiconductor layer is formed on the embedded oxide film of the semiconductor wafer of SOI structure, and the thickness of the silicon semiconductor layer of the photodiode is set to the thickness of about 150 nm, thereby to allow the visible light to pass therethrough and absorb only the ultraviolet light. Therefore, according to findings shown below, a problem arises in that the influence of reflection at the boundary face between the silicon semiconductor layer and the embedded oxide film cannot be avoided and the total quantity of ultraviolet light in the ultraviolet range of 400 nm or less in wavelength cannot be detected accurately.
That is, the inventors have determined by calculation the thickness of the silicon semiconductor layer which allows visible light to pass therethrough and absorb only a wavelength range of ultraviolet light, that is, which is capable of selectively detecting ultraviolet light.
That is, optical absorptance I/Io in silicon is represented by the Beer law expressed in the following equation (1):I/Io=exp(−αZ)  (1)where α: light absorption coefficient, Z: entrance depth of light, I: light intensity at depth Z, and Io: intensity of incident light
It is understood that when the optical absorptance I/Io is determined every thickness (Z) of the silicon semiconductor layer using the equation (1) in consideration of wavelength dependence of the light absorption coefficient α, and such a wavelength that the optical absorptance I/Io relative to the thickness of the silicon semiconductor layer 4 becomes 10%, is determined, the thickness of the silicon semiconductor layer may be set to a thickness of 50 nm or less to selectively have or hold sensitivity in the ultraviolet range of 400 nm or less in wavelength.
On the basis of the above result of calculations, a silicon semiconductor layer varied in various ways in a range of 50 nm or less in wavelength is formed in a semiconductor wafer of SOI structure, and horizontal photodiodes are formed in the silicon semiconductor layer. Sensitivity of these to the wavelength of light were measured by experiment.
FIG. 2 is a graph showing sensitivity of a photodiode at the time that the thickness of the silicon semiconductor layer is set to 40.04 nm.
It is understood that in the photodiode set to about 40 nm in thickness as shown in FIG. 2, a subpeak (marked in a circle shown in FIG. 2) exists in a wavelength range (purple) of visible light longer than the wavelength range of ultraviolet light of 400 nm or less in wavelength, and a photoelectric current that reacts to the wavelength range of visible light is contained in the detected photoelectric current.
It is considered that this is because in the case of an actual photodiode, although the above calculation is made assuming that light passes through the silicon semiconductor layer as it is, light is reflected by the boundary face between the silicon semiconductor layer and the embedded oxide film, and the length of a path through which the light passes becomes longer and hence it reacts with visible light having a wavelength longer than the wavelength range of ultraviolet light, so that it is absorbed into the silicon semiconductor layer and appears as a subpeak.
Such a subpeak further appears even at a thin silicon semiconductor layer. A result obtained by determining each wavelength (called "subpeak wavelength") that appears thereat by experiment is shown in FIG. 3.
As shown in FIG. 3, the subpeak wavelength becomes shorter as the thickness of the silicon semiconductor layer becomes thinner. Assuming that the thickness of the silicon semiconductor layer is Tsi (unit: nm), and the subpeak wavelength is Ls (unit: nm), the subpeak wavelength is made approximate by the following experimental equation. In order to avoid the influence of reflection at the boundary face between the silicon semiconductor layer and the embedded oxide film and prevent reaction with visible light having a wavelength longer than a wavelength of 400 nm, i.e., avoid an error due to the addition of the photoelectric current in the wavelength range of visible light to the total quantity of the detected ultraviolet light, the thickness of the silicon semiconductor layer needs to be set to a thickness of 36 nm or less.Ls=2.457Tsi+312.5  (2)

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.