A method and apparatus for determining a small number of parameters that spectrally characterize colorants by a small number of parameters and for using such colorant parameters to accurately predict the spectral reflection or transmission characteristics of such colorants when deposited on top of one another, either on an opaque, transparent or semitransparent carrier of a particular type, each colorant deposited with a certain coverage percentage, for example, dot percentage in the case of offset printing, the colorant parameters of any colorant being substantially independent of the color of the substrate and including dependency on the colorants deposited before and after. The method involves making measurements of sets prints of varying coverage percentages of a colorant on a number of backgrounds, and solving the resulting set of equations for the colorant. Colorants that are defined by a recipe of basic colorants can be characterized from measurements on prints of the basic colorants.

The present invention relates to computerized color graphics, color reproduction, and electronic printing systems. In particular, the present invention relates to a method and apparatus for characterizing colorants such as inks and predicting the color appearance of placing one or more colorant layers on top of a substrate such as paper or film as occurs, for example, in printing a page and photography.
Computerized color graphics systems and electronic printing systems are known in the art. Typically, they enable a user to produce a color image (any visual two-dimensional pattern including text, graphic line art, continuous tone images, etc.), and from that image to produce a picture which can be printed via a color reproduction system, for example, by producing color separation plates for offset printing. There has been much effort in the past to develop ways to accurately predict or simulate the appearance of such images when printed on a substrate, for example paper or film, using a number of colorants, such as inks, the prediction carried out without actually printing the images.
Printing may be carried out using halftoning, also called screening, which is the process of creating the illusion of a continuous tone (xe2x80x9cCT,xe2x80x9d xe2x80x9ccontonexe2x80x9d) image using an output (e.g., printing) device capable only of binary output (ink deposited or not deposited at any location on a substrate). For color printing, several images (xe2x80x9cseparationsxe2x80x9d) are produced in the primary colorants (typically inks) used to print in color, and printed over each other in a press. For typical four color printing, four images are produced in cyan (xe2x80x9cCxe2x80x9d), magenta (xe2x80x9cMxe2x80x9d), yellow (xe2x80x9cYxe2x80x9d) and black (xe2x80x9cKxe2x80x9d), and each of these images are halftoned. Usually, digital halftoning is used together with an imagesetter, laser printer, ink jet printer, digital film recorder, or other recorder output device.
It is desirable to be able to calculate accurately how a picture will look when one prints an image, including a halftoned continuous tone color image, with a certain technique on a certain substrate using a certain set of colorants (e.g., inks). A method of predicting the color appearance can be used for example to display a simulation of the color appearance on a computer display, or to print a simulation of the color appearance on a more easily accessible and cheaper printer as a proof of what is to be printed finally in production.
It is desirable to do this for both reflection printing on an opaque substrate, and transmission imaging on a transparent substrate.
By accurately calculating we mean a maximum deviation between predicted color and actual color of the order of 5 CIELAB Delta E units, and an average deviation of about 2 CIELAB Delta E units.
Various methods are known for calculating the color resulting from superimposing a set of colorant layers on a substrate. These methods can be divided in two groups. The first group are characterized by requiring printing and measuring a relatively large number of overprints of the colorants. That is, this group includes methods that for a particular set of colorants, a particular printing technique (e.g., offset printing on a particular imagesetter), a particular substrate type (e.g., paper, or film for a photographic transparency or print, textile, sheet of plastic, etc.), a particular substrate color (e.g., the color of the paper, or of the transparent film in the case of a transparency, or of the textile, or of the plastic sheet, etc.) and a particular order of printing the colorants, involve printing a relatively large number of overprints of the colorants in the set, for example as patches. These patches are measured with a spectrophotometer or calorimeter and the measurements are used to calculate any overprint of colorants in the set using mathematical techniques, for example, interpolation. If carried out well and carefully, these methods can lead to accurate results. Modem color management techniques such as COLORSYNC(trademark) (Apple Computer, Inc., Cupertino, Calif.) and the methods promoted by the International Color Consortium (ICC, see http://www.color.org) use such techniques. While these techniques can produce accurate results, and also work for halftone images, there are several drawbacks with such methods. One is that a large number of color patches of overprints need to be made. For example, the IT8.7.3 chart (American National Standards Institute [ANSI] Committee IT8 for Digital Data Exchange Standards) contains nearly a thousand patches for a four color output. Hence it is very difficult to characterize sets of more than four colorants, for example printing with six or seven colors (xe2x80x9cHI-FIxe2x80x9d printing including PANTONE(copyright) Hexachrome from Pantone, Inc., Carlstadt, N.J.). There also are applications where inks other than cyan, magenta, yellow and black need to be used. Another drawback is that a set of patches will only be useful for accurately calculating overprints using the particular colorants and the particular colorant printing order used in the patches. Changing one colorant in the colorant set or changing the order of overprinting typically requires redoing the whole job of printing the set of patches.
An additional problem occurs when using such characterizations with more than four inks in a typical modem color management workflow, such as the ICC workflow. The ICC standard uses look up tables and interpolation to predict the CIELAB values of a particular output device. The number of nodes in these lookup tables increases exponentially with the number of inks, and the amount of computer resources becomes too high to be feasible.
Also included in this first group of known methods are those that use the well known Neugebauer equations to predict the color of an overprint of colorants, and their derivative based on Yule-Nielsen and spectral Neugebauer equations (See H. E. J. Neugebauer: xe2x80x9cDie theoretischen Grundlagen des Mehrfarbenbuchdrucksxe2x80x9d, Zeitschrift fur wissenschaftliche Photographie, Photophysik und Photochemie, Band 36, Heft 4, April 1937; J. S. Arney, C. D. Arney:xe2x80x9d Modeling the Yule-Nielsen Halftone effect,xe2x80x9d Journal of imaging science and technology, vol. 40, No. 3, pp. 233-238, June 1996; R. Rolleston and R. Balasubramanian: xe2x80x9cAccuracy of Various Types of Neugebauer Modelxe2x80x9d, ISandT and SID""s Color Imaging Conference: Transforms and Transportability of Color, pp. 32-37, 1993). These Neugebauer-like models still need the knowledge of the color of the overprints of the primary inks, so still requires measurements overprint combinations of the colorants and the gradation steps of the colorants. Also, Neugebauer equations-based methods are known not to produce accurate results.
A second group of prior art methods are those that determine spectral characterizations of individual colorants that can be used for predicting the color of overprints of so-characterized colorants. These methods, for a fixed substrate and printing technique, involve making one or more printouts of each colorant on one or more substrates, measuring the prints, and out of this data extracting a set of one or more parameters for each colorant that can be used to calculate an overprint of each colorant. These methods thus have the advantage of not requiring producing a large set of overprints. One such prior art method uses the two-parameter Kubelka-Munk method which describes an ink wither by one spectral parameter, (K/S)(xcex), or by two spectral parameters, scattering S(xcex) and absorption xcex1(xcex), where xcex is the wavelength. See James H. Nobbs: xe2x80x9cKubelka-Munk Theory and the Prediction of Reflectancexe2x80x9d, Rev. Prog. Coloration, Vol. 15, pp. 66-75, 1985.
Determining the two colorant parameters involves measuring the spectrum on a bare substrate and on a black substrate, and solving the resulting equations. There also exist in the literature refinements on the two-parameter Kubelka-Munk theory that incorporate internal reflection, anisotropic scattering and other second order effects. However, these methods are applicable only for full (i.e., 100%) coverage of a layer of ink of a particular thickness, and/or are not applicable for variable ink coverages, for example, halftoning at less than 100% dot percentage. In addition, the colorant parameters they determine are neither substantially independent of the lowest substrate color nor are capable of incorporating dependencies on other ink layers. Thus these parameters are not easily applied to predicting the appearance of sequentially applied inks at less than 100% coverage wherein the substrate with the previously deposited inks may be regarded as a new substrate, with characterizable influence from layer to layer.
In order to so predict the appearance of overprints, it is advantageous to spectrally characterizing colorants by parameters that are substantially invariant for all substrates of the same type, and independent of the substrate color, in that, when there is no interaction between colorant layers, one can treat a substrate with one or more colorant overprints on it as a raw colored substrate of the same type but a different color, that different color dependent on the one or more colorant overprints.
In summary, prior art techniques that are capable of accurately calculating overprints of inks, including rasterized (i.e., halftoned) inks, require making a number of overprints of the colorants, so do include determining spectral parameters of a colorant that spectrally characterize the colorant. Furthermore, prior art techniques that do spectrally characterize the colorants are not applicable to less than 100% coverage, do not produce parameters that are substantially independent of substrate color, and do not produce parameters that can take into account interactions between the colorant layers.
Thus there is a need in the art for a method of characterizing colorants capable of accurately predicting the color of an overprint of the colorants without requiring measurement of overprints of the colorants and capable of predicting the color of overprints of halftones.
The Parent Invention describes such a method for determining and using colorant parameters that are substantially independent on the substrate color. The use of these parameters is described when there is no interaction between the layers. At least two parameters are needed for non-scattering parameters and at least three parameters are needed for scattering colorants. Such colorant parameters also may be used when there is some interaction between the layers of colorants. Parameters in such a case also may be determined that are capable of characterizing some interdependency of the colorants deposited, so that even when there is interaction between layers, one can treat a substrate with one or more colorant overprints on it as a raw colored substrate of the same type. Needed is a more detailed description of how the Parent Invention is applicable to this case of the colorant layers influenced each other. That is, the effect of any colorant being influenced by one or more of the inks printed before or after in an overprint.
Examples of when the effect of a colorant (e.g., ink) may be so dependent on inks earlier printed on which the new ink is to be printed, include phenomena such as xe2x80x9cink trappingxe2x80x9d in which an ink is xe2x80x9ctaken upxe2x80x9d less by the substrate when another ink has first been printed onto this substrate. Such a phenomenon could occur, for example, in offset printing. Another case is when the parameters of one or more inks already deposited onto a substrate are influenced on a new ink being deposited on top of these previously deposited inks. A lower ink may xe2x80x9cspreadxe2x80x9d as a result of additional inks deposited on top, so that the area the lower ink covers is increased. This is called xe2x80x9cspreadingxe2x80x9d herein, and might occur, for example, with ink-jet printing. Other examples when one colorant may be dependent on one or more overlying or underlying colorant layers include an ink-re-transfer-like phenomenon which could occur, for example, in dye sublimation printing, and mixing of the inks, which can occur in many printing techniques.
In the cases of xe2x80x9ctrappingxe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9cspreadingxe2x80x9d, the perceived ink quantity (halftone coverage percentage) also may change from the amounts laid down because of such interdependencies.
Thus there is a need in the art for a method for characterizing the spectral properties of colorants overprinted at a coverage percentage which may be less than 100%, on a reflective or transmittive substrate, the characterizing being by a small number of colorant parameters that are a function of the coverage percentage and that are substantially invariant to the substrate color for all substrates of a particular substrate type and for a particular printing technique, such colorant parameters capable of substantially incorporate the dependency on the colorants deposited before and after. Also, there still is a need in the art for a method and apparatus for accurately predicting the color of printing a set of colorants at any coverage percentages on a reflective or transmittive substrate, the method not requiring making and measuring overprints of the colorants, and applicable to overprinting where each colorant is laid at less than 100% coverage, for example using halftoning.
An object of this invention is a method for characterizing the spectral properties of colorants such as inks when printed on a substrate of a particular type by a small number of parameters which are independent of the base substrate color and that can incorporate interaction between other colorants printed on the substrate. A further object of this invention is a method and apparatus which use such characterization for predicting the color of printing a set of colorants such as inks on a substrate. Other objects would be clear from the description below.
These and other objects of the invention are provided for in a method and apparatus for determining a set of colorant parameters that spectrally characterize a colorant in order to predict the color spectrum of an overprint of the colorant deposited using a printing technique at a coverage percentage on a substrate of a substrate type, the set of colorant parameters substantially independent of the base substrate color and capable of incorporating mutual dependencies of the colorant with other colorants deposited on the substrate. For the example of offset printing using halftoning, these colorant parameters are a function of the dot percentage and wavelength.
At least two parameters are determined for characterizing a non scattering colorant, and at least three are determined for a colorant that has scattering properties. When mutual interaction of colorant layers in an overprint is possible, at least six parameters are determined for characterizing a non scattering colorant, and at least eight are determined for a colorant that has scattering properties.
In one aspect of the invention, the method includes making a number of sets of prints of the colorant at a range of coverage percentages on different background colors, for example, different dot percentages for the case of offset printing. To incorporate mutual interaction, more parameters need to be determined, so additional set of prints are made. For example, three sets of prints are made on three backgrounds for non scattering colorants and on four backgrounds for scattering colorants and in addition, if necessary to obtain a sufficient number of sets of prints on different backgrounds to determine the parameters, one or more similar sets of printouts are overprinted with one or more overprinting colorants.
The spectra of the prints, for example, the reflection spectra in the case of offset printing, are measured, and equations in the set of parameters are formed and numerically solved for the parameters. The backgrounds are, in one embodiment, two lightly colored backgrounds, a medium colored background, and, for the case of four sets of prints, a dark colored background and any overprinting is done with a lightly colored colorant. In one implementation for offset printing, the four backgrounds are formed by pre-printing the backgrounds, for example, in the case of the lightly colored background using 25% halftone dots, for the medium dark background, using 50% halftone dots with black ink, and in the case of the dark background used for the case of a colorant that has a scattering component, using 100% black ink, the overprinting happens for instance with a 100% colorant in a second set of prints. For coverage percentages for which prints are not made, interpolation is used to determine the parameters for such colorant coverages.
Some colorants, called derived colorants, can be defined by a recipe of concentrations of basic inks. In another aspect of the invention, the set of colorant parameters of a derived colorant is determined by making measurements on a set of dilutions of each of the basic colorants on several background colors on one or more substrates of the same substrate type, a set of dilutions in this sense possibly including the undiluted basic colorant. The prints that are made of each of the dilutions at different colorant coverages are the same as would be made to determine the colorant parameters of each of the dilutions of the basic colorants. Measurements of the resulting spectra are made. From these, coefficients, for example Kubelka-Munk coefficients are determined for the dilutions at the coverage percentages, and, using interpolation, Kubelka-Munk coefficients are determined for the concentrations specified in the recipe of the derived colorant. Then, using a formula for mixtures of colorants using the coefficients, for example, the Kubelka-Munk theory for mixtures modified for all the printed coverage percentages, the spectra that would result by printing the derived colorant on the different backgrounds at the different coverage percentages are calculated without actually having to print the derived colorant. From these calculated spectra, using steps analogous to the case of determining the spectral parameters directly, the spectral parameters of the derived colorant are determined.
In another aspect of the invention, a method for using the parameters for determining a single overprint of a colorant on a substrate also is disclosed. Using the result that the colorant parameters are substantially independent of substrate color and can incorporate the effects of interdependency with other colorants, a method is disclosed for determining the spectrum of several overprints of several colorants by sequentially applying the method for one colorant. One first determines the coverage percentages xe2x80x98belowxe2x80x99 and xe2x80x98abovexe2x80x99 each colorant, i.e., for a particular colorant, those on which the colorant is deposited and those deposited over the colorant, and from these percentages, one modifies the colorant parameters and then determines the color of the colorants when deposited sequentially on the background in much the same way as if the colorant parameters were substantially independent of each other (see the Parent Invention). the reflection spectrum of an overprint of the first colorant on the raw substrate. One then treats the resulting print as a new substrate of the same type but a different color (the color given by the first obtained reflection spectrum) and in the same way determines the reflection spectrum of overprinting a second colorant on top of the first. One continues this process until one has determined the reflection spectrum of all the overprints of the several colorants.
Also disclosed is an apparatus for using the colorant parameters to determine the spectrum of overprints on a substrate of a set of colorants at a set of coverage percentages. The apparatus comprises a first memory for storing the spectrum of the substrate, a logic unit with inputs specifying the coverage percentages and a set of outputs which are the values of the colorant parameters (as modified by interaction between the colorant layers) at the coverage percentages. When inter-layer interaction may occur, some dot gain values also are input for a range of coverage percentages. The outputs of the logic unit are coupled to a combiner unit, which also has an input coupled to the first memory. The combiner unit determines the color spectrum of the overprints on the substrate of the set of colorants at the set of coverage percentages. One embodiment of the apparatus described comprises the logic unit being implemented as one or more lookup tables and an arithmetic unit. Another embodiment described comprises the logic unit being implemented as one or more interpolators for determining by interpolation the colorant parameters at the required coverage percentages for each colorant from values of the parameters at a set of fixed values of coverage percentages and an arithmetic unit that incorporates the calculation of the average coverage percentage below and above each colorant and the modification of the colorant parameters by these coverage percentages. The combiner unit is implemented as one or more arithmetic units, each arithmetic unit having an associated background spectrum as an input and a set of colorant parameters at a coverage percentage as another input and determining the spectrum of the overprint of that colorant on a substrate having the associated background spectrum. A parallel implementation is described in which the number of sets of interpolators in the logic unit is the number of colorants and the number of arithmetic units in the combiner unit also is the number of colorants. A serial implementation also is disclosed which is applicable to the case of no interaction between th layers and in which the logic unit comprises a single set of interpolators for a single colorant and the combiner unit comprises a single arithmetic unit for determining a single overprint. The operation of such a serial implementation is that the logic unit and arithmetic unit determine one overprint at a time in sequence, starting with an overprint on the raw substrate, and continuing with the second overprint being on the raw overprint with the first colorant, etc., until all overprints have been determined. After a number of cycles equal to the number of colorant overprints, the output of the arithmetic unit is the spectrum of all the overprints.
Also disclosed is a method and apparatus for simulating the appearance of overprints of a set of colorants on a display using colorant parameters determined according to one or more embodiments of the method of the invention for such determination. One embodiment of the method includes the steps of determining the spectrum of the overprints according to one or more of the above embodiments for determining the spectrum of overprints, and from the spectrum, determining the CIE-XYZ values of the overprint using CIE illuminant-observer weightings, and converting these XYZ values to RGB values to drive a CRT (or LCD, etc.) monitor using matrix multiplication and, in some embodiments, also one-dimensional lookup tables. Another aspect of the method includes using a matrix multiplier, one dimensional lookup tables, a multidimensional lookup table and interpolation for converting the XYZ values to the device dependent color values needed to drive a proof printer. One embodiment of the apparatus includes an apparatus for determining the spectrum of the overprints according to one or more of the above embodiments, and multiplier adders for determining the CIE-XYZ values of the overprint using CIE illuminant-observer weightings, and a matrix multiplier and, in some embodiments, also one dimensional lookup tables to produce RGB values to drive a CRT monitor. Another aspect of the apparatus includes a matrix multiplier, one dimensional lookup tables, a multidimensional lookup table and a multidimensional interpolator for converting the XYZ values to the device dependent color values needed to drive a proof printer.
These and other objects, features, aspects and advantages of the present invention will become more apparent from the following detailed description of preferred embodiments with the accompanying drawings.

Method and device for determining the color appearance of color overprints


A room temperature emitter (10) operating in the 3-5 .mu.m wavelength range is provided. The emitter (10) includes a substrate (12) formed of a material selected from the group comprising cadmium telluride or cadmium zinc telluride. An epitaxial active layer (14) is formed over the substrate (12) from mercury cadmium telluride. The active layer (14) may be either a p-type or an n-type layer. The active layer (14) is doped with a predetermined concentration of dopant selected from the group comprising indium and arsenic. More particularly, if the active layer (14) is a p-type layer, it is doped with arsenic in a concentration between approximately 1.times.10.sup.16 atoms/cm.sup.3 and 1.times.10.sup.17 atoms/cm.sup.3. If the active layer (14) is an n-type layer, it is doped with indium in a concentration between approximately 5.times.10.sup.14 atoms/cm.sup.3 to 1.times.10.sup.15 atoms/cm.sup.3. A first epitaxial confinement layer (16) is formed from mercury cadmium telluride. The first confinement layer (16) is formed over the active layer (14). The first confinement layer (16) may be either an n.sup.+ layer or a p.sup.+ layer, depending upon whether the active layer (14) is a p-type or n-type layer. A metal layer (18) is formed over the first confinement layer (16).

All gases absorb light energy. For any particular gas, however, there is an associated absorption band for light energy known as that gas's signature band. A gas will absorb light energy having a wavelength that falls within its signature band. For example, carbon monoxide (CO) absorbs light with a wavelength of 4.6 .mu.m.
Semiconductor LEDs and laser emitters (hereinafter "emitters") can be fabricated to emit light energy at specific wavelengths. A gas having a signature band at one of those wavelengths will readily absorb the emitted light. Consequently, the intensity of the emitted light is inversely related to the concentration of gas through which the light has passed. Because of the relatively good gas absorption characteristics of infrared light, infrared emitters are used in certain gas detection systems. For example, infrared emitters operating in the 3-5 .mu.m wavelength range are used in conjunction with infrared sensing devices to detect and measure concentrations of noxious gases, such as carbon dioxide (CO.sub.2), carbon monoxide (CO), nitrous oxide (N.sub.2 O), trioxide (O.sub.3), or sulfur dioxide (SO.sub.2). In that regard, 3-5 .mu.m emitters have been very useful in environmental monitoring, medical diagnostics, and industrial process control applications.
Nevertheless, there have been numerous problems with existing infrared emitters. For example, although 3-5 .mu.m emitters have been formed from epitaxial films made of indium arsenic antimony phosphorous (InAsSbP) materials, substrate materials that could be lattice-matched to those films did not exist. Consequently, the performance of InAsSbP emitters has been somewhat limited.
Infrared emitters also have been formed from mercury cadmium telluride (HgCdTe) materials. The HgCdTe emitters can be lattice-matched to certain substrate materials. However, operating at the 3-5 .mu.m wavelength range, HgCdTe emitters had to be cooled with refrigerants or cryogenics equipment, since they functioned properly only at temperatures much lower than 100.degree. K. Such cooling equipment is relatively bulky and expensive, which has increased the space requirements and cost of previous 3-5 .mu.m HgCdTe emitters.
Accordingly, a need exists for a 3-5 .mu.m emitter, which can be lattice-matched to a substrate material and can also operate at ambient or room temperatures.

Room temperature 3-5 micrometer wavelength HgCdTe heterojunction emitter


A torso-covering garment for playing paintball having gripping areas to enable the user to grippably contact a gripping area of the garment with the butt stock of the gun. Each gripping area comprises a pliant, non-cushioning substrate. Common embodiments of the garment are shirts, jerseys, jackets, and vests. A method of playing paintball which comprises wearing the garment of the invention, and a method of fabricating the garment.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a garment worn by a paintball player. The garment has a sticky surface for positioning and griping the butt stock of a gun against the garment wearer's torso.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the sport of paintball, a player wears a garment which covers the torso. When aiming and shooting, the user stabilizes the gun to improve accuracy by pressing the butt end of the paintball gun to the torso garment.
A common problem in the sport of paintball is that the butt end of a paintball gun, which is an air tank, easily slips off of the user's shoulder or chest or other portion of the torso when the user contacts the torso-covering garment with the butt end of the tank to support the gun for shooting accuracy.
The butt end of the tank typically has a round, smooth surface with a low coefficient of friction in contact with commercially available garments, such as jackets, jerseys, vests or other garment configured to cover and protect the paintball player's torso, and made of material which allows the butt end of the tank in contact with the material to easily slip or slide. This makes it difficult for the user to achieve shooting accuracy.
The present invention overcomes this problem by providing a torso-covering or torso-encircling garment which has gripping, non-skid surface on at least a portion of the garment which grippingly contacts the butt end of the tank when the player attempts to support or stabilize the gun against the torso for shooting accuracy.


Method, system and computer-readable medium containing instructions for performing halftone gamma correction in a printing environment to achieve and maintain high print quality. The system includes one or more subsystems, including a tone reproduction subsystem that creates one or more print calibration pages, each having a tone curve defining a relationship between a plurality of input color levels, output color levels and a level of measured darkness. A pixel adjustment subsystem associates each input color level with one of the output color levels based on a desired percentage change in the level of measured darkness. Further, a gamma correction system performs gamma correction on a selected tone curve of one of the print calibration pages by associating each input color level with one of the output color levels based on the desired percentage change in the level of measured darkness in a substantially flat region of the selected tone curve.

The history of halftoning dates back to the seventeenth century print making technology of Mezzotint, which has evolved into classical screens, modern error diffusion and blue noise methods. Modern halftoning, commonly referred to as digital halftoning, encompasses a number of encoding methodologies often used to reduce the number of quantization levels per pixel in a digital image while maintaining the gray appearance of the image at normal reading distance. Halftoning techniques are widely employed in the printing and display of digital images. The need for halftoning arises either because the physical processes involved are binary in nature or the processes have been restricted to binary operation for reasons of cost, speed, memory or stability in the presence of process fluctuations. Examples of such processes include printing presses, ink jet printers, binary cathode ray tubes ("CRT") displays and laser xerography.
Image generation devices often provide image information as eight bit signals representing an image pixel, although the number of bits in a signal may be lesser or greater. A pixel, also known as a picture element, is generally understood to be the smallest unit (e.g., a bit in a binary image, or a byte in an image with 8 bits per pixel) of an image that a particular image generation device can produce, store, or transmit. The eight bit signals mentioned above may represent for each pixel 256 distinct levels of color (i.e., 0–255 bit combinations), or in the case of a black and white image, gray scale levels. As alluded to above, many image output devices, such as digital color printers, monochrome facsimile devices or raster image processors, are capable of reliably producing only binary pixels on a printing medium, analogous to a "0" or "1" in the computer arts.
Groupings of these binary pixels, typically referred to as halftone dots, are arranged preferentially in a predetermined pattern within a digital halftone cell. For example, in order to create the illusion of a variety of output gray scale levels representative of the colors in an input image, the binary pixels are output at various counts per unit area (i.e., halftone cell). Assuming a "1-state" pixel is dark, the lower the count of 1-state output binary pixels per unit area, the lighter the tone will appear at normal reading distance. On the other hand, the higher the count of 1-state output binary pixels per unit area, the darker the tone will appear.
Some high quality digital color printers use halftone cells capable of reproducing 150 or more levels per color, which are approximately uniformly distributed in a reflectance space, preferentially a reflectance space that is perceptually uniform, such as L* in CIELab space as used in color science. In some printing technologies, several of the colors have a steep gamma, reaching approximately 10% reflectance (i.e., 90% darkness) while only approximately 50% of the input bits are turned on. Empirical testing has shown that a steep gamma combined with the vagaries of human eye perception may hinder the desired appearance of a gradual shading change over the range of the output device (e.g., printer). Moreover, printer rendition and environmental factors such as humidity or temperature may increase the chances of obtaining an undesired steep gamma during printing to further deteriorate print quality.

System and method of performing halftone gamma correction in a printing environment


A method for embedding the spread spectrum watermark into images with the self-adaptive embedding strength includes the following steps: designing a spread spectrum watermark capable of completely shielding a host signal interference by using prior knowledge of the host signal interference, self-adaptively adjusting a value of an embedding strength in the spread spectrum watermark with different host images, ensuring imperceptibility of each image while simultaneously maximizing robustness of the watermark, and finally embedding the spread spectrum watermark in the host image. The present disclosure can not only completely shield the host signal interference but also effectively withstand various common image processing attacks and geometric attacks, and at the same time, all the watermarked images can obtain consistent imperceptibility. The present disclosure can be applied to various watermarking techniques based on discrete cosine transform.

With the rapid development of computer, Internet and digital media technologies, digital media contents including images can be readily produced, disseminated, copied and modified on the Internet, which brings convenience to people, whilst causes serious digital copyright issues. In recent years, the digital copyright has attracted more and more attention. It is obvious that digital copyright infringement imposes a great impact on interests of copyright holders. A combat against copyright infringement has become a common concern in all walks of life, especially in industry and academia, a demand for a boycott of the copyright infringement is becoming more and more prominent. Image watermarking technology provides a good solution for addressing digital image copyright protection issues, wherein a digital mark that identifies copyright is embedded into an image in an imperceptible manner, and this mark is also called a watermark. When a copyright dispute occurs, an ownership of the image can be identified by extracting the watermark. As an effective means for the copyright protection of digital images, though the image watermarking technology has been developed for more than 20 years and a huge progress has been made, there are still some imperative problems to be solved in both academic research and engineering applications.
A good digital watermarking technique has to possess both imperceptibility and robustness. Imperceptibility requires the watermark to be embedded in the image without compromising the quality and practicability of the image. Robustness means the watermark can be extracted correctly even when the image is distorted by various attacks (e.g., noise superimposition, content compression, dimensional change, etc.). Unfortunately, there exists contradiction between the imperceptibility and the robustness, of an image watermarking method. Increasing the robustness is usually at the cost of reduced imperceptibility, and vice versa. They are mutually constrained. An effective watermarking technique requires an appropriate trade-off between them.
Selection of the embedding domain, determination of the embedding locations, and design of the embedding and extracting schemes are the primary concerns in the intact watermarking framework. The embedding domain of the watermark is divided into a spatial domain and a transform domain. A transform domain watermarking technology has better imperceptibility and robustness than a spatial domain watermarking technology. Commonly used domain transformations include a discrete cosine transformation (DCT), a discrete wavelet transformation (DWT), and a discrete Fourier transformation (DFT), etc. Among these domain transformation methods, the DCT has an advantage of energy compression, so that better imperceptibility can be obtained when the watermark is embedded in a DCT domain. The embedding locations of the watermark depends on the selection of the embedding domain. Usually, the embedding locations are determined by exploring some stable characteristics of an embedding domain coefficient matrix, so that the watermark can be embedded into these locations synchronously to a certain extent. The design of the embedding method is the core of the watermarking technology and closely related to robustness and imperceptibility of the watermarking technology.
At present, the common embedding method is a spread spectrum method. The spread spectrum method converts every bit of the watermark into an independent code vector, a sequence of real numbers, and then adds it into the coefficients of the transform domain of the host image. At the decoder, the embedded watermark can be extracted by correlating the coefficients of the transform domain embedding the watermark to the code vectors. With the high embedding capacity, simple structure of the decoder, and enhanced robustness to noise, the spread spectrum scheme is attractive to the digital watermarking field. However, the main problem of this method is an existence of host signal interference, i.e., an influence of the image's own information on the watermark extraction, which leads to a degradation of the watermark extraction performance.
The spread spectrum method generally employs a parameter called embedding strength to control the embedding energy of the watermark. A value of the embedding strength determines robustness of the watermarking method. Increasing the value can improve robustness, but at the same time increase the embedding energy of the watermark, thereby leading to a decrease in imperceptibility and vice versa. Setting the embedding strength should consider both robustness and imperceptibility. Most of the existing spread spectrum methods use a fixed embedding strength in the course of embedding watermarks into each image, wherein only robustness of the watermarking method is taken into account, while good imperceptibility of watermark cannot be ensured in each watermarked image because imperceptibility depends on the embedding energy of the watermark, which is related to the image itself. The embedding energy of the watermark are different for different images, so imperceptibility of each image is different, intensifying the conflict between robustness and imperceptibility.

Method for embedding spread spectrum watermark into images with self-adaptive embedding strength


An Aided Location Communication System (“ALCS”) is described. The ALCS may include a geolocation server including a non-GPS position server, at least one server aiding database, server position-determination module, and a server fusion module. The ALCS may also include an Aided Location Communication Device (“ALCD”) including a communication section in signal communication with the geolocation server, and a position-determination section having a GPS Engine.

1. Field of Invention
This invention relates in general to Global Positioning System ("GPS") receivers, and in particular to a network aided GPS systems.
2. Related Art
Cellular telephony, including the use of Personal Communication System ("PCS") devices, has become commonplace. The use of such devices to provide voice, data, and other services, such as Internet access, has provided many conveniences to cellular system users.
A current thrust in the cellular and PCS area is the integration of Global Positioning System ("GPS") technology into cellular telephone devices and other wireless devices. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,874,914, issued to Krasner, which is incorporated by reference herein in it's entirety, describes a method where a basestation (also known as the Mobile Telephone Switching Office ("MTSO")) transmits GPS satellite information, including Doppler information, to a remote unit using a cellular data link, and computing pseudoranges to the in-view satellites of the GPS constellation without receiving or using satellite ephemeris information.
This current interest in integrating GPS with cellular telephony stems from a Federal Communications Commission ("FCC") requirement that cellular telephones be locatable within 50 feet once an emergency call, such as a "911" call (also referred to as Enhanced 911 or "E911") is placed by a given cellular telephone. This position data assists police, paramedics, and other law enforcement and public service personnel, as well as other agencies that may need or have legal rights to determine the cellular telephone's position. Further, GPS data can be used by the cellular user for directions, location of other locations that the cellular user is trying to locate, determination of relative location of the cellular user to other landmarks, directions for the cellular user via Internet maps or other GPS mapping techniques, etc. Such data can be of use for other than E911 calls, and would be very useful for cellular and PCS subscribers.
However, since cellular telephones can travel into areas where GPS signals cannot be reliably received, augmentations to the GPS system are being researched to support the E911 and other GPS/cellular applications. GPS is increasingly being pressed into service in the cellular telephone/PDA/mobile computer application where a solution is required in areas with substantial blockage, such as inside buildings, in subway stations, and other areas where the system RF link budget is unable to sustain communications with mobile units that travel into hostile signal reception environments such a buildings. Pseudolites are well-known commercially available ground-based transmitters which augment the orbiting GPS constellation with one or more additional transmitters to improve the availability and quality of a GPS solution. Current pseudolite applications include local-area augmentation system ("LAAS") transmitters for precision approach.
At present a number of different types of GPS assistance or aiding systems and architectures are known. Examples of these systems include aiding system designed and produced by companies such as Qualcomm of San Diego, Calif. and SiRF Technology, Inc. of San Jose, Calif. Generally, any type of aiding and/or assisting in obtaining a GPS location is referred to as Aided GPS ("AGPS" or "A-GPS").
Unfortunately, the different type of aiding systems presently known only support known AGPS functionalities and lack the capability of providing "anytime and anywhere" positioning and better location application support.


A system, method and apparatus for making endless belts having a profile layer, a fully embedded, helically wound, cord layer, and a top layer. The apparatus has a rotatable mandrel with a profile complementary to the belt profile, two or one engagement rolls adjacent the mandrel to maintain forced, wrapped engagement of the profile layer on a portion thereof; a cord applicator which may include a heated blade that plows a groove in the profile layer into which the cord is laid and fused thereto. A laminator applies the top layer onto the reinforced carcass. A system of buffer rolls handles the loose portion of the profile layer or carcass guiding it.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to a system for making endless belts reinforced with a spiraled tensile cord layer, more particularly a system for making toothed belts of practically any length on the same apparatus and tooling and specifically endless belts with no cord exposed to the outside surfaces of the belt.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Endless belts are typically made of elastomers having tension members embedded in the circumferential direction. The elastomer may be vulcanized rubber, thermoplastic elastomer, or castable elastomers. There are several methods typically used for manufacturing endless belts of thermoplastic elastomers and of rubber.
A first method uses a cylindrical mandrel of a defined diameter to produce a specific endless belt length corresponding to that diameter. Such a mandrel may include the desired surface patterns or profile on its surface to produce for example a toothed belt profile. An example as applied to thermoplastic belts is disclosed in GB 886,754 to Hutzenlaub. These mandrels are expensive and this method can only produce one specific belt length on a given mandrel. The longer the belt, the bigger and more expensive the mandrel. Belt length is therefore limited for practical purposes. Note that belt "length" for an endless belt refers to the circumference of the belt. This method is also used for making endless rubber belts, as disclosed for example in U.S. Pat. No. 3,078,206, to Skura. This kind of method is also common for castable elastomer belts.
A second method particularly adapted to making endless belts from open-ended belts is to produce a continuous length of reinforced belt material which is subsequently cut to the desired length and the two ends joined together to make an endless belt. Various splicing or joining methods are in use, but the splice is always weaker than if the tensile cord was continuous and helically wound. Examples of the continuous method for making open-ended thermoplastic belts are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,880,558 and 4,251,306 to Breher, et al., in which a rotatable molding wheel is supplied with a molding band (usually of flexible steel) wrapping around about half of the circumference of the molding wheel to form a rotating molding chamber into which cords are fed along with extruded belt material. Likewise, a continuous length of rubber belt can be made by advancing the belt elements between a heated grooved cylindrical mold and a pressure band. In a secondary process, the ends of the open-ended belt having the desired belt length are joined together. Such a splice causes dimensional irregularities (or pitch error) and provides a weak point in the belt, typically reducing the load capability and lifetime of the belt by about 50% vs. a non-spliced endless belt.
A third method uses two cylindrical mandrels which can be moved relative to each other to adjust for the desired belt length. Typically, the method includes helically winding the tension members around the two mandrels, and then extruding or casting and/or curing an elastomeric material to provide the elastic matrix, embedding the tension member and forming the profile of the belt. Typically, one of the mandrels is a molding wheel with a pressure band forming a molding chamber into which belt material is injected or extruded as described in the second method above. This method has some disadvantages. The equipment is expensive and space consuming, especially for longer belt lengths, and the operating efficiency and output rate is less than desirable. The belt length is limited on the low end by the minimum distance between the two mandrels. Belt length is limited on the high end by the maximum distance technically feasible to control the accuracy of the center distance of the belt. Center distance variation can also be a problem as a result of the gradually increasing total tension between the two mandrels as the cord is wound on under tension. Mold flights are typically used to support the tension members, resulting in cord exposure in the finished thermoplastic belt. Rubber belts according to this method could be cured in a series of steps in which the belt materials are progressively advanced between flat molding plates.
In a fourth method, an open-ended strip of belt is helically wrapped around two mandrels spaced to achieve a desired belt length, and the edge seams are fused or glued together to form an endless belt of desired belt width. This method permits belts of different length by changing the distance between the two mandrels. An example is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,058,424 to Breher. This method also has some disadvantages. The equipment is expensive and space consuming, and the operating efficiency and output rate is less than desirable. In addition, depending on the width of the strips, more cords are cut and exposed on the belts edges, reducing the effective strength of the belt, slight differences in the tension of the strips causes pitch variation and sideways tracking of the belt, resulting in reduced belt life and noise. The belt length is limited on the low end by the minimum distance between the two mandrels. Belt length is limited on the high end by the maximum distance technically feasible to control the accuracy of the center distance of the belt. Further reliable joining of the strips is difficult and represents a potential failure risk, causing the belt to disintegrate during higher load conditions, particularly by cutting the ends of the strip on the belt edge against a pulley flange and then peeling or unraveling the belt.
Mention is made of the applicants' co-pending U.S. application Ser. No. 13/715,977, titled "Method of Making Open-Ended Thermoplastic Belting," filed on the same day, claiming the benefit of provisional application 61/570,815 filed on Dec. 14, 2011, the entire contents of which are hereby incorporated herein by reference.
What is needed is a more efficient, accurate method of making endless reinforced belts without need for a splice, no exposed cord, and using one tool to make different belt lengths.

Apparatus and method for making endless reinforced belts


A dye-sensitized solar cell module includes a plurality of dye-sensitized solar cells electrically connected in series. The dye-sensitized solar cell includes a first electrode that comprises a transparent substrate, and a transparent conductive film provided on the transparent substrate, a second electrode that faces the first electrode, an oxide semiconductor layer that is provided on the first electrode or the second electrode, and an annular sealing section that joins the first electrode and the second electrode. The transparent substrate is composed of a transparent substrate that is common to the plurality of dye-sensitized solar cells. The second electrodes of two adjoining dye-sensitized solar cells are separated apart from each other. The sealing section includes an annular first sealing section that is provided between the first electrode and the second electrode, and the first sealing sections that are adjoining are integrated together.

As a photoelectric conversion element module which is inexpensive and can give high photoelectric conversion efficiency, attention has been paid to dye-sensitized solar cell modules, and thus, development has been carried out in various ways in connection with dye-sensitized solar cell modules.
A dye-sensitized solar cell module generally includes plural dye-sensitized solar cells that are connected in series, and each dye-sensitized solar cell includes a working electrode, a counter electrode, and an annular sealing section that connects the working electrode and the counter electrode. The working electrode has a transparent substrate, a transparent conductive film formed thereon, and an oxide semiconductor layer provided on the transparent conductive film. As such a dye-sensitized solar cell module, for example, a solar cell module such as described in Patent Document 1 that will be described below is known. Patent Document 1 described below discloses a dye-sensitized solar cell module having two adjoining dye-sensitized solar cells, in which a conductive member extending from the counter electrode of one of the dye-sensitized solar cells, and a transparent conductive film of the other dye-sensitized solar cell are connected at a site between adjoining sealing sections.


A method for determining a dispensing apparatus for a heat-dissipating material and according to one aspect of the present invention is provided. The method for determining a dispensing apparatus for a heat-dissipating material includes detecting an internal material of a dispensing apparatus from a heat-dissipating material discharged from the dispensing apparatus; and determining suitability of the dispensing apparatus based on the detected amount of the internal material.

A battery, a television, a video, a computer, a medical instrument, an office machine or a communication device, and the like generates heat during operation and a temperature rise due to the heat causes operation failure or destruction, and the like, so that a heat-dissipating method for suppressing the temperature rise or a heat-dissipating member used for the method, and the like has been proposed.
For example, there is known a method in which heat is transferred to a cooling medium such as cooling water, or a temperature rise is suppressed through heat conduction to a heat sink using a metal plate or the like having a high thermal conductivity such as aluminum or copper.
In order to efficiently transfer heat from a heat source to a cooling medium or a heat sink, it is advantageous that the heat source adheres to the cooling medium or the heat sink as close as possible or is thermally connected thereto, and a heat-dissipating material can be used for this purpose.
On the other hand, there is a demand for a dispensing apparatus that requires high heat-dissipation performance due to high power output of a battery module, increases a filling amount of a heat-dissipation filler, and is applicable to an irregular portion while reducing thermal resistance by a thin thickness upon filling.
Furthermore, upon selecting a dispensing apparatus, it is important to determine it by predicting a lifetime and a durability problem due to abrasion.

Method for determining dispensing apparatus for heat-dissipating material


An electromagnetically driven valve includes multiple valve elements that have respective valve shafts and reciprocate in a direction in which the valve shafts extend; a pivoting member that extends from a driving end, which is operatively linked with the valve shafts, to a pivoting end, and that pivots around a central axis which extends along the pivoting end; a support member that supports the valve elements; and a single push plate that drives the multiple valve elements when being pressed by the pivoting member.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to an electromagnetically driven valve. More specifically, the invention relates to a pivot-type electromagnetically driven valve that is used in an internal combustion engine, and that is driven by elastic force and electromagnetic force.
2. Description of the Related Art
An electromagnetically driven valve is described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 6,467,441.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,467,441 describes a pivot-type electromagnetically driven valve having a fulcrum in a disc (armature). In this electromagnetically driven valve, valves are driven by respective actuators, that is, each valve needs an actuator. This increases both the cost of producing a drive circuit and the number of components.


The invention relates to a nucleotide sequence which is present at a position adjacent to the 5' end of the reverse sequence complementary to the open reading frame coding for a potential transposase contained in the insertion element IS900 in Mycobacterium paratuberculosis. The nucleotide sequence has promoter functions and contains important signals for the regulation of transcription and translation. The invention also relates to methods for cloning and expressing heterologous proteins using such regulatory sequences, to vectors and transformed host cells containing these sequences, and to immunogenic compositions prepared by expression of nucleotide sequences placed under control of these regulatory sequences.

1. Field of the Invention
The object of the invention is a nucleotide sequence which makes it possible to done or express nucleotide sequences in a specific cell host.
A nucleotide sequence of the invention may be obtained from Mycobacterium paratuberculosis.
2. Description of the Related Art
Certain strains of mycobacteria are particularly well known, for example the bacillus of Calmette and Guerin (BCG) which is an avirulent strain of Mycobacterium bovis widely used throughout the world in the context of vaccination against tuberculosis. Its biological properties make it a useful candidate for the development of recombinant vaccines. The cell wall functions as a very effective adjuvant and a single inoculation can trigger long-lasting immunity. Serious side effects due to this bacillus are rare even on repeated immunizations.
The induction of specific immunity, following vaccination by BCG is initiated when T cells interact with macrophages presenting mycobacterial antigens in combination with products of the major histocompatibility complex (abbreviated to MHC). Clones of sensitized T cells proliferate and produce lymphokines which in turn activate macrophages in order to eliminate the bacilli non-specifically. In addition, helper T cells induce the proliferation of B cell clones which lead to the production of antibodies.
Attempts have already been made to carry out the cloning and expression of heterologous genes in BCG, in particular by using available know-how relating to replicative or integrative vectors. Thus an epitope of the gag protein of HIV-1 has been cloned in the form of a fusion polypeptide with the alpha antigen, this antigen being one of the major proteins exported by mycobacteria, in particular the BCG or Mycobacterium kansasii and resistance genes for antibiotics have been expressed under the control of their own regulatory region. In order to optimize the expression of heterologous antigens in BCG recombinants, the inventors have directed their researches towards the characterization of the gene regulatory units which are functional in the mycobacteria
The inventors have thus described the isolation and characterization from Mycobacterium paratuberculosis of nucleotide sequences which make possible the expression of given nucleic acids in mycobacteria or in other cell hosts.
By nucleic acid is meant any nucleotide sequence capable of being cloned and/or expressed whatever its composition, length or origin (synthetic or obtained by extraction).
Various experiments have been performed on M. paratuberculosis (also designated hereafter by Mptb) and Green et al. (Nucleic Acids Research Vol. 17 (22) 1989, pages 9063-9072) in particular have characterized and sequenced an insertion element of this mycobacteria, an element which has been called IS900. According to Green et al., this insertion element contains an open reading frame called ORF1197 which codes for a protein of 399 amino acids.

Promoter of M. paratuberculosis and its use for the expression of immunogenic sequences


The present invention is defined by the following claims, and nothing in this section should be taken as a limitation on those claims. By way of introduction, the preferred embodiments describe below include a method of simultaneously presenting user specific real-time financial information includes authenticating a user, for example by using a user-id and password. Then receiving an input from the user indicating the shareholder of interest. The user is then presented with a list of the shareholder's account information. The shareholder account information can be retrieved from several different record keeping systems. The record keeping systems can be maintained by different entities and can store the respective account information in different formats. The shareholder account information can be retrieved by broadcasting an account inquiry to the record keeping systems or by using a cross-reference table that indicates which record keeping systems the shareholder has accounts with. A combination of the broadcast and cross-reference table can be used. Once the shareholder account information is presented, the user can select an account, for example by a hyperlink tag, and receive detailed information about that account.

A user of financial system must log-on to the financial system before the user performs an action such as an inquiry or a transaction. If the user wishes to access another financial system, the user must log-on to the second financial system. Each financial system usually has its own menus and presents information in its own manner. Thus, a user, who wishes to access multiple financial systems, must remember multiple log-on user IDs and passwords and learn to operate each financial system. This process is time consuming and difficult. If the user wishes to access information from multiple financial systems, the user access each financial system serially, create time lags between accesses. Additionally, some financial systems charge fees based on the user's actions. If a database provider, also called a data warehouse company, maintains the database for the financial institution and provides access to the users, the database provider charges access fees. However, access and fees are limited to fees associated with accessing the databases that the database provider maintains.

Simultaneous real-time presentation of financial information


A component defines a blade or a vane for a rotor rotatable about a rotary axis. An inner space of the component is limited by first and second walls, and forms a passage for a cooling fluid. First and second ribs project form the first and second walls, respectively, and form first and second channels for the fluid from a leading end to a trailing end of the ribs. The first and second ribs intersect and are directly connected to each other at said intersections. The first and second ribs intersect at an intersection joint in the proximity of the trailing end in such a way that the first channel and the second channel form a common outlet channel with a flow area.

It is known from for instance U.S. Pat. No. 6,382,907 to provide a cooling system for such a component, which includes first and second ribs placed on the first wall and second wall, respectively, i.e. on the suction side and the pressure side, at different inclination angles in relation to the rotary axis of the machine and in relation to the flow direction of the cooling air. The ribs form a matrix of channels for the cooling fluid flowing through the component. The ribs connect at their intersections to each other and to a central plane of the component. In this prior art document, the component has a leading set of ribs and trailing sets of ribs which either are connected to each other or are divided from each other.
Although this prior art cooling system is able to provide an efficient cooling of the component, it may happen, in case the cooling fluid is not perfectly clean, that foreign particles in the cooling fluid may be caught in the matrix. In a worse scenario, some of the matrix channels can be plugged close to the trailing edge, thus reducing the cooling performance of the system. Furthermore, since the ribs are joined at the central plane of the component, the height of the cooling channels is merely 50% of the total height, i.e. distance between two walls of a component, available for the cooling system. This is especially critical at the trailing edge of the component, where the height of the cooling passage is the smallest in the whole component.
SU-A-1228559 discloses a rotor blade for a rotary machine. The blade comprises an inner space, forming a passage for a cooling fluid and limited by first and second walls facing each other. Ribs project form said walls and extend substantially in parallel to each other to form first channels for said fluid from a leading inlet part of the inner space to a trailing outlet part of the inner space. The ribs are divided into a leading set of ribs in the leading inlet part and a trailing set of ribs in the trailing outlet part. The leading set of ribs extend in a first direction forming a first angle of inclination to the rotary axis of the machine in said leading part. The trailing set of ribs extend in a second direction forming a second angle of inclination to the rotary said axis in said trailing part. The trailing end of some of the ribs in the leading set of ribs are following a curved path to have a decreasing angle of inclination.
RU-C1-2042833 discloses another blade for a rotary machine. The blade comprises an inner space, forming a passage for a cooling fluid and limited by first and second walls facing each other. Ribs project form said walls and extend substantially in parallel to each other to form first channels for said fluid from a leading inlet part of the inner space to a trailing outlet part of the inner space. The ribs are divided into a leading set of ribs in the leading inlet part and a trailing set of first ribs in the trailing outlet part. The leading set of ribs extend in a first direction forming a first angle of inclination to the rotary axis of the machine in said leading part. The trailing set of ribs extend in a second direction forming a second angle of inclination to the rotary said axis in said trailing part. The first angle is clearly smaller than the second angle.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,806,274 discloses a rotor blade for a gas turbine, which has first ribs on an inner wall and opposite second ribs on an opposite wall. However, the first and second ribs are separated from each other by an insert plate in such a way that the flow channels formed between the first ribs are completely separated from the flow channels form between the second ribs.


The present invention relates to a method for enhancing the health of an animal comprising administering to the animal a composition comprising Bacillus subtilus QST 713 or a mutant thereof.

The Bacillus genus comprises numerous endospore-forming bacteria that have myriad uses in the agricultural and animal nutrition fields, among others. Several strain of Bacillus are currently marketed for use as probiotics in animal feed as an alternative to antibiotics. These probiotics enhance animal health, including improving animal growth and feed efficiency, by modulating the gastrointestinal flora. Use of such probiotics has increased due to concerns about antibiotic residues in animal products for human consumption and the development of resistance to antibiotics. Work has been conducted in recent years to screen spore-forming bacteria for use as probiotics. Although various commercial products contain strains of Bacillus subtilis, Bacillus licheniformis, and Bacillus coagulans, such screening reveals that not all. Bacillus strains are effective feed additives.


An interposer having one or more hollow electrical contact buttons disposed in a carrier. The interposer is formed by disposing sacrificial posts in vias of the carrier. The electrical contact buttons are formed on the sacrificial posts by a metallizing process in desired pattern using a mask. The sacrificial posts are made of a material that thermally decomposes upon application of heat without altering the carrier or the electrical contact buttons.

Land Grid Array (LGA) interposers provide an array of interconnections between a printed wiring board (PWB) and a chip module, such as a Multi-Chip Module (MCM). LGA interposers allow connections to be made in a way that are reversible and that do not require soldering as, for example, in ball grid arrays and column grid arrays. Ball grid arrays are unreliable on large areas because the lateral thermal coefficient of expansion driven stresses that develop exceed the ball grid array strength. Column grid arrays hold together despite the stresses but are soldered solutions and, thus, do not allow field replacibility of the chip modules. Field replacability is important because it saves the customer significant cost in maintenance and upgrade of high-end computers for which LGAs are typically used.
Currently, there are at least two LGA types commercially available. Each suffers from serious problems. One type utilizes as the conducting medium a composite of siloxane elastomer and silver particles, which when mixed above the percolation threshold concentration, conducts electricity. The composite is injection molded into the shape of buttons across a full LGA in one injection mold operation, and is, thus, a good solution from the standpoint of manufacturing the LGA cost-effectively. Another advantage is that it can operate at low contact forces on the order of 30 to 80 grams per contact. Typically, current LGA's have several thousand contacts per interposer. A disadvantage is that the composite of elastomer and silver particles is itself a poor elastomer. In other words it undergoes significant plastic deformation under typical operating conditions and leads to eventual failure.
Another type of LGA interposer consists of an area array of button contacts each made of a random spaghetti coil spring. These springs are formed one at a time by injecting at high speed a length of gold-coated molybdenum wire into a mold. This interposer works reliably. However, they have a disadvantage of being expensive because of the button-by-button fabrication method. Also, they require being squeezed with a very high contact force between the MCM and the PWB. Forces on the order of 100 to 120 grams per button are typically required. Such high forces, once multiplied by the large number of buttons on an interposer, can cause deformation of the MCM and the PWB, and have been known to crack the chips mounted on the MCM. Further, these interposers do not scale reliably to larger MCMs with higher input/output (I/O) requirements. In addition, these interposers are also inconsistent with the introduction of organic packaging. Organic packages strive to replace expensive ceramic MCMs and offer better electric performance. Organic packages are much softer and more fragile and could thus only tolerate LGA forces much smaller than 100 to 200 grams per button.

Interposer with electrical contact button and method

International Business Machines Corporation


A method includes: identifying a timing path of a logic circuit; determining a Boolean expression at an internal node in the timing path; providing a DC vector having a plurality of forms; determining a Boolean value at the internal node for each of the forms based on the Boolean expression; determining a quantity of stressed transistors in the timing path for each of the forms separately based on the respective Boolean value; and determining a best-case form, associated with an aging effect of the logic circuit, and a worst-case form, associated with the aging effect, out of the forms based on the quantities of stressed transistors.

System-on-chip (SoC) technology integrates multiple functional blocks on a single silicon chip. The multiple functional blocks may include digital circuits, analog circuits, mixed-signal circuits or any combination thereof. SoC technology reduces development cycle and manufacture costs and increases product reliability, functionality and performance.
However, an SoC chip is relatively complicated. Such a complicated chip having various types of functional blocks demands a thorough reliability analysis before going through an expensive and time-consuming fabrication process. Semiconductor aging has emerged as a major factor for SoC chip's reliability. Aging induced defects include Hot Carrier Injection (HCl), which relates to the change in electrons/holes' mobility; Electron-Migration (EM), which relates to the gradual displacement of ions in a conductor as a result of current flowing through the conductor; Negative Bias Temperature Instability (NBTI), which relates to a shift of a threshold voltage of a transistor; and Time Dependent Dielectric Breakdown (TDDB), which relates to the damage caused to the gate oxide region of a transistor. In short, HCl, EM, NBTI and TDDB are major mechanisms of device degradation due to aging effects.
Conventionally, design reliability margin is given by the worst-case assumption. That is, the user usage model of a design is assumed to be operated at high voltage and temperature over expected lifetime. As a result, over design issues in early development stage are incurred. Simulation tools such as Simulation Program with Integrated Circuits Emphasis (SPICE) can be used to simulate aging induced defects.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Method of determining a worst case in timing analysis

TAIWAN SEMICONDUCTOR MANUFACTURING COMPANY LTD.


The present invention relates to a tractor for transferring a variety of trailers and transfer devices (12) equipped with a kingpin (13), which tractor is equipped with a vertically adjustable 5th wheel (4). The 5th wheel (4) comprises gripping members (14, 15) and power mechanisms (16) by means of which the transfer device (12) is by the kingpin (13) with a convenient force pulled into contact with the 5th wheel 4 thus making an inner force balance of the joint 4-12 possible.

The invention relates to a tractor for trailers and devices equipped with a kingpin, used for transferring these in harbours, lorry terminals, industrial plants and elsewhere.
With the development of container transports the need to handle various kinds of trailers, transfer devices and the like has grown substantially at points of departure and destinations and junctions in the traffic. Examples of this include the loading and unloading of semitrailers in roll on-roll off vessels (ro-ro vessels); transfers of semitrailers in lorry terminals, as well as e.g. transfers of swap bodies from points of loading and unloading to stations where transport vehicles are waiting.
Traditionally these operations and transfers are carried out by means of so-called terminal tractors which are two-axle vehicles similar to lorries. These vehicles are expensive and of complicated build, and owing to their great length, less maneuverable. Especially in freight stations and industry's internal transports old tractors removed from actual road traffic have been reconditioned for short-range transfers. The only advantage of these vehicles lies in their relatively low price, in all other aspects they are inferior to the above mentioned terminal tractors.
Patent specification FI 50596 presents the principle of a single-axle tractor equipped with a gooseneck. The vehicle is not directly applicable to the use described here. Patent specification CH 533570 presents a transfer device with a 5th wheel for a semitrailer which transfer device grips the trailer by the kingpin. The device, however, is constructed in such a manner that in practice it is unable to control forces directed to it from the trailer to be transferred, for example forces directed to it upon braking seek to rotate it around the kingpin. The clearances of an ordinary 5th wheel locking and the dynamic shocks they enable damage either the pulling device or the kingpin upon sudden stress and make the transport a risky measure.


Provided is a complex comprising cisplatin encapsulated therein in a form in which a chlorine ion thereof is ligand-exchanged with a carboxyl anion of a block copolymer comprising poly(ethylene glycol)-poly(glutamic acid). This complex can be a medicinal preparation to which a novel dosage form decreased in toxicity can be applied.

Cisplatin (cis-Diaminedichloroplatinum (II); hereinafter abbreviated as CDDP) is a very effective carcinostatic agent in a medical practice, but it is known that it has very strong side effects such as nephrotoxicity. Further, when CDDP is administered in blood, it is quickly excreted to the outside of the body by glomerular filtration, and therefore the blood half-time thereof is very short. Accordingly, a lot of pharmaceutical preparations have so far been tried to be developed by many researchers in order to extend this blood half-time of CDDP and reduce nephrotoxicity, but the existing situation is that the successful examples thereof have not yet been achieved.
Thus, it is the existing situation that in general, a suitable transfusion is administered before administering a CDDP agent and that CDDP is then mixed with a large amount of a physiological salt solution or a glucose-salt solution and it is intravenously dripped in several hours.
Accordingly, strongly desired to be developed is a pharmaceutical preparation which makes it possible to carry out a new administering form in place of complicated and time-consuming intravenous drip, for example, bolus intravenous administration.
In order to meet such desire, the present inventors proposed a polymeric metal complex micelle obtained by forming a complex of poly(ethylene glycol)-poly(α,β-aspartic acid) (hereinafter abbreviated as PEG-P(Asp)) with CDDP in an aqueous medium (for example, Yokoyama; Kataoka et al., J. Controlled Release 39 (1996) 351–356; Nishiyama; Kataoka et al., Langmuir 1999, 15, 377–383). The above polymeric metal complex micelle maintains a stable micelle structure in refined water over a long period of time and slowly releases a Pt (II) complex in a physiological salt solution (0.15M NaCl solution) of 37° C., and it can maintain a polymer micelle structure over a period of about 10 hours. That is, attentions have to be paid to this metal complex micelle in the point that it can be present under physiological environment, for example, in blood circulation over a considerably long period of time. Further, it is indicated that when carrying out intravenous administration, the above metal complex micelle provides a carcinostatic effect and a nephrotoxicity-reducing effect which are excellent as compared with those of a CDDP simple substance (for example, Kataoka, PHARM TECH JAPAN Vol. 16, No. 8 (2000) 1209 to 1219).
However, desire to development of a pharmaceutical preparation which can maintain, if possible, a polymer micelle form under physiological environment over further longer period of time shall still be present. Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide a polymeric metal complex which can maintain a polymer micelle form under physiological environment over further longer period of time than the foregoing polymeric metal complex micelle of PEG-P(Asp) with CDDP.

Polymeric micelle containing cisplatin enclosed therein and use thereof


In a joint formwork for glass building units, which consist of a plurality of glass units, in particular glass blocks, which are connected by reinforced mortar or concrete joints which are covered on at least one side by outer frames which enclose the glass units, according to the invention it is provided that each outer frame forms a building unit and the cover strips of its angularly rigidly interconnected frame members are individually positively connected on their rear side to neighboring frame members of adjoining outer frames by moulded-on, projecting tongues and covered edge strips, the edge strip on each frame member being recessed for the guidance of at least one tongue of the neighboring frame member and having for the frame recess of the other frame member a substantially smooth tongue and at least one further tongue, which bears on its upper side a groove, which establishes the positive connection to the edge strip.

The invention relates to a joint framework for glass building units, which consist of a plurality of glass units, in particular glass blocks.
Glass building units according to the invention are generally glass plates which differ from simple panes of glass by the profiling of their edge, it being possible for at least one of the major faces of the glass unit to be profiled for its part. Glass blocks generally combine two such glass units which are mutually offset and connected by their rear sides.
Glass building units according to the invention are generally prefabricated compound units which are built into one or more space limitations of a building. They are preferably floor units, which due to their construction from glass units, allow the incidence of light and, due to their reinforced mortar or concrete joints, absorb their own weight and transfer it to structures of the building. Such glass building units are generally fabricated horizontally, by laying out the glass units apart from one another by the joint spacing, introducing the joint reinforcement into the joint spaces and then filling the joints with mortar or concrete. The underlying joint surfaces in fabrication must be encased. This produces joint faces as smooth as the framework, which is of significance in particular on the visible side of the glass building unit.
For glass building units which are used in the vertical building confinements, that is in walls or internal dividing walls, a joint framework is known on which the invention is based. In this case, the glass units are bricked in situ, i.e., the glass building unit is built up from bottom to top. The joint framework consists of continuous profiles, which are used for the horizontal wall joints, and of profile sections, with which the vertical joints are encased. The profile sections are connected to the horizontal joint limitations, producing outer frames on both sides of the glass building unit, which enclose the glass units and mask the joint faces.
While the joint framework according to the invention is a type of permanent framework, hitherto repeatedly reusable frameworks have generally been used for the horizontal fabrication of glass building units. These consist of a matrix in the form of a mat-shaped mould, in the recesses of which the glass units are laid before the joints are cast following introduction of the reinforcement. The glass building units thus fabricated do not have any outer frames but joint faces as smooth as the framework. This frequently requires different mortars in the joints in order to bring about the necessary strength on the one hand and the sealing of the joint on the other hand, because the joint mortar or concrete interacting with the reinforcement is generally not watertight. Consequently, fabrication of the units is hampered not inconsiderably. It is also difficult to obtain in this way joints which, for reasons of strength, must have relatively large dimensions to the plane of the glass building unit. This applies in particular to glass building units of considerable dimensions which are exposed to stresses transversely to their principal plane. For example, load-bearing floor units which are made as glass building units must, due to the considerable weight of the glass units and the resultant stresses, be made with joints which project to one side beyond the glass units, which later in the building is usually the inside.


An electrical connector includes a body, two rows of terminals, and a grounding sheet. The body has a base and a tongue extending forwards from the base. The two rows of terminals are disposed in the tongue. At least one row of terminals includes a differential signal terminal pair and a grounding terminal that are disposed neighboring to each other. The grounding sheet is disposed in the tongue and located between the two rows of terminals. The grounding sheet has an open slot located between the differential signal terminal pair and the grounding terminal that are in the same row.

Chinese Patent No. CN200920302446.4 discloses an electrical connector, which includes an insulating body. A front end of the insulating body is provided with a tongue. An upper side and a lower side of the tongue are respectively provided with a first conductive terminal and a second conductive terminal. The tongue has a narrow slot. The narrow slot runs through the tongue in a front-to-rear direction. A grounding sheet is received in the narrow slot. A rear end of the grounding sheet is integrally provided with a pin. The pin is connected to a grounding line of the circuit board. The grounding sheet can effectively prevent electromagnetic interference between the first conductive terminal and the second conductive terminal.
For low frequency cases, the above-mentioned method of disposing a grounding sheet can prevent electromagnetic interference. However, as the frequencies of signals transmitted in the electronic industry are becoming higher, electromagnetic interference between terminals seriously affects the transmission effect of high frequency signals, and the grounding sheet cannot meet the demand of preventing electromagnetic interference between terminals.
Therefore, a heretofore unaddressed need exists in the art to address the aforementioned deficiencies and inadequacies.


In a linear-type actuator where an elastic wave is excited upon the vibrator composed of a rod shaped elastic member and a piezo member so as to drive the moving member bought into pressure contact upon the vibrator, the present invention provides a linear-type actuator where the improvement of the driving efficiency and the simplification of the driving circuit can be achieved by the new driving principle.

The present invention generally relates to the construction of a linear-type actuator for generating driving force with the use of elastic vibrations to be obtained by the piezo-electric effect of a piezo member, and a method of driving it.
In recent years, a linear-type actuator is watched, where elastic vibrations are excited upon the vibrator consisting of a piezo member such as piezo ceramic or the like so as to use them as driving force.
The conventional linear type actuator will be described hereinafter in conjunction with the one shown in FIG. 1.
FIG. 1 is a schematic view of the conventional linear-type actuator shown in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 63-283473. Referring now to FIG. 1, there provides integrally a driver member 2 on the one surface of a basic member 3, and a vibrator 1 is composed of piezo elements 4a, 4b, 4c being stuck, as shown in FIG. 2, on three faces except for driving the vibrator 1 on the basic member 3 with the driver member 2 being integrally projected.
The vibrator 1 constructed as mentioned above is excited in the diagonal line E - F or G - H direction of the vibrator 1 of FIG. 1 so that a slider (not shown) which has been brought into pressure contact onto the driving member 2 can be driven. A voltage V.sub.1 to be expressed by the (1) equation is applied upon the piezo element 4a, a voltage V.sub.2 expressed by the (2) equation is applied upon the piezo elements 4b, 4c. EQU V.sub.1 =V.sub.0 X sin (.omega.t) (1) EQU V.sub.2 =V.sub.0 X cos (.omega.t) (2)
where V.sub.0 is an instantaneous value of a voltage, .omega. is a angular frequency, t is time.
Bending vibrations for effecting elliptic movement expressed by the (3) equation are excited upon the driving member 2 of the vibrator 1 at the top end of the driving member 2. EQU .xi.=.xi..sub..theta. X (cos (.omega.t)+sin (.omega.t)) (3)
where .xi. is an amplification value of bending vibrations, .xi..sub.0 is an instantaneous value of bending vibrations.
A slider established in pressure contact against the end of the driving member 2 of the vibrator 1 by the movement of the elliptic track by frictional force is driven in the movement direction of the elliptic track by the frictional force. Also, the movement can be effected in a direction opposite to the above description by the change in phase.
In the construction of the conventional linear- type actuator, the bending rigidity of the vibrator in the Y direction to be driven by the piezo member becomes large with providing the driving member 2 to be different from the bending rigidity of the vibrator in the X direction, and the resonance frequency and impedance of the piezo element 4a taken from the side of driving element become largely different from the resonance frequencies and impedances of the piezo members 4b and 4c.
Therefore, even if the voltages v1 and v2 expressing with the equations (1) and (2) are loaded on, the vibration amplitudes in the X and Y directions are different from each other to lower largely the driving efficiency of slider. The driving circuit, the controlling circuit and so on become complicated if the vibration amplitude in the X, Y directions is made to be set in approximately the same extent. As the change in the bonding rigidity by the driving member 2 causes the slip in the node position of the displacement distribution in the X, Y directions due to not specifying the position for supporting the driver member, the vibration loss by the support fixing operation of the vibrator becomes larger so as to reduce the driving efficiency.
Although the moving direction of the slider is changed with the composite resonance by the piezo member provided on an orthogonal plane and the phase of the vibration in the X, Y directions, the efficiency is not expected to be improved, because approximately double inputs are required because of the change in the moving direction. That's why the vibration displacement amount is not increased by the composition of two vibrations.
The driving member and the slider come into contact against each other on the plane, with a problem of lowering the driving efficiency and causing the noises when the plane accuracy is inferior. Further, when the plane accuracy is improved, there is a problem in that the mass production and manufacturing cost increase are caused.

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.


An exciting light 2 is introduced within a slab-type optical waveguide 1, an evanescent wave due to the exciting light 2 excites fluorescent light, and among the fluorescent light, a fluorescent light which is radiated in a direction which direction crosses the exciting light 2 by a predetermined angle, is detected by a fluorescent light detector 4. Consequently, the exciting light and the fluorescent light are spacially separated so as to reduce stray light, and an arrangement of an optical system is simplified.

From past, a method is proposed which introduces an exciting light into a slab-type optical waveguide, propagates the exciting light within the slab-type optical waveguide in a total reflection manner so as to generate an evanescent wave component, excites fluorescent substance by the evanescent wave component which fluorescent substance exist in vicinity of a face of the slab-type optical waveguide which face totally reflects the exciting light, and detects a fluorescent light component by a detector which fluorescent light is a part of the generated fluorescent light and is introduced into the slab-type optical waveguide through the face and is outgone from the slab-type optical waveguide thereafter. When a light propagating within a medium having a larger refractive index totally reflects at a boundary face of the medium and a medium having a smaller refractive index, the evanescent wave is a light component which exist within the medium having smaller refractive index and within a limited region with respect to the boundary face. Specifically, when is is supposed that refractive indexes of the medium are n1, n2 (where n1<n2), a wavelength of the light is .lambda., a incident angle is .theta., an intensity of an incident light is I0, an intensity of a light at a point which is apart from the boundary face by a distance z is I, a specific refractive index is n (=n2/n1), a distance of a point from the boundary face (invasion depth) is dp which point makes an electric field strength to be 1/e of that of the boundary face of the optical waveguide. The intensity I depends upon the distance Z and is expressed with equation (1) . EQU I=I0{4n.sup.2 /(n.sup.2 -1)} cos.sup.2 .theta.exp(-2z/dp) EQU dp=.lambda./2.pi.{(n2.sup.2 /n1.sup.2) sin.sup.2 .theta.-1}.sup.1/2 !(1)
Therefore, it is understood by analyzing the equation (1) that an evanescent wave exists within a limited region with respect to the boundary face (refer tp M. Born & E. Wolf "Principle Of Optics I"). Wherein, it is assumed that the incident angle .theta. is greater than a critical angle .theta.c {.theta.c=sin.sup.-1 (n1/n2)}.
As to evanescent wave, not only penetrating of a light to lower refractive index side but also propagating of a light from lower refractive index side to higher refactive index side satisfy the foregoing. That is, a rate of a light which propagates to fluorescence dye et al. by an angle which is greater than the critical angle is expressed with the equation (1) similarly, which fluorescent dye et al. exists at a position apart from the boundary face by a distance z. Therefore, only light which is generated at vicinity of the boundary face can propagates to the medium having the higher refractive index by an angle which is greater than the critical angle {refer to C. K. Carniglia et. al. "J. Opt. Soc. Am. 62, 479 (1979)}.
It is a phenomenon that evanescent wave exists localized in a region which is near a boundary face and is an extent of nearly wavelength, therefore evanescent wave is possibly applied as a probe light for detecting boundary phenomena. In application to fluoresence immuno assay, determination of reagent labeled with fluorescence dye which dye is bound at a surface of solid phase by antigen-antibody reaction, is possibly performed by directly measuring fluorescent light without separating and washing out unreacted reagent which exist freely within a test liquid.
Following three methods are known as fluorescence immuno assay using above-mentioned evanescent light.
(1) exciting fluorescence dye with evanescent light which dye is bound to a face by immuno-reaction which face is a face of an optical waveguide for totally reflecting an exciting light, and detecting a fluorescent light component by a detector which fluorescent light is a part of fluorescent light radiated from excited fluorescence dye and is intruded into the optical waveguide through the face and is radiated almost uniformly from a face which is opposite to the fluorescent light incidenting face of the optical waveguide as a plane wave thereafter (refer to FIG. 24 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,604,927).
(2) exciting fluorescence dye uniformly using a plane wave, utilizing characteristics in which only fluorescent light from fluorescence dye which are bound to a surface of an optical waveguide, intrudes within the optical waveguide and the fluorescent light propagates within the optical waveguide, and detecting fluorescent light which is outgone from an egde section of the optical waveguide which egde section is located in fluorescent light propagating direction (refer to FIG. 25 and Japanese Patent Laid Open Tokuhyoushou 61-502418), and
(3) exciting fluorescence dye with evanescent light which dye is bound to a face by immuno-reaction which face is a face of an optical waveguide for totally reflecting an exciting light, and detecting a fluorescent light component by a detector which fluorescent light is a part of fluorescent light radiated from fluorescence dye bound to the surface of the optical waveguide and is intruded into the optical waveguide and is propagated within the optical waveguide in a total reflection manner and is outgone from the optical waveguide optical axis of which fluorescent light coincident with that of exciting light (refer to FIG. 26 and Japanese Patent Laid Open Tokuhyoushou 59-501873).

Optical measurement method and apparatus thereof

c/o Daikin Industries, Ltd., Shiga-seisakusho, 1000-2, Aza Ootani, Okamoto-cho