A physical quantity sensing device includes an AC voltage generator for generating an AC voltage and a bridge circuit that has first and second input points, to which the AC voltage is applied, and first and second output points connected to a differential amplifier. The bridge circuit includes first and second sensor elements, the impedance of which change with a physical quantity to be measured. The first and second sensor elements have a positive temperature characteristic in which sensitivity increases as temperature rises. The AC voltage generator includes an amplitude limiter which has a negative temperature characteristic that decreases the amplitude of the AC voltage with a rise in temperature, thereby compensating for temperature dependence of a differential voltage produced between the first and second output points.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a physical quantity sensing device with a bridge circuit and more particularly relates to a sensing device that includes a pair of sensor elements, the impedance of which changes with a physical quantity to be measured. As used herein, the "physical quantity" is any quantity that can be measured with sensor elements, and refers to any of a broad variety of quantities such as forces (various forces including torque load), current, voltage, light quantity, and temperature.
2. Description of the Related Art
Magnetostrictive load sensing devices, including magnetostrictive sensor elements, have been developed for many years. A magnetostrictive sensor element is an element made of a magnetostrictive material, the initial permeability of which changes with the given load, and senses a variation in the initial permeability of the magnetostrictive material as a variation in the impedance (e.g., inductance and resistance) of a sensing coil, for example. Examples of preferred magnetostrictive materials include magnetic materials, soft magnetic materials and ultramagnetic materials such as ferrous alloys, iron-chromium based alloys, iron-nickel based alloys, iron-cobalt based alloys, pure iron, iron-silicon based alloys, iron-aluminum based alloys, and permalloys.
FIG. 1A is an equivalent circuit diagram showing a typical sensing circuit in a conventional magnetostrictive load sensing device. The bridge circuit shown in FIG. 1A has first and second input points N1 and N2, to which an AC voltage is supplied, and first and second output points S1 and S2, which are connected to a differential amplifier (not shown). The AC voltage is supplied to the first and second input points N1 and N2 from an AC voltage generator 10.
In the bridge circuit shown in FIG. 1A, magnetostrictive sensor elements SE1 and SE2 are connected in parallel to each other. A bridge circuit of this type will be referred to herein as a "parallel bridge circuit". Load sensing devices with such a parallel bridge circuit are described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publications Nos. 5-60627, 10-261128 and 2001-356059 and Japanese Utility Model Application Laid-Open Publication No. 5-45537, for example.
The sensitivity of a magnetostrictive sensor element changes due to a temperature variation and therefore requires some temperature compensation. In the prior art, such temperature compensation is performed via a temperature sensor and a sensitivity variation corrector including thermistors (see Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2001-356059, for example).
Japanese Patent Publication No. 2776693 discloses a method of performing temperature compensation on the sensing characteristic of a sensing device by measuring the DC resistance of an AC signal detecting coil. This method is advantageous because no special temperature sensing elements are needed anymore and because the temperature of a coil with a temperature coefficient can be measured directly.
However, according to the method disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2001-356059, not only the thermistors as temperature sensing elements but also the temperature sensor and sensitivity corrector are needed, thus requiring an overly complicated circuit configuration. Then, the circuit board including those circuits and elements should have an increased area and the manufacturing cost would increase significantly, too.
Likewise, the method disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication No. 2776693 needs a means for measuring the DC resistance separately, thus requiring a more complicated circuit configuration, a bigger circuit board and a higher manufacturing cost also.

Physical quantity sensing device with bridge circuit and temperature compensating method


A novel process of sequentially mixing polymers comprising. a. mixing together and melt blending impact modifier and semicrystalline polymer to form a preblend, and PA0 b. mixing together and melt blending the preblend with amorphous polymer,. and polymer compositions produced as a result of the novel process are disclosed.

Polymer compositions are generally useful in manufacturing objects by employing techniques commonly used with thermoplastic materials, e.g., injection molding, extrusion, blow molding, melt spinning, and stamping. Semicrystalline and amorphous polymers are commonly blended together to obtain polymer compositions having desirable physical characteristics.
Unfortunately, many semi-crystalline and amorphous polymer compositions can be brittle and crack upon impact making them undesirable for certain applications requiring high impact resistance, for example, in the fabrication of automobile body panels. The desire to improve toughness of polymer compositions has led to the use of impact modifiers, also known as elastomers or elastomeric polymers. Impact modifiers improve the toughness of an otherwise brittle polymer composition by imparting elastic properties to the polymer composition. Generally, the impact modifiers are melt blended simultaneously with the semicrystalline and amorphous polymers to produce a polymer composition which is then injection molded or otherwise formed into a desired shape.
Gallucci et al. U.S. Pat. No. 4,873,286 discloses an improved process for the manufacture of polyphenylene ether-polyamide compositions wherein a polycarboxylic acid modifier is precompounded with either the polyamide or, preferably the polyphenylene ether prior to compounding with the other polymer. The polycarboxylic acid modifier is employed to modify surface properties of the resulting polymer composition. The polycarboxylic acid modifier is not an impact modifier. Gallucci et al. broadly suggests that other components such as impact modifiers, reinforcing agents, stabilizers and the like, may optionally be precompounded into the resulting polycarboxylic acid modified polyphenylene ether-polyamide compositions.
It has also been suggested to initially blend a butadiene copolymer with a polyamide prior to blending with a polyepoxy compound. See Sasaki et al. U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,567,235 and 4,567,238. Additionally, Flexman et al. U.S. Pat. No. 4,942,200 discloses preblending a polyarylate and an epoxy functional polymer before blending with either a polyamide or an elastomeric modifier. It is also known that certain impact modifiers preferentially disperse within poly(phenylene oxide) rather than Nylon-6,6 in a poly(phenylene oxide)-Nylon 6,6-polymer composition. This is discussed in an article entitled "Morphology and Properties of Toughened Poly(Phenylene Oxide)-Polyamide Blends", Hobbs, S.Y., Dekkers, M.E.J. and Watkins, V.H. Journal of Materials Science vol. 24 pp. 2025-2030 (1989).
A need exists to develop sequentially mixing or preblending components to obtain certain physical characteristics of a semicrystalline and amorphous polymer blend to accommodate various utilities.

Polymer compositions and methods of making same


A method, system, and computer program product for measuring web site satisfaction of information needs are provided. The method includes: selecting a page for analysis; generating a page profile in the form of a list of keywords representing the page; generating a page traffic profile in the form of lists of keywords representing information needs of users, wherein the page traffic profile is generated from keywords used by users to visit the page; determining the success of users' visits to the page; and analyzing whether a page satisfies users' information needs by applying a distance measure between the keywords of the page profile and the keywords of the page traffic profile and combining the distance measure result with a success rate of the keywords.

This invention relates to the field of web site analysis. In particular, the invention relates to measuring web site satisfaction of information needs.
The purpose of web analytics tools is the measurement, collection, analysis and reporting of internet data for purposes of understanding and optimizing web usage. A known web analytics tool is Google Analytics (Google is a trade mark of Google, Inc.).
Web analytics tools measure all kinds of key performance indicators (KPIs) (for example, hit rate and bounce rate) that measure the effectiveness of pages from the site, together with some global measures like the most popular browsing paths into a site's hypertext.
In addition, web analytics tools allow discovery of the terms that when used by users in internet search engine queries have brought them to a specific site.
Web analytics tools also allow measurement of whether some targets are reached by users visiting a site. For example, a site may assume that the information need of a user is fulfilled by a page whenever the user stays at least 30 seconds before leaving it.
The measurements can be analyzed by content providers in order to tune the content of their sites. To do so, they need to interpret those KPIs and try to figure out what are the users are looking for and why they like or do not like what they find in the site. There is no automated way to analyze what is the "information need" of the users browsing a site, how it evolves while browsing, and automatically detecting whether this information need is fulfilled or not, other than the time spent on a page.

Measuring web site satisfaction of information needs using page traffic profile

International Business Machines Corporation


A hand 1 is constituted by a hand base 4 serving as a base portion, a rocking hand 3 disposed to be superposed on the hand base 4 and serving to support a substrate 2, and a rocking mechanism 5 provided between the hand base 4 and the rocking hand 3 and serving to support the rocking hand 3 to be tiltable and movable in parallel with respect to the hand base 4.

The present invention relates to a substrate delivering device for delivering a substrate such as a wafer or a liquid crystal in a semiconductor manufacturing apparatus, and more particularly to a hand for directly transmitting/receiving the substrate to/from other apparatuses.
A semiconductor manufacturing apparatus includes a substrate delivering device for delivering a substrate to a desirable position in the apparatus. The substrate delivering device includes a hand for properly holding the substrate. In a large number of semiconductor manufacturing apparatuses, the substrate is horizontally held and delivered in the apparatus by means of the hand in order to carry out a predetermined treatment over a surface or a back face which is a plane of the substrate. In the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus, the substrate mounted on the hand is further held by another substrate holding mechanism in the apparatus and is transmitted/received in a baton passing way. In other words, a separate substrate holding mechanism from the hand in the apparatus approaches the substrate held by the hand in a horizontal condition from above and transmits/receives the substrate in a normal direction of the plane of the substrate. However, the substrate holding mechanism and the hand of the substrate delivering device have horizontal levels which are not adapted to each other or have planar positions shifted from each other in some cases. Therefore, it is hard to directly transmit/receive the substrate between them.
For this reason, a station for temporarily mounting the substrate thereon is provided between the substrate delivering device and the substrate holding mechanism in some cases. A mounting surface of the station is provided with a guide groove for carrying out an adjustment to adapt the level of the station to that of the substrate holding mechanism and correcting the planar position of the substrate when the substrate delivering device mounts the substrate on the station. Consequently, a substrate processing device mounts the substrate on the station and the substrate holding mechanism approaches the substrate mounted on the station which is to be taken so that the substrate is properly delivered from the substrate delivering device to the substrate holding mechanism.
In this case, the station only has a mounting portion for mounting the substrate thereon and does not have a mechanism for positively holding the substrate held on the hand of the substrate delivering device. In other words, the hand of the substrate delivering device only mounts the substrate on the mounting portion at a substrate receiving side. Even if the horizontal levels of the hand and the station are not adapted to each other or the planar positions are slightly shifted from each other, accordingly, the hand can mount the substrate on the mounting portion of the station without trouble.
However, a reduction in a size of a footprint is required in the semiconductor manufacturing apparatus. When the station is provided, the size of the apparatus is increased correspondingly.
If the station is not provided, however, it is hard to properly transmit/receive the substrate directly in the normal direction of the plane of the substrate between the hand and the substrate holding mechanism.
In consideration of the problems, it is an object of the invention to provide a hand for a substrate delivering device which can directly transmit/receive a substrate held on the hand to/from a substrate holding mechanism on a partner side in a normal direction of a plane of the substrate.
In order to solve the problem, the invention has the following structure.
According to a first aspect of the invention, there is provided a hand for holding a substrate in a horizontal plane, including:
a hand base serving as a base portion,
a rocking hand disposed to be superposed on the hand base and serving to support the substrate, and
a rocking mechanism provided between the hand base and the rocking hand and serving to support the rocking hand to be tiltable and movable in parallel with respect to the hand base.
According to a second aspect of the invention, there is provided the hand according to the first aspect, wherein
the rocking mechanism supports the rocking hand by means of a compression spring.
According to a third aspect of the invention, there is provided the hand according to the first aspect, wherein
the rocking hand includes a guide pin for correcting a position in a horizontal direction in abutment on a periphery of the substrate, and
the guide pin is pressed down from a surface of the rocking hand.
According to a fourth aspect of the invention, there is provided the hand according to the third aspect, wherein
the rocking hand includes a pad on which the substrate guided by the guide pin is mounted and a gripping click for gripping the periphery of the substrate mounted on the pad.
According to a fifth aspect of the invention, there is provided the hand according to the fourth aspect, further including:
an external wall for surrounding the rocking mechanism and a gripping click driving mechanism for driving the gripping click is provided on the hand base.
According to a sixth aspect of the invention, there is provided a substrate delivering device including:
the hand according to the first aspect.
According to a seventh aspect of the invention, there is provided a semiconductor manufacturing apparatus including:
the substrate delivering device according to the sixth aspect, and
a holding mechanism for directly transmitting/receiving the substrate to/from the hand.
According to the invention, even if the horizontal level or planar position of the holding mechanism on the partner side for directly transmitting/receiving the substrate to/from the hand in the planar direction of the substrate is not adapted to that of the hand, the rocking hand portion of the hand is rocked in conformity with the holding mechanism on the partner side. Therefore, it is possible to reliably transmit/receive the substrate between the hand and the holding mechanism on the partner side.

Hand having rocking mechanism and substrate delivering device having the same


Compound of formula (I′) or (I″) or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof. The compound is an inhibitor of mammalian kinase enzyme activity, including ROR1 tyrosine kinase activity and may be used in the treatment of disorders associated with such activity.

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) originates from B lymphocytes which differ in activation and maturation stage and are derived from antigen experienced B cells with different immunoglobulin heavy chain variable (IgVH) gene mutations (Chiorazzi N et al., N. Engl. J. Med., 2005, 352, 804-15). Patients with mutated IgVH genes have a better prognosis compared to patients with unmutated genes (Damle R N et al., Blood 1999, 94, 1840-7; Hamblin T J et al., Blood, 1999, 94, 1848-54). Global gene expression profiling studies have revealed partly distinguishing but in general overlapping expression profiles in mutated and unmutated leukemic B cells, suggesting a common phenotype (Klein U et al., J. Exp. Med., 2001, 194, 1625-38; Rosenwald A et al., J. Exp. Med., 2001, 194, 1639-47).
Gene expression profiling studies showed a 43.8 fold increase of the orphan receptor tyrosine kinase (RTK) ROR1 in CLL cells (Klein U et al., J. Exp. Med., 2001, 194, 1625-38). ROR1 is a member of the RTK family of orphan receptors related to muscle specific kinase (MUSK) and Trk neurotrophin receptors (Glass D J, et al., Cell, 1996, 85, 513-23; Masiakowski P et al., J. Biol. Chem., 1992, 267, 26181-90; Valenzuela D M et al., Neuron, 1995, 15, 573-84). ROR receptors are cell surface receptors participating in signal transduction, cell-cell interaction, regulation of cell proliferation, differentiation, cell metabolism and survival (Masiakowski P et al., Biol. Chem., 1992, 267, 26181-90; Yoda A et al., J. Recept. Signal Transduct. Res., 2003, 23, 1-15). They are evolutionarily highly conserved between different species e.g. human, mouse, Drosophila, and C. elegans, suggesting important biological functions.
The human ROR1 gene has a coding region of 2814 bp with a predicted 937 amino acids sequence and 105 kDa protein size including an Ig-like domain, cysteine-rich domain, kringle domain, tyrosine kinase domain, and proline-rich domain (Yoda A et al., J. Recept. Signal Transduct. Res., 2003, 23, 1-15). ROR1 is located on chromosomal region 1p31.3 (http://www.ensembl.org), a region where chromosomal aberrations are not frequently seen in hematological malignancies. The human ROR1 is expressed at the gene level in heart, lung, and kidney but less in placenta, pancreas and skeletal muscles (Reddy U R et al., Oncogene, 1996, 13, 1555-9). Importantly, there is an almost complete absence of ROR1 protein expression in normal human adult tissues and organs. ROR1 was originally cloned from a neuroblastoma cell line (Masiakowski P et al., J. Biol. Chem., 1992, 267, 26181-90) and subsequently a shorter form lacking the entire extracellular domain but containing the transmembrane domain was isolated from a fetal brain library. Truncated ROR1 (t-Rorl) gene has been reported in fetal and adult human central nervous system, in human leukemias, lymphoma cell lines, and in a variety of human cancers derived from neuroectoderm (Reddy U R et al., Oncogene, 1996, 13, 1555-9). A shorter transcript from exons 1-7 including a short part of intron 7 has also been described with a predicted length of 393 amino acids and a molecular weight of 44 kDa (Ensembl ID; ENSG00000185483).
Gene profiling and protein expression studies of patients with chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) has revealed increased expression of ROR1, while mature leucocytes from healthy donors do not express this protein (DaneshManesh, A H et al., Int. J. Cancer, 2008, 123, 1190-5). Silencing of ROR1 with siRNA in CLL cells resulted in apoptosis, while siRNA treatment of B cells from normal donors did not (Choudhury, A et al., Brit. J. Haematol., 2010, 151, 327-35).
Acute myeloid leukemic (AML) stem cells (CD34+) may potentially account for the resistance for many cytotoxic drugs. In an in vitro assay, a chimeric antibody against ROR1 (UC99961) inhibited in a dose-dependent manner colony formation of ROR1+ AML stem cells but not ROR− AML cells and not normal CD34+ stem cells. The results suggest that targeting ROR may represent an important component to eradicate malignant stem cells in AML and potentially also other refractory cancer-stem-cell-driven malignancies (Balaian L et al, Blood, ASH Annual Meeting) 2012, Abstract 2560). In acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) ROR1 is up-regulated modulating in a counterbalancing manner with pre-BCR signaling pathways leading to activation of AKT, ERK and MEK. siRNA transfection induced impaired growth of ALL cells and apoptosis (Bicocca V et al, Cancer Cell, 22, 656-667, 2012).
Human breast cancer cells, but not normal breast epithelia cells also express ROR1. The intensity of ROR1 expression was higher in patients with hormone receptor negative tumors as well as in those with a low degree of cell differentiation, i.e. in patients with a poor prognosis. Silencing of ROR1 impaired the growth in vitro of human breast cancer cells and in immune-deficient mice. The results support the notion that ROR1 is of biological and clinical significance in breast cancer and may be a potential target for therapy (Zang S et al, PLoS One, 7(3): e31127, 2012).
In human lung adenocarcinoma cells ROR1 was overexpressed. The ROR1 kinase activity sustained a favorable prosurvival balance between the proliferative PI3K/AKT and apoptotic p38 signaling, partly through ROR1 kinase-dependent src activation as well as kinase-independent sustainment of EGFR/ERBB3 phosphorylation and PI3K activation. ROR1 knock-down effectively inhibited the growth of lung cancer cells in vitro and in vivo irrespective of EGFR status including those cells resistant to the EGFR tyrosine kinase inhibitor gefitinib. These data also indicate an important biological role of ROR1 in lung cancer and a structure for targeted therapy (Yamaguchi et al, Cancer Cell, 21, 348-361, 2012). Unexpectedly CLL cells showed an overexpression of ERBB2 and phosphorylation of src/PI3K, AKT/mTOR/CREB. The ROR1 tyrosine kinase inhibitors described in this work (see below) dephosphorylated ROR1/src/PI3K/AKT/mTOR/CREB which preceded apoptosis of CLL cells (own unpublished observations).
In another study, a number of solid tumor tissues (lung, ovarian, pancreatic) expressed ROR1 but not the normal cell counterpart. ROR1 expression was associated with high-grade histology and activation of AKT and CREB. Silencing of ROR1 using shRNA induced apoptosis of pancreatic and ovarian cancer cell lines and down regulation of the ROR1 protein as well as of activated AKT and CREB (Zhan S et al, American Journal of Pathology, 181:1903-1910, 2012).
Melanoma cells have been shown to express ROR1. ROR1 siRNA induced down regulation of ROR1 both at the mRNA and protein level, which preceded apoptosis. Targeting ROR1 of the melanoma cells by ROR1 directed monoclonal antibodies induced a significant apoptosis not requiring immune cells or complement. The degree of apoptosis induced by the antibodies varied between the cell lines (Hodjat-Farsangi M et al, PLoS One, 8, e61167, 2013). Furthermore, it has recently been shown that ROR1 plays an important role in adipogenesis and glucose homeostasis in 3T3-L1 cells (Sanchez-Solana, B, Laborda, J and Baladron, V, Molecular Endocrinology 26: 110-127, 2012). Hence, manipulating the WNT pathway, e.g. by modulation of ROR1, to alter adipose cellular makeup may constitute an attractive drug-development target to combat obesity-associated metabolic complications (Christodoulides, C, Lagathu, C, Sethi, J K and Vidal-Puig, A, Trends Endocrinol. Metab., 2009 January; 20(1):16-24).
The above described data serve to illustrate the validity of modulating ROR1 activity for treatment of disorders and diseases that include not only chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) but also other hematological malignancies as well as solid tumors and obesity-associated metabolic complications.
Antibody inhibitors of ROR1 have been described in the literature; e.g. PCT Int. Appl. WO2011079902. There are, however, no small molecule inhibitors of ROR1 known in the art. Substituted imidazo[4,5-b]pyridine compounds are well known in the art, e.g. PCT Int. Appl. WO2003045929, WO2004016270, WO2004016611, WO2006066913, WO2006066914, WO2006080821, WO2006125958, WO2007028135, WO2007072017, WO2007083978, WO2008121063, WO2008121064, WO2009001021, WO2009111277, WO2011066211, WO2013116291, Wang, T. et al. Bioorg. Med. Chem. Lett., 2012, 22(5), 2063-2069, Bavetsias, V. et al. J. Med. Chem., 2010, 53, 5213-5228 and Bavetsias, V. et al. J. Med. Chem., 2012, 55, 8721-8734. However, it has not previously been shown that such compounds are capable of modulating ROR1 activity.

2-phenylimidazo[4,5-b]pyridin-7-amine derivates useful as inhibitors of mammalian tyrosine kinase ROR1 activity


A data localization service is provided for a web browser residing on a computing device. Depending upon the availability of the network connection as well as the level of native support in the browser, the data localization service will support different levels of service/performance to optimize the user experience. To do so, the data localization service includes a priority handler configured to receive a request to localize data from a requesting client application and provide in response thereto a localized representation of the data to the requesting client application. The data localization service may also include a native data localizer configured to receive a request to localize data from the priority handler and localize the data in accordance with a localization preference parameter indicative of a locale. The native data localizer may be a function integrated into the script interpreter of the web browser.

Data localization and other support services are needed to support web applications which present data in different languages and to persons in different locales. For any given user, only a subset of data will be pertinent (e.g., one of hundreds of potential languages). Furthermore, these types of services can be too large to be hosted on the client device, such as a mobile phone. As a result, these types of services can be made available to web applications over a network from a server. While this approach has proven to be useful in certain situations, there are some drawbacks. Therefore, applicant proposes to expose a more robust data localization service to the web applications. Depending upon the availability of the network connection as well as the level of native support in the browser, the data localization service will support different levels of service/performance to optimize the user experience.
This section provides background information related to the present disclosure which is not necessarily prior art.

Data localization service made available by a web browser


A battery temperature adjusting device for a vehicle on which a battery is mounted, the battery being a lithium ion battery disposed near a powertrain unit inside an engine bay, is provided. The device includes a first air duct provided to an intake passage configured to lead intake air to a combustion chamber of an engine, a second air duct provided to the intake passage and provided with an intake opening that opens toward a space between the powertrain unit and the battery, an intake-air-amount adjusting part, and a controller configured to acquire an ambient temperature of the powertrain unit. The controller increases a ratio of the second intake air amount relative to the sum of the first intake air amount and the second intake air amount, when the ambient temperature exceeds a first threshold temperature, compared with when the ambient temperature is below the first threshold temperature.

A small-sized battery is mounted inside an engine bay, mainly for the purpose of supplying power to a starter motor when starting an engine, and supplying power when lighting inside a cabin and audiovisual apparatuses are used while the engine is stopped.
For example, JP1993-085197A discloses a technology for cooling a battery using a portion of intake air extracted from an intake pipe of an engine.
Meanwhile, although a lead storage battery is used as the small-sized battery described above, a lead storage battery may be replaced with a lithium ion battery in consideration of environmental problems, such as the lead regulations in Europe.
Lithium ion batteries are narrow in the optimum range of the temperatures of the battery and its periphery, as compared with lead storage batteries, and demonstrate the most excellent charge-and-discharge characteristics in a specific temperature range (e.g., about 25° C. to 40° C.). If the temperature of a lithium ion battery and its periphery deviates from this temperature range, degradation of the lithium ion battery progresses, and therefore, the battery life is shortened.
Inside the engine bay, the ambient temperature of a powertrain unit including an engine and a transmission may rise, especially during a high-load operation, due to exhaust heat from the powertrain unit. If the battery is disposed near the powertrain unit, the temperatures of the battery and its periphery may rise greatly, which leads to rapid degradation of the battery.

Battery temperature adjusting device for vehicle, vehicle, and method of adjusting battery temperature for vehicle


In a theatrical rigging system, a number of motors can be placed on platforms which can move upon rails to be connected to different theatrical rigging elements. The motors can be randomly attached to operate different overhead hanging devices.

In many theaters scenery is raised and lowered over the stage on wire rope (cables). The movable scenery can be changed in between scenes as required by the theatrical presentation. Most modern rigging line set systems are counterweight systems in which the weight of the scenery is balanced by counterweights. Stage hands can manually lower and raise the scenery by pulling on a cord attached to the counterweight.
Alternately, a control chain can be attached to the counterweight and the control chain connected to a motor. In this way, the motor can then control the raising and the lowering of the scenery. An example of such a system is described in R. A. Drew U.S. Pat. No. 3,165,296.
It is desired to have an improved system for positioning overhead scenery.

Motorized assist counterweight system for theatrical overhead rigging


A toner conveying member is a member with a shaft and a screw around a longitudinal non-end portion (i.e., a central portion) of the shaft integrally molded with resin, and also includes a metal pipe. The metal pipe includes a surrounding portion provided around an end portion of the shaft where the screw is not provided, and a buried portion buried in at least a portion of the screw and extended from the surrounding portion.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a toner conveying member, a developing device including the toner conveying member, and an image forming apparatus including the developing device.
2. Description of the Related Art
An electrophotographic image forming apparatus is equipped with a developing device in a two-component developing system using a developer containing toner and a carrier or in a one-component developing system using only toner without using a carrier. Such a developing device is provided with a developing roller, and is also provided with a toner conveying member for conveying toner and stirring and mixing toner and a carrier. The toner conveying member is a member with a conveying blade (screw) having a spiral shape or the like arranged on a shaft.
The image forming apparatus is also equipped with a toner supply device for supplying toner from a toner container to the developing device. A toner conveying member may also be used in the toner supply device. Some image forming apparatuses are equipped with cartridges into which a developing roller as a developer carrier, a toner supply device (a toner storage unit, a toner conveying member, a toner supply roller, etc.), and so on are integrated. Of them, a cartridge including a photosensitive drum as an image carrier is also called a process cartridge.
JP 2011-22467 A discloses a developing device (development container) including a toner conveying member. As shown in an axial cross section thereof in FIG. 1, the toner conveying member (mixing and stirring member) 200 has a conveying blade 202 made of resin and a rotating shaft (rotating shaft) 201 made of metal. With this, the developing device prevents the longitudinal deflection of the toner conveying member 200 due to rotation, and continually keeps the distance between the toner conveying member 200 and a detecting surface of a toner concentration detection sensor attached to an inner wall in the development container constant, thereby to stabilize the output of the toner concentration sensor.
JP 2014-115402 A discloses a toner conveying member with a shaft made of resin and a conveying blade made of metal. JP 2014-115402 A also discloses a toner conveying member with a shaft made of metal and a conveying blade made of resin or metal.
However, with the technique described in JP 2011-22467 A, the longitudinal deflection of the toner conveying member due to rotation can be prevented, but the distance between the toner conveying member and the detecting surface of the toner concentration detection sensor is made excessively constant. Therefore, although this technique stabilizes the output of the toner concentration sensor, it causes a problem that a developer conveyed over the detecting surface adheres to the detecting surface such as when the electrical charge of toner increases too much, and thus the correct output of the toner concentration sensor cannot be obtained. Further, with this technique, a metal shaft is present along the entire longitudinal length, which eliminates a problem such as deformation or breakage due to drive stress but causes a problem such as a cost increase.
In the technique described in JP 2014-115402 A, the toner conveying member with the shaft made of resin and the conveying blade made of metal longitudinally bends at the shaft made of resin, causing a developer on a detecting surface to pulsate, and making it hard for the developer to adhere to the top of the detecting surface. Thus, it can solve the above-described problem.
However, a toner conveying member with a shaft made of resin as described in JP 2014-115402 A permanently deforms relatively early at the shaft of the resin material, preventing a developer from being conveyed axially smoothly. Thus, in view of the recovery and recycle of cartridges, it causes a new problem that the number of recyclability of the toner conveying member decreases.
As shown in FIGS. 2A to 2C, it is also considered to put metal pipes (metal collars) 303 on end portions of a shaft 301 (end portions at both ends of a screw 302) of a toner conveying member 300 with the shaft 301 made of resin, to reduce the above new problem. The provision of the metal pipes 303 only at portions corresponding to bearings as illustrated not only reduces the above new problem but also has an advantage of being able to use them also as bearing members. FIG. 2B is an enlarged view showing an axial cross-sectional shape of the toner conveying member in FIG. 2A, and FIG. 2C is a cross-sectional view in the direction C-C in FIG. 2B.
However, when a developer is injected into a development container and a rotation operation is executed, the toner conveying member 300 like this goes into a state where a deflection due to rotational drive occurs, that is, a state where bending occurs. Stress under this state causes a troublesome phenomenon such as rubbing against an inner wall of the development container, the wear of a drive transmission gear, or a deformation at a bearing portion and the vicinity.

Toner conveying member for reducing bending of same, developing device, and image forming apparatus


Processes are disclosed for the selective hydrolysis of saturated esters, e.g., ethyl propionate, over unsaturated esters, e.g., ethyl acrylate, using enzymes, e.g., lipases. The processes are useful, for example, for removing undesired esters from monomer feeds used in latex polymerization and from the latexes after polymerization. The processes can be used, for example, to treat latexes used in hair fixative compositions to remove unpleasant odors.

Latex polymers can be made from a variety of ethylenically unsaturated monomers. Lower alkyl acrylates, e.g., those having from 1 to about 5 carbon atoms, are often employed as starting materials to make acrylic latexes. Most latexes, including acrylic latexes, contain residual monomers or impurities, some of which are benign and some of which can impart an unpleasant odor. Acrylic latexes made from ethyl acrylate often contain an analog, ethyl propionate, as an impurity with the ethyl acrylate monomer. Ethyl propionate can be a source of a residual odor which is undesirable in the latex product. Ethyl propionate levels must often be reduced to less than about 20 ppmw or lower to render the latex suitable for personal care use. In addition, residual unsaturated monomers, such as, for example, ethyl acrylate, are also often removed from latex polymers as these materials can be undesirable in the latex product.
It is not uncommon to treat latex polymers to remove residual monomers and impurities. For example, latexes can be treated with enzymes to hydrolyze such materials. Such treatments typically reduce the levels of the unsaturated esters as well as the saturated esters.
When treating the monomer starting material, it can be desirable to selectively remove the saturated analogs, e.g., ethyl propionate, from the unsaturated monomer, e.g., ethyl acrylate. Enzymes that do not selectively hydrolyze the saturated over the unsaturated species will unnecessarily degrade useful monomer.
When treating the latex instead of the monomer starting material to remove the saturated impurities, selective reaction of saturated over unsaturated esters is also desirable. In typical latex manufacture, for reasons related both to odor and toxicity, effort is made to reduce the residual level of unreacted monomer. One common measure to reduce the residual level of monomer is a period of post-heating of the latex after the polymerization is substantially complete during which the latex is held at an elevated temperature for a period of time to further react any residual monomer. Another common measure is the use of additional initiator to generate a fresh batch of free radicals during the post-heat period which react with residual monomer and so reduce its level. Such measures often have the effect of reducing the residual monomer level to values of 50 ppmw and less, often 20 ppmw and less. In contrast, the residual level of saturated ester species which is unreactive remains at higher levels, e.g., 80 to 140 ppmw or more depending on the level of saturated species in the original monomer feed and the relative amount of each monomer used in the monomer mix. Thus, the saturated concentration is typically greater than the unsaturated (or monomer) concentration in the final latex. An enzyme that selectively reacts with the species present in higher concentration is more efficient and economical than one that is not selective.
Therefore, processes are desired for selectively hydrolyzing saturated esters, e.g., ethyl propionate, over unsaturated esters, e.g., ethyl acrylate, using enzymes.

Selective hydrolysis of saturated esters over unsaturated esters using enzymes


A foot joint supporter includes a first anchor section for tightening the wearer's lower leg with a tubular knitted fabric, a second anchor section for tightening the wearer's instep and sole with the fabric, and a knitted figure eight section between the first anchor section and the second anchor section, being composed of a foot section and a body section and supporting the wearer's talocrural joint. The foot section includes an instep section covering the wearer's instep and a sole section covering the wearer's sole. A stretch resistance, in the length width direction of the tubular knitted fabric, of the sole section is larger than is the stretch resistance, in the length width direction of the tubular knitted fabric, of the instep section.

A sock or a tubular supporter for lower limb in the related art is a sock or a tubular supporter for lower limb, which covers a foot section, an ankle section, and a calf section, and has a stretchable reinforcing section integrally provided at a section covering from a sole section corresponding to the calcaneal bone and/or the cuboid bone to the side surface of the ankle section, and compression pressure distribution in which compression pressure is gradually reduced from the ankle section to the calf section when worn is provided (refer to PTL 1, for example).


A geometric hashing method usable by a machine vision system for model-based recognition of an object. More specifically, in a computer having a texture engine, a method of pattern matching for recognition of objects within an image. The method comprises the following steps: deriving at least one target primitive representative of the image; forming at least one basis from at least one target primitive; in the texture engine, determining, for each one of the at least one basis, an affine invariant representation of the at least one target primitives; and identifying, using the affine invariant representation, at least one predefined model primitives that at least partially matches the at least one target primitives.

Techniques of visual object (and/or pattern) recognition are increasingly important in automated manufacturing, biomedical engineering, cartography and many other fields. Model-based recognition techniques typically must solve the problem of finding, in an image acquired by a camera, an occurrence of a previously defined model that has been affected by affine transformation. Affine transformations are those in which straight lines remain straight and parallelism is preserved. Furthermore, in affine transformations, angles of an object in relation to a coordinate system may undergo changes and differential scale changes may be introduced.
Geometric hashing, as described in "Geometric hashing: A generalized and Efficient Model-Based Recognition Scheme" (Y. Lamdan and H. J. Wolfson, Second International Conference on Computer Vision, December 1988, pp 238-249), and "Affine Invariant Model-Based Object Recognition" (Y. Lamdan, J. T. Schwartz, H. J. Wolfson, IEEE Transactions on Robotics and Automation, Vol. 6, No. 5, October 1990) has been proposed as a method of finding occurrences between an image and a model with affine transformation and partial occlusion.
In known geometric hashing methods, models of objects are represented by geometric primitives. Geometric primitives of the models are referred to herein as model primitives. The geometric primitives can be either object geometric features, such as ends of lines, corners, edge points, etc., or sets of these geometric features, such as line segments, lines, etc. For each triplet, couple or single representation of geometric primitives (according to the type of primitive chosen), a respective coordinate system is defined using the involved geometric primitives as a basis. For example, in the method defined by Lamdan and Wolfson, geometric primitives are interest points. Each triplet of interest points defines a basis. The location of each of the other interest points can then be calculated within the respective coordinate system, to produce a representation of the interest points that is affine invariant. For each coordinate system (basis), the calculated coordinates of each interest point is then used as an index to reference a corresponding bin of a hash table, into which a reference to the model and basis (e.g., a record in the form of [Model-ID, Basis-ID]) is inserted. The fully populated hash table is intended to provide a representation of the model that is invariant to affine transformations, and contains sufficient information to enable a match to be made, even when an object is partially occluded.
As is well known in the art, object recognition commences by acquiring an image of the object (e.g., using a gray-scale digital camera), and processing the image to detect geometric features. As with the model, a set of these features is used as a basis for a respective coordinate system, within which the locations of each of other geometric features are calculated. These calculated coordinates are used to access corresponding bins of the hash table. If an accessed bin contains a record (e.g. in the form of [Model-ID, Basis-ID]), then that record is accorded a vote or more generally a proximity score is computed. The records that accumulate the largest significant number of votes or the highest score are adopted as candidates, and extracted for further analysis. The hypothesis is that the model referenced by the record with the highest number of votes or the highest score most closely corresponds to the target image, and the proper transformation of that model into the target image can be computed from the basis identified in that record.
This object recognition algorithm and essentially its improved versions present some important advantages regarding object recognition (See "A probabilistic Approach to Geometric Hashing using Line Features", Frank Chee-Da Tsai, Technical Report No. 640, Robotics Research Laboratory, Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, June 1993, or patent application US2002/0181780 A1 dated Dec. 5, 2002, which is hereby incorporated by reference). It is an algorithm robust to noise and occlusion. However in such algorithms an enormous amount of processing is performed by the CPU. This effectively slows down the recognition step. Accordingly, an implementation that enables faster and reliable recognition of objects remains highly desirable.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Model based object recognition method using a texture engine


Near infrared imaging using elastic light scattering and tissue autofluorescence and utilizing interior examination techniques and equipment are explored for medical applications. The approach involves imaging using cross-polarized elastic light scattering and/or tissue autofluorescence in the Near Infra-Red (NIR) coupled with image processing and inter-image operations to differentiate human tissue components.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a medical diagnostic for the examination of tissue components. Specifically, the present invention relates to an optical imaging method and apparatus for in-vivo and real-time imaging of bladder cancer and determination of tumor margins.
2. Description of Related Art
Diagnostic medical equipment typically includes time-consuming, bulky, expensive apparatus that often exposes human tissue components to potentially harmful radiation and or chemicals. Optical methods and systems for the identification of objects that possess different optical properties or abnormal compositions embedded in scattering media such as, human tissue, are desirable because such systems can be designed as compact, inexpensive, portable, and non-invasive spectral investigative tools. Optical spectroscopy, as one such optical method example, has been widely used to acquire fundamental knowledge about physical, chemical, and biological processes that occur in biomaterials. Most tissue spectroscopy research has employed UV to visible light sources from 250-nm to 600-nm. The main active fluorophores in this spectral region are tryptophan, collagen, elastin, NAD(P)H, flavins and prophyrins. The disadvantage of these wavelengths is their short photon penetration depth in tissues, which leads to extraction of information only from superficial tissue layers.
Accordingly, a need exists for optical diagnostic methods and systems to be utilized in a compact portable system to recover optical information with regard to human tissue and organ compositions.

Autofluorescence detection and imaging of bladder cancer realized through a cystoscope

The Regents of the University of California


The invention relates to a coupling for connecting construction parts, a truss provided therewith and associated meth od and use. The coupling comprises a female and a male coupling part. The female coupling part comprises: a tubular receiving part, the wall of which an opening is provided; a ball which is placed in the opening and which is movable in radial direction of the receiving part; and a locking sleeve which is screwed onto and encloses the receiving part and which by being screwed is movable in the longitudinal direction of the receiving part between an opened position, in which the locking sleeve allows movement of the ball in the opening for the purpose of placing/removing the male coupling part into/from the receiving part, and a closed position in which the locking sleeve locks the male coupling part in the female coupling part with the ball, wherein the male coupling part is an elongate pin which comprises in its outer wall a groove for the ball.

Couplings for trusses are known from NL 1018901 and NL 1027917. The known couplings comprise a tubular female coupling part in which a male coupling part can be received. A hole is arranged in transverse direction through both the female coupling part and the male coupling part so that the coupling parts can be fixed by placing of a locking pin. The locking pin is in turn secured by a cotter pin or nut.
A drawback of the known couplings is that it is necessary to work with a relatively large number of components during the assembly of a truss construction. The locking pin and the cotter pin are moreover relatively small components which can therefore be easily lost. A further drawback is that during the assembly of constructions the locking pin has to be hammered into the hole of the coupling parts for the purpose of fixation, and this can cause noise nuisance in some situations.

Coupling for connecting construction parts, a truss provided therewith and associated method and use


A shaving foil for a dry shaver has a plurality of perforation arranged in an array. The shaving foil is formed in its skin contact surface with a plurality of recesses which define a thin section of reduced thickness at the recesses, while leaving thick sections at the remainder of the foil. Each perforation is configured to have its circumference defined partly by the thin section and partly by the thick section. Both of the thin and thick sections can come into contact with a user's skin for smoothly guiding hairs into the perforations to make close shaving without irritating the skin, while the shaving foil is moved across the skin. Especially, the thin sections act to cut the hairs shorter than the thick section, as wall as to raise flattened hairs into the perforations for successfully cutting the flattened hairs.

U.S. Pat. No. 5,185,933 discloses a shaving foil for a dry shaver which is configured to have protuberances on a skin engaging surface of the foil in order to raise flattened hairs for efficient shaving. However, since the protuberances are distributed separately from each other to give discrete knobs on the shaving foil, they are likely to drag a user's skin and is therefore not suitable for smoothly guiding the outer foil across the skin. It is generally known that the shaving foil of reduced-thickness is effective to make a close shaving of cutting relatively straight hairs, as well as to raise flattened hairs for effectively cutting such hairs. However, the use of the thin shaving foil is certainly accompanied with a drawback of seizing the skin too much into perforations of the foil and irritating the skin. Accordingly, it has been a demand of making the close shaving added with capability of cutting the flattened hairs, yet minimizing the skin irritation.


A two-stage hydraulic pump includes a rotor, a ring, and a plurality of rollers disposed in slots formed on the rotor. The pump has two inlet ports and two outlet ports, which are disposed inwardly and outwardly, respectively, of the rollers. A valve mechanism is incorporated which provides for flow directional control of the output flow of the pump between one portion of the discharge ports and a portion of the inlet ports when a low output flow is desired and blocking that interconnection while connecting the inner portion of the suction inlet side with a reservoir.

Two-stage hydraulic systems generally employ two hydraulic pumps. One pump is operated for low flow conditions and both pumps are operated for high flow conditions. Other two-stage pumps might control a portion of the output flow to a reservoir and a portion of the output flow to a hydraulic system during low flow conditions and both output portions to the hydraulic system during high flow conditions.


A compact and integrated portable device is provided for the analysis of dispersions by low-field pulsed NMR including: an NMR probe module, a means for generating radio frequency and magnetic field gradient pulses, a signal processor, and a master controller. Also provided are methods for using the device to measure one or more characteristics of phases or particles comprising a dispersion such as surface area, solid/liquid ratio, particle size, and elemental analysis.

Dispersions especially concentrated dispersions are of obvious wide industrial importance in diverse applications such as foods, coatings, fabricated materials and consumer packaged goods. It is well known that the overall characteristics exhibited by such dispersions are in varying degrees controlled by the basic physical properties of the individual particles comprising the dispersion. These properties include the surface chemistry, size, surface area, volume fraction and shape of the particles making up the dispersed phase. Such basic physical properties are generally optimized for a specific application empirically by manipulation of process and composition until the desired characteristics of the dispersion as a whole are achieved, e.g., stability, viscosity, spreadability.
The optimization process itself and the control of the quality of the optimized dispersions, e.g., paint composition, can be greatly facilitated by being able to measure the basic physical properties of the dispersed and continuous phase(s) in an accurate and reproducible way. Indeed, a host of methods and specialized instruments have been introduced over the last 50 years each having their own range of applications, limitations, and assumptions. For example, these include instruments based on dynamic and static light scattering, electrical properties, and acoustics.
Low-field pulsed NMR has been recognized as a potentially powerful technique for the characterization of dispersions since the pioneering work of Tanner and Stejskal (J. Phys, Vol 42, P288 (1965)) and is now widely used to measure for example the size of water droplets in margarine and food spread compositions. Numerous modifications and improvements in the analysis of the relationship between NMR spectra and the particle or other basic physical properties of a dispersion have appeared in the literature in order to make the technique more accurate and reproducible.
Pulsed NMR is an attractive technique for the characterization of dispersions for a number of reasons. Firstly, it is capable of measuring a number of key physical properties as will be discussed further below. This allows in principle one instrument to perform the function of several more specialized instruments thus streamlining the characterization process and potentially the expense of setting up a characterization lab.
Secondly, pulsed NMR allows the characterization of dispersions without the need for dilution, or special sample preparation. For example, the technique can in principle be applied to dispersions containing solid, liquid or gas dispersed phases, concentrated dispersions, optically opaque dispersions, highly viscous dispersions and dispersions containing multiple dispersed phases.
In spite of its potential advantages, pulsed NMR has not gained broad acceptance as a routine technique for the characterization of broad classes of dispersions. Its main use has been in the characterization of droplet size, water content of water-in-oil emulsions, and oil characterization, e.g., solid/liquid ratio, especially in the food and petroleum industry.
Among the potential reasons for the limited use of NMR in particle characterization is the lack of availability of compact, portable and readily affordable instruments that are specifically designed for dispersion characterization. Currently available instruments tend to be bulky, heavy and expensive.
Furthermore, currently available low field NMR instruments are primarily designed as general purpose instruments. As such these instruments are not optimized for dispersion characterization. Since the science underpinning pulsed NMR is complex, especially the relationships between pulse sequencing, signal acquisition and dispersion characteristics, the task of adapting these instruments for routine analysis is often daunting.
The following patents and publications form a part of the related art:
U.S. Pat. No. 4,389,613 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,480,227 to Brown describe portable pulsed NMR instruments and method of use that are designed to measure fluid flow properties in porous media especially oil field rock samples.
Shanks et al in a publication entitled "Miniature magnet assembly for NMR-ESR spectroscopy" (Am. J. Phys, Volume 48, pp 620-622) describes the evaluation in terms of field strength and field uniformity of the magnet assembly incorporating a sintered SmCo3 pole pieces. The assembly has a field strength of 3.35 kG with a claimed uniformity of +/−13.4 mG.
Martin et al. in a publication entitled "The NMR mouse: Its application to food science" (Magnetic Resonance in Foods Science: Latest developments, edited P S Belton, Royal Society of Chemistry, 2003) describes a low field bench top pulsed instrument based on a one-sided magnet and surface mounted RF coils. The magnet arrangement provides a high but rapidly decaying magnet field adjacent to one of the poles of the magnet.
Packer and Rees report the use of a pulsed magnetic field-gradient spin echo technique for the determination of droplet size distribution in emulsions (J. Colloid and Interface Sci., vol. 40, p206 (1972)).
Van Den Enden et al. describe a protocol for the rapid determination of water droplet size distributions in water-in-oil emulsions by pulsed field gradient NMR utilizing echo attenuation caused by restricted diffusion (J. Colloid and Interface Sci., vol. 140, p105 (1990)).
Goudappel et al. developed a method for measuring oil droplet size in oil-in-water by pulsed field gradient NMR by suppression of the NMR signal from the continuous water phase (J. Colloid and Interface Sci., vol. 239, p 535 (2001)). The accuracy of this technique was subsequently checked by Denkova et al. (Langmuir, vol. 20, p11402 (2004).

Compact and portable low-field pulsed NMR dispersion analyzer


A method and apparatus for lifting and lowering of pipe continuously, during the drilling, repair or maintenance of wells, without interruption to connect or disconnect pipe.

This invention is in the field of drilling, repair or maintenance of wells.
In the drilling, repair or maintenance of wells, particularly oil and gas wells, pipe is raised and lowered by cables mounted on derricks. A pipe or pipes may be lifted singly to be introduced into the wellbore, or a pipe or pipes may be lifted singly to be removed from the wellbore. Pipes may be connected n stands, consisting of two or more joints, and be lifted to be introduced to the well bore or lifted to be removed from the well bore, for example, during a tripping operation, where all of the pipe is removed from the well and then reinstalled back into the well, to replace, modify, maintain or repair some or all of, for example, the bottom hole assembly which may include several tools known to those skilled in the art, during which pipe may be removed, replaced or reinstalled. The pipe may be lowered either gradually, as during drilling, or may be lowered or raised more quickly during, for example, a tripping operation.
A deficiency in the raising and lowering of pipe in the operation of drilling, repair or maintenance of wells is the necessity to interrupt the raising or lowering operation in order to connect or disconnect pipe while removing or installing pipe, for example, during a tripping operation.

Method and apparatus for continuous raising and lowering joints of pipe


The invention relates to a tire having a tread of a rubber composition with compositional limitations containing minimal, if any, of in situ formed volatile alcohol byproduct. The tread component rubber composition contains a combination or pre-hydrophobated silica reinforcement and siloxane functionalized styrene/butadiene copolymer elastomer. The pre-hydrophobated silica is prepared, prior to mixing with the elastomer(s), by reacting hydroxyl groups (e.g. silanol groups) contained on the surface of a precipitated silica with an alkoxyorganomercaptosilane or with a bis-3(triethoxysilylpropyl)polysulfide which contains an average of from 2 to 4 connecting sulfur atoms in its polysulfidic bridge to form a composite thereof which may optionally include an alkyl silane. The volatile alcohol byproduct (e.g. ethanol) therefrom is thereby removed from the pre-hydrophobated silica composite prior to its introduction into the rubber composition(s).

Tires are a complex structural combination of many components of various physical properties and of various compositions. Two of such components are a circumferential tire tread which is intended to be ground-contacting and pair of tire sidewalls which conventionally extend between the tire's spaced apart bead portions radially outward to the peripheral edges of the tire tread.
Tire treads and tire sidewalls are normally intended to present very different properties for a tire. For example, tire treads, which are intended to be ground contacting, are normally expected to provide physical properties such as, for example, traction and resistance to abrasion. For example, tire sidewalls, which are not intended to be ground contacting, are normally expected to provide physical properties such as, for example, resistance to flex fatigue and scuff resistance.
For this invention, it is desired to present a tire with a tread, and optionally its sidewalls, which contains silica reinforcement in which the silica reinforcement is provided as a pre-formed silica/coupler composite, namely a pre-hydrophobated precipitated silica.
In practice, various tires with silica reinforced rubber treads have been described and manufactured. Some tires have been mentioned which have silica containing rubber sidewall(s). Some tires have been mentioned which have both treads and associated sidewalls which are composed of silica containing rubber compositions.
Alkoxysilane-polysulfide based coupling agents (e.g. bis(3-triethoxysilylpropyl)polysulfides) are often used to aid in coupling of precipitated silicas to diene-based elastomers in a rubber composition. However, such ethoxysilane moieties rely upon reaction with hydroxyl groups (e.g. silanol groups) contained on the surface of the precipitated silica which in turn produces a volatile alcohol byproduct (e.g. ethanol) in situ within the rubber composition itself.
For this invention, it is desired to provide a tire with a tread of a rubber composition which has reduced, or substantially eliminated, volatile alcohol (e.g. ethanol) evaporative emission.
Accordingly, a tire is provided with a tread of a rubber composition which contains a pre-hydrophobated silica reinforcement and siloxane functionalized styrene/butadiene copolymer rubber.
For said silica pre-hydrophobation purposes, the precipitated silica may be pre-treated with a bis(3-triethoxysilylpropyl)polysulfide or alkoxyorganomercaptosilane, optionally including an alkoxysilane, prior to its addition to the tread rubber composition. The alkoxyorganomercaptosilane may alternately be in a form of a blocked alkoxyorganomercaptosilane. One aspect of such pre-hydrophobation of the precipitated silica is to reduce, or substantially eliminate, evolution of as volatile alcohol (ethanol) during the actual mixing of the silica with the rubber compositions in a rubber mixing operation.
From a historical perspective, preparation of tires have been suggested with a rubber component which contains a precipitated silica which is hydrophobated in situ within the elastomer host by addition of both a coupling agent, as an organomercaptosilane, and an alkyl silane. For example, see U.S. Pat. No. 4,474,908. However, for this invention, it is required that the precipitated silica is pre-hydrophobated to substantially reduce the hydroxyl group content on its surface prior to its addition to the rubber composition.
From a historical perspective, preparation of tires has also been suggested with a rubber component in which both a coupling agent, as an organosilyl polysulfide, and an alkylsilane are individually added to a silica-containing rubber composition to treat the amorphous silica in-situ within the rubber host with both a hydrophobating agent (the alkylsilane) and a silica coupler (the organosilyl polysulfide compound). For example, see U.S. Pat. No. 5,780,538.
From a historical perspective, preparation of tires has further been suggested where one or more of its components (e.g. tread and sidewall) are silica reinforced wherein the silica is pre-treated with a coupling agent and, optionally, a substituted alkylsilane, prior to addition of the silica to the associated rubber composition with an expected result of reduction of alcohol evolution upon mixing the silica with the rubber composition. For example, see European patent publication EP-A-1 142 730 where the silica is pre-hydrophobated with an alkylsilane (e.g. Formula I therein) such as, for example, an alkoxyorganosilane which will release an volatile alcohol byproduct (e.g. ethanol) upon reaction with alcohol groups (e.g. silanol groups) contained on the surface of a precipitated silica and an alkoxyorganomercaptosilane (e.g. Formula II therein) which may also release an volatile alcohol byproduct upon reaction with alcohol groups (e.g. silanol groups) contained on the surface of a precipitated silica. Various alternative blocked alkoxyorganomercaptosilanes has been suggested, for example, in PCT/US98/17391 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,692,812 patent publications.
Representative examples of such alkylsilanes, and particularly alkoxyalkylsilanes are provided in said European patent publication for the pre-hydrophobation of the silica (from its Formula I) are trichloro methyl silane, dichloro dimethyl silane, chloro trimethyl silane, trimethoxy methyl silane, dimethoxy dimethyl silane, methoxy trimethyl silane, trimethoxy propyl silane, trimethoxy octyl silane, trimethoxy hexadecyl silane, dimethoxy dipropyl silane, triethoxy methyl silane, triethoxy propyl silane, triethoxy octyl silane, and diethoxy dimethyl silane.
Representative examples of such alkoxyorganomercaptosilanes are mentioned in said European patent publication for the pre-hydrophobation of the silica (from its Formula (II) as triethoxy mercaptopropyl silane, trimethoxy mercaptopropyl silane, methyl dimethoxy mercaptopropyl silane, methyl diethoxy mercaptopropyl silane, dimethyl methoxy mercaptopropyl silane, triethoxy mercaptoethyl silane, and tripropoxy mercaptopropyl silane.
In practice, it is recognized that precipitated silica aggregates are typically hydrophilic (water attracting) in nature and, in order to aid in dispersing the silica aggregates in various rubber compositions, it is sometimes desired to make the silica aggregates more hydrophobic (water repelling) in nature and therefore more compatible with the rubber. Accordingly, and as described in the aforesaid U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,474,908 and 5,780,538, a hydrophobating agent may be added to a rubber composition in addition to the precipitated silica to combine with the silica in-situ within the rubber host to make the silica more hydrophobic in nature.
However, it is considered herein, for the tire tread application where properties are desired by silica reinforcement are often sought, and particularly where a good homogeneous dispersion in the rubber host is often sought, that an in-situ modification of the amorphous silica within a viscous rubber host on a hit and miss basis, under relatively harsh high sheer and high temperature conditions is a relatively inefficient procedure of modifying the amorphous silica for use in rubber compositions which are intended to be silica reinforced, particularly where both an organosilane and alkyl silane are used which would compete within the rubber composition for reaction sites on the silica surface and particularly where an alcohol byproduct is formed in situ within the rubber composition which is then available as an evaporative emission.
Accordingly in one aspect, it is proposed herein to provide a tire having a tread comprised of individual rubber compositions which contain particulate pre-hydrophobated precipitated silica aggregates where the silica aggregates are added to, or mixed with, the individual rubber compositions in a pre-hydrophobated form instead of more inefficiently subsequently hydrophobating the silica aggregates in situ within the elastomer host, thus essentially eliminating formation of a volatile alcohol byproduct (e.g. ethanol) therefrom in situ within the rubber composition itself and thereby essentially eliminating evaporative emission of such in situ formed volatile alcohol.
Historically, according to U.S. Pat. No. 5,750,610, an organosilicate-modified silica gel may be hydrophobated with both an organomercaptosilane and alkyl silane and the dried treated organosilicate-modified silica gel blended with natural rubber and/or synthetic rubber. This invention is not intended to be directed to use of such modified silica gels which, for the purposes of this invention, are intended to be distinguished from rubber reinforcing precipitated silica aggregates for this invention.
A general description of silica gel and precipitated silica may be found, for example, in the Encyclopedia of Chemical Technology, Fourth Edition (1997), Volume 21, Kirk-Othmer in Pages 1020 through 1023.
A further descriptive discussion of silica gels and precipitated silicas may be found, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,094,829.
A significant aspect of this invention is the preparation of a tire with reduced volatile alcohol based evaporative emission which requires a tread component of a rubber composition which contains a combination of a siloxane functionalized elastomer and pre-hydrophobated precipitated silica aggregates, instead of using non pre-hydrophobated precipitated silica aggregates which are then hydrophobated in situ within the elastomer host, to produce a tire with reduced volatile alcohol evaporative emissions. It is considered that such tread composition is a departure from past practice, particularly where volatile alcohol based evaporative emission is taken into consideration, for a tire with acceptable performance characteristics.
In the description of this invention, the term "phr" relates to parts by weight for a material or ingredient per 100 parts by weight elastomer(s)". The terms "rubber" and "elastomer" are used interchangeably unless otherwise indicated. The terms "cure" and "vulcanize" are used interchangeably unless otherwise indicated.

Tire with low volatile alcohol emission rubber tread with compositional limitations


The present invention discloses a system and method for data communication. In the system and method for data communication, a part of communication peers in the communication system are assigned as super peers, and each super peer forwards message according to its route table. When a communication peer logs in the system, network information of the logged communication peer is saved in a super peer which is logically closest to the logged communication peer through messages forwarded among every super peer. And when an origination communication peer searches for a destination communication peer, the network information of the destination communication peer is saved in a super peer which is logically closest to the destination communication peer through the message forwarded among every super peer in super peer layer. The origination communication peer establishes connection with the destination communication peer based on the network information of the destination communication peer, and implements the data communication through the connection established.

At present, with development of data communication technologies, multiparty data communication for multiple communicating parties has been implemented. For example, audio and video data can be transmitted among multiple communicating parties, so an audio and video interaction among these communicating parties is implemented.
In the multiparty data communication, network information of each communicating party, such as a port number and IP address, is managed in a uniform manner. That is, the network information of every communicating party is stored and managed by a network information management server. In the multiparty data communication, the communicating parties acquire network information of each other via the network information management server, and establish data connection with each other for data communication based on the network information.
Though data communication can be implemented in the above mentioned way, the network information of every communicating party has to been stored and managed in a uniform manner by the network information management server. Once the network information management server fails, a large number of communicating parties can not acquire the network information of other parties, and fail to establish data connection with destination communicating parties, so data communication in a large area can not be implemented.
In addition, a relay server is also used to implement the data communication. Though the data communication can be implemented by the relay server relaying data, the data communication implemented by the relay server has the following disadvantages.
Since data needs to be relayed by the relay server in the data communication, and the relayed data usually includes large amounts of data, such as audio and video, the relay server needs a wide bandwidth, which increases cost of the relay server. In addition, because of the limited bandwidth of the relay server, the relay server only supports data relay for a limited number of communicating parties. If the number of communicating parties is large, a large number of relay servers will be needed, and the cost of data communication will further be increased. Furthermore, if a relay server fails during the data communication, multiparty data communication forwarded by the relay server will be interrupted, which results in a paralysis of data communication in a certain area.

Method for data communication and system thereof

Tencent Technology (Shenzhen) Company Ltd.


A system and method for a voice controlled video screen display system are provided. The voice controlled system is useful for providing "hands-free" navigation through various video screen displays such as the World Wide Web network and interactive television displays. During operation of the system, language models are provided from incoming data in applications such as the World Wide Web network.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to a system and method for providing a voice controlled video screen display, and more particularly to modifying existing systems to be voice interactive.
2. Background of the Related Art
As is well known, conventional methods for controlling video screen displays include use of a keyboard or "mouse" device. Other methods for controlling video screen displays include a sensor pad and hand-held pointing stylus, and light beams for effecting movement of a cursor on a display screen.
Conventional video screen display controlling devices generally require a fixed level surface and close proximity of the user to the display screen. Ample space for the controlling device, i.e., keyboard and/or mouse is also necessary.
Since all of the devices require manual dexterity, they are impractical devices for use by persons who are physically challenged, visually impaired, or have a limited range of movement due to arthritis, etc.
Various voice controlled video screen displays including speech recognition systems are well known in the art. See, for example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,345,538, 4,757,541, 4,633,499 and 4,158,750 the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference. However, the aforesaid prior art utilize voice controlled video screen display systems which incorporate speech recognizers that depend upon predefined and prestored languages. Therefore, the aforesaid prior art speech recognition systems have a significant shortcoming in that they are unable to be readily adapted to existing non-speech recognition systems so as to make such systems voice interactive. Thus, a voice controlled video screen display system is needed wherein the scope of the speech recognizable by the speech recognizer changes according to the user's operation of the system, as well as the system's operating program.

System and method for voice controlled video screen display


A winding machine for winding a finishing roll having a radius R of a sheet material on a core having a radius rc is provided. The winding machine includes: a support drum assembly arranged on a first side of the finishing roll and configured to support the finishing roll from the first side; a rider roll arranged on a second side of the finishing roll opposite to the first side and configured to apply a first nip pressure onto the finishing roll from the second side the finishing roll being supported by the support drum assembly; and a control unit configured to adaptively control the second nip pressure applied by the rider roll onto the finishing roll depending on an ascent rate of the rider roll.

Winding machines are machines for wrapping a sheet material, such as paper or textile, on a roll. In particular, in a winding machine, a sheet material is wrapped on a core to form finished rolls. The finished rolls are typically supported by a support assembly and pushed against the support assembly by a rider roll. To obtain a tightness profile of the finished roll the sheet material should be wounded on the finishing roll under similar conditions. During wrapping of the sheet material on the core the finishing roll increases in size. Accordingly, a nip pressure applied by the rider roll onto the finishing roll should be controlled to obtain a tightness profile and to attempt to keep the finishing roll inside the winding machine during all running, and do not to let the finishing roll be thrown out while turning.
The nip pressure should be controlled to be good enough in all situations. Conventional solutions work in certain (limited) circumstances, but are not optimized for all emerging cases. This can lead to poor tightness profile in finished rolls (further post processing and end-use problems, and broke rolls), failures in possible front splices, vibration, swinging and bouncing of the rolls, and even the finishing rolls can be thrown out in the middle of running, which in turn, when creating uncontrolled friction between rolls can cause fire, machinery breakdown and for operating personnel this is an obvious security risk. In winders this problem (risk) has aggravated when searching for capacity increase, by faster accelerations and higher running speeds.
Recently, the control of the nip pressure has been improved by adding a feed-forward (ff) component from an ascent rate of the rider roll. But the ff-term can never be sufficiently accurate, because the valve which is controlling the RR nip pressure is non-linear in many ways. Linearity depends on temperature and viscosity of hydraulic oil, and the change in differential pressure over the valve during reeling. Therefore, improving the pressure controller itself by finding and using optimal values for control of the nip pressure becomes an important role, in order to achieve the best available result.
At the beginning, when the finishing roll diameter is relatively small and the growth rate is high, a high gain is needed in the nip pressure controller, and towards the end of the winding, when the finishing roll diameter is large and has a small growth rate, then a less aggressive pressure controller is preferred. A too aggressive nip pressure controller is prone to cause vibrations, and on the other hand a too slow nip pressure controller fails to take the desired nip pressure, and thus deteriorates the tightness profile of finishing rolls.
In recent methods, PI (proportional-integral) force- or pressure-controller are used. PI values are optimized by changing gain and integration values with respect to the finishing roll diameter. This means that the PI controller is optimum only at certain web thickness and rate of diameter increase of the roll. As a result, optimizing the pressure controller PI values based only on the diameter does not bring the desired performance for all emerging situations. The problem with this can be seen, for example, in possible front splicing, where the rider roll instability can deteriorate the success of the joint. Similarly, a bad control of the nip pressure can expose the rolls, whereby the rolls can be thrown out in the middle of running, causing possible fire, machinery damage and is also a personal safety hazard.

Winding machine and method for controlling a second nip pressure


IPv6 traffic may be carried through an MPLS IPv4 network without the use of IPv6-over-IPv4 tunneling. This provides great savings in overhead, signaling, and state information storage and also allows for routing through the MPLS IPv4 network to adjust in response to changes in network state. In one embodiment, an edge node of an MPLS IPv4 network resolves a destination IPv6 network of a received IPv6 packet to an MPLS label switched path. The resolution exploits received inter-domain routing information. This information identifies the IPv4 address of an egress node that is usable as a gateway to the destination network. Within the inter-domain routing information, the IPv4 address may be encoded in IPv6 format.

The present invention relates to data communication networks and more particularly to systems and methods for facilitating interoperation between currently deployed Internet infrastructure and newer Internet infrastructure employing next generation protocols.
To accommodate the explosive growth of the Internet, a very large number of network nodes have been configured to employ IP (Internet Protocol). These nodes range from user workstations to very high throughput core routers. There have been successive versions of IP but as of the filing date of the present application, the predominant variant of IP deployed in the field is IPv4.
In recent years, many service providers have deployed IPv4 core networks that employ a forwarding mechanism referred to as MPLS (Multiprotocol Label Switching). Such networks are referred to herein as MPLS IPv4 networks. MPLS employs labels, rather than the contents of the IP packet to make forwarding decisions at each intermediate node. At each hop, an output interface and a substitute label are selected based solely on the received packet label. This provides advantageous flexibility in the deployment of new beneficial routing schemes. For example, the use of MPLS facilitates traffic engineering to shift traffic from congested paths to paths with excess capacity, fast re-routing around failed links or nodes, and large-scale virtual private network (VPN) deployment.
The Internet engineering community is planning and implementing a shift from IPv4 to IPv6. Advantages of IPv6 include an enormous expansion in the available address space to accommodate both greater ubiquity of Internet-enabled devices as well as less reliance on cumbersome network address translation schemes which have been utilize to conserve addresses. IPv6 also provides highly useful auto-configuration capabilities.
Service providers wish to offer IPv6 connectivity through their core networks while minimizing expense and configuration difficulties. Immediately replacing the core network infrastructure with MPLS IPv6 equipment is economically unviable for many service providers. Reconfiguring MPLS IPv4 routers to support both IPv4 and IPv6 raises challenges in the areas of hardware incompatibility with IPv6 forwarding requirements, network management, stability, and commercial availability of appropriate software.
Despite the fact that MPLS IPv4 networks makes forwarding decisions based on labels rather than IPv4 destination addresses, interoperation with IPv6 equipment is nonetheless problematic. An edge router configured to provide ingress access to the MPLS IPv4 network will expect each incoming packet to have an IPv4 address on which to base a selection of initial label. Furthermore, inter-domain routing information received at the ingress edge node will use the IPv6 addressing scheme to specify an address prefix of a destination network and the address of an edge node of the core network that can be used as a gateway to reach this destination network. Additionally, the mechanism by which labels are distributed among nodes of an MPLS IPv4 network relies on the IPv4 address scheme.
Thus, a need arises to forward IPv6 traffic over the MPLS IPv4 core so that service providers can offer IPv6 services without any upgrading or reconfiguration of their core network. One proposed solution is to employ some type of tunneling mechanism (e.g., IPv6-over-IPv4) where each IPv6 packet is encapsulated into an IPv4 packet that in turn is encapsulated into MPLS. Using this type of encapsulation over MPLS, however, brings several drawbacks. There is extra overhead resulting from the added header information. Furthermore, establishing numerous static tunnels requires additional configuration and storage of state information while use of dynamic tunnels requires support of specific software mechanisms, activation/configuration of these software mechanisms and furthermore involves constraints on IPv6 addresses to be allocated.
What is needed are systems and methods for forwarding IPv6 packets across an MPLS IPv4 network without employing IPv6-over-IPv4 tunnels.


The present invention relates to quinazoline derivatives of the formula (I) useful as anti-tumor medicaments, or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof, the definition of the substituents R1, R1′, R2, R2′ are as defined in the description. It also relates to a pharmaceutical composition containing same, and a method for the preparation of quinazoline derivatives of formula (I) or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof.

Cancer is regarded as a disease in the intracellular signal transduction system or in the mechanism of the signal transduction. The cell accepts many extracellular orders and decides whether or not to proliferate. The aim of the signal transduction system is to accept these or other signals from the cell surface, and to transfer them into cells. And then these signals are conducted to cell nucleus, cytoskeleton and the structure for transportation and protein synthesis.
The most common pathogenesis for cancer is a series of defects. The mentioned defects can be that of some proteins (when mutation occurs) or the defects in the regulation of the amount of the intracellular protein, which result in excessive or deficient production of the proteins. Generally, the constitutive state can be induced by a significant trauma in a cell, and a signal for proliferation is thus received by the cell nucleus, while this signal is inexistent in fact. The above mentioned procedure can be mediated by many kinds of mechanisms. Sometimes, some cells will start producing true growth factors for their own receptors in unnecessary cases, which is so-called autocrine loop mechanism.
There are many receptors on the cell surface. The interaction between the growth factors and these receptors is essential for the regulation of normal cellular growth. However, in some cases, the overexpression or mutation of the abnormal receptors will result in uncontrollable proliferation, which may induce tumor growth and cancer at last.
Epidermal cell growth factors receptors (EGFR) are identified as one significant driving factor in the process for cellular growth and proliferation. In common cancer, such as non-small cell lung cancer, the epidermal cell growth factors receptors are expressed excessively far above the normal level. The epidermal cell growth factors receptors family is composed of EGFR (Erb-B1), Erb-B2 (HER-2/neu), Erb-B3 and Erb-B4. The epidermal cell growth factors receptors are concerned in the process for most cancer, especially colon cancer and breast cancer. The overexpression and mutation of the receptors have been proved to be the leading risk factor for a bad-prognosis breast cancer. Besides, it has been verified that each of the above four members of the receptors family can aggregate with another member into a heterodimer, and form a signal delivery complex. Overexpression of more than one member of this family in a malignant tumor will result in a synergistic signal delivery.
EGFR belongs to the protein tyrosine kinase (PTK) family. The protein tyrosine kinase is an enzyme which catalyzes the transportation of phosphate groups from ATP to the tyrosine residue located in a protein substrate. Protein tyrosine kinases play important roles in normal cell growth. The overexpression of EGFR may cause the activation of receptors without ligands and the phosphorylation of some proteins, and then the signal for cell division is produced. As a result, EGFR may magnify the weak signal excessively by the auto-tyrosine-kinase action, and render the overproliferation of cells.
Due to the importantance of the abnormal receptor kinases in the mechanism for the onset of cancer, many researches have been involved in searching for specific PTK inhibitors as potential anti-cancer drugs recently. European patent application 520722A1 discloses certain 4-phenylamino-phthalazinone derivatives with inhibitory activity against PTK. European patent application 566226A1 discloses some 4-phenylamino-phthalazinone derivatives with substituents at position 5 to position 8 having PTK inhibitory activity. European patent application 635498A1 discloses that certain 4-phenylamino-phthalazinone derivatives with various substituents at position 6 and with a halogen at position 7 also possess PTK inhibitory activity.
The international publication WO96/30347 (Chinese patent CN96102992) relates to a series of 4-(substituted-phenylamino)-quinazoline derivatives, the prodrugs and the pharmaceutical acceptable salts thereof, which are used in treating diseases induced by overproliferation.
The international publication WO97/38983 (Chinese patent CN97194458) provides the compounds useful as irreversible inhibitors against tyrosine kinase.
The international publication WO 00/06555 (Chinese patent CN99808949) also relates to certain substituted quinazoline compounds that possess PTK inhibitory activity.
The international publication WO 99/35146 (Chinese patent CN99803887) discloses bicycloheteroaromatics as inhibitors against protein tyrosine kinase.
However, there remains the need in this field for new inhibitors effective against protein tyrosine kinases.

Quinazoline derivatives useful as anti-tumor medicament


An improved deposit envelope comprising front and rear panels. The front panel comprises first and second designation areas, and first and second designations respectively. The front panel partially overlays the rear panel and is secured along its side edges and bottom edge to the rear panel. At least one aperture is formed in both the front and rear panels with such apertures being aligned with one another. Preferably the apertures are located along the vertical center lines of both front and rear panels. Alternative embodiments of the deposit envelope are disclosed.

The present invention relates generally to envelopes, and more particularly, to an improved deposit envelope.
Convenience stores, service stations, and other retail establishments often transact a substantial amount of business necessitating the need for the frequent storage of cash deposits. These deposits often cannot be taken from the place of operation to a banking establishment either due to the lateness of the hour or just because of the efficient utilization of worker time. Consequently, these establishments typically utilize some kind of a receptacle for the temporary storage of cash deposits.
In an effort to deter crime, many such establishments utilize drop safes. These receptacles permit the deposit thereinto of cash. While it is possible to merely empty the cash into the drop safe, the need for an orderly accountability of such cash deposits has resulted in the need to retain individual cash deposits together.
Up until this time, there have been two primary means to retain cash deposits together. The first means has been through the use of rubber bands, string, or other clipping or wrapping mechanisms. The problem with the above means for retaining cash deposits is that some, if not all, of the deposit may become separated from the rest of the deposit either during transmission through a tube or slot into the drop safe, or through the impact of the deposit in the drop safe, or the impact of subsequent deposits upon already dropped deposits.
The second means for making these deposits has been through the utilization of paper envelopes, of the type typically used in mailing letters. Under this approach, the cash deposit is placed in a paper envelope, which paper envelope is then either sealed or just dropped into the safe.
Numerous inventions have been made concerning envelopes. Some even have included provision for apertures formed in at least one panel of the envelope. Examples of this are Daly, U.S. Pat. No. 3,856,198 and Templet, U.S. Pat. No. 4,951,863. Daly discloses an interoffice envelope with apertures formed adjacent the side edges of the envelope. A flap 14 is provided for inter-engagement of cooperative retention means 22 and 23 thereby totaling enclosing the contents of the interoffice envelope. Templet discloses a double envelope construction for facsimile handling. The double envelope permits the insertion of a facsimile or copy into one of two pockets formed in the double envelope. Space is provided on the outer flap of the envelope to indicate who the facsimile is for or from as well as other information which may be pertinent to the user.
Several problems exist with using paper envelopes. First, they have a tendency to tear and jam up in drop safes. This tendency towards tearing and jamming is complicated if the envelopes are reused, such that the paper itself becomes weakened. An additional problem occurs if the envelope is not sealed, since spillage of the contents is made easier. A third drawback to the use of paper envelopes exists in the fact that they are not reusable, if sealed. This requires the stocking of sufficient envelopes to account for shift-by-shift and often cashier-by-cashier depositing of the envelopes.
Although none of the above methods are completely satisfactory, heretofore there has been no other apparatus available to store owners which holds funds securely thereby preventing scatter and which permits the orderly accountability of cash deposits. For example, even with the above mentioned means for making cash deposits, none of those discussed permit a store owner to easily ascertain what cash deposit corresponds with a particular shift or cashier.
It is thus apparent that the need exists for an improved deposit envelope which permits a more orderly accountability of cash deposits by cashiers.