A system and method is provided for selecting clearly defined picture elements of a picture displayed in a video screen display by use of an operating element. The operating element can be rotated about its longitudinal axis. The operating element can be rotated with stop positions and controls a search beam rotatable about a center. The angle of rotation of the search beam changes with each stop position of the operating element and is variably adapted to the position of the picture elements such that the search beam hits exactly one clearly defined picture element in each stop position.

The invention relates to a system and method for selecting clearly defined picture elements of a picture displayed in a video screen display by use of an operating element that is rotatable rotated about its longitudinal axis.
For this purpose, it is basically contemplated to provide a "search beam" and to move the latter by way of the operating element to the respectively desired picture element. This may be difficult, for example, when only a few picture elements are present in the picture on the video display and may lead to long moving paths and durations.
It is an object of the invention to provide a system and method which permits rapid and reliable movement to clearly defined picture elements of a display.
The invention achieves this object by a system and method for selecting clearly defined picture elements of a picture displayed in a video screen display by use of an operating element that can be rotated about its longitudinal axis. The operating element can be rotated with stop positions. The operating element controls a search beam rotatable about a center, whose angle of rotation changes with each stop position. The angle of rotation is variably adapted to the position of the picture elements such that the search beam hits exactly one clearly defined picture element in each stop position.
As a rule, the operating element is rotatable and includes stop positions. By use of a search beam, which can be rotated about a center, and its angle-of-rotation change adapted to the position of the clearly defined picture elements, the angle of rotation can be variably adapted to the position of the picture elements such that the search beam hits precisely one clearly defined picture element in every stop position.
A movement to precisely one picture element takes place per stop position of the operating element. When the respective picture element is hit by the search beam, additional information of the respective picture element can be illustrated on the video screen. This can automatically take place, for example, after a defined time of several seconds if the search beam stays on the respective picture element, or can be initiated by an axial movement of the operating element.
Other objects, advantages and novel features of the present invention will become apparent from the following detailed description of one or more preferred embodiments when considered in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.

System and method for selecting clearly defined picture elements of a display

Bayerische Motoren Werke Aktiengesellschaft


To secure proper reception quality for the control signal of an EUDCH during a handover. A transmission power control unit 23 controls transmission power of a downlink control signal of an EUDCH based on at least one of the following information: the CQI in an HS-DPCCH transmitted from a mobile station 30 regarding HSDPA to the mobile station 30, information on the reflection timing of a control pointer of the EUDCH from the mobile station 30, and information on transmission power of the HS-DSCH regarding HSDPA to the mobile station 30. A transmission unit 12 transmits the downlink control signal of the EUDCH to the mobile station 30 with a controlled transmission power.

With the development of mobile communication, the demand for broadband access to a downlink such as a large capacity data transfer is increasing. HSDPA (High Speed Downlink Packet Access) is a protocol for such purposes, and the downlink transmission speed of HSDPA is improved to 12 Mbps, compared to 2 Mbps, the transmission speed of W-CDMA (Wideband-Code Division Multiple Access). The development of radio base station apparatuses and mobile terminals supporting HSDPA has increased in recent years.
As a technology corresponding to such an increase in downlink capacity, radio communication systems where an increase in uplink capacity is possible have gained attention, and EUDCH (Enhanced Uplink Dedicated Channel) has been discussed in 3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Project). EUDCH can be described as an uplink version of HSDPA, and using an EUDCH control signal, a radio base station apparatus can control the data rate that a mobile station can transmit. By performing scheduling, an EUDCH enables a mobile station to transmit large data over the uplink. One of the major points in the discussion in 3GPP regarding the standardization of EUDCH is the handover between sectors (softer handover—SHO) with HSDPA, and what kind of technologies should be implemented in the standard has been debated.
The focus of the debate has been in which cell the scheduling of an EUDCH should be performed in order to realize the softer handover between the EUDCH and HSDPA. One method is to perform the scheduling of the EUDCH in the same cell as the serving cell (i.e. cell under service) for HSDPA. Another method is to perform the scheduling of the EUDCH in the other cell, which is different from the serving cell for HSDPA.
As a related technology, there is disclosed in Patent Document 1 a technology where an EUDCH service can be performed in an optimal radio environment although a UE (User Equipment) using the EUDCH service in a soft handover region receives different scheduling commands from a plurality of active Node Bs.
[Patent Document 1]
Japanese Patent Kokai Publication No. P2004-248300A
The description of this Document is incorporated herein by thereto.

Radio base station apparatus and method for transmission power control of an uplink channel


The present invention is directed to a heavy duty pavement structure comprising an open-graded asphalt layer fortified with a non-segregating grout mixture. The heavy duty pavement structure is made through the steps including forming an open-graded asphalt layer and then fortifying the layer with a non-segregating grout mixture that includes a predetermined amount of portland cement, sand and cement binder system.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to methods of making heavy duty pavement structures. The invention further relates to the use of heavy duty pavement in high use and high traffic areas.
2. Description of the Related Art
Pavement structures designed to carry repeated heavy loads have traditionally been formed through overlaying portland cement concrete or asphalt, to base layers of aggregate, stabilized soil or other improved natural materials. Both concrete pavement and asphalt pavement are effective for general use, but neither provides the necessary strength and flexibility needed for heavy duty use.
Although concrete pavement is typically strong enough for heavy duty use, it is brittle and must be constructed with joints to control the cracking, and also must be constructed with a thicker cross section, thus increasing the initial cost, as well as the cost of repair.
On the other hand, asphalt pavement is more flexible under loading and hot weather, but it does not provide the strength and durability necessary for the heavy duty use. In addition, asphalt pavement tends to crack under repeated loading and cyclic cold weather and is less resistant to abrasion and wear than concrete pavement. Since asphalt cement, the binder material in asphalt pavements, is a viscoelastic material, it is soft when warm and brittle when cold. This range in behavior, coupled with repeated truck traffic, results in the need for continuous maintenance of cracks, patching, and occasional overlays.
In recent years, pavement structure designs have become more complex. Multiple layers of asphalt and concrete materials, as well as other materials such as steel or fabric, additives or modifiers, and other innovations are used to reinforce and strengthen the pavement designs.
One such design combined the flexibility of asphalt and durability of concrete in a composite layer. In this approach, an open graded asphalt layer was placed first, and then the open voids were filled with cement grout. This structure known as "resin filled macadam," does provide greater strength and durability as compared to either the asphalt pavement or concrete cement alone, but its design limitations make it impractical for large scale use.
More specifically, the open graded asphalt layer has been constructed with conventional asphalt cement. The use of asphalt cement limits the strength of the asphalt component thereby making it more susceptible to temperature and loading. In addition, the grout used to fill the voids within the open graded asphalt structure includes ordinary (Type I) portland cement, local sand, water reducing additives (plasticizers), bonding agents (latex), and water.
Although this mixture is theoretically promising, it is impractical in use because the freshly-mixed grout applied to the surface of the open graded asphalt layer segregates so that the sand settles to the bottom of the open graded asphalt layer and the water rises to the top of the layer. This results in the top part of the open graded asphalt layer having low strength and durability because of the relatively high water/cement ratio. Furthermore, air voids or bubbles form within the filled layer which displaces the grout mixture causing a lack of bonding between the grout and the open graded asphalt layer and the underlying structure layer, whether it is an existing pavement or aggregate base course.
In an effort to reduce the degree of grout separation, grout may be mixed in small batches and immediately applied to the open graded asphalt layer. Although this does not eliminate the separation of the grout components, it does reduce the degree of separation. This dramatically increases the time needed to complete the grout application. Unfortunately, rapid construction of heavy duty pavements is necessary in order to minimize "down time" and loss of function of a facility. For high-use facilities such as ports or industrial yards that operate around the clock, loss of use is costly. Therefore, better materials and methods are needed to make this type of heavy duty pavement more robust and economical to build, in order to realize the full potential.

Method of making and use of a heavy duty pavement structure


A method is provided for removing sulfur dioxide from a hot gaseous stream while directly producing .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum from a scrubber effluent. A portion of an aqueous scrubbing medium containing calcium and magnesium sulfite is removed from a scrubbing unit and passed to a pressurized oxidation vessel where the sulfites are contacted with an oxidizing gas at an elevated temperature to convert calcium sulfite directly to .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum and magnesium sulfite to magnesium sulfate. The .alpha.-hemihydrate is separated from the aqueous medium removed from the pressurized oxidation vessel.

The use of wet scrubbing processes for removing sulfur dioxide from hot flue gases has become a primary means for cleaning stack gases from power plants or other coal combusting units. Such processes usually use an aqueous lime or limestone slurry which is passed downwardly through a wet scrubbing unit to react with, and remove sulfur dioxide from, hot gases passing upwardly through the wet scrubbing unit. Especially favorable results have been commercially achieved by using aqueous lime slurries that are enriched with a magnesium component such as magnesium oxide or magnesium hydroxide, such as disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,919,393 and 3,919,394, the contents of both patents incorporated by reference herein.
In scrubbing of hot sulfur dioxide-containing gases by magnesium enhanced lime scrubbing processes, calcium sulfite is formed which must be removed from the scrubbing system through use of a bleed stream from the recycling aqueous scrubbing medium. This bleed stream will also contain minor amounts of magnesium sulfite and chlorides. The bleed stream is normally passed to a thickener or separator where a resultant thickened sludge, or underflow, is separated and removed from the system while clarified aqueous media, or overflow, is normally returned to the aqueous scrubbing slurry in the wet scrubbing unit. The sludge removed from the wet scrubbing system contains primarily calcium sulfites and magnesium sulfites, along with various chloride salts and other impurities. The calcium sulfite sludges are difficult to dewater due to their physical properties and, when deposited into settling ponds or collection areas, require a large area and a period of time before solidification occurs.
One procedure for reducing the amount of sludge produced and discarded has been to oxidize the calcium sulfite-containing sludge so as to convert the calcium sulfite to calcium sulfate which is more easily dewatered and thus provides less volume of sludge that must be handled and used as landfill. Also, when calcium sulfate is produced as gypsum, or calcium sulfate dehydrate (CaSO.sub.4 - 2H.sub.2 O) , the gypsum can, at times, be used in various products such as industrial and building plasters, such as gypsum wallboard. The demand for gypsum is not, however, sufficiently high to absorb all of the gypsum produced by various commercial processes as well as that which would be produced if all sulfur dioxide lime scrubbing sludges were converted to gypsum. In addition, magnesium present in gypsum can have an adverse affect on the gypsum performance in conventional usage.
An especially useful form of gypsum, .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum, or calcium sulfate .alpha.-hemihydrate (.alpha.CaSO.sub.4 .multidot.1/2H.sub.2 O) which is not normally formed in sulfur dioxide removal aqueous sludges, has specific uses which provide value over and above conventional gypsum or calcium sulfate dehydrate. The production of .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum is generally effected by heating natural or by-product gypsum in an autoclave at elevated temperatures of above 100.degree. C. and superatmospheric pressure. The production of .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum from gypsum obtained from power plant flue gas desulfurization processes has been proposed, for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,015,449 and 5,015,450, where moist fine grained gypsum is molded into a body and the molded body fed to an autoclave where it is subjected to a temperature in the range of 110.degree. C. to 180.degree. C. under pressure.
When gypsum (calcium sulfate dehydrate) is converted to .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum, energy is required to drive off the excess water and provision of such energy is costly to the process.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,069,300, a process is described for producing .alpha.-type hemihydrate calcium sulfate by oxidizing calcium sulfite in a suspension that contains at least one anionic, nonionic or amphoteric surface active agent. That process suggests that the calcium sulfite suspension used could be one produced by absorbing a waste gas containing SO.sub.2 with a slaked lime slurry. In that process, temperatures as low as 90.degree. C. are used, and no autoclave is used meaning that the process is not carried out under superatmospheric pressure, which is said to result in coarser crystals. The suspension must contain seed crystals of .alpha.-type hemihydrate of calcium sulfate which are added in an amount of between about 10 to 150 times the weight of the surface active agent used.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a method for the removal of sulfur dioxide from a hot gas stream, using an aqueous scrubbing medium containing calcium and magnesium scrubbing components and continuously produce .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum from the scrubber effluent.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a method for the removal of sulfur dioxide from a hot gas stream, using an aqueous scrubbing medium containing calcium and magnesium scrubbing components and continuously produce .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum from the scrubber effluent at exceptionally high conversion rates while removing magnesium sulfate therefrom.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a method for removal of sulfur dioxide from a hot gas stream using an aqueous scrubbing medium containing calcium and magnesium scrubbing components and continuously produce .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum from the scrubber effluent in an energy efficient manner.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a method for removal of sulfur dioxide from a hot gas stream using an aqueous scrubbing medium containing calcium and magnesium compounds and continuously produce .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum while using the exothermic energy of calcium sulfite oxidation to produce heat and a portion of the pressure required to form .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum.

Method of sulfur dioxide removal from gaseous streams with .alpha.-hemihydrate gypsum product formation


The present invention provides a developing apparatus which comprises a rotatable developer bearing member, a rotatable developer regulating member, a first magnetic portion provided in an opposed relation to the developer bearing member in order to prevent the magnetic toner from leaking at ends of the developer bearing member in a rotation axis direction thereof, and a second magnetic portion provided in an opposed relation to the developer regulating member in order to prevent the magnetic toner from leaking at ends of the developer regulating member in a rotation axis direction thereof, and, in the vicinity of the developer regulating portion, the second magnetic portion is disposed inwardly of the first magnetic portion in the rotation axis direction.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a developing apparatus used with an electrophotographic apparatus, an electrostatic recording apparatus or the like.
2. Related Background Art
Conventionally, various electrophotographic methods have been proposed, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,297,691, Japanese Patent Publication No. 42-23910 and Japanese Patent Publication No. 43-24748. However, in general, there has been used a method in which an electrostatic latent image is formed on a photosensitive member by means of various means utilizing photo-conductive material and the electrostatic latent image is developed and visualized as a toner image by using toner and after the toner image is transferred onto a transfer material such as a paper sheet the toner image is fixed to the transfer material by heating or solvent vapor, thereby obtaining a copy.
Further, various methods for visualizing the electrostatic latent image by using the toner are already known. For example, there have been proposed various developing method such as a fur brush developing method, a cascade developing method and a liquid developing method, as well as a magnet brush developing method as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,874,063 and a powder cloud developing method.
Among these developing methods, particularly, the cascade developing method and the magnetic brush developing method using toner and carrier mainly have widely been used. These methods are excellent developing methods capable of providing a high quality image relatively stably.
However, all of the above-mentioned developing methods have common disadvantages such as degradation of the carrier, change in mixing ratio between the toner and the carrier, complexity of the apparatus, scattering of the toner and unevenness stripes due to existence of the carrier, which are inherent to two-component developing agent.
To eliminate the above-mentioned disadvantages, various developing methods utilizing one-component developer consisting of toner have been proposed. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,909,258 discloses a developing method using electrically conductive magnetic toner in which the conductive magnetic developer is born on a cylindrical conductive sleeve having a magnet therein and an electrostatic latent image is developed by contacting the sleeve with the latent image. In this case, in a developing portion, toner particles forms a conductive path between a surface of a recording body (photosensitive member) and a surface of the sleeve, and charges are supplied to the toner particles from the sleeve through the conductive path, and the toner particles are adhered to the electrostatic latent image on the recording body by a Coulomb force between the latent image and the toner particles, thereby effecting development. This developing method using the conductive magnetic toner is excellent in the point that the disadvantages of the conventional two-component developing methods can be eliminated, but, has a disadvantage that, since the toner is conductive, it is difficult to electrostatically transfer the developed image from the recording body to a final support member such as a normal paper sheet.
To eliminate this disadvantage, as a developing method using high resistance toner capable of being transferred electrically, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 52-94140 discloses a developing method utilizing dielectric polarization of the toner particles.
However, this developing method has disadvantages that a developing speed is inherently slow and that density of the developed image is insufficient, and, thus, is hard to be practically used.
As another developing method using the high resistance magnetic toner, a developing method in which toner particles are frictionally charged by friction between the toner particles and friction between the toner particles and a sleeve and the toner particles are contacted with an electrostatic holding member to achieve development has been proposed.
However, this method has disadvantages that poor frictional charging is apt to occur since the number of contacts between the toner particles and the friction member is small and that, if the Coulomb force between the charged toner particles and the sleeve is strong, the toner particles are apt to be aggregated on the sleeve, and, thus, it has been pointed out that this method is hard to be practically used.
To eliminate these disadvantages, a new developing method capable of eliminating the above-mentioned disadvantages has been proposed, as disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 54-43036. In this method, after a very thin toner layer is formed on a sleeve by coating and the toner layer is frictionally charged, the toner layer is closely approached to an electrostatic latent image within a magnetic field, thereby achieving development without contact between the toner and the latent image. According to this method, since the magnetic toner is coated as the very thin layer, the chance of contact between the magnetic toner particles and the sleeve is increased, with the result that frictional charges required for development can be applied to the toner particles.
As a result that inventor tested and checked the application of charges in the above-mentioned one component developing method, it was found that movement of the toner particles at the charge applying portion in the one-component developing method becomes as follows.
FIG. 5 shows an example of a developing apparatus using one-component magnetic toner.
Namely, FIG. 5 is a sectional view of a developing apparatus 3 in which a developing sleeve 1a formed from non-magnetic material can be rotated in a direction shown by the arrow. A permanent magnet 1b is fixed within the developing sleeve 1a. The developing apparatus further includes a magnetic blade 2 made of magnetic material, and a convey member 4. The magnetic blade 2 is disposed in such a manner that a distance W between the magnetic blade and the developing sleeve 1a becomes constant. Incidentally, in general, in most cases, the distance W is selected to 100 .mu.m to 1 mm.
In the developing apparatus 3 shown in FIG. 5, one-component magnetic toner T is coated on the developing sleeve 1a as a thin toner layer having a thickness which is determined by a position of a cut line L shown in FIG. 7.
According to the inventor's investigation, it was found that the charges are applied to the magnetic toner when the magnetic toner T passes through a space between the developing sleeve 1a and the magnetic blade 2. Further, it was found that the movement of the magnetic toner T in this case becomes as follows.
As shown in FIG. 6, among planes perpendicular to a line connecting between the developing sleeve 1a and the magnetic blade 2, when it is assumed that the plane nearer to the magnetic blade 2 is S1 and the plane nearer to the developing sleeve 1a is S2, generally, since a width of the magnetic blade 2 is smaller than a width of the permanent magnet 1b, magnetic flux density on the plane S1 becomes greater than magnetic flux density on the plane S2. Accordingly, the magnetic toner T is subjected to a force directing toward the magnetic blade 2 (shown by the arrows in FIG. 6) between the developing sleeve 1a and the magnetic blade 2.
Thus, as shown in FIG. 6, the magnetic toner T forms "ears" (condition shown in FIG. 7) which extend from the magnetic blade 2 to the developing sleeve 1a. The application of charges to the magnetic toner T is achieved by increasing density of toner at the ears and by contacting the developing sleeve 1a and toner particles t1 on the tip ends of the ears formed from the magnetic blade 2 to apply charges to the toner particles.
Further, it was found that conveyance of toner between the developing sleeve 1a and the magnetic blade 2 is effected as follows.
As mentioned above, since the charges are applied to the toner particles t1 (on the tip ends of the ears) contacted with the developing sleeve 1a, the toner particles are subjected to a force (generated by a mirror symmetry force (mirroring force)) directing toward the developing sleeve 1a and are also subjected to a conveying force (due to a frictional force between the toner particles and the developing sleeve 1a) directing toward a rotational direction of the developing sleeve 1a.
Further, since there is a certain cohesive force between the toner particles, toner particles t2 contacted with the toner particles t1 are also subjected to the conveying force due to the presence of the cohesive forces. Similarly, toner particles t3 (on the upper surface of the toner layer) are also subjected to the conveying force due to the presence of the cohesive forces.
However, as mentioned above, since there is the magnetic force directing toward the magnetic blade 2 between the developing sleeve 1a and the magnetic blade 2, the toner ears are cut at a location where the conveying force overcomes the magnetic force (i.e., on the cut line L shown in FIG. 7), with the result that only the toner particles remaining on the developing sleeve 1a are conveyed toward the rotational direction of the developing sleeve 1a.
Accordingly, in systems wherein the magnetic toner cohesive force is great or in systems wherein magnetic toner having the greater number of contacts for obtaining the required amounts of frictional charges is used, toner particles not contacted with the developing sleeve and having poor charges are conveyed to a developing area, thereby creating a poor image due to poor charging.
To avoid this inconvenience, the inventor has proposed a developing apparatus 3 (as shown in FIG. 8) comprising developer including magnetic toner, a rotatable developing sleeve (developer bearing member) 1a for bearing the magnetic toner on a surface thereof, a permanent magnet 1b disposed within the developing sleeve 1a, and a developer regulating member 6a for regulating a coated amount of the magnetic toner, wherein at least two conveying forces directing in opposite directions are applied to the magnetic toner at a developer regulating portion, and, at least one of the conveying forces is a force for conveying the toner toward a developing area and mainly depends upon a charged amount of the toner, and, the other conveying force (acting toward a direction opposite to the developing area) depends upon a rotational force and a magnetic force acting from the developer regulating member 6a to the magnetic toner, so that non-charged magnetic toner is not subjected to the conveying force directing toward the developing area. As a result, only the sufficiently charged magnetic toner is coated on the surface of the developing sleeve 1a uniformly, with the result that only the sufficiently charged magnetic toner can be conveyed to the developing area. Incidentally, in FIG. 8, the reference numeral 9 denotes a photosensitive drum as an electrostatic latent image bearing member.
In association with such a developing device 3, the inventor has proposed a magnetic seal member 7 (as shown in FIG. 9) made of magnetic material and adapted to cover peripheries of the developing sleeve 1a and the developer regulating member 6a in a "3"-shaped (inverted E shaped) manner, as an end toner leakage preventing member of non-contact type.
At an edge portion A of the developer regulating member 6a side shown in FIG. 8, the magnetic seal member 7 shown in FIG. 9 serves to coat the magnetic toner on the developer regulating member 6a at an area having a width equal to a width of the magnetic seal member 7 in the same manner that the toner is coated by the magnetic blade 2 at a magnetic pole portion N61 within the developer regulating member 6a. The coated magnetic toner is returned to a developing container while passing through a space or gap between the developing sleeve 1a and the developer regulating member 6a and is restrained again at an edge portion B of the magnetic seal member 7 in the space between the developing sleeve 1a and the developer regulating member 6a, thereby preventing toner leakage at the edge portion of the developer regulating member 6a.
Further, regarding the developing sleeve 1a side, the edge portion B of the magnetic seal member 7 in the space between the developing sleeve 1a and the developer regulating member 6a, a phenomenon similar to the toner coating of the magnetic blade 2 is generated so that the toner is coated on the developing sleeve 1a, and the coated toner is restrained again at an edge portion C of the magnetic seal member 7, thereby preventing toner leakage at the edge portion of the developing sleeve 1a.
However, in the developing apparatus 3 using the magnetic seal member 7 as the end toner leakage preventing member, if an amount of magnetized toner is small or if the cohesive force between the toner particles is great, a width of the toner coated on the developer regulating member 6a by the magnetic seal member 7 becomes greater than the width of the magnetic seal member 7, with the result that the toner coated on the developer regulating member 6a and to be returned to the developing container leaks laterally toward ends of the developing sleeve 1a and the developer regulating member 6a at an edge portion of the magnetic seal member 7. Consequently, the toner may leak at end areas of the developing sleeve 1a and the developer regulating member 6a where the permanent magnets 1b, 6b are not located.


An illuminating baby bottle with a removable container includes a first container, a second container, a release mechanism, a connecting member, a liquid-flowing system, a bottle cap, and a lighting device. The first container and the second container are axially attached to each other through the connecting member while the release mechanism is concentrically positioned in between the first container and the connecting member. The release mechanism selectively rotates in between a locked position and an unlocked position in such a way that the locked position separately stores baby formula and water while the unlocked position allows the mixing of baby formula and water. The liquid-flowing system releases baby formula mixture from the first container so that infants or young children can be fed with the baby formula mixture. The lighting device is positioned on the bottle cap and can selectively operate in between an on-position and an off-position.

The baby bottle has through the history and gone through different variations so that the infants and young children are able to feed oneself or being fed when a mother is not breastfeeding. In particular, the baby bottle is used to feed baby formula, usually prepared by mixing water, so that the infants and young children are able to gain complete or partial substitute for human milk. In its basic form, the baby bottle is a bottle with a teat that is also known as the nipple. The bottle holds the liquid baby formula while the infants and young children are able to sucks the liquid baby formula through the teat. The modern baby bottles come in scores of styles, colors, and shapes so that the parents or the caregivers are able to choose one from a verity of different baby bottles. Most of the modern baby bottles are also engineered as leak-proof containers and cause less spitting up, burping, or gas to the infants and the young children. Even though the baby bottles provide an efficient and a safe method to feed the infants and young children, the baby bottle can be further improved to accommodate the efficiency of bottle feeding. One of the main problems with the modern baby bottle is that the parents or the caregivers usually have to carry a separate container so that the baby formula can be separately carried from the water as the water is stored within the baby bottle. Another problem with the modern baby bottle is that the baby bottle does not have a lighting device. More specifically, when the parents or the caregivers need to feed the infants or the young children during night time, the parents or the caregivers have to turn-on a light to locate the mouth of the infants or the young children. This often causes the infants or the young children to wake up from their sleep, resulting restless nights for the parents or the caregivers.
Therefore it is the object of the present invention to provide an illuminating baby bottle with a removable container. The removable container of the present invention allows the parents or the caregivers to store the baby formula within the present invention while the bottle portion allows them to store water. The baby formula and water are separated by a release mechanism of the present invention, where the release mechanism allows the parents or the caregivers to mix the baby formula and water within the baby bottle. The illuminating device of the present invention provides a lighting source for the present invention so that the parents or the caregivers are able to turn-on and turn-off the lighting source at their discretion.

Illuminating baby bottle with removable container


A carbon material for nonaqueous-electrolyte secondary-battery negative electrode is provided, which satisfies the followings (1) and (2):

Nonaqueous lithium secondary batteries including a positive electrode and a negative electrode that were capable of occluding and releasing lithium ions and a nonaqueous electrolytic solution in which a lithium salt, e.g., LiPF6 or LiBF4, had been dissolved were developed, and are in practical use. Although various negative-electrode materials for use in these batteries have been proposed, use is being made of graphitic carbon materials such as natural graphites, artificial graphites obtained by graphitizing, for example, cokes, graphitized mesophase pitch, graphitized carbon fibers, etc., because of advantages thereof, such as a high capacity and excellent flatness of discharge potential.
Also used is amorphous carbon materials, for example, for the reason that the carbon materials are relatively stable to some electrolytic solutions. Furthermore, a carbon material which was obtained by causing amorphous carbon to cover or adhere to the surface of graphitic carbon particles and which has been thereby made to combine the properties of graphite and the properties of amorphous carbon is in use.
In patent document 1 is used a rounded graphitic carbon material which was obtained by subjecting graphitic carbon particles, which in themselves are flaky, scalelike, or platy, to a mechanical energy treatment to damage the surface of the graphitic particles and simultaneously make the particle shape spherical and which has been thereby made to attain improved high-rate charge/discharge characteristics. Furthermore, proposed therein is to use a multilayered rounded carbon material which was obtained by causing amorphous carbon to cover or adhere to the surface of the rounded graphitic carbon particles and which has been thereby made to combine the properties of both graphite and amorphous carbon and high-rate charge/discharge characteristics.
Patent document 2 discloses that a battery having excellent high-rate charge/discharge characteristics is obtained by using, as an electrode, a multilayered carbon material which was obtained by causing amorphous carbon to cover or adhere to the surface of graphitic carbon particles and in which the amount of CO eliminated therefrom during heating to 800° C., as determined with a temperature programmed decomposition mass spectrometer (TPD-MS), is 0.8×10−6 mol/g to 30×10−6 mol/g.
However, as a result of the recent development of applications of nonaqueous lithium secondary batteries, there is a desire for a nonaqueous-electrolyte secondary battery that combines high-rate charge/discharge characteristics and high cycle characteristics and that is for use in notebook type personal computers, mobile communication appliances, portable cameras, portable game machines, and the like, which are expected to have higher performances than before, and for use in power tools, electric vehicles, etc.
Meanwhile, although battery production includes the step of infiltrating an electrolytic solution into the electrodes disposed in a battery can, the prolonged time period required for the electrodes to absorb the electrolytic solution is a cause of an increase in production cost.

Carbon material for nonaqueous-electrolyte secondary-battery negative electrode and process for producing the same, negative electrode including the same for nonaqueous secondary battery, and nonaqueous-electrolyte secondary battery

Abstract: (1) the carbon material has an aspect ratio of 10 or less;

Abstract: (2) the amount of CO eliminated from the carbon material during heating to 1,000° C., as determined with a temperature programmed decomposition mass spectrometer (TPD-MS), is 2-15 μmol/g.


An bit error rate tester for use in connection with a high speed networks. The bit error rate tester includes transmit and receive ports, as well as a sequence generator, memory, synchronizer, sequence start detect module, and comparator. The sequence generator generates a bit sequence for transmission through a network path. The bit sequence returns to the bit error rate tester by way of the receive port. The synchronizer then bit-aligns the received bit sequence to compensate for idles/fill words added/dropped as the bit sequence transited the network. The synchronized bit sequence is passed to the start word detector which detects start and end words in the bit sequence and instructs the comparator to compare only data between the start and end words. The comparator compares the received bit sequence with a copy of the transmitted bit sequence regenerated from the memory, and calculates a bit error rate.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to error detection in high speed data transmission systems and components. More particularly, embodiments of the present invention concern error rate testing methods and devices suitable for use in connection with various network protocols and configurations.
2. Related Technology
Computer and data communications networks continue to proliferate due to declining costs, increasing performance of computer and networking equipment, and increasing demand for communication bandwidth. Communications networks—including wide area networks ("WANs") and local area networks ("LANs")—allow increased productivity and utilization of distributed computers or stations through the sharing of resources, the transfer of voice and data, and the processing of voice, data and related information at the most efficient locations. Moreover, as organizations have recognized the economic benefits of using communications networks, network applications such as electronic mail, voice and data transfer, host access, and shared and distributed databases are increasingly used as a means to increase user productivity. This increased demand, together with the growing number of distributed computing resources, has resulted in a rapid expansion of the number of installed networks.
As the demand for networks has grown, network technology has developed to the point that many different physical configurations presently exist. Examples include Gigabit Ethernet ("GE"), 10 GE, Fiber Distributed Data Interface ("FDDI"), Fibre Channel ("FC"), Synchronous Optical Network ("SONET") and InfiniBand networks. These networks, and others, typically conform to one of a variety of established standards, or protocols, which set forth rules that govern network access as well as communications between and among the network resources. Typically, such networks utilize different cabling systems, have different characteristic bandwidths and typically transmit data at different speeds. Network bandwidth, in particular, has been the driving consideration behind many advancements in the area of high speed communication systems, methods and devices.
For example, the ever-increasing demand for network bandwidth has resulted in the development of technology that increases the amount of data that can be pushed through a single channel on a network. Advancements in modulation techniques, coding algorithms and error correction have vastly increased the rates at which data can be transmitted across networks. For example, a few years ago, the highest rate that data could travel across a network was at about one Gigabit per second. This rate has increased to the point where data can travel across Ethernet and SONET networks at rates as high as 10 gigabits per second, or faster.
As communication networks have increased in size, speed and complexity however, they have become increasingly likely to develop a variety of problems that, in practice, have proven difficult to diagnose and resolve. Such problems are of particular concern in light of the continuing demand for high levels of network operational reliability and for increased network capacity.
The problems generally experienced in network communications can take a variety of forms and may occur as a result of a variety of different circumstances. Examples of circumstances, conditions and events that may give rise to network communication problems include the transmission of unnecessarily small frames of information, inefficient or incorrect routing of information, improper network configuration and superfluous network traffic, to name just a few. Such problems are aggravated by the fact that networks are continually changing and evolving due to growth, reconfiguration and introduction of new network typologies and protocols. Moreover, new network interconnection devices and software applications are constantly being introduced and implemented. Circumstances such as these highlight the need for effective, reliable and flexible diagnostic and remedial systems, methods and devices.
Consequently, as high speed data communications systems, processes and devices mature, many designs have increasingly focused on reliability and performance issues. One area of particular interest concerns the detection of errors, and determination of a corresponding error rate, for network systems and devices. Among other things, reliable and accurate error rate measurement during the development, manufacturing and installation of high speed networks and associated systems and devices is useful because it gives administrators and other personnel the capability to readily and precisely detect and correct problems, thereby helping to ensure the integrity of the data transmitted and processed by the network and associated devices.
To that end, various equipment, systems and methods have been developed that are used to determine an error rate along a particular data transmission path. In some instances, it is useful to determine the error rate on a bit and/or word basis. Thus, error rate testers and other systems and equipment have been developed that are employed to determine a bit error rate along a particular path on a network.
Generally, bit error rate testers operate by transmitting a predetermined bit sequence onto the network path, and then analyzing the predetermined bit sequence when it returns to the bit error rate tester. Typically, such analyses involve comparing the received bit sequence to a copy of the bit sequence that was initially transmitted onto the network. This comparison permits errors within the sequence to be identified and counted. After the errors in the bit sequence are counted, that information is used to calculate an overall bit error rate. Depending upon the particular value of the bit error rate, various remedial, or other, actions may then be implemented.
While such bit error testers have proven effective in some applications, they have nonetheless proven rather limited in terms of their ability to effectively adapt to the myriad of different, and evolving, network types and protocols. By way of example, conventional bit error rate testers are generally only effective when used in connection with network paths having certain configurations.
More particularly, many network devices drop or add idles or filler words to a data stream in order to maintain synchronization of the data within the stream. This situation is commonly encountered when a variety of network devices, each using a different clock, reside on a single network path. However, the bit sequence comparison procedures employed by typical bit error rate testers are not configured to compensate in any way for such idle or filler word modifications to the data stream. Consequently, once such a modification occurs, the received bit sequence becomes unsynchronized with the test bit sequence, invalidating the bit error rate test from that point forward.
Thus, network paths intended to be tested with known error rate testers generally must be clear of any networking device that could modify the data stream in which the transmitted test bit sequence was traveling. Restrictions such as these sharply constrain the usefulness of the testing device.
Advancements and changes in network protocols have likewise complicated network error testing and diagnostic processes. For example, the movement from the GE to 10 GE protocol has introduced some unique problems that have not been adequately resolved. One such problem relates to the manner whereby the physical layer encodes data for physical transmission on the network. In particular, developers had initially anticipated that the 8 B: 10 B code from Gigabit Ethernet could likewise be employed in connection with the 10 GE protocol. However, it is difficult to operate directly modulated lasers, such as are commonly employed in high speed networks, at the 12.5 Gbd data rate required to accommodate the 25% overhead of 8 B:10 B coding. Therefore, a more efficient coding method, known as 64/66 b, was devised. This reduces the coding overhead to approximately 3% and makes cost-effective 10 Gbit transceiver systems feasible. However, known test systems do not accommodate this coding method and are therefore unable to decode protocol data, which is necessary to compensate for modifications to the data stream since these occur at the protocol level.
In view of the foregoing, it would be useful to provide an error rate tester that is not constrained for use with particular network paths or configurations. Among other things, the error rate tester should be able to compensate for modifications to the data stream in which the transmitted test bit sequence travels. In this regard, it would be useful for the error rate tester to be able to identify when a bit sequence has become unsynchronized due to the insertion or deletion of a fill word, re-synchronize that bit sequence, and then perform an error rate test on the re-synchronized sequence. Furthermore, the error rate tester should support multiple protocols so as to enable effective and efficient testing, by a single tester, of networks conforming to a variety of different protocols, including networks with line speeds as high as 10 gigabits per second, or higher. Finally, the error rate tester should be capable of identifying and tracking errors at both the bit and word levels in the datastream.

System and method for network error rate testing


A layered imaging stack for minimizing interference fringes in an imaging device. A polymer layer has one flat surface and a second opposed surface that has a surface roughness, R.sub.A, within the range of 0.5 .mu.m to 2.5 .mu.m. An adhesive layer provided on the roughened surface of the polymer layer has an index of refraction, n.sub.2, which differs from the refractive index, n.sub.1, of the polymer layer by at least 0.02. The multiplicative product of R.sub.A in .mu.m and the absolute value of n.sub.2 -n.sub.1, .DELTA.n, is within the range of from about 0.01 to 0.05.

A beam of radiation can be separated into two parts which follow different paths and are then brought back together to form a single beam. If the two paths are not of identical optical length, the two beams may not be in phase, and can destructively interfere at some points (resulting in areas of relative darkness), and constructively interfere at other points (resulting in areas of relative brightness). A beam can be split in two wherever it strikes a stack of transparent film. While some of the beam is reflected at the upper surface of the stack, the rest of the beam enters the stack and continues through it until it is reflected at some lower film surface at which time it continues back through the stack and exits the same side it entered. The difference in path lengths for the two rays is a function of the thickness of the additional film or films that the second ray passes through. The result is a fringe pattern of areas of relative darkness and lightness which gives a contour map of the thickness of the film(s) with each contour line representing a difference in thickness of .lambda./2, where .lambda. is the wavelength of the radiation used. This contour map-like pattern is commonly known as "Newton's Rings".
These interference patterns are especially troublesome when they occur in imaging systems, such as photographic equipment and digital radiation imaging systems. Digital radiation imaging systems employ photoconductive materials to absorb incident radiation representative of an image of an object. Suitable photoconductive materials will absorb the radiation and produce electron-hole pairs (charge carriers) which may be separated from each other by an electric field applied across the photoconductor, creating a latent image at the surface of the photoconductor (which is typically a thin planar layer). A narrow beam of scanning radiation substantially completes discharge of the photoconductor by creating the motion of a second set of charge carriers. The distribution of these second charge carriers in the plane of the photoconductor is affected by the distribution of the first charge carriers, i.e., by the latent image. The motion of the second charge carriers is detected and digitized in an appropriate circuit, thereby capturing the latent image in digital form.
Various methods for minimizing the effects of interference fringes have been patented. Several known methods involve the addition of particles dispersed in or on the top surface of a layered imaging stack to diffuse light rays. Other known methods include roughening or dimpling the top surface to induce light scattering.
The above methods reduce interference fringes to varying degrees. However, such reduction is commonly accompanied by a reduction in image resolution. It would be desirable to minimize the effects of interference fringes while at the same time maintaining good image resolution.

Layered imaging stack for minimizing interference fringes in an imaging device

Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company


A rotary friction welding machine and method is disclosed. The rotary friction welding machine has a first rotating spindle and a second non-rotating spindle, where a first component of the components being connected to one another is positioned on the first spindle and a second component of the components being connected to one another is positioned on the second spindle. Several flywheel mass bodies are positioned on the rotary friction welding machine, where the flywheel mass bodies cooperate with the first rotating spindle such that at least one of these flywheel mass bodies can be brought out of operating engagement or into operating engagement with the first rotating spindle, where both the flywheel mass bodies that are in operating engagement with the first rotating spindle and the flywheel mass bodies that are out of operating engagement with the first rotating spindle are positioned on the rotary friction welding machine.

This application claims the priority of International Application No. PCT/DE2005/000364, filed Mar. 4, 2005, and German Patent Document No. 10 2004 011 615.6, filed Mar. 10, 2004, the disclosures of which are expressly incorporated by reference herein.
The invention relates to a rotary friction welding machine.
Friction welding is a widespread joining method for the fabrication of gas turbines. Friction welding is considered a part of the so-called pressure welding process, whereby in terms of friction welding a differentiation is made, among other things, between so-called linear friction welding, rotary friction welding and so-called friction stir welding. The present invention relates to so-called rotary friction welding in which rotationally symmetrical components are joined to one another or connected to one another via friction. In rotary friction welding, a first component rotates, while the other component is stationary and is pressed with a specific force against the rotating component. In this case, the joining surfaces of the components being connected to one another adapt to one another via hot forging.
Rotary friction welding is performed on so-called rotary friction welding machines, whereby, according to the prior art, the rotating component is positioned on a rotating spindle and the stationary component is positioned on a non-rotating spindle. According to the prior art, a disk flywheel or a flywheel mass body is allocated to the rotating spindle. The flywheel mass body and the rotational speed of the rotating spindle are coordinated with the components being connected to one another, particularly with the materials of the components being connected to one another. In the case of components that are made of nickel-based alloys, large or heavy flywheel masses and low rotational speeds of the rotating spindle are used. In this case, the following interrelationship applies: large or heavy flywheel masses are coupled with a low rotational speed of the rotating spindle and small or light flywheel masses are coupled with a great rotational speed of the rotating spindle.
In rotary friction welding machines known from the prior art, when there is a change in the components being connected to one another, particularly a change in the material composition of the components being connected to one another, it is necessary to adapt the rotary friction welding machine by exchanging or adapting the flywheel mass body or the disk flywheel to the modified conditions. In this case, it is necessary to perform expensive set-up work on the rotary friction welding machine according to the prior art. Thus, according to the prior art, the flywheel mass bodies are positioned or removed using a crane. This type of set-up work requires a lot of time and causes downtime for the rotary friction welding machine.
Starting from this, the object of the present invention is to create a novel rotary friction welding machine.
According to the invention, several flywheel mass bodies are positioned on the rotary friction welding machine, wherein the flywheel mass bodies cooperate with the first rotating spindle such that at least one of these flywheel mass bodies can, as needed, be brought out of operating engagement or into operating engagement with the first rotating spindle, wherein both the flywheel mass bodies that are in operating engagement with the first rotating spindle and the flywheel mass bodies that are out of operating engagement with the first rotating spindle are positioned on the rotary friction welding machine. In so doing, the rotating spindle itself can serve as a flywheel mass body. According to the present invention, it is possible to adapt the rotary friction welding machine to changing components without expensive retooling or set-up work.
According to an advantageous development of the invention, several flywheel mass bodies are allocated to the first rotating spindle such that the flywheel mass bodies when in operating engagement with the first spindle rotate jointly with the spindle and when out of operating engagement with the first spindle are stationary as compared with the spindle. In this connection, at least one of the flywheel mass bodies is rigidly connected to the first rotating spindle, while the or every other flywheel mass body is rotatably mounted on the spindle in such a way that the or every flywheel mass body that is rotatably mounted on the first spindle can be selectively coupled to and uncoupled from the or every flywheel mass body that is rigidly connected to the first spindle. This embodiment of the rotary friction welding machine has a particularly simple structure.
According to an alternative advantageous development of the invention, the several flywheel mass bodies are allocated to a flywheel mass shaft, wherein the flywheel mass shaft is coupled to the first rotating spindle via a transmission gear. The first spindle that bears the rotating component can be coupled via the transmission gear to a flywheel mass shaft that rotates more quickly. In this case, smaller flywheel masses that rotate at a greater rotational speed can be used in order to generate the same torque.
According to another alternative advantageous development of the invention, the flywheel mass bodies can be moved back and forth between two magazine halves such that the flywheel mass bodies are in operating engagement with the first spindle in a position that is inserted into a first magazine half and out of operating engagement with the first spindle in a position that is inserted into a second magazine half. Both magazine halves are preferably embodied as a revolver magazine, wherein the two magazine halves have recesses to accommodate the flywheel mass bodies.

Apparatus and method for rotary friction welding


A system, method, and computer program product are provided for selecting a ray tracing entity from a group of ray tracing entities for processing by a parallel processing architecture. In operation, it is determined whether at least one thread in a parallel processing architecture has completed processing a ray tracing entity. Further, an additional ray tracing entity is selected from a group of ray tracing entities for processing by the parallel processing architecture, based on the determination.

Processor cores of current graphics processing units (GPUs) are highly parallel multiprocessors that execute numerous threads concurrently. Furthermore, threads of such processors are often packed together into groups, called warps, which are executed in a single instruction multiple data (SIMD) fashion. At any one instant, all threads within a warp may be nominally applying precisely the same instruction, each to its own private data values. If the processing unit is executing an instruction that some threads do not want to execute (e.g. due to conditional statement, etc.), those threads are idle. This condition, known as divergence, should be carefully avoided as idling threads are unutilized, thus reducing, total computational throughput.
Many applications, at some point, traverse a data structure (e.g. a search tree, etc.) in response to a query. In some cases, data records are stored only at the leaf nodes (e.g. nodes with no corresponding child nodes, etc.). The rest of the nodes in the search tree are called inner nodes. This restriction is common in B+ trees used in database and file systems, as well as in ray tracing hierarchies in the context of ray tracing.
For example, given a ray in space, it is desirable to discover which (if any) object (e.g. a geometric primitive or a group of primitives) in a scene is first intersected by the ray. In some cases, these geometric primitives (e.g. points, lines, triangles, etc.) may be organized in a tree, such as a bounding volume hierarchy (BVH), k-dimensional (kd) tree, or a binary space partitioning (BSP) tree. After the geometric primitives are organized in such tree, ray tracing involves traversing the tree, searching, for the leaf node or nodes that are intersected by a given ray. When such leaf node or nodes are found, the ray may be intersected against the primitives contained by the node or nodes.
A tree structure may be organized so that also inner nodes may contain primitives. In this case, inner nodes differ from leaf nodes only in that they contain other nodes. The nodes in this kind of tree structure may be processed in the same order as in a tree structure that may only contain primitives in leaf nodes. However, the ray may be intersected against primitives in both inner and leaf nodes.
Furthermore, the geometric primitives may be organized in a grid structure that may be traversed for determining ray-node intersections. In this case, each grid cell has a list of primitives that at least partially overlap the cell. The list may be empty if no primitive overlaps the cell. The traversal of grid acceleration structure includes finding the cell that contains the ray origin and stepping from cell to adjacent cells along the ray. When a cell that contains primitives is encountered, the ray may be intersected against the primitives contained by the cell.
Regardless of the particular type of structure used for organizing the primitives, there are two basic operations that need to be executed during the tracing of a ray. The first operation is node traversal, which typically includes intersecting the ray against one, two, or another predetermined number of nodes and choosing the node to be considered next. By repeated application of a node traversal operation, node or nodes that may contain primitives that the ray intersects may be found. The second operation is primitive intersection, i.e. intersecting the ray against the primitives in a node found during traversal. The execution of a ray tracing algorithm includes repeated application of these two operations in some order.
When formulating ray tracing algorithms on a highly parallel architecture such as a GPU, it is important to determine how rays and traversal tests are assigned to the various parallel threads of execution included in the parallel architecture. In particular, it is important to design a system to minimize divergence due to different threads in a warp making different decisions.
Various prior art techniques provide ways which allow rays to traverse a data tree independently. As a result, each ray visits only the nodes it actually intersects, such that redundant work is avoided. At any given time in a SIMD architecture, however, the entire warp has to be executing node traversal or primitive intersection due to the SIMD execution. This causes execution type penalties. For example, if node traversal is chosen to be executed, the threads that currently require primitive intersection to be executed will have to remain idle.
Another performance issue is the termination penalty due to threads in a packet of threads terminating prior to other threads of the packet. Here, a packet refers to one or more warps. For example, threads of a packet may terminate processing only when all its rays have terminated. Thus, threads in the packet may remain idle waiting for other threads in the packet to complete processing. In some cases, this termination penalty may be significant.
There is thus a need for addressing these and/or other issues associated with the prior art.

Parallel processing system, method, and computer program product for selecting a ray tracing entity from a group of ray tracing entities for processing


A DNA encoding an enzyme, which forms non-reducing saccharides having trehalose structure as an end unit from amylaceous saccharides having a degree of glucose polymerization of 3 or higher, enables an industrial-scale production of a recombinant enzyme with such enzyme activity. Non-reducing saccharides obtainable by the recombinant enzyme can be used in a variety of food products, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals and feeds because of their substantial non-reducibility, mild and high-quality sweetness, adequate viscosity, and moisture-retaining ability.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a novel DNA encoding an enzyme which forms non-reducing saccharides having trehalose structure as an end unit from reducing amylaceous saccharides having a degree of glucose polymerization of 3 or higher, and a recombinant DNA and enzyme containing the DNA as well as to a transformant. The present invention further relates to preparations and uses thereof.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Trehalose is a disaccharide which consists of 2 glucose molecules that are linked together with their reducing groups, and, naturally, it is present in fungi, algae, insects, etc., in an extremely small quantity. Having no reducing residue within the molecule, trehalose does not cause an unsatisfactory browning reaction even when heated in the presence of amino acids or the like, and because of this it can sweeten food products without fear of causing unsatisfiable coloration and deterioration. Trehalose, however, is far from being readily prepared in a desired amount by conventional production methods, and, actually, it has scarcely been used for sweetening food products.
Conventional production methods are roughly classified into 2 groups, i.e. the one using cells of microorganisms and the other employing a multi-enzymatic system wherein enzymes are allowed to act on saccharides. The former, as disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 154,485/75, is a method comprising growing microorganisms such as bacteria and yeasts in nutrient culture media, and collecting trehalose from the proliferated cells in the resultant cultures. The latter, as disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 216,695/83, is a method comprising providing maltose as a substrate, allowing a multi-enzymatic system using maltose- and trehalose-phosphorylases to act on maltose, and recovering the formed trehalose from the reaction system. Although the former facilitates the growth of microorganisms with relative ease, it requires sequential complicated steps for collecting trehalose from the microorganisms containing only 15 w/w % trehalose, on a dry solid basis (d.s.b.). While the latter enables to separate trehalose with relative ease, but it is theoretically difficult to increase the trehalose yield by allowing enzymes to act on substrates at a considerably-high concentration because the enzymatic reaction in itself is an equilibrium reaction of 2 different types of enzymes and the equilibrium point constantly inclines to the side of forming glucose phosphate.
In view of the foregoing, the present inventors energetically screened enzymes which form saccharides having trehalose structure from amylaceous saccharides, and found that microorganisms such as those of the species Rhizobium sp. M-11 and Arthrobacter sp. Q36 produce a novel enzyme which forms non-reducing saccharides having trehalose structure as an end unit from reducing amylaceous saccharides having a degree of glucose polymerization of 3 or higher. Before or after this finding, it was revealed that such a non-reducing saccharide is almost quantitatively hydrolyzed into trehalose and glucose and/or maltooligosaccharides by another enzyme produced by the same microorganisms as mentioned above. Since the use of the combination of enzymes enables to form a desired amount of trehalose with relative ease, the aforementioned objects relating to trehalose would be completely overcome. Insufficient levels of production of the novel enzyme by such a microorganism is a drawback, i.e. a relatively-large scale culture thereof is inevitably used to industrially produce trehalose and/or non-reducing saccharides having trehalose structure as an end unit.
Recombinant DNA technology has made a remarkable progress in recent years. At present, even an enzyme whose total amino acid sequence has not been revealed can be readily prepared in a desired amount, if a gene encoding the enzyme was once isolated and the base sequence was decoded, by preparing a recombinant DNA which contains a DNA encoding the enzyme, introducing the recombinant DNA into microorganisms or cells of plants and animals, and culturing the resultant transformants. There is a pressing need to find a gene encoding the enzyme and to reveal a base sequence thereof.

DNA encoding enzyme recombinant DNA and enzyme transformant, and their preparation and uses

Kabushiki Kaisha Hayashibara Seibutsu Kagaku Kenkyujo


A die change method includes providing a press apparatus having a base and a ram, and a first die set including an upper die member and a lower die member. The lower die member is supported on the base and the upper die member is mounted on the ram. The ram is lowered into a closed, home position to mate the upper and lower die members and to perform an operation on a workpiece disposed between the die members. The ram is released from the upper die member. The ram is raised a minimum distance to provide minimal clearance for removing the upper and lower die members from the press. The mated upper and lower die members are moved out of the press with the workpiece held between the upper and lower die members.

It is known in the art relating to flexible assembly systems to use a batch build method or a synchronous method. In a synchronous method, the batch size is one. Synchronous production methods typically use multiple presses without changing the die in any of the presses. Use of multiple presses requires a large amount of space and is associated with high machinery costs. On the other hand, batch production methods, such as in the production of vehicle closure panels, often use press and die hemming apparatuses with die changers. Conventional die change methods, however, are time-consuming and decrease production speed. For example, for automotive closure panel assembly lines, production speeds are typically in the range of 50 to 120 jobs per hour.
In conventional press applications, the home position of the press is an open position. The first step in the operational sequence is the part is loaded onto the lower die, and the press cycles to a closed position and returns to the open position to complete a work stroke. During the work stroke, the press performs work on a workpiece via a die held by the press. To change the die, a workpiece or part inside the die is first removed from the die and/or transferred to another station. Then the die is moved from the open home position to the closed position. The upper die is released and the press raises to the home position, leaving the upper die on the lower die. The die is then shuttled out of the press and a new die is shuttled into the press. The press then lowers to the closed position, and the upper die is clamped to the press. The press then raises back to the home position and is ready to perform work on a new workpiece.


A membrane shield for application over the eye of a wearer to retain moisture. The moisture shield includes a window that can be made of a transparent plastic. A collar is connected to the perimeter of the window such that the collar extends outwardly from the window. An adhesive layer, such as an adhesive gel, is applied to the collar to permit the moisture shield to be adhered to the wearer's face about the eye. A vapor distribution element is attached to the membrane shield to expose the eye to a desired substance or substances, such as water or medication.

When eyes are exposed to the elements, such as heat, cold or dry air, the moisture in the membranes of the eyes tends to evaporate, leaving the person with uncomfortably dry eyes. Retaining moisture is particularly difficult for the elderly and for persons with certain eye disorders. Additionally, it is often helpful to retain a high level of moisture in the membranes of the eyes following certain types of eye surgeries.
Eyes also are susceptible to dirt, bacteria, and other particles that become lodged therein. Dirt and bacteria are especially problematic following certain eye surgeries. They are also a problem in environments where the air is recirculated, as for example, in airplanes.
Standard goggles are currently used to protect the eyes. Goggles are secured over the eyes by a strap that wraps around the wearers head If the strap is too loose, the goggles will not stay in place. On the other hand, if the strap is tightly fastened, the user may complain that the goggles are uncomfortable. Another problem with goggles is their bulk which makes them conspicuous when worn. Because they take up more space, bulky goggles are also difficult to store in a purse or a pocket.
Another product sold to protect eyes, as well as to treat dry eyes, is the PRO-OPHTHA S.TM. adhesive eye dressing, product no. 95574 distributed by Visitec Company, located in Sarasota, Fla. This product has a clear, hard plastic center with a porous flap extending outwardly from the hard plastic center. The porous flap includes an adhesive applied to one surface to permit adherence of the flap to the face of a wearer surrounding one of the wearer's eyes. Due to the porous, vapor permeable nature of the flap, moisture, e.g., water vapor, can still escape from the region surrounding the wearer's eye, and bacteria has access to the eye. For serious dryness problems and for proper therapy following certain eye surgeries, the eye should be separated from the environment by a moisture barrier.
Another product that has been distributed by Solan Opthalmic Products of Jacksonville, Florida is the Guibor EXPO BANDAGE.RTM. Eye Bubble eye cover which includes a clear, stiff plastic bubble surrounded by a plastic flap. The flap includes adhesive applied to one surface to permit the product to be adhered over the wearer's eye. However, the bubble is inflexible and the flap is relatively narrow which can lead to gaps between the flap and the wearer's face, thereby providing a less secure moisture barrier.
Both of the above-described products work well for some procedures, but in many applications, it would be advantageous to create a more secure moisture barrier that could supplement the moisture in the eye or medicate the eye. In other situations, it would be advantageous to incorporate vision correction lenses into the eye shield.
The present invention addresses the drawbacks of existing eye protection devices.


A thermoelectric generating device has a thermoelectric element which utilizes an exhaust gas from an engine as a high temperature heat source and an engine coolant as a low temperature heat source in order to generate electricity. An introducing passage introduces a part of the exhaust gas passed through the thermoelectric element into an intake of the engine. An introducing valve opens and closes the introducing passage. A controller controls an opening degree of the introducing valve according to a load of the engine.

A conventional thermoelectric generating device is shown in JP-U-63-162916A. The conventional thermoelectric generating device has a thermoelectric element which utilizes an exhaust gas as a high temperature heat source and an ambient air as a low temperature heat source in order to generate electricity. A bypass pipes branched from an exhaust pipe of an engine through a plurality of branch pipes. Each of the branch pipes has an electric valve which opens and closes the branch pipes. The electric valve closes the bypass pipe respectively when the temperature of the exhaust gas exceeds a predetermined value to control an amount of the exhaust gas flowing in the bypass pipe so that the temperature of the thermoelectric element at the high temperature side is kept under the resisting temperature.
JP-2000-297699A shows another conventional thermoelectric generating device which utilizes an engine coolant as a low temperature heat source.
In the thermoelectric generating device shown in JP-U-63-162916A, an amount of generated current depends on a temperature difference between the exhaust gas and the ambient air when the temperature of the exhaust gas is lower than a predetermined value. Since the temperature difference fluctuates in each situation, there is no technical concept to generate current effectively in a positive way.
In the thermoelectric generating device shown in JP-2000-297699A, since the heat of the exhaust gas is absorbed by the engine coolant, the temperature of the engine coolant may increase over a threshold so that overheating of the engine may be caused. To prevent the overheating, it is necessary to upsize a radiator.


Systems, methodologies, media, and other embodiments associated with a block-by-block off-resonance frequency estimation method are described. One exemplary method embodiment includes calculating a field map from local B0 off resonance frequency estimates. The example method may also include performing water-fat decomposition and signal de-blurring based on the calculated map.

Spiral imaging is a popular fast MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) data acquisition strategy. Flow artifacts are usually not apparent in images reconstructed using spiral techniques due to inherently nulled gradient moments of the spiral trajectories. However, off-resonance effects may lead to blurring artifacts in spiral imaging. Additionally, specific blurring artifacts due to fat spins may be difficult to correct using conventional spiral off-resonance correction methods.
Spiral Dixon techniques using conventional spatially selective RF (radio frequency) pulses may be based on conventional Dixon techniques in rectilinear acquisitions. These spiral Dixon techniques may achieve unambiguous water-fat signal separation with effective blurring artifact correction, even in the presence of B0 inhomogeneity. In Spiral three-point Dixon (S3PD) techniques, a frequency field map can be generated using methods analogous to rectilinear three point Dixon (3PD) techniques since off-resonance blurred signals do not affect the phase difference between the first and third data sets. De-blurred images may then be reconstructed using the frequency field map. However, three point spiral techniques may be computationally intensive. Thus two point techniques may be employed.
Spiral two-point Dixon (S2PD) techniques may be employed to facilitate unambiguous water-fat decomposition in spiral imaging with fewer computations than S3PD techniques. S2PD techniques may also facilitate correcting for off-resonance blurring artifacts using only two data sets. S2PD techniques may acquire the two data sets with different TEs (echo times). However, direct computation of a frequency field map in S2PD techniques may be complicated by the phase relationship between water and fat spins being disrupted by off-resonance blurred signals. Thus, to achieve both water-fat decomposition and signal de-blurring, off-resonance correction at multiple predetermined frequencies may be required in these conventional techniques. For example, in an S2PD technique that employs multi-frequency testing, several predetermined off-resonance frequencies may be tested to facilitate separating water and fat signals and de-blurring the decomposed images. However, the range of tested frequencies must be large enough to span a full range of anticipated B0 variations, and thus S2PD techniques may also be computationally intensive.
Block regional off-resonance correction (BRORC) techniques may also be employed to facilitate correcting for off-resonance blurring artifacts in conventional spiral acquisitions. BRORC has been used with spiral acquisitions using spatial-spectral RF pulses (SPSP pulses). In BRORC, off-resonance correction proceeds block-by-block through a reconstructed image under the assumption that each small sub-image block has a constant B0 off-resonance frequency. This assumption is valid in most cases since magnetic field inhomogeneities are usually smoothly varying across a field-of-view (FOV). BRORC is typically several times more computationally efficient than the conventional frequency-segmented off-resonance correction with no perceptual difference between the images.


The present invention provides a smart RFID infrastructure and method. Specifically, under the present invention, the infrastructure includes a set (e.g., one or more) of smart RFID tags adapted to communicate with one another, wherein each operating smart RFID tag is adapted to create an individual table of information pertaining to operation of other smart RFID tags. In addition, the infrastructure includes a set of writeable RFID tags adapted to communicate with and receive the individual table of information from each operating smart RFID tag, wherein each of the set of writeable RFID tags is further adapted to create a master table of information based on the individual table of information received from each operating smart RFID tag.

As Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID) technology has become more pervasive, the reliance on RFID technology has grown. Today every thing from security passes in electronically controlled doors to inventory management of products can be controlled via RFID technology. Current RFID technology comes in two forms, one utilizes "active" technology and the other "passive" technology. In the active RFID system, a beacon/radio signal is transmitted periodically with a built-in battery. In the passive system, the power source must be induced with a reader signal to transmit RFID tag data to a reader. Both forms utilize wireless technology that transmits data to a reader (portable or stationary). Unfortunately, current passive RFID systems do not communicate with each other. Instead, they rely on an external source to initiate a RF inductive coupling energy into a small capacitor on the passive tag that transmits back a preprogrammed binary code that is unique for every passive and active tag.
Therefore, relying on an external reader does not provide a highly effective percent read, especially when these tags are placed among products such as palettes of liquid (i.e., due to RF absorption). That is, limited read ranges and interference with radio signals caused by metals and liquids have presented barriers to accurately read all RFID tags.
In view of the foregoing, there exists a need for a solution that solves at least one of the problems in the related art.

Smart radio-frequency identification (RFID) infrastructure and method

International Business Machines Corporation


An image signal processing system such as a television, a video tape recorder, a video disk player, a digital camera and the like, more particularly to an impulse noise reduction method and circuit which can reduce impulse noise component effectively in the image signal without damage of the original input image signal by using the noise characteristic in which has no vertical correlation and of which frequency component has 2 MHz or more in a horizontal direction at least.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image signal processing system such as a television, a video tape recorder, a video disk player, a digital camera and the like, more particularly, to impulse noise reduction method and circuit which can reduce impulse noise component in the image signal without a damage of the original input image signal.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In such an image signal processing system, for example, a television, a video tape recorder and the like, one of the important problems is to reproduce a clean picture image without noise components and/or other artifacts.
Generally, the picture image provided from broadcasting stations or tape manufacturers, is likely to be mixed with noise due to an image transmitting channel or a repeated copy therefor and further mixed with unnecessary noise depending upon a performance of the iamge signal processing system.
Such that noise is intended to be occurred when an image source originally contains the noise component or a poor film is employed in the image signal processing system. Moreover, the picture image is mixed with the noise in case that a recording is effected under a bad light effect and also the image is affected by a weak electric field during the reception of television image signal.
The noise component is generally divided into impulse noise and line noise and the impulse noise is further divided into white noise and black noise. These noise components may be simultaneously cantained in the image signal. Accordingly, various counterplans must be considered in order to reduce the noise components effectively. Because of that, various technical methods have been developed to reduce the noise component. However, the original image signal is likely to be affected by such the methods.
More particurlary, an examplary one of the methods has been proposed in, for example, U.S Pat. No. 4,926,261 (VIDEO NOISE REDUCTION CIRCUIT) issued on May 15, 1990. With this patent method, a high-pass component is filtered from a brightness signal of the image signal so that the signal is defined and controlled in level to obtain a noise suppressing signal and a low noise output is then obtained by subtracting the noise suppressing signal from the input image signal.
Referring to FIG. 1, there is shown a conventional noise reduction circuit, but similar to that of the patent publication. In the drawing, the brightness signal A shown in FIG. 2 (A), is entered to an input terminal IN in FIG. 1. The input brightness signal A is divided into high-frequency and low-frequency components by means of a low-pass filter (LPF) 2 and a high-pass filter (HPE) 4, as shown in FIGS. 2 (B) and (C). Subsequently, the low-frequency component B from the LPF 2 is amplified by a first amplifier 6 and then entered into an input terminal of an adder 12 while the high-frequency component C from the HPF 4 is input to a coring portion 8 which removes the noise component below a coring level T so as to output a higher signal D than the coring level T, as shown in FIG. 2(D). The output D of the coring portion 8 is amplified by means of a second amplifier 10 and the amplified signal is then entered into the adder 12, as shown in FIG. 2(E). The adder 12 adds the output signals from the first and second amplifiers 6 and 10, and outputs at an output terminal OUT the noise-reduced brightness signal F as is shown in FIG. 2 (F).
With the conventional circuit constructed as mentioned above, however, a detail signal having relatively higher frequency component of the picture image is also removed together with the high frequency noise component, resulting in a problem that the picture image is in a soft condition. That is, in case that pulses of a transition period of the high-frequency image signal shown in FIG. 3 (A) are subjected to process, it is a problem that the image signal is changed into a low-frequency component as shown in FIG. 3 (B), to be thereby outputted a soft picture image.

Impulse noise reduction method and circuit


A machine for tying together mutually crossing rods with the aid of wire-ties includes a device 8, 9 having a curved wire-guide surface which is intended to be positioned so that it will surround a rod intersection point on three sides of the mutually crossing rods 6, 7. The machine also includes a mechanism 18-20 for feeding at least one wire to the device, so that the wire will be bent by the guide surfaces into a wire-stirrup which surrounds the intersection point on three sides, and a rotatable twisting head by means of which the free legs of the stirrup are twisted together on the fourth side of the intersection point. The machine also includes a feed tube 18 for feeding severed, straight wire-sections 16 of predetermined lengths, and the lower end of the feed tube is located above an opening in the twisting head positioned in line with a part of the guide surface. Mounted for axial movement in the tube is a device which functions to press wire-sections introduced into the tube in a downward direction and displace the wire-sections along the guide surface, to form a wire-stirrup.

The present invention relates to a machine which is intended for joining together mutually crossing rods with the aid of wire-ties, and particularly for lashing or tying reinforcement rods, said machine including a wire guide device having a curved guide surface and being positioned so that the guide surface will substantially surround an intersection point of two rods on three sides thereof, means for feeding at least one wire to said device so that the wire is bent by said guide surface in a manner to form a wire-stirrup which embraces said intersection point on three sides thereof, and a rotatable twisting head by means of which the free legs of the wire-stirrup are twisted around each other on the fourth side of the rod intersection point.
The reinforcement rods or irons of tied mesh reinforcements are traditionally tied or lashed with the aid of simple, manually operated tools, and the task of tying the irons is therefore highly time-consuming, costly and laborious, and is liable to cause strain injuries to the workman involved, among other things. Such strain, or wear on the joints, is caused by the fact that when tying together the reinforcement irons of concrete slab reinforcements, floor structures or the like with the aid of present-day tools, it is necessary for the workman to remain stooped over long periods of time, therewith subjecting the spine to undue loads.
The reinforcement irons are normally tied together with the aid of pliers or "twisters" by means of which the ends of a wire-tie or stirrup positioned manually around the reinforcement rods at the various intersection points are intertwined to provide a firm and durable connection. Conventional tying of reinforcement rods is also encumbered with accident risks, particularly when working on roofs, bridges and the like, due to the stooped position in which the workman is forced to work, therewith placing the workman in danger of falling.
The present invention is based on the realization that the work of tying reinforcement rods can be made much more effective while eliminating, or substantially reducing the risk of injury, when tying can be effected with the aid of a tying machine which enables the workman to work in an upright position.
An automatic tying machine is known from DE-A1-1434519. This machine, however, is a hand-operated machine which requires the workman to stoop when tying the reinforcement bars of floor reinforcements and the like. Furthermore, the machine can only work with pre-bent wire-stirrups of standard sizes. The tying head used with this machine is also relatively complicated, and includes two parts which can be moved axially in relation to one another and which are intended to hold the legs of a wire-stirrup between said parts. This mechanism is highly susceptible to damage and to the presence of contaminants, because of the small tolerances and clearances involved, and is hardly suited for use on building sites.
WO-88/01671 describes a tying machine which enables tying to be effected in an upstanding position. The function of this machine also depends on the use of prefabricated standard-size wire-stirrups housed in a magazine.
In many instances, particularly within the building industries of different countries, tying is effected with the aid of relatively thin wire-ties which are bent to an appropriate stirrup-like shape by the workman on the working site, prior to placing the ties or stirrups over the point of intersection of, for instance, two reinforcement rods or bars.
There is at present no suitable machine which will facilitate this type of tying, in which pre-cut wire lengths are not formed into stirrup-like ties until the actual tying operation is commenced.
In an attempt to automatize tying operations with the use of relatively thin wires, there have earlier been proposed tying machines which include a spool from which wire is continuously taken and passed around the rods in conjunction with a tying operation. These machines have not been found successful in practice, probably due to their unrealibility in operation, among other things. When using such machines, it is also difficult to pass the end of the wire around the rods, in an open groove and up into a twisting head. Because of this, telescopically displaceable devices (see GB-A-2171038 and DE-A1-2223099) have been used, although these devices require a relatively large amount of free space beneath the rods that are to be tied together. These devices must also be provided with wire feed means and wire cutting means, which makes it difficult to run the machine on battery power, owing to the high energy consumption of such means. The machine described in the German patent specification also includes a wire aligning mechanism. The provision of such a mechanism is necessary owing to bending of the wire as it is taken from a spool, therewith complicating guiding of the wire. The use of a wire aligning mechanism also increases energy consumption and adds to the weight of the machine.
DE-B1-1138207 describes a machine which includes a hook-shaped device which requires a relatively large space on the underside of the rods to be tied together.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,368,590 describes a machine which, in order to ensure that the end of the wire is inserted into the twisting head, includes a chain mechanism which draws the end of the wire completely around the rods. This machine is relatively complicated and heavy and consumes a large amount of energy. CH-A-408384 teaches a machine in which the end of a wire is bent into the twisting head by means of a liftable plate. This machine is also relatively complicated, heavy and energy demanding.

Machine for joining together mutually crossing rods