A mask is adapted for superimposing on a photograph to accentuate a portion of the photograph. The mask is made of a thin sheet of plastic, by means of, e.g., colored raster which is opaque in a periopheral region surrounding a transparent, central area without raster. The peripheral region and the central area are separated by a relatively narrow, transitional zone with increasing distance between the raster, so that the transitional zone gradually fades out into the transparent, central area. The mask may be employed in the same simple manner as a passe-partout frame for accentuating one particular portion of a photograph, and with the same good visual effect achieved by a traditional phototechnical method for integrally providing a photograph with a neutral peripheral region gradually fading out via a soft transitional zone into the desired portion of the photograph.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a mask for superimposition onto a photograph, to thereby accentuate a portion of the photograph.
2. Background of the Invention
Passe partout frames have for many years been a frequently employed means for showing a particular portion of a photograph. Such frames are made of a sheet of paper or cardboard having a cut-out, oval portion that allows the desired portion of the photograph to be freely visible when the photograph is mounted within the frame, while the rest of the photograph is hidden by the frame. Consequently, a viewer will immediately focus attention directly on the exposed portion of the photograph without being diverted by other images within the viewer's field of vision.
One particular portion of a photograph which is frequently accentuated, when arranged in a passe partout frame, is a portrait view of a person. A portrait is perceived much differently as compared to a photograph that includes the full figure of a person and the surroundings at the place the photograph was taken. When the photograph is framed as a portrait, the viewer immediately focuses attention on it. Thus, a visual effect is obtained in which the framed portrait is accentuated and manifests itself clearly to the viewer, who thus perceives the portrait far more intensely than the viewer would when contemplating the photograph in full.
This attractive effect is, however, to a certain extent reduced by the sharp edge along the cut-away portion of the frame, which provides for an abrupt transition from the portrait to the frame. Thus, the frame itself becomes sufficiently perceptible to attract part of the viewer's attention.
It has been sought to remedy the above mentioned drawback through a purely phototechnical method. When using this method, a peripheral region of a photograph is dimmed during the shooting of the negative or at a later time, when the prints are made, so that the central area appears with 100% sharpness and gradually fades out to vanish completely at a surrounding, neutral peripheral region. This peripheral region may be provided with uniform coloration, which does not by itself capture the eye. On the contrary, the smooth fading out directs the eye unnoticed towards the central portion of the photograph, the peripheral region in reality not being perceived. Thus, the resulting visual effect is optimal, allowing the central portion of the photograph to be studied without disturbing interference from other images within the field of sight, leading up to the central portion, which invariably would attract the attention of the viewer.
Thus, a distinct demand exists for a mask using means just as simple as a passe partout frame, which provides a visual effect as good as the one realized by the above mentioned phototechnical method.


A multimode combiner or coupler (MMC) may combine the inputs into a larger core multimode fiber. The multimode combiner may be combined with a re-transmitting laser for detecting and re-transmitting signals. Thus, the multi-mode combiner may detect and combine input signals, and then retransmit the detected, combined signal. The detection can be implemented with multiple single mode fibers to small single mode detectors or a multi-mode coupler with a larger multi-mode detectors. In embodiments of the MMC, a bi-directional optical splitter/combiner includes a transmitter for re-transmitting an RF signal received at a receiver, a first wave division multiplexer (WDM) combiner combining the output of the first transmitter in an upstream direction to a downstream signal in a downstream direction, and a second WDM combiner combining split downstream signals in the downstream direction with upstream signals received via at least two optical fiber inputs.

An existing impairment of RFoG communication channels is Optical Beat Interference (OBI), which afflicts traditional RFoG networks. OBI occurs when two or more reverse path transmitters are powered on, are very close in wavelength to each other, and are combined on a single mode fiber and directed to a detector. For more details on OBI, Applicants refer to application Ser. No. 13/151,257, which is herein incorporated by reference. OBI limits upstream traffic, but also can limit downstream traffic due to corruption of acknowledgements sent upstream. Existing efforts at mitigating OBI include adjusting ONUs to be wavelength specific, creating an RFoG-aware scheduler in the CMTS, changing ONU wavelengths in real-time, or RF combining multiple upstream inputs nominally in the same wavelength range.
However, such solutions for reducing or eliminating OBI require additional power, add cost or limit traffic throughput. For example, to combine multiple upstream inputs nominally in the same wavelength range without the occurrence of OBI requires power to drive the photodiodes and the retransmitting laser. Such OBI reducing/eliminating devices have OEO conversion in upstream and downstream to aid in downstream splitting that require additional downstream transmitting lasers, which also requires additional power and adds cost. Wavelength specific or adjustable ONUs are costly and can create logistical problems with different versions of ONUs. RFoG aware schedulers limit upstream transmissions to one ONU at a time this reducing the upstream channel throughput.
Improved techniques for reducing OBI in a network that do not reduce throughput with a minimal need for increased power are desirable.
It is noted that while the accompanying Figures serve to illustrate embodiments of concepts that include the claimed invention, and explain various principles and advantages of those embodiments, the concepts displayed are not necessary to understand the embodiments of the present invention, as the details depicted in the Figures would be readily apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art having the benefit of the description herein.

N-input receiver: RFoG OBI mitigation with retransmission


A method for rectangular-shape motion search has been disclosed. One embodiment of the method includes performing motion measurement on a plurality of motion search points, the plurality of motion search points forming a rectangular search region, finding a minimal motion search point among the plurality of motion search points substantially based on result of the motion measurement, and finding a motion vector corresponding to the relative movement of the pixel block from the first video frame to the second video frame if the minimal motion search point is within an inner region of the rectangular search region.

Video data compression removes redundant data that can be easily restored to reduce storage space or transmission bandwidth. Typically, video data is in a series of frames in which much of the image is substantially similar as objects in the video frames move in the field. By tracking the moving objects, the amount of data recorded can be reduced to the changes in the objects from one frame to another while the rest of the data can be substituted with data recorded for a previous frame.
An existing gradient-descent method to estimate how a block of pixels in a video frame will move in a subsequent frame is commonly referred to as full pixel diamond search. A full-pixel diamond search performs a motion search using two levels as shown in FIGS. 1A and 1B. Referring to FIG. 1A, measurements of the pixels are collected at the 9 search points 103 within a diamond search pattern in the first level of the motion search. The measurements at the motion search points are compared with each other to determine how close each search point of a block of pixels in a reference frame is to the block of pixels in the current frame. The reference frame may be a prior frame in the video data. If the closest point is one of the eight outer points within the diamond search pattern, the search pattern is shifted to a new position centered at that point. In such a case, the new search pattern has 4 search points in common with the old search pattern and 5 new search points. Therefore, 5 new measurements are performed when the diamond search pattern is shifted to the right by 2 grid lines. No measurement is necessary for the search points common to both search patterns because the data from previous measurements can be reused.
If the best measurement is at the center point, the next level search is performed as shown in FIG. 1B. At this level, four new motion search points 110 are measured and the data of the point 105 at the center from previous measurements is reused. The motion search point with the smallest measurement is the full-pixel search position.
The diamond search is a fast algorithm because only 5 or more measurements are required for shifting the pattern by 2 grids. However, the irregular shape of the diamond search pattern complicates operations on the measurement data stored in a register file. Some of the problems of the diamond search include the difficulties in keeping track of the address offsets of the data, the inefficient usage of storage space, and possible miss of true minima due to its sparse sampling pattern.
Due to its massive amount of computation requirement, motion search is usually performed by a parallel processor. One such parallel processor uses operations of Single Instruction Multiple Data (SIMD). For example, one measurement of motion search is the Sum of Absolute Different (SAD), a measure of the L1-norm of the difference between the block in the current frame and a block in the reference frame. Another measurement of motion search is the Sum of Square Different (SSD), a measure of the square of L2-norm (Euclidean norm) of the difference between the block in the current frame and a block in the reference frame. The SAD or SSD measurement on multiple data entries may be performed by a SIMD operation. A typical parallel processor has a large register file in order to reduce the number of data access to the memory hierarchy. Data of the diamond search within a search region is usually stored in the register file. The parallel processor may access multiple data entries in the register file in a parallel operation, such as, for example, a SAD operation to compute the sums of absolute difference of data entries in several consecutive columns. Since the rows in the diamond shaped region in the register file have different numbers of columns, different numbers of columns are accessed to compute the SAD of entries in the rows. Consequently, the parallel processor has to keep track of different address offsets for various rows and columns, and thus, complicating the performance of parallel operations.


Disclosed is a method, system, and computer program product for timing closure with concurrent models for fabrication, metrology, lithography, and/or imaging processing analyses for electronic designs. Some embodiments of the present invention disclose a method for timing closure with concurrent process model analysis which comprises the act of generating a design for the one or more interconnect levels; analyzing the effects of the concurrent models to predict feature dimension variations based upon the concurrent models; modifying the design files to reflect the variations; determining one or more parameters based upon the concurrent models; and determining the impact of concurrent models upon the electrical and timing performance. Some embodiments disclose a computerized system for implementing the method(s) disclosed herein. Some embodiments also disclosed a computer program product comprising executable code for the method(s) disclosed herein.

Timing closure has become increasingly difficult and presents some profound challenges in electronic circuit designs. The main goal of computer-aided design simulations is obtaining desired device electrical characteristics. Nonetheless, geometric dimensions and profiles of features of an electronic circuit design often have significant impact on the device electrical characteristics. The device dimensions which may have significant impact on the electrical characteristics include, for example, gate oxide thickness, gate width and length, shape of the poly gate at the bottom, and spacer width. As device geometry shrinks, semiconductor fabrication processes require more complex techniques to meet the design goals such as lower power supply, thinner gate oxides, shorter channel length, higher body doping concentration, and thinner silicon films. More importantly, the timing delay caused by the wires becomes more significant and can no longer be ignored.
As the device size continues to shrink and the clock frequency nevertheless increases, particularly into the deep-submicron regime, the electrical properties of wires or conductors become more prominent, and integrated circuit chips are more susceptible to breakdowns during fabrication due to, for example, the antenna effect or due to wear out or degradation over time due to, for example, electro-migration. Some prior methods propose prioritizing the nets and forcing shorter wire lengths among the high-priority, timing critical nets. However, making certain wires shorter usually comes at the expense of making other wires longer. Some other prior methods use larger gates with bigger transistors and higher drive strengths to charge the capacitance of wires more quickly and therefore making the path faster to maintain timing correctness without overly shortening some wires while lengthening others. However, there exists one problem for these methods. In electronic designs, the actual wire lengths are usually not known until some gates are physically in place occupying certain area(s) in the electronic circuit. Nonetheless, because larger gates also have larger capacitance and thus increases power and perhaps timing delay, the above method does not satisfactorily solve the problems caused by increasingly shrinking feature sizes. FIG. 1 illustrates a general method of timing closure, and FIG. 2 illustrates a method of timing closure with gate sizing.
Another problem with using larger gates is that larger gates with larger drive strength tend to worsen the problem of electro-migration. Deposited aluminum and copper interconnect have a polycrystalline structure from most fabrication processes; that is, these aluminum and copper interconnects are made of small grain lattices. Metal atoms can be transported between the grain boundaries. Electro-migration occurs during the momentum exchange between the mobile carriers and the atomic lattice as the current flow through the interconnect. As a result of the momentum exchange, metal tends to deposit in the direction of the electron flow, and voids thus form at the grain boundaries and reduce the conductivity. Such voids may over time cause the interconnect to stop conducting electricity altogether and thus cause the interconnect to fail.
Moreover, the continual effort to scale down electronic design features to the deep submicron region requires multilevel interconnection architecture to minimize the timing delay due to parasitic resistance and capacitance. As the devices shrinks to smaller sizes, the delay caused by the increased R-C time constant becomes more significant over the delay caused by the actual wire length. In order to reduce the R-C time constant, interconnect materials with lower resistivity and interlayer films with lower capacitance are required. However, the use of low-k dielectric material also aggravates the electro-migration problem due to the poor thermal conductivity of these low-k dielectric materials.
One way of resolving the aforementioned problems introduced by the continual reduction in feature sizes is to impose certain density rules for metal filling. Such rules typically comprise certain maximum and minimum densities within certain windows or areas on the chip. Some other rules impose different density limits among different window areas. Various tools and methods (see metal fill and slotting) have been developed or proposed for keeping the metal densities within the specified limits. However, the rules and equations used for estimating timing typically assume that the thickness of wires or conductors, at least for those on the same layer, is constant according to certain formulae, and therefore these rules and equations manipulate only the width of the wires to achieve the design goals.
Although this assumption of constant wire thickness arose out of a practical consideration and has worked while the thickness variation is relatively insignificant as compared to the geometry sizes, such an assumption appears to be outdated, especially in light of the current development in incorporating the topological variations of each film into the electronic designs and the continuously shrinkage in sizes of device features. Moreover, wire width cannot be arbitrarily altered due to the polycrystalline structure of the interconnect materials. As a result, additional methods have been developed to slot certain wires such that the metal densities within certain regions fall within the prescribed maximum and minimum limits.
Nonetheless, the above rule-based methods pose new problems and challenges in electronic designs. For instance, a good interconnect may be wrongfully determined to be improper for failing to meet the density rules or for producing unacceptable R-C delay even though the interconnect actually satisfies the design goals by having certain thickness that is different from the assumed value. A contrary example is that a bad interconnect unfit for the design intent or goals may nonetheless be wrongfully determined to be proper for meeting the metal density rules and/or the delay requirement. Furthermore, even among legal designs as bound by such limits, designers may nevertheless prefer different metal thicknesses in different parts of their designs. For example, a designer might prefer thin metal where minimum capacitance (C) is needed and thick metal where minimum resistivity or resistance (R) is required. A density limit, as typically specified now, does not tell how the thickness depends on density and does not express any relationship between density and thickness or the sign of such a relationship.
There are many existing approaches to timing closure. Typical timing closure approaches keep the gate delay constant under load by sizing the gates. The flaw in these approaches, as interconnects get longer, is that wire resistance can no longer be neglected as it usually is in these gate sizing approaches. Moreover, keeping the delay constant by sizing the gate offers reasonably accurate approximations only when there is no or insignificantly low resistance between the driving gate and the capacitive load. This is no longer true as the geometry continually shrinks, especially into the deep submicron technologies. Another approach by employing timing-driven placement methods may also be ineffective because these methods rely only on and are thus limited by the quality of the placement and the accuracy of the timing model. Furthermore, one common limitation of all these approaches is that these approaches only change the placement and/or the nominal, center-line routing.
With the advent of deep submicron technologies, resolution enhancement techniques (RET) have become one of the most important techniques to guarantee design for manufacturability (DFM). Nonetheless, applying these resolution enhancement techniques without taking the surface topology of certain features of the electronic design into consideration may pose further challenges to timing closure due to the continual pursuit for smaller geometry sizes and the use of shorter wavelengths on the lithographic tools such as the 193 nm λ ultra-high NA (numerical aperture) lithography or even the Extreme Ultra Violet lithography, especially in the deep submicron and increasing clock frequency designs. For example, in order to meet the increasing demand for higher resolution and finer geometries, the semiconductor industry has been pushing in order to obtain larger numerical aperture (NA) to achieve smaller minimum feature size. However, larger NA also decreases the depth of focus, and such decreased depth of focus causes the lithographic tools' ability to print accurate circuits to be more sensitive to the topographical variation of the films on the wafer.

Method, system, and computer program product for timing closure in electronic designs


A semiconductor device with reduced contact resistance between a substrate and a plug includes a gate electrode disposed over the substrate, the plug formed over the substrate at both sides of the gate electrode and having a sidewall with a positive slope, a capping layer disposed between the gate electrode and the plug, and a gate hard mask layer whose sidewall disposed over the gate electrode is extended to a top surface of the capping layer. By employing the capping layer having a sidewall with a negative slope, the plug having the sidewall with a positive slope can be formed regardless of a shape or profile of the sidewall of the gate electrode. As a result, the contact area between the substrate and the plug is increased.

One or more embodiments relate to the technology of fabricating a semiconductor device, and more particularly, to a semiconductor device with reduced contact resistance between a substrate and a plug, and a method of fabricating the semiconductor device.
As the degree of integration of semiconductor devices increases, a space between gate patterns becomes narrow and thus a contact processing margin reduces. Therefore, in order to secure a desired contact processing margin, a landing plug contact (LPC) structure is commonly used.
A landing plug contact process is accomplished by filling a space between gate patterns where, previously, a bit line contact and a storage contact are formed with a conductive layer to secure an overlay margin in subsequent contact processes.
FIG. 1 illustrates a cross-sectional view of a conventional semiconductor device.
Referring to FIG. 1, a gate 17 is formed by sequentially stacking a gate insulation layer 14, a gate electrode 15 and a gate hard mask layer 16 over a substrate 11 including a device isolation region 12 and an active region 13, and then etching the gate insulation layer 14, the gate electrode 15 and the gate hard mask layer 16 at once by using a gate mask. Then, after forming gate spacers 18 on sidewalls of the gate 17, a source and drain region (not shown) is formed in the active region 13 between two neighboring gates 17.
After depositing an interlayer insulation layer (not shown) covering the resultant structure, the deposited interlayer insulation layer undergoes a photolithography process and an etching process using a contact mask as an etch barrier. As a result, a contact hole is formed. The contact hole is then filled with a conductive layer, thereby forming a landing plug 19.
However, during the formation of the gate 17, since etch rates of the gate insulation layer 14, the gate electrode 15 and the gate hard mask layer 16 with respect to an etching gas are different from each other, the resultant gate 17 is formed having a sidewall with a positive slope. That is, a bottom line width (bottom CD) W2 of the gate 17 is greater than its top CD W1 (W1<W2). Therefore, a space between two neighboring gates 17 is reduced and thus a contact area between the landing plug 19 and the substrate 11 is also reduced. The reduction of the contact area between the landing plug 19 and the substrate 11 becomes a more serious issue as the gate spacers 18 are formed. Byproduces or residues R generated during formation of the gate 17 may further reduce the contact area between the landing plug 19 and the substrate 11.
As described above, when the contact area between the landing plug 19 and the substrate 11 is reduced, the contact resistance between the landing plug 19 and the substrate 11 is increased, thus, the operational speed of the semiconductor device deteriorates.

Semiconductor device and method of fabricating the same


The invention relates to an arrangement for seismic acquisition the spacing between each adjacent pairs of receiver and sources lines is not all the same. Some receiver and/or source lines and/or receiver and/or source spacings are larger and some are smaller to provide a higher quality wavefield reconstruction when covering a larger total area or for a similar total area of seismic data acquisition while providing a wavefield that is optimally sampled by the receivers and sources so that the wavefield reconstruction is suitable for subsurface imaging needs.

Seismic data is acquired to investigate and map the structures and character of geological formations under the earth. Seismic data is typically gathered by laying out seismic receivers (e.g., geophones or similar sensors) in a survey area and directing one or more seismic sources such as vibrator trucks to move from shot point to shot point and direct seismic energy into the ground. As the seismic sources direct seismic energy into the earth where they are reflected and/or refracted by interfaces between subsurface geological formations the seismic receivers sense the resulting reflected and/or refracted energy, thereby acquiring seismic data that provides information about the geological formations under the ground. Basically a seismic source emits a wavefield that propagates down through the earth and is reflected and/or refracted by interfaces between subsurface geological formations then propagates back to the surface where the receivers detect and discretely sample the returning, ascending or upcoming wavefield.
Typically, thousands of discrete seismic receivers are used to gather seismic data. The seismic receivers are generally laid out in lines that are substantially parallel and laterally spaced at equal distances and uniformly spaced down the line. In this configuration, uniform coverage of the subsurface is achieved. It is conventional that receiver spacing along the lines is closer than the spacing between the lines and that, therefore, the wavefield detected by the sensors is less well sampled in the lateral direction (perpendicular to the receiver lines) in most seismic surveys. The normal ratio of the station spacing to the line spacing runs between 2 and 30 to 1. This means that the spacing of the receivers along the line is between half and one thirtieth the spacing between parallel receiver lines. This is normally due to the costs and expense of adding additional receiver lines that can dramatically increase the expense of the survey to achieve a better sampling of the returning, ascending or upcoming wavefield.

Seismic data acquisition using designed non-uniform receiver spacing


A closure for mating with a container has a threaded finish. The closure comprises a flange and a skirt downwardly depending therefrom. The skirt includes a deformable element formed of a different material than that of the flange and skirt and disposed on an interior surface. The deformable element inner diameter is smaller than the outer diameter of the container, and accordingly deforms upon mating the closure with the container. The container threads impress threads into the deformable element to form threads on the closure. The deformable element is formed of a suitable material. The closure of the present invention provides for the use of high-speed press-on capping equipment.

The present invention relates to container closures, and more particularly to closures having threads formed thereon and related methods.
Conventional injection molded, plastic closures often include a circular top member, a cylindrical skirt that depends downwardly from the top member, threads formed on the interior of the skirt, and a tamper evident band formed on a lower rim of the skirt. Typically, such closures are molded in a one-step process such that the top member, skirt, and threads are integrally formed. Closures having threads integrally molded as part of the skirt typically require a rotary capper operation to twist the threaded closure onto matching threads on the container finish. A conventional rotary capper process is relatively slow and requires expensive machinery compared with commercial, high-speed, conventional press-on or in-line capper technology.
Conventional composite closures typically include a metal panel for covering and sealing to a container rim and a threaded plastic band for coupling to mating container threads. U.S. Pat. No. 5,685,443 discloses embodiments of such a band that may be pressed-on and twisted-off
Another type of conventional closure is formed of an integral metal top member and metal skirt. A particular type of metal skirt is formed with a smooth, cylindrical sidewall. A liquid or flowable material, such as plastisol, is subsequently applied to the skirt inner wall, usually by spraying while the closure is spinning. The plastisol, or like material, is formed on the skirt sidewall by a process that includes baking, curing, or a similar treatment step. U.S. Pat. No. 5,190,177 discloses a press-on, twist-off metal closure having a conventional lining into which threads are formed by the container thread, and requires a baking or curing step.
Further, the baking or curing process makes it difficult or infeasible to provide such a metal closure with an integrally formed, frangible tamper evident band of the type that depends from the bottom of the skirt and detaches upon removal of the closure from the container. Although the metal top member may include a button-type tamper evident feature, for hot-fill applications, it is often preferable to employ a frangible, tamper evident band. For example, the U.S. Pat. No. 5,190,177 patent discloses that the tamper evident band is formed by a separate security ring that is fitted into an annular shoulder formed on the peripheral skirt.
Thus, there is a need for improved closures, and techniques for forming closures.

Closure having band with internal thread formed by impression


A method for mitigating parallax for component reels being x-ray inspected, containing an x-ray inspection system and a plurality of reels circularly arranged in a conical field of view of an x-ray source of the x-ray inspection system, wherein a reels' inner edge is disposed higher than a reels' outer edge, wherein a plane of a reel is substantially parallel to a ray distances from the x-ray source.

When x-rays are generated using an electronic x-ray source, the x-ray photons emitted from the x-ray source are emitted in a conical pattern. When the photons reach an x-ray detector, the photons closer to the edge of the detectable area arrive at an angle, as opposed to normal to the surface. The effect on x-ray images is that anything not directly in the center of the x-ray cone, will have an elongated appearance stemming from the different angle of the arriving photons. This effect is called parallax and is an error condition.
Therefore, there has been a long-standing need in the industry for methods and systems for correcting parallax error. Details of one or more such approach(es) is provided in the below description.

System and method to mitigate x-ray image parallax by tilting the sample


This application relates to a water treatment process. The process comprises contacting contaminated water with a catalyst, introducing hydrogen and an oxygen-containing gas into the contaminated water, and reacting hydrogen and oxygen in the presence of the catalyst and the contaminated water.

There is an increasing demand on the availability of clean water as a natural resource throughout the world. Access to clean water is a requirement in all areas of society, ranging from domestic dwellings and agriculture to disaster areas and areas with a high risk of drought. With an increasing population, more strain is being placed on the availability of clean water in many areas around the world.
A large amount of contaminated water is generated by each household every day. Some of this wastewater originates from toilets and may be subject to faecal contamination. This wastewater is classified as black water and is generally treated in a sewage treatment facility. On the other hand, wastewater from all other sources (e.g. from sinks, baths, showers, kitchen, harvested rain water and laundry) is classified as greywater. By treating this mildly contaminated greywater, it can be re-used for applications such as toilet flushing, landscape and agricultural irrigation.
Various methods for treating greywater are known. For example, the greywater can be filtered and treated with chlorine to prevent bacterial growth. Other methods include UV treatment, and treating the greywater with hydrogen peroxide in combination with UV treatment.

Catalytic water treatment with in-situ production of hydrogen peroxide

UNIVERSITY COLLEGE CARDIFF CONSULTANTS LTD


An apparatus and method is disclosed providing the automatic, self configuration of a communication device to adjust to the user's environmental circumstances. Method includes creating a set of mode templates corresponding to a plurality of potential environmental circumstances and may be stored in a database in the computer readable memory of the communication device. At predetermined intervals, a suite of environmental sensors integral to the communication device may periodically sample the user's environment. The user's environmental circumstances may be derived by an analysis module based on the output of the suite of environmental sensors. The derived set of environmental circumstances may then be compared to the mode templates to determine a matching mode template. A change to a plurality of communication device operational settings may then be made based at least partially on the matching mode template.

Personal communications devices have become a ubiquitous staple of today's society. The most common personal communication device is a cellular telephone but such devices may include any number of personal electronic devices such as pagers, PDA's, small laptop computers, MP3 players, radios, etc. These devices, in particular, have become an omnipresent necessity. They are carried throughout a user's day and follow the user into a myriad of environmental conditions that can range from a quiet office, to a construction site, to use on the road while driving.
Generally, communication devices such as cellular telephones are designed to allow users to change their operational settings as a user's circumstances change. An example may include changing from a ring tone to vibrate while attending an important meeting. However, users must usually alter each setting or mode manually and each operating feature must be adjusted independently. On some devices, the user may manually select a "profile" which adjusts several features simultaneously, yet this still requires manual user action. Even those devices with automatic audio gain or automatic lighting controls adjust only a single operating feature and that feature is usually adjusted independently of all other features. Further, learning how to adjust rarely changed features on a complex device requires unnecessary time and effort upon the part of the user. Learning how to manipulate a communication device will only become more difficult as the complexity of the devices allows more and more features to be added. Therefore, the appropriate and real time adjustment of the operational settings of a communications device continues to be an unnecessary impediment to the full operational potential and convenient use of a communication device.


Distributed The disclosed embodiments include distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) systems, methods to improve DAS properties of optical fibers, and optical fibers having improved DAS properties. In one embodiment, the system includes an optoelectronic device operable to generate optical pulses. The system also includes an optical fiber having a first end and a second end. The optical fiber is formed from a material having a Rayleigh back-scattering coefficient, and is operable to transmit optical pulses from the first end towards the second end and to reflect a first portion of the optical pulses towards the first end. The system further includes perturbations that are selectively imprinted on the optical fiber, where the perturbations are compatible with a range of wavelengths and are operable to reflect a second portion of the optical pulses towards the first end of the optical fiber if a wavelength of the optical pulses is within the range.

The present disclosure relates generally to distributed acoustic sensing (DAS) systems, methods to improve DAS properties of optical fibers, and optical fibers having improved DAS properties.
Optical fibers are sometimes used in a wellbore to facilitate fiber optic communications with downhole tools and devices and for optical sensing of a downhole environment. For example, optical fibers may be utilized to perform DAS of various downhole conditions, such as but not limited to the pressure, vibration, strain, displacement, velocity, torque, acceleration, as well as other properties of the downhole environment.
Many DAS systems that transmit optical signals through an optical fiber utilize a Rayleigh back-scatter property of said optical fiber to back-scatter a portion of the optical signals. However, the responsivities of many DAS systems using low-loss telecommunications type fibers for sensing are limited to Rayleigh back-scattering signal levels that are below the desired levels for high performance sensing applications. Although, there are various methods to increase the Rayleigh back-scattering, such as adding dopants to an optical core of the optical fiber, such methods also increase optical attenuation along the optical fiber, lower the Modulation Instability threshold of said optical fiber, and thereby reduce the signal-to-noise (SNR) ratio over the length of the optical fiber.
The illustrated figures are only exemplary and are not intended to assert or imply any limitation with regard to the environment, architecture, design, or process in which different embodiments may be implemented.

Systems and methods to improve distributed acoustic sensing properties of optical fibers


The present invention is directed to a new and useful method and apparatus for use in determining the levels of macular pigments in the tissue of live subjects. Specifically, the method and apparatus of the present invention provide a non-invasive, rapid, and objective determination of the macular carotenoid levels, and in turn, offer valuable diagnostic information applicable to large populations. The present invention measures the levels of macular carotenoid pigments, as well as other retinal materials. Monochromatic laser light is projected onto a retina, preferably in the macular area. A very sensitive detection system then detects light scattered from the retina. The majority of the light is scattered elastically at the same wavelength of the laser in a manner known as Rayleigh scattering. A very small fraction of laser light is scattered inclastically at a wavelength different from that of the laser in a manner known as Raman scattering. The Raman scattered light is selected and then routed to a detection system, wherein the results are calibrated against actual standards for the particular retinal material being tested.

1. The Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to methods and apparatus for measuring levels of chemical compounds located in the anatomy of the eye, and more specifically to methods and apparatus for measuring such compounds in the eye for assessing the risk of suffering diseases of the eye.
2. The Relevant Technology
Vision, or sense of sight, is one's ability to perceive the form, color, size, movement, and distance of objects, by way of complex anatomy generally termed the eye. Vision occurs when light passes through the eye and is absorbed by the sensitive cells of the retina in the back of the eye. Specifically, light enters the cornea of the eye, passes through the pupil, and then through the lens, from which it is projected to the retina. Human vision in particular is sensitive for light in the visible spectrum, which is from approximately 380-720 nanometers in wavelength.
In order to actually see an image, the lens of the eye must bring the image into focus on the retina. Clear vision, or visual acuity, refers to the sharpness of the image and depends in part on the capability of the lens. The portion of the retina in which visual acuity is the greatest is called the fovea centralis. In the fovea centralis, light falls directly on individual photoreceptors, the sensory cells that respond electrically to light, whereas light in other regions of the retina must pass through several layers of nerve cells before reaching the photoreceptors.
Surrounding the fovea centralis is an area called the macula. The macula is less efficiently shielded from incoming light than other retinal tissue because there are fewer cell layers lying between the incoming light and the photoreceptors. The macula is typically yellow in color due to the presence of a high concentration of the carotenoids lutein and zeaxanthin. These carotenoids, which are normal constituents of a healthy diet, have been shown to offer statistically significant protection against age-related macular degeneration, the leading cause of irreversible blindness among the elderly in the United States. Lutein and zeaxanthin are actively concentrated in the macular tissue where it is believed they screen out phototoxic short wavelength visible light and act as free-radical scavenging antioxidants. It is believed that insufficient levels of these carotenoids permit photic and oxidative damage of the macular tissue.
It is possible to detect the levels of the macular carotenoids. One technique measures carotenoid levels in post-mortem eye tissue utilizing conventional biochemical means such as high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and visible absorption spectrophotometry. However, this technique clearly suffers from the absence of any value for use in connection with live subjects.
The conventional technique for non-invasive measurement of human macular carotenoids is a "subjective psycho-physical flicker photometric test" which involves color intensity matching of a light beam aimed at the fovea with one aimed at the parafoveal area of the retina. This technique is time-intensive and requires both highly sophisticated optical apparatus and highly skilled technicians. In addition, the patient must be alert, cooperative, and have relatively good visual acuity. Such requirements limit the usefulness of this technique for assessing macular carotenoids in an elderly population at risk for age-related macular degeneration, the very essence of which is a reduction in visual acuity. Elderly patients may face added frustration in an attempt to communicate the necessary information to the technician. Clearly, the conventional technique is not conducive for testing the levels of macular carotenoids in non-communicative patients and animals.

Method and system for measurement of macular carotenoid levels

The University of Utah Technology Transfer Office


Thermal printing apparatus is disclosed in which a thermal transfer ink ribbon (14) is drawn from a supply spool (15) past a thermal print head (12) in ink transfer engagement with an item (17) on which printing is to be effected. The used ribbon is wound upon a take up spool (16) which is driven to apply tension to the used ribbon to peel it from the face of the printed item. Drive (43) to the take up spool is controlled by a pivoted member (22) which actuates a switch (26) to apply drive when the ribbon is slack and to terminate energisation of the drive as the ribbon becomes taut.

This invention relates to apparatus for feeding ink ribbons and in particular for feeding thermal transfer ink ribbons and controlling the winding of used ribbon onto a take-up spool.
Ink ribbons for printing on a print receiving medium are commonly fed from a supply spool past a printing head where printing is effected and then the used ribbon is wound onto a take-up spool. Thermal transfer ink ribbons are usually maintained stationary relative to the print receiving medium and relative movement is effected between a thermal print head and the combination of thermal ink transfer ribbon and the print receiving medium. The thermal print head may be stationary and the print receiving medium together with the ribbon is fed past the print head. The thermal transfer ink ribbon extends between the elements of the print head and the print receiving medium. Printing is effected by selectively heating thermal printing elements arranged in a row on the print head during movement of the ribbon and medium past the elements. Heating of an element results in melting of the ink layer in the vicinity of the heated element and the melted ink is deposited on the surface of the ink receiving medium. Successive selective heating of the elements effects line by line printing of dots in selected positions to build up complete characters or patterns. Transfer of ink from the ribbon requires that the print receiving medium is urged into intimate contact with an ink layer of the ribbon. This is accomplished by means of a pressure roller which resiliently urges the print receiving medium into contact with the ribbon and the back of the ribbon into heat transfer engagement with the printing elements of the print head. When the print receiving medium is fed past the print head, the intimate contact between the ribbon and the print receiving medium ensures that sufficient frictional force is applied by the print receiving medium on the ribbon to feed the ribbon at the same speed as the feeding of the medium. Accordingly no additional feeding means are required to feed the ribbon with the medium.
After passage of the ribbon past the thermal print head, the used ribbon is peeled from the surface of the print receiving medium to leave the deposited ink pattern on the medium. The used ribbon tends to adhere to the print receiving medium and accordingly it is necessary to apply a small tension force to the used ribbon in a direction at an angle to the surface of the medium. Furthermore it is convenient to wind the used ribbon onto a take up spool to retain the used ribbon within the machine until subsequent disposal of the used ribbon. The tension required to peel the ribbon from the medium may be applied to the ribbon by rotationally driving the take up spool to wind the ribbon thereon. This is achieved by driving the take up spool such that it tends to wind the ribbon faster than the ribbon issues from the print head. The drive tot he take up spool may be through a slipping clutch or the drive motor may be stalled when the ribbon is under tension.
It is proposed to use thermal transfer printing in franking machines for printing franking impressions on mail items. The mail item is fed into the machine and is pressed into contact by means of a pressure roller with a thermal transfer ribbon in the vicinity of a thermal print head. As the mail item is fed past the print head, together with the ribbon, the franking impression is built up line by line by rows of printed dots. Upon completion of printing of the franking impression, the pressure roller is retracted to release the mail item to permit the item to be ejected from the machine. When the pressure roller is retracted to release the mail item, the mail item no longer imposes any restraint upon travel of the ribbon and as a result the tension applied to the ribbon to peel it from the mail item during printing of a franking impression tends to draw additional ribbon from the supply spool and wastage of ribbon occurs between consecutive franking operations.


The present invention discloses a technique for applying diffraction characteristic of electrons to a two-dimensional electronic device to manufacture multi-functional transistor having various ON/OFF states. A quantum diffraction transistor according to the present invention is capable of adjusting the amplitude of drain current and having various ON/OFF states utilizing diffraction characteristic of electrons by interposing a reflection-type diffraction grating in an electron path. The inventive multi-functional quantum diffraction transistor uses a two dimensional electron gas in formed at a different species junction in a semiconductor heterostructure, and has a bent electron path between the source electrode and the drain electrode with a reflection-type diffraction grating. The quantum diffraction effect of the electrons is used for the control of the diffracted drain current.

Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a device structure for applying diffraction characteristics of electrons to a high electron mobility transistor to manufacture multi-functional transistor having various ON/OFF states. More particularly, a high electron mobility transistor is capable of adjusting the amplitude of the drain current and having various ON/OFF states by diffraction effect of electrons, which occurs by means of interposing a reflection type grating in an electron path.

Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute


An uninterruptible power supply includes an input switching circuit, an AC-to-DC converting circuit, a bus capacitor, an energy storage unit, a charging circuit, a DC-to-DC converting circuit, and a system control circuit. The input switching circuit receives an input AC voltage. The AC-to-DC converting circuit is used for converting the input AC voltage into a bus voltage. The energy storage unit is used for storing electric energy. The charging circuit is used for charging the energy storage unit. The DC-to-DC converting circuit is used for converting the energy storage unit connecting node voltage into a regulated DC voltage. The system control circuit is used for controlling operations of the uninterruptible power supply. When the uninterruptible power supply is initiated, the AC-to-DC converting circuit is disabled and the bus capacitor is charged by the DC-to-DC converting circuit under control of the system control circuit.

With increasing development of information industries and high-tech industries, most precise electronic instruments and facilities need highly reliable power to maintain normal operations. Generally, an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) are widely used to provide stable power to the loads that are connected with. In other words, UPS apparatuses become essential for supplying stable power.
The conventional uninterruptible power supply principally includes an AC-to-DC converting circuit, a DC-to-AC converting circuit and a bus capacitor. The output terminal of the AC-to-DC converting circuit is connected to the bus capacitor and the input terminal of the DC-to-DC converting circuit. By the AC-to-DC converting circuit, an AC input voltage is converted into a regulated DC voltage and a bus voltage is generated to the DC bus. The bus capacitor is connected to the DC bus for filtering off undesirable noise contained in the bus voltage, thereby providing a constant bus voltage. By the DC-to-AC converting circuit, the constant bus voltage is converted into an output AC voltage required for powering a load.
That is, if the input AC voltage is suffered from a sudden variation or interruption, the uninterruptible power supply apparatus can still generate a stable and uninterruptible output AC voltage to the load and thus a high-quality output AC voltage is continuously transmitted to the load.
Moreover, since the amount of electric energy outputted from the AC-to-DC converting circuit and the duty cycle of the internal switching circuit are adjusted, the output voltage of the AC-to-DC converting circuit (i.e. the bus voltage) can be maintained at the rated voltage value.
When the conventional uninterruptible power supply is initiated or enabled, the voltage across the bus capacitor and the electric energy stored in the bus capacitor are zero. As a consequence, the voltage difference between the bus voltage and the rated voltage value is very huge and internal switching circuit is adjusted to be operated at the maximum duty cycle. At the same time, the AC-to-DC converting circuit generates a very huge current to charge the bus capacitor. Since a huge initiation current is generated in the input side of the uninterruptible power supply, an inrush current is ready generated.
For preventing the uninterruptible power supply from being burnt out, the input side of the uninterruptible power supply is usually connected to a NTC (negative temperature coefficient) thermistor in series. Due to the inherent property of the thermistor, the initiation current generated when the uninterruptible power supply is initiated will be reduced. In some cases, a phase-adjusting circuit including a silicon-controlled rectifier (SCR) is connected to the input side of the uninterruptible power supply. The phase-adjusting circuit is controlled by a phase control circuit. As a consequence, the input AC voltage with certain phases can be transmitted to the AC-to-DC converting circuit through the phase-adjusting circuit to reduce the initiation current.
Although the thermistor is effective for reducing the initiation current, there are still some drawbacks. For example, the thermistor may consume additional power and thus the overall efficiency of the uninterruptible power supply is decreased. Moreover, the resistance value of the thermistor needs to be adjusted according to the capacitance value of the bus capacitor. Since there is a large error between the practical capacitance value and the labeling capacitance value of the bus capacitor, the resistance value of the thermistor is usually undesired. Under this circumstance, the efficacy of using the thermistor to reduce the initiation current is insufficient.
Moreover, the phase-adjusting circuit can only adjust the phase of the input AC voltage to be transmitted to the AC-to-DC converting circuit. The phase-adjusting circuit, however, fails to adjust the magnitude of current during the on phase period. As known, the magnitude of current generated during the on phase period is varied depending on the magnitude of the input AC voltage. After the silicon-controlled rectifier of the phase-adjusting circuit is conducted, the silicon-controlled rectifier of the phase-adjusting circuit fails to be shut off under control of the phase control circuit and thus the initiation current can not be accurately reduced. Since the phase control circuit is very complicated, the stability of the phase control circuit is usually insufficient. In other words, the overall stability of the uninterruptible power supply is unsatisfactory.
Therefore, there is a need of providing an improved uninterruptible power supply to obviate the drawbacks encountered from the prior art.


A rotary manipulation type input apparatus includes: a rotatable wheel; a first magnet joined to a side of the wheel for cooperation with the wheel and magnetized to have N- and S-poles; a detection element, positioned to face the first magnet, for detecting changes in magnetism; a second magnet positioned to face the first magnet; a printed circuit board, on which the detection element and the second magnet are mounted; a base, to which the printed circuit board is secured; and a holder joined to the base and interposed between the wheel and the base to rotatably support the wheel. Here, the second magnet is an electromagnet, and the printed circuit board has a circuit for regulating the amount of current delivered to the second magnet. The apparatus allows the user to decide whether or not to create click sensations and to regulate the magnitude of the click sensations.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a rotary input apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a mobile terminal has the numbers 0-9 and the symbols * and # on a keypad of 12 keys. In addition to the numbers, there are also alphabet letters as well as consonants and vowels of Korean letters marked on such a keypad, to enable the input of information including numbers and letters. Recently, there are also navigation keys formed above the keypad equipped with a variety of functions such as phone number search, writing and managing text messages, and connecting to the Internet, etc. There are various forms of navigation keys, such as button types and rotary types, etc., but the use of rotary input apparatus is currently increasing, as they enable various functions such as menu browsing, etc.
Rotary input apparatus are used in televisions, camcorders, and PDA's (personal digital assistants), etc., as input apparatus in the form of rotary switches, rotary encoders, and rotary volume dials, etc.
In such rotary input apparatus, rotating by a particular angle can transfer a certain degree of vibration periodically via the user's hand, etc., and the sensation of this vibration is referred to as a click sensation. Clicks transfer a certain vibration to the user, at the rotation of a rotary input apparatus, thereby allowing the user to recognize whether or not a rotation has been made on the rotary input apparatus and to recognize the rotation angle, etc. Thus, click sensations not only increase the convenience of using a rotary input apparatus, but also allow the user to operate the rotary input apparatus more precisely.
An example of a conventional rotary input apparatus that generates click sensations include, first, a rotary input apparatus for generating click sensations consisting of a rotary member having a plurality of concavo-convex portions, a click member for engagement with and disengagement from the concavo-convex portions, a biasing member for urging the click member elastically in a direction towards the concavo-convex portions, and a holding member for holding the biasing member.
A second example includes a rotary input apparatus consisting of a rotor capable of free rotational motion, cam seats provided in the rotor and having concavo-convex portions, clicking members to be put in slide contact with the cam seats, and a holding member to hold the clicking members, where the holding member is furnished with a plurality of holding parts for holding the clicking members. There are a plurality of different concavo-convex portions formed so that different clicking sensations are obtained when the cam seats are in sliding contact with the clicking members.
Such conventional rotary input apparatus for generating click sensations have grooves such as the concavo-convex portions or the cam seats, where click sensations are created when click members are caught on and disengaged from these grooves. However, in rotary input apparatus thus comprised, the fact that click sensations are created even when they are not desired by the user presents an inconvenience in usage. Also, since click sensations are created as the click members are caught on and disengaged from concavo-convex portions or cam seats of constant sizes, the magnitude of the click sensations cannot be regulated.
Further, in conventional rotary input apparatus, because the click members are caught on and disengaged from concavo-convex portions or cam seats, not only is there a problem of damage on the click members due to friction, etc., but also the composition is made complicated, due to the requirement of a flat spring, etc., for providing elastic force by which the click members always press against the cam seats or concavo-convex portions.

Rotary manipulation type input apparatus


A multivariable control system provides regulation for a plurality of control variables of interest based on selecting a particular one of the variables for regulation relative to a corresponding setpoint, while continuing to monitor the other variables and switching regulation control over to another one of the variables as needed to maintain all of them within their allowed ranges. The system includes one or more PID regulators that tune themselves for the particular variables selected for regulation control. In an exemplary embodiment, the control system is configured for controlling an alternative energy system, wherein it includes one or more power flow devices that control power flow between electrical energy storage devices (EESDs) and a common dc bus and/or power flow between the dc bus and an external ac electrical system.

The present invention generally relates to alternative energy systems, and particularly relates to the control of such systems.
Alternative energy systems represent an increasingly viable alternative to or supplement to conventional utility grid power. For example, advancements in power generation and control technologies have increased the power density and reliability of fuel cell based generation systems such that those types of systems are increasingly realistic for use in providing localized power for residences and small business, and even in providing opportunities for cogeneration wherein a grid-connected alternative energy system injects a portion of its output power into the utility grid.
Typically, such systems convert dc power from a fuel cell (or other local source) into ac power using a power inverter. Further, such systems typically include one or more batteries to provide backup power, and, at least on a temporary basis, to provide higher power than can be provided by the primary source, e.g., fuel cell. As such, the typical alternative energy system includes multiple energy sources (e.g. fuel cell and backup batteries) and it is necessary to be able to regulate more than one power system variable. Examples of variables of interest include, but are not limited to, fuel cell current, battery current and/or voltage, and dc bus voltage.
Controlling such systems based on a plurality of different, potentially conflicting, system variables presents a significant control challenge, particularly where the systems operate in and switch between a variety of modes, such as stand alone, grid-connected, etc. For example, in certain operating modes, there can be one or a limited number of control elements within the system that can be used to effect the desired regulation.

Alternative energy system control method and apparatus


In one aspect, the invention relates to an isolated polypeptide comprising an amino acid sequence that is at least 95% identical to SEQ ID NO: 71. In another aspect, the invention relates to an immunogenic composition including an isolated non-lipidated, non-pyruvylated ORF2086 polypeptide from Neisseria meningitidis serogroup B, and at least one conjugated capsular saccharide from a meningococcal serogroup.

Neisseria meningitids is a Gram-negative encapsulated bacterium that can cause sepsis, meningitis and death. N. meningitidis can be classified into about 13 serogroups (including serogroups A, B, C, E29, H, I, K, L, W-135, X, Y and Z) based on chemically and antigenically distinctive polysaccharide capsules. Five of the serogroups (A, B, C, Y, and W135) are responsible for the majority of disease.
Meningococcal meningitis is a devastating disease that can kill children and young adults within hours despite the availability of antibiotics. There is a need for improved immunogenic compositions against meningococcal serogroups A, B, C, Y, and W135 and/or X.

Neisseria meningitidis compositions and methods thereof


A two-piece lug bolt including a shank having first and second end portions and a central portion therebetween, a thread on the first end portion, a first flange of larger diameter than both the first and second end portions located on the central portion of the shank, a head, a wrench-receiving portion on the head for receiving a wrench, a bore in the head for receiving the second end portion of the shank with a press-fit and a second flange on the head which is of larger diameter than the wrench-receiving portion and substantially the same diameter as the first flange located in contiguous relationship to the first flange and in bearing relationship therewith.

The present invention relates to an improved two-piece lug bolt.
In the past, two-piece lug bolts have been fabricated for the purpose of permitting the head to be made of a different material than the remainder of the shank. One embodiment of a prior two-piece lug bolt is disclosed in the drawings accompanying the present specification, and the manner in which the improved lug bolt of the present invention is superior is discussed hereafter.


Disclosed a transmission apparatus in a CDMA mobile communication system. Transmission frames each have a plurality of time slots, and each of the time slots includes two data parts having the same length, a midamble intervening between the data parts, and a guard period for dividing the consecutive time slots. The transmission apparatus modulates the frames into a radio signal with a modulation signal and transmits the modulated radio signal using a plurality of antennas. A power amplifier amplifies the radio signal. A controller generates a switching control signal in a guard period of time slots of a frame associated with the radio signal amplified by the power amplifier. A switch switches the amplified radio signal from the power amplifier between a first and a second antenna in response to the switching control signal.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a transmission/reception apparatus and method for a TDD (Time Division Duplexing) CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access) mobile communication system, and in particular, to a transmission/reception apparatus and method for transmitting frames in a transmit diversity mode to conquer a time-varying channel characteristic.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a TDD CDMA mobile communication system refers to a CDMA mobile communication system in which a plurality of slots constituting one frame are divided into the slots for a downlink channel and the slots for an uplink channel. Meanwhile, the CDMA mobile communication system is classified into the TDD CDMA mobile communication system and an FDD (Frequency Division Multiplexing) CDMA mobile communication system in which a transmission frequency is separated from a reception frequency.
The TDD CDMA mobile communication system is further classified into a W-TDD (Wide band TDD) CDMA mobile communication system and an NB-TDD (Narrow Band TDD) CDMA mobile communication system.
The W-TDD and NB-TDD techniques have been defined by 3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Project), an ongoing standard for the 3rd generation mobile communication. A mobile phone employing the existing TDD digital mobile communication scheme includes a GSM (Global System for Mobile) phone and a CT-2 (Cordless Telephone-2nd generation) phone.
Commonly, performance of the mobile communication system depends on how well the system can operate in a bad mobile communication environment where the channel characteristic is subject to extreme variations. The mobile communication system has used a diversity technique in order to increase transmission/reception efficiency (or throughput) in the bad mobile communication environment. The diversity technique is divided into frequency diversity, time diversity and space diversity.
The frequency diversity is a technique for transmitting the same data with two separate frequencies, and this technique employs interleaving and channel coding. The time diversity is a technique for transmitting the same data twice at regular intervals, and this technique employs a Rake receiver. The Rake receiver, comprised of one searcher and a plurality of fingers, separately receives signals having a different arrival time due to the multiple paths. The space diversity is a technique for transmitting the same data using two antennas being spaced apart.
However, when there are almost no multiple paths or a UE (User Equipment) moves slowly, it is difficult to use the frequency diversity and the time diversity. This is because it is difficult to use the Rake receiver when there are almost no multiple paths.
In this case, therefore, the use of the space diversity is recommended, which corresponds to a transmit (transmission) diversity which can be implemented at the minimum expenses with the minimum modification of the transmission hardware of the Node B (base station transmitter) and the reception hardware of the UE (User Equipment or mobile station).
In addition, there is a time switched transmit diversity (TSTD) technique using one or more antennas. The TSTD is different in principle from the space diversity.
In the TSTD technique, the transmitter alternately uses the two spaced-apart antennas for signal transmission, so that it is possible to increase the capacity of reception channels to the maximum without modifying a structure of the receiver. The TSTD technique can be divided into a closed-loop TSTD technique and an open loop TSTD technique. A space-time transmit diversity (STTD) technique is a typical example of the open loop TSTD technique.
Meanwhile, there is a beam former scheme for improving performance of radio channel. Although it has improved performance, requires a complicated transmission or reception device such as an array antenna. Therefore, it is difficult to apply the beam former scheme to the UE. Further, the beam former scheme, even though used for the Node B, cannot be applied to a common physical channel (CPCH) which is simultaneously transmitted to a plurality of UEs.
Reference will now be made to a transmitter not using the diversity technique in the W-TDD or NB-TDD mobile communication system, and a transmitter using the closed-loop or open loop transmission diversity technique in the W-TDD mobile communication system. In addition, a description will be given of a transmitter using the TSTD technique in the FDD mobile communication system.
FIG. 7 illustrates a structure of a general transmitter not employing a diversity scheme in a Node B for a W-TDD or NB-TDD mobile communication system. Referring to FIG. 7, transmission data is encoded into a coded symbol stream at a predetermined coding rate by a channel encoder 700. The coded symbol stream is interleaved by an interleaver 702, and then, demultiplexed by a demultiplexer 704 into an I channel and a Q channel, creating a pair of complex channels. Among the complex channels, the I channel, a real channel, is spread by a first spreader 706 with an OVSF (Orthogonal Variable Spreading Factor) code, while the Q channel, an imaginary channel, is spread by a second spreader 708 with an OVSF code. The OVSF codes used in the first spreader 706 and the second spreader 708 are identical to each other. The signals on the complex channels I and Q spread with the OVSF code are scrambled with a scrambling code by first and second scramblers 710 and 712, respectively. The scrambled signals are multiplexed with a midamble sequence on a time axis by a time division multiplexer (TDM) 714. Here, output signals of the TDM 714 have a frame structure of the TDD mobile communication system. The I and Q-channel signals output from the TDM 714 are provided to a first multiplier 720 and a second multiplier 722 through a first FIR (Finite Impulse Response) filter 716 and a second FIR filter 718, respectively. The I-channel signal is multiplied by a carrier signal cos(ωct) by the first multiplier 720, and the Q-channel signal is multiplied by a carrier signal sin(ωct) by the second multiplier 722, thus outputting modulated radio frequency (RF) signals. The modulated RF signals are added by an adder 724, and then, amplified by a power amplifier (PA) 726 before being transmitted through a single antenna.
However, when the channel environment between the transmitter antenna and the UE becomes worse due to the time-varying mobile communication environment, the receiver of the UE may not decode the received signal.
FIG. 8 illustrates a structure of a common Node B transmitter using the STTD scheme, an open loop TSTD scheme, in a W-TDD mobile communication system. Meanwhile, a technical report for the NB-TDD mobile communication system just mentions possible consideration of the STTD scheme.
Referring to FIG. 8, in the transmitter using the STTD scheme, serial input data is encoded by a channel encoder 800, and then, interleaved by an interleaver 802. The interleaved coded symbols are provided to an STTD encoder 804. The STTD encoder 804 STTD-encodes the interleaved coded symbols and divides the symbols into two separate signals to be transmitted through two different antennas. The two divided signals are provided to a first demultiplexer 806 and a second demultiplexer 828, respectively. The first demultiplexer 806 and the second demultiplexer 828 each demultiplex the signals provided from the STTD encoder 804 into an I-channel signal and a Q-channel signal. The I-channel signal demultiplexed by the first demultiplexer 806 is spread with an OVSF code by a first spreader 808, and the Q-channel signal demultiplexed by the first demultiplexer 806 is spread with an OVSF code by a second spreader 809. Further, the I-channel signal demultiplexed by the second demultiplexer 828 is spread with an OVSF code by a third spreader 830 and the Q-channel signal demultiplexed by the second demultiplexer 828 is spread with an OVSF code by a fourth spreader 832. The OVSF codes used by the first to fourth spreaders 808, 809, 830 and 832 are identical to one another. The signal spread by the first spreader 808 is scrambled with a scrambling code by a first scrambler 810, and the signal spread by the second spreader 809 is scrambled with a scrambling code by a second scrambler 812. Further, the signal spread by the third spreader 830 is scrambled with a scrambling code by a third scrambler 834, and the signal spread by the fourth spreader 832 is scrambled with a scrambling code by a fourth scrambler 836. The I-channel signal and the Q-channel signal output from the first scrambler 810 and the second scrambler 812, respectively, are provided to a first TDM 814, and the I-channel signal and the Q-channel signal output from the third scrambler 834 and the fourth scrambler 836, respectively, are provided to a second TDM 838. The first TDM 814 multiplexes the signals from the first and second scramblers 810 and 812 with a first midamble sequence on a time axis according to the channels. The second TDM 838 multiplexes the signals from the third and fourth scramblers 834 and 836 with a second midamble sequence on a time axis according to the channels. The signals output from the first TDM 814 are added by an adder 824 after passing through first and second FIR filters 816 and 818 and first and second multipliers 820 and 822, and then, amplified by a power amplifier (PA) 826 and transmitted through a first antenna ANT1. The signals output from the second TDM 838 are added by an adder 848 after passing through third and fourth FIR filters 840 and 842 and third and fourth multipliers 844 and 846, and then, amplified by a power amplifier (PA) 850 and transmitted through a second antenna ANT2.
The signals transmitted through the first and second antennas ANT1 and ANT2 of the transmitter are received at the UE through two different paths, so that even if only one of the two paths maintains a proper communication environment, the UE can decode the received signal, thus increasing the performance.
It is however undesirable that the transmitter uses two power amplifiers, causing an increase in the cost of the transmitter. When applied to the UE, the STTD scheme not only causes an increase in the cost of the UE, but also impedes miniaturization of the UE. Besides, in order to receive a signal transmitted using the STTD scheme, the receiver requires an additional device for receiving the signal.
FIG. 9 illustrates a structure of a common Node B transmitter using the closed-loop TSTD scheme in a W-TDD mobile communication system.
Referring to FIG. 9, transmission data is encoded by a channel encoder 900, and then, interleaved by an interleaver 902. The interleaved coded symbols are demultiplexed by a demultiplexer 904 into an I channel and a Q channel, creating a pair of complex channels. Among the complex channels, the I channel, a real channel, is spread by a first spreader 906 with an OVSF code, while the Q channel, an imaginary channel, is spread by a second spreader 908 with an OVSF code. The OVSF codes used in the first spreader 906 and the second spreader 908 are identical to each other. The signals on the complex channels I and Q spread with the OVSF code are scrambled with a scrambling code by first and second scramblers 910 and 912, respectively. The scrambled signals are multiplexed with a midamble sequence on a time axis by a time division multiplexer (TDM) 914. The output signals of the TDM 914 are distributed to first and second multipliers 916 and 930 such that the signals should be transmitted through first and second antennas ANT1 and ANT2. The first and second multipliers 916 and 930 multiply the signals output from the TDM 914 by complex weights ω1 and ω2, respectively, provided from an uplink channel estimator 944. The complex weights ω1 and ω2 are calculated by the uplink channel estimator 944 by calculating feedback signals from the respective UEs. The complex weight ω1 is multiplied by the signal to be transmitted through the first antenna ANT1, while the complex weight ω2 is multiplied by the signal to be transmitted through the second antenna ANT2. The I-channel signal and the Q-channel signal multiplied by the complex weight ω1 by the first multiplier 916 are filtered by first and second FIR filters 918 and 920, respectively, and then, modulated with modulation signals by third and fourth multipliers 922 and 924. The modulated I-channel signal and the modulated Q-channel signal are added by an adder 926, and then, amplified by a first power amplifier 928 before being transmitted through the first antenna ANT1. Further, the I-channel signal and the Q-channel signal multiplied by the complex weight ω2 by the second multiplier 930 are filtered by third and fourth FIR filters 932 and 934, respectively, and then, modulated with modulation signals by fifth and sixth multipliers 936 and 938. The modulated I-channel signal and the modulated Q-channel signal are added by an adder 940, and then, amplified by a second power amplifier 942 before being transmitted through the second antenna ANT2.
The complex weights ω1 and ω2 indicate the channel environments between the respective UEs and the antenna ANT1, or between the respective UEs and the antenna ANT2, and are calculated using the midambles received from the UEs. Actually, since the signals transmitted through the first and second antennas are received at the UEs through the same path and the midamble used to calculate the weights, it is known that the closed-loop TSTD scheme has excellent performance.
However, the closed-loop TSTD scheme also requires two power amplifiers, like the STTD scheme shown in FIG. 8.
FIG. 10 illustrates a structure of a common Node B transmitter using the TSTD scheme in an FDD mobile communication system. The structure shown in FIG. 10 is well disclosed in Korean patent application No. 98-5526, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference. In the existing TSTD scheme, the transmitter alternately transmits a transmission signal using two antennas, thereby obtaining a space diversity gain. Therefore, in order to support the TSTD scheme which switches a transmission signal from one antenna to another antenna, the transmission signal should have a switching point, i.e., a guard period (GP) so as to prevent a time delay due to the switching. However, in the FDD mobile communication system, a frequency for downlink transmission is separated from a frequency for uplink transmission, so that no GP exists between frames. Therefore, in order to apply the TSTD scheme to the FDD mobile communication system, a switch should be located before digital-to-analog conversion part. As a result, two power amplifiers are required.
Referring to FIG. 10, transmission data is encoded by a channel encoder 1000, and then, interleaved by an interleaver 1002. The interleaved coded symbols are demultiplexed by a demultiplexer 1004 into an I channel and a Q channel, making a pair of complex channels. Among the complex channels, the I channel, a real channel, is spread by a first spreader 1006 and then scrambled by a first scrambler 1010, while the Q channel, an imaginary channel, is spread by a second spreader 1008 and then scrambled by a second scrambler 1012. The I-channel signal from the first scrambler 1010 and the Q-channel signal from the second scrambler 1012 are provided to a switch. The I-channel signal and the Q-channel signal are digital signals. The switch switches the I-channel signal and the Q-channel signal under the control of a switch controller 1014. The switch controller 1014 controls the switch to alternately switch the I-channel signal and the Q-channel signal to a first antenna ANT1 and a second antenna ANT2 at stated periods. When the I-channel signal and the Q-channel signal are switched to the first antenna ANT1, the I-channel signal and the Q-channel signal are converted to analog signals by first and second FIR filters 1016 and 1018, respectively, and then, modulated with corresponding modulation signals by first and second multipliers 1020 and 1022. The modulated I-channel signal and the modulated Q-channel signal are added by an adder 1024, and then, amplified by a power amplifier 1026 before being transmitted through the first antenna ANT1. Otherwise, if the I-channel signal and the Q-channel signal are switched to the second antenna ANT2, the I-channel signal and the Q-channel signal are converted to analog signals by third and fourth FIR filters 1028 and 1030, respectively, and then, modulated with corresponding modulation signals by third and fourth multipliers 1032 and 1034. The modulated I-channel signal and the modulated Q-channel signal are added by an adder 1036, and then, amplified by a power amplifier 1038 before being transmitted through the second antenna ANT2.
Accordingly, the FDD mobile communication system employing the TSTD scheme also requires a plurality of power amplifiers associated with a plurality of antennas.

TSTD apparatus and method for a TDD CDMA mobile communication system


A wire cover for an electrical connector that defines the direction in which a plurality of wires is led out of the electrical connector comprises a main body having side walls. At least one of the side walls has an interference member receiving recess. An elastic engaging member extends from a lower edge of at least one of the side walls. The elastic engaging member has an elastic tongue member bent upwards from the lower edge such that a gap is formed between the elastic tongue member and the side wall. An interfering member extends from the elastic engaging member and into the interference member receiving recess when the elastic engaging member is flexed. The interfering member substantially covers the gap. An electrical connector engaging protrusion extends from the elastic engaging member and engages the electrical connector.

FIG. 1 of Japanese Unexamined Utility Model Publication No. 5(1993)-069868 illustrates an example of a wire cover for connectors. The wire cover is mounted on a rear section of a connector main body and includes two pairs of latch members having engaging apertures therethrough at both sides thereof. The engaging apertures engage with engaging protrusions, which are provided on side surfaces of an electrical connector, to fix the wire cover to the electrical connector.
Because the wire cover is mounted on the rear surface of the electrical connector at a location where a plurality of wires connected to contacts are led out, the wire cover must be mounted while fitting a great number of wires there through. A comparatively large amount of force is therefore required to mount the wire cover onto the electrical connector. In the above-described wire cover, the wire cover is pressed against the electrical connector to flex the latch arms to engage the engaging apertures and the engaging protrusions on both sides substantially simultaneously. Thus, the force required to mount the wire cover onto the electrical connector is high, because not only is a force required to fit the plurality of wires through, but also an additional amount of force is required to engage the latch arms and the engaging protrusions.
FIG. 6 of Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 11(1999)-291835 illustrates another known mechanism for mounting a wire cover. The wire cover is not mounted to an electrical connector, however, but to a flat panel trim within an interior of an automobile. The wire cover seals an opening formed in the trim. A cutout and a locking aperture are formed in opposing edges of the opening in the trim. An engaging member and an elastic U-shaped locking member are formed on the wire cover and engage the cutout and the locking aperture, respectively.
In the above-described wire cover, a great amount of force is not required for engagement of the U-shaped locking member. There are instances, however, where pieces become trapped within the open groove or gap of the U-shaped locking member. The wires therefore may become entangled in the U-shaped locking member, causing excessive force to be applied thereto and damaging the U-shaped locking member. Additionally, when a great number of the wire covers having this structure are packed in a bag or the like, the U-shaped locking members may become entangled with each other and damaged.


A flexible electronic component module includes a first substrate and a second substrate. The first substrate overlaps the second substrate to define at least one first exposed portion and at least one second exposed portion. The at least one first exposed portion includes a first electrode layer and the at least one second exposed portion includes a second electrode layer. The first electrode layer is disposed on a lower surface of the first substrate and the second electronic layer is disposed on an upper surface of the second substrate.

A flexible electronic component module has its flexibility. With this characteristic feature, a flexible electronic component module facilitates the design of a large-size array that would otherwise not be easily attainable by using non-flexible electronic component modules. In some existing large-size arrays formed by flexible electronic component modules, staples are widely used to connect the component modules in a splice structure, which causes unsmooth surface at the splice structure. Consequently, the flexibility of the large-size array is limited and the splice structure is liable to damage when the large-size array is folded.

INDUSTRIAL TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH INSTITUTE


A method of image restoration in an image processing system is provided. An observed image of an original image, wherein the observed image comprises multiple samples, is received. For a selected sample from the multiple samples, a subset of the multiple samples is selected, wherein said subset includes the selected sample. Image restoration to restore an original image sample from the selected sample is performed as a function of said subset of multiple samples, and not the entire observed image. A novel image restoration method which requires shorter length FFT calculation in the image restoration process is utilized, wherein the resulting restored image maintains the same quality as the result from conventional approaches.

In digital image processing applications, image restoration is usually used for restoring an original image from a blurred and noisy observed image where prior knowledge of the system point spread function (PSF) or blurring function is available. Image restoration can be applied to numerous applications including astronomy, medical imaging, military surveillance, and digital television (DTV).
The conventional one dimensional image restoration based on "regularized least square" requires the calculation of fast Fourier transform (FFT) of the observed image and the system PSF. Then, complex divisions and multiplications between the FFTs of the observed image and the system PSF are performed in frequency domain and the result is further processed by inverse FFT (IFFT) to obtain the restored image in spatial domain.
A discrete model for a 1-D linear shift invariant (LSI) image acquisition (including degradations caused by a PSF and additive noise) can be given by defined as:
                                          g                                      [              n              ]                                =                                                                      ∑                                      k                    =                    0                                                        N                    -                    1                                                                                h                                                              [                                              n                        -                        k                                            ]                                                                                f                                                              [                      n                      ]                                                                                +                                                v                                                        [                    n                    ]                                                                                for                                                                                n                                      =            0                          ,        1        ,        2        ,        …                                          ,                  N          -          1                ,                            (        1        )
wherein g[n] is a degraded (blurred and noisy) observed image of length N, f[n] represents an original image, h[n] is the system PSF (assumed to be known), and v[n] is an additive noise introduced by system. Let H(u) and G(u) denote the FFTs of the system PSF and observed image, respectively. The restored image R(u) in the frequency domain based on regularized least square can be expressed as:
                                          R                                      (              u              )                                =                                                    [                                                                            H                      *                                                                                (                      u                      )                                                                                H                          *                                                                                (                          u                          )                                                                                H                                                                          (                          u                          )                                                                                +                    γ                                                  ]                                                          G                                                  (                  u                  )                                                                                for                                                                                u                        =            0                          ,        1        ,        …                                          ,                  N          -          1.                                    (        2        )
The superscript * in the preceding equation is the complex conjugate operator and constant γ is commonly referred to as the regularization parameter, which helps control the tradeoff between fidelity of the observed data and the smoothness of the solution. The restored image in spatial domain r[n] can be calculated using the IFFT of the result in relation (2) above.
It is known that the highest complexity of this conventional image restoration is due to the calculation of FFT and its inverse counterpart of the same length N as the observed image. In practice, the implementation of FFT of the same length as the observed image is complicated and difficult in hardware design. Further, generally the image length N is not a power of 2. Therefore, calculation of FFT of such length generally cannot be performed in an efficient manner.

1-D image restoration using a sliding window method


A method for detecting an insert object in an injection-molded part pertains to an insert object that is fixedly connected to the injection-molded part during the injection molding by the insert object being placed in a cavity, which is surrounded by a mold wall of a mold, before the beginning of the injection-molding cycle. The mold wall includes at least one temperature or pressure sensor, which records and analyzes at least one measured value at at least one point in time during an injection-molding cycle. On the basis of the analysis, it is established whether an insert object was present at a specific location in the cavity during the injection-molding cycle. Finally, after it is ejected, the injection-molded part is sorted as an accepted part or a rejected part on the basis of the analysis of the measured value.

In injection moulding processes, insert objects are frequently placed into the cavity in order to provide the injection-moulded product with a certain surface, for example, by means of an externally arranged foil. Examples of such products are yogurt cups or insulin syringes. The surfaces of such insert objects feature, for example, product-specific information, advertising, an expiration date and/or a barcode.
During the manufacture of an injection-moulded part, an error may occur and no insert object or more than one insert object is inadvertently placed into the cavity. A thusly manufactured injection-moulded part needs to be sorted out as a reject part after the manufacture.
A quality control is nowadays carried out after the manufacturing process in order to detect such errors, i.e., in order to determine the presence of an insert object or exactly one insert object. This is realized with the aid of cameras that create images of the finished injection-moulded products. Elaborate analyses of these images ultimately make it possible to determine whether the injection-moulded part features a desired insert object such that the injection-moulded part can be accordingly sorted as an acceptable part or a reject part.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,582,845 discloses a system that optically detects inserts by means of a camera before the injection moulding process is carried out. If the insert is missing, an alarm is activated and the system backs up and obtains an insert in order to correct the error. In DE 202008014027U1, JP 60219017, JP 60068918 and JP 63220967, an insert part likewise is respectively detected prior to the injection moulding process and the process is stopped if it is determined that such an insert part is missing. In this way, the manufacture of defective parts is prevented.
All these methods indeed successfully prevent the manufacture of defective parts without inserts. However, it was determined that the process needs to be started up anew after a machine stop such that other complications may arise, particularly due to varied temperatures of the molten masses, to cite just one example.
In addition, optical methods proved to be problematic because different gray scales need to be reliably evaluated and a complicated evaluation system is required for this purpose.

Method for detecting insert objects in an injection-moulded part


One of multiple types of battery packs may be selected and mounted on the main body of a portable computer. The battery pack mounted on the main body can be rotated in reaction to the main body and, according to the rotation position thereof, can be in a position where the bottom surface of the main body and the bottom surface of the battery pack form a single plane or a position where the back of the main body is lifted and the main body is inclined toward the user.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a portable computer wherein a battery pack is removably installed.
2. Description of the Related Art
Portable computers, wherein a battery pack housing a plurality of batteries is installed, are widely used. The portable computer itself is limited in form, such as being small, lightweight, and thin, because of the portability thereof. At the same time, it is desirable that the battery pack installed thereon be able to house enough batteries to supply the necessary power and not make the entirety unwieldy when installed on the portable computer.
Some users of portable computers prefer that the size of the entire portable computer on which the battery pack is mounted be as small as possible, even if the capacity of the batteries housed in the battery pack is low (even if the usage time is short). Oppositely, however, some users do not care if the total size of the portable computer on which the battery pack is mounted is rather large, but prefer that the capacity of the batteries housed in the battery pack be large (that usage time be long).
At the present time, the number of batteries which can be housed in the battery pack is certain, because the structures are such that only specific battery packs can be mounted on specific types of portable computers. Consequently, increasing the capacity of batteries housed in the battery pack and lengthening usage time is not possible with such battery packs.

Portable computer provided with removable battery pack