An occupant restraint system includes an air bag arranged inside a roof side rail in a folded state. When a vehicle is involved in a collision, the air bag so arranged is inflated with a gas generated by an inflator so as to be deployed along an inner surface of a side portion of a passenger compartment in a curtain-like fashion. In a pillar garnish which covers a side of a pillar inner of a B pillar which faces a passenger compartment side, a rod-like projection provided on an inner surface of the pillar garnish at an upper portion thereof in such a manner as to project therefrom is inserted into a hole formed in the pillar inner. Even in case the air bag which is being deployed pushes against an upper end of the pillar garnish, the dislocation of the pillar garnish from the pillar inner is prevented.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an occupant restraint system in which an air bag in a folded state is arranged in such a manner as to extend along a side portion of a roof, so that, when a vehicle is involved in a collision, the air bag is inflated with a gas generated by an inflator so as to be deployed in a curtain-like fashion along an inner surface of a side portion of a passenger compartment.
2. Description of the Related Art
The occupant restraint system is known by JP-A-2001-39260. In this occupant restraint system, when the folded air bag arranged in such a manner as to extend along the side portion of the roof is deployed downwardly along a center pillar (a B pillar), the air bag may be caught at an upper end of the pillar garnish which covers the side of the center pillar which faces the passenger compartment, and the pillar garnish is dislocated from the center pillar, whereby the smooth deployment of the air bag is interrupted. In order to prevent this, straps on bridges formed on an inner surface of the pillar garnish are locked at first ends thereof to upper and lower ends of the pillar garnish and are fixed at the other ends thereof to a vehicle body side with bolts.
Incidentally, with the related-art occupant restraint system, the complex construction of the bridge on the pillar garnish has not only made the mold for the pillar garnish expensive to thereby cause a problem that the production costs are increased, but has also required special components such as the straps and bolts to thereby cause a problem that the number of components is increased.


A line-contact dry electrode comprises a conductive electrode base and at least one conductive contact member extending from the conductive electrode base. The conductive contact member includes a plurality of elastic conductive branches arranged intermittently to form a comb-like electrode able to comb and push away the testee's hair and contact the testee's skin.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a line-contact dry electrode, particularly to a comb-like line-contact dry electrode.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, electro-biomedical signal measurement devices, which can detect physiological signals from skin, have been extensively used in medical diagnosis and research, including electrocardiography (ECG), electroencephalography (EEG), electromyography (EMG), galvanic skin reflex (GSR), and body fat meters. The electro-biomedical signal measurement devices are non-invasive detectors. For an example, EEG can record brainwaves and features economy, safety, easy operation, and comfortable inspection environment. Therefore, EEG has been widely used in clinic diagnosis and neurobiological research, such as inspections for patients of coma, apoplexy, epilepsy, encephalitis, Parkinson's disease, and other brain diseases.
The sensor electrodes used by EEG may be categorized into the wet electrodes and the dry electrodes. While the wet electrode is used, the testee's skin normally needs processing beforehand, such as removing the horny layer or shaving the hair-rich region, so as to overcome too high interface impedance between the skin and the electrode. Further, conductive paste is applied to the testee's skin to achieve better measurement quality. With time elapsed, the conductive paste will dry, and its conductivity will decay. Therefore, the conductive paste needs applying to the testee's skin repeatedly, which not only may irritate the testee's skin but also makes the operation complicated and time-consuming. The dry electrode is fabricated with a microelectromechanical technology and less likely to damage in measurement. The dry electrode normally uses a flat probe module to contact the testee's skin and detect the physiological signals without using any conductive paste. The dry electrode can directly contact the skin of a hair-rich region, e.g. the head skin. The dry electrode outperforms the wet electrode in some respects. However, the flat probe module is unlikely to comply with the contour of the head. Further, hair is likely to interfere with measurement and affect the precision thereof. Thus, the dry electrode can not effectively work in EEG, which is undertaken on the head. Therefore, how to decrease the discomfort the dry electrode causes to testees and increase the precision of measurement using the dry electrode is a problem the field concerned is eager to overcome.


An apparatus for providing forced airflow to a surface of a cylindrical gradient coil in a cylindrical magnet assembly including a cylindrical magnet and a first annular gap between the gradient coil and the magnet, the gradient coil mounted inside the magnet includes a first manifold tube having an annular shape and located in the first annular gap between the gradient coil and the magnet. The first manifold tube includes at least one inlet on a first side of the first manifold tube and a plurality of outlet holes on a second side of the first manifold tube. The apparatus also includes an air source coupled to at least one inlet of the first manifold tube and configured to provide airflow to the first manifold tube. In one embodiment, a second manifold tube may be located in a second annular gap between the gradient coil and the RF coil.

MRI scanners, which are used in various fields such as medical diagnostics, typically use a computer to create images based on the operation of a magnet, a gradient coil assembly, and a radio frequency coil(s). The magnet creates a uniform main magnetic field that makes nuclei, such as hydrogen atomic nuclei, responsive to radio frequency excitation. The gradient coil assembly imposes a series of pulsed, spatial-gradient magnetic fields upon the main magnetic field to give each point in the imaging volume a spatial identity corresponding to its unique set of magnetic fields during the imaging pulse sequence. The radio frequency coil creates an excitation frequency pulse that temporarily creates an oscillating transverse magnetization that is detected by the radio frequency coil and used by the computer to create the image. An image may be created using one of many known reconstruction techniques. Typically, in a cylindrical MRI system, there is a radio frequency coil and a gradient coil assembly within the magnet.
During a patient scan, the gradient coil(s) of the gradient coil assembly that produce the magnetic field gradients dissipate large amounts of heat. The heat produced by the gradient coils may be removed from the gradient assembly by liquid filled cooling tubes positioned at a given distance from the heat conductors. A liquid coolant, such as water, ethylene or a propylene glycol mixture, absorbs heat from the gradient coils as it is pumped through the cooling tubes and transports the heat to a remote heat exchange/water chiller. Heat is then ejected to the atmosphere by way of the heat exchange/chiller.
With modem high power MRI imaging sequences, however, it is increasingly difficult to remove the heat generated by the gradient coils. This, in turn, increases the risk of MRI patients becoming over-heated. Therefore, there is a need to provide additional cooling to gradient coils in an MRI scanner. In particular, there is a need to provide an apparatus and method for providing forced-air cooling to a gradient coil. It would be advantageous to provide an apparatus and method to provide forced airflow to a surface of a gradient coil to cool the gradient coil. The forced air-cooling may be provided by itself or in addition to a liquid cooling system or other cooling system.

Apparatus and method of providing forced airflow to a surface of a gradient coil


A first signal passes through a first layer of a circuit apparatus at a first propagation speed, and a second signal passes through a second layer of the circuit apparatus at a second propagation speed different from the first propagation speed.

Some signals transferred within computer systems have very strict timing constraints. For example, specifications that define computer bus systems often require that the signals of the bus system arrive at each node of the bus system at the same time, or within an acceptable tolerance. The bus signals must be synchronized so they can be read at a receiving node at the same time. Otherwise, data transmitted over the bus system could be corrupted, and the computer would not work.
A physical signal-transmission portion of the bus system commonly includes signal lines formed in a printed circuit board (PCB). The bus signals travel, or propagate, through conductive traces disposed in various layers of the PCB between the nodes of the bus system. Each conductive trace forms a segment of one bus signal line.
In a common situation, the distance between one pair of nodes of the bus system is significantly different from the distance between another pair of nodes. If both conductive traces electrically connecting both pairs of nodes were routed through the PCB in the shortest manner possible, then the length of the conductive traces would potentially be significantly different. The difference in lengths of the conductive traces, if sufficiently large, would significantly impact the timing of the bus signals transmitted between each of the nodes. The specification for the bus system, however, requires that the timing of the bus signals be within an acceptable tolerance of each other.
To ensure that the signal timing requirements are met, the shorter conductive trace is artificially made longer to have a length about the same as the length of the longer conductive trace. To lengthen the shorter conductive trace, the conductive trace is routed in a serpentine manner for a portion of its length. The bus signals, thus, propagate through the different conductive traces in about the same amount of time.
The trace-lengthening technique for bus signal synchronization requires that there be sufficient space in the PCB for the added length of some of the conductive traces. However, as ICs become more complex, the number of nodes, and concurrently the number of conductive traces, increases. Additionally, as the PCBs are made smaller, the space available for the conductive traces decreases. The increasing number and density of the conductive traces is incompatible with the decreasing space in the PCBs and places severe constraints on the layout of the PCB.
One solution to this problem has been to increase the number of layers in the PCB in which the conductive traces can be formed. However, this solution increases the thickness of the PCBs and increases the time, complexity and cost of manufacturing the PCBs.

Multiple propagation speeds of signals in layered circuit apparatus

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.


A searching section V3 of a content sales site 1 searches a content database V2 in accordance with search conditions inputted in a search condition inputting section M5 and generates an offerable content list. A checking section V4 refers to an owned content list UL stored in an owned content list storage section V1 in order to detect content items owned by a user from the offerable content list. A display information generating section V5 adds to the detected content items in the offerable content list the information indicating that the detected items have been already owned, generates display data of the offerable content list, and transmit it to electronic musical apparatuses 2 to 4. A charging processing section V6 refers to the owned content list UL, so that distribution of owned content items may be discounted or offered without charge. As a consequence, users can prevent unnecessary repurchase of owned content items, while users' convenience of intended repurchase from the content sales site 1 is facilitated. In addition, information on offering content items can be managed easily and reliably.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a content sales site and a program applied to the content sales site.
2. Description of the Related Art
There exist web sites which online-market to users various data including MIDI data, electronic musical score data, incoming-call melody data, and karaoke data (hereafter referred to as "content"). When users purchase content items from those web sites, users find it inconvenient to manage purchased content items as the number of them increases. Such inconvenience could cause users to repurchase unnecessary content items which they have already purchased. It could also cause them to buy content items which have been preset in their terminal device such as electronic musical instrument or mobile communication terminal device (hereafter referred to as "electronic musical apparatus"). As a result, such situations make users pay for unnecessary content items.
In Japanese Non-examined Patent Publication No. 07-129604 (Hiuka Sangyo KK, System Gijutsu Kenkyusho KK), there is disclosed a system entitled "REMOTE LIBRARY SYSTEM FOR PURCHASED ELECTRONIC BOOK DATA". According to this system, once a user purchases an electronic book data object from an electronic book data supply center, the center records the data object in a catalog listing all data objects that the user has purchased. When the user requests the catalog, it is sent from the center to the user's electronic book. From among the data objects listed in the catalog, the user selects one of purchased electronic book data objects to be transferred from the center to the user's electronic book. By following above procedure, the user can record a purchased electronic book data object on his/her electronic book any number of times.
That is, the user can use the electronic book center as storage space which stores purchased electronic book data objects and retrieve a desired object at any time. This usage serves to reduce storage space of the electronic book and to prevent one object from being stored in plural spaces. On purchasing a new data object, however, there arises an inconvenience that the user cannot make a judgement whether the user has already owned it until the user requests the purchased data catalog in order to confirm that it is not in the catalog.
Another related art is a system for retrieving content items, which is entitled "INFORMATION PROCESSOR, INFORMATION PROCESSING METHOD AND PROVIDING MEANS" (Japanese Non-examined Patent Application No. 2000-293586: SONY CORP). According to this system, information on content items which a user purchased from content providers is retained by the user's device (a receiver in the user's network). If the user re-purchases a content item which the user has already owned, the user is charged at a reduced price which is set by the user's device.
This system can serve to reduce prices of content items which are repurchased. In this system, however, prices have to be set by users' devices which manage information. Users' devices also have to check whether frauds such as information tampering are perpetrated or not. As a result, this system causes inconvenience that these loads placed on users' devices complicate the device configuration.


A variety of polymers and copolymers suitable for use as biologically compatible constructs and, as a non-limiting specific example, in the formation of degradable tissue scaffolds as well methods for synthesizing these polymers and copolymers are described. The polymers and copolymers have degradation rates that are substantially faster than those of previously described polymers suitable for the same uses. Copolymers having a synthesis route which enables one to fine tune the degradation rate by selecting the specific stoichiometry of the monomers in the resulting copolymer are also described. The disclosure also provides a novel synthesis route for maleoyl chloride which yields monomers suitable for use in the copolymer synthesis methods described herein.

Non-woven textiles formed from polymers are useful materials for a variety of applications including, but not limited to, general textile applications and specialty applications such as scaffolding materials for tissue engineering. Tissue scaffolds must be capable of mimicking native tissues to not only provide a temporary repair of damaged or diseased tissue, but also to promote the healing process. Furthermore, porosity is a significant parameter to evaluate when gauging the success of a particular scaffold because the cellular environment is crucial to cell viability and migration. Suitable porous bioengineered constructs and methods of forming the same are described in co-pending parent U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/943,803, which is herein incorporated by reference.
Under certain circumstances, it may be desirable for the bioengineered constructs to be biodegradable, such that the bioengineered construct can form a scaffold for bone or other tissue formation that degrades once the new tissue is sufficiently formed. However, many of the previously described materials that are used to form bioengineered constructs have a very slow rate of degradation. For example, studies of poly(propylene fumarate) (PPF), a polymer commonly used in bioengineered construct application, show little or no degradation in vivo after 18 weeks and little or no degradation in vitro after 50 weeks. It will be appreciated that tissue regeneration typically takes place in significantly less time than this resulting in a tissue scaffold which can eventually hinder, rather than aid, the healing process. Accordingly, there is a need for bioengineered constructs formed from materials with significantly reduced biodegradation times.
Furthermore, it will also be appreciated that tissue generation rates can vary based on the type of tissue being generated (e.g., bone vs. cartilage, large repair vs. small repair). Accordingly, a tunable system that enables the formation of bioengineered constructs having a specific, predetermined biodegradation rate would be greatly desired.

Polymer scaffold degradation control via chemical control


The collectors of transistors are connected via respective resistances to a power supply terminal receiving a power supply voltage. The emitters of the transistors are connected to a ground terminal via respective resistances. A shunt resistance, a FET, and a shunt resistance are connected in series between nodes connected to the respective emitters of the transistors. The gate of the FET is connected via a resistance to a control terminal receiving a control voltage. The shunt resistances and FET form a variable resistance circuit.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a variable impedance circuit, a variable gain differential amplifier using the same, a multiplier and a differential distributed amplifier using the same and a high-frequency circuit using them.
2. Description of the Background Art
Variable gain differential amplifiers (differential amplification circuits having a variable gain function) have been conventionally in use. Integrated circuits using Si (silicon) devices, such as bipolar transistors and MOSFETs (Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field-Effect Transistors), mainly include an amplifier having the Gilbert-cell structure or OTA (operational transconductance amplifier) structure as a variable gain differential amplifier.
An amplifier having the Gilbert-cell structure has a wide variable gain range, but is inferior in power consumption and noise characteristics. For this reason, mobile communication devices and the like in general use the OTA structure having a variable resistance circuit formed by an FET switch and the like in a differential amplifier.
FIG. 35 is a circuit diagram of a conventional variable gain differential amplifier having the OTA structure.
The variable gain differential amplifier shown in FIG. 35 is formed by bipolar transistors (hereinafter abbreviated to transistors) 101 and 102, resistors 103, 104, 105 and 106, and an n-MOSFET (hereinafter abbreviated to an FET) 107. The FET 107 forms a variable resistance circuit 50.
The base of the transistor 101 is connected to an input terminal NI1 receiving an input signal RFin(+), and the base of the transistor 102 is connected to another input terminal NI2 receiving another input signal RFin(−). The input signals RFin(+) and RFin(−) are differential inputs. The collectors of the transistors 101 and 102 are connected to a power supply terminal NVC receiving a power supply voltage Vcc via the resistors 103 and 104, respectively. The emitters of the transistors 101 and 102 are connected to ground terminals via the resistors 105 and 106, respectively. The collectors of the transistors 101 and 102 are connected to output terminals NO1 and NO2, respectively. Output signals RFout(−) and RFout(+) are derived from the output terminals NO1 and NO2, respectively. The output signals RFout(+) and RFout(−) are differential outputs.
The FET 107 is connected between nodes N1 and N2 that are connected to the respective emitters of the transistors 101 and 102. The gate of the FET 107 is connected to a control terminal NG receiving a control voltage AGC via a resistor 110.
In the variable gain differential amplifier shown in FIG. 35, the control voltage AGC is applied to the gate of the FET 107 for varying a source-to-drain resistance of the FET 107 so as to perform gain control. The maximum gain and lowered noise characteristics can be achieved when the FET 107 is in an ON-state, for example. In this case, the variable gain differential amplifier is suitable for amplifying a small high-frequency signal. On the other hand, the amount of attenuation is maximized (minimum gain) to enhance distortion characteristics when the FET 107 is in an OFF-state. In this case, the variable gain differential amplifier is resistant against cross modulation in a state of high electric field strength.
Also for Gilbert-cell multipliers, a similar structure as that of a variable gain differential amplifier having the OTA structure has been proposed.
FIG. 36 is a diagram showing the structure of a conventional differential input/output high-frequency circuit used for a high-frequency receiver.
The differential input/output high-frequency circuit shown in FIG. 36 is formed by a variable gain amplifier 610, multiplier 620, and a variable gain intermediate frequency band multiplier (hereinafter abbreviated to an IF band amplifier) 630. A differential signal is input to the variable gain amplifier 610, and an amplified differential signal is output from the variable gain IF band amplifier 630. The variable gain amplifier 610 and the variable gain IF band frequency 630 are supplied with a control voltage AGC for controlling the gain.
The variable gain amplifier 610 is formed by a differential amplifier having a variable gain function; the multiplier 620 is formed by a Gilbert-cell amplifier without a variable gain function; and the IF band amplifier 630 is formed by a differential amplifier having a variable gain function.
Thus, in the differential input/output high-frequency circuit, the dynamic range of a differential amplifier used for the first stage greatly affects the dynamic range of a high-frequency receiver. In this case, the operating conditions of the Gilbert-cell multiplier are not optimized, resulting in a small dynamic range.
For this reason, receivers having a high-frequency amplifier, a mixer, and an intermediate frequency detecting circuit provided with an AGC (Automatic Gain Control) circuit that controls the gains of the high-frequency amplifier and the mixer have been proposed (refer to, for example, JP-5-300039-A.)
Distributed amplifiers are well known amplifiers that operate over a frequency band of one octave or wider in microwave band to millimeter wave band (refer to, for example, JP-9-252228-A, JP-11-88079-A, and JP-2003-209448-A.)
FIG. 37 is a circuit diagram showing one example of the structure of a conventional distributed amplifier. The distributed amplifier has a plurality of transistors TR1 to TR4, the gates (input terminals) of the plurality of transistors TR1 to TR4 being connected via respective inductive elements IL1 to IL4 each formed by a high-impedance transmission line or inductive element, the drains (output terminals) of the plurality of transistors TR1 to TR4 being connected via respective inductive elements OL1 to OL4 each formed by a high-impedance transmission line or inductive element. The parasitic capacitances of the respective transistors TR1 to TR4 (gate-to-source capacities on the input side and source-to-drain capacities on the output side) and the inductances IL1 to IL4, OL1 to OL4 thus form a quasi-transmission line. As a result, input and output impedance matching over a wide band can be achieved. In general, distributed amplifiers having a larger number of stages of transistors operate in a wider band.
In the variable gain differential amplifier shown in FIG. 35, however, the variable resistance circuit 50 has strong non-linearity at a region of the control voltage around a pinch-off voltage for the FET. This causes deterioration in the distortion characteristics around a specific control voltage. In the case of continuous gain control, therefore, the distortion characteristics of the variable gain differential amplifier are deteriorated when the FET is supplied with a control voltage at which waveform distortion is increased.
It is possible to increase emitter resistances of the transistors 101, 102 to achieve improved distortion characteristics in the variable gain differential amplifier. In this case, however, the operating current of the variable gain differential amplifier varies with varying gain.
In some variable gain differential amplifiers, it is desired to improve the distortion without variation of the operating current, depending on their uses.
Further, in the variable gain differential amplifier shown in FIG. 35, when the input voltage level is constant, the output voltage level increases at higher gain to easily cause saturation of the input/output characteristics. This is because the operating current of the variable gain differential amplifier does not vary with varying gain.
In some variable gain differential amplifiers, it is desired to set the operating current according to the output voltage level to suppress the saturation of input/output characteristics, depending on their uses.
In addition, in a conventional receiver using the variable gain differential amplifier shown in FIG. 35, a sufficiently high dynamic range has not been realized.
Distributed amplifiers are used in high-speed digital signal transmission systems, for example. In the high-speed digital signal transmission system, an amplifier having a variable gain function is effective in varying the gain in case of variation in the input level.
For this reason, a structure of a distributed amplifier has been proposed in which cascode-connected transistors are used in each of amplifying sections, and the transistors are individually turned on/off (refer to, JP-2003-298370-A, for example.)
In the structure in which the transistors are individually turned on/off, however, the gain only varies in a discrete manner.

Variable impedance circuit, variable gain differential amplifier, multiplier, high-frequency circuit and differential distributed amplifier


An illuminating umpire counter and timing device including a hand-held housing having three apertures through a top face thereof. Each of the apertures have distinguishable indicia adjacent thereto. Three indicating wheels are rotatably disposed and extending outwardly of side walls of the housing. The wheels has illuminated numbers disposed circumferentially thereon. The three wheels are positioned within the housing whereby the numbers selectively aligning with the three apertures of the housing. An illuminating digital watch/stopwatch is secured within the top face of the housing.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an illuminating umpire counter and timing device and more particularly pertains to tracking pitches, outs and time during a ball game with an illuminating umpire counter and timing device.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The use of umpire counters is known in the prior art. More specifically, umpire counters heretofore devised and utilized for the purpose of counting balls and strikes are known to consist basically of familiar, expected and obvious structural configurations, notwithstanding the myriad of designs encompassed by the crowded prior art which have been developed for the fulfillment of countless objectives and requirements.
By way of example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,084,695 to Freeman discloses an umpire's counter.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,637,732 to Jones et al. discloses a hand held athletic officiating timers.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,072,125 to Spalla discloses an umpire's counter.
U.S. Pat. No. Des. 349,859 to Asano discloses the ornamental design for a score counter.
U.S. Pat. No. Des. 323,629 to Murphy discloses the ornamental design for a football score keeper.
U.S. Pat. No. Des. 314,711 to Cox discloses the ornamental design for a tennis score recorder.
While these devices fulfill their respective, particular objective and requirements, the aforementioned patents do not describe an illuminating umpire counter and timing device for tracking pitches, outs and time during a ball game.
In this respect, the illuminating umpire counter and timing device according to the present invention substantially departs from the conventional concepts and designs of the prior art, and in doing so provides an apparatus primarily developed for the purpose of tracking pitches, outs and time during a ball game.
Therefore, it can be appreciated that there exists a continuing need for new and improved illuminating umpire counter and timing device which can be used for tracking pitches, outs and time during a ball game. In this regard, the present invention substantially fulfills this need.

Illuminating umpire counter and timing device


A method for optimizing hash table lookup speed during hash table resize on a computing device, the method including performing the following on the computing device: providing a first hash table having N slots for entries, designating the first hash table as an active hash table, allocating a second hash table, and performing the following after allocating the second hash table: when a hash table insertion of an entry is requested, performing insertion by inserting the entry to the first hash table and inserting the entry to the second hash table, and when a hash table lookup is requested, looking up the requested entry in the active hash table, one of the performing insertion and the performing deletion including also copying K entries, K being greater than or equal to 1, from the first hash table to the second hash table. Related apparatus and methods are also described.

Computing equipment using hash tables is well known. When a hash table reaches a certain level of being full (that is, when a certain percentage of the available slots in the hash table become occupied as entries are added to the hash table) it is conventional to increase the size of the hash table in some way so that the hash table can continue to be used. Likewise, it might be appropriate to reduce the size of a hash table when the hash table reaches a certain level of being empty (that is, when a certain percentage of the available slots in the hash table become unoccupied as entries are deleted from the hash table). Various ways of increasing and/or reducing the size of a hash table are known.
One known way of increasing the size of a hash table is described in the Wikibooks reference Data Structures/Hash Tables, found on the World Wide Web at en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Data_Structures/Hash_Tables. As described in that reference, particularly in real-time systems it is not appropriate to pay a performance price during hash table enlargement. To overcome that problem, the reference suggests that:                a new hash table be allocated, leaving the old hash table in place and checking both hash tables during lookups        when an insertion is performed, the inserted record is added to the new hash table, and in addition a certain number of elements (k) are moved from the old table to the new table        once all elements have been removed from the old table, the old table is deallocated        to prevent a situation wherein the new table requires enlargement before all of the old table elements have been completely copied over, the size of the new table relative to the old table must be at least (k+1)/k times that size of the old table

Equipment and method for hash table resizing


DNA molecules comprising a sequence encoding the signal peptide of hGH linked to a heterologous protein and related cells, methods and fusion proteins.

This invention relates to α-galactosidase A and treatment for α-galactosidase A deficiency.
Fabry disease is an X-linked inherited lysosomal storage disease characterized by symptoms such as severe renal impairment, angiokeratomas, and cardiovascular abnormalities, including ventricular enlargement and mitral valve insufficiency. The disease also affects the peripheral nervous system, causing episodes of agonizing, burning pain in the extremities. Fabry disease is caused by a deficiency in the enzyme α-galactosidase A (α-gal A), which results in a blockage of the catabolism of neutral glycosphingolipids, and accumulation of the enzyme's substrate, ceramide trihexoside, within cells and in the bloodstream.
Due to the X-linked inheritance pattern of the disease, essentially all Fabry disease patients are male. Although a few severely affected female heterozygotes have been observed, female heterozygotes are generally either asymptomatic or have relatively mild symptoms largely limited to a characteristic opacity of the cornea. An a typical variant of Fabry disease, exhibiting low residual α-gal A activity and either very mild symptoms or apparently no other symptoms characteristic of Fabry disease, correlates with left ventricular hypertrophy and cardiac disease (Nakano et al., New Engl. J. Med. 333:288–293, 1995). It has been speculated that reduction in α-gal A may be the cause of such cardiac abnormalities.
The cDNA and gene encoding human α-gal A have been isolated and sequenced (Bishop et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 83:4859, 1986; Kornreich et al., Nuc. Acids Res. 17:3301, 1988; Oeltjen et al., Mammalian Genome 6:335–338, 1995). Human α-gal A is expressed as a 429-amino acid polypeptide, of which the N-terminal 31 amino acids constitute a signal peptide. The human enzyme has been expressed in Chinese Hamster Ovary (CHO) cells (Desnick, U.S. Pat. No. 5,356,804; Ioannou et al., J. Cell Biol. 119:1137, 1992); insect cells (Calhoun et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,179,023); and COS cells (Tsuji et al., Eur. J. Biochem. 165:275, 1987). Pilot trials of α-gal A replacement therapies have been reported, using protein derived from human tissues (Mapes et al., Science 169:987 1970; Brady et al., N. Engl. J. Med. 289:9, 1973; Desnick et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 76:5326, 1979), but there is currently no effective treatment for Fabry disease.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Nucleic acid encoding a chimeric polypeptide


Novel rate-based flow control methods operate in conjunction with a data communications network. Such networks include a plurality of interconnected nodes, wherein each node is adapted for connection to any of a plurality of sources. The sources send data to, and receive data from, the nodes. The path that data follows in traveling from a first source, through one or more nodes, to a second source, is referred to as a virtual circuit path. Each node includes a processor and an associated memory for storing a data queue of data received from sources. According to one embodiment, referred to as first-order rate-based flow control, a node allocates a data transfer rate to a source based upon the difference between the current queue length at that node and the queue threshold of that node multiplied by a gain. If an appropriate value is calculated and/or empirically determined for the gain, the closed-loop system is asymptotically stable with no persistent oscillation, irrespective of the number of node-to-node connections in a given virtual circuit path, and the round-trip delay of this virtual circuit path. First-order rate-based flow control maintains high node-to-node link utilization and low data loss.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to data communications, and more particularly to data switching arrangements.
2. Description of Related Art
Recent developmental efforts have focused upon feedback-based flow control in the operational environment of high-speed, wide-area ATM networking. In particular, an explicit rate-based approach has been studied extensively and adopted by the ATM Forum as a standard for the flow control of Available Bit Rate (ABR) service. An illustrative rate-based flow control problem may be stated as follows, with reference to FIG. 1. Consider a network 100 that includes a plurality of nodes 102, 104, 106, 108. (These nodes 102, 104, 106, 108 could also be conceptualized as representing switches.). A first source 110 at a first geographic location transmits data into node 102, and a second source 112 at a second geographic location transmits data into node 104.
The first source 110 transmits data into node 102 at a data transfer rate allocated by node 102, and the second source transmits data into node 104 at a data transfer rate allocated by node 104. Node 102 allocates a data transfer rate to first source 110 based upon a virtual circuit path 115 over which data from node 102 is to travel, and node 104 allocates a data transfer rate to second source 112 based upon a virtual circuit path 117 over which data from node 104 is to travel. In allocating data transfer rates among sources 110, 112, each node 102, 104, 106, 108 computes the rate that will be allocated to each of the active sources whose virtual circuit path is routed through that node 102, 104, 106, 108. These computed rates are conveyed from a given node 102, 104, 106, 108 to the sources connected to that node via a data structure termed a resource management (RM) cell.
An RM cell is generated by, and transmitted on, a given virtual circuit path 115 by a source 110. The RM cell includes a data field that contains the minimum circuit path 115 to the source 102 during a round trip of data from the source 102 to a destination source, and back to source 102 along the virtual circuit path 115. For a wide-area network in which the end-to-end round-trip propagation delay is relatively large, the rate allocation carried by an RM cell may no longer be valid in view of the current status of the network, and so immediate, real-time flow control cannot be performed. In this scenario, there is an increasing likelihood of cell loss and link under-utilization. Particularly as link speed increases (i.e., the speed of the communications links connecting a pair of nodes 102, 104), this problem becomes more serious, due to the large bandwidth-delay product involved in the closed loop.
Methods by which a node processor allocates data transfer rates are classified are into one of two types: queue-length-based rate control, and explicit rate allocation. In queue-length-based rate control, the rate to a source is calculated as a function of the difference between the queue length and the queue threshold, based on the measurement of the queue length. In this type of approach, a desired fairness in rate allocation (e.g., MAX-MIN fairness) among sources is accomplished as a consequence of the queue-length control. Examples of this type of algorithm are found in F. Bonomi, D. Mitra and J. B. Seery, "Adaptive Algorithms for Feedback-Based Flow Control in High-Speed, Wide-Area Networks", IEEE J. Select. Areas on Communications, Vol. 13, No. 7, Sep. 1995, pp. 1267-1283, and S. Mascolo, D. Cavendish and M. Gerla, "ATM Rate Based Congestion Control Using a Smith Predictor: an EPRCA Implementation", Proc. of IEEE INFOCOM '96, March 1996, pp. 569-576. In an explicit rate allocation approach, instead of controlling the queue-length explicitly, the switch computes the rate to a source based on an asynchronous distributed algorithm that is designed to accomplish a desired fairness in rate allocation. Examples of this type of algorithm are found in L. Kalampoukas, A. Varma and K. K. Ramakrishnan, "An Efficient Rate Allocation Algorithm for ATM Networks Providing Max-Min Fairness," Technical Report UCSC-CRL-95-29, Computer Engineering Dept., University of California, Santa Cruz, June 1995, and D. Bertsekas and R. Gallager, Data Networks, Prentice Hall, 1992.

First-order rate-based flow control with adaptive queue threshold for ATM networks


Embodiments of the present application provide a data transmission method and a communications apparatus. A Hypertext Transfer Protocol version 2 HTTP/2 adaptation layer is configured between an application layer and a Multipath Transmission Control Protocol MPTCP layer of a protocol stack. All frames belonging to a same HTTP/2 stream are allocated to a same MPTCP subflow for transmission, so that a data throughput is large, and system robustness is good, thereby improving HTTP/2 stream transmission performance.

A Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is an application-layer communication protocol between a client browser or another program and a Web (web) server, and uses a request/response model. As a user has an increasingly high requirement for network performance, various related application programs come into being. However, a conventional HTTP/1.0 or HTTP/1.1 (HTTP version 1) cannot meet running requirements of some application programs, and even has a negative effect.
HTTP/2 (HTTP version 2) efficiently uses a network resource and reduces a perceived delay by introducing header field compression and multiplexing. In a Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) connection, various to-be-transmitted frames are divided into multiple streams, and multiple HTTP request and response exchanges are allocated to each stream, so as to implement the foregoing multiplexing.
In the prior art, because multiple streams in an HTTP/2 TCP connection are multiplexed on a same TCP connection between a client and a server for transmission, a data throughput is limited. In addition, because an entire data transmission process depends on only one TCP connection, robustness needs to be improved.

Data transmission method and communications apparatus


A primary electrochemical cell includes a cathode including lambda-manganese dioxide (λ-MnO2), an anode including lithium or a lithium alloy, a separator interposed between the cathode and the anode, and a non-aqueous electrolyte contacting the anode and the cathode.

A battery includes one or more galvanic cells (i.e., cells that produce a direct current of electricity) in a finished package. Cells of this type generally contain two electrodes separated by a medium capable of transporting ions, called an electrolyte. Typical electrolytes include liquid organic electrolytes or a polymeric electrolytes. The cell produces electricity from chemical reactions through oxidation at one electrode, commonly referred to as the negative electrode or anode, and reduction at the other electrode, commonly referred to as the positive electrode or cathode. Completion of an electrically conducting circuit including the negative and positive electrodes allows ion transport across the cell and discharges the battery. A primary battery is intended to be dischargedto exhaustion once, and then discarded. A rechargable battery can be discharged and recharged multiple times.
An example of a primary battery is a primary lithium cell. A lithium electrochemical cell is a galvanic cell using lithium, a lithium alloy or other lithium containing materials as one electrode in the cell. The other electrode of the cell can include, for example, a transition metal oxide, such as gamma-manganese dioxide (γ-manganese dioxide or γ-MnO2) or transition metal sulfide such as iron disulfide. The metal oxide or sulfide used in the electrode can be processed prior to use in a lithium battery. Generally, γ-manganese dioxide can be prepared by chemical methods or electrochemical methods. The resulting materials are known as chemically produced γ-manganese dioxide (CMD) and electrochemically produced (e.g., electrolytic or electrodeposited) y-manganese dioxide (EMD), respectively.


A semiconductor device includes a substrate, a semiconductor layer and a switching element. The semiconductor layer is disposed on the substrate. The semiconductor layer has a light-sensing portion and includes microstructures at a side face area corresponding to the light-sensing portion. The switching element is disposed on the semiconductor layer. In the semiconductor device, the switching element and the light-sensing portion are staggered.

Semiconductor image sensors are operated to sense light. Typically, the semiconductor image sensors include complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) image sensors (CIS) or charge-coupled device (CCD) sensors, which are widely used in various applications such as digital still camera (DSC), mobile phone camera, digital video (DV) and digital video recorder (DVR) applications. These semiconductor image sensors utilize an array of image sensor elements, each image sensor element including a photodiode and other elements, to absorb light and convert the sensed light into digital data or electrical signals.
In general, a CMOS image sensor adopts a stacked structure including a micro-lens layer, a color filter layer, a passivation layer and/or a semiconductor layer. However, the intensity of incident light is significantly decreased when the incident light penetrates through these layers. The decreasing of the intensity of incident light results in quantum efficiency degradation of the CMOS image sensor.

Image sensor device with improved quantum efficiency

TAIWAN SEMICONDUCTOR MANUFACTURING CO., LTD.


The present disclosure provides a microfluidic device (1) comprising at least one flow channel (21) connecting an inlet opening (22) with an outlet opening (23), and an array of wells (24) in fluid communication with the flow channel (21), wherein the flow channel (21) comprises an inlet portion (211) at the inlet opening (22), an outlet portion (212) at the outlet opening (23), and a middle portion (213) between the inlet portion (211) and the outlet portion (212), wherein at least the middle portion (213) comprises the array of wells (24) and is provided with a hydrophilic surface, and the flow channel (21) further comprises a transition area (214) provided at least between the middle portion (213) and the outlet portion (212), which transition area (214) is constituted by providing a hydrophobic surface. Furthermore, a method for manufacturing such a microfluidic device is also provided.

In the field of diagnostic technology for the assay of chemical or biochemical reactions, it is a goal to be able to carry out multiple different assays on one or more test samples on the same, preferably disposable, microfluidic device, thereby providing methods of independently analyzing one or more test samples with multiple different reagents in the course of a single analytic process. In more detail, the present disclosure relates to a microfluidic device comprising at least one flow channel in fluid communication with an array of wells which are intended, for example, as reaction chambers for chemical or biological reactions of at least one sample provided therein, respectively, and further to a method for manufacturing such a microfluidic device for the study of chemical or biological reactions occurring in the array of wells. In particular, the present disclosure is directed to an improved microfluidic device and an improved manufacturing method of the same, in order to achieve a filling of preferably all provided wells in the microfluidic device as comprehensive as necessary in order to avoid any unused or insufficiently filled wells on the microfluidic device.
In general, there is a need to make diagnostic assays faster, cheaper and simpler to perform while achieving precision as well as efficiency of conventional laboratory processes. In order to accomplish this goal, substantial effort has been made in order to achieve miniaturization and integration of various assay operations, for increasing the number of parallel assays on one single carrier device. However, when actually miniaturizing the reaction chamber volumes to become microfluidic structures of a microfluidic device in order to generate the desired dimensions, several already known problems increase, such as undesired liquid evaporation, as well as problems related to the increased surface-to-volume ratio. Also, and more importantly, shortcomings in sample liquid metering during a filling procedure of the microfluidic structures occur, which shortcomings are substantially caused by the specific flow behavior of the sample liquid inside the microfluidic device. As an example of such a microfluidic device comprising the desired microfluidic structures, microfluidic chips are already known in the field, which provide microscale channels to receive microliter or nanoliter-scale samples in the form of streamable liquid. Microliter-scale reagents, typically filled in advance into an array of small wells provided as reaction chambers on the microfluidic chip, are placed therein for contacting a stream of sample liquid in a reaction flow channel, wherein each type of assay is dependent on the reagents loaded into the array of wells as well as the configuration of reaction channels and detectors. Such technology allows a plurality of assays to be carried out simultaneously on a miniaturized scale. Here, however, it is necessary to accurately control the amount or concentration of a certain substance or compound in a sample to be provided into each well. Most of these chemical, biochemical and/or biological assays are directed to the immobilization of biological materials such as polypeptides and nucleic acids, cells or tissues within the wells and the performance of one or more reactions with the immobilized material, followed by a quantitative and/or qualitative analytical process, such as luminescence test measurements, as is the case in the course of performing a polymerase chain reaction (PCR). One particular example of such assaying—being in the focus of the present disclosure—is the digital polymerase chain reaction method, also referred to as digital PCR or dPCR, which denotes a biotechnology refinement of conventional PCR methods that can be used to directly quantify and clonally amplify nucleic acids including DNA, cDNA or RNA. Here, the substantial difference between dPCR and traditional PCR lies in the method of measuring nucleic acids amounts, since traditional PCR carries out one reaction per single sample whereas dPCR carries out a single reaction within a sample which is separated into a large number of partitions and wherein the reaction is carried out in each partition individually such that a more reliable collection and sensitive measurement of nucleic acid amounts becomes possible.
In order to provide an efficient movement of sample liquid within such a microfluidic device and a sufficient filling of sample liquid in preferably all present wells, U.S. Pat. No. 8,859,204 B2 describes methods to analyze concentrations of specific nucleic acids in sample fluids and methods for detecting amplification of a target nucleic acid sequence, wherein miniaturized analytical assemblies in the form of porous sample retainers are filled with the sample fluids. In order to provide an improved filling property, according to an embodiment of U.S. Pat. No. 8,859,204 B2, the sample retainers exhibit a complex construction with a hydrophilic bottom and hydrophobic sidewalls. Such a complex structure of sample retainers, however, is difficult to manufacture, involving considerable manufacturing effort and costs.
As an alternative, U.S. Pat. No. 6,776,965 B2 describes a microfluidic device for analytical purposes, comprising, for example, a filling section for taking up a sample fluid, an analysis section connected to the filling section for analysis of the sample fluid, a waste section for collecting a dead volume of the sample fluid coming from the analysis section, and the like, which are all connected by a flow channel. Also, the microfluidic device of U.S. Pat. No. 6,776,965 B2 is provided with geometrical features for enhancing fluid transfer performance through the device's structure, such as butterfly and cascade structures, which geometrical features are supposed to provide a more homogeneous spread of the liquid stream of the sample fluid through the device. As a specific example of such a three-dimensional geometrical structure for enhancing fluid transfer performance, so-called pre-shooter stops are shown and described in one specific embodiment of the microfluidic device of U.S. Pat. No. 6,776,965 B2, which geometrical pre-shooter stops are provided in the form of irregularly shaped edges of the flow channel, such as triangular or saw-toothed edges of the flow channel, and are intended to slow down or hinder so-called pre-shooters.
The phenomenon of the occurrence of pre-shooters is exemplarily depicted in FIGS. 6A and 6B for better understanding. FIGS. 6A and 6B show the bottom layer 8 of a microfluidic device, comprising a flow channel 81 in which microstructures on the form of microwells 82 and an outlet opening 83 are provided. In the flow channel 81, an aqueous solution 9, such as a sample liquid, is streamed towards the outlet opening 83, which solution 9 is supposed to be filled into the microwells 82. Here, portions of the solution 9 on the inner walls of the flow channel 81 on either lateral side of the microwells 82 stream faster than, for example, in the lateral middle of the flow channel 81 due to the unstructured surface of the flow channel 81 in these areas, i.e. due to the lack of microwells 82 in these areas. These faster streaming portions are referred to as pre-shooters 91, wherein each pre-shooter 91 usually consists of a portion of the introduced aqueous solution 9, and which portion rushes ahead of the major bulk of introduced solution 9, as in the presently depicted case in the form of liquid column tips on a lateral side of the flow channel 81 between the microwells 82 and an inner wall of the flow channel 81. In case such pre-shooters 91 are not stopped at some point during the filling process, the solution 9 can pass through these unstructured areas past the microwells 82 and out of the outlet opening 83 of the microfluidic device, and would therefore be lost. Such an undesired occurrence can result in the already known microfluidic devices in approximately 50% loss of solution.
In U.S. Pat. No. 6,776,965 B2, the pre-shooter stops are intended to provide for an even advancing flow line of the sample fluid through the flow channel by inhibiting undesired edge fluid flow, i.e. so called pre-shooters, which effect should be achieved in that the capillary forces along the flow channel inner surface are disturbed by the thus provided discontinued inner surface of the flow channel. However, the provision of irregularly shaped edges for providing a geometrical disturbance of the inner surface of the flow channel in such a microfluidic device requires substantial structural customization of the design of already known microfluidic devices, involving additional or more cumbersome manufacturing steps and/or higher manufacturing precision, which again results in considerably higher manufacturing effort and, thus, manufacturing costs. Accordingly, in order to be able to achieve sufficient filling of sample liquid in preferably all present wells of a microfluidic device, a need exists for enhancing fluid transfer performance inside a flow channel of a microfluidic device in a simple and cost-efficient way.

Microfluidic device and method for manufacturing the same


A sound engine in a processor-based system utilizing real-time synthesis optimizes synthesis time, maximizes the number of fully-synthesized sound requests and preserves currently excessive sound requests. During synthesis, the sound engine attempts to full-synthesize all requests. If the sound engine determines that remaining sound requests are excessive and cannot be fully-synthesized, it preserves each excessive request by synthesizing a substitute waveform segment. If the sound engine determines that limiting the number of preserved requests is required, it synthesizes a concluding waveform segment for and then discards selected requests during selected synthesis intervals. Both substitute-synthesis and discarding of sound requests are achieved with minimized detrimental impact on ongoing sound performances.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to sound production systems and more particularly to a sound engine that preserves requests for synthesis of sound waveforms such that if its capacity for real-time synthesis is exceeded, then impact on an ongoing sound performance will be minimized.
2. Discussion of the Prior Art
In processor-based sound production systems, such as personal computers ("PCs") utilizing real-time synthesis, sound generating processes, such as multimedia programs, send requests for sound to a sound engine. The sound engine manages the sound requests and synthesizes corresponding digital waveforms, and an audio output system converts the digital waveforms into audible sounds.
Although sound-generating processes may request sound as digitally recorded segments to be played back as with a conventional tape recorder, event-based sound production is favored as being more responsive for producing interactive sounds while producing acceptable ongoing sound such as soundtracks. It is also favored as requiring the generation and storage of far less data. With event-based sound production, such as according to the Musical Instrument Digital Interface ("midi") and General Musical Instrument Digital Interface ("General midi") standards, sound-generating processes send sound requests, including instructions for how to create requested sounds, to the sound engine. The sound engine creates or "synthesizes" digital waveforms according to the instructions, similarly to a player piano pressing keys according to the arrangement of holes in a piano roll. A General midi sound request might for example include an instruction to start synthesizing ("note-on") a specific pitch ("note") for a specific sound quality or "instrument" such as middle-C on a piano. Upon receipt of the sound request, the sound engine not only initiates but continues to synthesize a piano sound throughout the sound's characteristic duration unless it receives a request to stop synthesizing the sound ("note-off").
Since a processor-based sound engine necessarily synthesizes waveforms serially, the audio output system uses a conventional double-buffering system to create a continuous waveform that will produce continuous sound. A double-buffering system includes two buffers that alternate input and output tasks on a regular and continuous basis. While one buffer is available to receive a waveform for a given period of time ("one cycle"), the other buffer is continually outputting individual parts ("samples") of the previous waveform to a digital-to-analog converter. When a cycle ends ("times-out"), the buffers switch tasks and continue outputting samples without interruption.
While each double-buffering cycle times-out in only several milliseconds, a typical sound lasts several seconds. Thus, the sound engine will ideally synthesize a waveform corresponding to each of any number of sounds requested in segments ("waveform segments") with each segment having a duration of one cycle and each complete waveform having a duration of typically a few to several hundreds of samples. In addition to continuing waveforms, the sound engine will ideally synthesize a waveform segment corresponding to each request for a new sound as it receives the request. Inconveniently, since PCs are not exclusively dedicated to producing sound, the processor may be interrupted at an unpredictable time for an unpredictable interval during any given cycle.
Thus, the need to produce sounds interactively, combined with the need to produce continuous sound using processor-based systems that are not exclusively dedicated to producing sound, causes problems if the sound engine receives more sound requests than it can fully synthesize in real-time.
In prior PC-based sound production systems, excess sound requests have been summarily and irrevocably discarded both upon receipt and again during synthesis. At the start of each double buffering cycle the total number ("playable number") of synthesizable waveform segments is calculated as a presumed processor-available time divided by the sum of a mean time for fully synthesizing an average complexity waveform plus additional time to account for potentially more complex waveforms and processor interruptions. The sound engine then irrevocably discards any requests for sound in excess of the playable number and begins fully synthesizing the remaining ("planned") sound requests. When the current cycle times out, the sound engine irrevocably discards all planned sound requests that it has not yet synthesized.
While summarily discarding sound requests assures that the capacity of a sound engine is not exceeded due to processor interruptions, it conflicts with the sound engine's very purpose: synthesizing requested sounds as accurately and completely as is possible. Accurate synthesis is important not only in initiating requested sounds, but also in sustaining and concluding sounds that were initiated earlier.
The FIG. 1a graph shows how conventional non-discriminating, irrevocable and abrupt discarding of sound requests results in the loss of auditory cues and sound textures. Most naturally occurring sounds 110, such as piano sounds, have a characteristic attack portion 110a, sustain portion 110b and concluding portion or "release" 110c. In the piano example, a hammer hitting the strings causes attack portion 110a, sound 110 sustains 110b while the key is depressed and sound 110 concludes 110c after sufficient time has elapsed or when the key is released. Portions of sound 110 not only provide sonic texture, but also provide a listener with sonic cues. When conventional sound engines discard a sound request, the corresponding sound 110 ends abruptly, thereby preempting cues provided by remaining portions of sound 110. Thus, if a sound request is discarded at t.sub.1 prior to a sound's attack at time t.sub.2, the entire sound 110 is lost. If the sound 110 provided a critical system warning, musical event or interactive cue, then that is lost as well. If a sound request is discarded at time t.sub.4 during a sound's sustaining portion, then the attack portion 110a of sound 110 is not affected. However, the remaining duration 120b of sound 110 is lost along with the texture and cues provided by the remainder of sustaining portion 110b and release 110c. Thus, during each double-buffering cycle conventional sound engines discard many sounds, along with the respective textures and cues they provide, indiscriminately at any point during their duration and without consideration of their sonic importance. Therefore, the integrity of a sound performance might be severely compromised.
The FIG. 1b graph, by magnifying portion 200 of the FIG. 1a graph, shows how conventional, non-discriminating, abrupt, and irrevocable discarding 115b of a sound request during the corresponding sound sustaining portion 110b or concluding portion 110c introduces readily perceived noise. Abruptly discarding 115b a sound request immediately ceases all synthesis of a corresponding sound 110, resulting in a total lack of the sound 110 or equivalently a waveform 110e having a constant zero amplitude. Since it is extremely unlikely that the amplitude of the last sample prior to discarding 115b will be zero, a difference in amplitudes ("waveform discontinuity") occurs at time t.sub.4. This waveform discontinuity, after mixing with other sounds and amplification, is perceived by listeners as a loud, obnoxious, popping sound followed by the sudden absence of the remainder of the sound as well as a loss of the textures and cues that the request-initiating process intended the sound to provide. To make matters worse, conventional sound engines may discard any number of sound requests during each typically ten to twelve millisecond cycle.
The conventional sound engine solution of completely and irrevocably discarding sound requests is also inconsistent with the problem that it is intended to solve, ie., temporarily exceeded sound engine capacity. Exceeded sound engine capacity is most often due to processor interruption during synthesis. While conventional sound engines discard excess sound requests during each cycle in anticipation of processor interruption, such processor interruption might not and in many cases does not occur. Further, processor interruption and resultant exceeded sound engine capacity during a current cycle indicates a greater likelihood of sufficient capacity during successive cycles when synthesis of such sound requests might be continued. Thus conventional discarding of sound requests is in both cases premature; a waste of time better reserved for fully synthesizing more requests; and might needlessly, severely and detrimentally impact an ongoing sound performance.
Thus, there is a need for a sound engine that makes better use of time and equipment resources to synthesize sounds.

Real-time waveform substituting sound engine


An electronic apparatus includes a packaging enclosure, first and second die pads disposed within the packaging enclosure, first and second semiconductor die disposed on the first and second die pads, respectively, a plurality of packaging leads, each packaging lead projecting outward from the packaging enclosure, a plurality of packaging posts disposed within the packaging enclosure and extending inward from opposite sides of the packaging enclosure between the first and second die pads, each packaging post being connected with a respective one of the plurality of packaging leads, and a plurality of wire bonds disposed within the packaging enclosure. Each packaging post of the plurality of packaging posts is connected via a first wire bond of the plurality of wire bonds to the first semiconductor die and via a second wire bond of the plurality of wire bonds to the second semiconductor die. The plurality of packaging posts includes first and second sets of packaging posts extending inward from first and second opposite sides of the packaging enclosure, respectively.

Integrated circuit (IC) chips and other semiconductor devices are often packaged using lead frames. Lead frames include a number of metal leads (or pins) that extend outward from an enclosure in which a semiconductor die (or chip) is disposed. Deployment of the semiconductor device often involves soldering the pins to a printed circuit board.
Wire bonds are typically used to establish electrical connections between the pins and the semiconductor die. In wire bonding, bond wires are attached to bond pads located on the semiconductor die. The bond wires generally do not overlap. In this manner, short circuits may be avoided.
Lead frame packaging is complicated by disposition of multiple die in the same package. One complication involves the presence of die-to-die wires, which may increase the likelihood of wire crossings and short circuits. Other complications involve the inefficient allocation of pins. For example, the multiple die may have a number of pins in common. For example, ground and power supply pins may be duplicated across the multiple die.
The number of duplicative pins may increase substantially in multiple die packages in which the multiple die are identical or similar. Such duplication may lead to artificially high pin counts. For these and other reasons, the resulting package may be excessively or undesirably large.
Attempts to address the multiple die complications may present other issues. One approach involves mounting the multiple die on a common substrate. But such substrate packages unfortunately often introduce thermal limitations. For instance, the substrate typically impedes heat dissipation.


Methods for screening mutations that affect the synthesis of plant small molecules or compounds capable of activating a mammalian nuclear receptor protein and systems for rapidly assigning functionality to genes that regulate plant secondary metabolism are provided.

Plants produce many small molecules with specific and potent biological activity. These are commonly economically important, either because they are valuable commercial products, or because they have regulatory functions as plant hormones or intracellular messengers. The genetic regulation of the synthesis of such compounds is often unknown. For example only a small fraction of the Arabidopsis genome is recognized as being involved in plant secondary metabolism. The problems in elucidating these pathways include low accumulation levels, transient or tissue-specific expression, or the complications associated with long multi-step pathways. To overcome these problems a strategy has been devised combining activation tagging mutagenesis (ATM) with pharmacological high throughput screening (HTS). In this, ATM of Nicotiana tabacum protoplasts are used to produce a mutant population of microcallus cultures, and individual clones that over-accumulate products with a specific biological activity are then selected after HTS. These mutant clones are then used to isolate the tagged genes responsible for this accumulation. This enables product-relevant genes to be identified without the requirement for understanding the metabolic pathway. However, because of the random nature of ATM, and the large genome size, as many as 300,000 individual mutants would need to be screened to cover the entire genome. Thus, there is a need for systems and methods to significantly increase screening throughput.

Methods for screening for genes and small molecules that activate mammalian receptor proteins

The University of Kentucky Research Foundation


A dispenser, configured to dispense material on a substrate, includes a dispensing unit having a housing with a chamber, a piston disposed in the chamber and axially movable within the chamber, and a nozzle coupled to the housing. The nozzle has an orifice co-axial with the chamber of the housing. The dispenser further includes an actuator coupled to the dispensing unit and configured to drive the up- and down movement of the piston, and a compliant assembly coupled to the actuator and the piston. The compliant assembly is configured to permit limited relative travel between the actuator and the piston. A method of dispensing is further disclosed.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to methods and apparatus for dispensing a viscous material on a substrate, such as a printed circuit board.
2. Discussion of Related Art
There are several types of prior art dispensing systems or dispensers used for dispensing metered amounts of liquid or paste for a variety of applications. One such application is the assembly of integrated circuit chips and other electronic components onto circuit board substrates. In this application, automated dispensing systems are used for dispensing dots of liquid epoxy or solder paste, or some other related material, onto circuit boards. Automated dispensing systems are also used for dispensing lines of underfill materials and encapsulents, which mechanically secure components to the circuit board. Underfill materials and encapsulents are used to improve the mechanical and environmental characteristics of the assembly.
Another application is to dispense very small amounts or dots onto a circuit board. In one system capable of dispensing dots of material, a dispenser unit utilizes a rotating auger having a helical groove to force material out of a nozzle and onto a circuit board. One such system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,819,983, entitled LIQUID DISPENSING SYSTEM WITH SEALING AUGERING SCREW AND METHOD FOR DISPENSING, which is owned by Speedline Technologies, Inc. of Franklin, Mass., a subsidiary of the assignee of the present disclosure.
In an operation employing an auger-type dispenser, the dispenser unit is lowered towards the surface of the circuit board prior to dispensing a dot or a line of material onto the circuit board and raised after dispensing the dot or line of material. Using this type of dispenser, small, precise quantities of material may be placed with great accuracy. The time required to lower and raise the dispenser unit in a direction normal to the circuit board, typically known as a z-axis movement, can contribute to the time required to perform dispensing operations. Specifically, with auger-type dispensers, prior to dispensing the dot or line of material, the dispenser unit is lowered so that the material touches or "wets" the circuit board. The process of wetting contributes to additional time to perform the dispensing operation.
It is also known in the field of automated dispensers to launch dots of viscous material toward the circuit board. In such a system, a minute, discrete quantity of viscous material is ejected from a nozzle with sufficient inertia to enable the material to separate from the nozzle prior to contacting the circuit board. As discussed above, with the auger-type application or other prior, traditional dispensing systems, it is necessary to wet the circuit board with the dot of material to enable the material to adhere to the circuit board such that when the dispenser is pulled away the dot of material will release from the nozzle. When ejecting, the dots may be deposited on the substrate without wetting as a pattern of discrete dots, or alternatively the dots may be placed sufficiently close to each other to cause them to coalesce into more or less a continuous pattern. An example of such a system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 7,980,197, entitled METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR DISPENSING A VISCOUS MATERIAL ON A SUBSTRATE, which is owned by Illinois Tool Works Inc. of Glenview, Ill., the assignee of the present disclosure.

Method and apparatus for dispensing a viscous material on a substrate


An electronic component can be more easily tested after being mounted onto a circuit board (660). The component also stops cracks from propagating over vital areas of a substrate (110). The component includes an electrically insulative substrate (100), electrically conductive traces (120) supported by the electrically insulative substrate (100), and an electrically insulative layer (310) covering inner and outer portions of the electrically conductive traces (120) while middle portions of the electrically conductive traces (120) remain exposed.

This invention relates, in general, to electronics, and more particularly, to electronic components and methods of manufacturing.
Often used as leadframes for large integrated circuits, ball grid array substrates typically have copper traces underneath permanent solder masks. A solder mask can have openings for mounting a semiconductor chip onto the substrate and for electrically coupling the copper traces to the integrated circuit in the semiconductor chip.
Ball grid array substrates are usually made in strips, with several substrates in each strip. However, when a ball grid array substrate is singulated from the strip, the solder mask often cracks and creates reliability problems.
Furthermore, to provide protection from electro-static discharge, all of the copper traces can be electrically shorted together along a perimeter of the ball grid array substrate. When a ball grid array substrate is singulated from the strip, the copper traces are cut and electrically isolated from each other. However, the forces exerted on the copper traces during the removal process often peels the ends of the copper traces off of the underlying ball grid array substrate material. The copper trace peeling causes undesired electrical shorting of the copper traces, among other problems.
Moreover, after the ball grid array substrate is mounted onto a circuit board, it is extremely difficult to individually test the semiconductor chip.
Accordingly, a need exists for an electronic component and method of manufacturing that stops solder mask cracking, prevents copper trace peeling, and provides easy access for electrical testing after mounting the electronic component on a circuit board.

Electronic component and method of manufacture


A particular failed connection attempt initiated by a particular source asset in a network is identified and subsequent failed connection attempts initiated by the particular source asset in the network during a time period are tracked. A low frequency sequence of failed connection attempts involving the particular source asset is detected during the time period and the source asset is designated as a potential security risk based on the detected low frequency sequence of failed connection attempts.

This specification relates to network security.
A network is a system of computer assets in data communication. Many networks are private networks, e.g., a particular network may be an internet protocol based network that is logically independent from other internet protocol based networks. An enterprise network of a company that is connected to the Internet through a router and firewall is one example of such a private network.
One or more security provisioning systems can be used to protect each network from attacks by malicious software and users. For example, network security systems includes network sensors that are deployed on the edge of a protected network or within the network, and one or more network security servers in data communication with the network sensors. The sensors detect new assets attempting to gain access to the network and monitor assets that have been granted access to the network. The sensors report to the network security server(s) when new assets are attempting to gain access to the network, and report actions taken by the assets that are attempting to join the network or that are already on the network. The sensors can take actions with respect to an asset immediately, or can take actions with respect to the asset as determined by the network security server(s), depending upon a number of security related factors.
Often an attack on a network is preceded by, or begins with, a series of probes on the network. For example, an attacking device, such as malicious software or a bot, may attempt to connect to multiple different ports in a network to discover services. Multiple ports may exist on a particular host, and multiple hosts may serve a particular port. Accordingly, such probing actions are often burst-like in nature.
Current algorithms for probing detection rely on detecting N connection attempts (whether successful or not) in M seconds from a particular asset. The asset may be internal to the network, or may be an external asset that is attempting to or has gained access to the network. These algorithms work well for fast, noisy scanners. To avoid keeping too many tracking instantiations in the system, the duration M is usually in the order of seconds of minutes so that the security monitoring system does not need to track all sources for long periods of time (e.g., hours or even days). Another reason for maintaining an aggressive N/M ratio (i.e., high N, low M) is the sheer volume of "true positives" from fast-scans in many environments.
Thus, given the burst-like nature of the probing action, the relatively brief tracking time duration accomplishes dual goals—providing a time window that is long enough to detect probing attacks from an asset, and limiting the amount of memory and processing resources required to protect the network.
However, if the scanning by an attacking asset is intentionally slowed down to stealth levels (e.g., 3-4 probes over several hours), N/M thresholds for current scan detection algorithms are not triggered. For example, an unauthorized user may gain access to an asset on a company premises, and may manually seek out services on various ports for exploitation. The user, however, may issue the requests in a stealth manner, e.g., one or two requests every several hours. Likewise, a malicious agent may be installed on an asset and systematically seek out services on various ports for exploitation. The agent, however, may be programmed to issue the requests in the same stealth manner.


A purge procedure which is part of an injector, that may be used as part of a reductant delivery unit (RDU), where the RDU is part of a selective catalytic reduction system for injecting diesel exhaust fluid into an exhaust system, to control exhaust emissions. The RDU delivers a reductant carrier to the engine exhaust system. The purge process includes a control strategy to improve the quality of the purge cycle (i.e., increase the amount of fluid evacuated). The sequence of the purge event is adjusted in order to generate a strong vacuum in the fluid supply line and the injector—this enhances the efficiency of the purge by increasing the initial flow rates through the injector. However, upon opening the injector, the pressure inside the fluid path increases to a level just below the ambient pressure outside the injector, therefore the gas flow rate is substantially reduced.

New emissions legislation in Europe and North America is driving the implementation of new exhaust aftertreatment systems, particularly for lean-burn technologies such as compression-ignition (diesel) engines, and stratified-charge spark-ignited engines (usually with direct injection) that are operating under lean and ultra-lean conditions. Lean-burn engines exhibit high levels of nitrogen oxide emissions (NOx), that are difficult to treat in oxygen-rich exhaust environments characteristic of lean-burn combustion. Exhaust aftertreatment technologies are currently being developed that treat NOx under these conditions.
One of these technologies includes a catalyst that facilitates the reactions of ammonia (NH3) with the exhaust nitrogen oxides (NOx) to produce nitrogen (N2) and water (H2O). This technology is referred to as Selective Catalytic Reduction (SCR). Ammonia is difficult to handle in its pure form in the automotive environment, therefore it is customary with these systems to use a liquid aqueous urea solution, typically at a 32% concentration of urea (CO(NH2)2). The solution is referred to as AUS-32, and is also known under its commercial name of AdBlue. The urea is delivered to the hot exhaust stream typically through the use of an injector, and is transformed into ammonia prior to entry in the catalyst. More specifically, the urea is delivered to the hot exhaust stream and is transformed into ammonia in the exhaust after undergoing thermolysis, or thermal decomposition, into ammonia and isocyanic acid (HNCO). The isocyanic acid then undergoes a hydrolysis with the water present in the exhaust and is transformed into ammonia and carbon dioxide (CO2), the ammonia resulting from the thermolysis and the hydrolysis then undergoes a catalyzed reaction with the nitrogen oxides as described previously.
AUS-32, or AdBlue, has a freezing point of −11 C, and system freezing is expected to occur in cold climates. Since these fluids are aqueous, a volume expansion happens after the transition to the solid state upon freezing. This expanding ice can exert significant forces on any enclosed volumes, such as an injector, or fluid supply pipes. This expansion may cause damage to the injection unit, therefore, injection systems typically purge the injection unit when the engine shuts down to remove the fluid contained therein.
In the known system configurations, injector purging is used to remove fluid from the injector when the injector is not in use. It has been found that the efficiency of this method is not 100%, i.e., a certain amount of fluid remains in the injector unit. Although the amount of remaining fluid may not always be sufficient to risk damage to the injector upon freezing (expansion volume is available for the expanding ice), a risk remains that during engine hot soaks, the remaining fluid could be exposed to high temperature. This high temperature exposure could result in the decomposition of the AUS-32 which would also cause damage to the injection unit.
In other types of designs, it has been found that the remaining fluid tends to collect in the upper portion of the injector, in the volume between the filter and the inlet tube. Many types of injectors have O-rings which are used in combination with an injector cup to provide a sealing function, and prevent the remaining fluid from leaking. However, in some injectors, there is a potential leak path for the AUS-32 past the installed O-ring which cooperates with the injector cup to provide a sealing function. Although this sealing path created by the 0-ring is typically sufficient for liquids, it has been found that AUS-32 solution is prone to breaching seals of this type in the form of creeping urea crystals. At the fluid boundary layer, if there has been a minimal bypass of the sealing joint, fluid evaporates and leaves behind urea in its solid form. This provides a wicking path for more liquid urea solution, which establishes another boundary layer, evaporates, and leaves behind more solid urea. This creeping mechanism has often been observed on AUS-32 systems.
Accordingly, there exists a need for a way to purge an RDU, thereby sufficiently remove fluid from the RDU, and reduce or prevent the creeping mechanism as described above.

Purge system for reductant delivery unit for a selective catalytic reduction system


This invention relates to a plastics processing equipment cleaning compound comprising a hard outer shell made from a thermoplastic resin and a soft inner core containing a substituted pyrrolidone.

The thermoplastic resin industry processes approximately 7.75 million tons of thermoplastic resin per year. The machinery used to process these resins, injection molding machines and extruders, are subject to substantial wear and tear.
Specifically, injection molding machines and extruders operate at high temperatures, and usually, at some point during the resin processing cycle, under high pressures. In the injection molding process, the plastics are either melted into a viscous liquid, or softened to a putty like solid, and are forced, with pressure, into the mold. The mold is then usually allowed to cool, and the resin re-solidifies, only now the resin pellets are a solid mass the shape of the mold.
Extruders consist of a tube, or barrel, that contains an auger, or screw device. The barrel is heated, so that as the plastic pellets travel down the tube, through the action of the screw, they soften into a very flowable putty which exits the barrel through an opening that is the shape of the final product being produced. As the softened plastic exits the barrel, into the open air, the extruded shape instantly hardens.
When organic molecules are subjected to the temperatures (300.degree.-500.degree. F.) and pressures (up to several tons per square inch) associated with the extrusion and molding processes, there is some tendency for degradation of the molecules to occur. Although antioxidants and heat stabilizers are usually added to the plastics, small amounts of the plastic degrade and the residue particles plate out onto the surfaces of the feed lines and mold surfaces of injection molding machines, and onto the screw and barrel surfaces of extruders. Over time, the residue gradually builds up into a baked on blackish-brown film. The film eventually grows to a thickness where it begins to either interfere with the process causing deformation of parts or extrusions, or flakes off into the hot liquid or putty like plastics, and becomes a surface defect. When the carbon black film builds up to this critical thickness, where it becomes a major quality problem, the processing equipment has to be cleaned.
Other occasions that facilitate the cleaning of plastics processing equipment are when either a resin color change is made or when a resin with compounded ingredients and fillers, follows in a production run, a resin that contains different fillers or additives that should not be intermixed with the new resin system. A thorough cleaning of the injection molding machine or extruder is required, for both of these cases, before the next production run can begin.
Currently, a number of methods are employed to clean plastics processing equipment. One method is to disassemble the injection molding machine or extruder, and have the metal parts submerged into a hot caustic bath. Usually these baths contain some surfactants also. The caustic, over time, breaks up the carbon black build up. This cleaning process is the least desirable, of the potential cleaning methods, as the time involved with disassembling, dip cleaning, and re-assembling the equipment adds up to substantial loss of production time. Also, there are serious safety considerations whenever hot caustic baths are employed.
Another cleaning method employed, usually when color changes or compound changes occur, is to simply run the mold or extruder through multiple cycles using the new color or compound. The cycle is repeated with the new compound until parts are made or extrusion occurs which are free from the previous color or filler additives. The drawback of this cleaning alternative, is that the generation of large amounts of scrap can occur. Often times this scrap cannot be chopped up or re-ground for re-use, and ends up being landfilled.
Cleaning of extruders or injection molding machines, is also accomplished with specialty formulated resin based "cleaning compounds." These cleaning compounds are solid thermoplastic resins that contain surface active agents, abrasive fillers (usually glass or finely chopped fiberglass), and sometimes an amine compound such as monoethanolamine. The cleaning resins are put into the plastics processing equipment in the same manner as compound resins for making production parts. The equipment is operated as if normal production is occurring, except that: (a) the equipment is operated at a slower rate, and (b) the equipment is occasionally shut down. The slower operating rate allows for the abrasive fillers to "grind" away at any hardened build-up of carbon, and the occasional stopping of the equipment gives the monoethanolamine a chance to work at dissolving carbon build-up. Carbon deposits are normally susceptible to alkaline or basic agents, such as monoethanolamine. Cleaning compositions are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,139,694; 5,443,768; 5,427,623; 5,397,498; 5,395,456; 5,298,078; 5,238,608; 5,236,514; 5,124,383; 5,108,645; 5,087,653; and 4,838,945. Specifically, Itoh (U.S. Pat. No. 5,298,078) teaches the melting of polystyrene and polyethylene and addition of alkaline salts and glass fibers as cleaning ingredients. Kmiec (U.S. Pat. No. 5,139,694) and Obama (U.S. Pat. No. 5,124,383) teach the melting of polyethylene resin (substituted pyrrolidones are not soluble in polyethylene or polypropylene) and then adding in abrasive inorganic fillers and polyethylene waxes and fatty acid amide waxes. Abrams (U.S. Pat. No. 5,395,456) teaches the melting of polymers and inclusion of calcium carbonate abrasive, and rosins as cleaning ingredients.
Scheilbelhoffer (U.S. Pat. No. 5,443,768) and Obama (U.S. Pat. No. 5,108,645) both disclose the melting of polymers and the inclusion of hard methacrylate and acrylate compounds as cleaning media. Also, Ishida (U.S. Pat. No. 5,397,498) discloses the melting of a thermoplastic and inclusion of polyalkylene oxide based polyol cleaning agents.
An alternative method for making an extruder cleaning compound, is taught by Schumann (U.S. Pat. No. 5,427,623)(U.S. '623). U.S. '623 teaches a method for making an Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene (ABS) powder (or resin) cleaning compound which contains water. The ABS cleaning resin is produced by taking an ABS emulsion and separating the ABS polymer from the emulsion by adding an ionic salt to the emulsion, in large enough quantities to cause the emulsion to break.
A major drawback to these cleaning compounds is that the resins themselves tend to be abrasive in nature. Acrylate based resins that require high temperatures for melting, to flow state, are normally used, and can be very abrasive on the metal surfaces of the equipment. This extra wear on the surface can detract from the useful life of the equipment. Another drawback of some of these cleaning resins is that they contain monoethanolamine which has a high degree of toxicity associated with it. During that portion of the cleaning cycle when the processing equipment is shut down, large quantities of the amine compound vapors are emitted from the hot machines.
An improvement in the art of cleaning plastics processing equipment is needed. The process should not require the disassembling of equipment to accomplish proper cleaning, and should not require the use of highly alkaline compounds or abrasive resins.
The present invention is just such an improvement in the art. Applicants have surprisingly discovered a novel plastics processing equipment cleaning compound comprising a bead or pellet having a hard thermoplastic resin outer core and a soft inner core containing alkyl or alkoxy substituted pyrrolidones. Applicants' novel cleaning compound is added directly into extruders and injection molding machines in the same way that resins are fed during routine production, eliminating the need for disassembling the machines. As the cleaning compound is melted and forced through an extruder or injection molding machine's interior, it softens and removes carbon build up and hardened resins from the surfaces of the machine's barrel and screw.

Substituted pyrrolidone plasticized thermoplastic resin useful as a plastic processing equipment cleaning compound