A training bat has a central rod extending through the longitudinal length of the bat. A knob may be located at a proximal end of the bat. A handle located immediately distal to the knob may slide along the length of the rod. A cone section may be located distal to the handle. The knob and cone section may limit the longitudinal sliding of the handle. A barrel section may be located distal to the cone section. If the barrel section includes an interior chamber, the distal end of the barrel section may include a removable cap. Weights, springs, pins and other objects may be located inside the barrel section. Electrical components or other devices may also be included in the cone section, barrel section or cap. The handle may include an acoustic chamber and an amplifying chamber to provide for emission of a sound when the bat is swung. The acoustic chamber and amplifying chamber may also incorporate safety features.

Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to devices and methods for training athletes. More particularly, the invention relates to devices, systems and methods to improving an athlete's swing of a baseball bat or other device.
Description of the Related Art
Many devices and techniques have been developed to improve athletic performance of baseball players. Bat swing practice means of various kinds have been conventionally proposed and used. For example, there is known a bat swing practice means in which a weight having a predetermined weight value is slidably placed on a bat-shape shaft body to be swung.
In the past, a variety of exercise or warm-up devices have been provided for use by baseball players. Persons who play baseball, softball, and similar sports, often use various devices and methods to improve their batting skills. For example, players may utilize a plurality of bats, a single bat with weighted collars or clamps and the like attached thereto, permanently weighted bats (e.g. hollowed out bats with solid or flowable weight materials included therewithin), or a bat with attached vanes or the like to effect aerodynamic drag. Such devices and methods are employed to facilitate general warming-up, stretching muscles, and developing the muscles used for batting, as well as to improve a player's bat speed, reaction skill, bat control, and the like. Swinging a plurality of bats can be awkward, and there is a limit as to how many bats a person can swing safely and/or comfortably.
Unlike power hitting, in which a bat is swung at a ball with immediate acceleration for high speed so as to gain maximum momentum and great impact upon contact with a pitched ball, contact hitting requires a more controlled swing in which the bat is drawn more slowly toward contact with the ball, with minimal acceleration, and the wrists of the batter are turned just prior to making contact with the ball so as quickly to accelerate, or "snap", the bat for accurate placement of the hit ball. While many training devices have been proposed for increasing proficiency in power hitting, these devices are not suited to learning the controlled swing necessary in contact hitting, and especially in connection with hitting in soft ball play.
Further, none of these existing devices assist an athlete and/or trainer in identifying problems with an athletes bat swing such as, for example, the amount of twisting done to the bat during a swing, or whether a wrist is actuated at the proper time and to the proper extent to optimize performance.
Further, none of the existing devices assist an athlete in learning to naturally assume proper stance and posture, or to maintain proper stance and posture while simultaneously minimizing negative twisting, or rolling of the bat during a swing.
In view of the foregoing, there is a need to provide means by which and athlete and trainer may isolate and identify many distinct aspects of an athlete's posture, stance and kinetics as they relate to baseball performance.


A two motor electric drive hybrid transmission for a vehicle. The two motor electric drive hybrid transmission allows both electric motors to provide propulsive force during engine on and engine off operations when desired. The two motor electric drive hybrid transmission also provides improved and flexible operating configurations.

Many current hybrid transmissions feature two electric motors coupled to an internal combustion engine. Such hybrid transmissions provide vehicle operation while the internal combustion engine is both on and off. However, when driving with the engine off, typical hybrid transmissions utilize only one electric motor to provide propulsion while the other electric motor spins to allow the engine to remain stationary. This limits vehicle performance during electric operating modes. In addition, many typical transmissions and hybrid transmissions feature multiple and complex planetary gear sets that increase operating losses within the transmission. In hybrid transmissions, the electric motors must be properly sized to provide sufficient propulsive power while still meeting the packaging size requirements of the transmission. As larger motors are capable of providing greater propulsive force, there is an inherent tradeoff between utilizing an adequately powered motor and meeting the transmission packaging requirements. What is needed, therefore, is a hybrid transmission that utilizes one or both electric motors as desired while reducing the number of planetary gear sets in order to improve transmission efficiency.

Two motor electric drive hybrid transmission


A new cultivar of Perovskia plant named ‘LISSLITT’, characterized by its compact plant habit, its foliage that is highly dissected and silver-green in color, and its stiff, upright flowering stems with an abundance of flowers.

The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Lamium plant, botanically known as Perovskia atriplicifolia 'LISSLITT' and will be referred to hereinafter by its cultivar name, 'LISSLITT'. The new cultivar of Perovskia is a hardy herbaceous perennial grown for landscape use.
'LISSLITT' resulted from a breeding project by the Inventor at his nursery in Liss, Hampshire, United Kingdom with the goal of developing a more compact cultivar with stiff, upright flowering stems. The Inventor self-pollinated Perovskia atriplicifolia 'Blue Spire' (not patented) in 1999, the collected seeds were sown in 2001 and the new cultivar was selected as a single unique plant from the resulting seedlings in 2002.
Asexual reproduction of the new cultivar was first accomplished by the Inventor by means of stem cuttings in 2003 in Liss, Hampshire, United Kingdom. The characteristics of the new cultivar have been found to be stable and reproduced true to type in successive generations.


A method for quantitative evaluation of emulsion stability using Critical Electric Field (CEF) determinations over a range of conditions, such as a range of temperatures, demulsifier compositions, or demulsifier concentrations. The method includes determining the CEF for a series of emulsions that differ substantially only in their internal phase volume ratio. A plot of CEF values as a function of the inverse of the internal phase volume ratio is characterized by a linear slope. Using the slope, a theoretical CEF value can be determined by extrapolating to where the inverse of the internal phase volume ratio is about one. The slope for a given emulsion series is associated with the relative energy barrier to flocculation and the theoretical critical electric field for a given emulsion series is associated with the relative energy barrier to coalescence. Comparative studies are performed using this method.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to emulsion stability evaluation and the development of chemical demulsifiers.
2. Background of the Related Art
The inevitable creation and subsequent resolution of water-in-oil emulsions during the production and processing of crude oils are of significant importance in the oil field industry. These emulsions, which could typically be any combination of water-in-oil, oil-in-water, or complex emulsions, are very diverse in their nature and stability. The majority of oil field emulsions are resolved by the application of chemical demulsifiers in special processes under specific conditions. The stability of crude oil emulsions is influenced by a large number of variables and chemical demulsifiers are therefore specifically developed for each application, to achieve optimum economic efficiency.
Emulsion stability of water-in-oil emulsions encountered in the oil field industry can be evaluated using various methods, for example, the determination of droplet size and distribution by various methods, determining the amount of water resolved as a second phase, moisture analysis of the oil phase as well as more sophisticated methods such as interfacial rheology.
The use of Critical Electric Field (CEF) has recently been used to compare the stability of water-in-oil emulsions. With the CEF technique, a sample of water-in-oil emulsion is injected between two parallel electrode plates. A direct current voltage is applied between the two electrodes and increased in incremental steps, with continuous monitoring of the conductivity or electrical current through the oil sample. In response to the increasing applied electric field, the water droplets tend to align themselves to form agglomerated columns of droplets, which form a conducting bridge once a critical voltage (or electric field) has been reached. The strength of the electric field at which the sample shows a sharp increase in conductivity (increase in current through sample, between the two electrode plates) is recorded as the "Critical Electric Field". By this method, relative emulsion stability is quantitatively compared in terms of the CEF-value and expressed in units of kV cm−1.
Demulsification processes may be described in terms of a few basic steps. Most often, these steps will include flocculation, coalescence and sedimentation. In some cases, aggregation or coagulation are preferred above flocculation to indicate specific qualities or properties of a pair or group of droplets. However, the term "flocculation," as used herein, is considered to be the reversible formation of a droplet pair or cluster, with virtually no change in the total oil/water interface area and is intended to encompass, without limitation, aggregation, coagulation, and agglomeration. Coalescence is defined here as the complete association of two droplets to form a single droplet by rupturing the thin film that separated the two droplets. Sedimentation implies settling of the coalesced droplets or flocculated group of droplets under gravitational influence. Large droplet sizes, high differences in density and low viscosity of the external phase favours sedimentation of droplets, which can proceed along three main routes. First, individual droplets can settle without any flocculation or coalescence. Second, individual droplets can flocculate or coagulate to settle as flocculated pairs or clusters of droplets. Third, flocculated pairs or groups of droplets can coalesce to settle as a single larger drop or group of enlarged drops.
Stokes law dictates that the settling rate of a spherical droplet will be proportional to the density difference between the drop and the continuous phase as well as proportional to the square of the drop radius. This implies that the settling of a droplet aggregate will be faster than an individual droplet, but slower than its equivalent, single coalesced droplet.
In reality, any demulsification process will be a complex combination of steps and will be determined by a large number of variables. However, for practical purposes, emulsion stability is considered to depend on the degree of flocculation and coalescence. Since sedimentation can also proceed from the flocculated pair, both flocculation and coalescence can act as parallel pathways to sedimentation. In the case of a gravitational settling process, the rate of demulsification (or mechanism) is not practically controlled or limited by the coalescence process as the only route to emulsion resolution. The stability of water-in-oil emulsions, as observed under conditions of gravitational settling, therefore generally depends on the ability or tendency of the water drops to form bigger droplets by flocculation and subsequent coalescence
The majority of oil field emulsions are thermodynamically unstable. Thus, emulsion stability could in essence be described as a kinetic phenomenon, where emulsion stability is an expression used to describe the rate of phase separation for a given emulsion. Water-in-oil emulsions with high water settling rates are referred to as unstable emulsions, whereas emulsions with settling rates well outside the time domain of the observation, would be called stable emulsions.

Quantitative evaluation of emulsion stability based on critical electric field measurements


The invention provides monoclonal antibodies and other binding agents to human cytochrome P450 2C19 having advantageous properties, including capacity substantially to inhibit enzyme activity of human cytochrome P450 2C19 and lack of specific binding to other human cytochrome P450s. The binding agents of the invention are useful inter alia in methods for screening drugs for metabolism by cytochrome P450 2C19, and in methods of measuring P450 2C19 levels in individuals relative to P450 2C19 levels in a control population.

The human cytochrome P450s collectively metabolize a multitude of drugs and non-drug xenobiotics including toxins, mutagens and carcinogens as well as endobiotics such as steroids, prostaglandins and fatty acids. Drug metabolism in human liver is primarily catalyzed by twelve major microsomal P450 enzymes having different substrate and product specificities and are heterogeneously distributed in tissues (Ioannides, 1996, CYTOCHROMES P450 METABOLIC AND TOXICOLOGICAL ASPECTS. CRC Press, New York) (Rendic and DeCarlo, 1997, Drug Metab Rev 29:413-580). P450-catalyzed metabolism of drugs and non-drug xenobiotics is a key element in drug disposition and may be responsible for certain adverse drug reactions, chemical toxicity and immunotoxicity (Ioannides, 1996, CYTOCHROMES P450 METABOLIC AND TOXICOLOGICAL ASPECTS. CRC Press, New York).
The human cytochrome P450 2C sub-family consists of four isoforms 2C8, 2C9, 2C18 and 2C19. The three major alleles of P450 2C9 are the wild type 2C9Arg144(*1), 2C9Cys144(*2), 2C9Ile→Leu359(*3) (Haining et al. 1996, Miners and Birkett, 1998, Clin Pharmacol 45:525-538; hereinafter referred to as 2C9*1, 2C9*2 and 2C9*3 respectively). The 2C isoforms are collectively among the most important human enzymes responsible for the metabolism of a wide variety of drugs including taxol (Rahman et al., 1994, Cancer Res 54:5543-5546) phenyloin, tolbutamide, S-warfarin, losartan, S-mephenyloin and diazepam (Miners and Burkett, 1998, Clin Pharmacol 45:525-538).
Monoclonal antibodies ("MAbs") are reagents (Yelton and Scharff, 1981, Annu Rev Biochem 50:657-680) that have proved to be of great value for the precise identification, measurement and functional characterization of each P450 isoform (Gelboin, 1993, Pharmacol Rev 45:413-453). The MAbs are derived from potentially immortal hybridomas and are specific and highly inhibitory to the enzyme activity of the target P450 and thus are powerful reagents for "reaction phenotyping" i.e., for measuring the metabolic contribution of each of the multiple P450s to a substrates metabolism (Gelboin, 1993, Pharmacol Rev 45:413-453)
MAbs specific to seven individual major human liver (HLM) P450 isoforms were described viz., 1A1, (Fujino et al., 1982, Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 79:3682-3686), 1A2 (Yang et al., 1998, Pharmacogenetics 8:375-382), 2A6 (Sai et al., 1999, Pharmacogenetics 9:229-237), 2B6 (Yang et al., 1998, Biochem Pharmacol 55:1633-1640), 2D6 (Gelboin et al., 1997, Pharmacogenetics 7:469-477), 2E1 (Gelboin et al., 1996, Chem Res Toxicl 9:1023-1030) and 3A4/5 (Gelboin et al., 1995, Biochem Pharmacol 50:1841-1850) and to the entire 2C sub-family (Yang et al., 1998, Biochem Pharmacol 55:889-896; Park et al., 1989, Biochem Pharmacol 38(18):3067-3074). The MAbs measured the contribution of each target P450 to the metabolism of a variety of examined drugs (Yang et al., 1999, Drug Metab Dispos 27:102-109; Gelboin et al., 1999, Trends Pharmacol Sci 20(11):432-438). Many of the MAbs can also be used to measure the tissue P450 protein content by immunoblot analysis.
Genetic polymorphisms of cytochromes P450 result in phenotypically-distinct subpopulations that differ in their ability to perform biotransformations of particular drugs and other chemical compounds. These phenotypic distinctions have important implications for selection of drugs. For example, a drug that is safe when administered to most humans may cause toxic side-effects in an individual suffering from a defect in an enzyme required for detoxification of the drug. Alternatively, a drug that is effective in most humans may be ineffective in a particular subpopulation because of lack of a enzyme required for conversion of the drug to a metabolically active form. Further, individuals lacking a biotransformation enzyme are often susceptible to cancers from environmental chemicals due to inability to detoxify the chemicals (Eichelbaum et al., 1992, Toxicology Letters 64/65, 155-122). Accordingly, it is important to identify individuals who are deficient in a particular P450 enzyme, so that drugs known or suspected of being metabolized by the enzyme are not used, or used only with special precautions (e.g., reduced dosage, close monitoring) in such individuals. Identification of such individuals may indicate that such individuals be monitored for the onset of cancers.
Existing methods of identifying deficiencies in patients are not entirely satisfactory. Patient metabolic profiles are often assessed with a bioassay after a probe drug administration. Poor metabolizers (PM) exhibit physiologic accumulation of unmodified drug and have a high metabolic ratio of probe drug to metabolite. This bioassay has a number of limitations: Lack of patient cooperation, adverse reactions to probe drugs, and inaccuracy due to coadministration of other pharmacological agents or disease effects. See, e.g., Gonzalez et al., 1994, Clin. Pharmacokin. 26, 59-70. Genetic assays by RFLP (restriction fragment length polymorphism), ASO PCR (allele specific oligonucleotide hybridization to PCR products or PCR using mutant/wild-type specific oligo primers), SSCP (single stranded conformation polymorphism) and TGGE/DGGE (temperature or denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis), MDE (mutation detection electrophoresis) are time-consuming, technically demanding and limited in the number of gene mutation sites that can be tested at one time.
A complication in patient drug choice is that most drugs have not been characterized for their metabolism by P450 2C family and other cytochromes P450. Without knowing which cytochrome(s) P450 is/are responsible for metabolizing an individual drug, an assessment cannot be made for the adequacy of a patient's P450 profile. For such drugs, there is a risk of adverse effects if the drugs are administered to poor metabolizers.
Monoclonal antibodies that specifically bind to 2C family members and inhibit its activity, if available, could be used to screen drugs for their metabolism by 2C and/or identify 2C poor metabolizers by simple bioassays, thereby overcoming the problems in prior complicated methods discussed above. However, such monoclonal antibodies represent, at best, a small subset of the total repertoire of antibodies to human cytochrome P450 2C, and have not hitherto been isolated. Although in polyclonal sera, many classes of antibody may contribute to inhibition of enzyme activity of P450 2C family members as a result of multiple antibodies in sera binding to the same molecule of enzyme, only a small percentage of these, if any, can inhibit as a monoclonal. A monoclonal antibody can inhibit only by binding in such a manner that it alone block or otherwise perturb the active site of an enzyme. The existence and representation of monoclonal antibodies with inhibitory properties thus depend on many unpredictable factors. Among them are the size of the active site in an enzyme, whether the active site is immunogenic, and whether there are any sites distal to the active site that can exert inhibition due to stearic effects of antibody binding. The only means of obtaining antibodies with inhibitory properties is to screen large numbers of hybridoma until one either isolates the desired antibody or abandons the task through failure.
Notwithstanding these difficulties, the present invention provides inter alia monoclonal antibodies that specifically bind to human cytochrome P450 2C family members and inhibit their activity.

Agents that bind to and inhibit human cytochrome P450 2C19


An exemplary method includes a computing system providing a user interface to a user, populating a listing accessible via the user interface with a set of graphical icons that represent a set of computing objects that are associated with a customer of a service provider and hosted by the service provider, detecting a selection by the user via the user interface of one or more graphical icons from the set of graphical icons populated within the listing, and providing a graphical representation of one or more relationships between the customer and one or more of the computing objects represented by the one or more selected graphical icons for presentation to the user via the user interface. Corresponding systems and methods are also described.

Service providers often host physical and logical computing objects for their customers. For example, a service provider may host physical servers, cabinets, and/or chasses for certain customers. Additionally or alternatively, the service provider may host Internet Protocol (IP) networks, subnetworks, and/or Virtual Local Area Networks (VLANs) for certain customers.
Unfortunately, conventional object management and/or rendering tools may be unable to provide service providers and/or their customers with flexible graphical representations of the different relationships between the customers and their computing objects. As a result, these conventional object management and/or rendering tools may be somewhat ineffective at facilitating rapid visualization of the different relationships between the customers and their computing objects and/or rapid modification of certain operations of such computing objects.

Methods and systems for providing graphical representations of relationships between customers and computing objects


A foaming composition containing one or more fluorinated surfactants and or more alkylpolyglycoside hemisulphosuccinate surfactants of formula (I) is described, ##STR1## wherein R is a straight or branched chain alkyl radical with 6-18 carbon atoms, S is a sugar residue, one of R.sub.1, and R.sub.2 is a SO.sub.3 M group, and the other a hydrogen atom, M is an alkali metal, preferably sodium, X is an integer of 1 to 10, preferably of 1 to 4. The foaming composition is useful as a fire-extinguishing foam.

It is well known to employ foaming or emulsifier compositions based on surface-active agents for extinguishing fires of liquid solvents. These emulsifiers, known as fire-extinguishing emulsifiers, are generally thrown forward onto the fire in the form of a foam obtained by mixing them under pressure with water.
A particular class of fire-extinguishing emulsifiers is known under the designation of AFFF, for "Aqueous Film-Forming Foam" or "Agent Forming a Floating Film". AFFF compositions enable fires caused by liquid hydrocarbons to be rapidly extinguished. AFFF emulsifiers contain fluorine-containing surface-active agents which have a very low value of surface tension. As a result, these surfactants make it possible to produce a foam which, on separation, forms an aqueous film floating above the surface of the hydrocarbon. This aqueous film makes it possible to extinguish the fire and to prevent a possible reignition of the hydrocarbon.
However, emulsifiers of AFFF type, while being effective for extinguishing fires due to hydrocarbon liquids, are not effective in the case of fires caused by polar solvents, especially alcohols, ketones and esters of low molecular weights. In fact, with polar solvents of this type the foams obtained from AFFF emulsifiers are rapidly dissolved and destroyed.
A particular class of emulsifiers has been developed for fighting fires produced by such a polar solvent. These emulsifiers include fluorine-containing surfactants and a water-soluble polymer which precipitates in contact with the polar solvent, with the result that it forms a protective layer between said polar solvent and the foam. These emulsifiers are known under the designation A4P, for "Agent Producing a Multipurpose Protective Film" or under the designation ARAFFF, for "Alcohol Resistant Aqueous Film-Forming Foam". It is the designation ARAFFF that is employed in the present specification.
Emulsifiers of ARAFFF type are effective both on fires caused by hydrocarbon solvents and polar solvents.
In addition to the fluorine-containing surfactants, that is to say surfactants which have a perfluoroalkyl residue, emulsifiers of AFFF and ARAFFF type include surfactants not containing fluorine.
Thus, international applications WO 91/01160 and WO 92/15371 describe fire-extinguishing emulsifiers of AFFF and ARAFFF type containing nonionic surfactants of the alkylpolyglycoside type. The foremost advantage of these surfactants of alkylpolyglycoside type is that they allow a decrease in the concentration of the fluorine-containing surfactants in the emulsifiers of AFFF type. They also make it possible to reduce the content of water-soluble polymer in emulsifiers of ARAFFF type.
However, the Applicant Company has been able to ascertain that surfactants of alkylpolyglycoside type have the disadvantage of having to be used in combination with another, third, surfactant not containing fluorine with a view to obtaining a short emulsifier expansion time. The expansion time is the time needed for the emulsifier mixed with water to form the foam used for extinguishing fires.
It has also been ascertained that the foams formed from fire-extinguishing emulsifiers of AFFF and ARAFFF type including alkylpolyglycosides, even when the latter are used in combination with other surfactants, are relatively rapidly destroyed once the fire is extinguished. Risks of fire restarting are then possible.

Foaming composition and use thereof as a fire-extinguishing foam

Societe D'Exploitation de Produits Pour Les Industries Chimiques - SEPPIC


Isotopically-stabilized tetronimide compounds comprising one or more deuterium atoms, derivatives, and intermediates, thereof, including methods for their synthesis, pharmaceutical compositions thereof, and methods of using these compounds to interact with target molecules in cell-free samples, cell- and tissue-based assays, animal models, and in a subject are disclosed. One aspect relates to molecules that modulate the expression or catalytic activity of aspartyl (asparaginyl) β-hydroxylase (ASPH) within or on the surface of a cell. Other aspects of the invention relate to use of the molecules disclosed herein to diagnose, ameliorate, or treat cell proliferation disorders and related diseases. Related aspects include uses of the compounds to modulate the activity of viruses, as anti-hyperlipidemia agents, and as agents to ameliorate or treat thrombosis and related cardiovascular and metabolic disorders.

Aspartyl(asparaginyl)-β-hydroxylase (ASPH) is an iron-dependent dioxygenase that catalyzes the hydroxylation of β carbons of aspartic acid and asparagine residues in calcium binding Epidermal Growth Factor (cbEG F)-like domains of a variety of proteins, including Notch and Notch ligand homologs (Dinchuk, Focht et al. 2002) extracellular matrix proteins, and low density lipoprotein (LDL) receptors. ASPH was first observed to be involved in the hydroxylation of a specific aspartic acid residue in the blood coagulation cascade proteins (Drakenberg, Femlund et al. 1983), where the hydroxylated residue is underlined in the consensus sequence CX[D/N]X4[Y/F]XC (SEQ ID NO: 1). The role of the hydroxylated residue is presently unknown, but the sole known crystal structure with a beta-hydroxylated asparagine (Crystal structure deposited as 5JZZ in 2016, but annotated by Pfeffer et al, as to be published).
ASPH is generally classified as a peptide-aspartate beta-dioxygenase (EC 184.108.40.206), a member of the alpha-ketoglutarate-dependent hydroxylases superfamily, which catalyzes the following chemical reaction, facilitated by iron as a cofactor.peptide-L-aspartate+2-oxoglutarate+O2⇄peptide-3-hydroxy-L-aspartate+succinate+CO2  (Reaction 1)
ASPH is not normally expressed in adult cells (Lavaissiere, Jia et al. 1996), but is expressed during invasion of the uterine wall by trophoblasts during development of the placenta (Gundogan, Elwood et al. 2007). ASPH is overexpressed in a variety of tumors, including hepatocellular, cholangiocarcinoma, gastric cancer, pancreatic cancer, non-small cell lung cancer, glioblastoma multiform, osteosarcoma, cervical cancer, ovarian cancer and breast cancer (Yang, Song et al. 2010), and enhances signaling in the Notch pathway (Cantarini, de la Monte et al. 2006).
FIG. 1 sets forth an illustration showing the Activation of Notch Signaling Pathway by ASPH. FIG. 2 (Panels A-H, plus domain key) and FIG. 3 (Panels A-G, plus domain key) both set forth illustrations showing the Locations of Epitopes of Interest on ASPH.
Known and computationally predicted ASPH substrates are illustrated in FIG. 4 and FIG. 5. Prediction of ASPH substrates is based upon the protein possessing A) a cbEGF domain and B) the consensus sequence CX[D/N]X4[Y/F]XC (SEQ ID NO: 1). Of particular interest are nearly all of the Notch signaling proteins, not only including the receptors Notch1-4, but many of the known ligands such as Jagged1&2 and DII1&4, but also known Notch pathway modulator human homologues of Crumbs from Drosophila. ASPH is known to hydroxylate lipid receptor proteins, including Lrp1. Lrp1 is known to have an interaction with Wnt5a of the canonical Wnt signaling pathway (El Asmar, Terrand et al. 2016). ASPH substrate Gas6 is the ligand of the Tyro3, Axel and Mer (TAM) kinases, which have been implicated in cancer (Wu, Ma et al. 2018). Known ASPH substrates including the fibrillins are involved in the release of TGF-beta, which is implicated in cancer (Furler, Nixon et al. 2018). In addition to cancer, ASPH hydroxylated substrates are found in nearly all of the blood coagulation proteins involved in thrombosis (see panel D in FIG. 2), and many of the proteins involved in lipid uptake including LDLR, VLDLR and Lrp1 (see panel B in FIG. 2) and cholesterol homeostasis. Thus, ASPH expression is expected to have a cascade of effects, but may have particular value in the treatment of cancer, as well as thrombosis and lipid/cholesterol associated cardiovascular diseases. ASPH expression may be correlated with viral infection, particularly with hepatitis B, D and human papillomavirus, and may enhance viral replication either directly, by enhancing cellular proliferation, or by activating proteins (such as URG11/VWCE) that are specifically upregulated by the virus.
ASPH is known to contain multiple phosphorylation sites (Tong, Gao et al. 2013), including T748. Phosphorylation of ASPH is known to alter the expression and function of ASPH (Borgas, Gao et al. 2015), and plays a potential role in migration and tissue invasion of hepatocellular carcinoma (Borgas, Gao et al. 2015). Antibodies selective for ASPH phosphorylation state should be useful in the diagnosis of cancer and distinguishing ASPH expressed in normal cells compared to ASPH expressed in tumor cells.
Other strategies for modulating the expression or activity of ASPH include synthesis and testing of small molecule compounds that inhibit the activity of the enzyme (Aihara, Huang et al. 2014), a cellular approach relying on use of dendritic cells (Noda, Shimoda et al. 2012), and an approach directed to the synthesis and testing of vaccines against ASPH and related polypeptides (Iwagami, Casulli et al. 2017).
U.S. Pat. No. 9,771,356 discloses ASPH modulating compounds that possess a stereocenter that is easily racemized, which cannot be isolated as pure enantiomers under experimental conditions. While deuterated versions of existing drug products are known (Timmins, G. S., 2014), the use of deuterium to limit racemization of the tetronimide ring core, permitting stable isolation of pure enantiomers as disclosed herein, is surprising and unexpected. The deuterated versions of many tetronimide compounds disclosed herein have superior chemical and drug product properties, compared to the properties of undeuterated tetronimide compounds, precursor compounds, intermediates, and related derivatives.


A surgical instrument assembly and method particularly for grasping and displacing a large tubular organ such as a colonic section during a laparoscopic procedure comprises an elongate rigid tubular member, an elongate rod having at least a portion slidably inserted in the tubular member, and two or four prongs connected to the rod at a distal end thereof. The prongs each have an arcuate configuration when ejected from a distal end of the tubular member by a distally directed motion of the rod. Upon ejection, the prongs form a substantially C-shaped clamping member with a pair of grasping jaws. The prongs are flattened out and pressed towards one another when the distal end of the tubular member is shifted over a proximal portion of the prongs.

This invention relates to a surgical instrument assembly and an associated surgical technique.
During the performance of laparoscopic operations, it is frequently necessary to move an organ such as an intestine or an artery in order to reach an underlying organ. Such large tubular organs cannot be easily manipulated in laparoscopic surgery. Existing instruments such as grasping forceps have operating tips (e.g., jaws) which are basically too small to grasp a colon or major artery and move the organ without injury thereto.


An InP-based opto-electronic integrated circuit including an active layer having one or more quantum wells (36, 38). According to the invention, a barrier layer (34) of AlGaInAs is formed, preferably between the quantum wells and the substrate (30) to prevent the migration of species from the substrate and lower InP layers that tend to shift the emission wavelengths of the quantum wells to shorter wavelengths, i.e., a blue shift. The barrier layer can be patterned so that some areas of the quantum wells exhibit blue shifting to a shorter wavelength while other areas retain their longer wavelength during annealing.

Many advanced electronic and opto-electronic integrated circuits are based on compound semiconductors such as the III-V semiconductors. Gallium arsenide (GaAs) is the basis of a fairly well developed technology; indium phosphide (InP) and related materials are not so well developed but have received much attention, especially for active opto-electronic devices, such as lasers and optical modulators, operating in the 1.55 .mu.m band of optical wavelengths which is of great interest for integration with silica optical fibers. Indium gallium arsenide (InGaAs) is often considered to be an InP-based material because alloys with InP can be made that have little change in lattice constant while providing bandgap control of the commercially important part of the optical spectrum around 1550 nm.
A fundamental advantage of III-V semiconductors is that modern film growth techniques, such as organo-metallic chemical vapor deposition (OMCVD) and molecular beam epitaxy (MBE), enable the epitaxial growth of thin films with nearly arbitrary III-V compositions, assuming equality of Group-III cations and Group-V anions, thus allowing many important semiconductor characteristics such as electronic bandgap to be freely engineered. Similar freedom is available with II-VI semiconductors. An important structure that is so enabled is the single or multiple quantum-well (MQW) structure much used for lasers and modulators, an example of which is illustrated schematically in FIG. 1 with the horizontal axis representing the epitaxial growth direction and the vertical axis representing the electronic bandgap for the different materials. For example, an electronic diode structure includes an n-type InP layer 10 and a p-type InP layer 12 sandwiching an undoped active layer 14 comprising alternating thin layers of InGaAs wells 16 and InGaAsP barriers 18. The wells and barriers 16 and 18 are thin enough, usually less than 10 nm, that one or more quantum mechanical valence states 20 and conduction states 22 form within the wells 16. The number of quantum wells may be one or more.
The effective bandgap between the valence and conduction states 20, 22 within the wells 16 depend both upon the well composition and the thickness of the well. Although the compositions are generally chosen to be lattice matched to the InP substrate, a controlled amount of strain can be introduced into the wells and barriers to further control the electronic band structure. The result is an active layer 14 having a high density of narrow electronic states, assuming the wells 14 have been well fabricated, with the effective bandgap that determines optical characteristics being easily varied. In a typical opto-electronic device, electrical leads are connected to the two InP layers 10, 12 and an unillustrated optical waveguiding structure is formed along the active layer 14 in the directions perpendicular to the illustrated z-direction so as to confine a major portion of the optical wave within the active layer 14 to there interact with the electrically controlled carriers.
However, the process of forming the optical confinement structure tends to degrade the multi quantum-well structure. A typical though simplified buried heterostructure MQW laser is illustrated in cross section in FIG. 2. The vertical planar structure of FIG. 1 is grown and then patterned and etched so as to form a ridge extending along the y-direction and having a finite width along the x-direction of the active layer 14 including the multiple quantum wells. Thereafter, a semi-insulating InP 24 is epitaxially regrown around the ridge to reduce the contrast of the refractive index of the active layer 14 relative to that of the surrounding material and to confine the biasing current to the active layer 14. The structure shown in FIG. 2 is simplified for ease of presentation. More layers may be included to, for example, better confine the light to the core, but the illustrated structure is sufficient to explain the effect of the invention. More realistic structures for buried heterostructure lasers are described by Odagawa et al. in "High-Speed Operation of Strained InGaAs/InGaAsP MQW Lasers Under Zero-Bias Condition," IEEE Journal of Quantum Electronics, vol. 29, 1993, pp. 1682-1686 and by Aoki et al. in "Monolithic integration of DFB lasers and electroabsorption modulators using in-plane quantum energy control of MQW structures, International Journal of High Speed Electronics and Systems, vol. 5, 1994, pp. 67-90.
The regrowth of the fairly thick semi-insulating layer 24 imposes a large thermal budget on the already fabricated quantum wells. Even the after grown upper cladding layer 12 incurs a significant thermal budget. OMCVD of these materials is typically done between 625.degree. and 650.degree. C. so that temperatures between 600.degree. and 700.degree. C. should be anticipated. Even higher temperatures may be required for explicit annealing. The thermal treatment of the quantum wells in these temperature ranges has been generally observed to shift the bandgap between the well states to the blue. That is, the effective bandgap of the well states anneal to larger bandgap energy. Also, the potential wells tend to lose their rectangular shape. The structure described by Aoki et al., ibid., includes both lasers and modulators having different well thickness and involves two regrowths, one for the upper, p-type InP layer and another for the semi-insulating InP. Thus significant blue shifting is expected, but the amount of blue shift will differ between the laser and modulator because of the differing well thicknesses.
The size of the blue shift has been observed to shift the photoluminescence peak by about 10 to 40 nm at devices designed for 1550 nm. However, the shift varies across a wafer and from wafer to wafer. A shift in the wavelength peak of the photoluminescent emission presents a problem in fabricating lasers and modulators since, for example, optimum performance in distributed feedback lasers requires the wavelength of the gain peak to match the grating pitch. In the case of modulators, a variation of the blue shift between different ones of the multiple quantum wells will produce a less steep change of absorption with wavelength, thereby degrading the modulator performance.
Several suggestions have been made to reduce the blue shift. One entails the use of substrates with high dislocation densities, the dislocation pipes acting as gettering sites for the species, speculated to be phosphorus interstitials, responsible for the blue shift. This solution is not attractive because heavily dislocated substrates introduce concerns about the reliability of devices formed on them.
Another suggestion involves the use of strained quantum wells in which both the wells and the barriers have the same compositional ratio As/P of the Group-V components, thereby avoiding any effect from the mobile phosphorus. Although this solution seems effective, it restricts the device design.
Several groups have reported their understanding of the mechanism for blue shift in Proceedings of Fifth International Conference on Indium Phosphide and Related Materials, Apr. 19-22, 1993, Paris, France (IEEE Catalog #93CH3276-3). See Glew, "Interdiffusion of InGaAs/InGaAsP quantum wells," ibid., pp. 29-32; Gillin et al., "Group V interdiffusion in In.sub.0.66 Ga.sub.0.33 As/In.sub.0.66 Ga.sub.0.33 As.sub.0.7 P.sub.0.3 quantum well structures," ibid., pp. 33-35; Camassel et al., "Experimental investigation of the thermal stability of strained InGaAs/InGaAsP MQWs," ibid., pp. 36-39; and Vettese et al., "An investigation into the effects of thermal annealing on long wavelength InGaAs/InGaAsP multi-quantum well lasers," Ibid., pp. 40-44. Although diffusion of phosphorus is a recurring theme, there is no agreement on the responsible mechanism.
Accordingly, a more reliable and less restrictive method is desired for controlling and reducing the blue shift in InP-based and related quaternary quantum-well structures.

Method for making InP-based lasers with reduced blue shifts


Systems, methods, and devices can include a processing engine implemented at least partially in hardware, the processing engine to process memory transactions; a memory element to index physical address and virtual address translations; and a memory controller logic implemented at least partially in hardware, the memory controller logic to receive an index from the processing engine, the index corresponding to a physical address and a virtual address; identify a physical address based on the received index; and provide the physical address to the processing engine. The processing engine can use the physical address for memory transactions in response to a streaming workload job request.

Accelerators are a type of connected device or endpoint that can offload general purpose processing and execute certain workloads more efficiently in terms of performance and power. Address virtualization capabilities allow for scalable, robust use of accelerators, address virtualization capabilities. An operating system can manage virtual address spaces and the assignment of real memory to virtual memory. Address translation hardware in the central processing unit, often referred to as a memory management unit or MMU, can translate virtual addresses to physical addresses, and vice versa.

Address translation for scalable linked devices


An optical link power management scheme takes the best advantage of a dynamic connection environment, where ports may be connected and disconnected at any time, and where data flows may start and stop as needed by the applications using the high speed data links Power consumption is optimized, eye safety standards are met, and robust connection detection is preserved.

Most optical links to date are used in the telecom and datacom industries, where optical modules tend to be connected during installation, and stay connected for the life of the equipment. These connections stay active as long as the link is connected, never switching off once started.
Optical links to be used in a consumer application may have different requirements, as the links are used dynamically, with devices being plugged and unplugged from the systems. In this case, it is desirable to save power when a port is not being used, insure that the port meets eye safety standards when the fiber is not connected, and that the port is able to robustly and reliably detect connections as they occur.

Power management implementation in an optical link


Materials for dielectrics and/or buffer layers in microelectronics utilize polymers can be based on bis-o-nitrophenols. The bis-o-nitrophenols carry a tert-butoxycarbonyl group on at least one of the hydroxyl groups. The polybenzoxazoles prepared from these compounds have a lower dielectric constant than corresponding polymers which are prepared from bis-o-nitrophenols that do not have a tert-butoxycarbonyl group.

Field of the Invention
The invention relates to bis-o-nitrophenol derivatives, to polybenzoxazoles that can be obtained from them, to the use of these materials as a dielectric or as a buffer layer, as well as to a microelectronic device that includes such a material.
In microelectronics, high-temperature stable polyimides and polybenzoxazoles are used, for example, as dielectrics and/or buffer layers. Precursors of polybenzoxazoles, so-called poly-o-hydroxyamides, can also be rendered photoreactive if suitable photoactive components are added to the formulation of these dielectrics. By heat treatment (heating) at temperatures in excess of 250° C., a poly-o-hydroxyamide can be converted into a polybenzoxazole.
The mechanism taking place during the cyclization of poly-o-hydroxyamides to form polybenzoxazoles is schematically represented as follows:

When heated, the o-hydroxyamide cyclizes to form the oxazole by eliminating water.
Besides thermal and mechanical stability, the dielectric constant of these materials is an important criterion, especially for use as a dielectric. It must be as low as possible, so that the electrical insulation effect is good, for example between interconnects or interconnect planes in microchips, and the electrical performance of the microelectronic device is enhanced. Polybenzoxazoles and/or poly-o-hydroxyamides are preferred over polyimides because they regularly have a lower dielectric constant than polyimides.
Compared with polyimides, photostructurable poly-o-hydroxyamides and/or polybenzoxazoles also have the advantage that they are positively structurable. This leads to a lower occurrence of defects, because only a small part of the layer needs to be illuminated in most cases. In addition, they are aqueous-alkalinically developed, whereas polyimides are usually developed by using organic solvents. For the production and/or disposal of the materials, it is always more favorable for a component not to consume any organic solvents, which regularly need to be disposed of separately.
In order to achieve a high resolution, that is,to be able to represent even small structures, illumination instruments that operate at short wavelengths, for example at 248 nm or less, are used. However, most of the buffer layers (coatings) that are used absorb so strongly, even at this wavelength, that sufficient illumination of the added photoactive component as far as the lower regions of the layer is scarcely still possible. This problem can be solved by increasing the transparency of the layer, in particular the transparency of the base polymer of this layer. The transparency of the poly-o-hydroxyamides, and/or of the polybenzoxazoles obtained from them, is therefore of particular importance for their suitability in microelectronics.
European Patent Application No. EP 0 317 942, which corresponds to U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,939,215 and 4,845,183, discloses bis-o-nitrophenols that are used as monomer units for the preparation of polymeric benzoxazoles. However, the polymers obtained in this way show very strong absorptions in the range of 248 nm and less, so that they are suitable only for illumination instruments with a longer wavelength. Furthermore, the polymers disclosed therein exhibit such high dielectric constants that they cannot be used as dielectrics in microelectronics.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Bis-o-nitrophenols derivatives and poly-o-hydroxyamides, polybenzoxazoles, materials, and microelectronic devices made therefrom


Systems and methods of providing alerts on a recording device. The alerting service is provided on a digital video recorder (DVR) or other computing device as an application that is loaded into memory. The DVR is configured with geographic information and is able to determine its geographic location. A data channel is used for receiving the emergency bulletins. A central database system receives the emergency bulletins and transmits to the DVR. The DVR may process the bulletins to select those which are geographically relevant. The DVR displays the bulletins on top of the video signal that it is sending to a display device. The bulletin is displayed even if the user is pausing, rewinding, fast-forwarding, altering the display of the program content, or controlling the DVR.

Conventional recording devices such as video cassette recorders (VCRs) and digital video recorders (DVRs) provide a convenience to viewers in that they provide for recording of audio/video content for later viewing. This is the so-called "time-shifting" of programming content. Currently, television viewers watching over-the-air, cable or satellite broadcasts are alerted about emergency situations, such as severe weather, through the Emergency Alert System. A problem with viewing time shifted content is that viewers will not receive such alerts. For example, a viewer may be watching a recorded episode of his/her favorite television show while a severe storm is approaching. Instead of the severe weather alert for the viewing area, the viewer continues to watch the recorded content, unaware of the approaching danger. Similarly, the viewer would miss breaking news or traffic reports that may be of relevance to the viewer.


An upper wing surface of a laminar-flow airfoil for decreasing an undesirable head-lowering pitching moment around an aerodynamic center of the airfoil. The upper wing surface includes: a convex front profile portion extending from a leading edge to a largest-thickness point located corresponding to 38% of a wing chord length. A convex central profile portion extends from the largest-thickness point to a position corresponding to 90% of the wing chord length at which a value obtained by dividing a thicknesswise difference between the position and the largest-thickness point by a distance in a direction of the wing chord from the largest-thickness point is equal to or smaller than 0.12. A concave rear profile portion extends from a position corresponding to 95% of the wing chord length to the trailing edge. The rear profile portion forms a pressure gradient is steeper than that formed by the central profile portion.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a novel trailing edge shape of a laminar-flow airfoil, in which a head-lowering pitching moment around an aerodynamic center, which is a problem peculiar to a laminar-flow airfoil, is suppressed.
2. Description of the Related Art
A boundary layer on a surface of a main wing of an airplane is a laminar-flow boundary layer at a leading edge, but changes from the laminar-flow boundary layer to a turbulent-flow boundary layer toward a trailing edge. A friction drag on the surface of the main wing is smaller at the laminar-flow boundary layer than at the turbulent-flow boundary layer. For this reason, in order to decrease the drag on the main wing, it is desirable that a transition point at which the laminar-flow boundary layer changes to the turbulent-flow boundary flow is displaced toward the trailing edge, to thereby extend the region of the laminar-flow boundary layer as much as possible.
A laminar-flow airfoil of "6-series" developed by NACA in early 1940s can suppress the drag better than the conventional laminar-flow airfoil. However, when a portion of a wing surface in the vicinity of a leading edge is rough, the largest lift disadvantageously tends to decrease largely, leading to a great problem during takeoff or landing of the airplane.
Thereafter, NASA developed NLF(1)-0215F and NLF(1)-0414F in 1977 and 1983, respectively. These laminar-flow airfoils enables a reduction in the drag, but have a problem of causing a large head-lowering pitching moment. Moreover, because these laminar-flow airfoils are for use in a low-speed range, they have a problem of causing drag-divergence phenomenon at an early stage, of a subsonic speed range.
In HSNLF (1)-0213 developed by NASA in 1984 for use in a high subsonic speed range, a drag-divergence phenomenon is difficult to generate, and a head-lowering pitching moment is small. However, the largest lift in a lower Reynolds number range is small and the capacity of an inner-wing fuel tank is insufficient because the wing thickness is about 13% of a wing chord length, leading to a difficulty in ensuring mileage.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,858,852 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,318,249 disclose known airfoils having a feature in the shape of a trailing edge.
In the airfoil disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,858,852, a trailing edge of the airfoil for use in a transonic speed range is of a blunt shape having a thickness, and the distance between an upper wing surface and a lower wing surface diverge in the vicinity of the trailing edge so that the wing thickness is increasing toward the trailing edge, thereby providing an increase in lift and a decrease in drag.
In the airfoil described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,318,249, a portion of each of an upper surface and a lower surface of the airfoil for use in a transonic speed range is largely curved downwardly in the vicinity of a trailing edge, thereby preventing laminar-flow separation at an upper wing surface in the transonic speed range.
Generally in a laminar-flow airfoil in which a laminar-flow boundary layer region extends along towards a trailing edge, a negative pressure on an upper wing surface is also large at the trailing edge, so that the trailing edge side lift accounts for a large proportion in the entire wing lift. As a result, a head-lowering pitching moment about an aerodynamic center is disadvantageously increased. In order to countervail the head-lowering pitching moment, it is necessary to increase a negative lift generated by a horizontal empennage. If the negative lift generated by the horizontal empennage is increased, the lift on the entire airplane is decreased and the drag on the horizontal empennage is increased, whereby the drag on the entire airplane is disadvantageously increased. It is also necessary to increase the area of the horizontal empennage and to increase the moment arm extending from a gravity center position to the horizontal empennage, disadvantageously leading to further increases in the weight and drag.


The present invention provides power supply devices having illuminated receptacles. Some or all of the receptacles are encircled or otherwise circumscribed by a lighting member. The lighting member may be a continuous strip of material, such as an electroluminescent laminate. The lighting member may illuminate the receptacles regardless of whether the receptacles themselves are currently powered. Thus, although the power supply device is in a no or low light environment, or when the device is plugged in but is turned off, a user may easily identify where the receptacles are, which ones are available, and which equipment is plugged into which receptacles. The lighting member may be color coded according to a surge protection rating for the power supply device. In this case, the user can immediately identify which power supply devices have a given surge protection, and can therefore distinguish among different power supply devices having similar physical configurations.

The present invention relates to power supply devices, including power strips, power taps, surge protection devices and the like that include a built-in light source to illuminate receptacles or plugs for the user.
Power supply devices such as power strips, power taps and surge protectors are used in many different environments for a wide variety of applications. For instance, a power strip in a home theater can supply power to stereo equipment, televisions and game systems. In an office the same power strip may be used to power a desktop or laptop computer, printers and scanners, a desk lamp, etc. A power tap may be plugged into a wall outlet to provide two or more additional outlets into which electronic equipment may be plugged. A surge protection device, whether stand alone or in combination with a power strip or power tap, may be placed between the wall outlet and the user equipment to provide additional protection to electronic equipment.
Such power supply devices may include a power on indicator in the form of an incandescent light or LED, which is illuminated when the device is turned on. The power on indicator may be included in the on/off switch, or may be separately located on the power supply device. Similarly, a surge protection indicator may be lit to indicate that a surge protection device is operating properly.
During use the power supply device may be partly or fully hidden behind furniture, a bookcase, or the electronic equipment to which it is supplying power. Hiding the device may be a conscious aesthetic decision by the user, or may be necessitated by the layout of the room or of the electronic equipment. In either case, the power supply device is often situated in a low light or no light location. Here, even though the device may have a power on indicator or surge protection indicator, such lights may not provide adequate lighting of the power supply device. In particular, these lights do not illuminate some or all of the receptacles on the power supply device. This can be highly problematic, especially in the situation where the user needs to add a component to a power strip, power tap or surge protector, or is unplugging a component from the device. Without adequate lighting, the user may not easily locate an available receptacle, or may confuse the plugs of different components and accidentally unplug the wrong one.
In the past, LEDs have been added to the corners of a power strip so that they light when the power strip is plugged in and turned on. However, such a configuration does not provide adequate illumination to individual receptacles or to the receptacles as a whole, and therefore does not overcome the aforementioned problems. Therefore, a need exists for enhanced power supply devices to address these and other problems.

Power supply devices with illuminated receptacles


A dispensing toothbrush for use when cleaning teeth comprises a toothbrush base plate, a plurality of bristles implanted in and projected perpendicularly upward from the toothbrush base plate, toothbrush neck member, a sleeve concentric about toothbrush neck member, a thumb lever coupled to the sleeve for rotating the sleeve when pressure is applied to the thumb lever, and toothpaste wiping trough, coupled to the sleeve, for receiving toothpaste therein from the toothbrush neck member. In operation, as pressure is applied to the thumb lever, the sleeve rotates and the toothpaste wiping trough rotates around the toothbrush base plate and the plurality of bristles for evenly distributing the toothpaste onto the top surface area of the plurality of bristles, in a single wiping action. The dispensing toothbrush further comprises a toothpaste reservoir and a dispensing mechanism coupled theretogether for storing toothpaste and dispensing the toothpaste into the toothpaste wiping trough via the toothbrush neck member.

Typically, a toothbrush has a plurality of bristles wherein a sufficient amount of toothpaste is evenly distributed along the top surface area of the plurality of bristles to obtain good cleaning effect, when the user brushes his or her teeth. Conventionally, toothpaste is dispensed via squeezable tubes. As the toothpaste is evenly distributed along the top surface area of the plurality of bristles, the toothpaste substantially remains in place because of its non-fluid property until the user brushes his or her teeth.
Toothbrushes have been designed to store toothpaste therein and dispense the toothpaste into the plurality of bristles. Because the prior toothpaste dispensing toothbrushes dispense toothpaste into the bottom surface area of the plurality of bristles, the toothpaste is not evenly distributed along the top surface area of the bristles reducing the cleaning effect of the toothpaste. Moreover, since the toothpaste is dispensed from an aperture in the toothbrush base plate and dispersed therefrom into the bottom surface area of the plurality of bristles, the toothpaste does not reach the teeth when brushing.
The known dispensing toothbrushes do not address the need for a dispensing toothbrush having toothpaste or the like stored therein whereby a sufficient amount of toothpaste or the like is easily dispensed and evenly distributed along the top surface area of a plurality of bristles to obtain a good cleaning effect when the user brushes his or her teeth.


An extendable hand control for a stretcher undercarriage (10) which has height adjustable legs (11, 12). It comprises a handle (19) fitted to an end of a tube (20), slidable within an undercarriage frame member (21). The handle has an associated lever (15) which operates a control cable (14) for adjusting the height of the height adjustable legs (11, 12) . The arrangement includes a locking bar (26) within the slidable tube (20) which sets the maximum extendable position of the handle and the fully retractable position of the handle.

This invention relates to stretcher undercarriages and is particularly concerned with multi-height adjustable undercarriages which are operable by hand controls such as brake levers, on one or both ends of the undercarriage.
Such height adjustable undercarriages are typically used for loading patients into ambulances where it is necessary to firstly collapse the leading set of undercarriage legs during loading, followed by collapsing the trailing set of legs. The reverse process occurs when the undercarriage is being removed from the ambulance.
An example of a typical height adjustable undercarriage is the subject of U.S. Pat. No. 5,509,159 dated Apr. 23, 1996, assigned to Ferno Washington, Inc.
A common failing with height adjustable undercarriages is that when a taller than average person is being conveyed into or from an ambulance, the feet of that person tend to extend out past the hand controls on the end of the undercarriage making it difficult for the attendant to move the undercarriage with ease, let alone be able to readily manipulate the height adjusting hand controls. This failing can be overcome when height adjusting hand controls are not required, by using extendable handles which slide within the upper longitudinally extending support framework of the undercarriage, and which extend the effective length of the undercarriage. However when hand controls are present on the end of the undercarriage, their very design and nature means that they must be located in a fixed position to be operable and such extendable handles cannot be used. This problem has been addressed and it has now been found after much trial and experimentation that extendable hand grips with their controls for multi-height adjustable undercarriages, can be produced.


A device for monitoring motion of a movable closure arranged for travel between limit positions, comprising an absolute position encoder for identifying whether the closure is in one of a plurality of sectors of travel, a relative position encoder for monitoring the speed and relative position of the closure, and a drive means for operatively coupling the relative position encoder and the absolute position encoder to the closure, such that there is a fixed relationship between motion of the closure and movement of both encoders, wherein the absolute position encoder features an adjustment assembly comprising a first element and a second element, the first element being selectively adjustable in position relative to the second element to adjust the absolute position encoder without movement of the drive means or the relative position encoder.

In this specification, where a document, act or item of knowledge is referred to or discussed, this reference or discussion is not an admission that the document, act or item of knowledge or any combination thereof was at the priority date part of common general knowledge, or known to be relevant to an attempt to solve any problem with which this specification is concerned.
The drive motor for powered doors, such as roller doors and sectional doors, is operably connected to the door by way of a gear assembly. Rotation of the motor itself is controlled by way of an electrical controller. The controller is commonly operated via a remote control device to allows a user to wirelessly transmit coded signals to the controller to actuate the drive motor so as to open and close the door.
The controller must have knowledge of certain parameters associated with the door, such as its instantaneous position, velocity and direction, to ensure that the drive motor does not move the door into inappropriate or dangerous states. For example, the controller needs to know when the door reaches its travel limits (corresponding to the door being either fully closed or fully open), so that rotation of the drive motor stops when these limits are reached. In addition, the controller must provide or operate in association with obstruction detection means.
One simple way for the controller to identify such parameters is to place physical limit switches in appropriate locations to be contacted by the door as it approaches a travel limit and, in response, to send an electrical signal to the controller causing it to shut off (or possibly reverse the direction of the drive motor.
One such approach is described in published international patent application WO-2004/044362, which describes the encoding of door travel limits by a cam-actuated microswitch. The upper and lower door travel limits are encoded by the microswitch respectively contacting either a ramp portion or a land portion of the cam, with the cam itself being rotated by the epicyclic motion of an eccentric member driven by the drive motor.
More recently, arrangements have been devised whereby door controllers are designed to learn parameters associated with the door, which parameters are stored in a memory device in the controller and utilised by associated control circuitry to efficiently and safely operate the drive motor. Real time readings of the values of continuously varying parameters, in particular displacement and velocity, can be measured by optoelectronic elements and communicated to the controller for use in operating the drive motor.
A controller with learning abilities has advantages over a limit switch solution, as it is a self-contained apparatus and does not require the maintenance of an electrical connection between locations external to the controller itself. The limit switches themselves are also vulnerable to damage through repeated contact with the moving door or by other items that may be present in the door's vicinity.
An example of a learning controller is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,831,509.
A more sophisticated device is described in published Australian patent AU-200053568. This device employs a position gear having a plurality of radially spaced arcuate protrusions, employed as a gray code position encoder. The wheel is operably coupled to the drive motor, and as the wheel rotates, the interaction between the protrusions and a set of radially directed optical sensors identifies the position of the door as being in one of a plurality of sectors into which the door travel path is divided. The device employs a separate rotatable cutter wheel, arranged to interact with optical sensors coupled to optoelectronic circuitry, in order to identify the instantaneous speed and direction of the door movement. Such a device can be seen as a hybrid door position monitor, as the cutter wheel provides a means of pulse encoding to determine the relative position and speed of movement of the door, whilst the position gear provides an absolute position encoder for the position of the door. Through a learning routine carried out at installation, the controller is provided with sufficient information to know at all times the precise position of the door.
Occasionally (eg. when power is unavailable), a door must be moved by means other than the drive motor. A secondary drive means in this context might be a hand operated chain or similar mechanism, that permits power to be applied to the drive shaft in the event that the drive motor is unavailable. Such a mechanism is described in applicants published Australian patent application AU-2004226994. Alternatively, the door may simply be opened and closed by hand once the drive motor has been disengaged. However, movement of a door by a secondary drive means will result in the controller losing stored knowledge of the position of the door, and it is this essential that the controller is arranged and programmed to immediately relearn the door position in such situations.
The device described in AU-200053568 deals with this problem by moving the door across the nearest sector boundary of the position gear, and then realigning the monitored position from a pre-stored sector transition table. Whilst this device performs well, it is complex and involves a great many individual components, and is thus relatively expensive to manufacture and maintain. It requires five optical sensor elements (and associated electronic circuitry), a multiplicity of aligned, interacting gear wheels, and a relatively complex stored sector transition table. It would be advantageous to provide a simpler and more compact and robust device for identifying parameters associated with a movable closure, or to least offer consumers with a choice of solutions. As the specification of AU-200053568 makes clear on page 6, the only way to change the relationship between the position gear and the door location is to disengage the ring gear from the door.

Device for monitoring motion of a movable closure

Automatic Technology (Australia) Pty Ltd


A recommendation apparatus comprises a monitoring processor which monitors the presentation of content items. A sample processor determines preference data for different content items by performing the steps of determining a preference value for a content item presented by the presentation unit in response to a first duration for a first section of the content item being presented relative to a total duration of the content item, and if the first duration is less than the total duration, determining if a second section of the content item not being presented corresponds to at least one of an end section and a begin section of the content item; and if so determining a confidence value for the preference value in response to a second duration of the second section. The preference data is used as training data for determining a user preference model which is then used to generate recommendations.

In recent years, the availability and provision of multimedia and entertainment content has increased substantially. For example, the number of available television and radio channels has grown considerably and the popularity of the Internet has provided new content distribution means. Consequently, users are increasingly provided with a plethora of different types of content from different sources. In order to identify and select the desired content, the user must typically process large amounts of information which can be very cumbersome and impractical.
Accordingly, significant resources have been invested in research into techniques and algorithms that may provide an improved user experience and assist a user in identifying and selecting content.
For example, Digital Video Recorders (DVRs) or Personal Video Recorders (PVRs) have become increasingly popular and are increasingly replacing conventional Video Cassette Recorders (VCRs) as the preferred choice for recording television broadcasts. Such DVRs (in the following the term DVR is used to denote both DVRs and PVRs) are typically based on storing the recorded television programs in a digital format on a hard disk or optical disc. Furthermore, DVRs can be used both for analogue television transmissions (in which case a conversion to a digital format is performed as part of the recording process) as well as for digital television transmissions (in which case the digital television data can be stored directly).
Increasingly, devices, such as televisions or DVRs provide new and enhanced functions and features which provide an improved user experience. For example, televisions or DVRs can comprise functionality for providing recommendations of television programs to the user. More specifically, such devices can comprise functionality for monitoring the viewing/recording preferences of a user. These preferences can be stored in a user preference profile and subsequently can be used to autonomously select and recommend suitable television programs for viewing or recording.
Such functionality may substantially improve the user experience. Indeed, with hundreds of broadcast channels diffusing thousands of television programs per day, the user may quickly become overwhelmed by the offering and therefore may not fully benefit from the availability of content. Furthermore, the task of identifying and selecting suitable content becomes increasingly difficult and time-consuming. The ability of devices to provide recommendations of television programs of potential interest to the user substantially facilitates this process.
In order to enhance the user experience, it is advantageous to personalize the recommendations to the individual user. The recommendation procedure includes predicting how much a user may like a particular content item and recommending it if it is considered of sufficient interest. The process of generating recommendations requires that user preferences have been captured so that they can be used as input by the prediction algorithm.
There are two main techniques used to collect user preferences. The first approach is to explicitly obtain user preferences by the user(s) manually inputting their preferences, for example by manually providing feedback on content items that the user(s) particularly liked or disliked. The other approach is to implicitly obtain user preferences by the system monitoring user actions to infer their preferences.
Explicit feedback tends to require substantial input by the user(s) and is often considered cumbersome and inconvenient by the users. This approach is therefore not ideal in the context of e.g. television viewing which is characterized by being a low effort and highly passive activity. Accordingly, it is desirable that the generation of a user preference profile or mode for the user(s) is at least partly based on implicit feedback.
Implicit preference systems acquire information indicative of user preferences by observing the user's behaviour when consuming content. A set of positive and negative preference examples is typically identified and used to train a learning algorithm which then creates a model of the user preferences. The recommendation system may then use this preference model to generate personalized recommendations.
Such mechanisms are increasingly used as part of Internet services. However, in other content consuming applications, such as television viewing, the approach tends to be less efficient as the approach is complicated by the interactions between the user and the device being more disconnected and passive than for an Internet application. Indeed, much of the information used in the Internet domain (such as click-streams, previous purchases or time spent on a particular page, etc.) are simply not available or appropriate in the television watching domain or do not provide sufficient accuracy.
However, it has been proposed to base recommendation systems for television watching applications on monitoring different user actions and interactions. For example, if a user has watched or has recorded a program then this may be considered to indicate that the user has a preference for this program. Such preference indications may be used to construct training examples for generating a user preference model.
However, much of the proposed implicit information tends to be relatively unreliable. Indeed, there are many factors that influence the user's selection of a program. For example, users will often watch programs they do not necessarily like or will miss their favourites programs. Accordingly, the training data for the user preference model is often suboptimal resulting in a suboptimal user preference model and thus in reduced accuracy of the generated recommendations.
Therefore, an improved system for content item recommendation would be advantageous. In particular, a system allowing an improved user experience, increased flexibility, reduced complexity, improved user preference models, reduced need for user inputs, improved accuracy and/or improved performance would be advantageous.

Method and apparatus for recommending content items


A radar system in which Coded Aperture Radar processing is performed on received radar signals reflected by one or more objects in a field of view which reflect a transmitted signal which covers a field of view with K sweeps and each sweep including Q frequency changes. For Type II CAR, the transmitted signal also includes N modulated codes per frequency step. The received radar signals are modulated by a plurality of binary modulators the results of which are applied to a mixer. The output of the mixer, for one acquisition results in a set of Q·K (for Type I CAR) or Q·K·N (for Type II CAR) complex data samples, is distributed among a number of digital channels, each corresponding to a desired beam direction. For each channel, the complex digital samples are multiplied, sample by sample, by a complex signal mask that is different for each channel.

CAR is a new technology that has not yet been implemented in IC form, therefore is no known prior art for processing methods and hardware for CAR signals.
The most straightforward method for CAR signal processing is to utilize a matched filter technique, which is common in radar signal processing. This technique consists of correlating the received signal against a library of reference signals, each of which corresponding to a scattering object at a particular range, velocity, and bearing angles. When the received signal contains a component due to a scattering object at the reference location, a strong output is produced, with the strength indicating the scattering cross section at the reference location. This technique is effective, but requires an often prohibitive amount of memory to store the reference signals, and significant computation to perform the correlations in a CPU (for example).
Comparing this invention to traditional digital beamforming radar, this invention reduces the computation time and/or the digital hardware complexity significantly, with an even bigger advantage for large arrays. Digital beamforming arrays possess a separate receiver and analog to digital converter (ADC) behind each of the array elements. The large number of output signals are then digitized and the directional beams with desired characteristics are produced by forming linear combinations of the element signals. This technique requires that digital information from all of the elements across the array be weighted and combined, with a separate linear combination for each beam position. This is highly computationally intensive and introduces significant latency for large arrays due to the limited speed with which basic digital calculations (e.g., multiplications) may be made.
One may try to reduce computation time by implementing the weighting and combining in digital hardware, thereby performing the computations in parallel. However, the fact that digital beamforming combines signals from all the elements creates highly complex combining networks that quickly become unfeasible as the array gets large and even more particularly so if the array is a two dimensional (2D) array.
Because the range, velocity, and spatial information for CAR are interdependent, it is not apparent that one may apply a simple set of multiplications and then utilize FFTs to produce estimates of range, velocity, and bearing angles.

Method and apparatus for processing coded aperture radar (CAR) signals


By correcting an optical proximity effect with respect to design patterns by an optical proximity effect correcting means and simulating patterns after the correction of optical proximity effect by a simulation means, transfer patterns of gate electrodes are generated and measurement portion in the transfer patterns of the gate electrodes are changed in accordance with characteristics required for a circuit. Then, in accordance with whether the point required from the circuit is a higher speed, stability, or a reduction of a leakage current, it is judged whether or not a deviation from the design value at the measurement point of the transfer pattern of the gate electrode as explained above is within an allowable range. The pattern of the measurement point is shifted when the deviation is not within the allowable range. By repeating feedback until the measurement point is within an allowable range, the optimum correction is performed in accordance with the characteristics required from the circuit within a range where it functions as a gate electrode.

A photo mask used in the production process of a semiconductor device is structured as a glass substrate formed with a light shielding film. The lithography process of a semiconductor device is carried out by projecting and exposing this photo mask onto a wafer.
In the photo mask used in the lithography process, it is necessary to convert designed CAD data to data for the lithography system and faithfully pattern this on the light shielding film on the glass substrate.
Further, even if the patterning of the photo mask is correct, occurrence of pattern deterioration on the wafer referred to as the "optical proximity effect" at the time of exposure becomes a problem.
This is a phenomenon where a stepper beam passing through an opened mask pattern shape is diffracted or interfered with and as a result is not correctly resolved on the wafer surface.
As one of the optical proximity effects, there is the self optical proximity effect wherein the stepper beam is diffracted at its own pattern and as a result the finished dimensions of the pattern resolved on the wafer end up becoming different or, in a rectangular pattern, the precision of the finished dimensions ends up greatly differing at both the short sides and the long sides. Further, there is a mutual optical proximity effect where there is interference with a stepper beam diffracted from another pattern and, as a result, the finished dimensions on the wafer end up becoming different.
In this way, in the photolithography process in the production process of a semiconductor device, the dimensional error between design patterns and actual resist patterns occurring due to the optical proximity effect becomes a problem.
In the past, in optical proximity effect correction masks used to deal with this, first, a mask dimension correction value minimizing the pattern dimensional error with respect to a design pattern was determined by shape simulation or results of exposure experiments. Then, this correction value was used to correct the dimensions of the design pattern and that data used for a mask EB lithography system.
Up to today, for a purpose of faithful reproduction according to the design patterns, a variety of optical proximity effect correction techniques have been developed.
In the production of the increasingly miniaturized semiconductor devices in recent years, however, it is very difficult to obtain a perfect resist pattern corresponding to the design pattern by an optical proximity effect correction technique. Some deviation from the design pattern occurs.
In this case, if it is intended to correct the patterns so that all of the patterns become as designed, an enormous time would be required.
Here, for example, in a MOS integrated circuit, the highest line width controllability is required when processing the gate electrodes.
The gate pattern width of a transistor, i.e., what is generally called the "gate length", determines the gate threshold voltage, mutual conductance, and other transistor characteristics. Accordingly, since variation in the line width of the gate length directly affects variation in characteristics, control of the line width of a gate electrode pattern is most important in formation of a MOS transistor.
In this case as well, like in the past, correction for faithfully reproducing all of the gate electrode patterns corresponding to the design patterns is very difficult in practice due in part also to the fact that the line width of a gate electrode pattern is particularly fine. Further, there is a problem in that the correction time of the patterns becomes enormous.
As described above, in the past, it was attempted to faithfully reproduce all patterns according to the design patterns. It would be useful if it were possible to correct patterns in a practical range according to the required circuit characteristics at mainly portions functionally related with the device characteristics.

Mask pattern correction apparatus and mask pattern correction method and mask preparation method and method of production of a semiconductor device


A directional collar locator sensor distinguishes between an outer casing collar from an inner pipe coupling deep within a wellbore by selectively positioning a semi-spherical magnetic shield about a magnetic sensor. The collar locator has virtually no moving parts and facilitates conventional logging, perforating multiple completion wellbores, and splitting of casing collars and inner pipe couplings. When used in perforating a well casing, the directional sensor ensures that the perforating gun is pointed in the right direction to produce complete perforations as opposed to just producing dents.

1. Field of the Invention
The subject invention generally pertains to locating couplings (or collars) within a wellbore, and more specifically to distinguishing between the couplings on the internal and external piping.
2. Description of Related Art
Many wellbores consist of a pipe within a pipe. The outer one is generally referred to as an "outer casing" or "production string" and is typically made up of 40 to 45 foot sections coupled together by way of "casing collars." The inner one, of 30 to 33 foot lengths, is called an "inner pipe string," and it is interconnected by "pipe couplings." It becomes necessary to both locate and distinguish which couplings belong to which string of pipe deep within a wellbore for the purpose of logging, perforating, or disassembly and repair.
With existing coupling sensors, it can be difficult to distinguish between casing collars and pipe couplings. Some sensors may have external hardware that properly orients the sensor in relation to the inner pipe string. However, the hardware often hangs up within the limited space of a well. Space is especially limited in multiple string wells, such as the one illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 3,064,571 which is specifically incorporated by reference herein.
An even greater problem exists when attempting to perforate the outer casing of a wellbore. To effectively perforate a well casing, it is critical to have the face of the perforating gun up against the inner wall of the casing. Otherwise, the stand-off distance between the face of the gun and the casing wall becomes too great. Exceeding the design stand-off distance even slightly can reduce the gun's explosive impact force to a level so low that the gun fails to perforate the casing. Magnets and other mechanisms can be used to urge the gun to its proper orientation. But when those fail, one can be misled to believe that complete perforation was accomplished, because the gun still discharges. It is difficult to determine whether any perforation occurred.

Directional coupling sensor for ensuring complete perforation of a wellbore casing


A merge conveyor defines a travel pathway for moving cargo. A tail pulley has a first rotational axis which is perpendicular to the travel pathway. First and second nose bars are parallel and spaced and are disposed at an angle with respect to the travel pathway. A drive pulley has a second rotational axis which is parallel with the travel pathway. A snub pulley has a third rotational axis which is parallel with the first rotational axis. An endless belt is sequentially routed over the tail pulley, the first nose bar, the drive pulley, the second nose bar, and the snub pulley. The endless belt extends directly from the second nose bar to the snub pulley and then directly to the tail pulley.

A merge conveyor can be inserted into a conveyor system to facilitate movement of cargo to or from a conveyor line. Conventional merge conveyors suffer from any of a variety of design deficiencies. For example, some conventional merge conveyors are not compactly configured, and accordingly require excessive floor space and/or engineering for installation into a conveyor system. Also, some conventional merge conveyors, due to their specific belt travel configurations, are unable to accommodate use of an endless belt having a tacky or sticky side (often called a "cover surface" or a "cover belt"), whereby such an endless belt can provide certain advantages with respect to transportation of certain cargo and improved friction qualities at the drive pulley. Furthermore, the tension of the endless belt present on some conventional merge conveyors cannot be easily adjusted, which can accordingly present significant maintenance inefficiencies. Accordingly, there is a need for a merge conveyor which resolves one or more of these and/or other deficiencies of conventional merge conveyors.