A transfer card structure includes a lower cover and an upper cover combined with the lower cover thereon. A terminal module is disposed between the upper cover and the lower cover. The terminal module has an insulation plate, a plurality of terminals, and an individual contact. The terminals and the individual contact are embedded in the insulation plate. The terminals include a plurality of touch portions and pin portions respectively on a front edge and on a rear edge of the insulation plate. A short portion is further arranged between the touch portions and the pin portions. The short portion includes a first bridge portion bent from a respective one of the terminals, and a second bridge portion bent from the individual contact. Therefore, a short circuit is caused via the terminals and the individual contact that connect with each other in order to lower production costs.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a transfer card structure, and particularly relates to a transfer card structure enabling a short circuit occurring between specific two terminals due to the middle portions of the conductive materials thereof.
2. Description of Related Art
A conventional transfer card disclosed in Taiwan No. 93217570 Improvement structure of transfer card, published on May 21, 2005, includes two upper bent portions connected with each other via a contact portion in order to cause a short circuit. The two upper bent portions are formed at the rear ends of two specific terminals respectively. The contact portion is used to bridge the two upper bent portions to cause the short circuit.
Obviously, although the conventional transfer card provides the necessary short circuit, surplus material for making the upper bent portions at rear ends of the two specific terminals should be prepared. The more surplus material there is, the more the square measure of the base material is punched. Thus, the amount of waste material left over results in unnecessary usage and raises production costs.
Hence, an improvement over the prior art is required to overcome the disadvantages thereof.


A cell division mechanism controlling protein which is not expressed during interphase but is expressed in the nucleus after entering into a cell cycle, in the cell cycle of mammalian cell, and fragments thereof, as well as DNAs coding for this protein or fragments thereof, as well as antibodies against this protein or fragment thereof.

Lymphoid cells have unique properties in cell growth ability in comparison with many other somatic cells. Namely, lymphoid cells, similar to many other somatic cells, are differentiated from a hematopoietic stem cell to mature cells via many steps of cell division, and enter interphase (G0/G1). After that, if they are stimulated with an antigen or a special growth factor, they again enter to a cell cycle and increase a clone with a redifferentiation, and then return to interphase (memory cells). In addition to functional differentiation and expression specific to lymphoid cells, such repeated cell proliferation (clone proliferation) is one of the big factors in an immune response of an organism.

Antibodies to the cell division protein SPA-1


A liquid ejecting head that ejects liquid includes a flow path member that includes a plurality of pressure chambers through which the liquid flows, pressure generation elements that include active parts arranged at positions corresponding to the pressure chambers and a common electrode for generating a common potential to the respective pressure chambers, and a conductive member that is electrically connected to the common electrode on the flow path member at the side to which the pressure generation elements are fixed and lowers resistance of the common electrode.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a liquid ejecting head that ejects liquid and a liquid ejecting apparatus.
2. Related Art
Known has been an existing liquid ejecting head that ejects liquid in accordance with pressure fluctuations in a flow path. The liquid ejecting head includes a flow path member including pressure chambers forming a part of the liquid flow path and pressure generation elements such as piezoelectric elements and heat generation elements. The pressure generation elements are arranged on the flow path member so as to correspond to positions of the pressure chambers. If the pressure generation elements are driven so as to generate the pressure fluctuations in the pressure chambers, the liquid ejecting head ejects liquid (for example, see Japanese Patent No. 3379106).
Normally, the pressure generation elements include electrodes for driving the pressure generation elements. The electrodes are constituted by a common electrode and individual electrodes. The common electrode generates a common potential on respective active parts of the pressure generation elements. The individual electrodes generate individual potentials (signals) on the respective active parts of the pressure generation elements.
In the liquid ejecting head, as density of nozzle holes through which liquid is discharged is increased, sizes of the pressure chambers and sizes of the electrodes become smaller. If the sizes of the electrodes are made small, wiring resistance is increased and the potentials to be supplied are not appropriate values. This results in deterioration of discharge performance of the liquid.

Liquid ejecting head and liquid ejecting apparatus


This disclosure covers methods, systems, and computer-readable media that identify a topic variance from digital survey responses and provide a variety of functionalities to a digital survey system based on the topic variance (i.e., by modifying a digital survey reporting structure based on the topic variance). In certain embodiments, the disclosed systems analyze one or more sets of digital survey responses to generate one or more response models. Furthermore, the disclosed systems can analyze the one or more response models to identify a topic variance (e.g., an emerging topic, a change in trend for a topic, and/or a change in sentiment for a topic). Upon identifying a topic variance, the disclosed systems modify a digital survey reporting structure and/or generate notifications based on the identified topic variance.

Various institutions in a wide range of disciplines (e.g., business, government, and education) rely on digital surveys to gather critical information from survey audiences (e.g., customers, employees, citizens, and students) regarding a wide range of issues and topics. However, as digital content continues to proliferate, institutions receive a seemingly endless amount of information, for a wide range of issues and topics, from survey audiences. This increase in information and data from survey audiences complicates the tracking of information related to digital surveys. Specifically, the amount of data that is received on a daily even hourly basis presents a unique challenge to survey administrators because survey administrators are presented with a seemingly boundless amount of information and, often time, cannot process the amount of information to recognize significant feedback or information from their survey audiences.
In an attempt to recognize significant information from the survey responses gathered through digital surveys, some conventional digital survey systems provide administrators with reports that show responses overtime to attempt to demonstrate any significant information. However, reporting the seemingly endless amount of information received in response to digital surveys creates several drawbacks. For example, due to the amount of available information, conventional digital survey system reports are not adequate and are not able to demonstrate a wide variety of significant information from the response data from digital surveys. Moreover, conventional digital survey systems typically include specialized reports designed to visualize a particular known aspect related to response data; however, conventional digital survey systems have not the ability and therefore fail to recognize significant information that might be outside the scope of the designed reports. Furthermore, most conventional digital survey systems generate reports periodically (e.g., every week), and therefore, conventional digital systems often report significant information late and thus the information loses practical importance to an administrator. Accordingly, conventional digital survey systems often time fail to both recognize a wide variety of significant information, generate timely information, and enable the administrators to realize the potential of the large amount of gathered response information.
As a result of the inability to recognize a wide variety of significant information from the gathered information, conventional digital survey systems often utilize excessive computational resources to gather such amounts of information from digital surveys. This often results in an inefficient utilization of storage and processing resources because the large volume of data may be maintained on computing devices with little to no gain (e.g., a wide variety of significant information from survey responses may remain unnoticed or may not be acted upon). Additionally, some conventional digital survey systems may increasingly utilize computing resources to recognize significant information when more information is gathered while the ability to recognize a wide variety of significant information further diminishes because of the increase in available information.
In addition to data storage and processing inefficiencies, conventional digital survey systems often inefficiently utilize communication bandwidth by gathering information from survey audiences without enabling the administrators to realize the potential of the gathered information. For instance, by failing to recognize a wide variety of significant information from the large amount of gathered information, administrators often fail to notice or address significant feedback provided by survey audiences. Consequently, some conventional digital survey systems inefficiently utilize communication bandwidth between the conventional systems and survey audiences by failing to provide administrators with tools to notice or address a wide variety of feedback provided by the survey audiences.
Accordingly, conventional digital survey systems suffer from these and other disadvantages.

Identifying topic variances from digital survey responses


A terminal apparatus including a display unit disposed on a case and is configured to display an image; a first camera disposed on a surface on which the display unit performs image display; a second camera disposed on a surface opposite the surface on which the first camera is disposed; a plurality of microphones disposed on the case; a sound processing unit that detects sound transmitted from a sound source on a side of the first camera with sound signals obtained by at least one of the plurality of microphones; and an image processing unit that combines a first image which is captured by the first camera or is stored in advance with a second image captured by the second camera on the basis of a result of the detection of sound transmitted from the sound source on the side of the first camera.

1. Field
The present disclosure relates to a terminal device suitable for use as a camera-equipped mobile telephone and an image capturing method suitable for use in a camera-equipped mobile telephone.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various mobile telephone terminal devices with a built-in camera have been commercialized. An image captured with a camera function of such a mobile telephone terminal device is stored in a memory included in the mobile telephone terminal device and is displayed by a display unit included in the mobile telephone terminal device. In addition, with a radio communication function of the mobile telephone terminal device, a stored image can be transmitted to a communication partner by e-mail. Alternatively, the mobile telephone terminal device can access an image storage server connected to the Internet and transmit a captured image to the image storage server.
Some of camera-equipped mobile telephone terminal devices have two cameras, a camera (an outside camera) for capturing the image of the outside of the device and a camera (an inside camera) for capturing the image of the inside of the device. In such a mobile telephone terminal device having two cameras, for example, an outside camera is used to capture the image of the scenery around a photographer and an inside camera is used to capture the image of the face of the photographer.
Patent Literature 1 discloses a mobile telephone terminal device having two cameras, an outside camera and an inside camera. Patent Literature 1 discloses a technique for detecting a line of sight of a photographer from a camera image and switching between an image captured by the outside camera and an image captured by the inside camera on the basis of the detected line of sight.

Terminal apparatus for combining images from two different cameras based on detected sound


A controller for a multi-roll printer, a printing system with such a printer and such a controller and a method for controlling such a printer are provided. A user may assign print jobs directly to one of the rolls by assigning graphical representations the print jobs to regions corresponding to those rolls in a GUI. The user may also assign print jobs to a region in the GUI that is not associated with any particular roll, as a result of which each image of said print job is individually assigned automatically to at least one of the rolls.

Roll printers are a well-known type of printers. In roll printers, a recording medium such as paper is, for example, wound up on an input roll and then fed into, and guided along, a path through the printer, unwinding the input roll by and by along the process. In this way, the recording medium is roll-fed (i.e. taken from a roll and fed) to a marking unit of the printer which applies a marking material (prints) onto the recording medium. Such printers are therefore also called roll-fed printers.
Roll-to-roll printers are a common type of roll printers and are characterized in that the recording medium is, after images have been printed on it, wound up on an output holder of an output roll by and by along the process.
In a multi-roll printer, more than one such roll of the recording medium is processed at the same time. For example, in a dual-roll printer, a first and a second roll are processed at the same time. The two rolls may process the recording medium with different speeds; usually, however, the two speeds are at least close to each other. One and the same controller may be used to control the processing of several, in particular the printing on several, rolls.
In some known controllers for a printer, print jobs are assigned to a printer using a graphical user interface, or GUI for short. US 2008/180 725 A1 describes a method for generating user-defined printer cluster groups for the automatic distribution of documents for printing, using a GUI.
One common mechanism is the drag-and-drop mechanism: The user performs a mouse click on a graphical representation of a print job and holds the mouse button down. While holding the mouse button down, the user moves the mouse and thus drags the graphical representation of the print job along the GUI until the graphical representation of the print job is positioned over a graphical representation of a drop zone. By releasing the mouse button when the graphical representation hovers over the drop zone, the graphical representation is dropped onto the drop zone. Of course, a drag-and-drop function may be performed also without the use of a computer mouse.
For example, touching a touch screen with a finger over a graphical representation may be interpreted in the same way as a mouse click, drawing with the finger over the touch screen while maintaining contact may be interpreted as dragging the graphical representation, and releasing the finger from the graphical representation when the graphical representation is located over the drop zone may be interpreted as dropping the graphical representation onto the drop zone.
A drop zone is a region of the GUI that is functionally connected to a specific function to be applied to the object that is dragged and dropped onto the drop zone. In the case of a printer controller, the GUI may be configured such that the print job whose graphical representation has been dropped onto the drop zone is then queued for printing by the printer. An example for such a drop zone is the printer queue window of a commonly used computer operating system using application windows. Any graphical representation of a printable file may be dragged and dropped into a window representing the printer queue, as a result of which the printable file is added to the printer queue of a printer connected to, and controlled by, the computer operating system.
The more rolls a roll-to-roll printer comprises, the more confusing such GUI may become, and the more difficult the controlling of the printer may become.
It is desirable to have a method for controlling a roll-to-roll printer that gives a user, or operator, full control over the assignments of different print jobs to different rolls while at the same time simplifying the controlling as much as possible. This is in particular desirable when the printer imposes preconditions to be met for the print jobs which are planned to be printed next to each other.

Controller for a multi-roll printer, printing system and method for controlling a multi-roll printer


A system and method for determining the optimal positioning of an implantable system for sensing physiologic signals within a body. According to a one embodiment of the system, electrodes are positioned on an external surface of a body, and an ECG monitoring device is used to measure cardiac signals between various pairs of the electrodes. One or more of the electrodes may be re-positioned until an electrode pair position and orientation is located that provides a maximum signal reading. This position and orientation may then be used as the position and orientation in which to implant a corresponding device.

This invention relates to a system and method for non-invasively determining the optimal orientation for implanting a device for sensing physiologic events.
Syncopal events and arrhythmias of the heart are particularly problematic for diagnostic physicians to observe in living patients. These events, can be of short duration and sudden onset, coming with little or no warning, and may happen very infrequently. Holter monitors are well known for monitoring electrocardiograms periods of time amounting to days or perhaps a week, but these are bulky and interfere with the patient""s normal life, making them impractical for long term use. Further, patient compliance cannot always be guaranteed, and is a common problem in use of the Holter devices. Problems with external monitors and associated recorders also include inability of some patients to abide the attendant skin irritation. Bulky or expensive special purpose devices may need to be available and maintained. Removal is required for showering, and so on. Any time a living body needs to have a long term monitoring of a physiologic event that is intermittent or infrequent or both, all these problems come into focus. Therefore, there exists a need for minimally intrusive long-term monitoring of the patient""s physiologic events and status. This is particularly indicated in, but not limited to patients with cardiac arrhythmias and vasovagal syncope to provide sufficient evidence for diagnostic purposes and for research into the causes and effects of such events. Patients have come to accept long term implants of small items for many things, including birth control, for example, like the xe2x80x9cNorplantxe2x80x9d ((trademark) of Wyeth Laboratories) devices which secrete birth control hormones for perhaps a year before they need replacing. Accordingly it is believed that small device implants for long term implant will be well tolerated by the patient population.
Many attempts to address some of these problems have been made and met with limited success. The problem has been long existing. The Instromedics approach is seen in the Mills, et al patents (U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,333,616; 5,289,824 and 5,111,396) for a wrist worn monitor for ECG""s which include features like patient triggering and microprocessor determination of event types (QRS detection). Wrist worn devices are also shown in the Righter patents issued to assignee Ralin, including U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,226,425 and 5,365,935. Jacobsen, et al in U.S. Pat. No. 5,513,645 describes multiple resolution storage for ECG""s (ELA Medical is the assignee), and Snell""s U.S. Pat. No. 5,518,001 vaguely describes a patient triggered recording device with multiple sensors and patient triggering(assigned to Pacesetter). InControl""s approach is seen in the Yomatov patents, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,411,031 and 5,313, 953 which seems to concentrate on beat to beat timing records, suggests the use of an arrhythmia detector, and does mention the possibility of leadless electrodes for monitoring cardiac signals. Examples of an external monitor/recorders can be found in Segalowitz"" patents, including U.S. Pat. No. 5,511,553, and Salo""s U.S. Pat. No. 5,417,717. Another well known event recorder is the xe2x80x9cKing of Heartsxe2x80x9d ((trademark) of Instramedix) which records pre-event and post-event data.
Monitoring can be done using implantable pulse generators such as pacemakers and other heart stimulating devices or devices with leads in the heart for capturing physiologic parameters, including the ECG. However, the expense and risk from implanting a pacemaker or changing out one without these functions is something both patients and physicians would prefer to avoid. Such devices, in addition to performing therapeutic operations, may monitor and transmit cardiac electrical signals (e.g., intracardiac electrograms) to an external diagnostic devices typically with leads fixed in the patient""s heart, to observe electrical activity of a heart. It is common for implanted cardiac stimulation devices to send intracardiac electrogram signals to a monitoring device, such as an external programmer, to allow a user to analyze the interaction between the heart and the implanted device. Often the user can designate that the communication from the implantable device to the programmer include a transmission of codes which signal the occurrence of a cardiac event such as the delivery of a stimulation pulse or a spontaneous cardiac depolarization.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,223,678, entitled xe2x80x9cArrhythmia Recorder for Use with an Implantable Defibrillatorxe2x80x9d, issued to Langer et al. on Sep. 23, 1980, discloses an arrhythmia record/playback component within an implantable defibrillator. ECG data is converted from analog to digital (A/D) form and stored in a first-in, first-out memory. When the defibrillator detects an arrhythmia event, it disables the memory so that no further ECG data is recorded in the memory until a command is received from an external monitoring device. This command requests the implantable defibrillator to transmit the stored ECG data to the monitoring device via telemetry. Langer et al. in U.S. Pat. No. 4,407,288, entitled xe2x80x9cImplantable Heart Stimulator and Stimulation Methodxe2x80x9d, issued Oct. 4, 1983, discloses a programmable, microprocessor based implantable defibrillator which senses and loads ECG data into a memory via a direct memory access operation. A processor analyzes this ECG data in the memory to detect the occurrence of an arrhythmia event afflicting a patient""s heart. Upon such an event, the defibrillator may generate a therapy to terminate the arrhythmia event and store the ECG data sequence of the event, for transmission to an external monitoring device and later study. In normal circumstances, when no arrhythmia event is occurring, the defibrillator continuously overwrites the ECG data in the memory.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,556,063, entitled xe2x80x9cTelemetry System for a Medical Devicexe2x80x9d, granted to D. L. Thompson et al, 1985, teaches a pulse interval telemetry system capable of transmitting analog data, such as sensed intracardiac electrogram signals, without converting analog data to a digital numeric value. The Thompson et al. telemetry system is capable of sequentially transmitting both digital and analog data, individually and serially, in either an analog or a digital format, to a remote receiver. The features and capabilities of these pacemaker/defibrillator devices is now well known, but the problems in long term monitoring for events and adequate recordation remain.
In the December 1992 Vol. 15 edition of PACE (15:588), a feasibility study was done for implantable arrhythmia monitors and reported in an article by Leitch et al. Subcutaneous, Bipolar xe2x80x9cPseudo-ECGxe2x80x9d Recordings using an Implantable Monitoring System and at chaired poster presentation of the North American Society of Pacing and Electrophysiology (NASPE) an implantable monitoring system was described using the pacemaker that had been altered to use a point on the can as an electrode and to have an electrode mounted into the connector block thereof. This was presented to NASPE in Munich in 1994 by Brian Lee of Medtronic, Inc. A photograph of the device shown in that poster presentation was published by the American Heart Association Inc. in 1995 by Andrew Krahn, M.D. in an article entitled xe2x80x9cThe Etiology of Syncope in Patients with Negative Tilt Table and Electrophysiological Testingxe2x80x9d, pp. 1820 of CIRCULATION, 1995; 1992. The initial thinking for this started in NASPE 1991 in an Abstract published in PACE, 1991, 14:677 authored and titled: Leitch, J W, Klein, G J, Yee, Lee BB, Kallok, M, Combs, B, Bennett, T: Feasibility of an Implantable arrhythmia Monitor.
Further, a leadless implantable sensor for cardiac emergency warning was described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,404,887 issued to Knowlan et al. which detects heart events through impedance measurement sensed using a coil. See also Yomato et al, U.S. Pat. No. 5,313,953 which describes (in FIG. 26) a large but leadless implant.
With sufficient hardware and connections to the body, numerous other physiologic parameters may be sensed as is pointed out in U.S. Pat. No. 5,464,434 issued to Alt and U.S. Pat. No. 5,464,431 issued to Adams et al.
Although important benefits are provided by leadless implantable sensing systems, these systems also present some unique challenges as well. In particular, signal-to-noise ratios are often inferior as compared to devices that employ sensors positioned on leads implanted within the patient. To ensure that signal quality is maintained, it is important to properly position the implantable sensing device within the patient. However, because the physiology of each patient differs, the optimal device position and orientation will also vary from patient to patient. Therefore, some system is needed to ensure that optimal positioning of the implantable device is obtained on a patient-by-patient basis.

System and method for non-invasive determination of optimal orientation of an implantable sensing device


Disclosed are systems and methods for obtaining a structured light reconstruction using a hybrid spatio-temporal pattern sequence projected on a surface. The method includes projecting a structured light pattern, such as a binary de Bruijn sequence, onto a 3D surface and acquiring an image set of at least a portion of this projected sequence with a camera system, and projecting a binary edge detection pattern onto the portion of the surface and acquiring an image set of the same portion of the projected binary pattern. The acquired image set of the binary pattern is processed to determine edge locations therein, and then employed to identify the locations of pattern edges within the acquired image set of the structured light pattern. The detected edges of the structured light pattern images are employed to decode the structured light pattern and calculate a disparity map, which is used to reconstruct the 3D surface.

The present disclosure relates to surface detection and imaging using structured light.
Real-time, robust, accurate structured light can enable novel applications for imaging patient anatomy within an operating room environment. Structured light systems work by projecting one or more patterns onto a scene, and recording those patterns with one or more cameras to create a depth map (or disparity map) that approximates the scene (i.e., a 3D surface) on which the pattern is projected. A 3D point cloud of the scene can be reconstructed from the depth map by triangulation.
To use triangulation, the optical system must be calibrated, so that the relative position and orientation and intrinsic optical properties of the optical components are known. There are two widely reported and utilized structured light system types. These systems types are 1) a system comprising two or more calibrated stereo cameras used with an uncalibrated projector, and 2) a system comprising a calibrated single camera with a calibrated projector. For system 1, a minimum of two calibrated cameras is used to capture the images of the projected pattern. From these captured images the disparity between the two views can be calculated. In system 2), the image of the projected pattern from one or more cameras is directly compared against a stereo rectified and undistorted projected pattern.
Many different techniques for performing structured light detection and imaging have been reported, (see for example J. Salvi, J. Pagès, and J. Batlle. "Pattern codification strategies in structured light systems; Pattern Recognition", 37(4):827-849, 2004, herein after [Salve 2004], which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety), such as methods based on temporal-multiplexing, spatial neighborhoods, and direct coding. In temporal-multiplexing based methods, multiple patterns are projected onto the scene as a function of time to encode regions of the scene for robust stereo-matching. The encoding robustness typically increases with the number of patterns used at the expense of increasing acquisition time, making time-based methods more suitable for reconstructing static scenes with high accuracy and point density.
In comparison, spatial methods can use as few as one unique pattern similar to a barcode or QR code to encode the scene, making these methods more suitable for reconstructing dynamic scenes due to the short image acquisition time. However, spatial neighborhood based methods require the entire local neighborhood of a point to be reconstructed to be visible in the acquired image(s) in order to accurately reconstruct the point. This constraint, known as the local smoothness approximation, is prone to breaking down in regions of the 3D target with sharp changes in elevation (the direction going away from the structured light system) (i.e. large slopes). Violation of the local smoothness approximation leads to data loss and/or corruption in these regions of the reconstruction.

Systems and methods for obtaining a structured light reconstruction of a 3D surface


A method for identifying an optimal crossing point for concatenation of speech samples within an overlap area is provided. The method includes retrieving a first speech sample and a second speech sample, the second speech sample is concatenated immediately after the first speech sample is concatenated; determining a first region within the ending of the first speech sample and a second region within the beginning of the second speech sample, the first region and the second region are determined respective of relatively high spectral similarity over time between the first speech sample and the second speech sample; identifying an overlap region between the first region and the second region; determining an optimal crossing point between the first speech sample and the second speech sample, the optimal crossing point has a maximum correlation over time; and concatenating the first speech sample and the second speech sample at the optimal crossing point.

Text-to-speech (TTS) technology allows computerized systems to communicate with users through synthesized speech. The quality of these systems is typically measured by how natural or human-like the synthesized speech sounds.
Very natural sounding speech can be produced by simply replaying a recording of an entire sentence or paragraph of speech. However, the complexity of human communication through languages and the limitations of computer storage may make it impossible to store every conceivable sentence that may occur in a text. Because of this, the art has adopted a concatenative approach to speech synthesis that can be used to generate speech from any text. This concatenative approach combines stored speech samples representing small speech units such as phonemes, di-phones, tri-phones, or syllables form larger speech signals.
Today, TTS libraries are limited to a certain amount of speech samples from which speech may be generated. These TTS libraries are limited to speech samples that have high spectral similarity in a point where the speech samples may be concatenated together. Typically, spectral similarity is determined based on spectral clustering techniques that are known in the existing art used to cluster similar symbols. Spectral similarity may be determined by using, for example, short-time Fourier transforms (STFT) or, alternatively, Mel-frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCC).
TTS synthesis techniques using the TTS libraries can face a number of difficulties, such as, requiring large amounts of space for speech samples storage needed to produce rich repositories of speech. When such space is not available, a poor speech repository is produced. Moreover, concatenating speech samples is limited to the context in which the speech samples were spoken. For example, in the sentence "Joe went to the store," the speech units associated with the word "store" have a lower pitch than those associated with the question "Joe went to the store?" Because of this, if stored speech samples are simply retrieved without reference to their pitch or duration, some of the speech samples could have the wrong pitch and/or duration for the concatenated speech samples, thereby resulting in unnatural sounding speech.
Existing solutions for producing speech typically require that speech samples be separated from each other and concatenated together in new combinations to enrich the speech repository. However, the drawback of such solutions is that the initial speech sample separation may be inaccurate, therefore production of speech from those speech samples may yield ineffective results. One way to overcome this drawback is by producing speech from a very large set of speech samples. However, maintaining all the speech samples will significantly increases the size of a TSS library, and the time for processing such speech samples.
It would therefore be advantageous to provide an efficient solution for optimally and dynamically concatenating speech samples.

System and method for concatenate speech samples within an optimal crossing point


In a three-piece combined oil ring comprising a pair of side rails and provided between them a spacer expander, the side rails are each provided in the inner edge thereof with a plurality of cutouts at given intervals, thereby providing a combined oil ring improved in its conformable property to any deformation of a cylinder bore. A nitrided layer is formed by plasma nitriding on each side rail only at its outer edge face, thereby preventing embrittlement of the side rails and improving the durability.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a combined (or multi-piece) oil ring feasible for oil control, fitted to a piston of an internal combustion engine or compressor.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In recent years, internal combustion engines have increasingly higher performances, and those of a higher speed and a higher load have been developed. Accordingly, sliding members such as cylinders and piston rings are improved in variety so that they Can be improved in their heat resistance, wear resistance and seizure resistance. Nowadays, in addition to these properties, it is desirable to decrease fuel consumption and lubricating oil consumption. For this purpose, it has become popular, particularly in gasoline engines, to use three-piece combined oil rings.
Three-piece combined oil rings are comprised of upper and lower two side rails and a spacer expander provided between them, and have the following advantages: The upper and lower rails are set separate, and hence they can readily follow any minute deformation of a cylinder bore. The upper and lower rails come into contact with both the top wall and the bottom wall of an oil ring groove, and hence they can promise an excellent sealing effect. The upper and lower rails can be assembled in such a way that their gaps (rail-end gaps) can be set aside each other by 180.degree., and hence the rings by no means open at their gaps. As a result, the lubricating oil consumption can be decreased.
FIG. 9 illustrates an example of combined oil ring of this type. This combined oil ring 11 is comprised of upper and lower circular side rails 13 and 15 and a spacer expander 17 U-shaped in its cross section and fitted between the side rails 13 and 15 in a compressed stated. The spacer expander 17 is provided with cutouts 19 so formed as to play a role of guides through which oil is led to the oil ring groove.
It is prevailing that the side rails 13 and 15 have rigid layers 21 formed on their whole or some surfaces. For example, Japanese Laid-open Patent Application No. 58-136771 discloses that side rails are provided with nitrided layers on their whole surfaces. Japanese Laid-open Utility Model Application No. 53-147309 discloses that side rails are provided with hardened layers formed on their inner and outer edge faces by hardening or nitriding.
The above conventional combined oil rings, however, have the following problems remaining unsolved.
In the first place, although the combined oil rings having upper and lower rails separately provided are advantageous in that they can readily follow any minute deformation of a cylinder bore, they often can not exhibit a satisfactory conformable property in engines comprised of a cylinder block in which a plurality of cylinders are integrally formed, because such engines have particularly a high temperature at the part between combustion chambers to cause a non-uniformity in temperature distribution, resulting in a loss of roundness of the cylinder bore because of a difference in thermal expansion.
Secondly, in the case where the whole surfaces of side rails are treated by nitriding as disclosed in Japanese Laid-open Patent Application No. 58-136771, there remain the problems that the side rails tend to embrittle to cause cracks and that the oil ring groove tends to be worn because of contact of the side rails with the piston oil ring groove.
Thirdly, in the case where the inner and outer edge faces are treated by nitriding as disclosed in Japanese Laid-open Utility Model Application No. 53-147309, the problem of embrittlement can be lessened compared with the case where the whole surfaces are treated by nitriding, but, because of the inner edge face made rigid, the problem of the wear of oil ring groove has not been settled. That is, inner edge faces of side rails and inside corners thereof at the gaps tend to come in touch with the top and bottom walls of the oil ring groove, so that the oil ring groove may be abraded.


The present invention provides a method for assigning a mobile unit to a tracking area based upon a location update frequency. The method includes selecting one of a technology-specific tracking area and a shared tracking area based on a location update frequency associated with a mobile unit.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to communication systems, and, more particularly, to wireless communication systems.
2. Description of the Related Art
The coverage area of a wireless communication system is typically divided into a number of cells, which may be grouped into one or more networks. Mobile units located in each cell may access the wireless communications system by establishing a wireless communication link, often referred to as an air interface, with a base station associated with the cell. The mobile units may include devices such as mobile telephones, personal data assistants, smart phones, Global Positioning System devices, wireless network interface cards, desktop or laptop computers, and the like. As a mobile unit moves between cells in the wireless communication system, the mobile unit may periodically provide location update messages that inform the wireless communication system of the mobile unit's current location. The wireless communication system may use the information in the location update messages to locate the mobile unit (e.g., by paging the mobile unit) and then direct information to the mobile unit via a base station indicated when the mobile unit responds to the page.
In some activity states, such as the idle or dormant mode, the mobile unit may not send location update messages even though it may continue to move through the cells in the wireless communication system, until some condition is met (e.g., when the mobile unit crosses the boundary of the tracking area associated with the last location update message, a new location update with the new tracking area is sent). Accordingly, the wireless communication system may not know the exact cell that includes the mobile unit when information becomes available for delivery to the mobile unit. The wireless communication system may attempt to reach the mobile unit by sending paging messages over a plurality of cells belonging to a paging area determined by the network based on the information it has about the last known mobile unit location. For example, the wireless communication system may attempt to reach the mobile unit by sending paging messages to the cells belonging to the last known tracking area.
The paging messages contain information that indicates to the mobile unit that information is available for transmission to the mobile unit. If the mobile unit receives the paging message, it may provide a paging response via a base station that provides wireless connectivity to the cell that includes the base station. The paging response typically indicates that the mobile unit is available to receive the information and also provides information indicating how to route the information to the mobile unit.
Both the paging messages and the location update messages represent system overhead. Accordingly, the wireless communication system is generally designed to meet two conflicting objectives: reducing the overhead from the paging load and reducing the number of location update messages transmitted by the mobile unit. The paging load is typically minimized when the location of the mobile unit is known with relatively high granularity so that each paging message can be transmitted to a relatively smaller number of cells. However, increasing the granularity of the location of the mobile unit requires transmitting a larger number of location update messages. In contrast, reducing the number of location update messages transmitted by the mobile unit may reduce the granularity of the location information used by the wireless communication system to locate the mobile unit, which typically results in each paging message being transmitted to a relatively large number of cells.
The conventional solution to this problem is to define tracking areas that include the cells serviced by a plurality of base stations. The mobile units may then transmit location update messages when they cross from one tracking area to another tracking area and the wireless communication system may begin the paging process by providing paging messages via the base stations in the tracking area indicated by the most recently received location update message. For example, the geographic area served by the wireless communication system may be divided up into multiple tracking areas that encompass the cells serviced by groups of 10 base stations. Mobile units in the wireless communication system may then provide location updates when they cross a cell boundary between the groups of 10 base stations and the wireless communication system may provide paging messages via the groups of 10 base stations in the tracking areas.
Conventional tracking areas may be static, i.e., the association of tracking areas to base stations remains constant over time, or dynamic, i.e., the wireless communication system may modify the tracking areas associated with a mobile unit. For example, an entity, such as a radio network controller, in a wireless communication system that implements dynamic modification of the tracking areas may determine a distance that the mobile unit has traveled between successive location update messages. If the mobile unit has moved a relatively large distance, the radio network controller may increase the size of the tracking area associated with the mobile unit to include a larger number of base stations. Conversely, if the mobile unit has moved a relatively small distance, the radio network controller may decrease the size of the tracking area. Conventional wireless communication systems may also dynamically adjust the size of tracking areas based on a velocity of the mobile unit.
Implementing static tracking areas and accounting for movement of the mobile units through these tracking areas using entities in the wireless communication system, e.g., in a radio network controller, increases the computational load in the wireless communication system. The computational load may be further increased if the tracking areas are dynamically assigned by the wireless communication system, at least in part because the algorithms for assigning and/or modifying tracking areas associated with each mobile unit are computationally much more complex than the algorithms used to implement static tracking areas. For example, each radio network controller may need to acquire, store, and manipulate information indicating at least the current and previous locations of each mobile unit served by the radio network controller, as well as the size and/or constituent base stations of the tracking areas associated with each mobile unit served by the radio network controller.
Mobile units may also be able to support multiple modes that permit the mobile units to access different wireless communication technologies. For example, a first technology may be used to provide wireless connectivity over a first area and a second technology (e.g., a new or updated technology) may be used to provide wireless connectivity over a second area that overlaps with a portion of the first area. Thus, when the mobile unit moves it may encounter areas where the environmental and/or radio conditions cause the mobile unit to move between the different technologies, which may cause the mobile unit to transmit location update messages. The proliferation of different wireless communication technologies, as well as the increasing market demand for access to these technologies, is expected to result in an increase in the number of multimode mobile units that can access multiple technologies. Consumers will also expect the multimode mobile units to move seamlessly across multiple technologies.

Method of assigning a mobile unit to a tracking area based on a location update frequency


The present invention is an imaged photographic element which includes a support, at least one silver halide light-sensitive emulsion layer superposed on the support; and a protective overcoat furthest from the support. The protective overcoat is superposed on the silver halide light sensitive layer. The protective overcoat includes a first polymeric particle having a glass transition temperature of greater than or equal to 25.degree. C. and a particle size of from 5 to 500 nm and a second polymeric particle having a glass transition temperature of less than 25.degree. C. and a particle size of from 5 to 500 nm at a weight ratio of the first polymeric particle to the second polymeric particle of from 3:97 to 80:20 and wax particle having a size of from 0.01 .mu.m to 0.5 .mu.m. The protective overcoat is applied from an aqueous coating.

Silver halide photographic elements contain light sensitive silver halide in a hydrophilic emulsion. An image is formed in the element by exposing the silver halide to light, or to other actinic radiation, and developing the exposed silver halide to reduce it to elemental silver.
In color photographic elements a dye image is formed as a consequence of silver halide development by one of several different processes. The most common is to allow a by-product of silver halide development, oxidized silver halide developing agent, to react with a dye forming compound called a coupler. The silver and unreacted silver halide are then removed from the photographic element, leaving a dye image.
In either case, formation of the image commonly involves liquid processing with aqueous solutions that must penetrate the surface of the element to come into contact with silver halide and coupler. Thus, gelatin, and similar natural or synthetic hydrophilic polymers, have proven to be the binders of choice for silver halide photographic elements. Unfortunately, when gelatin, and similar polymers, are formulated so as to facilitate contact between the silver halide crystal and aqueous processing solutions, they are not as tough and mar-resistant as would be desired for something that is handled in the way that an imaged photographic element may be handled. Thus, the imaged element can be easily marked by fingerprints, it can be scratched or torn and it can swell or otherwise deform when it is contacted with liquids.
There have been attempts over the years to provide protective layers for gelatin based photographic systems that will protect the images from damage by water or aqueous solutions. U.S. Pat. No. 2,173,480 describes a method of applying a colloidal suspension to moist film as the last step of photographic processing before drying. A series of patents describes methods of solvent coating a protective layer on the image after photographic processing is completed and are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,259,009, 2,331,746, 2,798,004, 3,113,867, 3,190,197, 3,415,670 and 3,733,293. The application of UV-polymerizable monomers and oligomers on processed image followed by radiation exposure to form crosslinked protective layer is described U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,092,173, 4,171,979, 4,333,998 and 4,426,431. Major drawbacks for the solvent coating method and the radiation cure method are the health and environmental concern of those chemicals to the coating operator and the instability and relatively short shelf life of the coating solutions. U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,397,980, 3,697,277 and 4,999,266 describe methods of laminating polymeric sheet film on the processed image as the protective layer. U.S. Pat. No. 5,447,832 describes the use of a protective layer containing mixture of high and low Tg latices as the water-resistance layer to preserve the antistat property of the V.sub.2 O.sub.5 layer through photographic processing. This protective layer is not applicable to the image formation layers since it will detrimentally inhibit the photographic processing. U.S. Pat. No. 2,706,686 describes a lacquer finish for photographic emulsions, with the aim of providing water- and fingerprint-resistance by coating the emulsion, prior to exposure, with a porous layer that has a high degree of water permeability to the processing solutions. After processing, the lacquer layer is fused and coalesced into a continuous, impervious coating. The porous layer is achieved by coating a mixture of a lacquer and a solid removable extender (ammonium carbonate), and removing the extender by sublimation or, dissolution during processing. The overcoat as described is coated as a suspension in an organic solvent, and thus is not compatible with current manufacturing of photographic products. U.S. Pat. No. 3,443,946 provides a roughened (matte) scratch-protective layer, but not a water-impermeable one. U.S. Pat. No. 3,502,501 provides protection against mechanical damage only; the layer in question contains a majority of hydrophilic polymeric materials, and must be permeable to water in order to maintain processability. U.S. Pat. No. 5,179,147 likewise provides a layer that is not water-protective.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,804,341 a protective overcoat is formed by applying a coating, in the presence of a electric field, charged, clear polymeric particles to an imaged silver halide element so as to cause the particles to adhere to a surface of the imaged element and then fusing the polymeric particles. In U.S. Pat. No. 5,856,051 a protective overcoat is formed by applying a coating of hydrophobic polymer particles having an average size of 0.01 to 1 microns, a melting temperature of from 55 to 200.degree. C. at a weight percent of 30 to 95, and gelatin at a weight percent of 5 to 70 over a silver halide light-sensitive emulsion layer. The silver halide light sensitive emulsion layer is developed to provide an imaged photographic element. The hydrophobic polymer particles are then fused to form a protective overcoat. However, there remains a need to provide protective overcoats on photographic elements without a fusing step.
Thus, there is a need to control the coefficient of friction of the overcoat layer in order to be run through photofinishing equipment and/or handled by the end-users properly. In addition, the desire to enhance the resistance of the protective layer to scratches and to prevent prints from adhering to on another in high temperature and/or high humidity is still greatly recognized.
The temperature and residence time of photographic coating in the drying section of photofinishing equipment in the trade vary from 50.degree. C. to 70.degree. C. and from 30 seconds to 2.5 minutes. The actual temperature of gelatin coating during drying is much lower than the temperature set for the dryer due to the evaporation of water. In addition, it is necessary to be free of volatile organic compound (VOC) in the formulation to be user and environmental friendly. Under these stringent requirements, it appears that an aqueous colloidal dispersion of a water insoluble polymeric material is an appropriate system for this technology. Water soluble materials will not provide any water resistance property.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,719,791 describes the use of an aqueous dispersion of organic plastic material, which yields a water and vapor permeable coating on drying. However, it is known that when dispersions of low Tg material (Tg<25.degree. C.) are used to obtain a water resistance protective coating, the surface of the protective coating has an undesirable tacky characteristic, which generally degrades other physical properties, such as print blocking, fingerprinting, dust attraction and high scratch propensity. When dispersions of high Tg materials (Tg>25.degree. C.) are used, it is not possible to form a continuous water resistance layer on the prints under the drying condition described above. U.S. Pat. No. 2,751,315 also describes the use of an aqueous dispersion of copolymer materials. It was recognized in this patent that low Tg materials were not suitable and therefore higher Tg polymers in combination with an organic solvent were used in order to form a water-resistant protective coating. The organic solvent that is released from the formulation during drying creates an environmental concern if used in the current photofinishing laboratories. U.S. Pat. No. 2,956,877 describes a method of applying a solution to a photographic image that solublizes the processing reagents from the photographic products as well as forming a protective coating on its surface. The acid groups on the polymer degrades the water resistant property of the final protective layer, and the organic solvent required in the formulation is not suitable for high volume photofinishing laboratories.
There remains a need for an aqueous coatable, water-resistant protective coating that can be easily coated on imaged processed photographic products and dried into a continuous coating under drying conditions typical of photographic processing equipment while not releasing volatile organic compounds and while also providing a low coefficient of friction, improved resistance to scratching and high-temperature blocking, without any adverse effect on the gloss of the photographic product.

Protecting layer for gelatin based AGX photographic products


A fin field effect transistor (FinFET) ESD device is disclosed. The device may include: a substrate; a silicon-controlled rectifier (SCR) over the substrate, the SCR including: a p-well region over the substrate; an n-well region laterally abutting the p-well region over the substrate; a first P+ doped region over the p-well region; a first N+ doped region over the p-well region; and a second N+ doped region over the p-well region; and a Schottky diode electrically coupled to the n-well region, wherein the Schottky diode spans the n-well region and the p-well region, and wherein the Schottky diode controls electrostatic discharge (ESD) between the second N+ doped region and the n-well region.

The subject matter disclosed herein relates to integrated circuit devices. More particularly, the subject matter relates to circuits for managing electrostatic discharge (ESD) in fin-type field effect transistor (FinFET) structures.
As integrated circuit technology has evolved, circuit devices, including process-technology used to make those devices, has become ever smaller. Crowding of circuitry in these advanced devices increases the incidence of ESD, or the discharge of static electricity from a body surface to a device. ESD concerns are relevant to both manufacturing processes used in forming integrated circuit devices, as well as in the end-user environment, where haptics have increased the level of interaction between users and devices.


A language information processing system includes a device for inputting a document preparation aid command including the kind of document to be prepared, a knowledge base having knowledge for document preparation is searched in accordance with the input command to determine a document preparation rule corresponding to the document to be prepared, the document preparation rule determined being converted to a form that can be understood by the user before it is output, thereby assisting the user in the preparation of a document or the learning of a language.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system for and a method of information processing for providing information necessary for document preparation, language learning, etc.
2. Description of the Related Art
There exist conventional systems capable of giving the user rough information in a specific field, such as document preparation. For example, for the preparation of a report, there exists a system which presents the principal entries of the report to be prepared, thereby informing the user of the outline of the report. For the preparation of a letter, there exists a system which enables the user to select the sections of the letter, such as the introduction, main body and closing statement, successively from a menu or the like in the order of the contents of the letter.
Of the above-mentioned conventional document preparation systems, the system for preparing a report presents entries but does not supply the user with the kind of contents to be written under each of the entries.
In the case of the preparation of a letter, the above system, which supplies the contents of each entry in the form of a selected paragraph, assists the user in the preparation of a letter by executing the preparation of the letter itself but is incapable of assisting the user in learning the procedures for preparing letters.
Further, it has been impossible for the above system to modify these paragraphs in conformity with particular needs, nor has it been capable of constructing a context.

System and method for language information processing for providing knowledge of language requested by the user


An atomic force microscope is provided that includes a micro thermal analyzer with a tip. The micro thermal analyzer is configured for obtaining topographical data from a sample. A raman spectrometer is included and is configured for use in obtaining chemical data from the sample.

An atomic force microscope is a device capable of imaging samples at the nanoscale level. The atomic force microscope typically includes a cantilever that has an extremely small radius of curvature. A tip extends from the cantilever and may be placed into contact with a sample being examined or may be spaced from the sample depending upon the specific testing scheme. In contact mode, the tip is placed against the sample and drug across its outer surface. A laser is reflected off of a portion of the top of the cantilever usually opposite the tip. The reflected laser light is then directed onto an array of photodiodes. Stimulation of different photodiodes results in data that can be processed to develop a three dimensional image of the surface of the sample.
As stated, atomic force microscopes are also arranged so that the tip extending from the cantilever is positioned some distance from the sample. Here, an electron cloud circling the tip interacts with an electron cloud at the surface of the sample to cause the tip to be repelled. The cantilever can be externally oscillated at a known phase, frequency and amplitude. Certain systems focus a laser onto the tip in order to generate these known parameters. The interaction between the surface and the tip will cause the phase, frequency and amplitude of the cantilever to be different than that at which it was originally motivated. These differences can be measured and yield information about various characteristics of the sample. Atomic force microscopes are capable of measuring contact forces, electrostatic forces and magnetic forces of the sample and can also provide topographic data as previously indicated.
Chemical bonds which make up the surface of the sample vibrate at different energy levels depending upon the shape of their molecular surfaces, their mass, and the type of exhibited coupling. Infrared light applied to the surface will be absorbed at different wavelengths depending upon the arrangement of bonds present. Multiple wavelengths of infrared light can be measured through use of a Fourier transform to create a graph of wavelength absorption. From this information the types of bonds present may be deduced to then result in an identification of the chemical composition of the surface.
Atomic force microscopes are also arranged to provide data regarding both topography and thermal conductivity of a sample. For example, one such atomic force microscope employs a tip that is a thermal resistor. Current is passed through the tip as it is moved over the sample. The amount of current needed to maintain the tip at a constant temperature is measured to result in a thermal conductivity map of the surface of the sample. At the same time, the topography of the surface can be measured so that this data is acquired in addition to the calorimetric properties.
Although various atomic force microscopes are known for acquiring different types of data from samples, prior atomic force microscopes are limited in that a particular system cannot provide certain combinations of data. Accordingly, there remains room for variation and improvement within the art.

Atomic force microscope with combined FTIR-Raman spectroscopy having a micro thermal analyzer


An armrest assembly for a vehicle is provided. The vehicle includes a body with a door having an inner panel. The door is preferably slidable with respect to the body and selectively openable with respect to the body by a selectively actuatable door handle assembly. The armrest assembly includes a selectively retractable armrest member pivotably mounted with respect to the inner panel and movable between a deployed position and a retracted position. The door handle assembly is operable to enable the selectively retractable armrest member to move from the deployed position to the retracted position when the door handle is actuated to provide clearance between the door and the body as the door opens. A vehicle incorporating the armrest assembly is also disclosed.

Van or van-type vehicles may include a selectively openable door, which is slidably mounted with respect to a body of the vehicle. The door is typically mounted on tracks by which the door slides rearward to permit access to the interior of the vehicle. The clearance between the door and the body as the door slides from a closed to an open position is often minimized to reduce the space required to open the door. Therefore, it may be difficult to provide a fixed armrest mounted on the door due to the possibility of interference with the body as the door is moved to the open position.

Selectively retractable armrest for a slidable door


A hash function used for content addressing is different from the hash function used for content verification. Adding a file to a database involves storing both hash function values in a table as pair. Verifying the integrity of a file believed to be a duplicate in a database, or when retrieving a file, makes use of the verification hash function. Files can be continuously checked. A multi-level database can be used. A second hash function can be added to an existing system. A verification hash function can be upgraded and more than one content verification hash function can be used. In a variation, a random number generator is used instead of a hash function for content addressing; the verification hash function is also used. Files addressed using a random number are added or retrieved from a database and their verification hash values are checked. Time stamps and digital signatures are used for security.

The prior art includes the concept of content-addressable storage of digital information, its retrieval, and the use of hash functions, message digests and descriptor files, as described in international publication No. WO 99/38093. International publication No. WO 99/38092 describes a particular technique for the storage and access of content-addressable information, and international publication No. WO 01/18633 describes a technique for encrypting content-addressable information. These publications are all incorporated by reference.
As discussed in the prior art, it is apparent that content-addressable techniques can be very useful for storing and accessing documents in a fashion that guarantees the integrity of the stored content. As discussed in the prior art, one technique is to use a message digest (such as an "MD5") to uniquely represent a particular document. Further, a single MD5 might uniquely represent many documents (for example, using a descriptor file), and an individual document might contain many different MD5s each referencing a single document or a set of documents.
There are two risks associated with hash functions that receive attention: the statistical hash function collision and the hash attack. A hash collision occurs when, by pure coincidence and in absence of any malice, a system implementing content-addressable storage will contain two files with different content yet having the same hash value, i.e., the same "content address." Under almost any conceivable scenario, this risk will remain negligible for a very long time—even though there would be substantial value in eliminating or strongly reducing it for marketing purposes.
A hash attack is an entirely different proposition, and is also known as a "second pre-image finding." A hash attack is when an unscrupulous party maliciously generates a significantly modified version of a computer file (for example) that has been arranged to produce a hash value (or "content address") identical to the hash value of the original file. A hash attack may simply insert a random bit pattern into a file or the meaning of a contract document might be changed. In any case, the hash attack amounts to the "breaking" of the hash function and the destruction of digital information thought properly preserved.
In any scenario the credibility of the system itself is at stake: after a few successful and widely published hash attacks (even under academic conditions without immediate real-world applicability), the system becomes suspect in the mind of the public. Further, the system would also be suspect once it is simply proven that the hash function in use could be broken. As computing resources continue to evolve, such a hash attack might succeed over the longer term. As larger hash function sizes are chosen and broken in succession, compatibility problems and broken trust chains result. This result is not an attractive prospect for the long-term storage services that should be a natural application for such a system.
Simply using a hash function having an enormous size is not always practical. On one hand, the hash function should be large enough to guarantee that hash function collisions (identical hash values for two different inputs) are statistically excluded. On the other hand, it should be small enough to remain practical as a reference in its targeted applications, as well as affordable in terms of processor time required for computing the hash value.
Unfortunately—even if a system is generally operational for a particular size hash function—changing to a different hash size is a major operation with many implications, loss of efficiency, and application conversion costs as well as backward compatibility overhead. For example, replacing the MD5 algorithm in a content-addressable storage system with a different hash function and generating new message digests for every computer file presents problems. Because the 128-bit message digests (each representing a unique address for a file) are likely sprinkled throughout other documents and computer systems worldwide, it can prove nearly impossible to replace these 128-bit message digests with the newly calculated message digests. Additionally, if the conversion occurs after the time the earlier hash function is generally accepted to be "broken," an important and essentially irrecoverable "trust gap" may be a consequence, as the existing content addresses will not be beyond suspicion at conversion time.
Thus mechanisms and techniques are needed to remedy the above issues.

Additional hash functions in content-based addressing


Transmission patterns for pilot symbols transmitted from a mobile station or base station are provided. The pattern allows for improved receipt of the pilot symbols transmitted. In addition, schemes for improving the ability to multiplex pilot symbols without interference and/or biasing from different mobile stations over the same frequencies and in the same time slots.

I. Field
The present document relates generally to wireless communication and amongst other things pilot information transmission in an orthogonal frequency division wireless communication system.
II. Background
An orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) system utilizes orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM). OFDM is a multi-carrier modulation technique that partitions the overall system bandwidth into multiple (N) orthogonal frequency subcarriers. These subcarriers may also be called tones, bins, and frequency channels. Each subcarrier is may be modulated with data. Up to N modulation symbols may be sent on the N total subcarriers in each OFDM symbol period. These modulation symbols are converted to the time-domain with an N-point inverse fast Fourier transform (IFFT) to generate a transformed symbol that contains N time-domain chips or samples.
In a frequency hopping communication system, data is transmitted on different frequency subcarriers in different time intervals, which may be referred to as "hop periods." These frequency subcarriers may be provided by orthogonal frequency division multiplexing, other multi-carrier modulation techniques, or some other constructs. With frequency hopping, the data transmission hops from subcarrier to subcarrier in a pseudo-random manner. This hopping provides frequency diversity and allows the data transmission to better withstand deleterious path effects such as narrow-band interference, jamming, fading, and so on.
An OFDMA system can support multiple mobile stations simultaneously. For a frequency hopping OFDMA system, a data transmission for a given mobile station may be sent on a "traffic" channel that is associated with a specific frequency hopping (FH) sequence. This FH sequence indicates the specific subcarrier to use for the data transmission in each hop period. Multiple data transmissions for multiple mobile stations may be sent simultaneously on multiple traffic channels that are associated with different FH sequences. These FH sequences may be defined to be orthogonal to one another so that only one traffic channel, and thus only one data transmission, uses each subcarrier in each hop period. By using orthogonal FH sequences, the multiple data transmissions generally do not interfere with one another while enjoying the benefits of frequency diversity.
An accurate estimate of a wireless channel between a transmitter and a receiver is normally needed in order to recover data sent via the wireless channel. Channel estimation is typically performed by sending a pilot from the transmitter and measuring the pilot at the receiver. The pilot signal is made up of pilot symbols that are known a priori by both the transmitter and receiver. The receiver can thus estimate the channel response based on the received symbols and the known symbols.
Part of each transmission from any particular mobile station to the base station, often referred to as a "reverse link" transmission, during a hop period is allocated to transmitting pilot symbols. Generally, the number of pilot symbols determines the quality of channel estimation, and hence the packet error rate performance. However, the use of pilot symbols causes a reduction in the effective transmission data rate that can be achieved. That is, as more bandwidth is assigned to pilot information, less bandwidth becomes available to data transmission.
One type of FH-OFDMA system is a blocked hop system where multiple mobile stations are assigned to a contiguous group of frequencies and symbol periods. In such a system, it is important that pilot information be reliably received from the mobile station, while at the same time reducing the bandwidth that is allocated to pilot information, since the block has a limited amount of symbols and tones available to be used for both pilot and data transmission.

Pilot signal transmission for an orthogonal frequency division wireless communication system


A method is described which applies Acoustic Spectrometry to characterize both the particle size distribution and mechanical properties of the soft particles in concentrated dispersed systems. It is shown that compressibility of the soft particles can be calculated from the measured sound speed using well-known Wood expression. The value of the thermal expansion coefficient can be calculated from the measured attenuation spectra either for known particle size or together with particle size as adjustable parameter.

The invention relates to the determination of not only the size distribution, but also the compressibility and thermal expansion coefficients of the particles, from the measured ultrasound attenuation frequency spectra and sound speed.
This invention deals with a particular kind of dispersed system (or colloid) that can be described as a collection of small soft particles immersed in a liquid. These particles can be either solid (latex) or liquid (emulsions). Such dispersed systems play an important role in all kind of paints, lattices, food products, paper coatings, polymer solutions, etc.
These systems have a common feature. Because of the small particle size, the total surface area of the particles is large relative to their total volume. Therefore surface related phenomena determine their behavior in various processes. This invention has particular application to dispersed systems where these surface effects are dominant, corresponding to a range of particle size up to about 10 microns. The importance of these surface effects disappears for larger particles.
The characterization of such colloids is important not only for the manufacture, but also the development of new systems with improved properties. Particle size distribution is a one of the basic notions for characterizing these dispersed systems. Several methods are known for determining particle size. Most methods are based on light, for example: light scattering; light diffraction; etc. There is a new alternative method based on ultrasound that is rapidly becoming important. This ultrasound method has a large advantage over traditional light-based techniques because it is able to characterize a concentrated system without dilution. Light-based methods usually require extreme dilution in order to make the sample sufficiently transparent for measurement. This invention deals with improvements of this ultrasound characterization technique.
There are two methods for ultrasound characterization of disperse systems: Acoustics and Electroacoustics. This invention deals only with Acoustics.
This acoustic method involves two steps. The first step is to perform an experiment on the disperse system to obtain a set of measured values for certain macroscopic properties such as temperature, pH, attenuation spectra, sound speed, etc. This invention does not deal with this step. It assumes the availability of instruments for accurate and precise measurement of the ultrasound attenuation and sound speed. One of the possible examples is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,109,098 by Dukhin, A. S. and Goetz, P. J. xe2x80x9cMethod and device for characterizing particle size distribution and zeta potential in concentrated system by means of Acoustic and Electroacoustic Spectroscopyxe2x80x9d.
The second step is an analysis of the measured data to compute the desired microscopic properties such as particle size. Such an analysis requires three tools: a model dispersion, a prediction theory, and an analysis engine.
A xe2x80x9cmodel dispersionxe2x80x9d is an attempt to describe the real dispersion in terms of a set of model parameters including, of course, the desired microscopic characteristics. The model, in effect, makes a set of assumptions about the real world in order to simplify the complexity of the dispersion and thereby also simplify the task of developing a suitable prediction theory. For example, most particle size measuring instruments make the assumption that the particles are spherical and therefore a complete geometrical description of the particle is given by a single parameter, its diameter. Obviously such a model would not adequately describe a dispersion of carpet fibers that have a high aspect ratio and any theory based on this over-simplified model might well give incorrect results. The model dispersion may also attempt to limit the complexity of the particle size distribution by assuming that it can be described by certain conventional distribution functions, such as for example a lognormal distribution.
A xe2x80x9cprediction theoryxe2x80x9d consists of a set of equations that describes some of the measured macroscopic properties in terms of these microscopic properties of the model dispersion. For example, a prediction theory for acoustics would attempt to describe a macroscopic property such as the ultrasound attenuation in terms of such microscopic properties as the particle size distribution, volume fraction of the dispersed phase and various physical properties of the particles and liquid.
An xe2x80x9canalysis enginexe2x80x9d is essentially a set of algorithms, implemented in a computer program that calculates the desired microscopic properties from the measured macroscopic data using the knowledge contained in the prediction theory. The analysis can be thought of as the opposite or inverse of prediction. Prediction describes some of the measured macroscopic properties in terms of the model dispersion. Analysis, given only the values for some of the model parameters, attempts to calculate the remaining properties by an analysis of the measured data. There are many well-documented approaches to this analysis task.
This invention suggest a new xe2x80x9canalysis enginexe2x80x9d. The measurement part, xe2x80x9cmodel dispersionxe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9cprediction theoryxe2x80x9d are exactly the same as described in our previous invention, U.S. Pat. No. 6,109,098. The xe2x80x9canalysis enginexe2x80x9d described in this patent required a certain set of input parameters for calculating the particle size distribution from the measured attenuation spectra. In particular, for dispersions of soft particles such as latexes and emulsions, it was necessary to specify a thermal expansion coefficient and compressibility of the particle materials. In many cases this data was not available, which made it impossible to apply acoustic techniques for characterizing the particle size in these dispersions.
In this invention we suggest a means to extract this unknown data about the mechanical properties of the particles from the measured attenuation spectra and sound speed. This eliminates the need to know these mechanical properties in advance. We show that the attenuation spectra and sound speed contains sufficient information to calculate both the particle size as well as the above-mentioned mechanical properties of the particles.
The applicant describes a new xe2x80x9canalysis enginexe2x80x9d for calculating not only the particle size distribution from the measured attenuation spectra and sound speed but in addition mechanical properties such as compressibility and the thermal expansion coefficient.

Method for determining particle size distribution and mechanical properties of soft particles in liquids


A waterless vaporizer has a casing containing a heating module that causes vapors to be emitted from a refill pad that is impregnated with menthol and eucalyptus oil by slightly heating the pad and producing a thermally induced convective air flow through the pad. A top member of a casing has a planar pad-receiving surface with holes in it on which the pad can be placed in any selected position between a "low" output and a "high" output position on the surface. A pivotable and vertically displaceable chimney member fits over the pad. The chimney member has a pad retainer/holder portion, the top wall of which provides an alternative position for the pad. A power switch and an indicator lamp facilitate use of the vaporizer. All electrical components are highly durable and fully insulated. The vaporizer is assembled without any screws or equivalent fasteners.

Juvenile Products Corp. of Miami, Fla. which holds license rights in the present invention, marketed a waterless vaporizer in the United States under the trademark "MOUNTAIN BREEZE" for several years. Production of the "MOUNTAIN BREEZE" vaporizer, which was made in England, was discontinued in 1996.
The "MOUNTAIN BREEZE" vaporizer had a case containing two small electrical resistors of the type used in electronic circuits that thermally induced an air flow through openings in the case and through a refill pad supported on a pad-supporting grille on the top of the case. The pad was impregnated with menthol dissolved in eucalyptus oil, and the thermally induced air flow vaporized the menthol and conducted it into the environment. The pad-receiving grille surface was large enough to permit the pad to be placed in a selected position between a "low" and a "high" position on the surface. A pivotable and vertically displaceable chimney fit over the pad and upon pivoting by the user moved the pad with it. Outlet holes in the chimney released the vapors to the environment.
Various aspects of the design and construction of the "MOUNTAIN BREEZE" vaporizer were detrimental to its durability and ease of use and may have played a role in its disappearance from the market place. For example, there was no power switch--the unit was simply plugged into an outlet. The resistors were mounted on a circuit board and connected to the power cord by soldered connections, which were prone to sparking and failure.


Described are compositions containing fluorinated polyether isocyanate derived silane compounds for treating substrates such as hard surfaces, e.g. ceramic and/or glass, to render them oil and water repellent, and stain resistant, articles having coatings comprising such compounds, and methods for applying such coatings.

The use of fluorinated silanes, i.e., silane compounds that have one or more fluorinated groups for rendering substrates such as glass and ceramics oil and water repellent are known. For example U.S. Pat. No. 5,274,159 describes destructible fluorinated alkoxy silane surfactants that can be applied from an aqueous solution. WO 02/30848 describes compositions comprising fluorinated polyether silanes for rendering ceramics oil and water repellent.
EP 797111 discloses compositions of alkoxysilane compounds containing perfluoropolyether groups to form antifouling layers on optical components. Additionally, U.S. Pat. No. 6,200,884 discloses compositions of perfluoropolyether-modified aminosilanes that cure into films having improved water and oil repellency and anti-stain properties.
EP 789050 discloses the use of fluorinated polyether silanes for making composite film coatings. U.S. Pat. No. 3,646,085 teaches fluorinated polyether silanes for rendering glass or metal surfaces oil and water repellent. WO 99/37720 discloses fluorinated polyether silanes for providing antisoiling coating to antireflective surfaces on substrates such as glass or plastic. U.S. Pat. No. 3,950,588 discloses the use of fluorinated polyether silanes to render ceramic surfaces such as bathroom tiles or cookware water and/or oil repellent.
Although many fluorinated silane compositions are known in the art for treating substrates to render them oil and water repellent, there continues to be a desire to provide further improved compositions for the treatment of substrates, in particular substrates having a hard surface such as ceramics, glass and stone, in order to render them water and oil repellent and easy to clean There is also a need for treating glass and plastic as a hard surface, particularly in the ophthalmic field, in order to render them stain, dirt and dust resistant. Desirably, such compositions and methods employing them can yield coatings that have improved properties. In particular, it would be desirable to improve the durability of the coating, including an improved abrasion resistance of the coating. Furthermore, improving the ease of cleaning of such substrates while using less detergents, water or manual labor, is not only a desire by the end consumer, but has also a positive impact on the environment. Also, it is desired that the coatings show particularly good chemical resistance, in particular when exposed to various cleaning compositions with a pH greater than 9. The compositions can conveniently be applied in an easy and safe way and are compatible with existing manufacturing methods. Preferably, the compositions will fit easily into the manufacturing processes that are practiced to produce the substrates to be treated. The compositions preferably also avoid the use of ecologically objectionable components.

Fluorinated polyether isocyanate derived silane compositions


A digging implement (10) including an extendable linkage (12) including a bucket (14) and a thumb assembly (34) for holding materials in the bucket (14). The thumb assembly (34) is configured to rotate as the linkage (12) extends, and both the bucket (14) and the thumb assembly (34) are independently operable.

A. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to digging implements, and in particular a backhoe.
B. Background of the Art
Backhoes are used extensively for excavating and for carrying objects from one area to another. Backhoes have typically been used to dig holes in the ground for trenches and for the placement of building structural components, road substructures, cables, pipes, etc.
Heretofore, backhoes have included a first arm pivotally attached to a tractor and a second arm pivotally attached to the first arm in a scissors-like manner. A bucket is attached to the second arm for digging. Separate hydraulic actuators have typically been used to move each of the arms and the bucket. Some of these backhoes have included an extendable second arm. Furthermore, some backhoes have included a gripping device positioned opposite the bucket for gripping objects between the gripping device and the bucket. One of the gripping devices has included a gripping device statically attached to an arm of the backhoe that does not rotate relative to the arm. These gripping devices have been difficult to use because the arm and the bucket have to properly position relative to the gripping device before the gripping device can be used to pick up objects. Another gripping device includes a separate hydraulic actuator for moving only the gripping device. These backhoe are expensive to manufacture because of the cost for the extra hydraulic actuator and the cost for connecting the gripping device to the controls in the tractor. A third gripping device includes thumbs that rotate simultaneously with the bucket. These backhoes are also difficult to use because the bucket and the gripping device must be properly positioned before the gripping implement can be used. Furthermore, these backhoes are difficult to operate because the rotating gripping implement can get in the way of the rotating bucket, thus making the ground difficult to dig.


Disclosed is a toner comprising a fixing resin, a colorant, a releasant made of a polyolefin having a melting point of not more than 120.degree. C., preferably 60 to 120.degree. C. and a compatibilizing agent for the fixing resin and the releasant, wherein a glass transition temperature Tg of the toner is from 53 to 63.degree. C. and the releasant having a particle diameter of 0.2 to 1.5 .mu.m is dispersed in the fixing resin. This toner is superior in blocking resistance, filming resistance and the like and is capable of fixing at a low temperature and, therefore, this toner is useful as a toner for image forming apparatus utilizing an electrophotographic process.

The present invention relates to a toner. More particularly, it relates to a toner which is suitably used in image forming apparatuses utilizing an electrophotographic process, such as electrostatic copying machines, laser beam printers and the like.
In these image forming apparatuses, a thermal fixing system, which comprises developing a toner on a photoconductor, transferring the toner to copying paper, and passing the paper through a thermal fixing place to obtain a copied image of fixed toner image, is employed in most cases. Particularly, a thermal rolling system is very often employed under the condition that the surface temperature of the thermal roller is 180 to 200.degree. C., considering heat capacity or heat conductivity of the paper, toner and the like, a setting temperature of which is higher than a softening temperature (120 to 150.degree. C.) of the toner.
With the requirements of high speed and low energy of the electrophotographic process, it has recently been required to develop the toner at a lower temperature, e.g. the surface temperature of a thermal roller of not more than 170.degree. C.
Therefore, there has been made a trial of reducing the molecular weight of a binding resin to lower a softening temperature or reducing a glass transition temperature (Tg) to improve the fixing properties of the toner at a low temperature range. However, since the viscosity is also lowered by reducing the molecular weight of the fixing resin, when toner image is melt-fixed between thermal rollers, a part of the toner is transferred to the rollers, and transferred components cause scumming to the copied image, that is, so-called offset occurs. Furthermore, the toner before image formation is aggregated under a high temperature environment, that is, so-called blocking occurs.
For the purpose of inhibiting hot offset and blocking, there has been suggested a toner prepared by blending releasants such as lower molecular weight polypropylene (e.g. polyethylene, polypropylene, etc.) and natural wax. However, since the fixing resin has small affinity to the releasant, a poorly dispersed wax is released from the toner particles. The wax components thereby cause scumming and melt-adhering to a photoconductor drum, that is so-called filming, a dash mark and the like occur. For preventing toner-blocking, a fixing resin having a comparatively higher glass transition temperature, has been considered but such a method can not be employed because the fixing ability is inhibited.


This device applies to all internal combustion heat engines. It includes an electronic unit (10) associated with a ring gear (12) of the inertial flywheel and with sensor (22) with variable reluctance such as those used for electronic ignition engines. Instantaneous period d.sub.i of advancement of teeth (14-16) is produced (26-30-32-34). From signal d.sub.i, period T.sub.4 of the fraction of revolution of the flywheel corresponding to a period of the combustions is calculated (36) and stored (38). A magnitude D'.sub.4, representative of a projection of the alternating component of the angular velocity of the flywheel at the frequency of the combustions is also calculated (40-42). A calculating stage (44) combines (T.sub.4 and D'.sub.4) with constants A and B suited to the type of engine for producing signals for measuring the average gas torque for each combustion of the gas mixture in the cylinders of the engine. This makes possible optimized settings and the detection of misfirings of combustion of passenger or industrial motor vehicles.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a process and a device for measuring the torque of an internal combustion heat engine and, more specifically, to a device for measuring the average gas torque per combustion, produced by such an engine during each combustion, in particular when it is mounted on a passenger vehicle or on a commercial vehicle.
2. Description of the Related Art
In an internal combustion heat engine, the torque produced is the resultant of many parameters and reflects the adequacy of their settings. It constitutes the output of a complex dynamic system. Its measurement is relatively simple and usual on a test-bed, but the cost of this measurement is relatively high. Further, the usual measuring beds deliver only the average values on several combustion cycles of the torque of the engine in stabilized operation. Such measurements of average values over a large number of combustions are insufficient in many respects, for optimizing certain settings of the engine or for diagnosing certain operating defects. Of these defects, detection and statistical evaluation of misfirings are necessitated by new international regulations.
To achieve the above objectives, the quantitative analysis of the average gas torque per combustion produced by the combustions of the gas mixture in the various cylinders of the heat engines is necessary. Such an analysis so far has been made only in the laboratory or on very high-power engines, and it generally relies on increases of pressure in the combustion chambers. This technique exhibits the major drawback of being able to be used only on engines designed (or specially modified) to make possible an installation of pressure sensors. In addition, it obviously is not immediately applicable to engines routinely mounted on a vehicle and, further, it remains so as long as the reliability, the cost, the life and the convenience of use of the pressure sensors are not in accordance with the economic requirements of the automobile industry.
In a PCT international patent application, filed by Motorola Inc. and published on Jun. 20, 1990 under No. WO 90/07051, an electronic control system of the operation of an internal combustion heat engine is described. This system is based on the concept that the instantaneous value of the advancement period of the teeth of a measuring ring gear, integral with the inertial flywheel of the engine, and in front of a stationary sensor, corresponds to the measurement of the instantaneous power output successively produced in each of the cylinders of the engine. The signal thus produced by the sensor is accordingly processed. This processing consists in: (1) measuring the instantaneous period d.sub.i for advancement of a tooth of the ring gear in front of the sensor, (2) respectively multiplying periods d.sub.i of the teeth relating to each of the cylinders by given weighting factors P.sub.i belonging to a sequence corresponding to a particular operating criterion of the engine such as pinging or power output (the procedure for determining these factors is not described), (3) adding results d.sub.i .multidot.P.sub.i obtained for each cylinder, (4) comparing this sum to a particular value taken as reference, (5) deducing, if necessary, from the result of this comparison the presence of pinging in a cylinder or a power imbalance of a cylinder relative to the others and (6) consequently modifying the supplying of the cylinder with an air-fuel mixture.
The object of the system thus described is to eliminate all pinging in the cylinders of the engine and/or to balance the instantaneous power outputs provided by each of them. As a result, the absolute value of the various intermediate magnitudes obtained is neither desired nor found.

Process and device for measuring the torque of an internal combustion heat engine