A system identifying a source of radiation is provided. The system includes a radiation source detector and a radiation source identifier. The radiation source detector receives measurements of radiation; for one or more sources, generates a detection metric indicating whether that source is present in the measurements; and evaluates the detection metrics to detect whether a source is present in the measurements. When the presence of a source in the measurements is detected, the radiation source identifier for one or more sources, generates an identification metric indicating whether that source is present in the measurements; generates a null-hypothesis metric indicating whether no source is present in the measurements; evaluates the one or more identification metrics and the null-hypothesis metric to identify the source, if any, that is present in the measurements.

The detection of sources of radiation is particularly important to help secure nuclear material and to ensure the safety of the general population, military personnel, first responders, and so on. Sources of radiation may be grouped into radiation source classes based on the use of the radiation. For example, a radiological dispersal device (e.g., dirty bomb) and a radiopharmaceutical (e.g., 99mTc in a medical patient) would be in different radiation source classes. The radiation source classes of many sources of radiation (e.g., medical patients) represent approved uses because any safety risk is deemed acceptable, and the radiation source classes of other sources of radiation (e.g., dirty bombs) represent not approved uses because the safety risk is deemed unacceptable. Because some uses are approved and other are unapproved, it is rarely useful to simply detect the presence of a source of radiation. Thus, one of the goals of detection of sources of radiation is to differentiate radiation source classes that may present an unacceptable safety risk from those that do not.
To support radiation detection, a radiation detector, also referred to as a detector, (i.e., a physical device that detect photons) is used to collect counts of photons with energy within the radiation spectrum. A radiation detector is only able to identify the energy of a photon to a certain level of accuracy. As a result, the radiation detector may group counts of photon into ranges of energy. A radiation detector may collect the counts over a time period (e.g., one second) and present the counts within each energy range as a measurement of radiation (i.e., a radiation spectrum).
To detect sources of radiation over a wide area (e.g., city), a drone with a radiation detector may fly over the area in a pattern to collect measurements. Detectors can also be driven in vehicles, hand carried, or placed at strategic stationary locations. Those measurements can be provided to an analysis system to identify whether there is a source of radiation of interest which may be a source of radiation that presents an acceptable or unacceptable safety risk. Because different areas can have very different background radiations (e.g., caused by different geological formations or building materials), the measurements representing the same source of radiation in different areas can be very different. As a result, such an analysis system needs to consider the background radiation present in the area from which the measurements are collected.
The speed and accuracy at which a source of radiation is detected and classified (e.g., as an unacceptable or acceptable safety risk) is important. In addition, it is important to identify the nuclide (e.g., U or 137Cs) that is the source of radiation. However, some of the most advanced analysis systems require vast amounts of computational resources to process measurements, identify the background radiation, identify the source of radiation, and classify the radiation source class of the source of radiation. In addition, many of the currently deployed analysis systems employ detection algorithms that are not particularly accurate. Thus, such analysis systems may be impractical to use because of the needed computational resources or because of the poor accuracy. There is a strong need for algorithms that are both computationally efficient and have a high accuracy.

Multifaceted radiation detection and classification system

Lawrence Livermore National Security, LLC


The present invention provides compounds of Formula (I):

Factor XIa is a plasma serine protease involved in the regulation of blood coagulation. While blood coagulation is a necessary and important part of the regulation of an organism's homeostasis, abnormal blood coagulation can also have deleterious effects. For instance, thrombosis is the formation or presence of a blood clot inside a blood vessel or cavity of the heart. Such a blood clot can lodge in a blood vessel blocking circulation and inducing a heart attack or stroke. Thromboembolic disorders are the largest cause of mortality and disability in the industrialized world.
Blood coagulation is initiated in vivo by the binding of tissue factor (TF) to Factor VII (FVII) to generate Factor VIIa (FVIIa). The resulting TF:FVIIa complex activates Factor IX (FIX) and Factor X (FX) which leads to the production of Factor Xa (FXa). The FXa that is generated catalyzes the transformation of prothrombin into small amounts of thrombin before this pathway is shut down by tissue factor pathway inhibitor (TFPI). The process of coagulation is then further propagated via the feedback activation of Factors V, VIII and XI by catalytic amounts of thrombin. (Walsh, P. N. Thromb. Haemostasis. 1999, 82, 234-242.) Factor XIa plays a key role in propagating this amplification loop and is thus an attractive target for anti-thrombotic therapy.
An alternative way of initiation of coagulation is operative when blood is exposed to artificial surfaces (e.g., during hemodialysis, 'on-pump' cardiovascular surgery, vessel grafts, bacterial sepsis). This process is also termed contact activation. Surface absorption of factor XII leads to a conformational change in the factor XII molecule, thereby facilitating activation to proteolytic active factor XII molecules (factor XIIa and factor XIIf). Factor XIIa (or XIIf) has a number of target proteins, including plasma prekallikrein and factor XI. Active plasma kallikrein further activates factor XII, leading to an amplification of contact activation. Activated FXI acts on FIX, which acts through the coagulation cascade to produce thrombin. Thus, inhibitors of plasma kallikrein would be expected to exert an antithrombotic effect under conditions of contact activation. Contact activation is a surface mediated process responsible in part for the regulation of thrombosis and inflammation, and is mediated, at least in part, by fibrinolytic-, complement-, kininogen/kinin-, and other humoral and cellular pathways (for review, Coleman, R. Contact Activation Pathway, pages 103-122 in Hemostasis and Thrombosis, Lippincott Williams & Wilkins 2001; Schmaier A. H. Contact Activation, pages 105-128 in Thrombosis and Hemorrhage, 1998).
Factor XI is a zymogen of a trypsin-like serine protease and is present in plasma at a relatively low concentration. Proteolytic activation at an internal R369-I370 bond yields a heavy chain (369 amino acids) and a light chain (238 amino acids). The latter contains a typical trypsin-like catalytic triad (H413, D464, and S557). Activation of factor XI by thrombin is believed to occur on negatively charged surfaces, most likely on the surface of activated platelets. Platelets contain high affinity (0.8 nM) specific sites (130-500/platelet) for activated factor XI. After activation, factor XIa remains surface bound and recognizes factor IX as its normal macromolecular substrate. (Galiani, D. Trends Cardiovasc. Med. 2000, 10, 198-204.)
In addition to the feedback activation mechanisms described above, thrombin activates thrombin activated fibrinolysis inhibitor (TAFI), a plasma carboxypeptidase that cleaves C-terminal lysine and arginine residues on fibrin, reducing the ability of fibrin to enhance tissue-type plasminogen activator (tPA) dependent plasminogen activation. In the presence of antibodies to FXIa, clot lysis can occur more rapidly independent of plasma TAFI concentration. (Bouma, B. N. et al. Thromb. Res. 2001, 101, 329-354.) Thus, inhibitors of factor XIa are expected to be anticoagulant and profibrinolytic.
Genetic evidence indicates that factor XI is not required for normal homeostasis, implying a superior safety profile of the factor XI mechanism compared to competing antithrombotic mechanisms. In contrast to hemophilia A (factor VIII deficiency) or hemophilia B (factor IX deficiency), mutations of the factor XI gene causing factor XI deficiency (hemophilia C) result in only a mild to moderate bleeding diathesis characterized primarily by postoperative or posttraumatic, but rarely spontaneous hemorrhage. Postoperative bleeding occurs mostly in tissue with high concentrations of endogenous fibrinolytic activity (e.g. oral cavity, and urogenital system). The majority of the cases are fortuitously identified by preoperative prolongation of APTT (intrinsic system) without any prior bleeding history.
The increased safety of inhibition of XIa as an anticoagulation therapy is further supported by the fact that Factor XI knock-out mice, which have no detectable factor XI protein, undergo normal development, and have a normal life span. No evidence for spontaneous bleeding has been noted. The APTT (intrinsic system) is prolonged in a gene dose-dependent fashion. Interestingly, even after severe stimulation of the coagulation system (tail transection), the bleeding time is not significantly prolonged compared to wild-type and heterozygous litter mates. (Gailani, D. Frontiers in Bioscience 2001, 6, 201-207; Gailani, D. et al. Blood Coagulation and Fibrinolysis 1997, 8, 134-144.) Taken together, these observations suggest that high levels of inhibition of factor XIa should be well tolerated. This is in contrast to gene targeting experiments with other coagulation factors.
In vivo activation of factor XI can be determined by complex formation with either C1 inhibitor or alpha 1 antitrypsin. In a study of 50 patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI), approximately 25% of the patients had values above the upper normal range of the complex ELISA. This study can be viewed as evidence that at least in a subpopulation of patients with AMI, factor XI activation contributes to thrombin formation (Minnema, M. C. et al. Arterioscler. Thromb. Vasc. Biol. 2000, 20, 2489-2493). A second study establishes a positive correlation between the extent of coronary arteriosclerosis and factor XIa in complex with alpha 1 antitrypsin (Murakami, T. et al. Arterioscler Thromb Vasc Biol 1995, 15, 1107-1113.). In another study, Factor XI levels above the 90th percentile in patients were associated with a 2.2-fold increased risk for venous thrombosis (Meijers, J. C. M. et al. N. Engl. J. Med. 2000, 342, 696-701.).
Plasma kallikrein is a zymogen of a trypsin-like serine protease and is present in plasma at 35 to 50 μg/mL. The gene structure is similar to that of factor XI. Overall, the amino acid sequence of plasma kallikrein has 58% homology to factor XI. Proteolytic activation by factor XIIa at an internal I389-R390 bond yields a heavy chain (371 amino acids) and a light chain (248 amino acids). The active site of kallikrein is contained in the light chain. The light chain of plasma kallikrein reacts with protease inhibitors, including alpha 2 macroglobulin and C1-inhibitor. Interestingly, heparin significantly accelerates the inhibition of plasma kallikrein by antithrombin III in the presence of high molecular weight kininogen (HMWK). In blood, the majority of plasma kallikrein circulates in complex with HMWK. Kallikrein cleaves HMWK to liberate bradykinin. Bradykinin release results in increase of vascular permeability and vasodilation (for review, Coleman, R. Contact Activation Pathway, pages 103-122 in Hemostasis and Thrombosis, Lippincott Williams & Wilkins 2001; Schmaier A. H. Contact Activation, pages 105-128 in Thrombosis and Hemorrhage, 1998).
Proteins or peptides that reportedly inhibit Factor XIa are disclosed in WO 01/27079. There are advantages in using small organic compounds, however, in preparing pharmaceuticals, e.g., small compounds generally have better oral bioavailability and compatibility in making formulations to aid in delivery of the drug as compared with large proteins or peptides. Small molecule inhibitors of Factor XIa are disclosed in U.S. Patent Application Publications US20040235847A1, US20040220206A1(PH-7497), and US20050228000A1, U.S. patent application Ser. Nos. 11/151,627, and 11/151,667.
In addition, it is also desirable to find new compounds with improved pharmacological characteristics compared with known serine protease inhibitors. For example, it is preferred to find new compounds with improved factor XIa inhibitory activity and selectivity for factor XIa versus other serine proteases. Also, it is preferred to find new compounds with improved plasma kallikrein inhibitory activity and selectivity for plasma kallikrein versus other serine proteases. Also, it is preferred to find new compounds with improved activity in in vitro clotting assays, such as the prothrombin time (PT) assay or activated partial thromboplastin time assay (APTT) (for a description of the PT and APTT assays see, Goodnight, S. H.; Hathaway, W. E. Screening Tests of Hemostasis. Disorders of Thrombosis and Hemostasis: a clinical guide, 2nd edition, McGraw-Hill: New York, 2001 pp. 41-51). It is also desirable and preferable to find compounds with advantageous and improved characteristics in one or more of the following categories, which are given as examples and are not intended to be limiting: (a) pharmaceutical properties; (b) dosage requirements; (c) factors which decrease blood concentration peak-to-trough characteristics; (d) factors that increase the concentration of active drug at the receptor; (e) factors that decrease the liability for clinical drug-drug interactions; (f) factors that decrease the potential for adverse side-effects; and (g) factors that improve manufacturing costs or feasibility.

Substituted biaryl compounds as factor XIa inhibitors

Abstract: or a stereoisomer, tautomer, pharmaceutically acceptable salt or solvate form thereof, wherein the variables A, L, Z, R3, and ring B are as defined herein. The compounds of Formula (I) are useful as selective inhibitors of serine protease enzymes of the coagulation cascade and/or contact activation system; for example thrombin, factor Xa, factor XIa, factor IXa, factor VIIa and/or plasma kallikrein. In particular, it relates to compounds that are selective factor XIa inhibitors. This invention also relates to pharmaceutical compositions comprising these compounds and methods of treating thromboembolic and/or inflammatory disorders using the same.


The present invention is for an evacuation system which preferrably in its entirety is connected to and operates at the outlet side of a pump. The evacuation system is connected to the socket 5 by the connector 9 and one of the valves 15 or 16. In the evacuation system there is a compressor 19 and a pressurized air ejector 18. Air from the ejector exits through a pipe 24.

For the pumping of waste water centrifugal pumps are generally used, which can be started only if there is liquid in the pump body. The present invention is for an evacuation system to ensure that there is liquid in the pump body during start up and operation.
The supply of waste water to the pump is often irregular and occasionally nil. If nothing is done, the liquid level of the system will then fall so that air penetrates the pump body at a small or large extent. Also during operation air may occur in the pump body due to a too small supply of liquid or for other reasons. The pumping may then be interrupted, in spite of that, there is a small inflow of waste water. The waste water may also contain various kinds of contaminations, which cause difficulties and plugging, especially in connection with interruptions of the process.
In order to restart pumps which have been emptied of liquid it is known in the art to make use of evacuation systems, which create a vacuum at the low side of the pumps, so that liquid is lifted to the pumps. Such an evacuation system includes a closed container with a level sensor, i. e. a floater, and is mounted to the inlet tube of the pump. At the outlet side there is mounted a valve which is controlled by signals from the floater. After an interruption a vacuum pump evacuates the air from the pump through the container until it is filled with so much liquid that the floater raises and gives a starting signal to the pump. The system also controls and opens the outlet valve. If the level in the container of the floater falls, the vacuum unit will start again and evacuate the air until there is another signal from the floater.


In a Bi-CMOS logic circuit in which a bipolar transistor and a CMOS element are formed on the same semiconductor substrate, a pull-down current of an output circuit is discharged through a MOS transistor having a large transconductance gm and a constant current source having a large current value. Thus, the speed of a pull-down operation is increased. Moreover, a constant current source need not be provided in an output circuit, and the MOS transistor is operated when it is required during a pull-down operation, thereby reducing an extra current. Therefore, a circuit having low power consumption can be obtained.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a logic circuit using a bipolar transistor and a MOS transistor and, more particularly, to a Bi-CMOS logic circuit in which a bipolar transistor and a CMOS element are formed on the same semiconductor substrate.
2. Description of the Related Art
The basic arrangement of an ECL logic circuit using a conventional bipolar transistor is shown in FIG. 1. Complementary inputs IN and IN are input to an emitter-coupled differential circuit constituted by npn bipolar transistors Q.sub.1 and Q.sub.2. In this case, when the input IN is a high-potential signal, the transistor Q.sub.1 is turned on, and the transistor Q.sub.2 is turned off, thereby flowing a current I.sub.1 through the transistor Q.sub.1. Therefore, the output potential of the transistor Q.sub.1 becomes V.sub.CC -I.sub.1 R, where R is the resistance value of resistor R.sub.1 and the output potential of the transistor Q.sub.2 becomes VCC. It should be noted that R is also the resistance value of resistor R.sub.2. The output potentials V.sub.CC -I.sub.1 R and V.sub.CC are level-shifted to V.sub.CC -I.sub.1 R -V.sub.f and V.sub.CC -V.sub.f, respectively, by an emitter follower circuit constituted by npn transistors Q.sub.3 and Q.sub.4. The voltage V.sub.f is a base-emitter forward biasing voltage of each of the bipolar transistors Q.sub.3 and Q.sub.4.
In the above ECL logic circuit, bipolar transistors are unsaturated. When inequality I.sub.1 R<V.sub.f is satisfied due to the transistors Q.sub.3 and Q.sub.4 of a level shift circuit, the unsaturation of the bipolar transistors is ensured. Therefore, the ECL logic circuit is a logic circuit system having a high-speed operation and a large operation margin of bipolar logic transistors.
The above conventional ECL logic circuit has a merit of a high-speed operation. However, when the load capacitances of the outputs OUT and OUT are large, the ECL logic circuit has a problem.
That is, when the potential of the output OUT is pulled up from a low potential to a high potential, since the load is charged by the bipolar transistor Q4, this charging is performed at a sufficiently high speed. However, when the potential of the output OUT is pulled down from the high potential to the low potential, the bipolar transistor Q.sub.4 is cut off, discharging is performed by only a constant current source I.sub.2. Therefore, when the load capacitance is large, the speed of the pull-up operation is higher than that of the pull-down operation, and the operation speed of the whole circuit is decreased.
When the value of constant current sources I.sub.2 and I.sub.3 is increased to compensate for this drawback, the operation speed is not decreased, but power consumption in unit gate is increased. Since the ECL logic circuit generally has power consumption larger than that of a CMOS element or other bipolar logic circuits, a countermeasure for increasing the capacity of the constant current source cannot easily be employed.

BiCMOS logic circuit with bipolar transistor and MOS transistor formed on the same semiconductor substrate


The present invention is a device for reducing energy consumption by heaters on refrigerator doors and frames. A control unit is set so that the heater is on prior to the formation of condensation. The preferred embodiment provides for preset heater stop and start times entered by a system user. The heater may also be turned on when condensation is sensed by a sensor, and the sensor reading may be used to override the preset times. A programmer provides individual identification of each connected control unit and is used to read, measure and adjust one or more control units' settings. A communications host is used to enable remote monitoring and control. In addition, a quick-disconnect power connector provides for easily setting the system to a heater-on state.

Shopkeepers display refrigerated or frozen products in temperature-controlled display cases, such as refrigerators with glass display doors or open-air, "coffin," coolers. The refrigerators and freezers are referred to herein as "refrigerators." Changes in temperature and humidity in the surrounding area causes condensation and frost to build up on the refrigerators. This obstructs visibility of the products and can cause unsafe conditions as the condensation falls to the floor. As a result, it is desirable to prevent the build-up of condensation and frost on refrigerators.
To combat condensation and frost, heaters are installed in refrigerator doors and frames, which raise the temperature of the door or frame sufficiently to eliminate condensation. Typically these heaters run constantly, but devices that control whether the heaters are on or off are known in the art. They are referred to generally as anti-sweat controllers. One anti-sweat controller known in the art attaches one or more condensation sensors to the refrigerator door and turns on a door heater when condensation is sensed. Traditionally, a single control box is used to control all the sensors of a given refrigerator. These devices fail, however, to prevent condensation because the heater is not activated until after condensation is sensed. Another version uses a humidistat to sense humidity in the aisle and, when the humidity goes above a given level, the heater is turned on, often regardless of whether condensation is actually present. This increases energy consumption because the heater is either constantly on or turned on unnecessarily. It would be desirable to prevent condensation with the minimum amount of heat, and consequent energy expenditure, necessary.
The anti-sweat controllers known in the art also suffer from the fact that they are hardwired into the local power source, which results in difficult access for repair and replacement because the anti-sweat controllers must be unwired each time they are removed and rewired each time they are reinstalled. If the anti-sweat controller breaks, the fact that the system is integral with the local power source may cause the shopkeeper to be unable to set the system to keep the heaters on until a qualified repairman fixes the problem. Further, the dismantling and reconstruction cause safety issues while obstructing customer access to the refrigerators. It would be desirable to provide an anti-sweat controller that is easier to install, repair and replace and that provides a means for the shopkeeper to mitigate problems if a controller fails.
The controller box controls a number of factors that must be set correctly to reduce energy consumption and eliminate condensation, such as sensitivity of the sensor and how long the heater stays on or off once signaled. To date, these factors have been measured and controlled by manually adjusting various currents and voltages on each control box with a multimeter. For a store with multiple refrigerators and multiple anti-sweat controllers, the multimeter must be plugged into each separate controller in order to adjust the entire system. Detecting the specific location of an electrical failure is frustrating and time consuming due to the need to test each separate device. Balancing the system becomes tedious. As a result, it is desirable to reprogram, monitor, and control an anti-sweat controller system without having to plug into each control box on each refrigerator and without having to make on-site visits to each store.
Therefore, it is an object of this invention to provide door heating where condensation has not yet been detected but is anticipated. It is another object of this invention to provide ease of programming, repair, and reinstallation. It is a further object to provide a system that can be set to a heater-on state if a problem arises with the anti-sweat controller. Another object of this invention is to provide a mobile device that tests and programs all the devices of the system by connecting into only one portion of the system. It is an additional object of the invention to provide remote monitoring and control.

System for preventing condensation on refrigerator doors and frames


A work holding device is intended for use in combination with a processing machine, such as an assembling apparatus, an industrial robot or a machine tool. The work holding device comprises a base plate (8), a slide base (9) supported for vertical movement on the base plate (8), a swivel head (10) supported for turning on the slide base (9), and a rotary table (11) supported on the swivel head for rotation about an axis perpendicular to the axis of turning of the swivel head. The slide base (9), the swivel head (10) and the rotary table (11) are controlled properly to set a work (12) held on the rotary table (11) in an optional position relative to the associated processing machine. The work holding device and the processing machine are controlled for synchronous operation by a single controller according to a control program.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a novel work holding device and, more specifically, to a work holding device that enables a work to be set for machining or assembling in an optional position relative to a tool.
2. Description of the Prior Art
FIG. 10 shows, by way of example, a conventional work holding device in combination with an industrial robot for machining a work held by the work holding device or joining parts to the same.
A horizontal articulated robot a has an arm b, and a tool holding shaft c supported for rotation and axial movement on the free end of the arm b. Tools d are held on the lower end of the tool holding shaft c. A conveying device e is disposed under the operating region of the articulated robot a to convey a work f mounted on a work mount g through the operating region of the articulated robot a. The tool holding shaft c is lowered to machine the work f with the tools d.
This work holding device has the work mount g merely fixedly holding the work f and the work mount g cannot be tilted with respect to a processing direction along which the articulated robot a moves the tools d. Therefore, the articulated robot a is unable to gain access to the lateral side of the work f, for example, for fastening a screw to the lateral side of the work f. Accordingly, it has been a practice to design a work so that the work does not require a lateral processing operation in joining parts to the work or in machining the work. However, it requires a greater amount of time to design a work to take conditions into consideration for eliminating the lateral processing operations. Moreover, it is difficult to process a work designed to meet multiple purposes along limited processing directions.


Provided is a method of manufacturing a recorded matter including applying a first ink including a volatile first liquid to an intermediate transfer medium having ultraviolet transmittance; applying, using an ink jet method, second ink including a coloring agent and a polymerizable compound polymerized by irradiation of ultraviolet to locations on the intermediate transfer medium where first ink is applied; partially polymerizing the polymerizable compound by irradiating surface side of the intermediate transfer medium to which the second ink is applied with ultraviolet rays from the opposite side surface; transferring the second ink irradiated by ultraviolet in the polymerizing of the polymerizable compound to a recording medium; and curing the polymerizable compound configuring the second ink transferred to the recording medium.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a method of manufacturing a recorded matter, a manufacturing device of a recorded matter and a recorded matter.
2. Related Art
As a method of manufacturing a recorded matter, a method using an ink jet method is widely used. The ink jet method is excellent on the points that a minute pattern may be appropriately formed, a plate is unnecessary, and the method may appropriately correspond to small lot production and multiproduct production.
However, in a case in which direct printing is performed on a recording medium using the ink jet method, according to the type of recording medium (for example, a non-absorbent medium, such as a recording medium made of plastic which is not provided with an ink absorbing layer), there are problems such as flowing or cissing of the ink on the recording medium occurring, time being required for drying (hardening) of the ink applied to the medium, disturbance occurring in the undried (unhardened) ink image during the discharge or the like of the recording medium to which ink is applied, and it is difficult to reliably form a printing portion in a desired shape.
In order to solve these problems, an intermediate transfer method of recording method is used (for example, refer to Japanese Patent No. 3177985).
However, in the related art, it is difficult to sufficiently prevent the above problems from occurring, even using the intermediate transfer method of recording method. In addition, in the intermediate transfer method of the recording method of the related art, there are problems in that it is difficult to make the fixity of the printing portion to the recording medium sufficiently superior, and fixing requires high energy.
In particular, the above tendency occurs remarkably in a case where a film material manufactured of plastic and used as a packaging or the like for a product is used as the recording medium.

Method of manufacturing recorded matter, manufacturing device of recorded matter and recorded matter


An electrolyzer device comprises a container configured to receive liquid to be electrolyzed; a separator arranged in the container so as to define a first chamber and a second chamber positioned lower in a vertical direction than the first chamber; a cathode arranged in the first chamber and operatively connected to a power supply; and an anode arranged in the second chamber and operatively connected to the power supply.

Electrolysis is well known as being a method of separating an ionic substance, that is either molten or dissolved in a suitable solution, by way of a chemical reaction. A device for achieving electrolysis may require certain components, such as an electrolyte containing an ionic substance, a pair of electrodes (i.e., an anode and a cathode), and a direct electric current supply to drive chemical reactions at the electrodes. As one example, an electrolyzer device may include a container that retains an electrolyte such as a salt solution (i.e., water solving sodium chloride serving as an electrolysis aid), as well as an anode and a cathode arranged in the container. In the electrolysis process, the salt solution is electrolyzed by chemical reactions, resulting in the production of strongly acidic electrolyzed water (SAEW) at the anode and strongly alkaline electrolyzed water at the cathode. The resulting SAEW contains an available chlorine (AC) such as hypochlorous acid (HClO), which is known to have a strong sterilizing/cleansing action, and which thus enables the killing of various microorganisms such as viruses and bacteria. Further, by way of blending the SAEW and the strongly alkaline electrolyzed water, electrolyzed water having a pH in the physiologically neutral range (i.e., weakly acidic, slightly acidic, neutral) can be obtained. Water having such a neutral pH may be suitable for biological use.


The present disclosure relates to the technical field of display panels, in particular to a driving method and driving apparatus of a display panel. The driving method may include in response to detecting that the display panel is switched from a dynamic picture to a static picture, generating a refresh rate adjustment instruction; according to the refresh rate adjustment instruction, switching the picture refresh rate of the display panel from a first picture refresh rate to a second picture refresh rate and generating a voltage adjustment instruction; obtaining a target cathode power supply voltage matching the second picture refresh rate; and based on the voltage adjustment instruction and the target cathode power supply voltage, adjusting the display panel to change a working current of each pixel in the display panel.

Seamless Dynamic Refresh Rate Switching (SDRRS) technology is a power-saving technology for notebook computers proposed by Intel Corporation. Based on SDRRS, when a display panel of the notebook computer is in a state of displaying a static picture, its picture refresh rate can be switched from 60 Hz to 40 Hz, in order to achieve the purpose of effectively reducing the power consumption of the display, i.e., saving power.
However, when the display panel is switched to a different refresh rate, the charging time and discharging time of the display panel will be different, and therefore the brightness of the picture in the screen will be different, and human eyes will feel flicker. Specifically, for example, when the picture refresh rate of the display panel is 60 Hz, the charging time is shorter, so the brightness is lower. In the case of a picture refresh rate of 40 Hz, the charging time is longer, so the brightness is higher. Therefore, when the SDRRS technology is turned on and turned off, the brightness difference would be generated due to the switching of the picture refresh rate. For the human eye, the human eye is not sensitive to brightness changes at high brightness (i.e., at a high gray scale state), but at a low gray scale state, that is, when the brightness is low, the human eye is more sensitive to brightness changes. The greater the brightness change amplitude is, the easier it is for the human eye to catch, so human eyes will feel flicker.

Driving method and apparatus of a display panel

Everdisplay Optronics (Shanghai) Co., Ltd


A pattern inspection apparatus includes a light source which emits ultraviolet light, an irradiator which reduces coherency of the ultraviolet light and irradiates the coherency reduced ultraviolet light onto a specimen on which a pattern is formed through an objective lens, and a focus control means which projects light on the specimen from outside the objective lens, detects light reflected from the specimen by the projection and adjusts a height of the specimen relative to the objective lens. The apparatus further includes an image which forms an image of the specimen irradiated with the ultraviolet light and detects the formed image with a sensor, an image processor which processes a signal outputted from the sensor to detect a defect of the specimen, and a display which displays information of the defect detected by the image processor.

The present invention relates to the inspection of pattern for detecting defects (short-circuits, line breakages, etc. ) and foreign particle on a pattern under test, and particularly to a method and apparatus of pattern inspection for detecting defects and foreign particle on a pattern of semiconductor wafer, liquid crystal display panel, photomask, etc. In the following explanation, the term "defect" is used to signify also foreign particle inclusively.
There is a conventional pattern defect inspection apparatus which is designed to image a pattern under test with an imaging device such as a line sensor, while moving the pattern, and compare the image signal in terms of tone levels with the image signal which has been delayed by a prescribed time length, thereby recognizing the inequality to be the presence of a defect, as described in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. H7(1995)-318326.
There is known a conventional technique pertinent to the pattern defect inspection, as disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. H8(1996)-320294. The technique of this patent publication deals with the high-accuracy inspection of microscopic defects of a pattern formed on a semiconductor wafer or the like where each chip includes high pattern density areas such as memory mats and low pattern density areas such as peripheral circuits. Specifically, the pattern is imaged and a resulting image signal is D/A converted, and a resulting digital image signal is rendered the gradating conversion such that the high pattern density areas and low pattern density areas have a certain relation in terms of brightness or contrast based on the frequency distribution of brightness of the image signal. The image signal resulting from gradating conversion is compared with a comparative image signal resulting from gradating variation in a state of position matching thereby to detect accurately a microscopic defect.
There is known a conventional technique for inspecting a pattern of photo-mask, as disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. H10(1998)-78668. The technique of this patent publication uses a light source of UV laser such as excimer laser, with the coherency of laser being diminished by a revolving diffusion plate which is placed to cut in the light path, to illuminate the photo-mask uniformly thereby to image the pattern, and calculates the characteristic value from a resulting image data to assess the quality of photo-mask.
There are excimer laser exposure apparatus as disclosed, for example, in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Nos. S59(1984)-226317 and Sho. 62(1987)-231924.
In the recent LSI manufacturing, circuit patterns formed on wafers have their width decreased to become 0.25 μm or less to meet the demand of high-density integration, and this dimension is the limit of resolution of the imagery optical system. Therefore, the application of high NA based design of imagery optical system and super-high resolution technique are in progress.
However, the high NA based design is already at a physical limit, and the breakthrough approach is to shorten the wavelength of imaging light into the ranges of UV (ultraviolet) wavelengths of 300-380 nm, DUV (deep ultraviolet) wavelengths of 190-300 nm, VUV (vacuum ultraviolet) wavelengths of 100-190 nm, and EUV (extreme ultraviolet) wavelengths of the order of 10 nm.
Due to the requirement of high-speed inspection, the scheme of subject scanning with a spot-focused laser beam cannot be adopted. Illumination of subject with a wide full-field laser light creates speckles, which cause overshooting and undershooting called "wringing" at edge of circuit pattern, resulting in a degraded image quality.

Method and apparatus for inspecting a pattern formed on a substrate


A slatted base having a frame and a measuring device for detecting the deformation of a lying surface under the load of a person lying thereon, wherein the deformation is carried out by detecting the vertical deflection of slats, which are held on both sides in a slatted base with their free ends in a mounting body, on which the displaceable end of a vertically oriented lifting drive engages, which is supported with respect to a bottom-side base frame, wherein the mutual horizontal distances between the slats is adjustable and fixable.

Such an arrangement of a slatted base has become known, for example, as the subject of EP 2 572 607 B1.
The document described a slatted base in which at least some of the slats interact with a deformation sensor, and the output signals of the deformation sensors are supplied to a computer in order to determine, in dependence on the total weight of the user, a load distribution on the slats, the deflection of the slats, the tilting of the slats with respect to the frame axis and the tilting of the slats along their longitudinal axis, as well as the center of gravity of the user and the presence of a lateral, supine or prone position.
It is further known from this document that each pair of slats is held in an associated spring-loaded bearing element and that the bearing element is arranged on the frame of the measurement bed such that it can be electromotively raised and lowered.
Each bearing element, which accommodates either one or two slats, is accordingly allocated a servomotor, which drives a lifting drive via an angular gear, which is suitable for driving the bearing element in the vertical direction such that the bearing element can be raised and lowered.
With this kind of lifting drive of the slats via bearing elements, which are driven by a servomotor such that they can be raised and lowered, a specific target position of the lying surface is determined. This means that in order to produce a particular target position of the lying surface, all bearing elements are driven such that, for example, one slat lies slightly higher above the other slat, so as to create a particular lying profile on the lying surface.
One first departs from an initially established base position, which first consists of a completely flat lying surface which aligns all of the slats in a flat, horizontal position.
After the creation of this base position, in the unloaded state, a subject lies on the lying surface and then a contactless measurement of the deflection of the slats and the path of deflection within the spring body itself occurs in nearly every slat in order to determine the sinking depth of every slat with respect to the base position of the lying surface.
In this way, a lying profile of the loaded lying surface is created, which indicates at what body weight at which part of the body the respective slat flexes downward and sinks, and this distance is determined by said contactless measurement.
One thus determines a target sinking of the lying surface, namely with respect to the deflection and the spring deflection of the slats or the slat pairs, in that one converts these values to the bearing points of the bearing elements of the longitudinal beams of the lying surface.
If, for example, a sinking depth in the middle of the slat of, for instance, 5 cm is measured, this is converted with a conversion scale, e.g. 1:10 or 1:9 to the longitudinal beam side bearing element, which is then assigned a displacement of, for example, 1 cm from the lifting drive.
If, for example, a longitudinal displacement of the slat in the center region of the lying surface of 50 mm is determined, this is converted in a grid dimension scale, e.g. in a grid dimension of 1:10, and a corresponding lift adjustment is carried out on the longitudinal beam side bearing element, e.g. by a displacement of 5 mm.
A particular target profile is thus created through the lifting drives in dependence on the determined measurement values of each slat pair of the lying surface, in that each bearing element is raised or lowered on the longitudinal beam side so as to achieve that finally, the spine of the subject is in a straight alignment on the lying surface.
This means that the orientation of the bearing elements via the lifting drive arranged there leads to an ergonomically correct alignment of the lying surface with the goal of defining certain lying zones, so as to enable a continuously straight spine.
In known lifting drives, which are arranged at a mutual distance and in parallel to the longitudinal beams of the measurement bed, the lying profile is then steplessly adjusted in the manner of a target profile.
For reasons of simplification and for the improvement of the later usability of a user bed derived therefrom, it is provided that a particular grid dimension is derived from the stepless adjustment of the bearing elements which support the slats, and this grid dimension is later adjusted precisely to a slatted base assigned to a user.
Thus, in a later lying surface which is individually aligned to the user, the displacement positions of the individual bearing elements, which have been previously determined via the measurement arrangement of the measurement bed, are converted into assigned grid spacings from mutually displaceably arranged bearing elements, in order to thus enable a particular grid dimension of a lifting setting of a slatted base which is individually adapted to a user from the stepless lifting drive of the measurement bed.
As each lifting drive is individually adjustable for each slat, one has determined an individual lying profile, which is the object of EP 2 572 607 B1.
The disadvantage of said document is, however, that only one (vertical) lifting drive is shown for the individual adjustment of the slats, however no other adjustment possibilities are shown.

Slatted base having a frame and a measuring device


A speaker recognition system generates a codebook store with codebooks representing voice samples of speaker, referred to as trainers. The speaker recognition system may use multiple classifiers and generate a codebook store for each classifier. Each classifier uses a different set of features of a voice sample as its features. A classifier inputs a voice sample of an person and tries to authenticate or identify the person. A classifier generates a sequence of feature vectors for the input voice sample and then a code vector for that sequence. The classifier uses its codebook store to recognize the person. The speaker recognition system then combines the scores of the classifiers to generate an overall score. If the score satisfies a recognition criterion, then the speaker recognition system indicates that the voice sample is from that speaker.

Many applications rely on speaker recognition systems to either authenticate a speaker who is purporting to be a specific individual or to identify a speaker from a voice sample. For example, a security application controlling access to a building may authenticate a person requesting to enter the building by collecting a voice sample of the person and a purported identification of the person. Assuming that the true person is authorized to enter the building, the security application compares the input voice sample to previously collected voice samples of the true person to ensure that the person who wants to enter the building is indeed the true person. If so, the security application has authenticated the person and allows the person to enter the building. If not, the security application determines that the person is an imposter and denies entry. As another example, a wiretap application may collect voice samples of a telephone conversation and attempt to use speaker recognition to identify who is speaking. The wiretap application compares the voice sample to previous voice samples of known persons. If a match is found, the wiretap application has identified the speaker as the matching person.
Many speaker recognition techniques have been proposed to authenticate or identify a speaker by comparing a voice sample to a collection of voice samples. These speaker recognition systems can be classified as text-independent or text-dependent. In a text-independent speaker recognition system, a person can say any sequence of words both when training the speaker recognition system and when providing a voice sample for speaker recognition. A text-independent speaker recognition system employs a static analysis in which features (e.g., division of the sample into utterances) extracted from the speech are analyzed independently regardless of sequence. For example, the speaker can say "one two three" or "one three two" and the system will recognize the speaker. Text-independent speaker recognition systems typically use either a Gaussian Mixture Model or Vector Quantization. (See Reynolds, D., et al., "Speaker Verification Using Adapted Gaussian Mixture Models," Digital Signal Processing, 10(1-3), 2000; Soong, F. K., Rosenberg, A. E., Juang, B. H., and Rabiner, L. R., "A Vector Quantization Approach to Speaker Recognition," AT&T Journal, Vol. 66, pp. 14-26, 1987.)
In a text-dependent speaker recognition system, the system tells the speaker what to say or the speaker knows what to say (e.g., a password). A text-dependent speaker recognition system employs a dynamic analysis in which a sequence of features is analyzed to determine whether it corresponds to the known phrase as previously spoken by the speaker. Text-dependent speaker recognition systems typically use dynamic programming or a hidden Markov model.
Text-dependent speaker recognition systems typically require more training samples and are more computationally complex than text-independent speaker recognition systems. As result, text-dependent speaker recognition systems tend to be more accurate, but they support only a very limited vocabulary and sequence of words.
Typical speaker recognition systems have an initial training phase in which voice samples of a speaker are collected, features are extracted, and a model is generated from the extracted features for use in recognition. After a model is generated, a speaker recognition system inputs a target voice sample, extracts features, and compares them to the model or models. A popular set of features is referred to as the Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficients ("MFCCs"). Typically, 12 or 13 features of the MFCC are extracted to form a feature vector. A voice sample is typically divided into overlapping frames of 10-20 milliseconds each and a feature vector is extracted from each frame. Thus, a one-second voice sample with a 20 ms frame size will have 50 frames with 50 feature vectors represented as X(1), X(2), . . . X(50). With static analysis, each feature vector is processed independently of the other feature vectors. With dynamic analysis, each feature vector is processed based on its sequential relationship to the other feature vectors. With dynamic analysis, a speaker recognition system analyzes how well entire sequences match, which is computationally expensive. To reduce the computational expense, some speaker recognition systems perform a static analysis on the MFCC features of a frame and, to capture the dynamics of the voice sample, a static analysis of the differences between the MFCC features of adjacent frames.
Typical speaker recognition systems are either template-based or vector quantization-based. A template-based speaker recognition system extracts features during training and keeps a single template for each feature as a representative of the speaker. Thus, there is one template for each speaker of the training data. During the speaker recognition, a feature vector is extracted from the voice sample and compared to all the templates. The speaker recognition system identifies the speaker as the person associated with the template that is closest to (e.g., a Euclidean distance) the extracted feature vector.
A vector quantization-based speaker recognition system creates a codebook for each speaker during training using standard vector quantization techniques. To generate a codebook, the speaker recognition system collects many voice samples and extracts a sequence of feature vectors for each sample. The speaker recognition system then compresses the dimensionality of the sequences of feature vectors to form code vectors. The speaker recognition system then generates a smaller number of code vectors that are representative of groups of the sequences of feature vectors that are similar. A codebook thus contains fewer code vectors than the voice samples and the code vectors have a lower dimensionality than the feature vectors. There is one codebook for each speaker. During speaker recognition, a sequence of feature vectors is extracted from the voice sample and its dimensionality is reduced to generate a code vector. The speaker recognition system then identifies the speaker as a person associated with the codebook that is closest to the code vector.

Speaker recognition via voice sample based on multiple nearest neighbor classifiers


A method and system for an infinite precision split multiply and add operation which has increased speed. The method and system for providing a split multiply and add of a plurality of operands include a multiplier and an adder means. The multiplier multiplies a first portion of the plurality of operands, thereby providing a product. The adder, which combines the remaining operands and the product, comprise at least one pair of data paths. Each pair of data paths comprises a first data path and a second data path. The first data path comprises a first aligner, a first adder, and a first normalizer capable of shifting a mantissa by a substantially fewer number digits than the aligner. The second data path comprises a second aligner, a second adder, and a second normalizer capable of shifting a mantissa by a substantially larger number of digits than the aligner. Accordingly, the present invention includes split multiply and add data paths which, individually, are faster than a fused multiply and add. In addition, the split multiply and add data paths can preserve the appearance of infinite precision. Consequently, overall system performance is increased.

Floating point numbers are comprised of a digit and a decimal point followed by a certain number of significant digits, for example 52, multiplied by 2 to a power. For example, a floating point number can be expressed as (1.10110 . . . )*(2.sup.x). Consequently, floating point numbers are represented by a mantissa and an exponent. A mantissa is the digit and binary point followed by the significant digits. Therefore, the mantissa typically has a total of 53 significant digits. The exponent is the power to which 2 is taken.
Mathematical operations on floating point numbers can be carried out by a computer. One such operation is the multiply/add operation. The multiply/add operation calculates Ra*Rc+Rb, where Ra, Rb, and Rc are floating point operands. Typical split multiply/adds carry out the operation Ra*Rc first, thereby providing an intermediate product, Rm. After Rm is calculated and rounded, the sum Rm+Rb is calculated. In order to perform these operations in a timely manner, conventional processors round Rm. This can introduce error into the calculations. Typical floating point adds also require two wide shifters to align the mantissas prior to addition and to normalize the final result. Wide shifters cause significant delays in data flows. Thus, conventional split multiply/adds are slow.
One way to address this problem is to utilize a fused multiply/add operation to carry out the operations and have infinite precision. As discussed above, a split multiply/add rounds the intermediate product Rm=Ra*Rc, causing a loss in precision. A fused multiply/add, on the other hand, calculates Ra*Rc+Rb in one instruction. Since there is no intermediate rounding, all the significant digits of the mantissa of Ra*Rc are retained. Because all of the significant digits are retained, there is no loss in precision. For the purposes of this application, when there is no loss in precision, the operation is said to have infinite precision. Because the fused multiply/add operation preserves all of the significant digits the mantissa of Ra*Rc, the fused multiply/add operation has infinite precision.
However, current implementations of the fused multiply/add operation still align the mantissa of Rb to the mantissa of Ra*Rc through a wide shifter. In addition, a fused multiply/add operation normalizes the mantissa of Ra*Rc+Rb through a wide shifter. The use of these two wide shifters significantly slows the calculation of Ra*Rc+Rb in the fused multiply/add.
Accordingly, what is needed is a system and method for maintaining the infinite precision of the fused multiply/add while increasing the speed at which multiply/add operations are performed. The present invention addresses such a need.

Floating point split multiply/add system which has infinite precision

International Business Machines Corporation


To provide a tool mounting device for a turning center that allows a rotating tool to be clamped/fixed using a shared clamp mechanism (8), and a turning tool (1B) to be clamped/fixed in an engaged/locked state in a turning center. In the turning center configured with the shared clamp mechanism (8), a cylinder device (9) acting as a drawbar drive device (9) of the clamp mechanism (8) has a first clamp position (b) and second clamp position (c) in relation to a release position (a); a rotation allowance gap (14) is maintained between the stopper (12) and the support unit (13) in the first clamp position (b) to specifically clamp/fix the rotating tool (1A); the reciprocating driver (11) is driven by an amount equal to the rotation allowance gap (14) in the second clamp position (c); and when the support unit (13) and the stopper (12) are brought into contact and a load is imposed, the stopper (12) is supported/stopped by the support unit (13), and the reciprocating driver (11) is engaged/locked by the wedge mechanism (18) in the position of the return blocking state in which the return of the drawbar (7) is blocked.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a tool mounting device for a turning center that can suitably exchange rotating tools and turning tools to perform milling and cutting (turning).
2. Background Art
In a turning center, a mounting engagement unit for engaging a tapered shank provided to the base end of a tool is disposed on a main shaft that is rotatably mounted on a ram via a bearing unit. A clamp mechanism is disposed for clamping a clamping convexity of the tapered shank by retracting the drawbar, and drawing/engaging the tapered shank to the mounting engagement unit to detachably/replaceably mount and fix a tool to the main shaft, so as to allow the shaft to be clamped and released based on the reciprocating control of the drawbar. Tools are suitably attached and detached using the shared clamping mechanism, and rotating tools are rotatably clamped/fixed together with the main shaft. When turning tools are clamped/fixed, the tools are baffled and fixed together with the main shaft; and rotating tools and turning tools can thereby be suitably exchanged and mounted, and both milling and cutting can be carried out.
In such a turning center, when the clamp mechanism of the rotating tools and turning tools is configured so as to be shared as described above, the radial load on the turning tools is considerably greater than on the turning tools, and the clamp force must therefore be increased. In order to do so, however, a hydraulic cylinder device with a large diameter for outputting a considerable drive force must be used, and there are configurations in which a hydraulic two-stage cylinder is used.
Since a hydraulic cylinder device is therefore necessarily required, an oilless structure cannot be obtained and energy and resources cannot be saved.
On the other the hand, for example, a wedge mechanism (Japanese Laid-open Patent Application No. 2004-202659) developed by the applicant, and other mechanisms capable of withstanding a considerable cutting force even if an air cylinder device is used are difficult to mount in a turning center because of the need to rotatably clamp and fix a rotating tool in the turning center and because a shared clamp mechanism is provided for clamping/fixing rotating tools and turning tools.
[Prior Art 1] Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2004-216536
[Prior Art 2] Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2004-202659
[Prior Art 3] Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2004-50324


A variable capacitor includes a supporting substrate and a plurality of variable capacitance elements, and bias lines. The plurality of variable capacitance elements is formed on the supporting substrate, each of which is composed of a lower-laid first electrode layer, an upper-laid second electrode layer, and a dielectric layer sandwiched therebetween whose dielectric constant changes with direct current bias voltage. In the variable capacitance elements which are adjacent to each other, the second electrode layer of a first variable capacitance element and the first electrode layer of a second variable capacitance element are electrically connected in series with each other. The bias lines each include at least one of resistance component and inductance component for applying the direct current bias voltage. The variable capacitance elements are each connected to the bias lines.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a variable capacitor which can operate satisfactorily in a high-frequency region with a low dielectric loss, as well as to a circuit module and a communications apparatus. More particularly, the invention relates to an easy-to-handle variable capacitor that has the advantages of allowing great capacitive variation through application of a voltage; minimizing nonlinear distortion which is caused by a high-frequency signal; offering sufficiently high electrical strength; and functioning properly regardless of the polarity of a voltage to be applied, as well as to a circuit module and a communications apparatus that employ said variable capacitor.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, a silicon oxide (SiO2) thin film, a silicon nitride (Si3N4) thin film, and a tantalum oxide (Ta2O5) thin film have commonly been used for forming an IC-adaptable dielectric thin film capacitor. As compared with these thin films, a strontium titanate (SrTiO3: paraelectric substance) thin film and a barium strontium titanate ((Ba,Sr)TiO3: ferroelectric substance) thin film each exhibit a higher dielectric constant, and thus show promise nowadays for forming an IC-adaptable dielectric thin film capacitor that is smaller in area than ever.
There have been proposed to date thin-film capacitors that employ, as their dielectric layers, a ferroelectric oxide thin film having a perovskite structure such as strontium titanate or barium strontium titanate (for example, refer to Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication JP-A 11-260667 (1999)).
FIG. 18 is a sectional view showing a thin-film capacitor disclosed in JP-A 11-260667. The thin-film capacitor 200 is constructed by forming, on a supporting substrate 201, a first electrode layer 202, a thin-film dielectric layer 203, and a second electrode layer 204 one after another in the order named by deposition. More specifically, on the supporting substrate 201, a conductor layer to be formed into the first electrode layer 202 is formed by deposition over substantially the entire surface thereof. Then, patterning is performed to impart a desired electrode configuration to the conductor layer, thereby realizing the first electrode layer 202. Next, on the first electrode layer 202 is formed the thin-film dielectric layer 203. The thin-film dielectric layer 203 is formed, by the thin-film forming technique, with a mask placed at a predetermined position, or formed by a spin coating, followed by performing patterning thereon to obtain a desired configuration. The thin-film dielectric layer 203 is then subjected to a heat-hardening treatment on an as needed basis. After that, a conductor layer to be formed into the second electrode layer 204 is formed over substantially the entire surface of the thin-film dielectric layer 203. Then, patterning is performed to impart a desired electrode configuration to the conductor layer, thereby realizing the second electrode layer 204. In this way, the thin-film capacitor 200 is fabricated. Note that, in this construction, the facing region of the thin-film dielectric layer 203 that is actually held between the first electrode layer 202 and the second electrode layer 204 constitutes a capacitance producing region.
In putting the thin-film capacitor 200 into practical use, by adjusting the dielectric constant of the thin-film dielectric layer 203 to be a desired value through application of a predetermined direct current bias voltage (bias signal), it is possible to control the capacitance characteristic appropriately. As a result, the thin-film capacitor 200 is able to function as a variable capacitor normally. Note that, in the thin-film capacitor 200, the first electrode layer 202 and the second electrode layer 204 play two individual roles: an electrode for generating a bias signal-controlled capacitance component of predetermined level and an electrode for feeding a bias signal to the thin-film dielectric layer 203.
In the thin-film capacitor 200 of conventional design, however, as shown in the equivalent circuit diagrams depicted in FIGS. 19A and 19B for example, a bias signal is supplied through an external circuit (bias supply circuit) G disposed on a wiring board on which the thin-film capacitor 200 is mounted.
In FIG. 19A, reference symbol A indicates a point of connection of the thin-film capacitor 200 and the bias supply circuit G. Arranged between the point of connection A and a bias terminal V is a choke coil 205 acting as an inductance component.
On the other hand, in FIG. 19B, in the bias supply circuit G is formed a strip line 206 having a line length of λ/4, where λ indicates the wavelength of a high-frequency signal at which the thin-film capacitor 200 is operated. The strip line 206 has its bias terminal V-side end which is connected to ground. Moreover, between the bias terminal V-side end of the strip line 206 and the ground portion is formed a direct current regulating capacitance element 208.
Because of the above-described configuration, the thin-film capacitor 200, namely the conventional variable capacitor poses the following problems. In order to put the thin-film capacitor 200 into practical use, not only the thin-film capacitor 200 in itself, but also the bias supply circuit G appropriate to the structure and property of the thin-film capacitor 200 needs to be prepared for use. The bias supply circuit G is disposed on the wiring board. It is thus necessary to design the bias supply circuit G in conformity with the thin-film capacitor 200 to be mounted on the wiring board. In this case, very complicated and time-consuming process is required to make adjustment to the bias supply circuit G. Furthermore, the thin-film capacitor 200 and the bias supply circuit G are fabricated independently of each other. This leads to an undesirable increase in the size of the entire construction.
As another problem, in the conventional thin-film capacitor 200, the high-frequency signal terminal and the bias terminal V are used in an interchangeable manner. It is thus necessary to separate a high-frequency component (signal component of a high-frequency signal) and a direct current component (bias signal) from each other by using an additional component such as the choke coil 205 in an external circuit.
As still another problem, the capacitance of the thin-film capacitor 200 cannot be caused to vary greatly without making the thin-film dielectric layer 203 smaller in thickness. However, the capacitance of the capacitor is proportional to the area of the dielectric substance, and yet is inversely proportional to the thickness thereof. Therefore, in a case where the thin-film dielectric layer 203 is designed to have a small thickness, the lowering of the capacitance cannot be achieved without reducing the mutually facing areas of the first electrode layer 202 and the second electrode layer 204. This makes the manufacturing process difficult.
As further another problem, in the case of using the thin-film capacitor 200 as a high-frequency electronic component, both a direct current bias voltage for bringing about capacitive variation and a high-frequency signal voltage (high-frequency voltage) are applied to the thin-film capacitor 200 at the same time. In this case, however, when a high-frequency voltage of unduly high level is applied, the capacitance of the thin-film capacitor 200 is caused to vary not only with the application of the direct current bias voltage but also with the application of the high-frequency voltage. This is liable to result in occurrence of distortion such as waveform distortion or intermodulation distortion in the high-frequency electronic component. The waveform or intermodulation distortion cannot be minimized without decreasing the high-frequency voltage-induced capacitive variation by lowering the intensity of the high-frequency electric field. In order to decrease the capacitive variation, it is effective to make the thin-film dielectric layer 203 larger in thickness. However, as the thickness of the thin-film dielectric layer 203 is increased, the direct current electric field intensity is decreased correspondingly, which results in an undesirable decrease in the degree of the capacitive variation for which the direct current bias voltage is responsible.
A problem also exists in power handling capability. Since an electric current is allowed to pass through the capacitor easily in a high-frequency region, it follows that heat is generated in the capacitor due to the loss resistance that the capacitor sustains when operated in a high-frequency region. This gives rise to the risk of capacitor breakdown. In order to overcome such a problem associated with power handling capability, it is also effective to increase the thickness of the thin-film dielectric layer 203 so as to reduce the extent of heat generation per unit volume. However, as described above, as the thickness of the thin-film dielectric layer 203 is increased, the direct current electric field intensity is decreased correspondingly, which results in an undesirable decrease in the degree of capacitive variation for which the direct current bias voltage is responsible.
As further another problem, in the thin-film capacitor 200, in general, interfacial condition between the thin-film dielectric layer 203 and the first electrode layer 202 differs from that between the thin-film dielectric layer 203 and the second electrode layer 204. Therefore, in the case of applying a direct current bias voltage, there could be variation in leakage current characteristic depending upon the polarity of the direct current bias voltage applied. Such a variation has been well known as a so-called Schottky emission current phenomenon. More specifically, in a case where the first electrode layer 202 and the second electrode layer 204 are made of different materials, the work function of the first electrode layer 202 with respect to the thin-film dielectric layer 203 differs from that of the second electrode layer 204 with respect to the thin-film dielectric layer 203. In this case, when a leakage current is generated through the emission of electrons, the magnitude of the leakage current differs depending upon whether the electrons are emitted from the first electrode layer 202 or emitted from the second electrode layer 204. That is, the leakage current varies according to the polarity of the direct current bias voltage applied. On the other hand, even if the first electrode layer 202 and the second electrode layer 204 are made of the same material, interfacial condition between the first electrode layer 202 and the thin-film dielectric layer 203 formed thereon microscopically differs from that between the thin-film dielectric layer 203 and the second electrode layer 204 formed thereon, in consequence whereof there results a difference in work function. Also in this case, the leakage current varies according to the polarity of the direct current bias voltage applied. Accordingly, in order for the thin-film capacitor 200 to operate properly, it is necessary to take into account the polarity of the direct current bias voltage applied not only in a designing stage but also in a mounting stage.

Variable capacitor, circuit module, and communications apparatus


System and method for rule location, ordering, and combining in a polyhierarchical environment are described. In one embodiment, a polyhierarchical environment contains at least one rule, at least one logical structure representable by a graph and at least two connections between one or more of the logical structures and a rule set evaluator (RSE). The RSE retrieves an assembly definition associated with a particular ordering or combination of rules. Each assembly definition is associated with one or more location chains, and each location chain is associated with one of the connections to a logical structure. For each location chain, a rule location policy is invoked, returning a rule. An assembly policy is invoked upon the returned rules, forming the returned rule into a dataset that conforms to the ordering or combination associated with the assembly definition.

Rule-based computing organizes statements into a data model that can be used for deduction, rewriting, and other inferential or transformational tasks. The data model can then be used to represent some problem domain and reason about the objects in that domain and the relations between them.
Rule-based approaches are common to many areas of industry. For example, artificial intelligence researchers frequently use rule-based computing to allow computers to come to conclusions in the presence of incomplete information. These rule-based "expert systems" assist and amplify human efforts in drug research, medical diagnosis, network modeling, and computer vision. Another application of rule-based computing, the business rules approach, formalizes an enterprise's critical business rules into a machine-usable form. These business rules not only provide an unambiguous statement of what a business does with information to decide a proposition, but the formal specification also becomes information for process and rules engines to run. Rules-based approaches can also be used in semantic web applications, software engineering, information architecture, and knowledge-management systems.
One subset of rule-based systems is role-based computing systems. A role-based computing system is a system in which identities and resources are managed by aggregating them into "roles" based on job functions, physical location, legal controls, and other criteria. These roles can be used to model organizational structures, manage assets, or organize data. By arranging roles and the associated rules into graphs or hierarchies, these roles can be used to reason about and manage various resources.
In one application, role-based strategies have been used to form a new security model, Role-Based Access Control (RBAC). RBAC associates special rules, called "permissions," with roles; each role is granted only the minimum permissions necessary for the performance of the functions associated with that role. Identities are assigned to roles, giving the users and other entities the permissions necessary to accomplish job functions. This presents a flexible approach while still maintaining separation of duties concepts important to real-world security.
RBAC has been formalized mathematically by NIST and accepted as a standard by ANSI. American National Standard 359-2004 is the information technology industry consensus standard for RBAC, and is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.

Method for rule locating, ordering and combining in a polyhierarichical environment


Disclosed is a process for producing a fluorine-containing complex salt, characterized by that, on a reaction mother liquor containing a plurality of cation species and a fluoroanion in a state that they have been dissolved in a solvent, a trigger for accelerating decomposition of the fluoroanion is allowed to act, thereby precipitating a complex salt containing a plurality of cation species and fluorine, as a solid, from the reaction mother liquor. According to this process, it is possible to produce a monodispersed fluorine-containing complex salt with uniform particle size and shape.

Fluorine-containing salts are known as compounds having unique characteristics, such as light transmitting property. In particular, complex salts (salts containing a plurality of cationic species) are useful as light-emitting materials, ferroelectric materials, etc. Non-patent Publication 1 describes complex fluorides, such as ion conductors (e.g., PbSnF4), magnetic materials (e.g., Ba7CuFe6F34), light-emitting materials (e.g., 4f-metal containing KMgF3, BaLiF3, and LiYF4), ferroelectric materials (e.g., SrAlF5 and BaMgF4), etc. Non-patent Publication 2 also describes complex oxyfluoride ferroelectrics, such as K3MoO3F3 and Bi2TiO4F2, together with complex fluorides, such as BaMF4 (M=Mg, Mn, Fe, Co, Ni or Zn), SrMF5 (M=Al, Cr or Ga), and BaMF5 (M=Ti, V, Fe, or In). Compounds having a structure of LiAIIMIIIF6 (A=metal species to become a bivalent cation(s), such as Mg, Ca, Sr, Ba, Ni, Cu, Zn, Cd, Hg, etc., and M=metal species to become a trivalent cation(s), such as Al, Ti, V, Cr, Mn, Fe, Co, Ni, etc.) are also known. The application to optical materials as shown in Patent Publication 1 and the application to cathode materials of lithium ion batteries as shown in Patent Publication 2 are examined. Furthermore, ferroelectric complex fluoride crystals, such as BaMgF4, BaZnF4, SrAlF5, Na2MgAlF7, and Na2ZnAlF7, are mentioned, for example, in Patent Publication 3 as materials of wavelength conversion devices using nonlinear optical crystals, since they are highly transparent even in an ultraviolet region of 200 nm or shorter.
In case that a plurality of cations constituting a complex salt have similar ionic radii, a solid solution can be formed by occupying the same site in the crystals. In case that the difference of ionic radii becomes large, however, the formation of a solid solution in a wide range becomes difficult, resulting in occupying different sites in the crystals. For example, as shown in Non-patent Publication 2, in the case of BaMF4 (M=Mg, Mn, Fe, Co, Ni or Zn), Ba occupies an 8-coordinated site, and M occupies a 6-coordinated site. Fluorine surrounding M takes a distorted octahedron structure, which connects with adjacent octahedron in the form of holding vertexes in common. By the rotation of this octahedron, the position occupied by Ba shifts to generate polarization inversion. Therefore, BaMF4 shows ferroelectricity. Furthermore, as mentioned in Non-patent Publication 3, it is known that, since the lattice defects of F sites of BaMgF4 well trap electrons, a superior light-emitting property is shown by doping with Eu or the like. Upon this, Eu selectively occupies Ba sites having a similar ionic radius. Furthermore, Non-patent Publication 4 shows an example of observation of the energy transfer from Eu2+ to Mn2+ by simultaneously doping BaMgF4 with Eu and Mn. In this case, they selectively occupy sites having similar ionic radii, as Eu occupies Ba sites and as Mn occupies Mg sites.
Furthermore, Non-patent Publication 5 shows various crystal structures of M1nM2mM3F6 type complex fluorides. Of these, for example, LiCaAlF6 (LiCAF) and LiSrAlF6 (LiSAF) are known to become laser materials by doping with Ce, Cr, etc. As shown in Non-patent Publication 6, it is known that both of LiCAF and LiSAF take a Colquiriite-type crystal structure, in which the layer of 6-coordinated Al and Li and the layer of 6-coordinated Ca (or Sr) are alternately laminated.
Thus, complex salts, particularly fluorine-containing complex salts that contain at least two cation-species groups not capable of forming a solid solution, respective groups occupying crystallographically distinct sites, are rich in functionality and contain many useful substances. Their syntheses are, however, not easy.
As processes for synthesizing fluorine-containing complex salts, there are known processes in which the syntheses are conducted in a gas atmosphere of fluorine or hydrogen fluoride or in a liquid of anhydrous hydrogen fluoride by using a solid mixture of single-cation fluorides, single-cation chlorides, single-cation nitrates, etc. as cation sources. In these processes, fluorine, hydrofluoric acid or hydrogen fluoride, which is highly reactive chemical species, is used as a reactant. Therefore, it has been difficult to control the atmosphere, remove an excess of the reactant from the product, or prevent corrosion of the production equipment. Furthermore, in the case of synthesizing a fluorine-containing complex salt by conducting a solid-phase mixing of single-cation fluorides and then calcination, there has been a defect that the unreacted, single-cation fluorides remain, since it is difficult to complete the solid-phase reaction.
In contrast with these conventional processes, there are proposed a sol-gel process using trifluoroacetic acid, and a one-step process by undergoing an aqueous solution phase. In the sol-gel process shown in Non-patent Publication 7, the constituent cations of fluorine-containing salts and trifluoroacetic acid are once dissolved in a solvent, followed by mixing. Then, a gel is obtained by distilling the solvent off by a step of concentration and drying and under certain circumstances by a preliminary calcination step of 200° C. This gel is pulverized and then calcined to produce a fluorine-containing salt in the end. Fluorine is generated by a thermal decomposition of trifluoroacetate anion. Since this decomposition temperature is around 300° C., it is understood that the reaction of synthesizing the fluorine-containing salt proceeds by the calcination step. Furthermore, in the one-step process shown in Non-patent Publication 8, the constituent cations of the target salt are dissolved in an aqueous solution, followed by adding hydrogen fluoride, thereby conducting the reaction and synthesizing a fluorine-containing salt. In each example, there is reported the synthesis of fluorine-containing complex salts, such as BaMgF4, SrAlF5, and LiCaAlF6.

Process for producing fluorine-containing combined salt


An improved system and method for stirring suspended solids in a liquid media to enhance sample growth and improve sample detection results. The system and method employs a sample vessel holder which adapted to receive at least one sample vessel which contains the solids and liquid media and a stirrer, such as a ferrous metal filled stirrer, and maintain the sample vessel in a position such that the longitudinal axis of the sample vessel extends at an angle substantially less than 90 degrees with respect to the horizontal, such as within the range of about 15 degrees to about 25 degrees with respect to the horizontal. The system and method further employs a magnet driver, adapted to move a magnet, such as a rare earth magnet, proximate to an outer surface of the sample vessel to permit the magnet to impose a magnetic influence on the stirrer to move the stirrer in the sample vessel. Specifically, the magnet driver is adapted to move and, specifically, rotate the magnet such that the magnetic influence moves the stirrer along a side wall of the sample vessel. The magnet driver is further adapted to move the magnet away from said outer surface of the sample vessel to allow gravity to move the stirrer toward the bottom of the sample vessel. This technique therefore provides a more gentle and controlled stirring of the suspended solution.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an improved system and method for stirring suspended solids in a liquid media. More particularly, the present invention relates to a system and method employing a stirrer, in particular, a magnetic ferrous metal-filled polymer, which is deposited in a vessel containing a liquid media that includes a suspended solid, and is manipulated by a moving magnet outside the vessel to stir the suspended solid in an optimal manner.
2. Description of the Related Art
Many medical diagnoses require that a fluid sample, such as a blood sample, be taken from a patient, cultured in a growth medium, and then examined for the presence of a pathogen believed to be causing the patient's illness. The growth medium provides nutrients that allow the pathogen, such as bacteria, virus, mycobacteria, mammalian cells or the like, to multiply to a sufficient number so that their presence can be detected.
In some cases, the pathogen can multiply to a large enough number so that it can be detected visually. For example, a portion of the culture can be placed on a microscope slide, and visually examined to detect for the presence of a pathogen of interest.
Alternatively, the presence of a pathogen or other organism can be detected indirectly by detecting for the presence of byproducts given off by the microorganism during its growth. For example, certain microorganisms such as mammalian cells, insect cells, bacteria, viruses, mycobacteria and fungi consume oxygen during their growth and life cycle. As the number of microorganisms increases in the sample culture, they naturally consume more oxygen. Furthermore, these oxygen consuming organisms typically release carbon dioxide as a metabolic byproduct. Accordingly, as the number of organisms present increases, the volume of carbon dioxide that they collectively release likewise increases.
Alternatively, instead of detecting for the presence of carbon dioxide to detect the presence of an oxygen consuming microorganism, it is possible to detect for a depletion in the concentration of oxygen in the sample of interest. The presence of oxygen consuming organisms can also be detected by detecting for a change in pressure in a sealed sample vial containing the sample of interest. That is, as oxygen in a closed sample vial is depleted by oxygen consuming organisms, the pressure in the sealed sample vial will change. The pressure will further change in the sample vial as the organisms emit carbon dioxide. Therefore, the presence of such organisms can be detected by monitoring for a change in pressure in the closed sample vial.
Several methods exist for detecting the presence of carbon dioxide in a sample to determine whether organisms are present in the sample. For example, an instrument known as the BACTEC® 9050 manufactured by Becton Dickinson and Company detects for the change in color of an indicator to determine whether carbon dioxide is present in a sample. That is, each sample is collected in a respective sample vial containing an indicator medium having a chemical that reacts in the presence of carbon dioxide to change color. A light sensor detects the color of the indicator medium in the sample vial when the sample vial is loaded into the instrument. If the sample contains an organism which emits carbon dioxide, the reflected or fluorescent intensity of the indicator medium will change in response to the presence of carbon dioxide. The light sensor will therefore detect this change in intensity, and the instrument will thus indicate to an operator that an organism is present in the sample contained in the sample vial. Other examples of instruments for detecting the presence of organisms in a sample by detecting for the change in carbon dioxide in the sample are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,945,060, 5,164,796, 5,094,955 and 5,217,876, the entire contents of each of these patents are incorporated herein by reference.
An instrument employing an oxygen detecting technique is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5.567,598, the entire content of which is incorporated herein by reference. Instruments that are capable of detecting changes in pressure in the sample vial are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,152,213, 5,310,658, 5,856,175 and 5,863,752, the entire contents of each of these patents are incorporated herein by reference. In addition, an instrument capable of detecting changes in carbon dioxide concentration, changes in oxygen concentration, and changes in pressure in the vessel is described in a U.S. patent application of Nicholas R. Bachur et al. entitled "System and Method for Optically Monitoring the Concentration of a Gas, or the Pressure, in a Sample Vial to Detect Sample Growth", Ser. No. 09/892,061, filed on Jun. 26, 2001, and another instrument capable of detecting changes in carbon dioxide concentration or changes in oxygen concentration in the vessel is described in a U.S. patent application of Nicholas R. Bachur et al. entitled "System and Method for Optically Monitoring the Concentration of a Gas in a Sample Vial Using Photothermal Spectroscopy to Detect Sample Growth", Ser. No. 09/892,012, filed on Jun. 26, 2001, the entire contents of both of said applications being incorporated herein by reference.
It is noted that the results obtained by organism detection techniques described above can be improved if the growth of the organism is enhanced to cause a greater production of carbon dioxide, a greater depletion of oxygen, and a greater change in pressure in the vessel. It is known that the biological activity of a solid sample in a liquid media can be enhanced by maintaining the solid sample in a suspended state. This can be accomplished by continuously stirring the solid-liquid mixture, which improves nutrient, waste and gas exchange in the mixture.
Examples of stirring techniques are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,586,823, 4,483,623 and 4,040,605, the entire contents of each are incorporated herein by reference. Each of these techniques employs a magnetic stirrer that is placed in the vessel containing the sample and manipulated by a magnet to stir the sample in the vessel.
Although these stirring techniques may be somewhat effective in enhancing sample growth, they each suffer from certain disadvantages. For example, because each of the techniques require that the vessel be maintained in a vertical configuration, the fluid-gas interface is minimized, especially in vessels that are not shallow. This minimal fluid-gas interface inhibits biological performance in the vessel.
In addition, the vertical configuration of the vessel allows for the magnets to lose their influence over the magnetic stirrer in the vessel, especially if the magnetic influence on the stirrer is weak as in the case of gentle stirring. Also, the vertical configuration causes the stirrer in the vessel to follow a semi-random stirring path, which results in a stirring action that is inefficient and potentially damaging to the sample. Furthermore, in order to change the intensity of the stirring in these known arrangements, the physical size of the stirrer or the apparatus needs to be changed.
A need therefore exists for an improved system and method for stirring suspended solids in a liquid media to enhance sample growth and thus improve sample detection results.


A seatbelt retractor is provided that can be formed in a smaller size yet properly operated, and capable of smoothly providing seatbelt tension, and a seatbelt assembly including such a seatbelt retractor. The seatbelt retractor includes a frame, a seatbelt, a spool that takes up the seatbelt, the spool being rotatably supported by the frame, a lock mechanism that allows the spool to rotate in a non-activated state and restricts, upon being activated, the spool from rotating in the seatbelt withdrawal direction, and an energy absorption mechanism that limits the load applied to the seatbelt to thereby absorb and alleviate energy of the occupant, and the energy absorption mechanism includes a first torsion bar concentrically enclosed in the spool with one end portion retained by the spool and the other end portion disposed to be locked by the lock mechanism, and disposed to be rotated by torsional force, a second torsion bar eccentrically enclosed in the spool with one end portion 24a disposed to be locked by the lock mechanism, and disposed to be rotated by torsional force, and a moving member that rotates interlocked with the spool, and moves between the first position for retaining the other end portion of the second torsion bar and the second position spaced from the other end portion of the second torsion bar.

A seatbelt assembly conventionally equipped in a vehicle such as an automobile is designed to bind the occupant with the seatbelt in the emergency case, to prevent the occupant from being thrown out of the seat.
Such a seatbelt assembly includes a seatbelt retractor that retracts the seatbelt. In the seatbelt retractor, the seatbelt is wound around a spool when not in use, and withdrawn to be worn by the occupant when in use. In an emergency case as cited above, a locking device of the seatbelt retractor is activated so as to restrict the spool from rotating in the direction to withdraw the belt, thereby restricting the withdrawal of the seatbelt. Thus, the seatbelt binds the occupant in the emergency case.
In relation to the seatbelt retractor of the conventional seatbelt assembly, when the seatbelt binds the occupant in an emergency case such as vehicle collision, large vehicle deceleration is generated and hence the occupant is urged to move forward by large inertia. Accordingly, the seatbelt is subjected to a large load and the occupant is subjected to a large amount of energy from the seatbelt. Although such energy is not a critical issue to the occupant, it is preferable that the energy is limited.
Therefore, conventionally a torsion bar is provided in the seatbelt retractor, so as to limit the load applied to the seatbelt in an emergency case that happens while the seatbelt is worn by the occupant, thus to absorb and alleviate the energy.
However, in the conventional seatbelt retractors only a single load limit is specified with respect to a case of collision. Actually, the energy imposed on the occupant varies depending, for example, on the body weight of the occupant. Therefore, setting different load limits, instead of just one, in accordance with the situation of the emergency case to cope with the large energy that varies depending on the situation allows the occupant to be bound more effectively and more properly.
Accordingly, seatbelt retractors that allows setting of various limits to the load applied to the seatbelt have been proposed (see, for example, PTL 1).
The seatbelt retractor according to PTL 1 includes a pair of EA mechanisms having different EA characteristics, and one or both of the EA mechanisms are activated depending on the situation of the emergency case. Selectively activating the pair of EA mechanisms allows the load limit on the seatbelt to be set in two stages, depending on the situation of the emergency case.

Seatbelt retractor and seatbelt assembly including same