A method for configuring a Minimization of Drive Test (MDT) information reporting format and a time-stamp is provided that supports MDT in a 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) system. The method defines a reporting format needed in a process where UE transmits MDT measurements to a serving base station, and sets the number of bits required to log time stamp and the unit of logging time.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a Minimization of Drive Test (MDT) information reporting format and a time stamp configuring method to support a MDT function in wireless communication systems, or 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) systems.
The method defines a reporting format needed in a process where user equipment (UE) transmits MDT measurements to a serving base station, and sets the number of bits required to log time stamp and the unit of logging time.
2. Description of the Related Art
Mobile communication systems have been developed to provide communication services to users while they are moving. With the rapid development of communication technology, mobile communication systems have provided rapid data communication services as well as voice communication services. The specification for Long Term Evolution-Advanced (LTE-A), one of the next generation mobile communication systems, is being standardized by the 3GPP. The standardization for LTE-A is proceeding to be completed by the latter half of 2010. LTE-A refers to a technology that can provide packet-based communication with a higher transmission rate than the current data transmission rate.
As the 3GPP standardization is evolved, convenient optimizations for wireless networks are being discussed other than increases in communication service speed. When establishing wireless networks at the initial stage or optimizing networks, base stations or base station controllers must collect wireless environment information for their cell coverage, which is called a 'drive test'. Conventional drive tests are executed in such a way that engineers load measurement devices on a vehicle and repeatedly perform a measurement task for a relatively long period of time, which is complicated. The measurement results are processed in analysis processes and they are used to set system parameters of each of base stations or base station controllers. Conventional drive tests increase in wireless optimization cost and management cost and consume significant time. Therefore, in order to minimize drive tests and to improve analysis processes for wireless environments and manual setting processes, a study called 'Minimization of Drive Test (MDT)' is made. To this end, instead of performing Drive Test, UE measures a channel quality and transmits measurements regarding a corresponding wireless channel to a base station periodically or immediately when an event occurs. Alternatively, after a certain period of time has elapsed from the storage of wireless channel measurements, UE may transmit measurements regarding a corresponding wireless channel to a base station. In the following description, the transmission of wireless channel measurements measured by UE and additional information to a base station is called an MDT measurements reporting operation. In this environment, if UE is capable of communicating with a base station, it can immediately transmit the channel quality measurement result to the base station. On the contrary, if UE isn't capable of performing an immediate report, it logs MDT measurements and then reports, when it can communicate with the base station, the information to the base station. The base station uses the received MDT measurements to optimize cell coverage. LTE-A classifies types of MDT measurements reporting, according to UE RRC states, as the following table 1.
TABLE 1UE RRC stateMDT measurements reporting by UEIdle modeLogging and deferred reportingConnected modeImmediate reporting
As described in table 1, 'idle mode' refers to a state where UE is not communicating with a base station, and 'connected mode' refers to a state where UE is communicating with a base station. While MDT is performed, channel quality information measured by UE can be transmitted via RRC signaling. Therefore, although UE operates in an idle mode, it can switch the idle mode to a connected mode in order to transmit corresponding information. In that case, UE logs channel measurements and defers the transmission to a base station until its idle mode is switched to a connected mode.
MDT measurements are transmitted to the base station by the use of control plane protocol stacks for processing RRC and NAS signals.
FIG. 1 illustrates a general control plane protocol stack of an LTE system. RRC layers 105 and 155 perform system information transmission, RRC link control, channel measurement control, etc. PDCP 110 and 150 compress/decompress IP header. RLC 115 and 145 reconfigure PDCP PDU in proper size and perform an ARQ operation. MAC 120 and 140 connect to a number of RLC devices configured in one user equipment. MAC 120 and 140 multiplex RLC PUDs to MAC PDU, and de-multiplex RLC PDUs from MAC PDU. The protocol layer devices include proper headers at need. For example, RLC device adds an RLC header including a serial number, etc., to RLC SDU. MAC device adds an MAC header including an RLC device identifier, etc., to MAC SDU. Physical layers (PHY) 125 and 135 in UE and ENB channel-code and modulate MAC PDU, create OFDM symbols, and transmit them via a wireless channel 130. PHY 125 and 135 demodulate and channel-decode OFDM symbols received via a wireless channel 130, and transfer them to the upper layers. PHY 125 and 135 also perform Hybrid Automatic Retransmission request (HARQ) for MAC PDU. HARQ performs retransmission on PHY layer and is a soft combination of a retransmitted packet and the original packet.
As shown in FIG. 2, MDT measurements logged by UE is transferred from RRC layer to PDCP layer via Signaling Radio Bearer 2 (SRB2). RRC control message or NAS message 210 is transferred from RRC layer 205 to PDCP layer 230 via SRB0 (215), SRB1 (220) or SRB2 (225). SRB0 is used to transfer RRC message via CCCH. SRB0 has the highest priority order. SRB1 is used to transfer RRC message via DCCH, and also NAS message part of which is transferred in piggyback format. SRB2 is used to transfer NAS message via DCCH. The packets transferred by SRB1 and SRB2 are all encoded via integrity and ciphering processes. SRB1 has a higher priority order than SRB2. MDT measurements are transferred via SRB2 with the lowest priority order. User plane data can be also transferred via Data Radio Bearer (DRB) 250 other than SRB0˜SRB2. Packets transferred via DRB are processed by a ciphering and ROHC process 255 and transferred to RLC layer 265. RLC layer maps corresponding packets to DTCH.
UE operating in idle mode logs MDT measurements periodically or when the measured information meets a specific event. An example of an event for logging MDT measurements is as follows.
(1) Periodical downlink pilot measurements
(2) Serving Cell becomes worse than threshold
(3) Transmit power headroom becomes less than threshold
Logged MDT Measurements:
(1) Global cell ID of a serving cell
(2) Measurements regarding Reference Signal Received Power (RSRP) and Reference Signal Received Quality (RSRQ) of a serving cell
(3) Location information
(4) Time stamp
MDT measurements need to include information to identify a serving cell, i.e., global cell ID. This tells which cell corresponding information is acquired. A global cell ID must uniquely indicate one cell. A wireless channel state of a serving cell can be expressed via a specific measurement. The states of EUTRA can be expressed via RSRP and RSRQ, UTRAN via RSCP and Ec/No, and GERAN via Rxlev. The embodiments of the invention are described based on EUTRA LTE systems; however, it should be understood that the invention can also be applied to the other systems. In 3GPP, the MDT function will be applied to LTE and UMTS.
Location information from among MDT measurements transmitted to a base station serves as an important component. If UE can't acquire the GPS-based location information, it measures a set of Reference Signal Received Power from the adjacent base stations and informs the base station of it. The set of Reference Signal Received Power is called a RF fingerprint. Since the base station receiving the RF fingerprint has known the location information regarding the adjacent base stations, it applies the signal power values of the adjacent base stations to a signal path attenuation model and thus predicts the distances between the UE and the respective, adjacent base stations. If the location information regarding the adjacent base stations and the predicted distances between the UE and the adjacent base stations are applied to a technique, such as a triangulation, an approximate location of the UE can be acquired. If UE isn't capable of acquiring the GPS-based location information, it can acquire information regarding a predicted location instead of an accurate location and transmit it to the base station.
Time stamp is also important to acquire MDT measurements. When wireless channel measurement is performed, time stamp serves to optimize service coverage. This is because wireless channel states vary according to hours. Time stamp is more importantly used in a logging and deferred reporting operation in an idle mode than an immediate reporting operation in a connected mode. Since an immediate report in a connected mode is going to include a result measured immediately before the reporting operation, time stamp isn't important in the immediate reporting operation in a connected mode. However, if a logging and deferred reporting operation in an idle mode doesn't use time stamp, it can't be predicted when the measurement was performed. Therefore, the currently developed 3GPP standard doesn't have time stamp for an immediate reporting operation in a connected mode; however, it includes time stamp as necessary information in a logging and deferred reporting operation in an idle mode.
Time stamp can be provided in various types. Types of time stamps refer to an absolute time or a relative time that UE can provide. An absolute time needs a number of bits to report a corresponding time stamp. On the contrary, a relative time may need a relatively small number of bits than the absolute time.
In the 3GPP standard, relative time stamp is included in MDT measurements in order to reduce signalling overhead. When base stations provide reference information regarding absolute times to UEs, the UEs include relative time stamps in respective measurement samples, based on the received absolute times. After completing MDT measurement, UE reports the logged measurements to a base station and also informs the base station of the absolute time reference information that it has received from the base station. This is because a base station that provided absolute time reference information to UE at the initial stage may differ from a base station that the UE intends to make a report to.
FIG. 3 illustrates a flow chart describing a method for performing MDT measurement in a logging and deferred reporting operation in an idle mode. eNB 305 configures MDT measurement and transmits corresponding information, i.e., MDT measurement configuration information to UE 300 in a connected mode (310). The MDT measurement configuration information includes absolute time reference information, sampling cycle, measurement duration, etc. The absolute time reference information has been already described above. The sampling cycle is used for periodical downlink pilot measurements, and also used to measure wireless channels at each cycle. The measurement duration refers to the total period of time in performing MDT. UE performs MDT until a corresponding measurement duration has elapsed.
If the RRC connected state of UE 300 with the eNB 305 is switched from a connected mode to an idle mode, the UE 300 starts to perform MDT measurement (315). UE 300 measures and logs MDT (320), and then continues measuring and logging MDT at the sampling cycle that was received (325). MDT measurements are logged at each measurement cycle (330).
If UE 300 enters a connected mode (335), it informs the eNB 305 as to whether it has logged MDT measurements (340). eNB 305 may request a report from the UE 300 according to a corresponding state. If UE 300 receives the request from eNB 305, it reports the MDT measurements that it has logged by the time to the eNB 305, and then removes it. On the contrary, if UE 300 doesn't receive the request from eNB 305, it retains the logged information. If UE 300 enters an idle mode but the measurement duration hasn't elapsed (345), it continues to perform MDT measurement and acquires the MDT measurements (350). Measurement duration may or may not take a period of time in a connected mode into account. If the measurement duration has elapsed (355), UE 300 stops MDT measurement.
UE 300 enters a connected mode (360). UE 300 informs the eNB 305 that there is a newly logged MDT measurement, and reports, if the request is made from the eNB 305, it to the eNB 305 (365).
However, in order to efficiently transmit MD measurements from UE to eNB, the MDT information reporting format to the eNB and the time stamp configuration must be defined.

MDT information-reporting format in a wireless communication system, and time-stamp configuring method and apparatus


A wellbore casing self-tightening tubular gripping device.

Within the area of subterranean well construction, centralizers are used to keep the tubular casing centered in the wellbore to facilitate placement of the casing in the bore and to prevent cementing the pipe against a side of the borehole. Centralizers isolate the outer surface of the wellbore pipe from the inner surface of the wellbore. Additionally, in long horizontal sections of wellbore, centralizers provide support of the tubular casing section, preventing the wellbore pipe from laying on the lower inner surface of the horizontal wellbore. In some instances, a centralizer is configured to grip a tubular casing. In some instances, a gripping stop collar may be affixed around a tubular casing. For example, in situations where a non-gripping centralizer is employed, the non-gripping centralizer may be used in conjunction with a stop/lock collar which grips the tubular casing and may interface with the non-gripping centralizer to constrain linear and axial movement of the centralizer with respect to the tubular casing.
The embodiments described are focused on providing improved functionality for a gripping mechanism and devices suitable for use as a down-hole casing stop collar to be used in conjunction with a down-hole casing centralizer, or alternatively incorporated into a down-hole casing centralizer assembly. The utility the "Tapered Thread Gripping" mechanism described herein may be extended to many other applications where it its desired to assemble a stopping shoulder or facilitate a mechanical connection on to any part that might incorporate a section with a cylindrical surface, for example any tubular pipe or solid rod.


A photo detector having an electrically conductive thin film and a light-receiving unit. A coupling periodic structure is provided on a surface of the film and converts incidence light to surface plasmon. The coupling periodic structure has an opening that penetrates the obverse and reverse surfaces of the thin film. The light-receiving unit is provided at one end of the opening in the surface that is opposite to the surface on which the coupling periodic structure is provided. The opening is shaped like a slit and is broader than half (½) the wavelength of the surface plasmon in a direction that intersects at right angles with a polarization direction of the incidence light and is narrower than half (½) the wavelength of the surface plasmon in a direction parallel to the polarization direction.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a photo detector having a plasmon focusing antenna, and to an optically interconnected LSI using such photo detectors.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, the operating speed of large-scale integrated circuits (LSIs) has greatly increased, thanks to the improved performance of electronic devices such as bipolar transistors and field-effect transistors. The performance has been improved, owning to the decrease in transistor size. However, since the wires connecting transistors are now thin, the line resistance and the inter-line capacitance have increased, making great problems. These problems are a bottleneck of the improvement in LSI performance.
In view of the problem resulting from electric wires, some types of optically interconnected LSI, in which the components are interconnected by optical lines, have been proposed. Power loss in optical lines has virtually no dependence on frequency, ranging from direct current to 100 GHz or more. Further, the optical lines impose virtually no electromagnetic interference. Lines several 10 Gbps or more can therefore be realized easily.
The optical lines in an LSI need high-speed photo detectors made of silicon (Si), i.e., the substrate material of the LSI. Si is an indirect transition semiconductor, and its optical absorption efficiency is generally low. Inevitably it can hardly achieve both high light-receiving efficiency and high operating speed.
To solve this problem, photo detectors of plasmon focusing antenna type are known. Any element of this type utilizes surface plasmon that propagates in the surface of an electrically conductive member made of, for example, metal. (See Japanese Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 44, No. 12, and p. L364 (2005), hereinafter referred to as Document 1.) Light focusing and light passage through a small opening, both achieved by surface plasmon, are known in the art. (See Optics Letters, Vol. 26, No. 24, and p. 1972 (2001), referred to as Document 2.) On the other hand, in laser elements that differ from the photo detectors of plasmon focusing antenna type, a small asymmetrical opening may be used to improve the efficiency of transmitting light through a small opening. (See JP-A 2001-189519 (KOKAI), referred to as Document 3).
In the technology disclosed in Document 1, photoelectric conversion must be performed immediately after the light focused by the plasmon focusing antenna passes through the small opening. That is, a light-receiving Si layer must be arranged at the exit of the small opening in order to accomplish the photoelectric conversion. If the small opening is long (the length is equivalent to the thickness of an electrically conductive thin film), the light will be greatly attenuated as it passes through the small opening. Therefore, the electrically conductive thin film constituting the plasmon focusing antenna must be thin, but not so thin to allow the passage of light.
Hence, to apply optical lines to LSIs, one of the following two methods should be used. In one method, photo detectors of plasmon focusing antenna type are formed in transistor-forming surface (i.e., surface of the SI substrate). In the other method, photo detectors of focusing antenna type are formed on the multilayer interconnection lines of the LSI, and signals these elements have generated through photoelectric conversion are transferred via electric lines.
However, the method, in which photo detectors of plasmon focusing antenna type are formed in a transistor-forming surface, will reduce the number of transistors than can be formed in unit area of the LSI. Since method impairs the essential function of the LSI, it is not practical. The method, in which photo detectors of focusing antenna type are formed on LSI multilayer interconnection lines and electric wiring from these elements the surface of the Si substrate, is likely to make problems, such as signal degradation due to parasitic LCR in the electric lines, an increase in noise, and crosstalk to the other electric lines. In other words, the optical lines may impair the high operating speed.
In the method disclosed in Document 2, it is desirable to make the opening smaller in order to achieve a high-speed response.
If the opening is made smaller, however, the amount of light that passes through the surface plasmon may decrease.

Photo detector and optically interconnected LSI


A propulsive apparatus for use in an electric vehicle includes a gear rotatable by a propulsive motor and having first teeth, and a constant velocity joint having an outer member which includes a larger-diameter portion having second teeth on an outer wall surface thereof. The second teeth serve as part of a speed reducer mechanism which is thus interposed between the propulsive motor and the constant velocity joint. When the gear is rotated by the propulsive motor, the propulsive power is transmitted through the speed reducer mechanism to the constant velocity joint for rotation.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a propulsive apparatus for propelling an electric vehicle with at least a propulsive motor used as a propulsive source which is coupled to a drive shaft by a constant velocity joint.
2. Description of the Related Art
Some automobiles which include four-wheeled and two-wheeled vehicles have a propulsive motor as a propulsive source. Such automobiles are exemplified by hybrid vehicles which incorporate both an internal combustion engine and a propulsive motor as propulsive sources and electric vehicles or fuel-cell electric automobiles which incorporate a propulsive motor as a propulsive source.
On the electric vehicles, the rotational propulsive power generated by the propulsive motor is transmitted through a drive shaft to drive wheels, i.e., tires. As a result, the drive wheels are rotated to propel the electric vehicles.
The propulsive motor and the drive shaft are connected to each other by a constant velocity joint. Occasionally, the propulsive motor, the drive shaft, and the constant velocity joint are jointly referred to as "propulsive apparatus" or "power unit". The present applicant has proposed a power unit including a propulsive motor, a speed reducer mechanism, and a constant velocity joint which are housed in a case, as disclosed in Japanese Patent No. 4379867.

Propulsive apparatus for electric vehicles


To satisfactorily transmit two-way speech on digital computer networks, such as the Internet, it is necessary to reduce unpredictable delays due to variations in loading, routing and other factors. The present invention transmits extra packets of specially computed data along with the data representing speech. These extra packets are used at the receiving server to reconstruct any missing or late data packets. In one embodiment, any single packet of missing data in a stream of packets may be reconstructed. In additional embodiments, multiple packets of missing data may be reconstructed. This method is particularly suited to eliminating or reducing delays in networks in which data is sent down multiple diverse paths. Unlike prior art, it is not necessary to send full sets of redundant data down these diverse paths. The present invention significantly reduces latency with only a fraction of the added network bandwidth required with prior art methods that use full sets of redundant data.

At the present time a number of companies commercially offer computer hardware and software products which permit computer users to talk to each other using voice communication, and their computers, over the Internet. The Internet is a network using digital data and a large number of computers which communicate with each other over various types of communication channels, including data telephone lines, such as ISDN (Integrated Services Digital Network) T1, T2, T3 channels.
The digital data is organized into a bitstream consisting of packets. A packet is a series of bits comprising communicated data and a header, which gives control and/or address information, such as the source and destination of the packet.
The user's voice, an analog signal, is converted into digital data. For example, the analog voice signal is sampled at 8,000-100,000 times a second, and the voltage level at each sample is represented by a digital number. The voice Internet telephony software, which is commercially available, converts the voice signal to digital data, compresses it and transmits it as packets over a telephone line to an Internet server (provider or host server) which is generally a high speed and high capacity computer connected to a high bandwidth communication channel as part of the Internet.
For example, a telephone full duplex (two parties may talk simultaneously) real time voice conversation may be initiated over the Internet from one computer to another. Both computers generally require the same Internet telephony software, a microphone, a soundcard and a minimum of processor speed (Intel 486 or Pentium (.TM.)) modem (14.4 bps--bits per second), software (Microsoft 3.1 Windows or higher) and connection to an Internet provider. Both computers must be on line at the same time; which requires a pre-arrangement or a separate telephone toll phone call. Software for that type of system is available from IDT, Hackensack, N.J. ("Net 2 Phone" .TM.), Vocal Tec, Inc. ("Internet Phone" .TM.), or Digiphone .TM. and others.
It has also been announced, in February 1996, by Dialogic Inc.,.Parsippany, N.J., and Vocal Tec Inc., Northvale, N.J., that, in a product available in about the third quarter 1996, users may place voice calls from their PCs (Personal Computers) or a telephone connected to a gateway server, to an Internet "hopoff" server close to the person being called. The hopoff server would place a local call to the person being called. The telephone-to-telephone system would require "back-to-back" servers, i.e., each telephone is connected to a server.
The use of the Internet, in the United States, for voice communication, is presently being opposed by petition to the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) filed by America's Carriers Telecommunication Association. Data packets traverse the Internet by being routed from one node to the next. Each of these hops takes the packet closer to its destination. Each node along the route is designated by a globally unique IP address. Each node in the route looks at the destination address contained in the header of an IP packet and sends the packet in the direction towards its destination. At any time, a node along a particular route can stop accepting, or block one or more packets. This may be due to any number of reasons: congestion, maintenance, node crash, etc. Each routing node constantly monitors its adjacent nodes and adjusts its routing table when such problems occur. As a result, sequentially numbered packets may take different routes as they traverse the Internet.
The audio quality of duplex phone conversation over the Internet is often poor because of delays of transmission of packets, lost packets and lost connections. The delays are unpredictable and are usually caused by the dynamically changing data loads on the network and the changing and often long routes through which the data must pass. Existing methods for reducing this delay problem have included the use of (1) dedicated transmission lines, (2) permanent virtual circuits in which a route is reserved for the duration of the real-time data transmission, and (3) redundantly sending all of the critical data so that the delay experienced by the user will be only the delay of the shortest path.
Methods 1 and 2 above are undesirable for two-way voice communications due to the high cost of the dedicated path (channel) which must be present during the entire conversation. Additionally, these methods (1) and (2) are not universally available to most Internet users. Method (3) is undesirable because it wastes network resources by sending multiple copies of the data, although long delays along a given path are generally only occasional.
The recent increase in consumer interest in the Internet, for example the downloading of graphics using the World-Wide Web, has placed an increased demand for transmission and processing time. It is believed, by some, that such increased demand will result in even poorer audio duplex phone quality.

Method and apparatus for increased quality of voice transmission over the internet


Disclosed herein is a receiver including: a first mixer adapted to mix satellite signals from first and second satellites and a first local oscillation signal so as to convert a carrier frequency of the satellite signals into a lower first intermediate frequency; a second mixer adapted to mix a satellite signal of the second satellite frequency-converted by the first mixer and a second local oscillation signal so as to convert the first intermediate frequency of the frequency-converted satellite signal from the second satellite into an even lower second intermediate frequency; and a first frequency divider adapted to generate the second local oscillation signal by dividing a frequency of the first local oscillation signal.

The present technology relates to a receiver configured to receive a satellite signal, and more particularly, to a receiver configured to receive satellite signals from different types of satellites.
GPS, Galileo and GLONASS are known as positioning systems adapted to find the position and speed of a mobile using a positioning signal transmitted from a satellite. GPS (Global Positioning System) was developed in the United States and has found application for aviation and marine navigation and as a car navigation system. Galileo is a positioning system developed primarily in the European Union (EU). GLONASS (GLObal NAvigation Satellite System) is a positioning system developed in Russia. Although differing in pseudo noise in spread spectrum modulation of a positioning signal, GPS and Galileo use the same positioning principle and calculations. Further, the two systems are the same in terms of the center frequency of the carrier frequency in a specific frequency band. On the other hand, GLONASS differs from GPS and Galileo in terms of the center frequency of the carrier frequency.
A receiver has been proposed in related art that is designed to receive positioning signals from a plurality of types of satellites of all the positioning systems described above. For example, a receiver has been proposed that can receive GPS and GLONASS positioning signals. This is accomplished by setting a first local oscillation frequency intermediate between the GPS and GLONASS reception frequencies and using an image removal mixer (refer, for example, to Japanese Patent Laid-open No. Hei 07-128423). Further, another receiver has been proposed that is designed to generate intermediate frequencies for a plurality of satellites through a single down-conversion process (refer, for example, to Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 2009-092473). This is accomplished by setting different first mixer frequencies for two reception signals.


A laminate body includes a base material, a film-like or a membrane-like undercoat layer that is formed in at least a portion of the outer surface of the base material, and an atomic layer deposition film that is formed on a surface opposite to a surface coming into contact with the base material among both surfaces of the undercoat layer in the thickness direction thereof. At least a portion of precursors of the atomic layer deposition film bind to the undercoat layer, and the atomic layer deposition film is formed into a membrane shape covering the undercoat layer.

Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a laminate body in which an atomic layer deposition film is formed on the outer surface of a base material, a gas barrier film formed of the laminate body, and a method of manufacturing the same.
Description of the Related Art
Methods of forming a thin film on the surface of a substance using a gaseous phase that makes a substance move at an atomic/molecular level similar to gas are roughly classified into Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD) and Physical Vapor Deposition (PVD).
Typical methods of PVD include vacuum deposition, sputtering, and the like. Particularly, with sputtering, a high-quality thin film having excellent uniformity of film quality and film thickness can be formed in general, even though the cost of the apparatus is high. Therefore, this method is being widely applied to display devices such as a liquid crystal display.
CVD is a method of injecting raw material gas into a vacuum chamber and decomposing or reacting one, two, or more kinds of gases on a substrate by means of heat energy to grow a thin solid film. At this time, in order to accelerate the reaction during the film formation or to decrease the reaction temperature, sometimes a plasma or catalyst reaction is concurrently used, and such a method is called Plasma-Enhanced CVD (PECVD) or Cat-CVD respectively. Such CVD features a small degree of film formation defectiveness and is mainly applied to a manufacturing process of semiconductor devices, such as formation of a gate-insulating film.
In recent years, Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) method has drawn attention. ALD is a method in which a substance adsorbed onto a substrate surface is formed into films layer-by-layer at an atomic level by means of a chemical reaction caused on the surface, and is categorized as a CVD process. A difference between ALD and general CVD is that the so-called CVD (a general CVD) grows thin films by reacting a single gas on a substrate or by simultaneously reacting a plurality of gases on a substrate. On the other hand, ALD is a special film formation method that alternately uses highly-active gas which is called Tri-Methyl Aluminum (TMA) or a precursor and a reactive gas (also called a precursor in ALD) to grow thin films layer-by-layer at an atomic level by means of adsorption caused on the substrate surface and a chemical reaction following the adsorption.
Specifically, a film is formed as follows by ALD. During the surface adsorption caused on the substrate surface, if the surface is covered with a certain type of gas, a so-called self-limiting effect by which the gas is no longer being adsorbed is utilized to discharge unreacted precursors at a point in time when the precursors have been adsorbed onto only one layer. Thereafter, a reactive gas is injected to oxidize or reduce the above precursors and to obtain only one layer of a thin film having a desired composition, and then the reactive gas is discharged. The above treatment is regarded as one cycle, and this cycle is repeated to grow thin films. Accordingly, in an ALD process, thin films grow in a two-dimensional manner. Needless to say, a degree of film formation defectiveness is smaller in the ALD process than in the conventional vacuum deposition, sputtering, and the like than in the general CVD process and the like, and this is the feature of ALD. Consequently, ALD is expected to be widely applied to various fields including the fields of packing foods, pharmaceutical products or electronic parts.
ALD also includes a method that uses plasma for enhancing a reaction in a step of decomposing second precursors and reacting these with a first precursor having been adsorbed onto the substrate. This method is called Plasma-Enhanced ALD (PEALD) or simply called plasma ALD.
The technique of ALD was proposed by Dr. Tuomo Sumtola from Finland in 1974. Generally, since a high-quality and high-density film can be formed by ALD, this method is being increasingly applied to the field of semiconductors such as gate-insulating films, and International Technology Roadmap for Semiconductors (ITRS) also describes this method. Moreover, ALD has a feature in that this method does not provide an oblique shadow effect (a phenomenon in which sputtering particles obliquely enter the substrate surface and thus cause unevenness during film formation) compared to other film formation methods. Accordingly, a film can be formed as long as there is a space into which a gas is injected. Therefore, ALD is expected to be applied not only to coating films of lines and holes on a substrate having a high aspect ratio which indicates a high ratio between the depth and the width, but also to the field relating to Micro Electro Mechanical Systems (MEMS) for coating films of three-dimensional structures.
However, ALD also has faults. That is, for example, special materials are used to perform ALD, and accordingly, the cost increases. However, the biggest fault thereof is the slow film formation speed. For example, the film formation speed thereof is 5 to 10 times slower than that of general film formation methods such as vacuum deposition or sputtering.
As described above, a thin film formed by means of ALD using the above film formation methods can be applied to small plate-like substrates such as wafers or photomasks; inflexible substrates having a large area, such as glass plates; flexible substrates having a large area, such as films; and the like. Regarding equipment for mass-producing such thin films on these substrates according to the use thereof, various substrate-handling methods have been proposed according to the cost, ease of handleability, the quality of formed film, and the like, and have been put to practical use.
For example, a sheet-type film formation apparatus is known that forms a film for a wafer by a sheet of substrate being supplied to the apparatus and then forms a film again on the next substrate replaced, a batch-type film formation apparatus in which a plurality of substrates are set together such that the same film formation processing is performed on all the wafers, or the like.
In addition, regarding an example of forming a film on a glass substrate or the like, an inline-type film formation apparatus is known that forms a film while sequentially transporting substrates to a portion as a source of film formation. Moreover, a coating film formation apparatus is known using a so-called roll-to-roll process in which a substrate, which is mainly a flexible substrate, is wound off and transported from a roller to form a film and the substrate is wound around another roller. This apparatus also includes a web coating film formation apparatus that continuously forms a film by loading not only a flexible substrate but also a substrate on which a film is to be formed on a flexible sheet which can be continuously transported or on a tray of which a portion is flexible.
Regarding the film formation methods or substrate-handling methods used by any of the film formation apparatuses, a combination of the film formation apparatuses that yields the highest film formation speed is employed in consideration of the cost, quality, or ease of handleability.
Moreover, as a related technique, a technique of performing ALD to form a gas permeation barrier layer on a plastic substrate or a glass substrate has been disclosed (for example, see Published Japanese Translation No. 2007-516347 of the PCT International Publication). According to this technique, a light-emitting polymer is loaded on a plastic substrate having flexibility and light permeability, and ALD (top coating) is performed on the surface and the lateral surface of the light-emitting polymer.
As a result, it is possible to reduce coating defectiveness, and a light-permeable barrier film that can substantially reduce a degree of gas permeation in a thickness of tens-of-nanometers can be realized.
As described above, conventionally, laminate bodies in which an atomic layer deposition film is disposed on the outer surface of a base material by means of ALD are known, and these laminate bodies are preferably used for gas barrier films and the like having gas barrier properties. However, the present inventors conducted research and found that in the conventionally known laminate body, an atomic layer deposition film is laminated on a polymeric base material, and the form of growth thereof is highly likely to differ from the form of growth when inorganic crystals such as in the conventional Si wafer are used as a base material. When a substrate obtained by performing oxidation treatment on a Si wafer is used, the density of adsorption sites of the precursors is almost the same as that of the crystal lattice. In many cases, while the atomic layer deposition is being performed by several cycles, after the period of three-dimensional growth (island growth), the film grows in a two-dimensional growth mode. However, it was found that in the case of a polymeric base material, the density of distributed adsorption sites of the precursors is low, the precursors which are adsorbed in a state of being isolated function as nuclei to promote the three-dimensional growth, and an adjacent nucleus comes into contact with the precursors, thereby forming a continuous film. That is, these findings mean that in the growth of the atomic layer into a polymeric base material, the period of three-dimensional growth to form a continuous film is long, the period in which the continuous film becomes a dense film by two-dimensional growth is long, and a dense portion of the atomic layer deposition film that is formed by the two-dimensional growth is decreased. In view of gas barrier properties, the fact that the portion of the two-dimensional growth is small is not preferable. In other words, the conventional laminate body described above may not have ideal gas barrier properties.
Moreover, as described above, since it takes a long time for two-dimensional growth to occur, the portion of the three-dimensional growth that has a low density increases. Accordingly, not only is the binding density lowered, but also the portion of the atomic layer deposition film that has a low mechanical strength increases, whereby the adhesive strength is highly likely to be lowered.
The present invention has been made in consideration of the above circumstances, and an object thereof is to provide a laminate body and a gas barrier film having a high degree of gas barrier properties and a method of manufacturing the laminate body and the gas barrier film.

Laminate body, gas barrier film, and method of manufacturing the same


A faucet device includes a block disposed in a faucet member and having two passages for receiving hot and cold water and having an entrance and an exit coupled to a solenoid valve, a housing disposed in the faucet member and having two ports aligned with the entrance and the exit of the block and an outlet for supplying the water out of the faucet member. A controlling device may control the water to selectively flow through the ports of the housing to allow the faucet device to be selectively operated either manually or automatically. A valve shank may control the hot water and the cold water to flow through the passages and to be mixed in the block.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a faucet device, and more particularly to a faucet device including a structure for allowing hot water and cold water to be suitably or adjustably mixed with each other, and for allowing the faucet device to be selectively operated either manually or automatically.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Typical faucet devices normally comprise a hot water inlet and a cold water inlet for receiving hot water and cold water respectively and for allowing the hot water and the cold water to be suitably or adjustably mixed with each other, and for allowing an outlet water of a suitable temperature to flow out of or to be supplied out through the faucet device.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,725,010 to Marty et al. and U.S. Pat. No. 6,176,250 to Lin et al. disclose two of the typical faucet devices provided for suitably or adjustably mixing the hot water and the cold water with each other, and for supplying an outlet water having a suitable mixing temperature out through the faucet device. However, the typical mixing faucet devices may only be operated or actuated manually, but may not be operated or actuated automatically.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,771,923 to Paterson et al. disclose another typical faucet device operatable or actuatable automatically with an electrically operated or actuated solenoid valve. However, the typical mixing faucet device may only be operated or actuated automatically, but may not be selectively or changeably operated or actuated manually.
The present invention has arisen to mitigate and/or obviate the afore-described disadvantages of the conventional control structures for the faucet devices.

Faucet device selectively operatable manually or automatically


A catadioptric projection optical system for use in photolithography used in manufacturing semiconductors having a quarter waveplate following a reticle and multiple aspheric surfaces and calcium fluoride lens elements. A quarter waveplate following the reticle eliminates asymmetry in reticle diffraction caused by polarized illumination. The use of additional aspheric surfaces reduces the number of lens elements and aids in reducing aberrations. Calcium fluoride elements are used in the lens group adjacent the wafer to help minimize compaction. In one embodiment, only calcium fluoride material is used. The present invention provides a projection optics system having a numerical aperture of 0.75 for use with wavelengths in the 248, 193, and 157 nanometer range. The object and image locations are separated by a predetermined distance, making possible retrofitting of older optical systems. The present invention is particularly suited for use in semiconductor manufacturing and has improved imaging with less aberrations, particularly at shorter wavelengths.

The present invention relates generally to projection optics used in semiconductor manufacturing equipment, and particularly to a catadioptric projection optic system having a high numerical aperture used with short wavelengths.
In semiconductor manufacturing, photolithography techniques are often used. These photolithography techniques require the image of a reticle to be projected onto a wafer or photosensitive substrate. Relatively complicated projection optics are often used to project the image of the reticle onto the wafer or photosensitive substrate. The projection optics are required to provide a very high quality image of the reticle so that very small feature sizes on the reticle can be imaged accurately with very little aberrations. The projection optics often provide a magnification less than one resulting in a reduced image. Often, only a small portion of the image field is utilized that has the best imaging qualities. However, it is desirable to provide as large an image field as possible to enhance throughput and increase production of semiconductor devices. With the tremendous demand for decreased feature sizes in combination with higher throughput, new and improved projection optical systems are continually needed. Because of the ever decreasing feature sizes demanded by the semiconductor manufacturing industry, projection optics are needed that have higher numerical apertures and that are designed to operate at shorter wavelengths. Current optical designs cannot meet the demands of the manufacturers of semiconductors. For example, a prior optical system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,953,960 entitled xe2x80x9cOptical Reduction Systemxe2x80x9d issuing Sep. 4, 1990 to Williamson. Therein disclosed is an optical reduction system operating in the wavelength range of 248 nanometers and having a numerical aperture of 0.45. Another projection optical system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,089,913 entitled xe2x80x9cHigh Resolution Reduction Catadioptric Relay Lensxe2x80x9d issuing Feb. 18, 1992 to Singh et al, which is herein incorporated by reference. Therein disclosed is an optical system having a restricted spectral wavelength at 248 nanometers and having a numerical aperture of 0.6. Another projection optics system is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,537,260 entitled xe2x80x9cCatadioptric Optical Reduction System With High Numerical Aperturexe2x80x9d issuing Jul. 16, 1996 to Williamson, which is herein incorporated by reference. Therein disclosed is a projection optics system having a numerical aperture of 0.7 with different embodiments operating in wavelengths ranging from 360 to 193 nanometers. While these optical systems have operated adequately, there is a need for a projection optics used in semiconductor manufacturing to reproduce feature sizes substantially smaller than those of current systems.
The present invention comprises a catadioptric optical system using multiple aspheric surfaces improving performance and reducing the number of lens elements. Calcium fluoride lens elements are used in a lens group closest to the wafer or photosensitive substrate. A zero-order quarter waveplate is positioned after the reticle and before a lens group having at least one aspheric surface prior to a beamsplitter. An aspheric concave mirror is placed adjacent the beamsplitter and adjacent a surface perpendicular to the lens group. Another lens group is positioned adjacent the beamsplitter opposing the aspheric concave mirror having a majority of the lens elements made of calcium fluoride and imaging the reticle at the wafer or photosensitive substrate. A relatively high numerical aperture of 0.75 is obtained, and in one embodiment a wavelength of 157 nanometers is utilized.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a projection optic system with a higher numerical aperture than current projection optic systems.
It is a further object of the present invention to decrease the lens elements of the projection optic system.
It is yet a further object of the present invention to prevent asymmetry in reticle diffraction caused by polarized illumination.
It is an advantage of the present invention that it results in reduced aberrations.
It is a further advantage of the present invention that reduced feature sizes can be imaged.
It is yet a further advantage of the present invention that it uses circular polarized electromagnetic radiation through the reticle.
It is a feature of the present invention that it uses calcium fluoride as a lens material in a lens group near the wafer.
It is another feature of the present invention that multiple aspheric lens elements are used.
It is yet another feature of the present invention that a zero-order quarter waveplate is positioned after the reticle.
These and other objects, advantages, and features will be readily apparent in view of the following description.

High numerical aperture catadioptric lens


A failure analysis system for monitoring sub-system failures in an aircraft that comprises a plurality of sub-systems, the aircraft having a plurality of functions, wherein each function is available when one or more associated sub-systems is operating correctly. The failure analysis system comprising: a plurality of monitors for monitoring the status of one or more sub-systems of the aircraft and determining if a failure has occurred; a memory arranged to store a list of a plurality of flight phases or operating modes to be completed by the monitored system and data associating one or more of the functions with each flight phase or operating mode; and a processor in communication with the monitors and the memory and arranged to model the response of the sub-systems to a failure determined by the monitors to identify which functions required by the flight phases or operating modes are degraded or are not available.

Typically, alerts are triggered on an aircraft in response to a physical system failure. Such alerts merely notify a pilot that the system has failed and may not provide any guidance as to that system's relevance to the continued safe operation of the aircraft.
An aircraft comprises a large number of interconnected sub-systems that may co-operate as a highly integrated system to enable the complete functionality of the aircraft. Since many sub-systems are connected with others, when a sub-system fails, it can be very difficult for a flight crew to ascertain how that failure will propagate through the aircraft and affect overall functionality.
For example, the failure of a sub-system for sensing radar altitude can affect the correct functioning of an auto-throttle system and thrust reversers and affect the function of stopping on the ground, while loss of a sub-system for providing hydraulic pressure can affect the operation of ground spoilers, wheel braking, reverse thrust and rudder yaw control and thus affect the functions of stopping and steering on the ground.
System integration levels are increasing on newer system, increasing the burden on the operator to reason through the effects of a sub-system failure. Accordingly, there is a need to provide an alert system that aids the (operator) pilot in knowing how the sub-system failures remove or degrade important system-level or aircraft functions.


An apparatus and method to provide isolation between a first antenna and a second antenna, each of which is located on a ground plane. A slot that is tunable by a variable reactance is located on the ground plane, the slot not being appreciably resonant at the operating frequency of the first antenna and the second antenna. The antennas operate in an orthogonal mode. Varying the slot reactance varies the electrical distance over which the coupling current between the two antennas flows. Increased RF isolation to a desired magnitude results by maintaining the orthogonality at desired bands. The RF isolation can be measured and a departure from the desired magnitude of isolation causes the reactance to be varied to increase the RF isolation back to the desired magnitude. The antennas and the slot are placed at locations on the ground plane of high current density.

Mutual coupling between multiple antennas placed on the same platform of a mobile device is a limiting factor for even the design of multiple input-multiple output (MIMO) antennas where moderate levels of isolation are required. When the low bands used in Long Term Evolution (LTE) are considered, the antennas use the whole PCB for radiation and mutual coupling increases dramatically. In specific applications there is need for even higher isolation than currently used levels. As one example, at least one architecture requires 25 dB isolation as the required antenna isolation for all bands of operation, even at low band. There is a need for an antenna isolation structure that can control antenna isolation and can optimize it for a whole frequency interval, not just a fraction of the interval.

Antenna card for controlling and tuning antenna isolation to support carrier aggregation


Techniques for third-party content delivery via a unique mobile application address are presented. A mobile application on a mobile device of a consumer generates or is assigned a unique address. The consumer uses the mobile application to communicate with an enterprise over a network. The enterprise delegates delivery of content to the mobile application to a third-party service and provides the unique address. The third-party service directly sends the content over the network to the mobile application of the mobile device on behalf of the enterprise.

Consumers are increasingly using automated mechanisms to perform every day transactions. Kiosks exist to avoid enterprise personnel and lines. These automated kiosks allow consumers to perform transactions with an enterprise or agency with little to no human intervention. Individuals also perform transactions online and are capable of using their smart phones to check out of stores.
Some transactions, via mobile phones or other portable devices, also require security with delivery of secure content from an enterprise to a customer. For example, automated processing of boarding passes from airlines requires direct delivery of the boarding pass from the airlines to the phone, laptop, or tablet of a customer.
Consequently, many enterprises that require secure delivery of content have by and large retained legacy processing associated with delivery of such content to the customers. This is done for security reasons and because altering existing legacy processing to accommodate outsourcing of content delivery to a third-party is believed to be too difficult or too costly for the enterprises to accomplish.
Still another reason for not migrating to third-party outsourcing of content delivery is the perception that such outsourcing would entail manual actions by the customer and changes to the customer's existing applications and devices, which the customers may or may not embrace. For these reasons and others, most enterprises continue to deliver their secure content directly to their customers' portable devices even though most of these enterprises are not skilled in such technology and it is not their primary focus and area of expertise. That is, nearly every enterprise believes that to compete they have to offer what everyone else is offering the customer and these days this includes automated transactional processing and content delivery to mobile devices. Any changes to this legacy model for an enterprise must be seamless to the customers and require little to no changes by the customer in order to ensure acceptance of such changes by the customers.


The present invention provides a process for repairing concrete involving filling one of a void, gap or seam in the concrete with a polyurethane sealant containing a silane terminated prepolymer (“STP”), and a catalyst, optionally, one or more of plasticizers, fillers, pigments, drying agents, light stabilizers, antioxidants. thixotropic agents and bonding agents and applying an isocyanate-terminated prepolymer containing polyurethane or polyurea coating to the silane terminated prepolymer polyurethane sealant.

Fast-reacting polyurea coatings cannot be applied directly to concrete surfaces which contain defects called "bug holes". Bug holes are small regular or irregular cavities resulting from trapped air bubbles in the surface of formed concrete during its installation. Such bug hole defects may be found in both new and old concrete. When the bug hole is overcoated with a polyurea coating during repair processes, the gas trapped under the coating is heated by the exothermic polyurea coating. The expanding gas causes the coating to bubble producing a mushroom shape or a hole in the coating (if the bubble breaks). This hole must be patched and recoated.
Workers in the art have tried many approaches to repair bug holes before coating with polyurea. Epoxy primers, polyurethane/castor oil primers and latex primers have all been tried.
For example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,759,695 and 5,962,144, both issued to Primeaux, II, disclose polyurea elastomer systems which are said to have improved adhesion to a substrate with the use of a primer that is applied first. The primer is made of a hydrophobic, primary hydroxyl-containing compound, for example, castor oil, and an isocyanate. Primeaux, II states that it is not necessary to wait for the primer to cure prior to applying the polyurea elastomer system. The primer system is said to be particularly useful on wet substrates, where the primer penetrates the substrate prior to polyurea elastomer spraying.
Mishra, et al., in U.S. Pat. No. 6,376,579, report an epoxy composition said to be especially designed for use as a primer for sealing and filling small pores in concrete. Mishra, et al. state that their composition is a low temperature curing, sag-resistant epoxy primer, which provides good adhesion to concrete and to a polyurea coating applied to the primed concrete. Their epoxy primer is said to be curable at a temperature below 40° F. and is an admixture of two parts, Component A and Component B; in which Component A is a crystallization resistant reactive epoxy resin and Component B is an amine curing agent. The resulting primer bonds to concrete at 200 psi or greater, when measured by ASTM D 4541.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,875,500, issued to McGrath, Jr., discloses a flexible flooring system for floors exhibiting surface movement, and/or for cushioning hard floors, which includes an epoxy or polyurethane primer, a two-component ambient temperature cured polyurethane membrane substrate base atop the primer of a urethane grade castor oil, polyether based polyol, a tin catalyst and a thickening agent, along with a polymeric isocyanate activator, and a polyurethane or polyurea, aromatic or aliphatic coating atop the substrate base. The flooring system of McGrath, Jr. is said to provide a very tough, but flexibly soft non-cracking overlay which moves with the floor.
Primers have been shown to reduce the surface porosity and reduce the blistering of a subsequently applied coating. However, a thin coating of a primer usually does not solve the problem of bug holes, because although the primer coats the holes and reduces the porosity of the substrate, deep holes usually remain in the substrate. Thus, the application of a coating still results in a trapped pocket of gas in the deeper holes.
Another option is to use a sealant made with an isocyanate-terminated prepolymer to patch bug holes and fill seams in the concrete. However, if such a sealant is applied to wet concrete or used in high humidity conditions, the prepolymer likely will react with water. The isocyanate/water reaction produces carbon dioxide gas as a side product. Therefore, bubbling or foaming of the sealant may occur.
Thus, a need exists in the art for a process for coating or sealing concrete in restoration and repair processes. The process should be capable of repairing bug holes and filling seams in wet concrete and/or in high humidity environments.


An organic light emitting device includes a substrate, first and second ohmic contacts formed on the substrate, a driving semiconductor formed on the substrate and the first and second ohmic contacts and including polysilicon, a driving input electrode electrically connected to the first ohmic contact, a driving output electrode electrically connected to the second ohmic contact, a first gate insulating layer formed on the driving semiconductor, the driving input electrode, and the driving output electrode, and a driving control electrode formed on the first gate insulating layer and overlapping the driving semiconductor.

(a) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an organic light emitting device and a manufacturing method thereof.
(b) Description of the Related Art
Recent trends of lightweight and thin personal computers and televisions sets also require lightweight and thin display devices, and flat panel displays satisfying such a requirement are being substituted for conventional cathode ray tubes (CRT).
The flat panel displays include displays such as a liquid crystal display (LCD), a field emission display (FED), an organic light emitting device (OLED), and a plasma display panel (PDP).
Among the flat panel displays, the organic light emitting device is the most promising because of its low power consumption, fast response time, wide viewing angle, and high contrast ratio.
An organic light emitting device is a self-emissive display device that includes two electrodes and an organic light emitting layer interposed therebetween. One of the two electrodes injects holes and the other of the two electrodes injects electrons into the light emitting layer. The injected electrons and holes combine and form exitons and the exitons emit light as discharge energy.
The organic light emitting devices may be divided into two types, a passive matrix organic light emitting devices, and active matrix organic light emitting devices, based on the driving method utilized.
The passive matrix type of organic light emitting device includes a plurality of anode lines, a plurality of cathode lines intersecting the anode lines, and a plurality of pixels, each including a light emission layer, and the selection of one of the anode lines and one of the cathode lines causes light emission of a pixel located at the intersection of the selected signal lines. In contrast, the active matrix type of organic light emitting device includes a plurality of pixels, each including a switching transistor, a driving transistor, and a storage capacitor, as well as an anode, a cathode, and a light emission layer. The driving transistor receives a data voltage from the switching transistor and drives a current having a magnitude determined depending on the data voltage, and the current from the driving transistor enters the light emission layer to cause light emission having intensity depending on the current.
The thin film transistor such as the switching transistor and the driving transistor includes polycrystalline silicon (polysilicon) or amorphous silicon.
Amorphous silicon may be deposited under a low temperature, and thereby may be deposited on a substrate made of a glass having a low fusion point. However, the amorphous silicon has a low mobility of charge such that the thin film transistor having a channel of the amorphous silicon may have a limited performance. In contrast, the polysilicon may have a high mobility of charge such that the thin film transistor having a channel of the polysilicon may have a high performance. However, it is hard to deposit the polysilicon and the thin film transistor including the polysilicon may have a large leakage current. The leakage current may be increased when the surface of the polysilicon is damaged by an etching process, etc.
The above information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the invention and therefore it may contain information that does not form the prior art that is already known in this country to a person of ordinary skill in the art.

Organic light emitting device and manufacturing method thereof


The present invention provides a cell which co-expresses a first chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) and second CAR at the cell surface, each CAR comprising an antigen-binding domain, wherein the antigen-binding domain of the first CAR binds to CD19 and the antigen-binding domain of the second CAR binds to CD22.

A number of immunotherapeutic agents have been described for use in cancer treatment, including therapeutic monoclonal antibodies (mAbs), immunoconjugated mAbs, radioconjugated mAbs and bi-specific T-cell engagers.
Typically these immunotherapeutic agents target a single antigen: for instance, Rituximab targets CD20; Myelotarg targets CD33; and Alemtuzumab targets CD52.
The human CD19 antigen is a 95 kd transmembrane glycoprotein belonging to the immunoglobulin superfamily. CD19 is expressed very early in B-cell differentiation and is only lost at terminal B-cell differentiation into plasma cells. Consequently, CD19 is expressed on all B-cell malignancies apart from multiple myeloma. Since loss of the normal B-cell compartment is an acceptable toxicity, CD19 is an attractive CAR target and clinical studies targeting CD19 with CARs have seen promising results.
A particular problem in the field of oncology is provided by the Goldie-Coldman hypothesis: which describes that the sole targeting of a single antigen may result in tumour escape by modulation of said antigen due to the high mutation rate inherent in most cancers. This modulation of antigen expression may reduce the efficacy of known immunotherapeutics, including those which target CD19.
Thus a problem with immunotherapeutics targeted against CD19 is that a B-cell malignancy may mutate and become CD19-negative. This may result in relapse with CD19-negative cancers which are not responsive to CD19 targeted therapeutics. For example, in one paediatric study, Grupp et al. reported that half of all relapses following CD19-targeted chimeric antigen receptor therapy for B-acute Lymphoblastic leukaemia (B-ALL) were due to CD19-negative disease (56th American Society of Hematology Annual Meeting and Exposition).
There is thus a need for immunotherapeutic agents which are capable of targeting more than one cell surface structure to reflect the complex pattern of marker expression that is associated with many cancers, including CD19-positive cancers.
Chimeric Antigen Receptors (CARs)
Chimeric antigen receptors are proteins which graft the specificity of, for example, a monoclonal antibody (mAb) to the effector function of a T-cell. Their usual form is that of a type I transmembrane domain protein with an antigen recognizing amino terminus, a spacer, a transmembrane domain all connected to a compound endodomain which transmits T-cell survival and activation signals (see FIG. 1A).
The most common form of these molecules are fusions of single-chain variable fragments (scFv) derived from monoclonal antibodies which recognize a target antigen, fused via a spacer and a trans-membrane domain to a signaling endodomain. Such molecules result in activation of the T-cell in response to recognition by the scFv of its target. When T cells express such a CAR, they recognize and kill target cells that express the target antigen. Several CARs have been developed against tumour associated antigens, and adoptive transfer approaches using such CAR-expressing T cells are currently in clinical trial for the treatment of various cancers.
It has been observed that using a CAR approach for cancer treatment, tumour heterogeneity and immunoediting can cause escape from CAR treatment. For example, in the study described by Grupp et al (2013; New Eng. J. Med 368:1509-1518, paper No 380, ASH 2014) CAR-modified T cell approach was used for the treatment of acute B-lymphocytic leukemia. In that clinical trial it was found that 10 patients with a complete remission after one month did relapse and 5 of them relapsed with CD19-negative disease.
There is thus a need for alternative CAR treatment approaches which address the problems of cancer escape and tumour heterogeneity.
Expression of Two CAR Binding Specificities
Bispecific CARs known as tandem CARs or TanCARs have been developed in an attempt to target multiple cancer specific markers simultaneously. In a TanCAR, the extracellular domain comprises two antigen binding specificities in tandem, joined by a linker. The two binding specificities (scFvs) are thus both linked to a single transmembrane portion: one scFv being juxtaposed to the membrane and the other being in a distal position.
Grada et al (2013, Mol Ther Nucleic Acids 2:e105) describes a TanCAR which includes a CD19-specific scFv, followed by a Gly-Ser linker and then a HER2-specific scFv. The HER2-scFv was in the juxta-membrane position, and the CD19-scFv in the distal position. The Tan CAR was shown to induce distinct T cell reactivity against each of the two tumour restricted antigens. This arrangement was chosen because the respective lengths of HER2 (632 aa/125 Å) and CD19 (280aa, 65 Å) lends itself to that particular spatial arrangement. It was also known that the HER2 scFv bound the distal-most 4 loops of HER2.
The problem with this approach is that the juxta-membrane scFv may be inaccessible due to the presence of the distal scFv, especially which it is bound to the antigen. In view of the need to choose the relative positions of the two scFvs in view of the spatial arrangement of the antigen on the target cell, it may not be possible to use this approach for all scFv binding pairs. Moreover, it is unlikely that the TanCar approach could be used for more than two scFvs, a TanCAR with three or more scFvs would be a very large molecule and the scFvs may well fold back on each other, obscuring the antigen-binding sites. It is also doubtful that antigen-binding by the most distal scFv, which is separated from the transmembrane domain by two or more further scFvs, would be capable of triggering T cell activation.
There is thus a need for an alternative approach to express two CAR binding specificities on the surface of a cell such as a T cell.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) comprising a CD22-binding domain


A damper for absorbing impact shock generated upon docking of a moving structure with a stationary structure or foundation is shown, the damper comprising a cylinder (1) connectable to the docking structure, the cylinder arranged with a cap end and a head end and having a piston (2) arranged movable in the cylinder and separating a cylinder cap volume (13) from a cylinder head volume (10). A check valve (14), a pressure relief valve (15) with adjustable opening pressure and an orifice (16; 23) of static size are respectively arranged in the cap end of the cylinder, wherein under constant load from the piston during a terminal stroke length of the damper in compression, the orifice provides a restricted flow from cylinder cap volume generating a constant pressure in the cylinder cap volume below the opening pressure of the pressure relief valve.

Landing of subsea structures from a surface vessel or ship for installation onto structures or foundations that are already installed on the seafloor often requires a soft landing system in order to reduce the impact forces on the landing structure as well as on the already installed supporting structure.
A damper for this purpose is previously known from U.S. Pat. No. 8,256,587 B2. A piston/barrel unit is disclosed comprising a piston arranged slidably in the barrel. A piston rod extends from a lower end of the barrel for impact with an intended substructure on the seafloor. During lowering of the damper through the body of seawater, a barrel volume above the piston is filled with water which enters in the head of the barrel and passes the piston via axial passages through the piston. Rows of exit openings of successively reducing diameter towards the top of the barrel are formed through the barrel wall. As the piston moves past these exit openings in compression of the damper, the flow area provided by these openings is reduced in exponential way.
U.S. Pat. No. 8,256,587 B2 is one example of the type of dampers which control the water flow and pressure by a certain geometrical flow path with a decreasing outflow area. Other examples include annulus/needle designs, triangular hole shapes and different hole patterns. A disadvantage common to dampers designed for controlling water flow and pressure through a certain geometry and a water escape area that decreases over the stroke length is that the damping behaviour of these solutions seem less predictable, and are lacking an ability to be adjusted and adapted for a certain structure weight within a weight range.

Damper for absorbing shock generated upon docking a moving structure with a stationary structure or foundation


A semiconductor device and fabrication process wherein the device includes a conductive layer with a localized thick region positioned below the contact hole. In one embodiment of the invention, the thick region to which contact is made is formed by means of an opening in an underlayer of material. This embodiment of the device includes an underlayer of material having an opening therein; a layer of thin conductive material formed on the underlayer and in the opening; and overlayer of material having a contact hole therethrough formed on the layer of thin conductive material; a conductor contacting the layer of thin conductive material through the contact hole; and wherein the opening in the underlayer is positioned below the contact hole and sized and shaped to form a localized thick region in the layer of thin conductive material within the opening.

Generally, semiconductor devices are formed by alternately stacking layers of conducting and insulating materials over a semiconductor substrate. Contact holes are etched through some or all of these layers at specific locations and, thereafter, metal conductors are deposited into the holes to provide for electrical contact to external circuits. Contact holes are typically etched down to active areas on the surface of the substrate or to an intervening conductive layer. Variations in the thickness of the layers of material, non-uniformity of the film deposition and planarizing processes and limitations inherent in the etching process make it difficult to ensure the contact hole will stop precisely on the conductive layer to which contact will be made. This is particularly true as the conductive layers are made thinner for the increasingly small memory cell components currently being incorporated into random access semiconductor memory devices. Where contact must be made to a conductive layer that is thin in comparison to the overlaying materials through which the contact hole is etched, the contact hole etch must be precisely controlled to maximize the chances the hole stops on the thin conductive layer.
The problems associated with forming reliable contacts to a thin conductive layer are illustrated below where I have described part of a process for manufacturing a conventional stacked capacitor DRAM. FIG. 1 shows the structure of a conventional stacked capacitor DRAM after formation of the capacitor top electrode, also commonly referred to as the "cell poly." Cell poly 2 is a layer of doped polysilicon formed over dielectric layer 4, capacitor bottom electrode 6, field effect transistor gate electrode 8, and substrate 10.
Referring to FIG. 2, upper insulating layer 12 is stacked over substrate 10. Upper insulating layer 12 is etched to form a contact hole 14 which, ideally, extends just down to cell poly 2. In order to minimize the number of manufacturing process steps, this contact hole etch is typically performed as part of the same etch that forms bit line contact 15. Contact hole 14 is then filled with a metal conductor 16 for electrically connecting the cell poly to an external voltage source.
Upper insulating layer 12 and cell poly 2 are typically about 20,000 Angstroms and 1,000 Angstroms thick, respectively. The thickness of upper insulating layer 12 may vary from place to place due to the stepped substrate materials over which it is formed and non-uniformity of the film deposition and planarizing processes. Also, the contact hole etch must continue long enough to expose the deepest contact, bit line contact 15 in this example, at the thickest part of upper insulating layer 12. Hence, the contact hole will be over etched into and sometimes through the thin cell poly as illustrated in FIG. 3A. Etching through cell poly 2 diminishes the effectiveness of the cell poly/metal contact by forming a sidewall contact causing undesirable high contact resistance between conductor 16 and cell poly 2. Where the cell poly is formed in close proximity to the substrate, as shown in FIG. 3B, etching through cell poly 2 causes electrical shorting of cell poly 2 to substrate 10 through conductor 16.
Current methods to reduce the risk of over etching the cell poly contact hole include precisely controlled etch times and the development and use of highly selectively etch processes. Adequate selectivity is difficult to achieve, however, as device geometries shrink, bit line contacts become deeper and the cell poly becomes thinner.
One solution to the problem of shorting a thin conductive layer (described above for the cell poly) is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,243,219, issued to Katayama on Sep. 7, 1993. Katayama discloses an impurity diffused region in the substrate directly below the contact hole. The resulting pn junction between the impurity diffused region and the substrate isolates the conductive layer from the substrate in the event the contact hole is etched through the thin conductive layer. Although the device of Katayama minimized some of the undesirable effects of etching through the thin conductive layer, it does not eliminate this fundamental problem which is inherent in the formation of reliable contacts to a thin conductive layer.
There remains a need for a structure and manufacturing process that lessens or eliminates the risk of etching the contact hole through a thin conductive layer. It is desirable that such structure and process be of practical use in a variety of semiconductor device applications, including those in which the conductive layer is remote from the substrate.

Method of making a semiconductor device having improved contacts


Topical formulations comprising soft glycopyrrolates are useful for treating excessive sweating conditions in subjects, such as humans suffering from hyperhidrosis. Preferably, at least one soft anticholinergic agent is provided in an effective amount or concentration in an anhydrous formulation that can inhibit excessive perspiration resulting from a condition such as hyperhidrosis.

Various anticholinergic compounds and formulations for those compounds have been previously described. Glycopyrrolate is among the quaternary ammonium anticholinergics which have reduced CNS-related side effects as they cannot cross the blood-brain barrier; however, because glycopyrrolate is eliminated mainly as unchanged drug or active metabolite, its topical administration is often associated with common undesirable anticholinergic systemic side effects. To increase the therapeutic index of anticholinergics, the soft drug approach has been applied in a number of different designs starting from various lead compounds.
Soft anticholinergic zwitterions have been described in U.S. Pat. No. 8,568,699, and its related patents, U.S. Pat. Nos. 8,071,639; 7,538,219; and 7,417,147. Soft anticholinergic esters have been described in U.S. Pat. No. 8,628,759 and its related U.S. Pat. Nos. 8,147,809; 7,576,210; and 7,399,861. Each of the U.S. Pat. Nos. 8,568,699 and 8,628,759 and their related patents, U.S. Pat. Nos. 8,147,809; 8,071,639; 7,576,210; 7,538,219; 7,417,147; and 7,399,861 are hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety.
Recently, it has been discovered that soft anticholinergic analogs may be applied topically in treating hyperhidrosis. Hyperhidrosis is an idiopathic pathological condition characterized by excessive, uncontrollable sweating beyond that required to cool the body. Hyperfunction of the sweat glands and disturbance of their cholinergic stimulation have been described as possible causes of this condition.
Hyperhidrosis most often involves one or several anatomic areas, especially the hands, axillae, feet or face, although it can even involve the whole body. Axillary hyperhidrosis is the most common form, followed by palmar hyperhidrosis. Aluminum and other polycationic-based antiperspirants alone are generally not effective in treating this excessive perspiration. Oral medications are occasionally beneficial, but may have side effects.
Other therapeutic alternatives include botulinum toxin injection, iontophoresis and surgical procedures such as endoscopic thoracic sympathectomy. Botulinin toxin injections are painful, expensive and need to be repeated every 6 months to achieve the desired benefit. Iontophoresis has limited efficacy and cannot be used for axillary areas and although the surgery affords permanent benefit in some 40% to 90% of affected individuals, it is invasive, requires general anesthesia and is not without potential side effects. As many as 50% of persons who have undergone thoracic sympathectomy develop compensatory and annoying sweating of the trunk or thighs.
A non-invasive, convenient and effective treatment having high sweat reduction activity, long duration, and with fewer side effects would be a welcome alternative for treating hyperhidrosis. Topical formulations comprising soft anticholinergic analogs, such as esters of glycopyrrolate, have been proposed for use in treating hyperhidrosis; however, stable, pharmaceutically acceptable formulations which can meet regulatory requirements or provide commercially viable shelf-life for such products have been elusive. Thus, what is needed in the art is a stable, pharmaceutically acceptable, and commercially viable formulation for a topically administered composition comprising a soft anticholinergic analog.

Formulation for soft anticholinergic analogs


Disclosed are methods of making memory cells and semiconductor devices containing the memory cells. The methods involve oxidizing a portion of a copper containing electrode to form a copper oxide layer; contacting the copper oxide layer with at least one of a sulfur containing gas or plasma to form a CuS layer; forming an organic semiconductor over the CuS layer; and forming an electrode over the organic semiconductor. Such devices containing the memory cells are characterized by light weight and robust reliability.

The basic functions of a computer and memory devices include information processing and storage. In typical computer systems, these arithmetic, logic, and memory operations are performed by devices that are capable of reversibly switching between two states often referred to as "0" and "1". Such switching devices are fabricated from semiconducting devices that perform these various functions and are capable of switching between two states at high speed.
Electronic addressing or logic devices, for instance for storage or processing of data, are made with inorganic solid state technology, and particularly crystalline silicon devices. The metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistor (MOSFET) is one the main workhorses. Much of the progress in making computers and memory devices faster, smaller and cheaper involves integration, squeezing ever more transistors and other electronic structures onto a postage-stamp-sized piece of silicon. A postage-stamp-sized piece of silicon may contain tens of millions of transistors, each transistor as small as a few hundred nanometers. However, silicon-based devices are approaching their fundamental physical size limits.
Inorganic solid state devices are generally encumbered with a complex architecture which leads to high cost and a loss of data storage density. The circuitry of volatile semiconductor memories based on inorganic semiconductor material must constantly be supplied with electric current with a resulting heating and high electric power consumption in order to maintain stored information. Non-volatile semiconductor devices have a reduced data rate and relatively high power consumption and large degree of complexity.
Moreover, as inorganic solid state device sizes decrease and integration increases, sensitivity to alignment tolerances increases making fabrication markedly more difficult. Formation of features at small minimum sizes does not imply that the minimum size can be used for fabrication of working circuits. It is necessary to have alignment tolerances which are much smaller than the small minimum size, for example, one quarter the minimum size.
Scaling inorganic solid state devices raises issues with dopant diffusion lengths. As dimensions are reduced, the dopant diffusion lengths in silicon are posing difficulties in process design. In this connection, many accommodations are made to reduce dopant mobility and to reduce time at high temperatures. However, it is not clear that such accommodations can be continued indefinitely.
Scaling and integration makes isolation in a monolithic semiconductor substrate more challenging. In particular, lateral isolation of devices from each other is difficult in some situations. Another difficulty is leakage current scaling. Yet another difficulty is presented by the diffusion of carriers within the substrate; that is free carriers can diffuse over many tens of microns and neutralize a stored charge.


A communication apparatus has a power saving stand-by mode for reducing power consumption during stand-by and a non-ringing call receiving mode for communication without ringing an attached telephone set at the arrival of a call. In the power saving stand-by mode, an operation state of a relay for attaining the non-ringing call receiving mode is held by a stand-by power supply to render both modes compatible to each other.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a communication apparatus having a power saving stand-by mode to reduce power consumption during stand-by and a non-ringing call receiving mode to conduct communication without ringing an associated telephone set in receiving a call.
2. Related Background Art
A prior art apparatus of this type such as a facsimile apparatus has a non-ringing call receiving function in which the apparatus automatically determines whether a received call is for image communication or telephone communication without ringing an associated telephone set when the apparatus receives a call, if it is the image communication, the apparatus starts image reception and if it is the telephone communication, the apparatus applies a simulated calling signal to the telephone set (slave telephone set) to make it ring or generates a call sound from a speaker of the image communication apparatus to inform the call to a user. Such a facsimile apparatus is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,837,806 issued on Jun. 6, 1989 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,317,629 issued on May 31, 1994.
On the other hand, regulations on the power consumption of electronic equipment have recently been issued in many countries. For image communication apparatus, regulations require reduction of power consumption while in the stand-by mode depending on a recording speed. The power saving stand-by mode which suppresses power consumption is referred to as an ESS (energy saving stand-by) mode.
In the above-mentioned facsimile apparatus which has the non-ringing call receiving mode but does not have the ESS mode, an H relay for isolating a telephone set from a line is provided between the telephone set and a CML (communication line) relay which switches the telephone line between a facsimile apparatus (modem) and the telephone set, and a power is supplied to the H relay to keep the H relay in an on-state during the stand-by. Thus, when a call signal (Cl signal) is received from the line, the Cl signal is prevented from being applied to the telephone set and a bell of the telephone set from being rung.
On the other hand, in a facsimile apparatus having the ESS mode, power is supplied only to a minimum of circuits, such as a control circuit (CPU) of a microcomputer, in order to minimize the power consumption during the stand-by and the power supply to drive the H relay is shut down during the stand-by. As a result, once the apparatus is set to the ESS mode, the H relay cannot be turned on during the stand-by and the non-ringing call receiving mode is not realized.

Communication apparatus having a non-ringing call receiving mode and an energy-saving stand-by mode


A financial market analysis system includes a derivatives database which provides for floating frames of reference for data organization and retrieval. The system provides searchable characteristics based on relation to characteristics of the underlying instruments, other options of similar expiry, and between options of different expiry. The database may contain comprehensive data on all relevant securities, including underlying market price data and derivatives of the same class. The system may provide more easily accessible querying options that are based upon the ordinal numbering of relative expiration dates to take advantage of the market's structure. The system may also provide more easily processed queries based on a derivative's proximity to the underlying instrument's market price. For options and instruments with embedded options, the system may order options expiring on the same expiration date by proximity to the at-the-money options. The system enables easier query formulation by transforming the frame of reference of the user from an absolute, cardinal system of particular securities to a relative, ordinal system that moves with time and the underlying instruments.

Derivatives are financial instruments which trade based on the value of one or more other instruments. Those instruments from which the derivatives gain their value are referred to as "underlying securities," "underlying instruments," or "underlying." In addition to the underlying securities, traders value derivatives based on their specification, time until expiration (which can be long or short term), market interest rates, any relevant cash flows, and the market's demand (or lack thereof) for that derivative. Derivatives may trade on their own, such as exchange traded futures and options, or as part of another instrument, such as a convertible bond.
Database systems have been previously developed to provide financial market information. In particular, previously developed systems are available for providing the value of a particular stock or bond on a particular date or to plot the fluctuations of that value over a range of dates. From the viewpoint of derivatives market traders, however, these previously developed systems are inadequate and/or problematic. For example, the information output by these systems is not very useful to traders in that they do not provide data on all relevant derivatives organized by relation to the market price and expiry of the underlying instrument. In addition, the organization of derivatives having different expiry dates is poor.
There is a clear need for a system which supplies option trading data in a form which is simple for options traders to review and analyze.

System and method for analyzing financial market data


A method of automatically selecting at least one of stored multimedia files for transfer between a first storage medium and a second storage medium. In the method, each stored file is assigned a popularity weighting based on popularity information and files are selected that have a popularity weighting within a preferred range.

The widespread use of the Internet as a distribution channel for multimedia data and the advancement in storage technology enable users to have a very large collection of multimedia files. It is not uncommon for a user to have hundreds or even thousands of files stored in the hard drive of a personal computer (PC). The growing of the already very large collection of multimedia files increases the difficulty of accessing the desirable file.
The storage capacity of portable media players is usually much smaller than the storage capacity of a PC. Therefore it is impossible for a user to transfer their whole collection of multimedia files from the PC to a portable unit. The user must select a small portion from the large collection. This becomes increasingly difficulty as the collection grows.
The time required to transfer multimedia files from a PC to a portable unit can take minutes to hours depending on the capacity of the portable unit. As there is a trend in increasing capacity of the portable unit, the time required to fill-up the portable unit with multimedia content will increase. Therefore, it will be a waste of time and create inconvenience to the user if the transferred multimedia content is not the desirable one.
Currently, media player software only allows users to assemble 'playlists' based on a targeted range of capacity. This requires the user to be aware of the remaining capacity of the portable device. Some software allows a selection based on the popularity, source or last access time. However, their implementation is a manual process and requires the attention from users. For example, the user has to recall from his memory whether the most frequently or recently accessed media files are desirable. In short, the current approach requires the attention and active participation of the users to select the desirable content.

Method of automatically selecting multimedia files for transfer between two storage mediums