This present invention provides novel methods for deriving embryonic stem cells, those cells and cell lines, and the use of the cells for therapeutic and research purposes without the destruction of the embryo. It also relates to novel methods of establishing and storing an autologous stem cell line prior to implantation of an embryo, e.g., in conjunction with reproductive therapies such as IVF.

With few exceptions, embryonic stem cells have only been grown from blastocyst-stage embryos. ES cell lines are conventionally isolated from the inner cell mass of blastocysts and in a few instances from cleavage stage embryos. There are several drawbacks to the techniques used to create these cells. From the perspective of the technique, the culturing of embryos to blastocysts occasionally has a relatively low success rate. Some people express the basic objection that embryonic stem (ES) cell research is rooted in the fact that ES-cell derivation deprives preimplantation-stage embryos of any further potential to develop into a complete human being. The following invention provides novel and unexpected methods of deriving embryonic stem cell lines and other embryo-derived cells for use in research and in medicine.

Astellas Institute for Regenerative Medicine


A semiconductor fabrication method is provided for the fabrication of a shallow-trench isolation (STI) structure in integrated circuit. Conventionally, the insulating plug of the STI structure would be undesirably formed with microscratches in its top surface resulting from chemical-mechanical polishing (CMP) process, thus causing an undesired bridging effect thereacross when conductive layers are subsequently formed. This method can help solve this problem by forming a mending dielectric layer over the insulating plug of the STI structure to mend these microscratches. Since the mending dielectric layer is in a flowable state when it is being coated over the wafer, it can fill up all the microscratches in the top surface of the insulating plug, thereby mending the microscratches to prevent the bridging effect across the insulating plug that would other-wise occur in the case of the prior art. This method can thus help the resulting IC device to be more reliable in operation and also can help increase the yield rate of the wafer fabrication.

1. Field of the Invention:
This invention relates to semiconductor fabrication technology, and more particularly, to a method of fabricating a shallow-trench isolation (STI) structure in an integrated circuit.
2. Description of Related Art:
The shallow-trench isolation (STI) structure is a widely used isolation structure in integrated circuits for electrically isolating the various active components in the integrated circuit. A conventional method of forming an STI structure includes a first step of forming a trench in the substrate through an anisotropic etching process, a second step of depositing oxide into the trench, and a final step of performing a chemicalmechanical polishing (CMP) process to planarize the top surface of the oxide in the trench. The oxide in the trench then serves as the intended STI structure. One benefit of using the STI structure is that its topmost surface is substantially level with the topmost surface of the substrate.
One drawback to the foregoing method, however, is that the CMP process scratches the top surface of the oxide in the STI structure, thus forming undesired microscratches in the top surface of the oxide in the STI structure. The forming of these microscratches then causes some problems in the resulting IC device. To better depict this drawback, the conventional STI fabrication method is schematically depicted, step-by-step, in full detail in the following with reference to FIGs. 1A-1E.
Referring first to FIG. 1A, in the first step, a semiconductor substrate 100 is prepared. Subsequently, a pad oxide layer 102 is formed over the substrate 100 for surface protection of the substrate 100. After this, a mask layer 104 is formed over the pad oxide layer 102, preferably from silicon nitride through a low-pressure chemical vapor deposition (LPCVD) process.
Referring next to FIG. 1B, in the subsequent step, a selective etching process is performed to etch into a selected area of the wafer. Etching proceeds successively through the mask layer 104 and the pad oxide layer 102 until reaching a predefined depth in the substrate 100. Through this process, a trench 106 is formed in the substrate 100.
Referring next to FIG. 1C, in the subsequent step, a thermal oxidation process is performed on the wafer, whereby the exposed part of the substrate 100 is oxidized to form a liner oxide layer 108 on the bottom and sidewalls of the trench 106. This liner oxide layer 108 is formed to such an extent as to come into junction with the pad oxide layer 102. Next, a dielectric material, preferably silicon oxide, is deposited through an atmospheric-pressure chemical vapor deposition (APCVD) process into the trench 106 and also over the top surface of the wafer to thereby form an insulating layer 110. After this, a densification process is performed on the wafer in such a manner as to place the wafer in a gaseous nitrogen environment under a high temperature condition, whereby the insulating layer 110 is densified.
Referring next to FIG. 1D, in the subsequent step, a chemical-mechanical polishing (CMP) process is performed on the wafer until reaching the top surface of the mask layer 104, whereby all the surface part of the insulating layer 110 that is laid above the mask layer 104 is removed (the remaining part is here designated by the reference numeral 110a and is here and hereinafter referred to as an insulating plug). The CMP technique is a widely used and well-known surface polishing process in semiconductor fabrication, so details thereof will not be further described.
One drawback to the use of the CMP process, however, is that it scratches the top surface of the resulting insulating plug 110a, thus forming undesired microscratches 112 in the top surface of the insulating plug 110a. These microscratches 112 result because it is necessary to over-polish the mask layer 104 during the CMP process so as to ensure that the overlying part of the insulating layer 110 is entirely removed. Since the mask layer 104 (which is formed from silicon nitride) is harder than the insulating layer 110 (which is formed from silicon oxide), the slurry used in the CMP process together with the particles from the polished mask layer 104 abrade the top surface of the insulating plug 110a, thus resulting in formation of the microscratches 112 in the top surface of the insulating plug 110a.
Referring next to FIG. 1E, in the subsequent step, the mask layer 104 is entirely etched away by using a hot phosphate solution as the etchant. Next, the pad oxide layer 102 is also entirely etched away by using hydrofluoric acid (HF) as the etchant. Through these two etching processes, the insulating plug 110a (FIG. 1D) is also partly etched away (the remaining part thereof is here designated by the reference numeral 110b for distinguishing purpose). The remaining insulating plug 110b and the liner oxide layer 108 in the previously formed trench 106 (FIG. 1B) in combination constitute the intended STI structure.
One drawback to the use of the HF solution, however, is that it would also etch into the microscratches 112 in the top surface of the insulating plug 110a (FIG. 1D), thus further enlarging the microscratches 112. When conductive layers, such as doped polysilicon layers, are being formed on both sides of the insulating plug 110b, some of the doped polysilicon can be accidentally deposited into the microscratches 112, thus resulting in a bridging effect across the insulating plug 110b. The bridging effect across the insulating plug 110b causes leakage current to flow across the insulating plug 110b, thus making the resulting STI structure lose its isolating ability. As a consequence, the resulting IC device may be unreliable in operation. Moreover, it can cause pattern distortion that makes the resulting IC device inoperable, thus decreasing the yield rate of the wafer fabrication.

Method of fabricating a shallow-trench isolation structure in an integrated circuit


An insert for a surgical apparatus tray and method of preparing a surgical apparatus tray are described. The insert may include an upper part defining at least one support configured to receive an item of surgical equipment, and defining a first plane and having a plurality of edges defining a polygonal shape. A first side wall may extend downwardly from a first edge of the upper part and define a second plane. The first side wall may have a first, male attachment feature. A second side wall may extend downwardly from a second edge of the upper part and have a second, female attachment feature. The first attachment feature may be configured to mate with the form of the female attachment feature when the first side wall is moved in a direction parallel to the first plane and the second plane to connect the insert to a further insert having a similar construction.

The present disclosure is directed to surgical apparatus trays, and in particular to inserts for surgical apparatus trays, methods of assembling inserts for surgical apparatus trays and surgical apparatus trays.
Surgical apparatus trays are generally known and are typically used for handing various surgical apparatus such as surgical instruments, tools, implants and ancillary surgical equipment. Surgical apparatus tray may be used to transport the surgical apparatus to the operating theatre, to store the surgical apparatus during the surgical procedure and to remove the surgical apparatus for subsequent sterilisation and reloading the apparatus into a tray for storage and future use.
Some surgical procedures may use a large number of different instruments, some surgical procedures may vary depending on the patient and so may require different versions of the same instrument to be available in case they are needed, some surgical procedures may require different sized instruments to be available, some surgical procedures may require other surgical items to be present, such as surgical implants for orthopaedics procedures, and some surgical procedures may require ancillary surgical equipment to be available, such as bone screws or bone pins. Hence, a large number of trays may be required even for a relatively simple surgical procedure to try and make available most or all of the apparatus that the surgeon is likely to need.
Often, the intended content of a surgical tray is largely fixed as supports are provided in the tray to safely and securely hold the various different pieces of apparatus to be provided in the tray and in order to allow inventory checking by ensuring that all of the apparatus is present at the start and the end of the procedure. As discussed above, a large number of items of apparatus may end up being provided and many of those may not actually be needed or used during the surgical procedure.
The provision of redundant apparatus may be reduced by providing customised trays in which only a selected subset of the surgical apparatus most likely to be needed may be provided. However, that may vary from procedure to procedure and so for each procedure a different tray layout may be needed requiring a different tray to be assembled.
Also, large variation in tray layout and content may also reduce the ease with which operating theatre staff can locate the correct piece of apparatus and also with inventory control by ensuring that the tray is correctly and quickly packed in the first place and also apparatus returned to the tray to ensure that all apparatus is accounted for at the end of the procedure.

Surgical apparatus tray inserts and trays


A fuel injection pump equipped with a rotary deflector having an increased lifetime and reduced maintenance cost required to replace the deflector when it is wasted due to cavitation erosion. The deflector comprises a stationary holder and a tip member which is supported rotatably by the stationary holder so that the tip member is rotated by fuel flow that outbursts from the plunger room through the inlet/spill port and impinges against the tip member when fuel injection ends. This evades concentrated impingement at a specific portion of the tip member and prevents the occurrence of cavitation erosion.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a fuel injection pump for diesel engines. Specifically, the present invention relates to a fuel injection pump equipped with deflectors at input/spill ports of a plunger barrel in order to prevent occurrence of cavitations when fuel is spilled through the ports to finish fuel injection by allowing high-pressure fuel spilled from the plunger room through the ports to impinge against the deflectors.
2. Description of the Related Art
In many of jerk fuel injection pumps for diesel engines, deflectors are provided at input/spill ports of the plunger barrel so that fuel spilled from the plunger room at high speed through the ports impinges against the deflectors in order to prevent impingement of the high speed fuel against the casing of the injection pump, since the impingement induces cavitation erosion on the inside surface of the ports and fuel gallery surrounding the ports.
FIG. 5 is a sectional view along the center line of a plunger of a jerk fuel injection pump for a diesel engine to which the present invention is applied.
In FIG. 5, a plunger barrel 102 is fixedly provided in a pump case 105. A plunger 100 is fit in the plunger barrel 102 to be reciprocated. The plunger 100 is driven to reciprocate by means of a fuel cam not shown in the drawing via a tappet 106 and tappet spring 107. A plunger room 111 is formed in the plunger barrel 102 above the top face of the plunger 100. Fuel fed from a fuel gallery 104 formed between the inner surface of the pump case 105 and outer surface of the plunger barrel 102 through the input/spill ports 103 into the plunger room 111 is compressed to a high pressure by moving the plunger 100 in an upward direction. The highly pressurized fuel pushes open a delivery valve 108 seating on a valve seat 110, and the highly pressurized fuel flows through an outlet passage 109 to a fuel injection valve not shown in the drawing.
Deflectors 10 are located at the fuel gallery side openings of the inlet/spill ports 103. When the spill groove 101 of the plunger 100 uncovers the inlet/spill ports 103, pressurized fuel in the plunger room outbursts through the ports 103 and impinges against the deflectors 10. Occurrence of cavitation erosion on the surface of the inlet/spill ports 103 and the fuel gallery 104 is prevented by the impingement of fuel against the deflectors 10.
Fuel injection pumps equipped with deflectors like this are disclosed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2000-179428 (patent literature 1) and Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 9-144627 (patent literature 2).
In the fuel injection pump disclosed in the patent literature 1, the deflector for preventing cavitation erosion is shaped into a hexagonal socket head bolt having a protrusion to be inserted into the inlet/spill port with a plurality of fuel passages drilled to surround the socket part of the bolt to allow fuel that outbursts from the plunger room through the inlet/spill port to flow into the fuel gallery, wherein the deflector is screwed to the plunger barrel and further retained to the plunger barrel by means of a snap ring in order to prevent it from slipping out even when the screw has loosened.
In the fuel injection pump disclosed in the patent literature 2, the deflector is screwed to the pump case to face the inlet/spill port. Porous material is adhered on the end of the deflector facing the port to allow fuel bursting out through the port to impinge against the porous material, thereby alleviating rapid pressure change at the fuel impinging part and preventing occurrence of cavitation erosion.
In these prior art, the deflector is fixed securely to the plunger or pump case.

Fuel injection pump equipped with rotary deflector


Disclosed is an electronic device for a vehicle, including a processor acquiring image data acquired by a camera mounted in a vehicle, determining a riding intention of an outside person based on the location, posture, and gesture of the outside person detected from the image data, and generating a control signal to stop the vehicle based on the riding intention.

A vehicle is an apparatus that carries a passenger in the direction intended by the passenger. A car is the main example of such a vehicle. An autonomous vehicle is a vehicle that is capable of traveling autonomously without driving operation by a driver.
Recently, shared autonomous vehicles have been developed. A conventional shared autonomous vehicle allows only people who have previously reserved the use thereof to ride therein. In some cases, there are people who want to ride in a shared autonomous vehicle on the street. Therefore, there is the need to develop a shared autonomous vehicle that can be used by such people.

Electronic device for vehicle and method of operating electronic device for vehicle


Each disk enclosure 117 contains an ENC bypass 113A for a disk connector 111A, and PBC 101A and 103A, which perform selective switching to transfer data via either the disk connector 111A or the ENC bypass 113A. When the occurrence of an anomaly in the disk connector 111A is detected, the CTL 5A connected to the disk connector 111A asks the CTL 5B to bypass the disk connector 111A, whereupon the CTL 5B switches the data communication path from the disk connector 111A to the ENC bypass 113A by controlling the PBC 101A and 103A.

The storage control systems disclosed in Japanese Patent Applications Laid Open Nos. 2004-22058 and 2004-22059, for example, are known as storage control systems that comprise a plurality of disk drives.
Such storage control systems comprise a basic disk chassis and one or more additional disk chassis. The basic disk chassis comprises a controller, a plurality of disk drives, and a disk connector (port bypass circuit, for example) that connects the controller and the plurality of disk drives. The additional disk chassis are connected downstream of the basic disk chassis Each additional disk chassis comprises a plurality of disk drives, and a disk connector that is connected to the plurality of disk drives. A disk connector in one additional disk chassis is connected to a disk connector in an upstream additional disk chassis (or basic disk chassis). As a result of this constitution, the controller in the basic disk chassis is able to access the desired disk drive via one or more continuously linked disk connectors.
In the conventional storage control system above, when a fault arises with a certain disk connector, there are sometimes cases where access is then no longer possible not only to the plurality of disk drives connected to this disk connector but also to disk drives connected to any disk connector that lies downstream of the disk connector. For this reason, increased reliability of storage control systems is desirable.

Storage control system and operating method for storage control system


A pressure controlled safety switch comprises an electrical switch disposed in a cavity of a mandrel. A bellows assembly is operably engaged with the electrical switch. The bellows assembly is in fluid communication with a fluid surrounding the mandrel such that a pressure in the fluid no less than a predetermined pressure causes the bellows to activate the electrical switch, and a pressure in the fluid less than the predetermined pressure causes the bellows to deactivate the electrical switch.

The present disclosure relates generally to the field of downhole tools for well operations.
As the oilfield industry moves to perform down hole operations as efficiently as possible, some operations formally done on wireline are being run on slickline, drill pipe, or other deployment means that do not contain an electrical conductor. Batteries may be used as a power source for these operations. For some types of operations, for example perforating, or running a neutron generator, accidental activation on, or near, the surface may cause injury to personnel and/or damage to equipment. Operations that were formally made safe by not applying power to the wireline are now being connected to a power source at the surface when, for example, the battery sub is activated or installed before descending down hole, resulting in the potential for surface activation if the device is mis-programmed, or has an electronics failure.
While the invention is susceptible to various modifications and alternative forms, specific embodiments thereof are shown by way of example in the drawings and will herein be described in detail. It should be understood, however, that the drawings and detailed description herein are not intended to limit the invention to the particular form disclosed, but on the contrary, the intention is to cover all modifications, equivalents and alternatives falling within the scope of the present invention as defined by the appended claims.


An image conversion system for converting monoscopic images for viewing in three dimensions including: an input means adapted to receive the monoscopic images; a preliminary analysis means to determine if there is any continuity between a first image and a second image of the monoscopic image sequence; a secondary analysis means for receiving monoscopic images which have a continuity, and analyzing the images to determine the speed and direction of motion, and the depth, size and position of objects; a first processing means for processing the monoscopic images based on data received from the preliminary analysis means or the secondary analysis means; a second processing means capable of further processing images received from the first processing means; a transmission means capable of transferring the processed images to a stereoscopic display system.

The present invention relates generally to stereoscopic image systems, and in particular to the synthesis of stereoscopic image pairs from monoscopic images for stereoscopic display. The present invention may also be directed towards a five module method for producing stereoscopic images, that digitises a monoscopic source, analyses it for motion, generates the stereoscopic image pairs, optimises the stereoscopic effect, transmits or stores them and then enables them to be displayed on a stereoscopic display device.
The advent of stereoscopic or three dimensional (3D) display systems which create a more realistic image for the viewer than conventional monoscopic or two dimensional (2D) display systems, requires that stereoscopic images be available to be seen on the 3D display systems. In this regard there exists many monoscopic image sources, for example existing 2D films or videos, which could be manipulated to product stereoscopic images for viewing on a stereoscopic display device.
Preexisting methods to convert such monoscopic images for stereoscopic viewing do not product acceptable results. Other attempts in film and video have used techniques to duplicate the stereoscopic depth cue of xe2x80x9cMotion Parallaxxe2x80x9d. These involved producing a delay for the images presented to the trailing eye when laterals, left or right, motion is present in the images. Other attempts have used xe2x80x98Lateral Shiftingxe2x80x99 of the images to the left and right eyes to provide depth perception.
However, these two techniques are limited and generally only suit specific applications. For example, the Motion Parallax technique is only good for scenes with left or right motion and is of limited value for the stereoscopic enhancement of still scenes. The Lateral Shifting technique will only give an overall depth effect to a scene and not allow different objects at varying depths to be perceived at the depths where they occur. Even the combination of these two techniques will only give a limited stereoscope effect for most 2D films or videos.
Some existing approaches demonstrate limitations of these techniques. When an image has vertical motion and some lateral motion and a delay is provided to the image presented to the trailing eye then the result is often a large vertical disparity between the left and right views such that the images are uncomfortable to view. Scenes with contra motion, such as objects moving left and right in the same scene are also uncomfortable to view. Certain embodiments of these methods define that when objects of varying depths are present in an image there is a distinct xe2x80x98card board cut-outxe2x80x99 appearance of the objects with distinct depth modules rather than a smooth transition of objects from foreground to background.
In all these approaches no successful attempt has been made to develop a system or method to suit all image sequences or to resolve the problem of viewer discomfort or to optimise the stereoscopic effect for each viewer or display device.
There is therefore a need for a system with improved methods of converting monoscopic images into stereoscopic image pairs and a system for providing inproved stereoscopic images to a viewer.
An object of the present invention is to provide such a system with improved methods.
In order to address the problems noted above the present invention provides in one aspect a method for converting monoscopic images for viewing in three dimensions including the steps of:
receiving said monoscopic images;
analysing said monoscopic images to determine characteristics of the images;
processing said monoscopic images based on the determined image characteristics;
outputting the processed images to suitable storage and/or stereoscopic display systems.
wherein analysing of said monoscopic images to determine the motion includes the steps of:
dividing each image into a plurality of blocks, wherein corresponding blocks on an adjacent image are offset horizontally and/or vertically; and
comparing each said block with said corresponding blocks to find the minimum mean square error and thereby the motion of the block.
An image conversion system for converting monoscopic images for viewing in three dimensions including:
an input means adapted to receive monoscopic images;
a preliminary analysis means to determine if there is any continuity between a first image and a second image of the monoscopic image sequence;
a secondary analysis means for receiving monoscopic images which have a continuity, and analysing the images to determine at least one of the speed and direction of motion, or the depth, size and position of objects, wherein analysing of said monoscopic images to determine the motion includes the steps of: dividing each image into a plurality of blocks, wherein corresponding blocks on an adjacent image are offset horizontally and/or vertically, and comparing each said block with said corresponding blocks to find the minimum mean square error and thereby the motion of the block;
a first processing means for processing the monoscopic images based on data received from the preliminary analysis means and/or the secondary analysis means.
Ideally, the input means also includes a means to capture and digitise the monoscopic images.
Preferably the image analysis means is capable of determining the speed and direction of motion, the depth, size and position of objects and background within an image.
In a further aspect the present invention provides a method of optimising the stereoscopic image to further improve the stereoscopic effect and this process is generally applied prior to transmission, storage and display.
In yet a further aspect the present invention provides a method of improving stereoscopic image pairs by adding a viewer reference point to the image.
In still yet a further aspect the present invention provides a method of analysing monoscopic images for conversion to stereoscopic image pairs including the steps of: scaling each image into a plurality of regions; comparing each region of a first image with corresponding and adjacent regions of a second image to determine the nature of movement between said first image and said second image.
Preferably a motion vector is defined for each image based on a comparison of the nature of motion detected with predefined motion categories ranging from no motion to a complete scene change.
In yet a further aspect the present invention provides a system for converting monoscopic images for viewing in three dimensions including:
a first module adapted to receive a monoscopic image;
a second module adapted to receive the monoscopic image and analyse the monoscopic image to create image date, wherein analysing of said monoscopic image to determine the motion includes the steps of: dividing each image into a plurality of blocks, wherein corresponding blocks on an adjacent image are offset horizontally and/or vertically, and comparing each said block with said corresponding blocks to find the minimum mean square error and thereby the motion of the block;
a third module adapted to create stereoscopic image pairs from the monoscopic image using at least one predetermined technique selected as a function of the image data;
a fourth module adapted to transfer the stereoscopic image pairs to a stereoscopic display means;
a fifth module consisting of a stereoscopic display means.
Preferably the first module is further adapted to convert any analogue images into a digital image. Also, the second module is preferably adapted to detect any objects in a scene and make a determination as to the speed and direction of any such motion. Conveniently, the image may be compressed prior to any such analysis.
Preferably the third module further includes an optimisation stage to further enhance the stereoscopic image pairs prior to transmitting the stereoscopic image pairs to the stereoscopic display means. Conveniently, the fourth module may also include a storage means for storing the stereoscopic image pairs for display on the stereoscopic display means at a later time.
It will be appreciated that the process of the present invention can be suspended at any stage and stored for continuation at a later time or transmitted for continuation at another location if required.
The present invention provides a conversion technology with a number of unique advantages including:
The ability to convert monoscopic images to stereoscopic image pairs can be performed in realtime or non-realtime. Operator intervention may be applied to manually manipulate the images. An example of this is in the conversion of films or videos where every sequence may be tested and optimised for its stereoscopic effect by an operator.
The present invention utilises a plurality of techniques to further enhance the basic techniques of motion parallax and lateral shifting (forced parallax) to generate stereoscopic image pairs. These techniques include but are not limited to the use of object analysis, tagging, tracking and morphing, parallax zones, reference points, movement synthesis and parallax modulation techniques.
Reverse 3D is ideally detected as part of the 3D Generation process by analysing the motion characteristics of an image. Correction techniques may then employed to minimise Reverse 3D so as to minimise viewer discomfort.
The present invention discloses a technique applicable to a broad range of applications and describes a complete process for applying the stereoscopic conversion process to monoscopic applications. The present invention
Humans see by a complex combination of physiological and psychological processes involving the eyes and the brain. Visual perception involves the use of short and long term memory to be able to interpret visual information with known and experienced reality as defined by our senses. For instance, according to the Cartesian laws on space and perspective the further an object moves away from the viewer the smaller it gets. In other words, the brain expects that if an object is large it is close to the viewer and if it is small it is some distance off. This is a learned process based on knowing the size of the object in the first place. Other monoscopic or minor depth cues that can be represented in visual information are for example shadows, defocussing, texture, light, atmosphere.
These depth cues are used to great advantage in the production of xe2x80x98Perspective 3Dxe2x80x99 video games and computer graphics. However, the problem with these techniques in achieving a stereoscopic effect is that the perceived depth cannot be quantified: it is an illusion of displaying 2D objects in a 2D environment. Such displays do not look real as they do not show a stereoscopic image because the views to both eyes are identical.
Stereoscopic images are an attempt to recreate real world visuals, and require much more visual information than xe2x80x98Perspective 3Dxe2x80x99 images so that depth can be quantified. The stereoscopic or major depth cues provide this additional data so that a person""s visual perception can be stimulated in three dimensions. These major depth cues are described as follows:
Retinal Disparityxe2x80x94refers to the fact that both eyes see a slightly different view. This can easily be demonstrated by holding an object in front of a person""s face and focussing on the background. Once the eyes have focused on the background it will appear as though there are actually two objects in front of the face. Disparity is the horizontal distance between the corresponding lefts and right image points of superimposed retinal images. While Parallax is the actual spatial displacement between the viewed images.
2) Motion Parallaxxe2x80x94Those objects that are closer to the viewer will describes on the one hand techniques for 3D Generation where both the image processing equipment and stereoscopic display equipment are located substantially at the same location. While on the other hand techniques are defined for generation of the stereoscopic image pairs at one location and their transmission, storage and subsequent display at a remote location.
The present invention accommodates any stereoscopic display device and ideally has built in adjustment facilities. The 3D Generation process can also take into account the type of display device in order to optimise the stereoscopic effect.

Dynamic Digital Depth Research Pty. Ltd.


It is an object of the present invention to provide a polycarboxylic acid polpolymer which improves the water reducing capacity and workability of cement compositions and the like and making them easier to handle when the fluidity and water reducing capacity are at the same levels, a method of producing the copolymer, and a cement additive and a cement composition comprising the copolymer. The present invention is further to provide a polycarboxylic acid copolymer and a cement additive which are capable of improving the strength and durability of hardening products of cement compositions, hence can advantageously be used in ultrahigh strength concrete. The present invention is polycarboxylic acid copolymers having high water reducing capacity, reducing the viscosity of cement compositions and improving the workability in applying cement.

Polycarboxylic acid copolymers have been used as components of cement additives for cement compositions such as cement paste, mortar, and concrete. They are now essential in constructing civil engineering and building structures and the like from cement compositions. Cement additives comprising such polycarboxylic acid copolymers are used as water reducing agents; they increase the fluidity of cement compositions to thereby reduce the water requirement of the cement compositions and therefore are effective in improving the strength, durability, and the like, of hardening products. Such water reducing agents are superior in water reducing capacity to naphthalene-based and other conventional water reducing agents and thus have already led to good results in many cases as air-entraining and high-range water-reducing admixture.
Meanwhile, foundations and like parts of civil engineering and building structures are required to have high strength or durability and, therefore, the so-called ultrahigh strength concrete compositions having high performance characteristics among concrete species are used in constructing them. As water reducing agents for such ultrahigh strength concrete, use is made of water reducing agents for ultrahigh strength concrete, which are high in water reducing capacity, so that the amount of water in concrete can be reduced to a sufficient extent to attain high performance characteristics. Currently, copolymers of methacrylic acid and polyethylene oxide methacrylate, for instance, are in use as water reducing agents for ultrahigh strength concrete. However, when an ultrahigh strength concrete is produced using such a water reducing agent for ultrahigh strength concrete, the concrete shows a high viscosity. Therefore, water reducing agents for ultrahigh strength concrete which can improve the workability are demanded.
In the specification of Japanese Kokai Publication Hei-07-215746, there is disclosed the use, as water reducing agents, of copolymers of an alkenyl ether, which has oxyalkylene group containing 2 to 40 carbon atoms and its end essentially has an alkenyl group and a specific group containing 1 to 24 carbon atoms, and maleic anhydride. However, for their successful application as water reducing agents for ultrahigh strength concrete, in particular, there is room for contrivance concerning the copolymer structure and characteristics.
Japanese Kokai Publication 2000-191356 discloses that a cement dispersant whose main component is a water-soluble amphoteric copolymer obtained by copolymerization of a specific polyamine-derived monomer as compound A, a specific unsaturated carboxylic acid monomer as compound B and a specific polyalkylene glycol-derived monomer as compound C in the proportion compound A:compound B:compound C=10 to 40% by weight:10 to 40% by weight:50 to 80% by weight can be used as a dispersant for ultrahigh strength concrete and that it is excellent in field workability.
However, water-soluble amphoteric copolymers prepared in all Examples in this publication by copolymerizing compound A, compound B and compound C, when used in preparing high strength concrete, provide them with high viscosity, making the shovel work difficult; thus, they have a workability problem.

Polycarboxylic acid copolymer, production method and use thereof

Abstract: The present invention is directed to a polycarboxylic acid copolymer which is obtained by copolymerization of monomer components comprising a polyalkyleneimine unsaturated monomer (A1) and an unsaturated carboxylic acid monomer (B).


A vertical roasting apparatus is provided wherein a predetermined supply of liquid for generating the moisture required to produce a high quality and flavorful roasting of the meat is included in a reservoir formed within the support structure itself and disposed internally of the poultry or meat being roasted. The amount of liquid supplied for generating moisture is directly related to the uncooked weight of the poultry or meat to be roasted. The apparatus includes a scale provided integrally therewith and calibrated to indicate the proper level of fill in the reservoir for a particular uncooked weight of poultry/meat.

The present invention is directed to improvements in vertical roasting apparatus for use in closed ovens. Vertical racks or supports for oven roasting of poultry and meat are well known to the art and examples of such devices are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos.: Ciofalo 5,106,642; Finizie 2,587,133; Steibel 4,450,759; Schlessel 5,069,117; Kuhling et al. 5,081,916; Hamlyn 4,709,626; Jay 4,633,773; Rosenkrantz Des. 286,498; Schmengler Des. 322,911; Spanek et al. 4,027,583; and Harnest 3,392,665.
It has been determined that fat-free roasting is enhanced by the apparatus of the present invention by virtue of the fact that effective fat-free roasting requires the constant moistening of the poultry or meat being roasted during the cooking process. Furthermore, the amount of moisture and the method by which the roasting poultry or meat is moistened directly influences the quality and flavor of the cooked poultry or meat as well as the overall cooking time.


The present invention relates to variants of cyclomaltodextrin glucanotransferase. More specifically the invention relates to a method of modifying the substrate binding and/or product selectivity of a precursor CGTase enzyme, and CGTase variants derived from a precursor CGTase enzyme by substitution, insertion and/or deletion of one or more amino acid residue(s), which amino acid residue(s) holds a position close to the substrate. Moreover, the invention relates to DNA constructs encoding the CGTase variants, expression vectors, host cells and methods of producing the CGTase variants of the invention.

Cyclomaltodextrin glucanotransferase (E.C. 220.127.116.11), also designated cyclodextrin glucanotransferase or cyclodextrin glycosyltransferase, in the following termed CGTase, catalyses the conversion of starch and similar substrates into cyclomaltodextrins via an intramolecular transglycosylation reaction, thereby forming cyclomaltodextrins, in the following termed cyclodextrins (or CD), of various sizes. Commercially most important are cyclodextrins of 6, 7 and 8 glucose units, which are termed .alpha.-, .beta.- and .gamma.-cyclodextrins, respectively. Commercially less important are cyclodextrins of 9, 10, and 11 glucose units, which are termed .delta.-, .epsilon.-, and .zeta.-cyclodextrins, respectively.
Cyclodextrins are thus cyclic glucose oligomers with a hydrophobic internal cavity. They are able to form inclusion complexes with many small hydrophobic molecules in aqueous solutions, resulting in changes in physical properties, e.g. increased solubility and stability and decreased chemical reactivity and volatility. Cyclodextrins find applications particularly in the food, cosmetic, chemical and pharmaceutical industries.
Most CGTases have both starch-degrading activity and transglycosylation activity. Although some CGTases produce mainly .alpha.-cyclodextrins and some CGTases produce mainly .beta.-cyclodextrins, CGTases usually form a mixture of .alpha.-, .beta.- and .gamma.-cyclodextrins. Selective precipitation steps with organic solvents may be used for the isolation of separate .alpha.-, .beta.- and .gamma.-cyclodextrins. To avoid expensive and environmentally harmful procedures, the availability of CGTases capable of producing an increased ratio of one particular type of cyclodextrin is desirable.
CGTases from different bacterial sources, including CGTases obtained from Bacillus, Brevibacterium, Clostridium, Corynebacterium, Klebsiella, Micrococcus, Thermoanaerobacter and Thermoanaerobacterium have been described in the literature.
Thus Kimura et al. [Kimura K, Kataoka S, Ishii Y, Takano T and Yamane K; J. Bacteriol. 1987 169 4399-4402] describe a Bacillus sp. 1011 CGTase, Kaneko et al. [Kaneko T, Hamamoto T and Horikoshi K; J. Gen. Microbiol. 1988 134 97-105] describe a Bacillus sp. Strain 38-2 CGTase, Kaneko et al. [Kaneko T, Song K B, Hamamoto T, Kudo T and Horikoshi K; J. Gen. Microbiol. 1989 135 3447-3457] describe a Bacillus sp. Strain 17-1 CGTase, Itkor et al. [Itkor P, Tsukagoshi N and Udaka S; Biochem. Biophys. Res. Commun. 1990 166 630-636] describe a Bacillus sp. B1018 CGTase, Schmid et al. [Schmid G, Englbrecht A, Schmid D; Proceedings of the Fourth International Symposium on Cyclodextrins (Huber O, Szejtli J, Eds.), 1988 71-76] describe a Bacillus sp. 1-1 CGTase, Kitamoto et al. [Kitamoto N, Kimura T, Kito Y, Ohmiya K; J. Ferment. Bioeng. 1992 74 345-351] describe a Bacillus sp. KC201 CGTase, Sakai et al. [Sakai S, Kubota M, Nakada T, Torigoe K, Ando O and Sugimoto T; J. Jpn. Soc. Starch. Sci. 1987 34 140-147] describe a Bacillus stearothermophilis CGTase and a Bacillus macerans CGTase, Takano et al. [Takano T, Fukuda M, Monma M, Kobayashi S, Kainuma K and Yamane K; J. Bacteriol. 1986 166 (3) 1118-1122] describe a Bacillus macerans CGTase, Sin et al. [Sin K A, Nakamura A, Kobayashi K, Masaki H and Uozumi T; Appl. Microbiol. Biotechnol. 1991 35 600-605] describe a Bacillus ohbensis CGTase, Nitschke et al. [Nitschke L, Heeger K, Bender H and Schultz G; Appl. Microbiol. Biotechnol. 1990 33 542-546] describe a Bacillus circulans CGTase, Hill et al. [Hill D E, Aldape R and Rozzell J D; Nucleic Acids Res. 1990 18 199] describe a Bacillus licheniformis CGTase, Tomita et al. [Tomita K, Kaneda M, Kawamura K and Nakanishi K; J. Ferm. Bioeng. 1993 75 (2) 89-92] describe a Bacillus autolyticus CGTase, Jamuna et al. [Jamuna R, Saswathi N, Sheela R and Ramakrishna S V; Appl. Biochem. Biotechnol. 1993 43 163-176] describe a Bacillus cereus CGTase, Akimaru et al. [Akimaru K, Yagi T and Yamamoto S; J. Ferm. Bioeng. 1991 71 (5) 322-328] describe a Bacillus coagulans CGTase, Schmid G [Schmid G; New Trends in Cyclodextrins and Derivatives (Duchene D, Ed.), Editions de Sante, Paris, 1991, 25-54] describes a Bacillus firmus CGTase, Abelian et al. [Abelian V A, Adamian M O, Abelian L A A, Balayan A M and Afrikian E K; Biochememistry (Moscow) 1995 60 (6) 665-669] describe a Bacillus halophilus CGTase, and Kato et al. [Kato T and Horikoshi K; J. Jpn. Soc. Starch Sci. 1986 33 (2) 137-143] describe a Bacillus subtilis CGTase.
EP 614971 describes a Brevibacterium CGTase, Haeckel & Bahl [Haeckel K, Bahl H; FEMS Microbiol. Lett. 1989 60 333-338] describe Clostridium thermosulfurogenes CGTase, Podkovyrov & Zeikus [Podkovyrov S M, Zeikus J G; J. Bacteriol. 1992 174 5400-5405] describe a Clostridium thermohydrosulfricum CGTase, JP 7000183 describes a Corynebacterium CGTase, Binder et al. [Binder F, Huber O and Bock A; Gene 1986 47 269-277] describe a Klebsiella pneumoniae CGTase, U.S. Pat. No. 4,317,881 describes a Micrococcus CGTase, and Wind et al. [Wind R D, Liebl W, Buitelaar R M, Penninga D, Spreinat A, Dijkhuizen L, Bahl H; Appl. Environ. Microbiol. 1995 61 (4) 1257-1265] describe Thermoanaerobacterium thermosulfurigenes CGTase.
A CGTase produced by Thermoanaerobacter sp. has been reported by Norman & Jorgensen [Norman B E, Jorgensen S T; Denpun Kagaku 1992 39 99-106, and WO 89/03421], however, its amino acid sequence has never been disclosed. Here we report the nucleotide sequence encoding the Thermoanaerobacter sp. CGTase (presented as SEQ ID:NO 1), as well as its amino acid sequence (presented as SEQ ID:NO 2).
Also, CGTases from thermophilic Actinomycetes have been reported [Abelian V A, Afyan K B, Avakian Z G, Melkumyan A G and Afrikian E G; Biochemistry (Moscow) 1995 60 (10) 1223-1229].
Recently protein engineering has been employed in order to modify certain CGTases to selectively produce more or less of a specific cyclodextrin.
The Structure of CGTases
CGTases are functionally related to .alpha.-amylases. CGTases and .alpha.-amylases both degrade starch by hydrolysis of the .alpha.-(1,4)-glycosidic bonds, but produce virtually exclusively cyclic and linear products, respectively.
Members of the CGTase family possess a high overall amino acid sequence identity, more than 60%. CGTases and .alpha.-amylases share about 30% amino acid sequence identity. However, the active site clefts of CGTases and .alpha.-amylases, located between the A and B domain (Asp229, Glu257 and Asp328), are rather similar.
Recently, the tertiary structures of CGTases were determined. Thus, Hofman et al. [Hofman B E, Bender H, Schultz G E; J. Mol. Biol. 1989 209 793-800] and Klein & Schulz [Klein C, Schulz G E; J. Mol. Biol. 1991 217 737-750] report the tertiary structure of a CGTase derived from Bacillus circulans Strain 8, Kubota et al. [Kubota M, Matsuura Y, Sakai S and Katsube Y; Denpun Kagaku 1991 38 141-146] report the tertiary structure of a CGTase derived from Bacillus stearothermophilus TC-91, Lawson et al. [Lawson C L, van Monifort R, Strokopytov B, Rozeboom H J, Kalk K H, de Vries G E, Penninga D, Dijkhuizen L, and Dijkstra B W; J. Mol. Biol. 1994 236 590-600] report the tertiary structure of a CGTase derived from Bacillus circulans Strain 251, Strokopytov et al. [Strokopytov B, Penninga D, Rozeboom H J, Kalk K H, Dijkhuizen L and Dijkstra B W; Biochemistry 1995 34 2234-2240] report the tertiary structure of a CGTase derived from Bacillus circulans Strain 251, which CGTase has been complexed with acarbose, an effective CGTase inhibitor, and Knegtel et al. [Knegtel R M A, Wind R D, Rozeboom H J, Kalk K H, Buitelaar R M, Dijkhuizen L and Dijkstra B W; J. Mol. Biol. 1996 256 611-622] report the tertiary structure of a CGTase derived from Thermoanaerobacterium thermosulfurigenes.
These and other studies reveal that Bacillus circulans CGTases are composed of five domains. The three-dimensional structures also reveal that the N-terminal domains of CGTases have structural similarities to those of .alpha.-amylases, whereas the C-terminal domains were found to be unique to CGTases.
The catalytic site of CGTases is located in the A domain, and has three catalytic residues (in Bacillus circulans strain 251 these are Asp229, Glu257 and Asp328, respectively, cf. Strokopytov et al. 1995, op cit.). A central amino acid residue is located in the B domain, around which residue the cyclodextrins are formed, i.e. the cyclization axis. Substitution of this central residue, e.g. tyrosine at residue 188 in Bacillus ohbensis (corresponding to position 195, CGTase numbering) in order to increase the relative production of .gamma.-cyclodextrin to .beta.-cyclodextrin has been the object of the study described by Sin et al. [Sin K, Nakamura A, Masaki H, Matsuura Y and Uozumi T; Journal of Biotechnology 1994 32 283-288] and JP-A-5219948.
Nakamura et al. [Nakamura A, Haga K and Yamane K; Biochemistry 1994 33 9929-9936] describe the effects on substrate binding and cyclization characteristics by replacements carried out at four residues in the active center of a Bacillus sp. Strain 1011 CGTase. In these CGTase variants, a phenylalanine at position 183 has been replaced by leucine, a tyrosine at position 195 has been replaced by alanine, phenylalanine, leucine, threonine, valine, and tryptophan, respectively, a phenylalanine at position 259 has been replaced by leucine, and a phenylalanine at position 283 has been replaced by leucine.
Penninga et al. [Penninga D, Strokopytov B, Rozeboom H J, Lawson C L, Dijkstra B W, Bergsma J and Dijkhuizen L; Biochemistry 1995 34 3368-3376] describe the effect on activity and product selectivity of site-directed mutations in tyrosine at position 195 of a Bacillus circulans Strain 251 CGTase. In this publication four CGTase variants have been produced, in which variants the tyrosine at position 195 have been replaced by phenylalanine, tryptophan, leucine and glycine, respectively.
Fujiware et al. [Fujiwara S, Kakihara H, Sakaguchi K and Imanaka T; J. Bacteriol. 1992 174 (22) 7478-7481] describe CGTase variants derived from Bacillus stearothermophilus, in which a tyrosine residue at position 191 (corresponding to position 195 CGTase numbering) has been replaced by phenylalanine, a tryptophan residue at position 254 (corresponding to position 258, CGTase numbering) has been replaced by valine, a phenylalanine at position 255 (corresponding to position 259, CGTase numbering) has been replaced by phenylalanine and isoleucine, respectively, a threonine residue at position 591 (corresponding to position 598, CGTase numbering) has been replaced by phenylalanine, and a tryptophan residue at position 629 (corresponding to position 636, CGTase numbering) has been replaced by phenylalanine.
JP-A-7023781 describes CGTase variants derived from Bacillus sp. 1011, in which a tyrosine residue at position 195 has been replaced by leucine, valine, phenylalanine and isoleucine, respectively.
JP-A-5244945 describes CGTase variants derived from Bacillus stearothermophilus TC-91, in which tyrosine residues at positions 222 and 286 (corresponding to positions 195 and 259, CGTase numbering) have been replaced by phenylalanine in order to increase the relative production of .alpha.-cyclodextrin to .beta.-cyclodextrin.
JP-A-5041985 describes CGTase variants derived from Bacillus sp. #1011, in which histidine at residue 140 in region A, histidine at residue 233 in region B, and histidine at residue 327 in region C, respectively, have been replaced by arginine and asparagine residues, respectively.
EP 630,967 describes CGTase variants in which a tyrosine residue at position 211 of a Bacillus sp. 290-3 CGTase (corresponding to position 195, CGTase numbering), at position 217 of a Bacillus sp. 1-1 CGTase (corresponding to position 195, CGTase numbering), and at position 229 of a Bacillus circulans CGTase (corresponding to position 195, CGTase numbering), have been substituted for tryptophan and serine.
Up to now, all efforts in making CGTase variants have lead to substitutions in the region around the active site, in particular at the central cyclization residue, corresponding to position 195, CGTase numbering. Only few CGTase variants holding substitutions at more distant regions have been suggested, and the manufacture of these variants have not been based on any particular concept.


A laser direct write method used to transfer entire single components such as semiconductor bare dies or surface mount passive and active components on a substrate or inside recess in a substrate for making embedded microelectronics is disclosed. This method laser-machine the pockets, laser-transfer the individual components inside those pockets, and then laser-print the interconnects required to “wire” the components, thus resulting in a fully assembled embedded circuit required to make a fully functional microelectronic system.

The size and weight of small, unobtrusive devices is dominated by discrete electrical components mounted to the internal circuit boards. In these cases, the area on the surfaces of the circuit board is very valuable for adding components but as components are added, the height and mass of the completed circuit must increase. Semiconductors are the basic building blocks used to fabricate the wide variety of electronic systems used in commercial, aerospace and defense applications. Presently, every semiconductor device or combination thereof is first mounted on an independent chip carrier, then wire bonds are attached from the contact pads of the semiconductor bare-die to the leads in the chip carrier, and finally the whole assembly is encapsulated in order to package and protect the delicate bare-die and its wire bonds. The resulting assembly on a printed circuit board is rather bulky compared with the bare-die itself and thus limits the level of miniaturization that can be achieved in a circuit requiring several packaged semiconductor devices and associated passive components. Currently there are no techniques capable of transferring, mounting and interconnecting unpackaged semiconductor devices (bare-dies) onto circuit boards or other types of substrates. Most of the steps required for the manufacture of an electronic circuit on a traditional printed circuit board rely on pick-and-place machinery which is designed to handle the packaged devices and requires their placement on the surface of the board and not inside the substrate. Techniques for embedding passive components such as resistors and capacitors have been developed to address miniaturization goals, albeit partially, since they are not capable of embedding active components. These embedding techniques rely on the addition of thick polymer film compositions on a 2-D geometry, effectively building a laminated circuit board from the bottom up, and requiring subsequent tuning in order to achieve the required resistance or capacitance values. Such approaches are inherently limited as they require development of each individual circuit design, require significant volume for the final circuit design, do not allow the fabrication of truly embedded circuits, reduce the ability to add additional components or modify designs to circuits and are not compatible with active components such as transistors, LED's and integrated circuits.
Microelectronic circuits traditionally are fabricated by placing packaged components, such as integrated circuits and surface-mount devices, on the surface of a circuit board and connecting the components together. As the demand for miniaturization has grown, however, the size of these packaged components has become a limiting factor.
There are various ways to address this limitation; for instance, application-specific integrated circuits, which eliminate the need for individual components. Instead, the entire circuit is fabricated in one fell swoop and then packaged. However, development of these single-chip designs is costly and time-consuming, and once the chips are completed, their designs are very difficult to change.
A better solution to achieving desired component densities is to place unpackaged components, such as unpackaged active semiconductor integrated circuits or bare dies, inside the circuit board. These electronic circuits, comprising the embedded components and their interconnects, promise to advance the miniaturization of electronics manufacturing. Embedding components allows a significant reduction of the weight and volume of a circuit. It also leads to shorter interconnects and reduced parasitic inductance, thereby enhancing electrical performance.
Embedding passive components, such as resistors and capacitors, inside a circuit board is not a new technology. However, embedding active semiconductor components has been demonstrated only in specialized applications because the bare semiconductor die are very fragile and tend to be damaged easily by the robotic systems (called "pick-and-place" tools) that mount the devices on a circuit board. Furthermore, pick-and-place tools are ineffective at handling small (less than 1 mm square) or extremely thin (less than 50 μm thick) die, and they are unsuitable also for high-throughput applications (more than 10 devices per second). Avoiding these limitations requires new approaches to the assembly of embedded bare die.
The use of laser-based transfer processes for the release and assembly of structures or devices was initially studied by Holmes et al. In their work, the authors demonstrated for the first time, (see Holmes et al, J. Microelectromech. Syst., 7, (1998) 416, and Holmes, et al., Proc. 19th Int. Congress Applications of Lasers & Electro-Optics (ICALEO), Dearborn, USA, (2000) p.D-1). Holmes disclosed the use of laser-transfer processes for the batch assembly of MEMS structures. Despite the success obtained with MEMS structures, this group did not attempt the application of this process to the transfer of functional semiconductor bare die. It is important to distinguish the laser-based transfer process from the well established laser lift-off technique, which can be used to release functional bare die devices such as individual GaN pn-diodes without degrading their performance. In laser lift-off, the devices are separated from a bonded structure, due to the laser-induced melting of an intermediate layer. However, in this technique, the devices are never transferred across a gap. More recently, Karlitskaya et al., SPIE Proc. 5448, (2004) 935, proposed a thermal model for the laser-release process of relatively small Si die (200 μm×200 μm). Their model showed that the release threshold is below the thermal damage threshold for the reverse side of the die (<673 K), based on heat diffusion of the absorbed laser pulse through the Si substrate. In their work, the backside of the die was exposed to the laser pulse, thus protecting the front patterned side from damage due to excessive heating. However, the authors did not discuss whether or not the dies were damaged after the transfer. Furthermore, this configuration is not very practical for embedding individual devices, due to the difficulties in establishing the electrical connections to the pads on the patterned side of the die, which end up facing the bottom of the pocket in which the device has been embedded. A better approach is to transfer the die with its patterned or active side facing up, enabling direct-write approaches to print the electrical interconnects to each pad on the die. The challenge, however, is to be able to illuminate the active region of the die with the laser release/transfer pulse without damaging it.

Laser-based technique for the transfer and embedding of electronic components and devices

The United States of America, as represented by the Secretary of the Navy


A magnetomechanical EAS tag having a bias magnet made of a high magnetostrictive material so that stress, which is a result of ordinary use of an article incorporating the tag, demagnetizes the bias rending the EAS tag inactive is provided. In an alternate embodiment a mechanical mechanism is incorporated with a conventional EAS tag to deactivate the tag upon ordinary use of an article to which the tag is associated. In yet another embodiment, a combination of the bias magnet made of a high magnetostrictive material and a mechanical deactivation mechanism is used to deactivate an EAS tag during ordinary use of an article to which the tag is associated.

Not Applicable
Not Applicable
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to deactivatable magnetomechanical markers and labels for electronic article surveillance (EAS) systems, and more particularly to using a mechanical mechanism and a high magnetostrictive material as a deactivatable bias to reduce tag pollution due to magnetomechanical EAS markers.
2. Description of the Related Art
EAS systems are typically used to prevent unauthorized removal of items from a designated area. In a retail environment, EAS labels are attached to articles for sale, and when active, will trigger an alarm if carried through interrogation zones typically located at the store exits. After an authorized sale of an article, store personnel deactivate the attached EAS label so the article can be removed from the store without triggering the EAS system. As used herein, the terms xe2x80x9cmarkersxe2x80x9d, xe2x80x9clabelsxe2x80x9d, and xe2x80x9ctagsxe2x80x9d are used interchangeably and refer to markers, labels, tags, and the like, used to trigger EAS systems.
Presently, many items of merchandise are source tagged. Source tagging is the attachment of EAS labels at the manufacturing or distribution site. Source tagging can result in an increase in a problem known as xe2x80x9ctag pollutionxe2x80x9d. Tag pollution refers to active or partially active labels inadvertently being carried into EAS equipped stores triggering the EAS alarm. When articles are source tagged with EAS labels, some of the tagged merchandise may be shipped to stores that are not equipped with EAS systems. With no EAS system in the store, when these tagged products are legitimately sold the EAS labels are not deactivated. The active EAS labels can trigger EAS alarms when the customer carries or wears an article, having an active label attached, into a store equipped with an EAS system.
Solutions to the tag pollution problem include providing security personnel at the store entrance to appropriately handle inadvertent EAS alarms. For example, EAS labels that alarm the system can be deactivated at the door. This solution can increase personnel costs and inconvenience to the customers. Alternately, the problem can be handled at the distribution point by properly deactivating EAS labels that are attached to products intended for stores without the appropriate EAS equipment. However, this can increase the time and costs associated with distribution. As more and more articles are source tagged with EAS labels, tag pollution will be an increasing problem.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,574,431 (the ""431 patent) discloses a security tag that is deactivatable as a result of stress induced by ordinary use of the article. The ""431 patent is directed to radio frequency (RF) tags, which work in RF EAS systems. RF EAS systems transmit and respond to RF energy in the interrogation zone. RF tags are comprised of a resonant circuit that detectably responds to the RF energy transmitted into the interrogation zone. The ""431 patent is directed to a mechanical stress concentrator that breaks the resonant circuit at a stress concentration point due to the stress caused by ordinary use of the article. The resonant circuit is opened and becomes disabled preventing the circuit from resonating when exposed to the interrogating RF energy. Thus, normal wearing of RF EAS tagged articles deactivates the attached RF EAS tags reducing the tag pollution problem.
Magnetomechanical EAS markers do not contain resonant circuits in an analogous manner to RF tags. A magnetomechanical EAS marker is made of an elongated strip of magnetostrictive ferromagnetic material, the xe2x80x9cresonatorxe2x80x9d, disposed adjacent a hard ferromagnetic element that, when magnetized, magnetically biases the strip and arms it to resonate mechanically at a preselected magnetic resonant frequency. The resonator is captured within a cavity in the marker housing so that it is free to mechanically vibrate. The hard ferromagnetic element, or bias, is a high coercivity biasing magnet that is capable of applying a DC magnetic bias field to the resonator. The bias magnet is positioned adjacent the resonator, but not in direct contact. The marker resonates when subjected to a magnetic interrogation field at a frequency at or near the marker""s resonant frequency. The response of the marker at the marker""s resonant frequency can be detected by EAS receiving equipment, thus providing an electronic marker for use in magnetomechanical EAS systems. Demagnetizing the bias magnet deactivates the marker. U.S. Pat. No. 4,510,489 discloses further information about magnetomechanical EAS systems.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,729,200, (the ""200 patent) the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference, discloses that conventional magnetomechanical EAS markers use amorphous metal alloys such as Metglas 2628CoA, having a composition of Fe32Co18Ni32B13Si5, and Metglas 2826MB, both available from Honeywell AlliedSignal, Inc. Parsippany, N.J., and VC4613 available from Vacuumschmelze GmbH, Grxc3xcner Weg 37, D-63450, Hanau, Germany, and other similar alloys for the active resonator. The bais magnet can be formed from a semi-hard magnetic material, such as SemiVac 90 available from Vacuumschmelze, Hanau, Germany, having a coercivity of around 70 to 80 Oersteds (Oe), and which requires an AC deactivation magnetic field of about 200 Oe. Alternately, a low coercivity material, such as SensorVac, also available from Vacuumschmelze, having a coercivity of about 20 Oe, can be used for the bias magnet, which requires a lower deactivation field that is useful for source tagged articles as described in the ""200 patent. A characteristic of all conventional bias magnet materials is that they are selected to have low magnetostriction so that stress induced by normal handling of the markers, and the articles to which the markers are attached, does not cause deactivation.
A method of deactivating a magnetomechanical EAS marker attached or contained within an article by stress induced by ordinary use of the article is needed.
A first aspect of the present invention is a deactivatable magnetomechanical electronic article surveillance marker with a magnetostrictive resonator adapted to mechanically resonate at a frequency within a preselected detection frequency range provided by an incident magnetic field. A magnetizable bias magnet is disposed adjacent the resonator that, when magnetized, biases the resonator with a magnetic field having a predetermined field strength to arm the resonator to resonate at the frequency. The bias magnet is magnetostrictive and demagnetizable by stress, such that normal use of an article incorporating the marker deactivates the marker. The marker can be incorporated into the article during manufacturing, or subsequent to manufacturing of the article.
The bias magnet can be made of an alloy composition containing a saturation magnetostriction of about 25 to about 50 parts per million (ppm). In one embodiment, the bias magnet is made of an alloy composition containing a saturation magnetostriction of about 50 ppm.
A second aspect of the present invention is a deactivatable magnetomechanical electronic article surveillance marker having a marker housing attachable to an article, a magnetostrictive resonator adapted to mechanically resonate at a frequency within a preselected detection frequency range provided by an incident magnetic field is disposed within the marker housing. A magnetizable bias magnet is disposed adjacent said resonator that, when magnetized, biases said resonator with a magnetic field having a predetermined field strength to arm the resonator to resonate at the frequency. A mechanism as described herein is disposed adjacent the marker housing for compressing the marker housing during ordinary usage of the article to dampen the mechanical resonance of the magnetostrictive resonator.
A mechanical deactivator can be attached to the marker housing and has a moveable member with a free end terminating in a pointed protrusion. The moveable member is adapted to move towards the marker housing forcing the pointed protrusion into the marker housing during ordinary usage of the article to dampen the resonance of the magnetostrictive resonator.
The bias magnet can be magnetostrictive and demagnetizable by stress, wherein normal use of the article incorporating the marker deactivates the marker, so that the marker includes both modes of deactivation.
Objectives, advantages, and applications of the present invention will be made apparent by the following detailed description of embodiments of the invention.

Apparatus for electronic article surveillance tag pollution reduction


A picture frame is provided which has a frame portion and a frictionally retained insert. The frame portion is a single piece of plastic including a recess defined by a raised wall. The raised wall includes a plurality of recess-facing constricting tabs which as a result of their sloped faces increase frictional pressure on the insert as the insert is placed deeper into the recess. The insert is a flat member sized to snugly fit into the recess and to prevent a photograph from unintentionally exiting the recess. Included along the peripheral edge of the insert are a plurality of slots to cooperatively engage the constricting tabs of the frame. The front surface of the frame has an applique placed thereon and is shaped such that a portion of the front surface extends through the applique.

People have been displaying paintings and other pictures for centuries. Typically the paintings were, and still are, placed in a frame and hung on a wall or set on a desk or a table. The frames used in the past range from ornate gilded wood frames to simple metal frames. Photographic pictures have been displayed in both wall-hung frames and in free-standing frames. The free-standing frames used today typically consist of a wood or metal frame having a piece of glass placed therein. The photograph to be displayed is placed in contact with the glass such that the picture side of the photograph is facing the glass. To keep the photograph in the frame, some type of retaining system is normally included with the frame. The retaining system is often a piece of cardboard placed in back of the photograph and held in place by a series of bendable metal clips on the periphery of the frame. After the photograph and the cardboard are placed into the frame, the clips are bent to extend inward from the frame and across the cardboard to form a barrier thereby retaining both the cardboard and the photograph in the frame. In the past, most free-standing photographic frames were maintained in a substantially upright configuration by using a brace connected to the back side of the cardboard retaining member. These braces were often simply triangular tabs of cardboard which could swing out from the cardboard on vertical hinges.
More recently, advances in plastics and plastic production techniques have produced a new industry making plastic frames. Some of the frames produced merely replaced the wood or metal portion of the frames discussed above. On the other hand, others have begun producing single piece, all plastic frames for photographs. The all plastic frames are made by taking a thin sheet of plastic and folding it twice. The resulting frame has a main portion into which the photograph is placed and a base portion which supports the main portion while it supports the main portion. The main portion is generally an inverted U-shaped piece of the plastic having a 180.degree. bend at its top. The photograph is placed from the side into the space between the front and the back section of the plastic. The base is an extension of the front section which is folded under the main portion of the frame producing an angle between the base and the back portion between 90.degree. and about 60.degree.. These types of frames have the drawback that the photographs are not firmly held in the internal space which results in the pictures tending to slide out of the frames.
In light of the above, it is an object of the present invention to provide a frame for displaying a photograph. Further, it is an object of the present invention to provide a picture frame which firmly retains the photograph. Another object of the present invention is to provide a picture frame that is substantially a single piece of plastic which can be injection molded. Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a picture frame having a front surface suitable for accepting the placement of appliques. And yet another object of the present invention is to provide a picture frame which is aesthetically pleasing. Further, an additional object of the present invention is to provide a picture frame which is relatively easy to manufacture and is comparatively economical.


There is provided an etching method in which a protective film existing in an etching-destined region of a substrate structure is removed by means of ICP-RIE to form an exposure region of the principal surface of the substrate. The substrate structure comprises a substrate, a protective film formed on the substrate, a photoresist layer formed on the protective film, and a hole formed throughout the photoresist layer. The hole comprises an opening formed in the photoresist layer surface and a hollow linked to the opening in the thickness direction of the photoresist layer and reaching the protective film. ICP-RIE is performed under conditions such that (1) ICP power is 20 to 100 W, (2) RIE power is 5 to 50 W, and (3) the pressure in the etching chamber is 1 to 100 mTorr.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an etching method that is mainly used in the fabrication of semiconductor devices, a process of fabricating a metal film structure that employs the etching method, and an etching structure that is obtained by the etching method.
2. Description of Related Art
Generally, metal electrodes used in semiconductor devices comprising compound semiconductors are formed by means of the lift-off method.
That is, a photoresist pattern is formed on the principal surface of a substrate having the elements formed thereon. The photoresist pattern has provided therethrough an opening of the same shape as the planar shape of the metal electrode to be formed. Further, a metal of the electrode material is deposited by means of vacuum deposition or the like on all over the surface of the photoresist pattern including the opening. Thereafter, a metal electrode having a predetermined planar shape is residually formed through removal (lift-off) of unused metal film deposited in a region excluding the opening together with the photoresist.
Further, in compound semiconductor devices, a protective film comprising a silicon nitride film or silicon oxide film or the like is frequently formed on the principal surface of the substrate where the elements exist. The protective film serves to protect the elements from contamination and suppress the production of surface charge.
Therefore, when forming a metal electrode in a semiconductor device with a protective film, the protective film is required to be removed.
The process of forming a metal electrode of a conventional commonly known semiconductor device with a protective film will be described hereinbelow with reference to FIGS. 5A to 5E.
First, as shown in FIG. 5A, a substrate 102 having formed on its surface a protective film 100 is prepared.
The structure shown in FIG. 5B is then formed as follows. A photoresist is applied onto the protective film 100. Thereafter, by performing exposure and development, the photoresist layer 104 is removed at its portion where a metal electrode 112 is to be formed. The portion is a planned electrode formation region 102c of the photoresist. As a result, a hole 106 that reaches the protective film 100 is formed in the photoresist layer 104. Here, the opening in the surface of the photoresist layer 104 of the hole 106 is shown by a reference numeral 106a. Further, the planned electrode formation region 102c represents a region with the same planar shape as the opening 106a on the principal surface 102a of the substrate 102.
The structure shown in FIG. 5C is formed next. That is, the exposed portion of the protective film is etched by means of the RIE (reactive ion etching) method with the photoresist layer 104 serving as a mask. By the way, in the etching process, a component of the plasma particles penetrating the interior of the hole 106, flies obliquely toward the principal surface 102a of the substrate 102. Accordingly, the plasma particles strike onto the surface of the protective film 100 over a wider region than the planned electrode formation region 102c. As a result, the protective film 100 is removed through side etching from not only the region corresponding with the planned electrode formation region 102c but also as far as the peripheral region. As a result, within the hole 106, the protective film 100 is removed to form an exposure region 108 via which the principal surface 102a of the substrate 102 is exposed. For the reason provided above, the exposure region 108 has a larger surface area than that of the planned electrode formation region 102c.
Thereafter, the structure shown in FIG. 5D is formed. That is, a metal film 110 is deposited through vacuum deposition over the whole face on the side of the principal surface 102a in a state where the photoresist layer 104 still remains as shown in FIG. 5C. Further, metal atoms that fly from the evaporation source have stronger directivity than the plasma particles mentioned earlier. Accordingly, the metal atoms that penetrate inside the hole 106 after passing through the opening 106a are deposited on a limited region of the exposure region 108. Specifically, metal atoms are not deposited over the whole of the exposure region 108 but are rather deposited in a cross-sectional trapezoidal shape in a slightly wider region than the planned electrode formation region 102c. Here, the metal film that is deposited in the planned electrode formation region 102c is shown by a reference numeral 110a. Further, the metal film that is deposited on the photoresist layer 104 is shown by a reference numeral 110b.
Finally, the metal electrode 112 (metal film 110a) shown in FIG. 5E is obtained. That is, unnecessary portion to the metal film 110b on the photoresist layer 104 is removed by dissolving the photoresist layer 104 by means of an organic solvent or the like.
As shown in FIG. 5E, an uncoated region 114 via which the principal surface 102a of the substrate 102 is exposed exists between the metal electrode 112 and the protective film 100 that surrounds the metal electrode 112. This is because, as shown in FIG. 5C, excessive side etching occurs as a result of etching performed by means of the RIE method and hence the protective film 100 is removed over a wider region (exposure region 108) than the planned electrode formation region 102c.
The uncoated region 114 is not coated by the protective film 100 or metal electrode 112 and is therefore readily contaminated, which causes the production of surface charge.
Hence, a technique that does not allow the uncoated region 114 to be produced, that is, a technique that suppresses side etching of the protective film 100 (FIG. 5C) is desirable.
According to the technique, a porous silica film is changed to a hardly etchable film by exposing the side of the to be etched film comprising the porous silica film by means of hydrogen plasma. A conventional technique for suppressing side etching is known from Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2005-45176 (corresponding to U.S. Patent Application Publication No. US 2005/0017364 A1).
However, the conventional technique necessitates additional hydrogen plasma processing in order to suppress the side etching of the porous silica film. By this reason, the conventional technique has the problem that the number of steps of the etching processing increases.

Etching method, method of fabricating metal film structure, and etching structure


A child-resistant blister package having a tray adapted to receive a blister card with at least one blister compartment is provided. The tray includes a first slide component. A cover having a top and a second slide component is provided. The second slide component is complementary to and slidingly engaged with the first slide component. The second slide component is connected to the top of the cover such that the cover can be slidably displaced relative to the tray between a first position, in which the top of the cover substantially overlies the tray and is adapted to prevent access to the blister card, and a second position, in which the cover is displaced at least partially from the tray such that the blister card is exposed. A tab is connected to the cover, and one of a locking projection and a slot is located on the tab. The other of the slot and the locking projection is located on a first portion of the tray in a complementary location to the locking projection when the cover is in the first position, such that the locking projection is engaged in the slot to limit relative movement of the cover with respect to the tray. One of the tab and the first portion of the tray is movable to a position in which the locking projection is disengaged from the slot to permit movement of the cover to the second position.

The present invention relates to a child-resistant package of the type adapted to receive a blister card, and more particularly, to a child-resistant package which is also easy for adults with limited dexterity to open.
There is a continuing problem in the pharmaceutical industry of providing containers which are both child resistant as well as openable by adults having limited dexterity. Each year, numerous children are injured by the ingestion of pills, tablets and capsules of pharmaceutical products which are not packaged sufficiently to prevent opening by a child.
Many pharmaceutical products, such as pills, tablets, capsules, syringes and other articles, are packaged in blister packs which inhibit contamination and product tampering while providing easy access. Typically, one or more articles are sandwiched between a layer of transparent, translucent, opaque or colored plastic in the form of an outwardly extending cavity or blister, and a second, rupturable or puncturable layer. Force applied to the blister in the plastic layer is transmitted to the article, which ruptures or punctures the puncturable layer for removal of the article by the user. Alternatively, the second layer can be torn off, pulled back, peeled off, or bent and torn off for removal. Although this type of packaging is convenient and is in widespread use, unless this type of packaging is modified to be child proof, the products inside the blister pack are easily accessed by children.
One solution to this problem which has been proposed is to provide a blister pack having several layers of material over the transparent or translucent blister side of the package. The use of several layers of material strengthens the rupturable side of the blister card, making it very difficult or impossible to rupture by merely applying force on the article to force it through the layers of material. Instead, one or more layers must be peeled from the blister portion of the pack leaving a single rupturable layer of material over the blister compartment to be accessed. This single layer is then rupturable by force applied through the blister on the article to be removed. While this provides sufficient protection of the article to prevent access by young children, it often poses a problem for adults lacking the required manual dexterity to remove the separable layers and open the desired blister compartment.
Another known device provides a cover arrangement which is slidably disposed over a tray which contains a blister pack. A resiliently mounted button protrudes through an aperture in the cover and must be pressed downwardly to a position inside the cover at the same time as the user applies force on the tray in order to slide the tray outwardly from the cover and access the blister package. However, this can prove difficult for adult individuals lacking good manual dexterity.


A method and apparatus for integrating queries across different media types so that the response time performance of a customer care agent, such as time to respond and/or time to repair can be uniformly measured are disclosed. The present method can provide configurable time to respond and time to repair targets on a per media type basis or on a per queue basis across all different media types. Individual media type and/or queue thresholds can be set and alarms and notifications can be triggered when customer care agents exceed these thresholds.

Customer care agents may receive input from clients via voice calls, emails, voice mails, and instant messages. Independent of the medium that the clients use to communicate with the customer care agents, the agents must respond to the customers in the shortest amount of time possible. In order to guarantee and track customer inquiry response quality and performance, the customer inquiry response performance of customer care agents must be tracked. There needs to be a consistent way to measure customer care agent response performance across different media types.
Therefore, a need exists for a method and apparatus for integrating customer care inquiries across different media types in a packet network, e.g., a VoIP network.

Method and apparatus for integrating customer care inquiries across different media types


Improved lapping slurries provide for easier and more thorough cleaning of alumina workpieces, as well as inhibit corrosion of the lapping table and provide for easier cleaning of the lapping equipment. The unthickened lapping slurry comprises abrasive grains such as diamond abrasive dispersed in a carrier comprising water, glycerine, and triethanolamine. The thickened lapping slurry comprises abrasive grains such as diamond abrasive dispersed in a carrier comprising water, glycerine, triethanolamine, a water soluble silicate, and acid.

Lapping is a well-known process of abrasion metal-removal or machining for smoothing or polishing surfaces to a high degree of refinement or accuracy using a loose abrasive lapping compound. The lapping compound is often in a liquid suspension or semi-liquid form, and is called lapping slurry.
The present invention arose out of an effort to improve the cleanliness of parts that had been lapped to certain thickness and roughness specifications, and subsequently ultrasonically cleaned. In at least one instance ceramic wafers of alumina substrates that had been ultrasonically cleaned subsequently had metallized microcircuits applied for use as automobile sensors. Because of suspected surface contamination from the lapping operation, the microcircuits were not adhering properly to the contaminated ceramic substrates. Because it was suspected that residual lapping swarf or lapping carrier residue was interfering with the adherence of the microcircuit, efforts were initiated to more completely clean the workpieces after lapping. However, additional cleaning efforts were not entirely successful in eliminating the problem, and it was then determined that some contaminant adhesive was causing the lapping swarf to adhere to the workpieces. It was later determined that the lapping slurry in use at the time was a major contributor to the contamination problem. The slurry in use consisted of water, triethanolamine, 15-25 um diamond, and xanthan gum.
Xanthan gum is a commonly-used thixotropic component that suspends the diamond abrasive until it arrives on the lapping table. Shear forces then thin the slurry allowing the diamond to drop out onto the ceramic parts. It was found that under the shear forces, the xanthan gum formed into balls which were subsequently smeared onto the ceramic surfaces during the lapping process. This smeared gum acted as an adhesive for the particulate removed from the ceramic surfaces, making cleaning very difficult.
The lapping slurry in use also contributed to other operating problems regarding lapping machine cleanup. When machines are cleaned at the end of a work shift, the large cast iron tables are left unprotected overnight. In the morning, surface rusting is quite extensive, requiring cleanup prior to lapping. The presence of rust on the surface of the ceramic wafers is also a reason for rejection. A second problem also involves the xanthan gum lapping slurry. When lapping machines are unused during weekends, the xanthan gum-alumina swarf sets up like a mortar on the lapping table, and this often causes the first set of lapped parts to jam the machine on Monday morning.
In an effort to eliminate the problems described above, various slurry replacements were tried. One of the replacements was a thixotropic corn starch mixture. While this slurry gave acceptable lapping rates, it left intractable deposits on the lapping machine and on the ceramic workpieces.
Another slurry tried was one made of glycerine, triethanolamine, diamond abrasive, and water. This slurry gave excellent lapping times and cleaned up superbly. In addition, this slurry facilitated clean-up of the lapping table. It did not make "mortar" on the lapping table during off shifts. Moreover, residual triethanolamine inhibited surface rusting of the lapping tables. The only problem encountered with this slurry was that it did not suspend the diamond adequately. It was not thixotropic and had to be blended at a low viscosity suitable for lapping. Constant vigorous stirring was required to keep the diamond suspended. Silica gel and other viscosity enhancers proved to be unacceptable.


Compositions comprising glycerol hydroxyalkyl and/or hydroxyalkenyl ethers, which correspond to the general formula:

This invention relates to automatic dishwashing detergents containing polyol hydroxyalkyl ethers and to the use of polyol hydroxyalkyl ethers in rinse agents or detergents, preferably for automatic dishwashing.
Rinse agents are normally mixtures of low-foaming nonionic surfactants, typically fatty alcohol polyethylene/polypropylene glycol ethers, solubilizers (for example cumenesulfonate), organic acids (for example citric acid) and solvents (for example ethanol). The function of these compositions is to influence the interfacial tension of the water in such a way that it is able to drain from the tableware in the form of a thin, coherent film, so that no water droplets, streaks or films remain behind after the subsequent drying step. However, there is a constant demand for improved clear rinse performance. In addition, an increasing number of multifunctional detergent formulations have come onto the market in recent years. Besides a cleaning function, they are also expected to perform at least one additional useful function, for example as rinse agents and/or as water softeners (so-called 2-in-1 or 3-in-1 products). Combined products of dishwashing detergent and "built-in" rinse agent are being increasingly used both in the home and in the institutional sector. In domestic dishwashers, rinse agents are generally added separately before the cleaning process and are released into the tank of the dishwasher after the prerinse and cleaning cycle at 40 to 65° C. With combined dishwasher detergents (for example 2-in-1 or 3-in-1 tablets or powders), the rinse agent is formulated together with the detergents, but is released in such a way that it only develops its effect in the final rinse cycle which makes the detergents easier to handle and dose.
Against the background of these new formulations, there was a need to develop alternative rinse agents which would meet the requirements of multifunctional products without any reduction in their clear rinse performance. The alternative rinse agents would also have to be more efficient.
The problem addressed by the present invention was to provide rinse agents with improved clear rinse performance which, at the same time, could also be formulated as multifunctional products.

Dishwashing detergent containing glycerol hydroxyalkyl ethers

Abstract: in which R1, R2 and R3, independently, represent a hydrogen atom or a saturated or unsaturated, branched or unbranched hydroxyalkyl or hydroxyalkenyl group, or mixtures thereof, each group containing 10 to 22 carbon atoms, and the use of these, particularly, glycerol hydroxyalkyl mono- and di-ethers in detergents and as rinse agents for automatic dish detergents, particularly for multifunctional dish detergents.


An attachment for an auger of a harvesting machine reduces or essentially eliminates residue build-up on the auger of the harvesting machine. The attachment includes a paddle, which is adapted to be secured to the auger between the flighting of the auger, and at least one projecting member which extends from the paddle and projects above the flighting of the auger for breaking up crop residue which tends to build up above the auger. The projecting member is secured to the paddle by at least one fastener, for example a bolt, a screw, or a rivet. Preferably, the projecting member comprises metal, plastic, or polymeric material, such as ultra high molecular weight polyethylene or a high density polyethylene. In one form, the paddle and the projecting member are integrally formed to provide a unitary construction.

The present invention relates to a combine or harvesting machine and, more particularly, to an attachement which is mounted to the auger of the harvesting machine to reduce residue build-up on the auger which inhibits the flow of crop through the harvesting machine.
Conventional corn harvesting machines include a corn-head attachment. The corn-head attachment comprises a plurality of spaced apart row crop dividers. The dividers are arranged in a side-by-side relationship and define crop flow paths through which the crops are conveyed. During harvesting, the crop moves up the dividers along the flow path and the dividers, which are equipped with cutting edges, sever the crop near or at the ground surface. Positioned at the end of each of the flow paths is a converging or corn-head auger, which, together with a series of chains, moves the severed crop towards the central portion of the auger to feed the crops to a feeder housing for further procesing. The crop is fed to the feeder housing from the auger through an opening which tends to create a flow constriction. Under certain conditions, residue, i.e. cornstalks and weeds, collect on the top of the corn-head auger as a result of the contrictive flow path. When excessive build-up occurs, the operator must pause or stop the machine so that the operator can manually remove the residue from the auger. This is extremely time consuming and inefficient.
To resolve this problem, some combines have corn paddles mounted onto the main auger of the corn-head. The corn paddles are mounted to the cylindrical body of the auger and provide a pushing surface to urge the residue through the opening of the feeder housing. The paddles are generally made of rubber and, therefore, are flexible and inflict minimal damage on the crop. Typically, the height of the corn paddles are the same height of the main auger flighting. The flighting on the auger is a thin sheet of metal attached in a spiral fashion to the auger tube. The auger and the corn paddles, however, do not always eliminate the excess residue build-up. Although these paddles have alleviated some of the residue build-up, operators with some frequency are still required to stop the machine and remove residue build-up from the auger. Therefore, there is a need to modify the corn-head auger to eliminate the excessive build-up of residue which blocks the flow of the corn ears to the main feeder house of the combine. Preferably, the auger can be modified with an attachment which can break-up the residue as it collects thereby eliminating the excessive build-up of residue, and yet will inflict minimal damage to the crop.

Attachment for an auger of a harvesting machine