A pressure responsive spring valve which is able to function at high pressures and temperatures, and can attain a high degree of precision control in a minimum of space, as well as an improved high pressure fuel injector for internal combustion engines which uses such a spring valve to achieve the demanding performance characteristics of the more complex new injector designs within limited space requirements. In all cases, a band-like spring valve member is used to reduce the number of parts and the space requirements therefor relative to that required for a coil spring type pressure control valve. Furthermore, whether a split or continuous ring type spring member is used, in accordance with preferred embodiments, by giving the spring member a configuration which is different from that of the circumferential wail of the valve body on which it sits, while producing a matching of their surfaces in the area of the outlet port(s) of the valve member, higher pressures and precision factors are achieved since the spring force of the spring member is concentrated at the port area(s).

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is related to the field of pressure responsive valves, particularly those as used in fuel injectors for internal combustion engines for draining of fuel and timing fluid when predetermined fluid pressures are exceeded, and as is used in other applications where fast, predictable response times and minimum space requirements are prime considerations.
2. Description of Related Art
The competing demands for increased fuel economy and improved pollution control has led internal combustion engine designers to give increased attention to improvements in fuel supply systems, particularly fuel injection systems. However, these efforts have lead to more complex designs and more demanding performance characteristics, and has required the number of components to be increased and the size to be decreased.
For example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,721,247 and 4,986,472 (which are owned by the assignee of this application) address the problem of achieving the high injection pressures (on the order of 30,000 psi and above) required to reduce the levels of hydrocarbons, nitrogen oxides and particulate mass over the entire range of engine operating speeds. Furthermore, to achieve adequately high pressure at low engine speed without excessive pressures being generated at high engine speeds, the fuel injectors of these patents use a coil spring-loaded, pressure responsive valve to drain timing fluid from a timing chamber, that forms an intermediate hydraulic link in an injection plunger assembly, whenever the pressure of the timing fluid exceeds a predetermined value.
While an improvement over then existing fuel injections systems, such fuel injectors do not represent an optimized design, at least in part due to the fact that coil spring type relief valves can be subject to slow response rates resulting in pressure oscillation and valve chatter affects the ability to obtain adequate pressure regulation. Furthermore, due to the relationship between spring rate and springs size inherent in helical coil springs, the use of coil springs for the pressure responsive component of a valve imposes size constraints on the extent to which the size of a fuel injector, or any other device using such a valve, can be reduced. Also, coil springs are subject to spring relaxation which can affect the reliability of the precision pressure control achieved thereby.
Pressure responsive valves have long been known for use in a variety of environments in which a band-like spring element serves as the pressure responsive component for opening or closing a fluid port. In many cases, as shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,708,156 and 4,194,435, the band member is a resiliently stretchable ring that is made of rubber or a rubber-like material and is mounted in tension over an annular surface containing at least one port. When the fluid pressure becomes great enough, it stretches the band so as to uncover the port to permit the outflow of fluid. However, such elastomeric bands cannot be subjected to either high temperatures or high pressure levels, such as those experienced in high pressure fuel injectors.
Pressure responsive control valves using band-like spring elements of metal are also known (see, for example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 233,432; 4,095,617; and 5,014,918). In the case of the air compressor of U.S. Pat. No. 233,432, a band-like ring valve is beveled at each side and is received in a beveled seat which flanks an annular opening in a circumferential wall of a compression cylinder. To allow the ring valve to expand to allow air being compressed to exit the opening, the ring is cut or split; but, to close the annular opening at the split, a joint or cover is attached to the ring, or the ends of the ring are oppositely tapered and made to overlap each other, or a double-ring arrangement, in which the cuts of the rings are on opposite sides, is provided.
In contrast, in the airblast fuel injector for gas turbine fuel injectors Of U.S. Pat. No. 5,014,918, a spring valve in the form of a cantilever reed valve is formed of a partially cylindrical, arcuate band-like member that is machined from tubing stock. The spring valve lies against the inner surface of a cylindrical seat member. One end of the spring member is attached to the seat member by set screws at an area diametrally opposite the fuel outlet port formed in the seat member.
While the band-like valve spring members of the preceding two cases may be suitable for situations in which the pressure of the fluid being regulated is not that great and/or a high degree of precision is not required, such spring members would not be able to meet the demands for precision control that are necessary in high pressure fuel injectors for internal combustion engines that are being designed to have increased fuel economy and improved pollution control characteristics because such high performance injectors require fast response times and must meet minimum space requirements. Furthermore, in comparison to a continuous annular valve spring member, such split valve spring members are more difficult to make and install.

High pressure limiting valve with fast response and fuel injector equipped therewith


A system and method for determining when a position of a throttle is not adequately conforming to a command signal provided by a control module, such that a fault indication should be provided, is disclosed. The system includes a throttle assembly including the throttle, which is configured to generate a position signal indicative of the position of the throttle, and a processor that is coupled to the throttle assembly and is configured to receive the command signal and the position signal. The processor is further configured to determine a first limit that is functionally dependent upon the command signal, the first limit delimiting an acceptable range of throttle positions from a first unacceptable range of throttle positions, and to determine that the position of the throttle is not adequately conforming to the command signal when the position of the throttle as indicated by the position signal is in the first unacceptable range of throttle positions.

The present invention relates to electronically controlled throttles for vehicle engines. In particular, the present invention relates to systems for detecting throttle failures.
A throttle controls the flow of air, or air and fuel, inducted into an internal combustion engine, and thereby controls the power produced by the engine. Engine power defines the speed of the engine or vehicle to which it is attached, under a given load condition, and thus, reliable control of the throttle setting is important.
In prior art mechanical systems, a direct mechanical linkage controlled the throttle, typically in the form of a cable running from the accelerator pedal, operable by the user of the vehicle, to the throttle. Absent tension on the cable from the pedal, the throttle would revert to an idle opening (i.e., a default position) under the influence of a biasing spring. The idle opening provides sufficient inducted air and gas to permit low speed operation of the engine under no- or low-load conditions.
Although mechanical linkages are simple and intuitive, they are not readily adapted to electronic control of an engine such as may be desired in sophisticated emissions reduction systems or for features such as automatic vehicle speed control. For these purposes, the mechanical linkage may be replaced with electrical wiring carrying operator input signals from a position sensor associated with the accelerator pedal to a throttle controller, which in response sends throttle command signals to an electric motor (or other actuator) actuating the throttle. The operator input signals and throttle command signals may be monitored for loss or faults to provide greater reliability to the system.
While electronic control without mechanical linkages allows for a variety of desirable features, the removal of mechanical linkages eliminates the mechanical feedback such linkages provide. Throttle position is no longer physically tied to the operator""s movement of the accelerator pedal. Because throttle operation is critical to vehicle operation, alternate mechanisms must be developed to determine whether a vehicle""s throttle is operating in accordance with the throttle command signals derived from the operator input signals (and also in accordance with other commands provided by computer or other control elements within the vehicle).
Unfortunately, the design of such mechanisms is not simple. In the absence of dynamics, it would be possible to test whether a throttle was operating in accordance with throttle command signals simply by comparing the actual (i.e., measured) throttle position with the commanded throttle position. However, in practice, actual throttle position seldom equals commanded throttle position since there is usually (at least) some minimal error associated with the operation of the electric motor (in actuating the throttle), with the throttle position sensor or with some other element. In particular, the electric motor cannot respond instantaneously to changes in the throttle command signals. Actual throttle position often lags or overshoots changes in commanded throttle position. Therefore, a simple throttle monitoring mechanism that compares actual throttle position directly with commanded throttle position will too frequently find the throttle to be operating improperly.
Moreover, the acceptable, expected differences between actual throttle position and commanded throttle position are not within a constant error band, but rather dynamically change with the operation of the throttle. In particular, as the magnitude and frequency of changes in the throttle command signals increase, the difference between actual throttle position and commanded throttle position becomes even more pronounced. Therefore, a simple throttle monitoring mechanism that compares actual throttle position with the commanded throttle position plus (or minus) a constant error band also will too frequently find the throttle to be improperly operating even though the deviation between the actual throttle position and commanded throttle position is within an acceptable, expected range (unless the error band is made so large as to render the throttle monitoring mechanism overly tolerant).
Given the importance of determining whether a throttle is operating in accordance with throttle command signals, it would be advantageous to develop a throttle monitoring mechanism that accurately determined when the throttle was operating improperly. It would further be advantageous if such a mechanism was capable of determining improper throttle operation and yet at the same time was capable of ignoring expected deviations between actual throttle position and commanded throttle position due to acceptable levels of throttle lag, throttle overshoot and other error.
The present inventor has recognized that, for a throttle monitoring mechanism to both accurately determine improper throttle operation and be tolerant of expected deviations from ideal throttle performance, it would be desirable if the throttle monitoring mechanism was configured to allow for greater deviations between the actual and commanded throttle positions when such greater deviations were expected (i.e., when there were large and/or frequent changes in the throttle command signals), and to allow for only smaller deviations between the actual and commanded throttle positions when only such smaller deviations were expected.
The present invention therefore relates to a throttle error detection system for determining when a position of a throttle is not adequately conforming to a command signal provided by a control module such that a fault indication should be provided. The system includes a throttle assembly including the throttle, which is configured to generate a position signal indicative of the position of the throttle. The system further includes a processor that is coupled to the throttle assembly and is configured to receive the command signal and the position signal. The processor is further configured to determine a first limit that is functionally dependent upon the command signal, where the first limit delimits an acceptable range of throttle positions from a first unacceptable range of throttle positions. The processor determines that the position of the throttle is not adequately conforming to the command signal when the position of the throttle as indicated by the position signal is in the first unacceptable range of throttle positions.
The present invention further relates to, in a vehicle, a method of determining when a position of a throttle is not adequately conforming to a command signal provided by a control module. The method includes receiving the command signal at a processor, and receiving a position signal indicative of the position of the throttle at the processor. The method additionally includes determining at the processor a first limit that is functionally dependent upon the command signal, where the first limit delimits an acceptable range of throttle positions from a first unacceptable range of throttle positions. The method further includes determining that the position of the throttle is not adequately conforming to the command signal when the position of the throttle as indicated by the position signal is in the first unacceptable range of throttle positions.
The present invention additionally relates to, in a vehicle, a system for determining when a position of a throttle is not adequately conforming to a command signal provided by a control module. The system includes a means for calculating a limit that is functionally dependent upon the command signal, where the limit demarcates an acceptable range of throttle positions from an unacceptable range of throttle positions. The system further includes a means for comparing a position signal indicative of the position of the throttle to the first limit, and a means for determining that the position of the throttle is not adequately conforming to the command signal when the position signal goes beyond the limit. The means for calculating the limit adjusts the limit in a direction tending to expand the acceptable range of throttle positions immediately when the command signal, adjusted by an error band, changes to enter the unacceptable range of throttle positions, and adjusts the limit in a direction tending to reduce the acceptable range of throttle positions when the command signal changes to move away from the unacceptable range of throttle positions.

Electronic throttle control algorithm that determines whether a throttle is properly responding to throttle commands


A remote control device having, in one embodiment, a keypad including a time-lock key and another key; means for locking the other key for a time period specified by a user in response to a depression of the time-lock key; and a transmitter for transmitting a channel select signal in response to a depression of the other key when the other key is not locked. In a further embodiment the remote control device has a keypad including a key; a processor for generating electrical signals in response to a depression of the key; a transmitter for transmitting a transmit signal in response to the electrical signals; a low frequency detector for detecting low frequency soundwaves; and an audio signal generator for emitting an audio signal in response to the low frequency soundwaves.

The present invention relates to remote control of a television receiver or the like.
In the United States there are a number of major broadcasting networks, and a number of cable service networks, each of which distributes television programs throughout, or over large portions of, the country. Many viewers tend to associate television programs with the networks that carry such programs, rather than the particular number assigned to the networks in a particular area. In some areas of the country, the viewer has access to, for example, more than 50 television programs. A common problem, therefore, is that with so many channels available, it is difficult for the viewer to remember which channel number corresponds to which network (and thus to the particular television programs the viewer wishes to view). Thus, tuning by channel number, although widely used, may not be desirable for most viewers.
Furthermore, in a hotel/motel environment, the viewer is typically unfamiliar with local channel numbers. Thus, when the viewer wishes to watch a particular television program on a known network, he/she may have difficulty locating the proper local channel number associated with the desired network and television program.
Compounding this problem is the fact that it is common practice among cable television providers within the United States to remodulate broadcast television signals to different channel numbers than those on which they are normally broadcast. Unfortunately, because, for instance, UHF Channel 29 may be remodulated to occupy the space of, for example, VHF Channel 9, this also has the effect of confusing the viewer. Thus, even if the viewer knew that a particular broadcasting network broadcasts on Channel 29, the viewer may still have difficulty locating the particular broadcast network on his/her cable television system.
A common solution to this problem is to distribute channel conversion charts to cable subscribers so that they can locate the proper cable channel number, given a particular broadcast channel number from a printed television schedule. The channel conversion chart may also indicate the broadcasting network or cable network associated with each of the cable channels provided to the viewer. Unfortunately, such channel conversion charts are easy for the viewer to misplace and require that the user shift his or her attention to the chart whenever he or she wants to locate a network.
Efforts have been made by manufacturers to relate channel numbers to network names. For example, as pointed out by Duffield et al., in U.S. Pat. No. 4,959,720, the DRUNDIG Television Receiver, Model No. CUC-2400, displays a station identification label (previously entered by a user) on a television screen whenever a particular channel is selected. Problematically, the user must still remember which channel number is assigned to the particular broadcasting or cable network desired, because channel selection in the system is made by channel number.
A tune-by-label system is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,706,121, issued to Young, however, labels are provided by a broadcaster as part of a television schedule transmitted to an in-home tuner controller. Such a system requires costly and complex circuitry, and furthermore, requires the establishment of infrastructure and bandwidth by broadcasters for the transmission of schedule information.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,959,720, Duffield et al., describe a tuning system that allows a user to enter labels associated with respective channel numbers, and allows the user to subsequently select the channel numbers by entering the associated text label from a key pad. Unfortunately, Duffield et al. require that the user press multiple buttons in order to select a channel, and therefore, while attempting to simplify the selection of channels, in fact increase the complexity.
Another way in which viewers address the above-described problems is by "channel surfing". Channel surfing involves using forward (i.e., up) and/or reverse (i.e., down) channel selection keys that increment or decrement the channel number each time they are depressed. Thus, a user who is unsure of the channel number on which a particular broadcasting or cable network provides programming can simply depress these keys repeatedly until he/she locates the network or programming in which he/she is interested. Problematically, however, the viewer potentially must "surf" through many, i.e., 50 or more, channel numbers to locate a desired network.
Another popular use of channel surfing is for locating a television program to view. In order to locate a television program in this manner, the viewer simply depresses the forward or reverse channel selection key, briefly views the television program provided on the selected channel number, and makes a decision as to whether or not the television program is a television program in which the viewer is interested. In the event the user is not interested in the television program provided on the selected channel number, he/she again depresses the channel selection key in order to increment or decrement the channel number. This process is repeated, sometimes seemingly indefinitely, until the viewer locates a television program in which he/she is interested.
Unfortunately, in the event the viewer is interested in a particular type of television programming, he/she must "surf" through a multiplicity of networks that do not carry the type of programs in which he/she is interested, in order to evaluate television programs on the few broadcasting and/or cable networks providing the type of programming in which he/she is interested. Thus, heretofore, there has been no way for the viewer to channel "surf" through only those channels or broadcasting and/or cable networks providing the type of television programming in which the viewer is interested.
Another problem associated with television programming today is the broadcasting of "mature subject matter", i.e., violence, sex and/or profanity, on various channels or networks. This problem is of particular concern to parents with young children whom the parents feel should not be exposed to such programming. However, so far, there has been no effective way for the parents to "lock out" those channels which air such programming. In addition, there has been no effective way, so far, for parents to prevent or discourage their children from watching such programming when the parents are not at home, or for some other reason, cannot monitor what their children are watching.
Another familiar problem associated with remote control devices is their tendency to be misplaced. Thus far, there is no remote control device which effectively and conveniently guides the user to its location.
The present invention advantageously addresses the above and other needs.

Remote control of a television receiver with locator feature or the like


A valve includes at least one inlet chamber and at least one outlet chamber that can be connected to each other or blocked from each other by means of an actuator. A control chamber is provided for controlling the actuator. The control chamber is divided into a first chamber and a second chamber that are connected to each other.

A valve of the general type under consideration, which may be in the form of, for example, a 2/2-way valve, can be used, for example, for controlling the flow of pressure medium between a pressure medium source and a pressure medium sink. For this purpose, an inlet chamber of the valve is connected via an inlet connection to the pressure medium source and an outlet chamber of the valve is connected via an outlet connection to the pressure medium sink. The valve has a positioning device by which the inlet chamber can be connected to or shut off from the outlet chamber. In the through-flow position the inlet chamber is connected to the outlet chamber and the pressure medium source is therefore connected to the pressure medium sink. In the shut-off position the inlet chamber is disconnected from the outlet chamber and the pressure medium source is therefore disconnected from the pressure medium sink.
The positioning device is usually embodied as a piston. The control of the piston is effected by means of a control chamber, which can be subjected to the pressure medium. The pressure medium can act on the piston via a control face of the piston and thus bring about a movement of the piston. In a configuration of such a valve, which is also referred to as normally closed, the valve is in the shut-off position when the control chamber has been vented. The piston is preloaded by a spring such that the pressure medium cannot flow from the inlet chamber into the outlet chamber. In order to transfer the valve from the shut-off position to the through-flow position, pressurization of the control chamber with the pressure medium is required. During pressurization of the control chamber the pressure medium acts on a control face of the piston, whereby the piston is moved against the force of the spring and therefore opens the path between the inlet chamber and the outlet chamber, so that the pressure medium can flow from the inlet chamber to the outlet chamber.
During pressurization of the control chamber with the pressure medium, the problem can arise that the piston is set into oscillation caused by the activation with the pressure medium, since the piston, in combination with the spring, represents an oscillatory system. This oscillation is undesirable because, firstly, it can cause noise and, secondly, it can even lead to destruction of the valve.


A rubber-reinforcing cord (12) of the present invention includes at least one strand. The strand includes at least one filament bundle and a coating provided to cover at least a portion of a surface of the filament bundle. The coating includes a rubber component including at least one selected from the group consisting of carboxyl-modified nitrile rubber and carboxyl-modified hydrogenated nitrile rubber, an isocyanate compound, a bismaleimide compound, carbon black, and a rubber-modified epoxy resin. In the coating, the content of the isocyanate compound is 10 to 50 parts by mass, the content of the bismaleimide compound is 5 to 25 parts by mass, the content of the carbon black is 2 to 18 parts by mass, and the content of the rubber-modified epoxy resin is 5 to 30 parts by mass, with respect to 100 parts by mass of the rubber component.

A rubber belt or metal chain is used for driving a cam shaft of an internal combustion engine for an automobile, driving an accessory such as an injection pump, and transmitting power in an industrial machine. There has been an increasing interest in energy saving recently, and attention is focused on the use of rubber belts which have high power transmission efficiency, for example, in view of improvement of fuel efficiency and the like. Having higher strength and higher elastic modulus than metal chains, rubber belts also have an advantage of capable of being used even under a high load condition. However, the strength of rubber belts may be decreased by repeated application of stress, and thus rubber belts are limited in use.
A rubber product such as a rubber belt commonly includes matrix rubber and a rubber-reinforcing cord embedded in the matrix rubber. The strength of the rubber belt depends on the strength of the rubber-reinforcing cord. The rubber-reinforcing cord is, therefore, an important member that determines the durable life of the rubber belt.
The rubber-reinforcing cord is commonly formed of reinforcing fibers (a filament bundle including a plurality of filaments) and a coating protecting the surface of the reinforcing fibers. Such a coating can improve the adhesion between the rubber-reinforcing cord and matrix rubber when the rubber-reinforcing cord is embedded in the matrix rubber of a rubber product.
It is conventionally known (see Patent Literature 1, for example) that when matrix rubber is hydrogenated nitrile rubber, a rubber-reinforcing cord including a first coating layer which is a primary coating layer and a second coating layer which is an overcoat layer having contact with the matrix rubber is used in a rubber product including such matrix rubber and a coating including chlorosulfonated polyethylene is used as the second coating layer.

Rubber-reinforcing cord and rubber product including same


The device is a snap buckle with a safety feature--an additional catch which prevents the buckle from being inadvertently disengaged. A male plug, having side catch arms and a central member with an additional catch, forms one part of the device. A female socket having a depressible member forms the other part of the device. To engage, plug and socket are urged together until the side catch arms, and the additional catch on the central member, both engage the socket. To disengage, the depressible member is depressed to disengage the additional catch on the central member, while simultaneously the side catch arms are depressed to disengage them from the socket.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention is in the area of snap buckles, specifically a snap buckle with a safety feature that prevents inadvertent or unwanted release.
2. Description of the Related Art
Snap buckles are known in the art, beginning with U.S. Pat. No. 4,150,464 to Tracy. Variations on this buckle type include U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,569,106 to Lovato; 4,672,725 to Kasai; 4,688,337 to Dillner and Smous; 4,987,661 to Kasai; 5,131,122 to Lovato; 5,291,641 to Morino; and 5,438,737 and 5,459,910, both to Anscher.
All these prior art devices have a male plug member with one or two side catch arms, and a female socket member. When the male plug is inserted into the female socket, the catch arms engage openings in each side of the female socket, locking the male plug and female socket together. Disengagement is effected by pushing in the portions of the catch arms that protrude through the openings in the female socket.
Very few variations on the snap buckle incorporate an additional safety feature to prevent inadvertent or unwanted disengagement of the buckle. The very nature of the snap buckle design makes it easy to disengage, and so an additional safety feature is important in situations where the buckle may be inadvertently disengaged, or where young children may try to disengage the buckle and put themselves at risk of injury. For example, snap buckles are often used to join child restraining straps in grocery carts and strollers. Inadvertent or deliberate disengagement by a young child is inconvenient at best, and at worst can be dangerous.
Two basic approaches have been taken in the prior art to incorporating an additional safety feature into a snap buckle:
The first approach, shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,793,032 to Crowle, 4,825,515 to Wolterstorff, Jr., and 5,774,956 to French and Wigger, employs an additional catch to supplement either one or two side catch arms. The additional catch is incorporated into the male plug member and is accessible directly through an opening in the top of the female socket member. The catch arms and the additional catch are operated on simultaneously to disengage the male plug from the female socket.
A major disadvantage of the above devices, however, is that the additional catch cannot be easily disengaged, even when an adult may want to do so. For example, the additional catches of U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,793,032 and 5,774,956 must be fully depressed into the interior of the female socket to clear the socket and allow disengagement. The top socket opening cannot be made large enough to enable the catch to be easily disengaged by hand, since the catch's size (and thus the opening's size) is limited by the need to provide clearance to depress the side catch arms.
A further disadvantage is that in the engagement process, the additional catch must be depressed to enter the female socket, making engagement more difficult. The additional catch cannot protrude suitably out of the top socket opening (desirable for visibility and intuitiveness of operation), since the further it protrudes, the more difficult it is to engage and disengage the catch.
The additional catch shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,825,515 is also cumbersome to disengage. It is not centrally located on the female socket, making it less visible and less intuitive to operate.
The second approach to incorporating a safety feature into a snap buckle entails blocking the action of the side catch arms, thus preventing disengagement of the buckle. U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,912,950 to Crowle and 5,144,725 to Krauss employ locking assemblies within the female socket, which rotate to block the action of the side catch arms. The sockets of these devices are complex, entail multiple parts, and are difficult to manufacture in one piece. Further, it is difficult to manually unlock the side catch arms--it is best done with a screwdriver or other key-type tool. This is more involved and less intuitive than, say, simply pushing a button to disengage an additional catch body.
Thus it can be seen that a snap buckle with a safety feature that is difficult for a young child to operate simultaneously with the side catch arms, yet easier and more intuitive for an adult to operate than prior art, would be a significant improvement.
Accordingly, several objects and advantages of my invention are:
It is difficult for a small child to comprehend and operate. The button on the top of the female socket must be pushed down at the same time as the side catch arms are pushed in. Moreover, it is easier and more intuitive for an adult to operate than prior art devices. The button which is depressed to disengage the additional catch can be made suitably large--since it is part of the female socket, and not part of the male plug, its size is not as limited by the need to allow clearance for the action of the side catch arms. This aids visibility and intuitiveness of adult operation.
In addition, engagement of the additional catch is automatic--the additional catch need not be depressed to enter the female socket, unlike the aforementioned prior art. Lastly, the female socket can be manufactured in one piece, thereby minimizing manufacturing steps and cost, unlike those prior art devices which use rotating locking assemblies.
Further objects and advantages of my invention will become apparent from a consideration of the drawings and ensuing description.


Described herein is novel isolated or synthetic peptides derived from a complementarity determining region hypervariable domain amino acid sequence of a humanized monoclonal antibody to NaPi2B transporter, as well as derivatives thereof, and a pharmaceutical composition and a method for inhibiting tumor growth or treating a tumor or cancer treating using the antitumor peptides and derivatives thereof.

Worldwide, several carcinomas (cancers) stand out as leading killers, with millions of people dying from cancer every year.
This disease is characterized by the proliferation of abnormal or neoplastic cells derived from a normal tissue, forming a tumor mass, the invasion of adjacent tissues by these abnormal cells, and the generation of malignant cells which eventually spread via the blood or lymphatic system to regional lymph nodes and to distant sites (metastasis). With very few exceptions, metastatic disease from a carcinoma is fatal.
Due to the recurrence rates and side effects of current cancer treatment, there is a great need for new therapeutic agents capable of inhibiting neoplastic cell growth. In this scenario, immunoglobulin (Ig) molecules (both IgM and IgG) have been recently reported as sources of bioactive peptides that may display differential anti-microbial, anti-viral and anti-tumor activities in vitro and in vivo (Polonelli et al. PLoS One. 3(6):e2371, 2008; Magliani et al., Curr Med Chem. 6(18):2305-23, 2009). Such internal distribution of bioactive amino acid sequences parallels that of other peptide sequences expressed in receptors of native immunity (Litman et al., Nat. Rev. Immunol., 5: 866-879, 2005). There is, however, no structural similarity among them. Bioactive peptides with sizes ranging from 10aa to 20aa were obtained from the complementarity determining region (CDR) hypervariable domains, from sequences including framework and CDR amino acids, and even from Ig constant regions. To be tested, synthetic preparations of peptides were used which were generally amidated in the C-terminal amino acid. While bioactivity is generally independent of antibody specificity, CDR3 from VH may share antigen binding properties of the original antibody. This is especially true when the antigen is a peptide sequence and less so when it is a carbohydrate. Heavy chain CDR3 peptides that act as the original antibody are called "microantibodies (=microAbs)".
The conformation of VH CDR3 (H3) peptides was reviewed by Morea et al. (J. Mol. Biol., 275: 269-294, 1998). Unlike the canonical structures of the other five CDRs (H1, H2, L1, L2, L3), the H3 loops have various sizes flanked by C92 and G104 according to Kabat et al. (Sequences of proteins of immunological interest, 5th edition, Public Health Service, N.I.H., Washington, D.C., 1991) numbering in extended sequences of 10 to 22 amino acids.
An example of a bioactive VH CDR3 identified in a monoclonal antibody (mAb) is described hereinafter. Using anti-B16F10 melanoma mAb A4 (Dobroff et al., Hybrid. Hybridomics 21: 321-331, 2002), all six CDRs were tested in the form of synthetic peptides for cytotoxicity. Linear and cyclic extended H3 peptides bound to tumor cells, competed with mAb A4 for binding and they were cytotoxic in cells expressing protocadherin β-13, but not in HL-60 leukemia cells that do not express it (Dobroff et al., Translat. One., 3: 204-217, 2010). The advantage of using microAbs is in their small size making it easy to conduct the structure-function analysis and their accessibility to complex reaction sites.
Internal peptide sequences in immunoglobulins (e.g. monoclonal antibodies) belong to constant and variable regions. The CDRs, or the antigen recognizing sequences, although regarded as hypervariable domains, can be individually shared by different immunoglobulins or antibodies. Such similarity among antibodies can involve all CDRs (one each in a family of Ig molecules) with the exception of VH CDR 3. This CDR tends to be unique for a given antibody in its original C92-G104 sequence.
Mattes et al obtained, in 1987, a monoclonal murine IgG1 named MAb MX35, by immunizing mice with a mixture of four fresh ovarian carcinoma specimens. It showed reactivity with approximately 90% of human ovarian epithelial cancers and a limited number of normal tissues as determined by immunohistochemistry (Mattes et al., Cancer Res. 47: 6741-6750, 1987). MX35 MAb has been shown to also react with lung and renal carcinoma cell lines but not with most other carcinoma cell lines as well as cell lines derived from melanomas, astrocytomas, sarcomas, teratocarcinomas, choriocarcinomas and hematopoietic tumors. It reacted with 5/5 specimens of fresh ovarian carcinoma ascites cells by immunofluorescence, with 3/6 benign cysts and 18/18 solid tissue carcinomas by immunoperoxidase staining of frozen sections (Mattes et al., Cancer Res. 47: 6741-6750, 1987).
Subsequently, the localization and biodistribution of radiolabed murine antibody was studied in patients with ovarian carcinoma in phase I clinical trials. F(ab′) of MAb MX35 has been shown to localize to micrometastatic ovarian carcinoma deposits in the peritoneal cavity (Finstad et al., Clin Cancer Res. 3(8):1433-1442, 1997). MAb MX35 and fragments thereof labeled with alpha-particle-emitting nuclide 211astatine (At-a) showed high efficacy in treating micrometastatic tumor growth in a nude mouse model of human ovarian cancer (Elgqvist et al., J Nucl Med. 46 (11): 1907-15, 2005). Also, the MX35 MAb has shown efficient selective tumor localization in vivo as indicated by PET imaging and histology. It also targeted tumors in patients with ovarian cancer with no severe adverse events reported (Hultborn et al., Cancer Biother Radiopharm 21: 373-381, 2006).
More recently, a humanized version of MX35 (called huMX35 or RebMab200) was obtained and is described in an international patent application filed on Jan. 29, 2009 (PCT/US2009/000576).
Throughout this specification, various scientific publications and patents or published patent applications are referenced. The disclosure of all these publications in their entireties is hereby incorporated by reference into this specification in order to more fully describe the state of the art to which the present subject matter pertains. Citation or identification of any reference in this section or any other part of this application shall not be construed as an admission that such reference is available as prior art herein.

Antitumor peptide derived from a complementarity determining region of a humanized monoclonal antibody to NaPi2B transporter


A distance based method for mobile station registration in a cellular communication system. The mobile station registers whenever it moves into a new cell that is greater than some predefined distance from the previous cell where it registered. Cell base stations transmit corresponding base station location information and a distance value. The mobile station receives the base station location information and computes the distance from a cell in which the mobile station last registered to the current cell in which the mobile station is present. When the computed distance is greater than the distance value associated with the registration cell the mobile station registers. Pages for the mobile station are transmitted within a group of cells within a distance of the registration cell corresponding to the registration cell transmitted distance value.

I. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to communications. More particularly, the present invention relates to a novel and improved method for registration of a mobile communications device in a cellular communications environment.
II. Description of the Related Art
In a cellular communication system registration is the process a mobile station uses to notify a cellular communication system whether it is on the air and which cell it is receiving. The mobile station may be of a cellular radiotelephone or personal communication device typically in the form of a vehicle mounted unit or a hand carried portable unit. For calls that are directed towards a mobile station, the cellular system uses the registration information to reduce the amount of paging by determining whether to page a mobile station and, if so, to determine the set of cells to broadcast the page.
For calls directed to a mobile station, often called mobile terminated calls, the land system must determine whether the mobile station is powered on and the cell that the mobile station is receiving. To find the mobile station, the cellular system broadcasts a message, often called a page, in many cells. If the mobile station responds, the cellular system continues handling the call with further communication being directed to the cell containing the mobile station. It should be further understood that the paging process is used to locate the mobile station for any other transaction to be done with the mobile station.
If the system has no knowledge of the location of the mobile station, then the system must broadcast pages in every sector of every cell. As the amount of mobile terminated traffic increases, the communications resources to support system wide paging quickly becomes enormous in most large metropolitan areas.
A mobile station uses a process called registration to inform the cellular system where the mobile station is located. Several systems, such as AMPS and GSM, use a periodic or counter method to determine the location of the mobile station. The counter method is similar to the timer method described herein. Although these methods are far from ideal, they nevertheless can significantly reduce the amount of required paging.
An analysis of the timer method assumes the uniform hexagonal tessellation of the plane or uniform circular cells with radius r.sub.c. The same expected number of mobile stations, given by N.sub.a, is assumed to be in every cell.
In a cellular system implementing the timer method each mobile station registers every T.sub.r seconds. This requirement can be easily implemented by having the mobile station increment a counter periodically, or increment a counter in response to a global command from the system. By either supplying the maximum value of the counter or varying the increment rate, the system can vary T.sub.r. The average registration message rate, .lambda..sub.reg, per cell is thus given by the following equation: ##EQU1##
For a mobile terminated call, the system needs to determine the set of cells that the mobile station may have entered. If the mobile station can move at some maximum velocity v.sub.m, then the distance that the mobile station could have traveled is v.sub.m (t-t.sub.r) where t.sub.r is the time when the mobile station last registered. Unless the system knows where in the cell the mobile station was located when it registered, the system must assume that the mobile station was on the cell boundary. Unless the system has some direction information, it must assume that the mobile station was moving outward.
For a randomly chosen mobile station, the expected number of cells that must be paged can readily be found. The elapsed time since registration is a uniformly distributed random variable on [0, T.sub.r ]. Rather than considering the exact result which is discontinuous in the distance, more insight can be obtained by considering a quadratic approximation to the number of cells as function of the distance. The expected number of cells that the mobile station must be paged in, M.sub.s, is in accordance with the equation: ##EQU2##
The quantity r.sub.c /v.sub.m is the time that a mobile station moving at velocity v.sub.m takes move from the center of a cell to its boundary. If the excess outbound message rate is defined as the expected number of pages other than the answered page plus the expected number of messages that must be sent to acknowledge registrations, then the excess outbound message rate, .lambda..sub.ex, is determined by the equation: ##EQU3## where: M.sub.p is the number of times that a page message is repeated;
p.sub.p is the probability that the page is answered by the mobile station on a particular page repetition; and PA1 N.sub.a .lambda..sub.m .alpha..sub.t is the origination rate for mobile terminated calls in a cell.
As the interval between registrations, T.sub.r, decreases, the number of cells that must be paged decreases, but the acknowledgement rate increases. Thus some value of T.sub.r minimizes .lambda..sub.ex.
The main problem with the timer method is that paging must be done in area commensurate with the maximum vehicle velocity. If the region has a few routes that allow high velocity, then the system must use the highest velocity route for determining where to page. Portable units, which normally don't move very fast, may nevertheless be in a fast moving vehicle and cannot be counted as a separate class. Techniques which begin paging in a small region and then expand the paging region if the mobile station does not respond can be used to reduce the amount of paging at the expense of delay.
Another registration technique known as the zone method is also used to reduce the amount of paging in the cellular system. The zone method may simply divide the system into regions called zones. Thus, cells are grouped together to form fixed paging zones. Upon registration in a zone the mobile station is paged at all cell within the zone. The mobile station typically maintains a list of zones that it has recently visited. If the mobile station enters a zone not on the list, it then registers. Therefore as the mobile station travels throughout the system, each time it travels into a new zone it registers.
A variation of the basic zone method is described in the article entitled "A New Location Updating Method for Digital Cellular Systems," by Okasaka, Sadaatsu, Onoe, Seizo, Yasuda, Syuji, and Maebara, Akihiro, Proceedings of the 41st IEEE Vehicular Technology Conference, St. Louis, Mo., May 19-22, 1991, pp. 345-350. In this variation of the zone method, layers of zones are created along with the group of mobile stations divided by parameters, such as mobile station serial number, into which layer of zones the mobile station will register.
An analysis of the zone method again assumes the uniform hexagonal tesselation of the plane or uniform circular cells with radius r.sub.c. The same expected number of mobile stations, again given by N.sub.a, is assumed to be in every cell.
As mentioned above, in the zone method every cell in a system is assigned to a specific fixed zone. Every cell broadcasts the zone to which it is assigned. The mobile station keeps a list of zones that it has recently visited. Whenever a mobile station enters a zone not on its list, the mobile station registers and adds the zone to the list.
Vehicular traffic theory can be used to estimate the expected peak registration rate for a perimeter cell. If the cell is dominated by one or two main roadways, the rate is relatively easy to compute; otherwise, the computation can be quite tedious. A well known result is that the maximum capacity per lane of traffic on a well designed freeway is about 2000 vehicles per hour and occurs with vehicles moving about 50 km/hour. Good rule of thumb adjustments have been developed for other roadways. If the fraction of vehicles equipped with cellular telephones is known, then the expected peak registration rate can be obtained. For example, if 25% of the vehicles traveling on an 8 lane freeway were equipped with cellular telephones, then the expected peak registration rate for a perimeter cell would be 0.56 registrations per second.
One shortcoming of the zone method arises in the case of where a heavily travelled route, such as a freeway, intersects a zone boundary. In this instance all mobile stations register in the cells on the zone boundary through which the freeway passes. This situation can place a severe loading on the resources of these particular zone boundary located cell. One attempt to resolve this problem is to create a staggered or layered zone arrangement as mentioned above. In the fixed staggered zone arrangement, overlapping zones are created in which the particular zone a mobile station registers in is also a function of a serial or identification number of the mobile station. Such a scheme adds a further level of complexity and may not adequately distribute registrations amongst the cells.
Although the zone method does provide an improvement over timer or counter registration methods in that there is a reduction in cell pagings, there is still a need to reduce pagings even further.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide in a cellular communication system a method by which mobile station pagings may be reduced.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide in a cellular communication system a mobile station registration scheme which provides an improvement in the distribution of mobile station registrations amongst the cells.

Mobile communications device registration method


A rotating shaft has: a first shaft member that includes a rail member and a first connecting portion which is disposed at the rail member; and a second shaft member that includes a slider which is movably installed to the rail member, a tubular unit which is secured to the slider, and a second connecting portion which is disposed at the tubular unit. The slider includes a plurality of roller type rolling elements. The plurality of roller type rolling elements includes: first roller type rolling elements which roll along a rolling path and when torque in a first direction is inputted, transfer running torque between the slider and the rail member; and second roller type rolling elements which roll along a rolling path and when torque in a second direction, which is opposite of the first direction, is inputted, transfer running torque between the slider and the rail member.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an industrial robot using a parallel link mechanism.
2. Background Art
A known industrial robot using a parallel link mechanism (hereafter called "robot") is disclosed in Japanese Translation of PCT Application No. 2002-532269. This robot has a base unit, which is a support base, a head unit (end effector) including various tools or the like (hereafter called "tool"), and a plurality (three) of arms which respectively connect the base unit to the head unit, and the position and orientation of the head are changed by driving each arm individually in a collaborative manner using a motor installed in the base unit. This robot has a rotating shaft that is separate from the arms and that connects the motor installed in the base unit to the tool, whereby the tool can be rotary-driven by the motor. The rotating shaft is retractable, and both ends thereof are connected to the tool and the motor via a universal joint respectively. Therefore the rotating shaft can transfer the rotary driving force of the motor to the head, while following up the changes of the position and orientation of the head.
In concrete terms, the rotating shaft is configured by a cylindrical outer casing, an inner shaft, and a bushing which is secured inside the outer casing and holds the inner shaft with respect to the outer casing, so that the inner shaft can freely move in the shaft direction. In other words, the rotating shaft can be retractable by the inner shaft and the outer casing relatively displacing in the shaft direction. The inner shaft and the busing are configured by the so-called ball spline. The ball spline includes a spline shaft, a tubular unit in which the spline shaft is inserted, and a plurality of balls which is supported by the tubular unit and exists between the tubular unit and the spline shaft, and the spline shaft and the tubular unit are combined via the balls so that the spline shaft can be relatively displaced with respect to the tubular unit in the shaft direction, and the relative rotation of the spline shaft with respect to the tubular unit is constrained. In other words, in the rotating shaft, the inner shaft is constituted by the spline shaft, and the bushing is constituted by the tubular unit.
The rotating shaft which is applied to the robot according to Japanese Translation of PCT Application No. 2002-532269 has the following problems. In other words, the robot is demanded to operate at high-speed, and the arms and the rotating shaft must be light to implement the high-speed operation. However in the case of the configuration of the rotating shaft using the ball spline described above, each ball existing between the inner shaft (spline shaft) and the bushing (tubular unit) contacts the inner shaft and the bushing as point contacts. Therefore if the diameters of the inner shaft and the bushing are decreased to make the rotating shaft lighter, the contact pressure decreases since the diameter of the ball becomes smaller accordingly, which makes it difficult to transfer a desired running torque. This means that decreasing the size and the weight of the rotating shaft is difficult.
Furthermore, lubricating oil is normally supplied to the balls in order to slide the inner shaft for the bushing smoothly. But if a conventional rotating shaft is used, the inner shaft on which the lubricating oil adheres is exposed outside the outer casing when the rotating shaft is extended, which means that lubricating oil may splash. Therefore it is difficult to use the robot in a cleanroom, or to use the robot in food related application fields.

Rotating shaft and industrial robot employing same


A highly sensitive optical fiber interferometer sensor comprising a laser light source, a [2.times.2] optical fiber coupler to split the beam in two, a differential transducer which converts a signal of interest into optical phase shift in the laser light transmitted through the two optical fibers in the interferometer and a [3.times.3] optical fiber complex which recombines the two beams, producing interference which can be electronically detected. The use of the [3.times.3] coupler permits Passive Homodyne demodulation of the phase-modulated signals provided by the interferometer without feedback control or modulation of the laser itself and without requiring the use of electronics within the interferometer.

Since the first application of an optical fiber interferometer as a means of detecting an acoustical signal, there have been a long series of improvements to the sensitivity, selectivity, and robustness of this fiber-optic sensor strategy. (Bucaro el al, "Fiber optic hydrophone", J. Acoust. Soc. Am 62, 1302 (1977)). This development has resulted in the fabrication of fiber-optic acoustic and vibration sensors which are capable of reaching the phenomenological limitations of this technology imposed by the elastic properties of optical fibers and the unavoidable noise introduced by thermal fluctuations. (Gardner et al, "Fiber optic seismic sensor", Fiber Optic and Laser Sensors V, Proc. Soc. Photo Optical Inst. Eng. (SPIE) 838, 271-278 (1987); Garrett et al, "Multiple axis fiber optic interferometric seismic sensor", U.S. Pat. No. 4,893,930 (Jan. 16, 1990); Danielson et al, "Fiber optic ellipsoidal flextensional hydrophones", J. Lightwave Tech. LT-7(12), 195-2002 (1989); Garrett et al, "Flextensional hydrophones", U.S. Pat. No. 4,951,271 (Aug. 21, 1990); Garrett et al, "A general purpose fiber-optic interferometric hydrophone made of castable epoxy", Fiber Optic and laser Sensors V.III, Proc. Soc. Photo Optical Inst. Eng. (SPIE) 1367, 13-29 (1990); U.S. Pat. No. 4,959,539 (Sept. 25, 1990); Hofler et al, "Thermal noise in a fiber-optic sensor", J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 84(2), 471(1988); J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 87(3), 1363 (1990).) In order to produce a complete fiber-optic interferometric sensing system, one must also provide a light source and an opto-electronic receiver/demodulator, in addition to the sensor.
The receiver/demodulator converts the time varying optical power into a representation (analog or digital) of the original stimulus. The optical power modulations contain the information about the measurand that has been encoded as an optical phase modulation by the interferometric sensor. Ideally, this conversion creates a signal which is linearly proportional to the measurand. This conversion of the optically encoded signal back into a linear representation of the stimulus is by no means trivial. The optical signal may contain frequency components which are hundreds of times higher than those in the measurand signal for large signals which create many interference fringes for each cycle. For small signals which do not create a complete fringe, it may not even contain the fundamental signal frequency of the signal of interest. Furthermore, the demodulator should be able to compensate for fluctuations in the amplitude of the light source and drifts in the polarization of the light within the interferometer and other changes which might effect the interferometric fringe visibility (also known as the modulation depth) and the total optical power received by the demodulator.
The particular choices for these three components of the interferometric sensor system (i.e., the sensor, light source, and demodulator) are not independent. For example, a pseudo-heterodyne demodulation system using a phase generated carrier, requires that the sensing interferometer have an optical path imbalance and that the semiconductor laser diode light source wavelength be modulated, usually as a result of modulation of the current through the laser diode. These interlocked choices also effect the overall system performance. (Dandridge et al, "Homodyne demodulation scheme for fiber optic sensors using phase generated carrier", IEEE J. Quantum Electron. QE-18, 1647 (1982)) For example, a small path length imbalance will require large amplitude current modulation of the diode laser which leads to mode hopping and excess noise. Alternatively, if the path length imbalance is increased in order to reduce the laser diode current modulation requirement, then a laser with a longer coherence length must be used to insure that interference will still take place. Long coherence length laser diodes are expensive. In addition, the interferometer noise is also linearly proportional to the path length mismatch for a given amount of laser phase noise, so increases in the path length mismatch also introduce excess noise. (Dandridge et al, "Phase noise of single-mode diode lasers in interferometric systems", Appl. Phys. Lett. 17, 937 (1981))
The problems associated with the pseudo-heterodyne demodulation and other schemes which require a "carrier" signal and are not limited to the conflicting requirements for the light source, sensor, and demodulator. There are other technological difficulties which also degrade both the utility and the performance of these demodulators. These include system set-up complexity, dynamic range limitations, and scale factor instability. Although a detailed discussion of these problems would be beyond the scope of this disclosure, it is at least worth identifying their common phenomenological root.
The interferometric output, represented by the current, i, generated by the photodetector that receives the optical output of the coupler, can be expressed as the sum of an infinite series of Bessel Functions as shown below, ##EQU1## where .phi..sub.d is the quasi-static phase difference between the electric field vectors in the two legs of the interferometer and .phi..sub.s is the magnitude of the phase modulation, at angular frequency, .omega., which was induced in the sensor by the measurand. Heterodyne demodulation techniques introduce a "carrier signal" which consists of a phase modulation of amplitude .phi..sub.m, and of frequency .omega..sub.m, which must be at least a factor-of-two higher than the highest frequency of interest generated by the measurand. The amplitude of the carrier phase modulation (or operationally, the amplitude of the laser diode current modulation) is usually chosen so that two adjacent Bessel function components in the series, for example J.sub.1 and J.sub.2, or J.sub.2 and J.sub.3, have equal amplitude. The signal of interest then appears as side-bands on the carrier frequency and its harmonics.
These side-bands can then be "stripped" off of the carrier to provide an in-phase and quadrature signal which can be used to reconstruct the measurand by a conventional sine-cosine demodulation process which involves differentiation, cross-multiplication, summing, and integration. The sine-cosine reconstruction algorithm is based on the Pythagorean trigonometric identity, sin .sup.2 .theta.+cos .sup.2 .theta.=1. The differentiation of each of the signals produces an output which is proportional to the time derivative d.theta./dt. The cross-multiplication and summation produces the constant times the derivative, (d.theta./dt) (sin .sup.2 .theta.+cos .sup.2 .theta.). Integration of d.theta./dt with respect to time then recovers the phase modulation signal of interest, .theta..
Although the heterodyne demodulation process described above seems relatively straight-forward to one skilled in the art, there are many practical difficulties in its implementation, some of which are rather subtle. Since the previous process uses only two harmonics of the infinite series of harmonics, the total optical power is not available unless some other means is employed to obtain that parameter. This means that the process cannot compensate for fluctuations in the laser power or the interferometric fringe visibility. This leads to variations in the scale factor which characterizes the circuit's conversion of optical phase in radians to electrical output in volts. There is no way, in principal, to differentiate between a change in demodulator scale factor and a change in the amplitude of the measurement if a calibration signal is not inserted into the system.
Also, in the previous discussion no mention was made of how the chosen pair of Bessel function amplitudes were set equal and how their equality was to be maintained. In the present implementation of the pseudo-heterodyne demodulators (also called "passive homodyne" demodulators), the adjustment of the Bessel function amplitudes and the determination of their orthogonality (i.e. establishment of the "pure" in-phase and quadrature relationship) is done by a skilled technician. This adjustment typically requires the use of a Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) signal analyzer to adjust the Bessel amplitudes and an oscilloscope in the Lissajous mode to determine the orthogonality. Periodic re-adjustments must be made to compensate for drifts in the light source and the interferometer. The scale factor will again be a function of both the Bessel function equality and orthogonality. Though it should be possible in the future to make these adjustments, now done by a skilled technician, using some automatic feed-back control system, this would again add to the complexity and cost of the required circuitry. If it were simple, it would already have been done!
Finally, the use of the phase modulation of the carrier places a limit on the dynamic range of the heterodyne demodulator. As stated before, large signals create frequency components which can be higher harmonics of the signal of interest. Since the frequency spacing of the carrier frequency harmonics is .omega..sub.m the demodulation algorithm fails when the signal of interest contains frequency components which are greater than or equal to .omega..sub.m /2 because the lower side-bands of the upper carrier would become indistinguishable from the upper side-bands of the lower carrier. One cannot arbitrarily increase .omega..sub.m in order to increase the dynamic range since thermal time constants of the laser diodes restrict current induced wavelength modulation frequencies to about 100 Khz. Due to this dynamic range limitation, most of the heterodyne fiber optic sensor demodulators have been restricted to low phase rates and hence have had to produce acceptable dynamic ranges (.apprxeq.120 dB) by being able to detect very low amplitude phase modulations (.apprxeq.1-10 .mu.rad/.sqroot.Hz).
From the previous discussion of the sine-cosine demodulation process, it should be apparent that two signals (i.e. in-phase and quadrature) which contain the phase information are required to reconstruct the measurand. In the heterodyne demodulator, this was accomplished by using the side-bands of two carrier harmonics. Another approach which has been used to produce the in-phase and quadrature signals is an interferometer that employs a [3.times.3] coupler as the output coupler. (A. Dandridge, "Fiber optic sensors based on the Mach-Zender and Michelson interferometers", in Fiber Optic Sensors: An Introduction for Engineers and Scientists, Eric Udd, editor (Wiley-Interscience, 1991), Chap. 10) Due to energy conservation, the outputs of a [2.times.2] coupler are 180.degree. out-of-phase. When one of the [2.times.2] outputs is at its maximum, the other must be a minimum, since the total optical power out of the coupler, which is a passive device, must be constant for a constant input power. In an ideal, symmetric (i.e. equal split ratio) [3.times.3] coupler, the outputs have a relative phase difference of 120.degree..
In the previous attempts to produce a demodulator using the outputs of a [3.times.3] coupler, two of these three outputs were combined in order to produce the in-phase and quadrature signals which would then be processed by the sine-cosine demodulation algorithm described in the previous sub-section. (K. P. Koo, A. B. Tveten, and A. Dandridge, "Passive Stabilization Scheme for Fiber Interferometry Using (3.times.3) Fiber Directional Couplers, Appl. Phys. Lett. 41, 616 (1982)) If we represent two of the three outputs from the [3.times.3] coupler, I.sub.2, and I.sub.3, as shown below, EQU I.sub.2 =B.sub.1 +B.sub.2 cos .DELTA..phi.+B.sub.3 sin .DELTA..phi.(2) EQU I.sub.3 =B.sub.1 +B.sub.2 cos .DELTA..phi.-B.sub.3 sin .DELTA..phi.(3)
then by forming their sum and difference, EQU I.sub.2 +I.sub.3 =2B.sub.1 +2B.sub.2 cos .DELTA..phi. and I.sub.2 -I.sub.3 =2B.sub.3 sin .DELTA..phi. (4)
the in-phase (cos .DELTA..phi.) and quadrature (sin .DELTA..phi.) signals can be obtained after gain adjustment and offset subtraction.
Although the use of the [3.times.3] coupler to produce the in-phase and quadrature signal eliminates the problems of the heterodyne approach such as light source wavelength modulation, the required optical path imbalance, Bessel function balance and orthogonality, and the intrinsic dynamic range limitations, the [3.times.3] homodyne demodulation using only two of the three outputs to produce inputs for the sine-cosine algorithm has its own limitations. Again, the total power is not available, since only two of the outputs were utilized, hence no compensation is included for light source power variations or changes in fringe visibility. The lack of symmetry in the demodulation process also reduces the robustness of the algorithm against fluctuations in the split ratio, which is assumed to be equal for each of the three outputs.
It is within this context, and in response to the recent availability of [3.times.3] with good environmental stability and polarization insensitivity, that the new "Symmetric Demodulator for Optical Fiber Interferometers with [3.times.3] Outputs" was developed. (Davis et al, "Characterization of 3.times.3 Fiber Couplers for Passive Homodyne Systems: Polarization and Temperature Sensitivity", paper WQ2, Proc. Optical Fiber Communications Conference, Houston, Tex., Feb. 6-9, 1989)

Demodulators for optical fiber interferometers with [3.times.3] outputs


The present invention relates to a quad flat non-leaded package comprising: a lead frame, a semiconductor chip, a plurality of connecting wires and a molding compound. The lead frame has a plurality of leads, a die pad, a plurality of supporting bars and an external ring. The external ring is disposed around the die pad and is in contact with the semiconductor chip so as to increase the supporting to the semiconductor chip. The area of the semiconductor chip is larger than that of the die pad, and the semiconductor chip is attached to the die pad through its active surface. The molding compound encapsulates the lead frame, semiconductor chip and connecting wires, wherein part of the leads of the lead frame is exposed to the outside of the molding compound so as to be electrically connected to an external device.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a semiconductor package, and more particularly, to a quad flat non-leaded package.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIG. 1 shows a cross sectional view of a conventional quad flat non-leaded package. The conventional quad flat non-leaded package 10 comprises a lead frame 11, a semiconductor chip 12, a plurality of bonding wires 13 and a molding compound 14.
The lead frame 11 has a plurality of leads 111, a die pad 112 and a plurality of supporting bars (not shown). The die pad 112 has a top surface 1121 and a bottom surface 1122 being opposite to the top surface 1121. The supporting bars are used for supporting the die pad 112. The leads 111 are disposed at the periphery of the die pad 112. In order to facilitate wire bonding, prevent introduction of moisture into the molded package and enhance the engagement between the leads 111 and the molding compound 14, each of the leads 111 is designed to be in a stepped configuration. Thus, each of the leads 111 comprises a top surface 1111, a bottom surface 1112 and a relative thin bonding area 1113, wherein the bottom surface 1112 of the leads 111 and the bottom surface 1122 of the die pad 112 are on the same plane, and the top surfaces 1111 of the leads 111 and the top surfaces of the die pads 112 and the supporting bars are on the same plane. The bonding area 1113 is used for wire bonding by the bonding wire 13.
The semiconductor chip 12 has an active surface 121 and a back surface 122 being opposite to the active surface 121, wherein the active surface 121 has a plurality of bonding pads 123 thereon. The area of the semiconductor chip 12 is larger than that of the die pad 112 and therefore, after the active surface 121 is attached onto the top surface 1121 of the die pad 112 by utilizing an adhesive material 15 with high thermal conductivity, the bonding pads 123 are exposed.
The bonding wires 13, for example, gold wires or aluminum, are used for electrically coupling the bonding pads 123 to the bonding areas 1113 of the leads 111.
The molding compound 14 encapsulates the lead frame 11, the semiconductor chip 12 and the bonding wires 13, wherein the bottom surfaces 1112 and side surfaces of the leads 111 of the lead frame 11 are exposed to the outside of the molding compound 14 so as to be electrically connected to an external device. Additionally, the bottom surface 1122 of the die pad 112 is also exposed to the outside of the molding compound 14 so as to increase heat-dissipating efficiency.
A shortcoming of the conventional quad flat non-leaded package 10 is that when the semiconductor chip 12 becomes larger, the supporting area of the die pad 112 to the semiconductor chip 12 is not large enough to support the semiconductor chip 12. Therefore, the circumference of the active surface 121 of the semiconductor chip 12 is suspended. As a result, the semiconductor chip 12 may break or shift during wire bonding procedure, which causes packaging failure.
Consequently, there is an existing need for a novel and improved quad flat non-leaded package to solve the above-mentioned problem.

Advanced Semiconductor Engineering, Inc.


A method for patient monitoring includes receiving one or more first patient parameters from at least one medical device. The method further includes transforming the one or more first patient parameters into one or more gauge display parameters. The method further includes generating data operable to display the one or more gauge display parameters individually in a particular portion of a display device. The one or more gauge display parameters include at least a historical range and a current value within the historical range. The method further includes analyzing one or more second patient parameters to adjust the one or more gauge display parameters.

When monitoring a patient, a medical device may collect and display information about that patient. The medical device may collect information through one or more of a variety of ways, such as a patient interface that measures a physiological condition, or a user interface that collects information input by a user. One may rely on this information to assess and treat the health of the patient.

System, method, and software for displaying parameter values with historical ranges


Timing based servo bursts of servo frames, in which the frames are arranged to be symmetric with the same number of servo stripes in each burst of a frame, are synchronized by shifting selected bits. For example, servo frames are arranged with four servo bursts with an equal number of servo stripes in each burst, the servo frames comprising two symmetric sub-frames, each sub-frame comprising two bursts of servo stripes that are parallel to each other within a burst, and the bursts are non-parallel with respect to each other; each servo burst is arranged to comprise at least one reference servo stripe; and each servo burst is arranged to comprise at least one shifted servo stripe, wherein the shift is in the same longitudinal direction with respect to at least one reference servo stripe for each burst of a frame and the opposite longitudinal direction for bursts of sequentially adjacent frames.

Timing based servo arrangements are employed with respect to linear tape media, for example, in magnetic tape systems, to provide track following capability. Recorded servo patterns comprise dual magnetic transitions called "servo stripes" arranged as pairs recorded at more than one azimuthal orientation across the tape media. The technology is discussed in the incorporated U.S. Pat. No. 5,689,384. Reading a servo pattern by a servo read head yields a sequence of pulses called "dibits", where each dibit corresponds to the transitions at both edges of a servo stripe written on the magnetic medium. The timing between dibits that correspond to any pair of servo stripes with different azimuthal orientation thus varies continuously as the servo read head is moved in the lateral direction across the servo band. The pattern is read by a servo read head whose width is small compared to the servo band pattern, and servo head position is derived from the relative timing of pulses generated by the servo head reading the servo pattern as the tape is moved in the longitudinal direction. Position sensing with this system is achieved by deriving a ratio of two servo pattern intervals, one pattern interval comprising the timing between dibits corresponding to a pair of servo stripes having different azimuthal orientation, and the other pattern interval comprising the timing between dibits corresponding to a pair of servo stripes having the same azimuthal orientation. Thus, the position sensing is ratio dependent and is insensitive to tape speed.
A typical way to determine which servo stripe is being read is to arrange the servo stripes into servo frames, each frame having two sub-frames, each with two bursts of servo stripes arranged in patterns with different azimuthal orientations. A pattern interval between dibits in the servo signal is provided for servo stripes within a sub-frame, and another pattern interval is between sub-frames. Typically, frames and sub-frames are distinguished by having a different number of servo stripes in the bursts of one sub-frame as compared to the other sub-frame. As one example, the frames and sub-frames are easily distinguished by observing the counts of servo stripes in each burst, such as 5, 5, 4, 4, within a frame, the 5, 5 count bursts comprising one sub-frame, and the 4, 4 count bursts comprising the other sub-frame.
A drawback of asymmetric numbers of servo stripes in each frame is that the extra servo stripes result in longer frames, reducing the rate of generation of lateral position estimates from the servo signals, as the lateral position estimates are generated on a frame by frame basis.

Synchronization of symmetric timing based servo bursts

International Business Machines Corporation


A solid-state semiconductor light emitting device is disclosed. A heat sink that comprises a receiving cup for receiving a chip is provided. A leadframe that comprises a connection base is mounted above the heat sink, wherein the chip is connected to the leadframe via a metal wire and a resin or silicone is applied to cover all of them so as to form the a light emitting device that emits light. In the leadframe, two holders that include two top sides on their two top portions are opposite to one another, and a holder having holes is mounted between these two top sides. The holder having the holes is connected to one of these two opposite holders. A plastic material is applied to mold the three holders into the connection base for receiving the receiving cup of the heat sink. As a result, the heat sink provides with good heat-dissipating efficacy and each holder of the leadframe also provides with heat-dissipating efficacy and enhances connection stability as well.

In general, photometric efficiency of an LED is inversely proportional to the junction temperature of the LED. A major concern of the LED package designer is keeping the die cool to be lower than the junction temperature. In the conventional LED, the chip is mounted at the base of a concave cup (i.e. optical cavity) of one conducting wire and connected to another conducting wire via a connection wire. Accordingly, the packaged die will be damaged easily as a result of thermal stress.
In view of above conventional drawbacks, U.S. Pat. No. 6,274,924 entitled "surface mountable led package" discloses a structure, as shown in FIG. 1. In this structure, a heat sink 10 includes an optional reflective cup 14. The insert-molded leadframe 12 is a filled plastic material molded around a metal frame that provides an electrical path. The light emitting diode die 16 is mounted indirectly via a heat-conducting subbracket 18 to the heat sink 10. Connection wires extend from the LED 16 and the heat-conducting subbracket 18 to metal wires on leadframe 12 that are electrically and thermally isolated from the heat sink 10. An optical lens 20 may be added by mounting a pre-molded thermoplastic lens and an encapsulant or by casting epoxy to cover the LED.
Although the above structure can separate electricity and heat from one another to prevent the die from heat, its composition is very complicated. Accordingly, the present inventor has been made diligent studies with a quiet mind to design and fabricate a solid-state semiconductor light emitting device that provides with simplified composition in which electricity and heat are not separated from one another. The heat-dissipating area is increased by means of a plurality of holders of a leadframe in addition to the use of the heat sink for dissipating heat. Holders are also applied to enhance connection stability between the solid-state semiconductor light emitting device and a circuit board. This solid-state semiconductor light emitting device is provided for the public in accordance with motivations of the present invention.

Solid-state semiconductor light emitting device


Liquid aerosol formulations for generating aerosolized insulin include insulin and at least one high volatility carrier which protects the insulin from thermal degradation during vaporization of the carrier. The carrier can be a mixture of ethanol and water and the liquid aerosol formulation can be propellant free. An aerosol generating device generates the aerosolized insulin by passing the liquid aerosol formulation through a flow passage heated to convert the liquid into a vapor which entrains insulin particles which mix with air to form an aerosol. The insulin particles can be dry insulin particles produced by a hand held inhaler. By controlling the concentration of the insulin in the formulation, the size of the flow passage and/or the amount of heat which heats the flow passage, the aerosol can be provided with a selected mass median aerodynamic diameter of 1 to 3 μm or less than 1 μm so as to be delivered to a targeted portion of the lung using the inhaler.

Diabetes mellitus affects a significant portion of the world's population. Symptoms of diabetes include hyperglycemia and reduced production or release of insulin. Type I diabetes is a condition in which the pancreas has stopped producing insulin, a condition which often begins in childhood. Type II diabetes is the most common type of diabetes characterized by diminished insulin secretion and slower response to insulin by the diabetic's tissues. Type I diabetes is known as juvenile onset diabetes and Type II diabetes is known as adult onset diabetes.
As a result of diminished response to or low levels of insulin, blood glucose levels become chronically high and the normal body chemistry is altered which can lead to failure of the microvascular system in many organs. Diabetes can cause blindness, amputations and kidney failure. Moreover, medical treatment of side effects of diabetes leads to lost productivity in the workplace.
Aerosols are gaseous suspensions of fine solid or liquid particles. Medicated aerosols are useful in the treatment of respiratory or systemic ailments wherein the aerosols are produced by an aerosol generator and inhaled into a patient's lungs for local or systemic absorption.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Liquid aerosol formulations containing insulin and aerosol generating devices and methods for generating aerosolized insulin


The present disclosure provides a method and system for realizing interaction in augmented reality. The method includes: collecting a frame image and uploads the frame image; recognizing a template image that matches the frame image and returning the template image; detecting a marker area of the frame image according to the template image; and superposing media data corresponding to the template image on the marker area and displaying the superposed image.

An augmented reality technology is a simulation technology of applying virtual information to the real world, and superposes an image of a real environment and a virtual environment in a same frame in real time. All kinds of applications that use the augmented reality technology can make a user fitted into a virtual environment. A traditional interaction process in the augmented reality technology can be realized by all kinds of clients running on terminal devices.
For example, take a poster as a marker. An image of the marker is captured by using a camera and is used for recognition to get a recognition result. According to the recognition result, a movie trailer related to the content of this specific poster is got and is played. Since logic involved for recognition during the interaction process of the augmented reality technology is very complex and includes all kinds of files, which results in that the size of a client is over large, so in interaction applications of the augmented reality technology realized by all kinds of clients, each kind of interaction application can only correspond to a single marker and is realized by a corresponding client. In another word, each client can only correspond to a kind of marker, and for different markers, corresponding clients need to be developed specifically, and a single client is unable to realize the interaction process of the augmented reality technology for multiple kinds of markers, which results in that a user has to download and install multiple clients repeatedly and lacks of flexibility.
Furthermore, traditional interaction in the augmented reality technology may also be realized by a mainframe computer connected to a big screen set up indoors or outdoors. For example, when a shampoo commercial is being played on an outdoor big screen, if a viewer stands in a certain area before the big screen, a video of the viewer learning dance with a virtual famous people or taking a picture with the famous people will be played on the big screen; as another example, when an indoor big screen commercial is launched in a museum, if a viewer stands in a specified area, he may see a video of dinosaurs or astronauts passing by him on the indoor big screen. Though compared to a client running on a terminal device, a mainframe computer connected to an indoor or outdoor big screen has relatively strong backstage calculation abilities and can process complex logic in the interaction process of the augmented reality technologies, the interaction in the augmented reality technology realized by a big screen and a mainframe connected thereto, due to limitations of its use, also aims to a single marker and lacks of flexibility.

Augmented reality interaction implementation method and system

Tencent Technology (Shenzhen) Company Limited


A driving circuit of a liquid crystal display is provided. The driving circuit comprises: a plurality of gate drivers for selectively driving a plurality of thin film transistors of the liquid crystal display; a plurality of source drivers for receiving an image signal, the plurality of source drivers cooperating with the plurality of gate drivers to display an image on the liquid crystal display, each of the plurality of source drivers further comprising an adjustable common voltage generating circuit, each the adjustable common voltage generating circuit compensating, a common voltage output from each the adjustable common voltage generating circuit to make each the common voltage output from each the adjustable common voltage generating circuit the same or to make each the common voltage output to an ITO layer of a panel of the liquid crystal display the same, based on a common voltage adjustable data and a clock signal; and a timing sequence controller for providing a control signal and a data flow to the plurality of gate drivers and the plurality of source drivers and providing the common voltage adjustable data to each the adjustable common voltage generating circuit.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention generally relates to a driving circuit of a liquid crystal display (LCD), and more particularly to a driving circuit capable of providing a uniform common voltage distribution.
2. Description of Related Art
Recently, as the image display technology advances, a significant number of the traditional CRT monitors has been replaced by the flat panel displays. Among the flat panel displays, the thin-film transistor liquid crystal display (TFT-LCD) is most popular. In addition, the flat panel display using the light-emitting diodes or plasma has also become more popular than ever.
The display part of the flat panel display comprises a pixel array. The pixel array generally is a row-column matrix. The pixels are controlled by the drivers. The drivers drive the corresponding pixels according to rasterized image data, and the pixels will display the designated colors at prescribed time.
The LCD panel comprises an ITO layer. The ITO layer is connected to the common voltage. As the size of the TFT-LCD panel increases, the length of the layout of the common voltage becomes longer. Hence, the uniformity of the common voltage distribution on the ITO layer becomes worse. This non-uniformity of the common voltage distribution can be solved by reducing the resistance of the ITO layer. Additionally, improvement of the common voltage supply and response can further improve the flicker, and improvement of the panel and driver layout can improve the uniformity of the common voltage distribution. However the common voltage drop cannot be compensated effectively due to its inherent structure.
FIG. 1 is a traditional common voltage wire layout and the voltage adjustment circuit. Referring to FIG. 1, the common voltage Vcom is obtained by dividing the power supply VDD by the adjustable resistor 18a and amplified by the OP buffer 18b to drive the load on the entire panel 12. The fine tuning of the above voltage divider can be implemented by the mechanical trimmer of the resistor. Because the best common voltage for each panel would be slightly different, before the panel is shipped out of factory, the common voltage adjustment is necessary. The trimmer 18c is generally disposed on one end of the driving circuit board 14 as shown in FIG. 1. The OP buffer 18b and the resistor trimmer 18a/18c are disposed on the other end of the driving circuit board 14 and the panel 12. The common voltage wire 16 on the glass substrate of the TFT-LCD is coupled to the buffer 18b via the driving circuit board 14 from the source driver side.
Under this structure, the output voltage of the buffer 18b will be sent to every points (e.g., points A, B, and C) on the panel 12 via the common voltage wire 16. The fixed common voltage Vcom will drop for example from point A to point C due to the common voltage wire 16 and the panel 12 so that the common voltage distribution on the panel 12 is non-uniform.
Therefore, how to enhance the display quality and improve the uniformity of the common voltage distribution is very important. Due to the traditional circuit characteristics, the voltage drop of the common voltage Vcom cannot be improved effectively. How to modify the common voltage wire and circuit becomes an important issue.

Driving circuit of liquid crystal display


In one aspect of the invention, a cone crusher has at least one crushing surface disposed on either a cone and/or an inverted bowl of the crusher. The crushing surface has at least one insert having an impact head with a stem protruding from a base end of the head. The stem has a smaller cross sectional thickness than the head.

Replaceable wear liners are often incorporated into cone crushers to form the crushing surfaces used to crush various materials. Cone crushers typically comprise of an assembly that rotates about a stationary shaft resulting in a gyratory motion which is harnessed to crush material as it traverses between crushing surfaces in the crushing chamber where the replaceable wear liners are located. Material to be crushed is effectively reduced into smaller dimensions as a result of being subjected to compression between the tapered crushing surfaces of the crushing chamber. The reduced material then exits from a gap between the crushing surfaces sometimes called the "closed side setting" where the minimum width of the reduced material is predetermined by manipulating the closed side setting in accordance with the desired geometry of the reduced material. The final product consists of material that possesses the desired geometry or ratio of length to width to thickness for various applications such as road surfacing, paving, landscaping and so forth.
Over time the replaceable wear liner may begin to deteriorate such that the space between the crushing surfaces become distorted which consequently reduces the crushers ability to produce the desired geometry resulting in irregular or substandard final product material. Substandard product may require that the replaceable wear liner be serviced or replaced. Consequently, the time required to properly address wear issues equates to significant economic loss both in terms of maintenance and production loss.
In the prior art, U.S Pat. Nos. 5,967,431 and 6,123,279 as well as U.S Patent Publication Nos. 2003/0136865, 2008/0041994 and 2008/0041995 are herein incorporated by reference for all that they contain which disclose cone crushers that may be compatible with the present invention. U.S Patent Publication No. 2008/0041992 and No. 2008/0041993 are also incorporated by reference for all that they contain.