A cleavage creating and/or enhancing brassiere which in the preferred embodiment uses a pair of support straps with hook-and-loop-type fasteners to pull the breasts together and create and/or enhance a cleavage line. Each of the support straps has two ends, one end being fixed to a breast pocket and the other being adjustably connected to the opposite breast pocket. The support straps can be configured so that they may be fastened horizontally or in a criss-cross manner. The brassiere may further comprise a pair of breast-lifting and directing pads inserted into a respective breast pocket, or alternatively may be used in lieu of the support straps.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to cleavage enhancing brassieres, and more particularly to a cleavage enhancing brassiere which uses support straps with hook-and-loop-type fasteners or other fasteners to pull the breasts together to enhance the cleavage line.
2. Description of Related Art
For many years women have been looking for a brassiere which is flattering to their figure and gives the illusion of enlarged breast size. The best way to obtain these results is to create and/or enhance the cleavage line. The current method of creating and/or enhancing the cleavage line is by using a specially designed brassiere to simply lift the breasts. However, this method has had limited success because in order for this method to be successful in accomplishing its goal the woman must be fairly well endowed.
For those women for whom the current cleavage creating and/or enhancing method does not work, there is a need for a brassiere which creates and/or enhances the cleavage line by pulling the breasts toward one another in a horizontal and/or upward manner. The brassiere must be capable of creating and/or enhancing the cleavage line while keeping its structure concealed from an observer, even when wearing a blouse or a dress. The cleavage creating and/or enhancing brassiere must also be capable of being made in a wide variety of styles and sizes.
The following patents describe brassieres or bosom-pads which are either flattering to the figure or give the illusion of enlarged breast size. U.S. Pat. No. 599,180, issued on Feb. 15, 1898, to Dora Harrison describes a bosom-pad that can be inflated to enhance the appearance of size of the breasts which allows adjustment of the distance between the breast cups according to the location of the natural breasts of the wearer. U.S. Pat. No. 1,655,224, issued on Jan. 3, 1928, to Joseph Hirsch describes a brassiere which is adjustable by means of straps which tie in the front to support the bust and to bring out the contour of the body. U.S. Pat. No. 3,196,878, issued on Jul. 27, 1965, to Jon Hedu describes a brassiere having an adjustable connection immediately between the breast cups which can be used to adjust the angular positioning of the cups to conform to the physique of the wearer. U.S. Pat. No. 4,955,846, issued on Sep. 11, 1990, to Bert Greenberg describes a brassiere with a size and configuration adjustment mechanism. The size and shape adjustments are made by using two layers of front, centerline fasteners. The fasteners can also be used to create a plunging neckline. The above listed patents fail to describe a brassiere which can be used to create and/or enhance the cleavage line of the wearer by pulling the breast cups toward one another in a horizontal manner and/or in an upward manner.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,325,378, issued on Apr. 20, 1982, to Margaret Wilkinson describes a sports garment which is comprised of two liners which cover the breasts. The outer liner flap is adjustable by means of a strap with a hook-and-loop-type fastener and a loop. Acting as a cinch, the outer flap provides support, inhibits breast movement while jogging, and can be adjusted during exercise without the need for privacy. The patent to Wilkinson fails to describe a brassiere which can be used to create and/or enhance the cleavage line of the wearer by pulling the breast cups toward one another and in an upward direction. The patent to Wilkinson also describes a structure which would be difficult, if not impossible, to conceal from an observer.
None of the above inventions and patents, taken either singularly or in combination, is seen to describe the instant invention as claimed. Thus a cleavage enhancing brassiere solving the aforementioned problems is desired.

Cleavage creating and/or enhancing brassiere


A method and apparatus of treating food items having muscle protein and a product produced by the inventive apparatus and method. The inventive method preferably utilizes the inventive apparatus to (a) continuously press the food items using a pliable material which conforms to and at least partially surrounds the food items when pressing and/or (b) infuse the food items with a treatment liquid preferably by impacting the food items while they are at least partially suspended in the solution.

Infusion, curing, pickling, injection and marination of meat and food substances has been in practice for many years. The initial most common method was to submerge the material in a solution of marination, pickle solution, or brine for long periods of time. This could take one or more days depending upon the level of uptake of the solution. The industry progressed from that practice to either a needle injection or a massaging method using an upright drum, filled with product and the marination solution, with an agitator. The multi-vane agitator would travel in slow rotational speed in one direction for several minutes and then in the reverse direction. This process would take 20 to 30 hours for marination of meat.
That practice progressed to turning the drum on its side, loading the meat and marination solution, closing the doors and rotating the drum. Vanes were built into the walls of the drum to create more massaging action on the product. This method would later be enhanced by adding a vacuum pump to evacuate the air inside the drum, thus keeping down foaming and removing air from the product. This method would take 20 to 30 minutes to complete a marination cycle. These drums would hold on an average 3000 to 5000 pounds of product, with some as high as 20,000 pounds.
Typical process enhancements would be to pre-chill the product down to near freezing levels to stiffen the muscles, thus causing more massaging during tumbling. CO2 would also be injected into the tumbler during rotation or a refrigerated jacket around the outside of the tumbler would be used to further chill the product.
In these prior processes, the meat massaging action would result primarily from (a) the meat pieces themselves imparting forces one to another, (b) the vanes (if present) creating a force on the bulk of the meat mass, and (c) the meat falling into the drum wall and onto other pieces due to the rotation of the drum. None of these methods provide direct massaging of each individual piece of meat. Moreover, these meat marinators/massagers operate in a batch mode off-line from the main processing line. Marinated meat is staged into the constant flow of a processing line either by surge hoppers, conveyers, or push carts typically loaded with 300 to 500 pounds of meat.
The marination pick-up achieved in these prior processes has usually been limited to the exterior portions of the meat substance with only slight infusion into the body of the muscle. Because the meat pieces themselves are massaging one another, the tougher muscles receive much less massaging pick up and thus much less infusion of marination. The structure of this meat is very tight, allowing for minimum infusion of external liquid.
The vacuum tumbler and other conventional tumbling systems used heretofore have typically been "dry" marination systems wherein the amount of marination fluid placed in the tumbler equals or only minimally exceeds the amount of fluid which is actually infused into the product. For example, when processing poultry wings to obtain an eight percent pickup of marination solution, only eight pounds of marination fluid would be placed in the batch tumbling drum per each 100 pounds of wings. Thus, as the liquid becomes fully absorbed into the bulk product, the individual pieces thereof tumble onto and collide with each other.
Although the type of colliding interaction experienced in prior art tumblers can beneficially act to move protein from the interior of the product to the surface, it undesirably limits the amount of marinade pick up which can be achieved. The internal pressure created by the weight and momentum of the product pieces not only causes internal protein to flow to the surface but also causes the marinade solution to flow out of, rather than into, the product.
Additional disadvantages and shortcomings of the prior art batch tumbling systems are that (a) they typically require the installation, operation, and maintenance of vacuum pumps, (b) because the individual pieces of each product batch must be held in hoppers and fed to downstream processing units over a period of time, significant differences in drying, aging, moisture content, etc. can occur, thus resulting in a lack of product consistency and uniformity and lower quality, and (c) the colliding interaction of the product pieces not only causes marinade to flow out of the product but undesirably causes fat to flow out of the product as well.
Tenderization of meat muscle is usually performed by slashing or thin blade cutting the muscle, thus severing the connective collagen fibers. This reduces the toughness of the meat but also has a negative effect in that the overall structure is severely disturbed. A more natural tenderization method, much like the "hammering" of the meat commonly done in the home, is more desirable. However, this method damages the protein of the muscle.
Thus, a need presently exists for 1) an improved method of marinade infusion, 2) a continuous, real-time process which continuously delivers marinated meat directly into the processing line, and 3) a more effective, continuous method of tenderization which does not seriously either damage the muscle protein or disturb the overall structure of the product.

Liquid infusion and tenderization process, apparatus, and product


The present invention relates to novel monooxygenase nucleic acids and polypeptides created using mutagenesis, DNA shuffling, or both, in a single iteration or multiple iterations, and methods for their creation and use. The monooxygenase enzymes of the present disclosure have particular utility as biocatalysts in industrial chemical redox reactions, such as the oxidation of aromatic hydrocarbons, for example, toluene, benzene, or nitrobenzene, into industrially desirable products. The systems and processes of the present invention are especially useful for the coupled synthesis and recovery of catechols, methylcatechols, resorcinols, methylresorcinols, hydroquinones, methylhydroquinones, hydroxybenzenes, cresols, nitrobenzenes, and nitrohydroxyquinones.

Di- and trihydroxy aromatics are important industrial chemicals with many applications as evidence by worldwide production of catechol, resorcinol, and hydroquinone at 110,000 tons/year. Catechol is used as an intermediate in the food, pharmaceutical, and agrochemical industries, and hydroquinone is used in photography, in cosmetics, and in both medical and industrial X-ray films. Substituted catechols, especially 3-substituted catechols, are useful precursors for making pharmaceuticals; one of these, 3-methoxycatechol is an important intermediate for the antivascular agents combretastatin A-1 and combretastatin B-1. Hydroxyquinone and its derivatives are important chemicals used mainly as photographic developers, polymerization inhibitors, rubber antioxidants, food antioxidants, synthesis intermediates, and also used in water treatment. Methoxyhydroquinone is used in the synthesis of triptycene quinones that have been shown to have anti-leukemia cell activity. Resorcinol and its derivatives are used to inhibit rust in paints, to regulate plant growth, and to act as capacitor electrolytes. Production of 4-methylresorcinol is uncommon and prices can exceed $200,000/kg (Apin Chemicals). Methylhydroquinone has been recently reported to be used in the synthesis of (±)-helibisabonol A, and puraquinonic acid which are precursors to agrochemical herbicides and antileukemia drugs, respectively. 1,2,3-Trihydroxybenzene (1,2,3-THB, pyrogallol), the first synthetic dye for hair, is primarily used as a modifier in oxidation dyes, as a pharmaceutical intermediate, and has been used as a topical antipsoriatic. Hydroxyhydroquinone (1,2,4-THB) has been used in dyes and as a corrosion inhibitor. Manufacture of these substituted dihydroxylated compounds by chemical routes is difficult due to the employment of aggressive reagents, expensive and complicated starting materials, multiple reaction steps, and low yields. Direct microbial oxidation of NB or NPs for the synthesis of NC or NHQ is attractive to reduce wastes (relative to organic-based methods) since chemical synthesis of these compounds is problematic in terms of yield and selectivity.
Nitroaromatic compounds are widely used in industry as dyes, pesticides, plasticizers, explosives, and solvents, and dihydroxy nitroaromatics are important for medicine. Nitrocatechol derivatives have been shown to be selective and potent inhibitors of catechol-o-methyltransferase, which is important in the metabolism of catechol drugs, and so nitrocatechol derivatives may be used in the treatment of Parkinson disease. Nitrocatechols have been found to be useful intermediates for the synthesis of pharmaceuticals such as Flexinoxan, an antihypertensive drug. 4-Nitrocatehcol (4-NC) and 3-NC have potential for therapeutic interest, and were recently found to be competitive inhibitors of nitric oxide synthase with potential anti-nociceptive (pain relieving) activity. 3-NC is also essential as a building block for the production of some antihypertensive pharmaceutical such as flesinoxan. Nitrohydroquinone (NHQ) has been used to synthesize dephostatin; an inhibitor of the protein tyrosine phosphatase with is a candidate therapeutic agent for diabetes mellitus and neural diseases such as Alzheimer's disease and Parkinson's disease. Industrially, 3-NC is also useful for electrolytic capacitors operating at high temperatures or used to increase the amplification factor of transistors. NHQ is mainly used as electrophotographic photoreceptor, and dyes.
As chemical synthesis of these compounds is problematic in terms of yield and selectivity, the utilization of oxygenases is advantageous. The high redox potential of oxygenases enables them to perform reactions with chemically stable substrates as well as provide a high degree of region and enantioselectivity. Transforming selectively an inexpensive and abundant chemical as nitrobenzene (NB) into a valuable feedstock for drug production, namely 4-NC, is therefore of great significance.
There have been previous reports in the literature on oxygenases capable of producing nitrocatechols. p-Nitrophenol hydroxylase of Arthrobacter sp. and Bacillus sphaericus JS905 transforms p-nitrophenol (p-NP) to 4-NC often with further removal of the nitro group to obtain 1,2,4-trihydroxybenzene (Jain et al., 1994; Kadiyala and Spain, 1998). Kieboom and co-workers screened twenty-one microorganisms for their ability to convert nitroaromatics into 3-NC. Strains containing toluene-dioxygenases from P. putida F1, Nocardia S3, Pseudomonas JS150, Cornybacterium C125, and Zanthobacter 124X were able to transform NB to 3-NC rapidly. They did not report a toluene monooxygenase-containing strain able to perform this reaction. Haigler and Spain reported Pseudomonas mendocina KR1 and Ralstonia pickettii PKO1 convert NB to NC; however, the enzymes responsible for the addition of the second hydroxyl group to the nitrophenols to form nitrocatechols were not identified. Pseudomonas mendocina KR-1 converts NB to 4-NC via m-NP (10%) and p-NP (63%), and Pseudomonas pickettii PKO1 converts NB to 3-NC and 4-NC via m-NP and p-NO. Pseudomonas putida 2NP8 grown on m-NP has been shown to degrade NB into ammonia, nitrobenzene, and hydroxylaminobenzene. O—NP is degraded by this strain with production of nitrite, and m-NP resulted in the formation of ammonia. Pseudomonas pseudoalcoligenes JS45 degrades NB to 2-aminomuconate, which is also an intermediate in the metabolism of tryptophan in mammals.
Twenty-one oxygenase-containing bacteria were screened for the ability to convert nitroaromatics into 3-NC. Mycobacterium chelonae strain NB01 was shown to degrade NB via reductive degradation mechanism, which resulted with the formation of ammonia. Comamonas sp strain JS765 was shown to convert NB to an unstable nitrohydrodiol that spontaneously decomposes to form catechol and nitrite via nitrobenzene 1,2-dioxygenase.
Indigo is one of the oldest dyes and is still used worldwide for textiles with 22,000 tons produced annually worth $200 million. Historically, this blue dye was obtained from various plant sources, including woad (Isatis tinctoria) in Europe and Indigofera in Asia and South America. Now production of indigo is primarily by the Adolf von Baeyer 1890 chemical synthesis which resulted in the fifth Noble Prize in chemistry. More recently, bacterial systems for commercial indigo production have been developed, which were inspired by the discovery that growth of the recombinant Escherichia coli strain expressing naphthalene dioxygenase from Pseudomonas putida PpG7 in rich medium resulted in the formation of indigo. Indigo is formed and the result of the cloned enzyme oxygenating C-3 of the indole pyrrole ring, and indole is produced from tryptophan via tryptophanase in E. coli. Various monooxygenases and dioxygenases have been identified that are capable of indole oxidation to form indigo, and these biological processes are inherently safer than the Adolf von Baeyer process since they do not produce such toxins as aromatic amines (bladder carcinogens), and cyanide.
Indirubin, a pink pigment, is also produced in minor amounts from plant sources. Due to the small and variable amount of indirubin, plant-derived indigo dye has a more pleasing tinge than synthetic indigo. In addition, indirubin has important and potential therapeutic applications since it is the active ingredient of a traditional Chinese medicine used to treat diseases such as chronic myelocytic leukemia (CML) and was found to be a potent inhibitor of cyclin-dependent kinases and therefore belongs to a group of promising anticancer compounds.
Some of these compounds cannot be easily synthesized chemically, and the traditional chemical processes are often lengthy and require expensive starting materials. Direct microbial synthesis of such compounds from inexpensive substrates might provide a more cost effective and more environmentally benign approach, and biocatalysis is likely to account for 30% of the chemical business by 2050. Biocatalysis has become an attractive alternative to chemical synthesis because of its high selectivity and efficiency. Since 2000, more than 400 patents on the use of microorganisms or enzymes to produce specialty chemical shave been issued. Among the various classes of enzymes, oxygenases are considered one of the most promising due to their ability to perform selective hydroxylation that are not accessible by chemical methods. One recent commercial example is the production of an intermediate for an antilipolytic drug from the oxidation of 2,5-dimethylpyrazine to 5-methylpyrazine-2-carboxylic acid with whole cells of Pseudomonas putida ATCC 33015 expressing xylene monooxygenase. For example, it can produce relatively pure compounds compared with racemic mixtures often obtained by chemical methods. Biocatalysis also avoids tedious blocking and deblocking steps, which are common in the chemical synthesis of enantio- and regioselective compounds, and is inherently environmentally benign as the reactions are usually performed in water (avoiding harsh solvents) at room temperature and atmospheric pressure under milder conditions.
More recently, a large number of enzymes have been studied for aromatic hydroxylations such as heme P450s, flavin monooxygenases, pterin-dependent non-heme monooxygenases, non-heme mononuclear iron dioxygenases, and diiron hydroxylases. For example, Meyer et al. (2002) reported that directed evolution using error-prone PCR increased the substrate specific activity of the flavoenzyme 2-hydroxybiphenyl 3-monooxygenase 2 times towards o-methoxyphenol and 5 times towards 2-tert-butylphenol for making the corresponding 3-substituted catechols. Canada et al. (2002) used DNA shuffling to evolve toluene ortho-monooxygenase (TOM) from Burkholderia cepacia G4 for 1-naphthol synthesis, and one mutant (TomA3 V106A) with 6-fold increased activity was found. Furthermore, substituted catechols (e.g., 3-bromocatechol, 3-methoxycatechol, 3-iodocatechol, 3-methylcatechol) were synthesized from substituted benzenes in two steps using recombinant E. coli expressing both toluene dioxygenase and dihydrocatechol dehydrogenase.
Toluene 4-monooxygenase (T4MO) from Pseudomonas mendocina KR1 belongs to the family of diiron hydroxylases including the methane, toluene, benzene, o-xylene monooxygenases, phenol hydroxylases, and alkene epoxidases. T4MO is a soluble, non-heme, O2-dependent, diiron monooxygenase, and is a four-component alkene/aromatic monooxygenase enzyme consisting of six genes designated tmoABCDEF. The genes tmoA, tmoB, and tmoE encode the •, •, and • subunits, respectively. The hydryolase component (212-kDa with (•••)2 quaternary structure) which was recently described as responsible for the regiospecificity of the enzyme. Gene tmoF encodes a 36-kDa NADH oxidoreductase containing FAD and a [2Fe-2S] cluster. The tmoC encodes a 12.5-kDa Rieske-type [2Fe-2S] ferredoxin involved in electron transfer between the hydroxylase and reductase; tmoD gene encodes an 11.6-kDa catalytic effector protein. All four protein components from the 6 genes are required for efficient multiple catalysis and high regiospecificity. The (•••)2 hydroxylase component containing the active site for substrate binding and hydroxylation reaction (Pikus et al., 1997) was reported recently to be responsible for the monooxygenation regiospecificity of T4MO while the binding of the effector protein refined the product distribution leading to high regiospecificity. The binding effector protein has been shown to enhance the catalytic rate of the enzyme and to refine the product distribution leading to the high regiospecificity of T4MO.
T4MO is a highly regiospecific enzyme, hydroxylating nearly all monosubstituted benzenes tested including toluene, chlorobenzene, methoxybenzene, and nitrobenzene at the para position. Recent mechanistic studies reveal that active site-directed opening of an epoxide intermediate may account for this high regiospecificity. T4MO has been shown to perform single hydroxylations, transforming benzene to phenol, toluene to p-cresol and other monosubstituted benzenes to the subsequent p-hydroxylated compounds. Wood and co-workers have recently reported that T4MO expressed in Escherichia coli TG1 cells can perform successive hydroxylation, resulting in conversion of benzene to 1,2,3-trihydroxybenzene. Nevertheless, there is no evidence to date of T4MO being able to convert substituted benzenes (e.g., nitrobenzene) to their respective catechols (e.g., nitrocatechol). T4MO is the most efficient enzyme towards toluene oxidation among toluene monooxygenase family including TOM, toluene para-monooxygenase (formerly toluene 3-monooxygenase) of Ralstonia picketti PKO1, and toluene/o-xylene monooxygenase of Pseudomonas stutzeri OX1. T4MO has been identified to oxidize toluene to 96% p-cresol, 3% m-cresol, and less than 1% benzyl alcohol. Other enzymes, for example, ammonia monooxygenase, chloroperoxidase, cytochrome P450, methane monooxygenase, and xylene monooxygenase oxidize alkylbenzenes; however, they produce benzyl alcohols (70-100% of total products) and only negligible amounts of phenolic products. The high regiospecificity for para hydroxylation of toluene and nearly no ortho activity make T4MO a valuable and rare enzyme that is specialized for aromatic ring hydroxylation. In addition, T4MO has broad substrate specificity for mono-substituted benzenes including nitrobenzene, chlorobenzene, and methoxybenzene, which are catalyzed to single hydroxylated products in the para position.
Toluene-o-Xylene Monooxygenase (ToMO) hydroxylates toluene in the ortho, meta, and para positions as well as o-xylene in both the 3 and 4 positions, and it oxidizes many substrates including o-xylene, m-xylene, p-xylene, toluene, a benzene, ethyl-benzene, styrene, naphthalene, and trichloroethylene (TCE), and is the only known oxygenase which attacks tetrachloroethylene. The six genes coding for ToMO are touABE (three-component hydroxylase with two catalytic oxygen-bridged dinuclear centers, A2B2E2), touC (ferredoxin), touD (mediating protein), and touF (NADH-ferredoxin oxidoreductase). ToMO touA (499 amino acids has the greatest amino acid identity to the hydroxylase (TbuA1) of toluene 3-monooxygenase (T3MO) of Pseudomonas picketti PKO1 (68%) and the hydroxylase (TmoA) of toluene 4-monooxygenase (T4MO) of Pseudomonas mendocina KR1 (66.8%), but these are distinct enzymes given their different regiospecific oxidation of toluene.
The importance of position V106 as an active residue in toluene monooxygenases was reported previously by us as a result of directed evolution of toluene ortho-monooxygenase (TOM) of Burkholderia cepacia G4. This beneficial mutation resulted in a two-fold increase in the initial degradation rate for TCE degradation and a six-fold increase for naphthalene oxidation. This position corresponds to I100 of the alpha subunit TouA of the hydroxylase in ToMO.
The methane monooxygenase (MMO) active site residues have been identified by X-ray crystallography, and by comparison to MMO, some of these active site residues for T4MO, T3MO, and toluene 2-monooxygenase from Pseudomonas sp. strain JS150 have been predicted by Pikus et al. (1997); hence, several positions in the alpha subunits of aromatic monooxygenases have been studied. Position T201 of tmoA of T4MO, and positions T201, Q141, and F205 of TouA of ToMO (Vardar and Wood, 2004) have been studied via saturation mutagenesis. T4MO mutants Q141C, Q141V, I180F, and F2051 of tmoA have been studied previously via site directed mutagenesis; the same residues (except M180) and positions are the same for ToMO. For T4MO TmoA mutant Q141C, oxidation of m-xylene to 3-methylbenzyl alcohol formation increased 6-fold from 2.2% to 1.7%, and for p-xylene oxidation, the product distribution completely switched to 2,5-dimethylphenol (78%) from 4-methylbenzyl alcohol (22%). T4MO tmoA mutant T201F gave a large shift in the product distribution and also formed 10-fold more benzyl alcohol from toluene. For the hydroxylation of toluene by T4MO mutant F2051 of tmoA, the percentage of m-cresol formation increased 5-fold from 2.8% to 14.5%. The TouA F205G mutation in ToMO changed the hydroxylation regiospecificities of toluene, o-cresol, m-cresol, p-cresol, phenol, and resorcinol, and allowed for the novel formation of methylhydroquinone, 4-methylresorcinol, hydroquinone, resorcinol, and 1,2,3-trihydroxybenzene (Vardar and Wood, 2004). T4MO mutants from positions Q141, T201, and F205 were not studied previously for nitrobenzene oxidation with the exception of T4MO mutant T201G of TmoA that produced 7.9% o-NP whereas wild-type T4MO did not.
Burkholderia capacia G4 was isolated as the first pure strain that degrades trichloroethylene (TCE), and toluene ortho-monooxygensase (TOM) has been shown to oxidize mixtures of cholorinated compounds, including TCE (Shim and Wood, 2000). The subunit of TOMs are similar to the corresponding components of crystallographically-characterized soluble methane monooxygenase (sMMO) from methanotrophic bacteria, with their •-subunits sharing about 20% amino acid sequence identity. TOM is a three-component complex consisting of a 211-kDa hydroxylase (tomA1A3A4), with two binuclear iron centers in the (•••)2 quaternary structure, a 40-kDa NADH-oxidoreductase (tomA5), and a 10.4-kDa cofactor-less regulatory protein (tomA2) involved in the electron transfer between the hydroxylase and reductase. The (•••)2 component contains the active site for substrate binding and hydroxylation reaction and is capable of a peroxide-shunt mechanism like sMMO.
TOM originally was not considered as an indigo-forming strain, but our laboratory found it was responsible for color development and indole hydroxylation. During growth in complex medium, recombinant E. coli expressing TOM forms brown color on agar plates an in liquid culture, whereas typical indole-oxygenating enzymes in whole cells from blue colonies on agar plates and blue, water-insoluble pigments in liquid medium. In addition, one TOM variant created from DNA shuffling was identified as a potential indigo-forming enzyme; based on the color of its colonies on agar plates and in liquid culture it was termed TOM-Green with a single amino acid change of valine to alanine at position V106 of the hydroxylase a-subunit (TomA3). Thus in this variant, a single mutation was responsible of the cell color change, presumably due to the alteration in the hydroxylation of indole.
DNA shuffling is a widely used method for protein mutagenesis in which there is no need for crystal structure or any information about the structure of the protein. Using DNA shuffling, the TomA1 V106A mutation of toluene ortho-monooxygenase (TOM) of Burkholderia cepacia G4 was identified (corresponds to I100 of the alpha subunit TouA of the hydroxylase in ToMO) which resulted in a 2-fold increase in the initial degradation rate for TCE degradation and a 6-fold increase for naphthalene oxidation. The importance of position I100 was corroborated in saturation mutagenesis for TmoA of T4MO and TouA of ToMO (Vardar and Wood, 2004). T4MO TmoA mutant I100L was found to have a 4-fold increase in activity for 3-methoxycatechol formation from 1 mM guaiacol. In addition, T4MOTmoA mutant I100A and I100S produced 20% m-cresol and 80% p-cresol, whereas the wild-type T4MO produced 96% p-cresol. ToMO TouA variant I100Q had significantly altered hydroxylation regiospecificities for toluene, o-cresol, m-cresol, phenol, and catechol allowing for the novel formation of methylhydroquinone, hydroquinone, and 1,2,4-trihydroxybenzene (Vardar and Wood, 2004).
Despite efforts to date, a need remains for improved system(s), method(s) and/or process(es) for generating desired monooxygenase enzymes and related polypeptides.

Directed evolution of recombinant monooxygenase nucleic acids and related polypeptides and methods of use


An angle gating injection molding apparatus is disclosed. The apparatus includes a gate axis misaligned with a cone axis of a nozzle tip.

Molding material protruding from a gate area on a molded article after it has been removed from a mold is known as gate vestige. Gate vestige is undesirable as it requires close inspection to identify affected molded articles which are either disposed of or subjected to further processing to remove the protruding molding material from affected molded articles. Gate vestige can be particularly troublesome in angle gating injection molding applications where an axis of a mold gate is disposed at an angle between 25 degrees and 65 degrees, to a draw direction of an injection mold.

Angle gating injection molding apparatus


It is to realize a function clock generation circuit with which a wiring area and cell area, and further a power consumption can be reduced, and a timing design is easy. An input terminal D of a through latch circuit LTC11 is connected to an input line of an enable signal EN, an inversion clock input terminal G is connected to the input line of the clock signal, one input terminal of a NAND gate NAND11 is connected to an output terminal Q of a through latch circuit LTC11, the other input terminal is connected to the input terminal of the clock signal CK, and the output terminal is connected to the input terminal of an inverter INV11. Then, in the through latch circuit LTC11, the enable signal EN is sampled at the rising edge of the clock signal CK, and according to the value, the clock pulse immediately after the sampling is passed or blocked by the logical gate LGT comprising a NAND gate NAND11 and an inverter INV11.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a function clock (gated clock) signal generation circuit of, for example, a synchronous D-type flip-flop equipped with an enable function useful for reduction of the area of a E large-scale integrated circuit (LSI) of a complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) and reduction of the power consumption and to a D-type flip-flop equipped with an enable function and a memory circuit using the same.
2. Description of the Related Art
The increasingly larger size and complexity of LSIs means that a single type of clock is no longer sufficient. There is therefore a growing need for use of a plurality of clocks in a single chip.
The reason why a plurality of clocks are used is that, in general, the contents of the processing of different blocks are different. In recent large-scale high performance LSIs, however, in addition to this, the increase of the power consumption has become a serious problem. As one of the measures taken against this, useless operations are being reduced by using a large number of function clocks optimum for the processing of the blocks.
Below, an explanation will be made of a case where use is made not a plurality of clocks having a completely asynchronous relationship, but a plurality of clocks which are prepared by frequency division of an original clock and by clock pulse selection and which are synchronized with the original clock.
As examples of the related art where such a plurality of clocks are necessary, there is the system for generation of a function clock by a gate, a system using a D-type flip-flop equipped with an enable function which makes an equivalent operation to that of the case using a plurality of clocks be performed by using a single single-phase clock and a D-type flip-flop equipped with an enable function, and a system for generation of a function clock which samples an enable signal once by a D-type flip-flop and then generates a function clock by using a gate.
With these related arts, however, as will be explained in detail later with reference to the drawings, there are the problems of a large interconnection area and cell area, a large power consumption, and difficult design of timing in the function clock generation circuit and in the D-type flip-flop equipped with an enable function and the memory circuit using the same.

Function clock generation circuit and D-type flip-flop equipped with enable function and memory circuit using same


In a method for determining a low pressure exhaust gas recirculation mass flow {dot over (m)}Opt in the air system of an internal combustion engine (10) with low pressure exhaust gas recirculation, the determination of the low pressure exhaust gas recirculation mass flow {dot over (m)}Opt involves a preliminary low pressure exhaust gas recirculation mass flow {dot over (m)}EGRLPDs which is determined from a function involving, in particular, the pressure p42 upstream and the pressure p12 downstream of a low pressure side exhaust gas recirculation valve EGRVIvLP (29), the temperature TEGRVIvPUs downstream of the low pressure side exhaust gas recirculation valve (29), and the geometry arEGRVIvLP of the low pressure side exhaust gas recirculation valve (29). According to the invention, at least one mass balance based variable is also considered in the determination of the low pressure exhaust gas recirculation mass flow {dot over (m)}Opt.

The present invention relates to a method for determining the low pressure exhaust gas recirculation mass flow in the air system of an internal combustion engine.
Exhaust gas recirculation comprises an important measure for reducing the nitrogen oxide emissions which are produced upon the combustion of fuel in internal combustion engines. This measure enables the recirculation of a portion of the exhaust gas into the inlet space of the internal combustion engine. Production of nitrogen oxides during combustion is lessened by the recirculation of a portion of the exhaust gas which, being an inert gas, is nonreactive. Usually, the exhaust gas is recirculated into the inlet space by mixing in some of the exhaust gas of the inlet fresh air. An exhaust gas recirculation valve is provided for the metering of the exhaust gas. Also known in addition to a near engine high pressure exhaust gas recirculation system is a low pressure exhaust gas recirculation system in which, as a rule, the exhaust gas recirculation section is implemented downstream of a diesel particulate filter and upstream of a compressor.
Controlling the exhaust gas recirculation system requires the detection of various mass flows. The mass flow via the low pressure exhaust gas recirculation line is usually modeled, the low pressure exhaust gas recirculation mass flow being determined by means of a so-called throttle equation which involves the pressure upstream and the pressure downstream of the low pressure side exhaust gas recirculation valve, the temperature upstream of the low pressure side exhaust gas recirculation valve, and the geometry of the low pressure side exhaust gas recirculation valve. The problem arises in this case that generally only small pressure drops are present across the low pressure exhaust gas recirculation valve, and so this determination of the mass flow is strongly subject to tolerances, depending on the operating point.

Method for determining the low pressure exhaust gas recirculation mass flow in the air system of an internal combustion engine


An instrumentation package in broad terms includes at least one substantially cylindrical instrumentation component; a substantially cylindrical shield surrounding the instrumentation component, the shield having a diameter less than a standard predetermined diameter; and a sizing sleeve around the shield, thereby increasing the diameter of the sleeve to the standard predetermined diameter. A nuclear detector package is also disclosed that includes a substantially cylindrical crystal element; a photomultiplier tube arranged coaxially with the crystal element; an optical coupler sandwiched between one end of the crystal element and an adjacent end of the photomultiplier tube; the crystal element, optical coupler and photomultiplier tube hermetically sealed within a cylindrical shield; and a flexible support sleeve extending exteriorly along the crystal element and the photomultiplier tube and radially inside the cylindrical shield.

This invention relates to a low cost, high performance instrumentation package particularly applicable, but not limited to radiation detectors used in solid mineral mining or oil well logging operations (referred to in the industry as wireline operations), and to a highly integrated electro-optical radiation detector for Measurement While Drilling (MWD) or Logging While Drilling (LWD) operations in which the shock and vibration levels are more extreme.
Scintillation packages typically include a scintillation or crystal element (or simply, crystal) supported within a cylindrical shield. A consequence of making scintillation packages sufficiently rugged for reliable use in harsh environments, such as coal mining or oil well logging, has been some reduction in performance. Making scintillation packages rugged has also increased the cost of fabrication. Although significant progress has been made in recent years in the development and deployment of scintillation packages which are able to withstand temperatures of up to about 200° C. and to simultaneously withstand shock and vibration, there remains a need to further improve functional performance and reduce cost without compromising reliability while operating in harsh environments.
Several factors contribute to reduced performance of scintillation packages. Thicker glass windows are sometimes used in order to withstand the thermal and shock loads and to ensure a good hermetic seal. Thicker couplers are sometimes used in order to provide cushioning between the scintillation element and the window and to provide more compliance so that the scintillation element will be less likely to separate from the coupler under vibration. These thicker elements in the optical path result in loss of light and reduce the field of view of the photomultiplier that is receiving the light from the package.
Compressive forces around a scintillation element are necessary in order to minimize movement of the element under vibration and shock since such motion will result in unwanted noise being generated in the optical output. Such compressive forces, when applied to some reflector materials around the scintillation element cause the material to become less reflective and may cause the material to partially "wet" the surface of the scintillation element. An example of a highly effective reflector material is a special TEFLON® tape, which is porous. This is one of the most effective reflectors of scintillation-produced light in the near UV range and it has been widely used for reflectors on scintillation packages for decades. This material is very pliable, however, and if pressed against the surface of a scintillation element, the efficiency of this tape, as a reflector, diminishes. Yet, a scintillation element must be held firmly in order to be used in harsh environments in order to not break and in order to not produce spontaneous scintillations. Various elastomeric materials—pottings, boots, powders and metallic elements—have been used to support scintillation elements. Each material has its own advantages and disadvantages and may be chosen accordingly. However, all known methods of support within scintillation packages using Teflon® tape and certain other reflectors, which have proven to be effective to protect the scintillation element from thermal effects and high temperature, result in compression of the tape, causing loss in performance. For example, a boot placed around the reflector must be installed in a compressed state in order to prevent movement of the element at ambient temperatures. At elevated temperatures, the scintillation element expands and increases the compressive force. The boot material, typically made from an elastomeric material, also expands to further increase the pressure on the reflector. Using properly designed metallic supporting elements improves this loading problem by limiting maximum pressure on the tape.
In a similar manner, use of porous reflective tape at the rear of the scintillation element may also be affected by the constant pressure of the rear spring.
Use of relatively thick stainless steel housings, or shields, around the scintillation element has increased attenuation of gamma radiation as it passes into the package.
Similarly, several factors contribute to increased cost of ruggedized scintillation packages. This is particularly true for designs that are directed toward minimizing the performance weaknesses described above. Replacement of thick glass windows with thinner sapphire windows is more costly because sapphire is more costly than glass and can be significantly more costly if processed in only small quantities. Use of titanium reduces attenuation below that of stainless steel, while maintaining high strength, and, for the same strength, can be thinner than aluminum. But use of titanium for shields is more costly than stainless steel. Not only is titanium metal more expensive, titanium pipe sizes and tubing sizes that are readily available in the industry for use in manufacturing shields increase the work required to perform the machining of the shields to the required tolerances. Given all the variables, making special mill runs of extruded titanium pipe in order to minimize machining costs is not commercially acceptable in most cases. Therefore, there is a need for a design approach that addresses both technical and commercial considerations.
Another factor that constrains cost cutting is that there has been a degree of standardization in the industry that places specific requirements on the external and internal dimensions of many of the commonly used configurations. These factors and others, when taken together, result in overall higher costs while providing less than optimum functional performance.
Similarly, with regard to complete detector assemblies such as radiation detectors (typically including a scintillation package coupled by a window and/or optical coupler to a photomultiplier tube or PMT), used in mining operations (both oil well drilling and solid mineral mining), and in oil well MWD and LWD operations, is that the detector be able to survive harsh environments such as high vibration and shock. For much of the history of using nuclear radiation (e.g., gamma ray) detectors for mining applications, the critical elements inside the detectors as well as the complete detectors inside a tool housing, have been supported with elastomeric materials, sometimes in combination with longitudinally placed springs. Such relatively soft elastomeric materials are often still used to provide cushioning or dynamic isolation from shock and vibration. In recent years, the technology has advanced to the use of metallic support devices which are effective and use less space. Metallic supports are described in, for example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,742,057; 5,796,109; 5,962,855; and 6,355,932.
As already mentioned, one element commonly found in a nuclear detector, particularly when a hygroscopic scintillation crystal is used, is a window arranged between the scintillation crystal and the PMT or other device that converts the scintillations to electrical pulses. This window is utilized because the hygroscopic crystal must be encased in a hermetically sealed enclosure, and the window allows the scintillation pulses to pass from the enclosure to the PMT. Thick glass windows are typically used in scintillation packages for use in downhole applications in order to provide needed strength and in order to provide a good hermetic seal.
In an attempt to improve detector performance, configurations have been devised for eliminating the window by placing the PMT inside a hermetically sealed housing with the crystal. An immediate advantage is that the light can pass directly from the scintillation crystal, through a thin optical coupler, into the PMT, without having to pass through the window and an additional optical coupling. Without the additional two elements in the light path, less light is lost and the amount of light from each scintillation pulse is brighter, thus increasing the gain of the detector. This increased gain, in turn has the particularly important benefit of maintaining the overall gain of the detector above a minimum level as the gain of the PMT drops due to degradation of its photocathode over time at high temperature. The pulse height resolution can also be improved by deletion of the crystal window and also the space that would have been used by the window can then be used to add more crystal. However, most previous designs that place the PMT and crystal into a single hermetic housing cannot survive in a harsh environment, such as in mining operations, and particularly in MWD and LWD operations.
Another attempt to satisfy current needs has been to place both a PMT and crystal inside a hermetically sealed housing, and then to dynamically support the PMT and crystal with an elastomeric material. This arrangement is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,222,192. Due to the well understood need to prevent bending of the PMT/crystal, an elastomeric cylindrical sleeve is installed around the PMT/Crystal so as to rigidize the PMT/Crystal assembly. This arrangement creates additional problems, however, and has not proven to be fully satisfactory for reasons that will be better understood later.
In addition to considerations related to the internal construction of a radiation detector, it is common practice to also use elastomeric materials externally of the detector, i.e., to support the detector in the tool cavity or housing into which it must be installed. Again, elastomers take up valuable space and do not provide the high damping properties that are desired for dynamic isolation from induced vibrations. Moreover, the elastomeric support will tend to have a low resonant frequency that, when combined with the relatively low damping, will produce a relatively high response thus amplifying the vibrations induced into the detector. These amplified vibrations increase the chance of producing noise in the detector output, or of even breaking the crystal or its interface to the PMT. Elastomeric material is incapable of providing support that exhibits the properties of a hard mount during normal or expected vibration levels. Thus, there is a need for a more effective and space efficient means of supporting the improved nuclear detector within the tool in which it is to be used.
A need also remains for a reliable, compact, high performance detector that can operate for longer periods of time at high temperatures, up to 175 Deg. C. or higher while under high vibration and shock conditions.

Instrumentation package and integrated radiation detector


A user equipment includes a radio frequency (RF) modem configured to wirelessly communicate with at least one mobile network operator and a wireless local area network (WLAN) modem configured to wirelessly communicate with at least one WLAN access point. The user equipment further includes a processor coupled to the RF modem and the WLAN modem and at least one memory storing executable instructions. The executable instructions are configured to manipulate at least one of the processor and the RF modem to establish a first cellular connection with a first mobile network operator based on a first subscription represented by a first subscriber identity, and virtualize the first cellular connection as a wireless local area network (WLAN) connection for use by one or more processes executed by the processor for a second subscription represented by a second subscriber identity.

Cellular phones, tablet computers, and other wireless communication devices frequently are configured to support multiple mobile subscriber connections, such as through hardware and software support for multiple subscriber information modules (SIMs). To illustrate, one SIM may be used to establish a subscriber cellular connection for voice services with one mobile network operator and another SIM is then used to establish a separate subscriber cellular connection with a different mobile network operator for data services. As another example, one SIM may be used for the user's primary, or default, mobile subscription, while another SIM is used to provide an alternative subscriber connection when the wireless communication device is no longer able to connect with the network provided by the primary mobile network operator; that is, the wireless communication device is "roaming" outside the range of the primary mobile network operator.

Virtualization of cellular connection as wireless local area network connection


A main suction, that is a portion of a fuel feed-out pipe, and a bent portion, that is a lowermost portion formed at a return pipe, are both disposed within a fuel tank, positioned lower than a lowest liquid surface within a reserve cup, and can always be maintained in a state of existing within fuel. A fuel expelling port of a jet pump is positioned higher than a highest liquid surface at the reserve cup, and is always positioned higher than fuel within the reserve cup. As a result, a fuel tank structure in which suppression of flowing-out of fuel from the return pipe and the like, an improvement in the fuel transferring performance of the jet pump, and suppression of backward flowing of fuel through a transfer pipe, can all be realized is obtained.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a fuel tank structure that is provided in a vehicle such as an automobile or the like.
2. Description of the Related Art
As a fuel tank structure that is provided in a vehicle such as an automobile or the like, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open (JP-A) No. 7-304340 discloses a structure in which a jet pump is provided at a first tank portion of a saddle-shaped fuel tank. In this structure, negative pressure is applied to the interior of the jet pump by fuel that is returned from an engine through a return pipe. Fuel is sent to the jet pump from a second tank portion due to the negative pressure.
However, in the fuel tank structure disclosed in JP-A No. 7-304340, because the discharge opening (exit pipe) of the fuel from the jet pump is positioned within fuel, there is resistance to the expelling of the fuel, and the fuel transferring ability of the jet pump is low.
In order to overcome such a drawback, it has been thought to place the jet pump above, and to position the fuel discharge opening above the liquid surface. However, when the fuel discharge opening of the jet pump is positioned above the liquid surface, air enters-in from the fuel discharge opening of the jet pump at times when fuel is no longer returned from the engine. Therefore, there is the concern that the phenomenon of the fuel within the return pipe or the like flowing-out (so-called fuel flow-out) will arise.
Further, in the structure of JP-A No. 7-304340, when, fuel from the engine is no longer returned in a state in which, for example, the liquid level of a first tank chamber is higher than the liquid level of a second tank chamber, there is the concern that, due to the difference in heights in the first tank chamber and the second tank chamber, the phenomenon will arise that the fuel in the first tank chamber flows backward to the second tank chamber through a transfer pipe (suction pipe).


Disclosed is a roll-forming machine formed of a machine base and pairs of forming roll sets for the formation of a C-shaped component or a Z-shaped component from a sheet material, the two forming roll sets of each pair being symmetrically disposed at left and right sides on the machine base such that a gap is defined between the two impression wheels and two sheet-transfer wheels of each pair of forming roll sets for easy performance of maintenance work. The shaft-forming wheels of the forming roll sets of the 1st and 4th pairs are mounted with a respective locating block for easy rotation through 180° between two positions and selectively locking in one of the two positions by a respective locating rod to set the roll-forming machine for processing C-shaped component or Z-shaped component.

The present invention relates to a roll-forming machine and more particularly, to an improved structure of roll-forming machine, which is practical for the formation of a C-shaped component or a Z-shaped selectively. And, which facilitates the performance of maintenance and repair works.
Many roll-forming machines are known and used to transform a planar sheet of metal into a component having either a C-shaped or Z-shaped cross-sectional area. U.S. Pat. No. 6,216,514 B1 is a typical one of these designs. This design, as shown in FIG. 1, is still not satisfactory in function because of the following drawbacks:    1. When forming rolls 91, 92 or transferring rolls 931, 932, 941, 942 start to wear or other related component parts are damaged, locating members 951, 952, gears 981, 982, axle sleeve means 971, 972, 973, 974 and shaft members 981, 982 must be detached, so that the repair or replacement work can be started. After the repair or replacement work, the detached component parts must be installed again, that is, much labor and time are wasted during a repair or replacement work.    2. The left-side and right-side telescoping arbor assemblies that support the forming rolls 91, 92 are adjustable so that the lateral distance between the forming rolls 91, 92 may be adjusted. However, the forming rolls 91, 92 are not adjustable vertically to fit sheet materials of different thickness to facilitate the formation of C-shaped components/Z-shaped components of different specifications.
The present invention has been accomplished under the circumstances in view. It is therefore the main object of the present invention to provide a roll-forming machine, which eliminates the aforesaid drawbacks.
According to one aspect of the present invention, a sufficient partition space is provided between the forming roll sets at the left side of the machine base and the forming roll sets at the right side of the machine base for easy performance of maintenance and repair works. When the impression wheels or sheet-transfer wheels of the forming roll sets of the roll-forming machine are worn with a long use or damaged, the workers can easily unfasten the respective fastening members from the impression wheels or sheet-transfer wheels and the respective shafts and remove the impression wheels or sheet-transfer wheels from the respective shafts for repair or replacement.
According to another aspect of the present invention, the wheel shafts of the shape-forming wheels of the 1st and 4th pairs of forming roll sets are respectively mounted with a respective locating block through which the respective wheel shafts can be rotated through 180° between two positions and locked by a respective locating rod, setting the roll-forming machine for processing C-shaped component or Z-shaped component.
According to still another aspect of the present invention, the pitch between the first left-side carrier plate and the first right-side carrier plate and the pitch between the second left-side carrier plate and the second right-side carrier plats that carry the forming roll sets are adjustable for processing different sizes of C-shaped components or Z-shaped components.


An optical fiber system that includes an in-fiber optic component powered by in-fiber light includes an optical fiber having a core, wherein the optical fiber propagates a sensing/signal light and a power light, with the sensing/signal light being propagated in the core. An optical transducing element, such as a layer of light absorbing material, is located in proximity to the in-fiber optic component. An optical tap region is provided in the optical fiber in proximity to the optical transducing element, and enables the power light to leak from the optical fiber and be absorbed by the optical transducing element. The optical transducing element converts the absorbed power light into a second energy form, such as heat, which is used to tune the in-fiber optic component.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to fiber optic components used in applications such as fiber optic communications and sensing, and more specifically to active in-fiber optic components that are powered by in-fiber light.
2. Description of Related Art
Fiber optic components, such as, without limitation, Fiber Bragg Gratings (FBGs), fiber interferometers, and Fabry-Perot cavities (FPs) are well known and are key components used in many optical communication and sensing applications. For example, such components are often utilized in constructing multiplexers and de-multiplexers used in wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) optical communications systems, and in constructing optical strain sensors, temperature sensors, pressure or vibration sensors, chemical sensors and accelerometers. In-fiber optic components, meaning those provided in or as part of an optical fiber, offer several important advantages over other optical and electronic devices, including low manufacturing cost, immunity to electromagnetic radiation and changing (often harsh) ambient conditions, an explosive-proof and in-vivo safe nature, long lifetime, and high sensitivity.
Historically, in-fiber optic components have been passive, meaning they cannot be actively adjusted and/or reconfigured once deployed to, for example, adopt new network topologies or adjust sensing parameters including sensitivity, set point, triggering time, dynamic range and responsivity. In addition, passive in-fiber optic components require delicate and costly packaging to eliminate temperature drifting. These facts have, despite the advantages described above, limited the performance and use of in-fiber components. As a result, work has been done to develop tunable in-fiber optic components, such as a tunable FBG. As is known in the art, an FBG consists of a series of perturbations, forming a grating, in the index of refraction along the length of an optical fiber. An FBG reflects a spectral peak of a light that is transmitted through the fiber, and the particular spectral peak (called the resonance wavelength) that is reflected depends upon the grating spacing. Thus, changes in the length of the fiber due to heat, tension or compression will change the spacing of the grating (and to a lesser extent, the grating component indices of refraction) and thus the wavelength of the light that is reflected.
A typical prior art implementation of an FBG is shown in FIG. 1, and includes optical fiber 5 having core 10 surrounded by cladding 15, wherein the core 10 is provided with a grating 20. The light transmitted through optical fiber 5 and reflected by grating 20 is shown by the arrow in FIG. 1. The grating 20 shown in FIG. 1 has a constant period, Λ, meaning the grating elements are evenly spaced, and is referred to as a uniform FBG. FBGs may also include gratings that have a varying period. Such FBGs are referred to as chirped FBGs, and reflect multiple spectral peaks. Long period gratings, in which the spacing is large compared to the core diameter, and apodized gratings are also useful. Tuning mechanisms (for changing the fiber length and other characteristics such as refractive index) that have been previously explored for FBGs and other in-fiber optic components include on-fiber electrical heating, piezoelectric actuators, mechanical stretching and bending, and acoustic modulation. The problem has been that each of these tuning mechanisms requires an energy source for operation, which, to date, has been electrical. In particular, electrical cable must be run with the optical fiber to provide current for on-fiber heating elements, to supply voltages to drive piezoelectric actuators, to drive stepper motors to stretch and bend the fibers, or to initialize acoustic waves. Additional cabling of this sort is problematic, as it, among other things, typically increases manufacturing costs, is bulky, is not immune to electromagnetic radiation, is difficult to embed in materials and structures, and typically has a shorter lifetime than the associated, normally durable optical fibers.
Thus, there is a need for a mechanism for powering and tuning in-fiber optic components that does not require additional electrical cabling. Such a mechanism would allow fiber optic systems to take advantage of the improved performance and functionality of in-fiber optic components without the disadvantages and drawbacks presented by electrical cabling.

Active in-fiber optic components powered by in-fiber light

University of Pittsburgh - of the Commonwealth System of Higher Education


An input circuit has a differential amplification circuit which converts a differential signal to a single end signal to output the single end signal, an attenuation circuit which attenuates a first input signal to output the attenuated signal to the differential amplification circuit, a capacitor in which one end thereof is connected to a first input terminal to which the first input signal is inputted, and another end thereof is connected to an output side of the differential amplification circuit, a buffer to which the single end signal outputted from the differential amplification circuit and a signal transmitted through the capacitor are inputted, and which outputs the output signal, and a feedback circuit which outputs a signal based on an output signal outputted from the buffer and the second input signal to the differential amplification circuit.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an input circuit to which a first input signal and a second input signal are inputted from two input terminals and which outputs an output signal acquired by performing differential amplification of the first input signal and the second input signal from an output terminal. The present invention particularly relates to an input circuit which has a wide band of frequency characteristic and a large voltage range for input, with a high input impedance.
2. Description of the Related Art
The input circuits for the electronic measurement apparatuses, including an oscilloscope, need a so-called buffer amplifier for buffering to be less affected by the measured system (e.g., refer to JP-B-7-67053 and Japanese Patent No. 3154459). Particularly, in the case of an input circuit used in the oscilloscope, it is required to perform the offset adjustment for changing the voltage level of a DC (Direct Current) signal in a measuring signal so that the voltage range of the measuring signal from the measured system falls within the voltage range that can be treated by the input circuit and following circuits. The offset adjustment is implemented by providing the input circuit with a differential amplification circuit.
Also, it is required that the input circuit has a high input impedance to have no influence on the measured system. That is, it is required that the voltage of the measured system is only detected to keep the current flowing from a measured object into the input circuit. This is implemented by using a Field Effect Transistor (FET) at the first stage of the differential amplification circuit.
FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a conventional input circuit, and FIG. 4 is a circuit diagram of the input circuit as shown in FIG. 3. In FIGS. 3 and 4, an input terminal Ti1 is one input terminal of the input circuit, to which a measuring signal (first input signal) is applied from the measured system. An offset adjustment circuit 10 outputs an offset signal (second input signal). An input terminal Ti2 is the other input terminal of the input circuit, to which the offset signal is applied. A differential amplification circuit 20 has two inputs and one output, in which the measuring signal from the input terminal Ti1 is inputted into one input side and the offset signal (normally a DC signal) from the input terminal Ti2 is inputted into the other input side. And a signal corresponding to a voltage difference between the measuring signal and the offset signal is outputted from the output side to an output terminal To. The output terminal To is for the input circuit. A preamplifier circuit 30 is a circuit provided at the latter stage of the input circuit, with the input side connected to the output terminal To.
The differential amplification circuit 20 will be described below in detail.
A p-channel MOS-FET Q1 has the source connected via a constant current source Is to a power cable Vcc at a predetermined voltage level, and the drain connected to a power cable Vee at a predetermined voltage level. Also, the gate of the FET Q1 is one input end connected to the input terminal Ti1.
A p-channel MOS-FET Q2 has the source connected via a constant current source Is′ to the power cable Vcc at the predetermined voltage level, and the drain connected to the power cable Vee at the predetermined voltage level. Also, the gate of the FET Q2 is the other input end connected to the input terminal Ti2.
A differential signal/single end signal converter 21 is connected to the source of FET Q1, Q2, and converts a differential signal into a single end signal which is outputted via the output terminal To to the preamplifier circuit 30.
The operation of the above circuit will be described below.
A measuring signal from the measured system is inputted via the input terminal Ti1 into the gate of the FET Q1 in the differential amplification circuit 20. On the other hand, an offset signal of desired voltage level is inputted from the offset adjustment circuit via the input terminal Ti2 to the gate of the FET Q2 in the differential amplification circuit 20.
And a voltage following the voltage applied to each gate of the FET Q1, Q2 appears at the source of the FET Q1, Q2. Thus, the differential signal/single end signal converter 21 outputs a single end signal that is a voltage of the measured signal subtracted (or added) by a voltage of the offset signal via the output terminal To to the preamplifier circuit 30.
JP-B-7-67053 (pages 1 to 3, FIGS. 1 and 2) and Japanese Patent No. 3154459 (pages 1 and 2, FIG. 3) are referred to as related art.
Thus, the differential amplification circuit 20 has a high input impedance by using the FET Q1, Q2 at the first stage. Also, the frequency (so-called frequency characteristic) of the differential amplification circuit 20 to be transferred to the preamplifier circuit 30 at the latter stage is limited by the FET Q1, Q2. This frequency characteristic is typically about several hundreds [MHz].
However, in the case of measuring the high frequency signal (e.g., at least 1 [GHz]) with the oscilloscope, the differential amplification circuit 20 was difficult to transfer the high frequency signal to the preamplifier circuit 30 correctly.
If the FET Q1, Q2 are manufactured as the ordered products by altering the semiconductor design or manufacturing method of the FET Q1, Q2, the frequency characteristic may be enhanced. However, the rated range of input voltage (i.e., voltage range of FET Q1, Q2 into the gate) is narrowed. Therefore, the adjustment for large offset amounts could not be made to narrow the voltage range of measuring signal.

Differential amplification input circuit


There is provided a substrate mounting table for use in a plasma-based processing apparatus that performs a plasma-based process on a substrate inside a processing container, which includes a substrate mounting portion having a front surface subjected to a mirroring treatment and on which the substrate is mounted, and an edge portion located around the substrate mounting portion and treated to have an uneven shape.

In manufacturing a semiconductor device, there are sonic cases where a plasma-based process such as a film-forming process, an etching process or the like is performed on a substrate. In such a plasma-based process, for example, inside a processing container in which a pair of parallel flat plate electrodes (upper electrode and lower electrode) are arranged, plasma of a processing gas is generated by mounting a substrate on a stage functioning as the lower electrode and applying high frequency power to one of the electrodes to form a high frequency electric field between the electrodes.
As the stage, a configuration in which a roughened portion having a surface roughness Ra of 2 μm or more and 6 μm or less is formed on a surface on which a substrate is mounted, and a configuration in which a surface is smoothly formed are known.
However, in the configuration in which a roughened portion is formed on a surface on which a substrate is mounted, the substrate electrically floats from the stage so that a potential difference between the substrate and the stage is generated. As a result, arc discharge (arcing) may occur when a high voltage is applied between the upper electrode and the lower electrode. On the other hand, in the configuration in which a surface is smoothly formed, when the plasma-based process is repeatedly performed, reaction products may adhere and accumulate on a portion of the surface of the stage where the substrate is not mounted. As a result, the accumulated reaction products may peel off, which causes particles.


A first request for a bundle resource can be sent to a first location. A first response can be received that identifies a second location. The first response can be analyzed to identify the second location. A second request and a third request can be created for a metadata resource and for an artifact resource. The second request can be sent to the second location. The third request can be sent to a third location. A second response and a third response can be received. The second response can comprise the metadata resource. The third response can comprise the artifact resource. The second response can be evaluated to determine the metadata resource. The third response can be evaluated to determine the artifact resource. The bundle resource can be created.

The present invention relates to the field of accessing bundle resources and, more particularly, to creating a bundle resource at a client.
OSGi" is a modularity technology for Java. Within OSGi, a bundle is a unit of modularity. One example of a bundle is a raw artifact of a binary Java jar file with additional bundle metadata that describes the identity and externals of the bundle. Herein, the bundle is referred to as the "bundle resource", the raw artifact is referred to as the "artifact resource", and the metadata for the bundle referred to as the "metadata resource". Resources are also known as objects. (Java and all Java-based trademarks and logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of Oracle and/or its affiliates.)
There are a large number of Open Source Software (OSS) Java projects available that are not OSGi enabled. An example of such an OSS project is one that provides Plain Old Java Objects (POJO). A POJO is an ordinary Java object. If a user wants to use such a POJO in an OSGi framework, the user has to define the metadata resource and create a bundle resource by combining the original artifact resource with the new metadata resource.
Bundle repositories can be repositories of pre-bundlized jars. Some repositories are created for the purpose of helping users adopt OSGi. One example of a bundle repository is SpringSource Enterprise Bundle Repository. This allows users to search for bundles and download them for use in their builds/runtime. The EBR comprises artifacts under a vast array of OSS licenses.
The OSGi Bundle Repository (OBR) is an OSGi draft specification that defines how to use a bundle repository for resolution of bundle dependencies. There are two stages to this process:
1. Reasoning about metadata for a bundle (the actual raw artifact resource is not required at this point).
2. Downloading any binaries for the chosen bundle. The location of the binary artifacts can be held in the metadata in stage 1.
However, one problem with such an EBR is that some raw OSS artifact resources can affect the terms under which the metadata resources are provided to a user. Enterprise providers of EBRs want to be able to provide appropriate bundle resources to users, but want to keep the constituent parts of the bundle resources apart.


A device facilitating water or liquid fertilizer distribution to a plant growth medium by wicking from a tube that accepts a separate and removable liquid reservoir. The tube is closed at the bottom and accepts the outlet of the external reservoir. The tube is inserted into the top surface of the plant growth medium so that the wick emerges from the tube above the top of the plant growth medium and contacts it. As liquid is transferred by the wick, the liquid level in the tube drops below the opening of the reservoir outlet, allowing air to enter the reservoir from the bottom and more water to flow from the reservoir into the tube. The characteristics of the wicks can be adjusted by the user to change the water flow rate and water distribution pattern to accommodate the needs of individual plants.

Supplying water to indoor plants has historically required significant time and attention on the part of a caregiver. In the simplest approach, the caregiver will manually water the plant growth medium from a container, such as a watering can. Though this is simple and inexpensive, there are several drawbacks. This approach often requires frequent attention and the required frequency of watering and the quantity of water needed will vary from one plant to another. This method can result in spillage due to overflowing the plant container and saucer—clearly undesirable for indoor plants. Manual watering can also be required as frequently as every few days. This presents a problem in the case of extended caregiver absence. Beyond this approach, there are automatic water distribution systems but these are complex and expensive. A spray watering device is not practical indoors and water distribution piping or tubing is unsightly.
Some prior art solutions to these problems have provided a relatively large reservoir of water that communicates with the plant growth medium. However, in soil, as moisture increases beyond a certain level, oxygen content generally decreases. An imbalance between oxygen and water will reduce or even stop photosynthesis in many house plants. Additionally, a plant growth medium that is kept constantly wet will become oxygen deficient or even septic. This will likely result in damage to or loss of the plant. Therefore, adjustment of the water transfer rate from the reservoir is required to both provide adequate water to the plant and avoid long term water saturation of the growth medium. This is a significant problem for watering systems that involve watering from a large reservoir located at the bottom of the pot. A device of this type is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 8,381,441 issued Feb. 26, 2013 to G. Altendorfer et al. Also, the water transfer rate of such systems is difficult to adjust because of the location of the wicks that determine the water transfer rate. These wicks are buried at or near the bottom of the plant growth medium and require removal of the plant in order to change their type, number, length or location. It is also difficult to determine how much water remains in the reservoir. Also, a special purpose pot is needed, limiting the design choices available to the gardener and leading to higher cost. A variant of this approach is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 8,893,432 issued Nov. 25, 2014 to B. Asal. In this system, the wick is routed outside the pot to the top surface of the plant growth medium. This makes it easier to adjust the type, number, length or location of the wicks but the wicks are routed through visible tubing on the outside of the pot, creating a less desirable aesthetic and increasing cost. This approach also suffers from the other disadvantages of U.S. Pat. No. 8,381,441, given above: difficulty in determining water level, higher cost and limited design options. Since the water level is difficult to determine there is also greater risk that the reservoir will overflow during filling.
Another attempt to solve the plant watering problem is to provide a side reservoir as shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,446,994 issued Sep. 5, 1995 to W. Chou. This patent describes a top side reservoir using water transfer by wick into the plant growth medium. This system also requires a special pot. Such a pot suffers from the cost and aesthetic limitations noted previously. The external reservoir also increases the effective pot size with no increase in the area available for plants. This side mounted reservoir is also undesirable aesthetically. In addition to these shortcomings, U.S. Pat. No. 5,446,994 has an open reservoir. Such a reservoir would result in significantly more water loss due to evaporation directly from the reservoir than a reservoir with a lid or hermetic cap. Adding a lid to the reservoir would further increase cost.
Another prior art attempt is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 6,418,663 issued Jul. 16, 2002 to W. Smith. It uses water distribution by dripping or wicking from a top side reservoir that is mounted on the rim of an existing pot. It suffers from most of the same disadvantages as U.S. Pat. No. 5,446,994 above. In addition, the outside diameter of the pot used must be compatible with the inner diameter of the reservoir. This would significantly reduce the number of pots that would be usable with this system, thus increasing cost and decreasing design options. While one embodiment does show a lid over the primary reservoir with a secondary hermetic reservoir in it that would decrease evaporative loss, that option would further increase cost and the inconvenience in refilling the reservoir. In addition, there are aesthetic drawbacks to this approach. This lid also makes it less convenient to determine how much water remains in the reservoir. In addition, adjusting the flow rate for the drip distribution of water into the plant growth medium in those embodiments is more difficult and less reliable, being dependant on reservoir water level and flow impedance of the drip emitter.
Another potential solution to the problems of watering indoor plants noted above is described in U.S. Pat. No. 689,248, issued Dec. 17, 1901 to R. Timm. This patent describes a device that has a hermetic top reservoir and a stem open at the bottom that is inserted into the plant growth medium. Devices similar in concept to these were widely advertised in the late 20th and early 21st centuries and are still widely available commercially as of this writing. An example of this prior art device is shown in FIG. 1. They have been referred to as Aqua Globes® or watering globes—the latter name being used in this discussion. Such devices have a hermetic bulb on top with an extended stem that is designed to be inserted into the plant growth medium. They are usually made of glass. Those currently sold have longer stems than those illustrated by Timm so that the globe normally sits significantly above the surface of the plant medium and thus occupies little of the pot's top surface area. The globe is filled with water and inserted into the plant growth medium. The release of water from the globe depends on the admission of air into the globe, allowing the release of a limited quantity of water into the plant growth medium for each admission of air. Although the longer stem in current versions of these devices does reduce the surface area occupied by these watering globes, it leads to other problems, as discussed below.
These globes are purported to facilitate watering by eliminating the risk of under watering and over watering. However, these advantages are often not realized in practice. I have found that the water transfer rate of these globes depends on the porosity of the plant growth medium into which it is inserted. A porous plant growth medium will allow rapid water dispersal away from the tip of the watering globe. This allows relatively rapid air entry into the globe and consequent rapid water outflow from it that can cause the globe to empty too quickly. This can cause the pot's saucer to overflow. Moreover, I have found that plant growth medium with a higher clay content will be less porous and can cause the tip of the watering globe to become clogged. This inhibits adequate water transfer and results in under watering. In addition, I have found that the watering globe can sag to one side in the pot, since it is only supported by the plant growth medium at the relatively narrow end of the neck. This sagging occurs because the moist growth medium must support the significantly larger filled globe that is elevated above its surface, creating a significant upsetting torque, leading to a significant tilt of the watering globe.
Also, the capacities of the globes are limited to a relatively small range that is available in the market. This capacity is usually approximately one half liter or less. The maximum practical size of a globe inserted directly into a plant growth medium is constrained by the limitations of the mechanical support by the plant growth medium discussed above. Thus, weekly or more frequent refilling of the globe is often required. Though this frequency would not ordinarily be a problem, it becomes one if care must be provided to a relatively large number of plants or it the plants must remain unattended for a significant period of time while the caregiver is away. Additionally, I have found that the water from a watering globe moistens the plant growth medium only below and nearby its tip. This will often result in uneven distribution of the water among different plants within a pot or require the use of multiple globes for a single pot. Furthermore, since the open end of the globe is inserted into the plant growth medium, I have found that algae can find its way into the watering globe. Its growth there produces a non-uniform and unsightly appearance. When conditions are just right, these globes can work acceptably well by themselves but the above mentioned problems are common and significantly limit the globes' usefulness and appeal.
Another example of prior art is French patent FR 2,252,806 issued Jun. 27, 1975 to P. Dehaye. What is claimed is a storage container inserted into the plant growth medium that is used to store water that is in turn distributed to the plants by wicks. The element placed in the plant growth medium does not have the shape and stability needed to support a long stem watering globe or other reservoir of significant height. Thus, it could not be used with commercially available watering globes (FIG. 1—Prior Art) or other similar reservoirs that may become available. Devices of this type can only support shorter and thus lower capacity or larger surface area reservoirs. Also, though this invention employs water transport by wicking, the wicks emerge below the water level in the reservoir. This means that water in the reservoir of this invention will flow around the wicks at these openings and directly into the growth medium, leading to loss of watering rate control and to likely over-watering. In this device, the water transfer rate is not determined by wicking alone but also by this additional, difficult to control leakage. Also, this design does not provide easy modification of the number of wicks, since the number and size of these openings is set by its design. Any holes that are not occupied by wicks will transmit excessive volumes of water to the growth medium unless they are individually plugged. Algae can also find its way into the elevated secondary reservoir and grow there, causing it to become unsightly if it is transparent.
Another prior art device is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 7,082,715 issued Aug. 1, 2006 to K. De Winter. It employs a hermetic reservoir that is set over a base that is in turn placed on the surface of the plant growth medium. Water is transferred from the hermetic reservoir to the intermediate reservoir in the base. From there, it is transferred to the growth medium by wicking, employing rigid wicks that connect the intermediate reservoir and the growth medium. Because of its complexity, it is comparatively expensive and occupies significant space on the surface of the growth medium, reducing the space available for plants. The wick configuration also means that it waters the area only directly beneath the two ends of the device. The capacity of the primary reservoir is fixed by its design and manufacture, limiting aesthetic options, increasing cost and limiting the maximum time that the plant can be left unattended and still deliver water to the plant. These and other limitations diminish the usefulness of this device.
It is clear that many have tried to create a solution to the problem of unattended plant watering and all the attempts have failed to see commercial success with the exception of the watering globe, which has had some success. The reasons for these failures are outlined above. Though the watering globe has seen reasonable sales, it has significant shortcomings and limitations, as also noted above. The device described below addresses these shortcomings in a cost effective, practical and aesthetically pleasing manner.

Adjustable, controlled rate plant watering device


Systems and methods are disclosed for operating an interface of an electronic device in an active mode or a power save mode based, at least in part, on a condition of a data exchange module buffer. When buffer space is available, incoming data may be stored locally and the interface used to access remote memory storage may be in a power save mode. The interface may revert to active mode to transfer data to the remote memory, such as after a configurable reception interval. Outgoing data may also be stored in a buffer, allowing the interface to be in a power save mode with information transmitted from the buffer.

An ongoing trend in the design of modern electronics equipment is the drive to increase the power efficiency of the devices. Particularly with mobile devices or other battery-powered devices, greater power efficiency is almost a universally desirable attribute. To that end, various types of power saving mechanisms are often employed. For example, considerable emphasis may be placed on managing power states associated with the operation of various functional components or modules of the device. However, the power consumed by an interface used to couple such components may also represent an area where efficiencies may be realized.
In one aspect, many electronic devices employ an interface to provide interconnections between a host processor, memory, and one or more functional elements. As such, power efficiency may be increased when the interface offers one or more power saving modes. In most instances, operating one or more aspects of an electronic device in a reduced power mode comes at the expense of reduction in functionality. When returning to normal operation, a period of time is required for reactivation. This latency is typically proportional to the reduction in power consumed. For example, a power saving mode involving clock gating may have a wake up time on the order of tens of nanoseconds and result in a modest reduction in power. As another example, a power saving mode that deactivates phase locked loop (PLL) circuits may represent a greater power saving but require a wake up time on the order to tens of microseconds. Accordingly, it would be desirable to increase the amount of time the interface operates in a power saving mode without incurring a corresponding reduction in performance of the electronic device. This disclosure satisfies this and other goals.

System and method for reducing power consumption


A power supply device includes a transformer; a series circuit of two bidirectional switching elements connected between terminals of the commercial power supply and having a rectification function and a switching function; an LC resonant circuit connected between a primary coil of the transformer and both ends of one of the bidirectional switching elements; a rectifying element connected to a secondary coil of the transformer; and a control circuit for inputting a gate driving signal to the bidirectional switching elements. The power supply device performs synchronous rectification from the bidirectional switching elements.

A power supply device (AC/DC converter) using a multi-resonant half-bridge switching circuit is known as a power supply for a thin television receiver or the like (see Patent Document 1). The configuration of a conventional general AC/DC converter 50 is shown in FIG. 10. In the AC/DC converter 50, first, a rectifying circuit 53 such as a diode bridge rectifies AC power from a commercial power supply 52 and a capacitor 54 smoothes the rectified power. Next, a multi-resonant half-bridge DC/DC converter performs a voltage conversion. The DC/DC converter includes a multi-resonant half-bridge switching circuit composed of two switching elements Q51 and Q52 connected to a primary coil Np50 of a transformer 51, and rectifying diodes D53 and D54 respectively connected to the secondary coils Ns51 and Ns52 of the transformer 51. A resonant circuit composed of an inductor Lr and capacitors Cv and Ci is connected to the primary coil Np50 of the transformer 51.
As the switching elements Q51 and Q52, e.g., MOSFETs are used and the switching elements Q51 and Q52 are alternately turned on and off after a predetermined dead-off time. The commercial power supply 52 for the AC/DC converter 50 has a frequency of 50 Hz or 60 Hz. However, it is possible to increase a frequency of a current inputted to the primary coil Np50 of the transformer 51 by shortening a period in which the switching elements Q51 and Q52 are alternately turned on and off as compared with a period of the commercial power supply 52.
The transformer 51, the inductor Lr or the like can be miniaturized by increasing a switching frequency of the AC/DC converter 50. Meanwhile, switching loss increases as the switching frequency rises, but in the multi-resonant half-bridge switching circuit, the switching loss can be suppressed by zero voltage switching (ZVS) or zero current switching (ZCS). Thus, the multi-resonant half-bridge switching circuit may be a circuit suitable for high frequency.
As described above, since the switching loss is small in the multi-resonant half-bridge switching circuit, the multi-resonant half-bridge switching circuit is used for a small-sized, high-efficiency power supply. In a case where circuit efficiency is further required in the high-efficiency power supply, main loss is limited to the diodes and the transformer since the loss involved in switching conditions is small. In particular, the loss of the diodes becomes bigger in proportion to an increase in load capacity and thus it is important to reduce the number of diodes.
[Patent Document 1] Japanese Patent Application Publication No. Hei 8-214559.

Power supply device for converting AC power from a commercial power supply into DC power

Panasonic Intellectual Property Management Co., Ltd.


An equalizer/decoder for a communication channel presenting impairments to error-free reception of transmitted symbols includes a modified Viterbi decoder operating on samples of received signals in a plurality of equivalent subchannels. Estimates of each of the subchannels are updated using a locally best estimate in the Viterbi trellis processing, thereby avoiding delay in updating channel estimates in a rapidly changing channel such as a digital cellular communications channels. A leaky predictor channel updating technique also proves advantageous in an alternative embodiment.

Transmission of digital information over communication channels has been extensively studied. See, for example, A. J. Viterbi and J. K. Omura, Principles of Digital Communications and Coding, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1979. Among the many techniques developed to improve the speed and accuracy of digital communication have been those used for compensating for the distortion present in many such channels. An important set of such techniques are those for equalization of delay distortion and intersymbol interference.
A variety of techniques have long been used in equalizing relatively constant communication channels and adapting to changes that occur in the transmission characteristics of transmission channels due to changes in environmental and other circumstances. See, for example, J. G. Proakis, Digital Communications, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1989; and S. U. H. Qureshi, "Adaptive Equalization," Proceedings of the IEEE, Vol. 73, pp. 1349-1387, September, 1985. An important class of such techniques use non-linear equalizers such as decision feedback equalizers with adaptation logic to track slow variations in a channel after an initial learning phase. In this mode, it is assumed that the output of a decoder is correct with high probability. Error signals based on these output signals are then used to update the coefficients of the equalizer. Decision feedback techniques are generally described, for example, in A. Duel-Hallen and C. Heegard, "Delayed Decision-Feedback Sequence Estimation," IEEE Transactions on Communications, Vol. COM-37, pp. 428-436, May, 1989.
Recently, interim (non-final) decisions in delayed-decision (Viterbi-like) decoders have been used to adjust coefficients characterizing equalizers used in data communications. Such equalizers, including so-called blind equalizers using little or no training, are described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,263,033 which is assigned to the assignee of the present invention.
Many communication channels, including cellular telephone channels, exhibit rapid changes in transmission characteristics, thereby causing great difficulty in adaptively equalizing such channels. Digital cellular systems are currently implemented in some countries, and a new proposal has been made for standards for a new digital cellular communication system in the United States. See, "Cellular System," Report IS-54, by the Electronic Industries Association (EIA), December, 1989. In the sequel, this proposal will be referred to as the "IS-54 standard" and systems of the type described therein as the "IS-54 system."
When equalizing a mobile (cellular) radio channel such as those employing IS-54 systems, fast adaptation is required, especially at high vehicle speeds. Such channels are typically characterized by Rayleigh fading, Doppler effects and delay spread. Prior art equalization techniques have been found lacking in mitigating the effects of such rapidly changing channel conditions.
While the prior art adaptive Viterbi Algorithm uses the globally best estimates of the transmitted data to update the estimates of the channel impulse response, processing used to develop these estimates necessarily introduces considerable complexity and delay. In a rapidly changing channel environment, the channel estimates so obtained may no longer be sufficiently accurate for currently processed symbols.
The present invention avoids the limitations of the prior art and provides a technical advance in permitting rapid adaptive equalization of digital cellular communication channels and other channels, including those exhibiting such fast-changing characteristics.

Methods and apparatus for equalization and decoding of digital communications channels using antenna diversity