A recirculation stage of a radial turbomachine, the recirculation stage has an inner delimiting contour and an outer delimiting contour. The stator vane stage has stator vanes, wherein a difference between a vane construction angle at the leading edge and a vane construction angle at a downstream position defines a redirection angle for each point on the camber line of a respective profile cross section, wherein the stator vanes extend at least along part of the third section, wherein the trailing edges are arranged in the third section, wherein at the trailing edges in the center of the span width the redirection angle is in each case greater than the average overall redirection angle, wherein at both ends of the span width at in each case at least 10% of the span width in each case the redirection angle is smaller than the average overall redirection angle.

Radial turbomachines are known as either radial turbocompressors or radial turboexpanders. The embodiments below—unless stated otherwise—relate to the embodiment as a compressor. The invention can essentially apply to expanders as well as compressors, wherein a radial expander substantially provides a flow direction of the process fluid which is contrary to that of a radial turbocompressor.
In a radial turboexpander, with the expansion and deflection of a process fluid, a conversion of the thermodynamic energy accumulated in the process fluid into technical energy takes place by means of a drive of the impeller.
In radial turbocompressors, this procedure is reversed, these convert or accumulate technical energy into flow energy, which is thermodynamically accumulated in the process fluid. To this end, impellers of the compressor generally suction a process fluid axially with respect to a rotational axis or at an angle to the rotational axis with an axial velocity component and accelerate and compress this process fluid by means of the respective impeller, which deflects the flow direction of the process fluid into the radial direction. In a multi-stage radial turbocompressor, a return stage adjoins the impeller downstream when at least one further impeller is provided downstream.
Return stages of a multistage turbocompressor are described in each case in documents DE102014203251A1, DE 34 303 07 A1 and EP 592 803 B1. US 2010/0272564 A1 and WO2014072288A1 look at return stages in relation to aerodynamics.
WO2016047256 discloses a return stage, which has non-cylindrical guide blades. Deflection angles are not specified therein. Documents US 2010/272564 A1, DE 10 2014 223833 A1, JP H11 173299 A disclose aerodynamic embodiments of comparable configurations.
An analysis of complex guide blade geometries is revealed in the article "Design exploration of a return channel for multistage centrifugal compressors" from the conference "Proceedings of the ASME Turbo Expo", volume/year 2016, by authors Vishal Jariwala, Louis Larosiliere and James Hardin. The proposed guide blades extend in each case into the 90° deflection of the fourth section of the return stage in order to improve the homogeneity of the outflow with regard to the span width. Such return stages are difficult to manufacture and difficult to assemble.


An apparatus for detecting an action in a test video. In an illustrative embodiment, the apparatus includes a first mechanism for receiving a query for a particular action via a query video. A second mechanism employs motion vectors associated with the test video to compute one or more motion-similarity values. The one or more motion-similarity values represent motion similarity between a first group of pixels in a first frame of a query video and a second group of pixels in a second frame of the test video based on the motion vectors. A third mechanism uses the one or more similarity values to search for the particular action or similar action in the test video. In a more specific embodiment, another mechanism aggregates the similarity values over a predetermined number of frames to facilitate estimating where the particular action or version thereof occurs or is likely to occur in the test video.

This invention is related in general to video processing and more specifically to action-recognition systems and methods for detecting or locating a particular action in a video. Generally, video action recognition systems compare actions in a query video to many reference videos to detect whether an action in the query video matches the action in a particular reference video. In this manner, a particular action such as, e.g., walking, running, jumping, throwing a punch, or other action performed by an animate or inanimate actor can be identified. Action-recognition systems can be employed in various demanding applications, including video surveillance, collision-avoidance for unmanned aerial vehicles, video editing, video piracy prevention, and viewing applications. Such applications often demand high-speed recognition of a particular action(s) occurring in a video.
High-speed action-recognition systems are particularly important in surveillance applications, where any delays in detecting a particular action may result in a security breach. In such applications, multiple videos are often displayed simultaneously on various monitors. Security personnel may wish to be alerted when a particular action in a video occurs. An action recognition system may alert security personnel to a desired video display when a particular action in the video is detected by the action-recognition system.

High speed video action recognition and localization

The Regents of the University of California


A DA converter includes a first DA conversion section for obtaining an analog output signal in accordance with a digital input signal value, and a second DA conversion section for obtaining an analog gain control output signal in accordance with a digital gain control input signal value. In the DA converter, the gain control of the analog output signal generated by the first DA conversion section is performed on the basis of the gain control output signal generated by the second DA conversion section.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates a DA (Digital-to-Analog) converter for converting a digital signal into an analog signal, an AD converter including the DA converter, and a semiconductor device such as an imaging device, etc. The present invention relates to, for example, a mechanism of a DA conversion using a current-source cell matrix having an array of cells arranged in a matrix.
2. Description of the Related Art
DA converters for converting a digital signal into an analog signal are used in various ways in electronic apparatuses, for example, cameras or cell phones, or in semiconductor devices.
For example, a semiconductor device for detecting a physical-quantity distribution, in which a plurality of unit components (for example, pixels) having sensitivity to electromagnetic waves input from the outside, such as light, radiation rays, etc., are arranged in line or in a matrix, are used in various fields.
For example, in the field of video apparatuses, solid-state imaging devices of a CCD (Charge Coupled Device) type, a MOS (Metal Oxide Semiconductor) type, and a CMOS (Complementary Metal-Oxide Semiconductor) type, which detect light (an example of an electromagnetic wave) among physical quantities, are used. These imaging devices read out a physical-quantity distribution converted into an electronic signal by a unit component (a pixel in the case of a solid-state imaging device) as an electronic signal. Here, "solid-state" means that the device is made of a semiconductor.
Also, solid-state imaging devices include an amplified solid-state imaging device including a pixel having the configuration of an amplified solid-state imaging element (also called APS; Active Pixel Sensor/gain cell), which has a transistor for amplification in a pixel-signal generation section for generating a pixel signal in accordance with signal charge generated by a charge-generation section. For example, most of CMOS imaging devices have such a configuration.
In such an amplified solid-state imaging device, in order to read out a pixel signal to the outside, address control is performed on a pixel section in which a plurality of unit pixels are arranged, and the signal is arbitrarily selected to be read out from individual unit pixel. That is to say, an amplified solid-state imaging device is one example of solid-state imaging devices of an address control type.
For example, in an amplified solid-state imaging device, which is a kind of X-Y addressing-type solid-state imaging device, pixels are composed of active devices having a MOS structure, etc., (MOS transistors) in order to have an amplification function in pixels themselves. Specifically, signal electric charge (photo electrons) stored in a photodiode, which is a photoelectric transfer device, is amplified by the active device, and is read out as image information.
In an X-Y addressing-type solid-state imaging device, for example, a large number of pixel transistors are arranged in a two-dimensional matrix to constitute a pixel area. The storage of signal electric charge corresponding to incident light is started for each line (row) or for each pixel. The signal of electric current or voltage based on the stored signal electric charge is read out in sequence from each pixel by addressing. Here, in a MOS (including CMOS) type, a method, in which pixels of one row is accessed simultaneously, the pixel signals are read out from the pixel section for each row, and are output to the outside, is often used. Also, a method, in which analog pixel signals read out from the pixel section are converted into digital signals using an analog-to-digital converter (AD converter) and then are output to the outside, is sometimes employed (for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication Nos. 2000-152082 and 2002-232291).
As described in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication Nos. 2000-152082 and 2002-232291, there are various kinds of AD conversion methods in terms of a circuit size, a processing speed, a resolution, etc. Among them, there is an AD conversion method of a so-called single-slope integration type or a ramp-signal comparison type, in which a comparison is made between an analog unit signal and a reference signal changing uniformly for the conversion into a digital signal, count processing is performed concurrently with the comparison processing, and the digital signal of the unit signal is obtained on the basis of the count value at the time of completion of the comparison processing. Thus, in order to generate the reference signal changing uniformly, a DA converter is sometimes used.

DA converter, AD converter, and semiconductor device


Systems and methods are described for authentication of tunneled connections. A method includes establishing a first connection (CIO) from an inner agent to an outer agent including making a first TCP connection from the inner agent to the outer agent, negotiating a first SSL/TLS session (SSLSessionIO) between the inner agent and the outer agent over the first TCP connection and applying the second SSL/TLS session (SSLSessionIO) between the inner agent and the outer agent over the first TCP connection; establishing a second connection (CCO) from a client and the outer agent including making a second TCP connection from the client to the outer agent, negotiating a second SSL/TLS session (SSLSessionCO) between the client and the outer agent over the second TCP connection and applying the second SSL/TLS session (SSLSessionCO) between the client and the outer agent over the second TCP connection; and then negotiating a third SSL/TLS session (SSLSessionCI) between the client and the inner agent via both the first SSL/TLS session (SSLSessionIO) and the second SSL/TLS session (SSLSessionCO) and applying the third SSL/TLS session (SSLSessionCI) between the client and the inner agent layered over both the first SSL/TLS session (SSLSessionIO) and the second SSL/TLS session (SSLSessionCO), wherein negotiating the second SSL/TLS session (SSLSessionCO) includes verifying at the outer agent that the client possesses a certificate signed with a certificate associated with the inner agent.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to the field of network communications. More particularly, the invention relates to tunneled internet communications. Specifically, embodiments of the invention relate to: systems and methods for a three component secure tunnel; systems and methods for efficient SSL/TSL layering; and systems and methods for authentication of tunneled connections.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
(Freier 1996)(1) describes a protocol (SSL) that allows client/server applications to communicate in a way that is designed to prevent eavesdropping, tampering, or message forgery. The SSL protocol is the basis of security on the Internet. However SSL normally requires a direct connection between the client and the server and that means that if the server is behind a firewall then a hole must be opened to allow this access.
(Dierks 1999)(2) describes the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol that can provide communications privacy over the internet. TLS is essentially the latest evolution of SSL and suffers the same firewall problem as SSL.
EP 1081918 (Hinde 2003)(3) describes how to create connections using a versatile protocol such as TCP/IP to be established through a firewall and proxy server, the versatile protocol is tunnelled using HTTP. Tunneling connections via http as described by Hinde et al. provides a mechanism that can be used to pass through inspecting firewalls. However it does not provide the security offered by an SSL connection and the implementation of Hinde et al. requires that two connections be used for each tunneled connection.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,104,716 (Critchton et al.) describes a secure lightweight tunneling system for use over the internet. Critchton et al. describes the basic problem presented by firewalls blocking inbound connections and the well-known solution of using a middle server outside of the two firewalls to act as a relay. However it does not address the additional restrictions placed on outbound connections enforced by application level firewalls and packet inspecting firewalls.
Critchon et al. does not use the middle proxy to do authentication and does not throttle and limit unauthenticated connections. This makes the server vulnerable to attacks by unauthenticated clients.
U.S. Pat. Appl. Pub. 2003/0046586 (Bheemarasetti et al.) describes a system for accessing data from any location and any device including those behind firewalls, proxy servers, address translations and other devices, while securing the data and network. The mechanism described by Bheemarasetti et al. provides a secure tunnel mechanism however it requires that the client system can connect to the system running the tunnel software and thus requires that holes be opened in the firewall.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,061,797 (Jade et al.) describes a system that provides a special "tunneling" mechanism, operating on both sides of a firewall, for establishing "outside in" connections when they are requested by certain "trusted" individuals or objects or applications outside the firewall. The solution provided by Jade et al. makes use of outbound connections only and is therefore much more firewall friendly. However the protocols used to establish these connections may not be allowed by packet inspecting firewalls. The mechanism as described requires that the TCP port number of the connections is used to provide access control and routing functions. This implies that different port numbers must be used for different services thus requiring that any firewalls allow outbound connections on these ports. Jade et al. makes use of an "outside server" to act as a relay. This server is typically placed on the public internet. Because no end to end security or integrity is provided a compromised "outside server" could be used to gain access to or alter tunneled data.
(Phifer 2004)(4) describes a mechanism for using a "Communications Server" and a "Broker" server to create a connection between client and server systems located behind firewalls.
This "GoToMyPC" mechanism makes use of outbound connections using the standard SSL on standard ports to communicate with the "broker" system. These connections should have no problem passing through firewalls. However the "Communications server" makes use of a proprietary protocol on a non standard port number and so may be blocked by a firewall.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,367,009 (Davis et al.) describes extending SSL (secure socket layer) to a multi-tier environment using delegation of authentication and authority. The Davis et al. method delegates authentication to the middle tier server. However, this delegation of trust means that the middle tier server can impersonate the client and this is a problem if the middle tier server is compromised.
U.S. Pat. Appl. Pub. 2004/0039827 (Thomas et al.) describes a method a system for providing secure access to private networks with client redirection. The Thomas et al. method requires authentication information on the middle tier or direct access to an authentication database. Also, the Thomas et al. method does not provide a secure tunnel all the way to the back end servers, but instead only to the intermediate server.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.


A process for producing a porous ceramic, ceramic composite or metal-ceramic composite structure by combustion synthesis wherein a foamed polymer shape is impregnated with a slurry of ceramic precursors and ignited to initiate combustion synthesis, thereby obtaining a ceramic, ceramic composite or metal-ceramic composite article having interconnected porosity. Ceramic composite filters having improved strength, toughness and thermal shock resistance are provided, with the ceramic composite being an oxide and a nonoxide.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a process for producing a porous ceramic and porous ceramic composite structure having interconnected porosity, in particular a ceramic filter, which utilizes combustion synthesis, also known as self-propagating high temperature synthesis, thereby obviating a high temperature firing step required in the conventional process.
Ceramic filters are used for filtering undesirable particles from a molten metal before the metal is poured into a pattern or mold. Porous ceramic articles are also in use, e.g., as substrates for catalysts, removal of contaminants from exhaust gases, collecting impurities from highly corrosive acids and chemicals, in kiln furniture, or aerospace applications. Ceramic filters are also used as structural materials in low density load bearing structures.
2. Description of the Prior Art
U.S. Pat. No. 3,090,094, issued May 21, 1963 to K. Schwartzwalder et al, discloses a method of making an open-cell porous ceramic article which comprises immersing an open-cell spongy material, preferably polyurethane, in a slurry containing a ceramic coating material to coat cell-defining walls of the spongy material, removing excess slurry from the spongy material, and firing the coated spongy material at a temperature and for a time sufficient to remove the spongy material and form a hardened, vitrified structure. The ceramic coating material may include particulate zirconia, zircon, petalite, mullite, talc, silica and alumina, having particle sizes ranging from -80 mesh to -600 mesh. A binder such as clay, sodium silicate, and calcium aluminate and phosphoric acid, is preferably present in the slurry. Firing is conducted at 500.degree. to 3000.degree. F. (260.degree. to 1650.degree. C.), preferably at 2100.degree. to 2950.degree. F. (1150.degree. to 1620.degree. C.).
U.S. Pat. No. 3,097,930, issued Jul. 16, 1963 to I. J. Holland, discloses a method of making a porous shape of sintered refractory material which comprises impregnating a foamed plastic sponge shape with a suspension of refractory particles, drying the impregnated shape, and firing the dried shape in an inert atmosphere to volatilize the sponge material and to sinter the refractory particles. The impregnation and drying steps may be repeated. The foamed plastic sponge may be polystyrene, polyethylene, polyvinyl chloride, latex, or polyurethane, the latter being preferred. Refractory materials include clays, minerals, oxides, borides, carbides, silicides, nitrides and mixtures thereof. Specific examples used alumina, beryllia and china clay with particle sizes ranging from less than 1 to greater than 10 microns. Firing was conducted at 1700.degree. C. for alumina and 1350.degree. C. for china clay.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,697,632, issued Oct. 6, 1987 to N. G. Lirones, discloses a ceramic foam filter, insulating refractory lining, and a melting crucible, and a process for production thereof, which comprises providing an open-cell foam pattern, impregnating the pattern with a ceramic slurry, burning out the foam pattern at a temperature between 1400.degree. and 2200.degree. F. (760.degree. and 1205.degree. C.) to form a ceramic substrate, impregnating the ceramic substrate with additional ceramic slurry, and firing the impregnated ceramic substrate at a temperature of 2200.degree. to 3400.degree. F. (1205.degree. to 1870.degree. C.). The foam pattern material may be a flexible polyurethane, polyethylene, polypropylene or graphite. A suitable ceramic slurry contains from 1% to 20% silica (dry weight), and from 99% to 80% alumina (dry weight), with a viscosity between 5 and 20 seconds and a film weight between 1.0 and 8.0 grams per standard six inch square plate. Preferably the slurry includes a suspending agent, a wetting agent and a defoaming agent. Zirconia may also be used as ceramic material.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,111,396, issued Nov. 19, 1963 to B. B. Ball, discloses a method of making a porous metallic article which comprises impregnating a porous organic structure with a suspension of powdered metal, metal alloy or metal compound, and binder, slowly drying the impregnated structure, heating at about 300.degree.-500.degree. F. (150.degree.-260.degree. C.) to char the organic structure, and then heating at about 1900.degree. to about 3000.degree. F. (1040.degree. to 1650.degree. C.) to sinter the powder into a porous material.
Other United States patents relating to porous ceramic filters and methods for making them include:
______________________________________ 3,893,917 - July 8, 1975 - M. J. Pryor et al 3,947,363 - March 30, 1976 - M. J. Pryor et al 3,962,081 - June 8, 1976 - J. C. Yarwood et al 4,024,056 - May 17, 1977 - J. C. Yarwood et al 4,081,371 - March 28, 1978 - J. C. Yarwood et al 4,257,810 - March 24, 1981 - T. Narumiya 4,258,099 - March 24, 1981 - T. Narumiya 4,391,918 - July 5, 1983 - J. W. Brockmeyer ______________________________________
All these patents require firing the dried filter at high temperature in order to sinter the ceramic material.
"Simultaneous Preparation and Self-Sintering of Materials in the System Ti-B-C", J. W. McCauley et al, Ceramic Eng. & Sci. Proceedings, 3, 538-554 (1982), describes self-propagating high temperature synthesis (SHS) techniques using pressed powder mixtures of titanium and boron; titanium, boron and titanium boride (TiB.sub.2); and titanium and B.sub.4 C. Stoichiometric mixtures of titanium and boron were reported to react almost explosively (when initiated by a sparking apparatus) to produce porous, exfoliated structures. Reaction temperatures were higher than 2200.degree. C. Mixtures of titanium, boron and titanium boride reacted in a much more controlled manner, with the products also being very porous. Reactions of titanium with B.sub.4 C produced material with much less porosity. Particle size distribution of the titanium powder was found to have an important effect on the process, as was the composition of the mixtures. Titanium particle sizes ranging from about 1 to about 200 microns were used.
"Effects of Self-Propagating Synthesis Reactant Compact Character on Ignition, Propagation and Resultant Microstructure", R. W. Rice et al, Ceramic Eng. & Sci. Proceedings, 7, 737-749 (1986), describes SHS studies of reactions using titanium powders to produce TiC, TiB.sub.2, or TiC+TiB.sub.2. Reactant powder compact density was found to be a major factor in the rate of reaction propagation, with the maximum rate being at about 60.+-.10% theoretical density. Reactant particle size and shape were also reported to affect results, with titanium particles of 200 microns, titanium flakes, foil or wire either failing to ignite or exhibiting slower propagation rates. Particle size distribution of powdered materials (Al, B, C, Ti) ranged from 1 to 220 microns. Tests were attempted with composites of continuous graphite tows infiltrated with a titanium slurry, but delamination occurred. Tests with one or a few tows infiltrated with a titanium powder slurry (to form TiC plus excess Ti) were able to indicate a decrease in ignition propagation rates as the thermal conductivity of the environment around the reactants increases, leading to a failure to ignite when local heat losses are too high.
H. C. Yi et al, in Jour. Materials Science, 25, 1159-1168 (1990), review SHS of powder compacts and conclude that almost all the known ceramic materials can be produced by the SHS method for applications such as abrasives, cutting tools, polishing powders; elements for resistance heating furnaces; high temperature lubricants; neutron alternators; shape-memory alloys; steel melting additives; and electrodes for electrolysis of corrosive media. The need for considerable further research is acknowledged, and major disadvantages are pointed out.
This article further reports numerous materials produced by SHS and combustion temperatures for some of them, viz., borides, carbides, carbonitrides, nitrides, silicides, hydrides, intermetallics, chalcogenides, cemented carbides, and composites.
Combustion wave propagation rate and combustion temperature are stated to be dependent on stoichiometry of the reactants, pre-heating temperature, particle size and amount of diluent.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,459,363, issued Jul. 10, 1984 to J. B. Holt, discloses synthesis of refractory metal nitride particles by combustion synthesis of an alkali metal or alkaline earth metal azide with magnesium or calcium and an oxide of Group III-A, IV-A, III-B, or IV-B metals (e.g., Ti, Zr, Hf, B and Si), preferably in a nitrogen atmosphere.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,909,842, issued Mar. 20, 1990 to S. D. Dunmead et al, discloses the production of dense, finely grained composite materials comprising ceramic and metallic phases by self-propagating high temperature synthesis (SHS) combined with mechanical pressure applied during or immediately after the SHS reaction. The ceramic phase or phases may be carbides or borides of titanium, zirconium, hafnium, tantalum or niobium, silicon carbide, or boron carbide. Intermetallic phases may be aluminides of nickel, titanium or copper, titanium nickelides, titanium ferrides, or cobalt titanides. Metallic phases may include aluminum, copper, nickel, iron or cobalt. The final product has a density of at least about 95% of the theoretical density and comprises generally spherical ceramic grains not greater than about 5 microns in diameter in an intermetallic and/or metallic matrix. Interconnected porosity is not obtained in this product, nor does the process control porosity.
The well known thermit reaction involves igniting a mixture of powdered aluminum and ferric oxide in approximately stoichiometric proportions which reacts exothermically to produce molten iron and aluminum oxide.
The conventional process for producing porous ceramic filters and structural parts requires long soaking periods at very high temperatures. There are two serious disadvantages in this process: first, the energy consumption is high; secondly, soaking the ceramic foam (particularly larger structures) at very high temperature results in sagging and warping of the structure, thus losing dimensional tolerance. Moreover, the ceramic composition resulting from a conventional mixture of silica and alumina may not be capable of withstanding very high thermal shock, unless a cordierite phase (composed of silica, alumina and magnesia) is present.
There is therefore a definite need for an improved process for the production of porous ceramic structures, despite the numerous patents acknowledged above.
To the best of applicants' knowledge, there has been no suggestion in the prior art of the possibility of utilizing combustion synthesis techniques in the fabrication of porous ceramic structures involving the impregnation of a foamed polymer with ceramic precursors to obtain interconnected porosity.

Process for producing a porous ceramic and porous ceramic composite structure utilizing combustion synthesis


Plant protection device in the form of a weather protection extensible over the cultivation. The protection device including a framework (12) consisting of longitudinal and traverse support elements (13, 14) within which at least one waterproof foldable plant protection curtain (16) is extensible from a folded up position and vice versa. The invention also refers to a foldable curtain as a plant protection for cultivations, which curtain (16) has a high tensile strength in it's longitudinal and traverse directions and which via connectors (29) is hung up on a number of support lines (30) stretched across the curtain. The curtain is extensible from a folded up position to an extended position and vice versa, whereby the curtain includes a framework (18) consisting of strips or ribbons and/or lines. The curtain (16) is made of a waterproof laminate and is including relative to the curtain movable stretch or reinforcing lines (22) in essentially parallel rows stretching along the curtain's length. The curtain is provided with a device which in the extended position of the curtain form channels (36).

Until now greenhouses have traditionally been glass houses, that is, building frameworks of steel elements with glass mounted both on the sides and on the roof. The disadvantages of greenhouses of this type are that they are expensive to build, that it is too warm in them on sunny days, which requires temperature regulation measures, that their thermal insulation is very poor, which means that they require much heating in the winter, that they produce water condensation, that they do not lend themselves to large scale motorised working of the soil, etc. In recent years there are many cases where foldable greenhouse curtains have been mounted under saddle shaped greenhouse roofs. The greenhouse curtains can be used to regulate the amount of shadow and the temperature conditions and humidity to a certain extent.
Simple plant growing systems of the type described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,265,373 have been proposed which consist of pole constructions bound together on top by a framework which forms open horizontal or slightly sloping frame areas on which double foldable plant protection curtains are mounted so that the shadowing curtain can cover the whole frame area or leave it open. If frost protection is desired the shadowing curtain can be detached from the control cords and another curtain in the same frame area can be attached to them. If the shadowing curtain is perforated water cannot accumulate on it, but if the curtains are to serve as frost protection they must be waterproof. The problem is how to achieve water run off without formation of water pockets and how to support the weight of snow on a thin wire system. Solutions to these problems are not given in this document.
Through EP-A1-028 282 insulation for buildings in the form of halls, for example greenhouses, is known which consist of bubble films foldable in a zigzag pattern so that they can be used to insulate the inside of the glass roof or sides of the greenhouse as desired. The film is hung up via holders in wires and the opening width of the film folds can be regulated by changing the length of the spacers attached between the zigzag folds. Both in the bottom and in the upper part of the folds there are holes in the film for draining condensation water or for ventilating the multilayered film.
CA-A1-2,094,775 proposes a drainage system for retractable roofs in the form of membranes where wires have been drawn at even distances parallel to the roof ridges of the greenhouse to which the membranes lying on the roof trusses are attached with fasteners. This method of mounting the otherwise loose membranes means that they form a large number shell shaped depressions hung up at four points so that large amounts of water can accumulate, especially when the slope of the roof trusses is small.

Plant protection device with foldable waterproof plant protection curtain


An optical transducer for determining the presence or absence of liquid or the like in a reservoir includes a housing with a hollow interior and an optical probe that extends through the housing. The optical probe has a central axis, a proximal end positioned in the hollow interior and a distal end positioned outside of the housing. The distal end has first and second measurement surfaces that intersect at a transverse edge. The transverse edge extends at an acute angle with respect to the central axis. A light source is arranged for projecting radiant energy into the optical probe toward the distal end. A photosensor is arranged for detecting radiant energy reflected from the distal end to thereby detect the presence and absence of liquid on the optical probe.

This invention relates to optical transducers, and more particularly to optical transducers for detecting liquid level and the like.
FIGS. 1A-1C schematically depict a prior art optical transducer 10 for determining liquid level in tanks, vessels or the like. As shown, the transducer 10 includes an optical body 12 with a conical tip 14 at one end thereof, and a light source 16 and photosensor 18 at an opposite end thereof. In the absence of liquid as shown in FIG. 1A, light from the light source 16 is normally projected through the optical body 12 where it is internally reflected at a conical measuring surface 20 of the conical tip 14 and returns to the photosensor 18, as represented by arrow 22. When the conical tip 14 is submerged in liquid, as represented by dashed line 24 in FIG. 1B, the light is refracted out of the conical tip 14 and into the liquid (arrow 26). The amount of light at the photosensor 18 is thus significantly diminished. The presence or absence of liquid on the transducer 10, and thus the level of liquid in a tank, vessel or the like can be ascertained.
However, it has been found that liquid level transducers of above-described type can produce erroneous signals. As shown in FIG. 1C, when the liquid 24 descends to a level below the transducer 10, one or more liquid droplets 28 may form on the conical measuring surface 20 due to the surface tension of the liquid and the surface energy of the surface 20. Consequently, light is refracted out of the conical tip 14 and into the droplet(s) 28, as shown by arrow 26, to thereby give a false liquid level indication. This phenomena can occur whether the transducer 10 is in the horizontal position as shown, or in the vertical position.
In addition to the above, it has previously been difficult to construct a compact optical transducer that is capable of operating through a wide temperature range due to the relative proximity of the light source and photosensor to the liquid being measured.

Optical transducer for detecting liquid level


A transceiver for reducing a distortion component within a baseband receive signal is provided. The distortion component is caused by a baseband transmit signal. The transceiver includes a filter configured to filter the baseband transmit signal using a configurable transfer function to generate a modified baseband transmit signal. The configurable transfer function is based on a leakage component in the baseband receive signal, wherein the leakage component is caused by the baseband transmit signal. The transceiver further includes a processing unit configured to generate, based on the modified baseband transmit signal, an envelope signal representing the envelope of the modified baseband transmit signal. Moreover, the transceiver includes a combiner configured to combine the baseband receive signal and a signal related to the envelope signal.

In communication devices where a transmit path and a receive path share the same antenna, an intermediate device (e.g. a duplexer) may be provided to connect the transmit path and the receive path to the antenna. For example, a duplexer may separate different frequency bands used for transmission and reception of radio frequency signals by means of frequency-selective filter elements. For example, a first frequency band may be used by the transmit path for transmitting radio frequency signals, whereas a second frequency band may be used by the receive path for receiving radio frequency signals. A distance between a frequency band for transmission and a frequency band for reception is called "duplex distance". For example, a duplex distance may be 30 MHz for Long Term Evolution (LTE) frequency band 17. In particular, the transmit path and the receive path may be operated simultaneously, i.e., in Frequency-Division Duplexing (FDD) mode.
A duplexer should provide an adequate rejection of signal components related to transmission within a frequency band for reception. However, when a transmission signal is provided to the duplexer, leakage to the frequency band used for signal reception may occur. Thus, an undesired leakage component may be caused in a receive signal and yield significant transmit power in the receive signal. Accordingly, a signal containing a desired receive signal component and the undesired leakage component related to a baseband transmit signal may be provided to a subsequent receiver path of the transceiver which may even result with the desired receive signal component being unrecoverable.
InterModulation Distortions (IMD) may be generated by a receive path receiving a signal having different frequency components. For example, unwanted signal components may be present within a baseband receive signal generated by the receive path resulting from the non-linearity of the same. Referring to the above example, a second order non-linearity of the receive path may cause demodulation of the undesired leakage component into the baseband receive signal. In this event, the generated undesired signal components are referred to as second order IMD components. The second order IMD component consists substantially of the squared envelope of the undesired leakage component. The second order IMD components may lower a Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) of the baseband receive signal.
For Carrier Aggregation (CA), a transceiver may comprise a single receive path for each component carrier and multiple clock domains may be used in the receiving section of the transceiver (e.g. a dedicated local oscillator signal for a mixer of the respective receive path). Due to intermixing of frequencies from the multiple clock domains, a spur may occur at the mixer of a receive path. A spur is an undesired signal component occurring in addition to the dedicated local oscillator signal at an input of the mixer (e.g. due to crosstalk between the receive paths). Depending on the chosen carrier frequencies, the spur may have a frequency which is similar to a frequency of the undesired leakage component. Accordingly, the mixer may down-mix the undesired leakage component to the baseband due to the spur. The down-mixed leakage component may overlap with the down-mixed desired receive signal component and degrade the SNR of the baseband receive signal.
Hence, there may be a desire for reducing distortion components within a baseband receive signal.

Methods and transceivers for reducing a distortion component within a baseband receive signal


The present invention provides novel methods for the synthesis and isolation and purification of a peptide of interest (target peptide). In particular, the invention relates to peptide synthesis, isolation and purification methods that comprise use of penI fusion polypeptides and related gene fusion constructs that encode such polypeptides.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a novel method for synthesis, isolation and purification of peptides. More particularly, the invention relates to penI fusion polypeptides, peptide synthesis, isolation and purification methods that comprise use of penI fusion polypeptides, and related gene fusion constructs that code for such penI fusion polypeptides.
2. Background
Recombinant DNA methods are employed to produce a variety of peptides. Recombinant DNA technology includes expression of a gene, either synthesized or isolated, to produce a peptide of interest. In brief, a desired DNA sequence is ligated into a cloning vector such as a plasmid. A host cell such as E. coli, is transformed with the cloning vector and the transformed host is then cultivated under conditions suitable for expression of the peptide coded for by the DNA sequence. The thus produced proteins are then isolated from the culture medium and typically must be purified. For example, the expressed peptide is often secreted by the host cells into the culture medium and the peptide must be separated from the culture medium and other material in that medium such as cell waste products, other peptides, etc.
Peptides also may be produced by chemical synthesis techniques, although in many applications a chemical synthetic approach may be less preferred than a recombinant procedure. For example, peptides greater than about forty or fifty amino acids in length often cannot be chemically synthesized in acceptable yields. Further, purification of relatively large chemically synthesized peptides often can be more burdensome than corresponding recombinant peptides.
A number of methods have been reported to isolate and purify proteins, including peptides produced by chemical synthesis or recombinant DNA techniques. For example, known purification methods include centrifugation, column chromatography and electrophoresis. While these methods can produce a purified peptide, they each require one or more additional and often burdensome purification steps after initial purification of the peptide. Moreover, in many current isolation and purification procedures, a significant amount of the crude peptide is lost during the procedure resulting in reduced yields.
In certain prior peptide isolation and purification schemes, hybrid or fusion polypeptides have been employed. These approaches have generally provided construction of a gene fusion that codes for a polypeptide that contains a peptide of interest linked to a peptide that exhibits specific binding characteristics not exhibited by the peptide of interest.
These prior fusion peptide methods present notable shortcomings including low yields of purified protein as well as multiple step isolation and purification protocols. For example, in EP 0244147 a fusion polypeptide is described that contains a beta-galactosidase moiety linked to a desired peptide through a renin cleavage site. To isolate and purify the desired peptide, the fusion polypeptide is adsorbed to an affinity matrix and, after eluting to remove other proteins, renin is added to the bound complex to cleave the fusion polypeptide and release the peptide of interest while the beta-galactosidase remains bound to the matrix. In a still further step the isolated peptide is purified by anion exchange chromatography.
It thus would be desirable to have new and simple methods for the synthesis and purification of peptides, particularly peptides produced by recombinant means. It would be further desirable to have such new methods that enable convenient isolation and purification of a desired peptide in a single step, particularly without significant reduction in yields.

Peptide synthesis and purification by fusion to penI protein or precipitation effective portion thereof


A system and method for aggregating and tracking content is described. In one aspect, a computer-implemented method includes forming a consolidated graphical user interface that tracks activities related to a project identifier. The project identifier identifies aggregated content. A project search query is received on the consolidated graphical user interface. The system identifies the project identifier based on the project search query, and presents at least one of a content item, a file, a folder, a user identifier, a user message, a meeting identifier, and a website identifier associated with the project identifier. The system registers selected items with the project identifier with a user of the consolidated graphical user interface, and forms the aggregated content assigned to the project identifier and to the user based on the registered selection.

The subject matter disclosed herein generally relates to a special-purpose machine that generates a consolidated graphical user interface that suggests and tracks different types of objects. Specifically, the present disclosure addresses systems and methods for identifying dynamic content from multiple sources and tracking the dynamic content in a consolidated graphical user interface.
A document authoring application (e.g., Microsoft Word™ or any application from Microsoft Office™) is typically used to author a document and provides the user with a list of recent files accessed by the document authoring application. The list of recent files may not be always be relevant to the user. As such, the user may have to manually search through folders to identify content from previously generated documents that may be relevant to the document currently present in the document authoring application.


The present invention has an object to provide a photoelectric conversion device which can be manufactured through a simple manufacturing process, achieve photoelectric conversion over a wide range of wavelength regions, and attain high photoelectric conversion efficiency even in the infrared wavelength region, a photodetection device, and a photodetection method. This photoelectric conversion device 1 includes a substrate 2 containing single crystalline titanium dioxide, adhesion layers 2c formed on a surface 2a of the substrate 2, metal microstructure bodies 3, each of which has a volume of 1,000 nm3 or more and 3,000,000 nm3 or less, arranged at predetermined intervals in a predetermined direction on surfaces of the adhesion layers 2c, a container 4 for containing an electrolyte solution L in an arrangement region of the metal microstructure bodies 3 on the surface 2a of the substrate 2, a conductive layer 7 formed on a rear surface 2b of the substrate 2, and a counter electrode 5 in contact with the electrolyte solution L in the container 4; and the metal microstructure bodies 3 adhere onto the substrate 2 through the adhesion layers 2c, a Schottky barrier is formed at an interface of the substrate 2 with the metal microstructure bodies 3, and photoelectric conversion is carried out for light in an infrared region by utilizing a plasmon resonance phenomenon.

Currently, a silicon solar cell is widely utilized as one kind of photoelectric conversion device. Photoelectric conversion efficiency of a silicon solar cell has a logical limit of approximately 30%, and this is not such highly efficient energy conversion. This results from the following reasons: (i) near-infrared light whose wavelength is longer than a band edge of silicon (equivalent to wavelength of 1100 nm) does not contribute to photoelectric conversion, (ii) light whose wavelength is shorter than 1100 nm, although absorbed by silicon, is mostly not utilized in photoelectric conversion but converted into heat because of energy relaxation. In order to address the above two problems, it is required to create a photoelectric conversion system that realizes effective utilization of energy in all wavelength regions of the solar spectrum.
So far, for the purpose of effective utilization of solar energy, various developments have been made such as a dye-sensitized solar cell and a tandem solar cell using laminated semiconductors each of which has a different band gap. Such a photoelectric conversion device has been known in which titanium dioxide particles are deposited on a transparent electrode, onto which metal particles are applied and absorbed (see Non Patent Literature 1), and this device realizes photoelectric conversion in the visible light region.
Patent Literature 2 discloses that particles of platinum or palladium are so added to a dye-sensitized solar cell using titanium dioxide as to increase the absorption rate of dye made of ruthenium complex, thereby enhancing photoelectric conversion efficiency.
Meanwhile, various studies have been made on a scheme using titanium dioxide particles with silver or gold particles. Non Patent Literature 1 describes that titanium dioxide particles and gold nanoparticles are used to induce an electron transfer reaction on titanium dioxide particles, so as to realize photoelectric conversion in the visible light region. Non Patent Literature 2 describes that, using titanium dioxide and silver nanoparticles, photocatalysis and photocurrent corresponding to the plasmon band are observed in visible light. In Non Patent Literature 3, a surface photo-voltage (SPV) and a surface photo-current (SPC) in the anatase-type TiO2 particles with which gold is doped are measured so as to analyze charge separation and recombination processes. Patent Literature 1 discloses that a metal surface having a fine projection structure (in a form such as pyramid, stick, cuneiform, dendrite or spherical) is irradiated with light, so that plasmon absorption occurs, in which the irradiation light is absorbed into the metal due to the plasmon resonance, and electrons comes into a higher energy state and are extracted into a semiconductor layer, thereby achieving photoelectric conversion.
Among solar cells utilizing semiconductor substrates made of silicon or the like, it has been studied how to achieve efficient photoelectric conversion at the band edge, using a solar cell basically having PN junctions of semiconductors on which gold nanoparticles or nanostructures are arranged (Non Patent Literature 7, Non Patent Literature 8 and Non Patent Literature 9).

Photoelectric conversion device, light detecting device, and light detecting method

NATIONAL UNIVERSITY CORPORATION HOKKAIDO UNIVERSITY


An electronic device includes a main body, a battery and a battery latching assembly mounted on the main body. The main body defines a receiving space to receive the battery. A first magnetic member is positioned in a portion of the battery. The battery latching assembly includes a second magnetic member and a resilient member. The second magnetic member is opposite to the first magnetic member. The resilient member resists the second magnetic member.

1. Technical Field
The present disclosure generally relates to an electronic device, and more particularly, to an electronic device with a removable battery.
2. Description of Related Art
A typical mobile phone includes a main body and a battery mounted on the main body. People usually take their mobile phones with them wherever they go. And so the phones may be subject to a lot of vibrations and impact from being stored loosely in a briefcase or purse, or dropped by accident. During the times of vibration and impact the battery may become loose in its compartment and the battery or the parts in and around the battery may be damaged or wear out more quickly.
Therefore, there is room for improvement within the art.


Cross color from composite television signals is suppressed by averaging baseband chrominance samples spaced a certain number of frames apart, or when motion is detected in the television signals, by averaging baseband chrominance samples spaced a certain number of lines apart. Cross color suppression when motion is detected may be improved by low-pass filtering the line-spaced chrominance sample average. Both NTSC and PAL implementations are presented.

In composite video television systems such as NTSC and PAL, luminance and chrominance information share a portion of the total signal bandwidth. In NTSC, for example, chrominance information is encoded on a subcarrier of 3.579545 MHz. Within the chrominance band which extends from roughly 2.3 MHz to 4.2 MHz, both the chrominance and luminance spectra are intermingled.
A television decoder extracts both luminance spectral information and chrominance spectral information from the composite signal; however, a simple conventional television decoder cannot discern which of the higher frequency components are luminance information and which are chrominance information. As a result, these decoders generate incorrect chrominance information based upon the luminance spectrum. The term "cross color" refers to corruption of the chrominance spectrum caused by the misinterpretation of high-frequency luminance information as chrominance information. Conversely, the term "cross luminance" refers to corruption of the luminance spectrum by the misinterpretation of chrominance information as high-frequency luminance information.
Cross color is more apparent for certain images. For example, a tweed jacket of a television announcer may cause a television decoder to incorrectly produce a lot of shiny chrominance information. As another example, large vertical or substantially vertical transitions are often accompanied by bands of red and green color like a rainbow along the edge of the transitions.
Historically, it has not been very important to go to great lengths to reduce cross color because television screens were small and not very bright. But because screens are becoming larger and brighter, and because various picture enhancement techniques such as line doubling which eliminate a lot of other artifacts are becoming more common place, cross color is becoming much more noticeable and very objectionable. It has become very important to reduce cross color more efficiently. Examples of decoders in the prior art which incorporate some form of more intelligent cross color suppression schemes are set forth in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,179,705, 4,240,105, 4,706,112, and 4,864,389.
Prior art methods reduce cross color by operating upon chrominance information encoded on the chrominance subcarrier prior to demodulation into baseband chrominance information. These methods typically incorporate cross color suppression into the decoding process, focusing on improving the separation of the chrominance and luminance information to reduce both cross color and cross luminance.
A primitive technique in the prior art teaches separating chrominance and luminance using a combination of a notch filter passing lower-frequency spectral components as luminance information and a high-frequency bandpass filter (BPF) passing higher-frequency spectral components as chrominance information. The chrominance information is subsequently quadrature-demodulated into two components such as, for example, I and Q information, or R-Y and B-Y information. The luminance and the two chrominance components are matrixed together to generate the Red, Green, and Blue (RGB) signals needed to drive conventional analog television display systems. In NTSC systems using a BPF from about 2.3 to about 4.5 MHz, all higher-frequency luminance information is passed together with the chrominance information. Cross color is very heavy.
A better approach uses comb filters to separate chrominance and luminance. The comb filter exploits the fact that, in most color television systems, luminance energy in the vicinity of the chrominance subcarrier is most probably located near harmonics of the line scanning frequency, say 15 kHz, while chrominance information is located between the luminance information. The sidebands of the luminance and chrominance information will usually overlap somewhat.
The comb filter typically has two response characteristics: one response for the luminance path and a second response for the chrominance path. This technique for separating luminance and chrominance is superior to the primitive technique described above, but it works well only when the luminance information is concentrated around harmonics of the line scanning frequency, or when the luminance information is of a vertical nature. As a result, this technique works well for vertical bars, for example, but it does not work very well for diagonal bars which cause both the chrominance and luminance spectra to spread and mix, thereby causing cross color.
Comb filter decoding of diagonal bars can be improved by filtering in the time domain using frame memory rather than filtering in the line domain using line memory. The technique is applicable to various video standards such as NTSC and PAL.
The prior art also teaches reducing cross color by averaging chrominance information across successive frames or lines using comb filters or by recirculation of frame, field, or line periods of chrominance information. As mentioned above, such techniques are generally combined with the process of decoding or separating luminance information and chrominance information prior to demodulation of the chrominance information into the baseband domain. The averaging coefficients and the recirculation coefficients are typically adapted in response to the presence of vertical transitions or motion in the television picture to prevent blurring of chrominance information in either the vertical or the temporal domains. Examples of averaging and recirculation techniques are discussed more fully in U.S. Pat. No. 4,443,817 which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.
In NTSC systems, for example, the chrominance subcarrier phase rotates by 180 degrees between successive frames. This rotation causes luminance information to be misinterpreted as chrominance information which oscillates between two complementary colors such as red and green; that is, the luminance appears to be spectral energy which oscillates between two colors represented by chrominance information 180 degrees out of phase with each other. By averaging the chrominance information in two successive frames, the out-of-phase cross color information cancels thereby allowing chrominance information to be obtained which is free of cross color; however, this technique only works when the picture is stationary. When one or more objects in the picture image are moving, the amount of one-to-one correlation between luminance information in successive frames is so low that cross color suppression is difficult to do and expensive to implement. Therefore, comb filtering in the time domain does not suppress cross color very well for pictures containing objects in motion.
Cross color suppression in the prior art is difficult to accomplish in applications such as home video cassette recorders in which no stable clock or timing signal is available. In such recorders, for example, the chrominance subcarrier and the frame synchronization signal are independent; the frequencies of these two signals are allowed to vary independently. There is a need, therefore, to provide for cross color suppression without relying upon any particular clock or timing signal.
In addition, cross color suppression is very desirable in applications where only demodulated baseband chrominance information is available, especially where demodulation was performed without much regard for suppressing cross color. In such applications, for practical reasons, cross color suppression must be performed in the baseband domain.

Television cross color suppression and chrominance noise reduction


An apparatus for correcting positional deviation of the light source emitting light beams in an image recording apparatus is disclosed which corrects change of the image size (dimensions of the image) on the photosensitive member due to positional deviations of beam spots on the photosensitive member on account of physical distortions caused by external vibration, temperature change, and the like. Changes in the diameter of detective light beams are measured by photodetecting portions 5.sub.R and 5.sub.L and piezoelectric devices 6a and 6b are driven based on the results of the detection, whereby the semiconductor laser array 1 is moved so that the multiplication b/a for the image size may be kept constant.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus for correcting positional deviation of the light source emitting light beams in an image recording apparatus and, more particularly, to an apparatus for correcting positional deviation of the light source emitting light beams in an image recording apparatus configured to prevent occurrence of variation in dimensions of an image (hereinafter, briefly called "image size") on the photosensitive member in the main scanning direction and in the sub-scanning direction.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is an image recording apparatus which has an array of two-dimensional surface light emitting devices disposed in confrontation with a photosensitive drum through an optical system and allows the light emitting devices of the array of two-dimensional surface light emitting devices to be individually driven in accordance with an image signal, so that light beams corresponding to the image signal are emitted from the light emitting devices and the photosensitive drum rotating in the sub-scanning direction is scanned by the emitted light beams through the optical system and exposed to the same and, thereby, an electrostatic latent image is formed on the photosensitive drum. Such an image recording apparatus has come to be paid attention as the one capable of carrying out high quality and high density image recording at high speeds.
In such an image recording apparatus, need for using a polygon mirror for deflecting the light beams in the main scanning direction can be eliminated and, hence, high speed image recording can be attained. Further, by achieving high-density arrangement of the light emitting devices in the array of two-dimensional surface light emitting devices and devising a better optical system, it is expected that higher quality and higher density of the recorded image will become obtainable.
However, according to the conventional image recording apparatus, since the array of two-dimensional surface light emitting devices, optical system, photosensitive drum, and the like are fixed within a housing, when they are subjected to external vibration or temperature change, physical distortions are produced on them, whereby the positions of the beam spots produced on the photosensitive drum are deviated and the quality of the image is deteriorated. Especially when the array of two-dimensional surface light emitting devices is shifted in the direction of the optical axis or in another direction or it is tilted in a certain direction, all the light emitting devices are deviated from their right positions. Accordingly, the size of the image on the photosensitive drum in the main scanning direction and sub-scanning direction is varied and the quality of the image is deteriorated. In such a case, light emitting devices located at the extreme ends on both sides of the array of two-dimensional surface light emitting devices are greatly affected and their positional deviations put together changes the image size considerably.

Apparatus for correcting positional deviation of light source emitting light beams in image recording apparatus


A Ti:sapphire-pumped intracavity-doubled optical parametric oscillator generates up to 240 mW of sub100 femtosecond pulses tunable in the visible. The OPO consists of a 1.5 mm thick KTP crystal configured in a ring cavity which is synchronously pumped by a self-mode-locked Ti:sapphire laser. Intracavity doubling of the OPO is accomplished by inserting a .beta.-barium borate crystal into an additional focus in the OPO cavity. Continuous tuning of the second harmonic signal from 580 to 657 nm is obtained, with a potential tuning range being approximately 500 to 800 nm.

The present invention relates, in general, to an improved titanium-sapphire (Ti:S) pumped optical parametric oscillator, and more particularly to a high power, high repetition rate, intracavity-doubled optical parametric oscillator capable of producing femtosecond pulses tunable in the visible range.
Since the first demonstration of a high-repetition-rate femtosecond optical parametric oscillator (OPO), which was pumped intracavity by a colliding-pulse mode-locked dye laser there has been considerable interest in the further development of such devices. See, for example, D.C. Edelstein et al, Applied Physics Letters 54, page 1728 (1989); E.S. Wachman et al, Optics Letters 15, page 136 (1990); and E.S. Wachman et al, Journal of Applied Physics 70, page 1893 (1991). As a result of this interest, laser pulses in the femtosecond (fs) time domain have become important tools for studying extremely short duration events such as chemical reactions, for by directing femtosecond pulses at reacting chemicals, for example, researchers can capture spectroscopic information about the structure and behavior of short-lived molecular intermediates of the reactions. Femtosecond lasers, which have pulse widths of from 10.sup.-15 to 10.sup.-13 seconds, are also important for studying the dynamics and ultimate limits of high-speed semiconductor electronic and optical devices.
As pointed out in co-pending application Ser. No. 07/880,656 of Pelouch et al, filed May 11, 1992 and assigned to the assignee of the present application, a lack of suitable laser pump sources initially hampered the development of devices capable of operating with short pulses, high repetition rates and high output power. However, the high peak power at the intracavity focus of a colliding-pulse mode-locked dye laser was exploited to develop the first femtosecond optical parametric oscillator, described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,017,806. This resulted in pulses having widths of about 105 fs, with a pulse repetition rate of about 80 MHz at approximately 3 mW output power. Others resorted to Q-switched and mode-locked lasers to pulse an OPO to produce pulses having a duration of 160 to 260 fs at 4.5 mW average power. The above-mentioned '656 application improved on such devices through the use of an externally pumped, self-mode-locked Ti:S laser for producing high power, high repetition rate femtosecond pulses over a broadly tunable range from about 1.0 .mu.m to about 2.75 .mu.m. The Ti:S OPO of that application offers several desirable operating characteristics such as high output power, extensive tunability, nearly transform-limited pulses as short as 57 fs, excellent stability and low amplitude noise. However, there is still a need for an improved tunable source of optical pulses that can operate with a high average output power, short pulse widths, and which is tunable over a range of wavelengths to produce output light which has a shorter wavelength than such prior devices.

Intracavity-doubled tunable optical parametric oscillator


A wind turbine blade may include a plurality of longitudinal composite members each having a fiber and resin layer around a predetermined cross-sectional shape and each comprising at least one longitudinal outer surface and at least one longitudinal mounting surface, each of the outer surfaces of the plurality of longitudinal composite members corresponding to a different portion of a desired airfoil shape, the plurality of longitudinal composite members assembled such that the outer surfaces of the composite members form at least a majority of the airfoil shape. An outer skin may be provided. The composite members may be made up of transportable segments. A method of assembly may include transporting the segments to a desired location such as an installation site for assembly of the wind turbine blade at the installation site.

The present invention is a composite wind turbine blade construction and a method for manufacturing the same. Wind turbines convert kinetic energy in the wind into electrical energy. A typical wind turbine configuration is a three-bladed Horizontal Axis Wind Turbine (HAWT). Turbines of this configuration typically have a rotor with three wind blades with aerodynamic profiles attached to a central hub or rotor. The rotational axis of the rotor is approximately horizontally positioned and movable to be approximately aligned with the direction of the wind. Wind passing over the surfaces of the wind blades generates lift, which the rotor assembly converts to torque. The rotor is connected to a driveshaft extending through the front end of a nacelle, or enclosure. In certain wind turbine designs, a gearbox inside the nacelle increases the angular velocity of the rotation of an output shaft that drives an electrical generator converting the rotary motion into electricity. In alternative wind turbine designs, the driveshaft may operate a hydraulic pump or other hydraulic system to drive the electrical generator. The nacelle and rotor assembly is typically supported by a tower.
The efficiency and cost effectiveness of a HAWT depends in part on the average wind velocity and the area swept by the wind blades as the rotor rotates. As the area swept by the wind blades changes with the length of the blades, the length of commercial wind blades has increased. For higher wind velocity locations, longer wind blades may provide an increased return on investment. For lower wind velocity locations, longer wind blades may be required to provide a commercially viable investment.
Desirable locations for wind turbines are those with high average wind velocities. As the demand for wind power has increased many of the most accessible high average wind velocity locations have been utilized. Continuing demand has made more remote locations attractive despite lack of infrastructure to support transportation of wind turbine components, transport and operation of erection equipment, ongoing maintenance operations and access to existing electrical grids. Consequently, accessible locations with lower average wind velocities are also becoming commercially desirable as demand for wind power increases. The need to effectively utilize remote high average wind velocity locations and accessible lower average wind velocity locations increases the need for longer, larger wind blades.
In the past, the length of the wind blades has been limited by the capabilities of the structure and materials to support the weight of the blades and to withstand static and dynamic loads in service. Additionally, the breadth of the wind blades increases with the increase in length. Longer, wider blades require more material, which increases the weight of the wind blades. The length, breadth and weight increases impose constraints on transportation. In particular, overall dimensions for transport are limited by the quality of access roads, the clearance height of overhead obstructions on the transport path and weight limits on bridges. Transport constraints increase the need for blades of lighter weight materials and blades that can be transported in pieces and/or fabricated on-site while material capabilities drive a concomitant need for higher strength structures and materials.
Typical of many prior composite wind blades is a construction of a box spar assembly having shear webs forming the sides and spar caps forming the upper and lower surfaces. Skin halves are affixed to the upper and lower surfaces and joined at the leading and trailing edges of the wind blade. Thin composite materials in the shear webs, spar caps and skins over lightweight core materials such as balsa or foam materials yield high strength, light weight structures. This prior construction requires molds to form the skin halves. These molds are large, expensive, and subject to the same transportation constraints discussed above, rendering this construction method uneconomical for on-site fabrication of wind blades. Variations of prior methods employing multiple-piece shear web/spar cap spar assemblies and multiple piece skin segments have been proposed.
An alternate prior wind blade construction uses a composite tubular spar affixed to skin halves. Additional shear webs have been used with this construction. However, this construction is subject to the same constraints and economies as conventional shear webs/spar caps/skins construction.
Multiple-piece wind blades where each piece contains core structure and outer skins in a completed subassembly have been proposed for simplified transport and on-site assembly. However, the joints between blade segments of the prior multiple-piece wind blades can be weak points relative to the required service loads. Strengthening of the joints increases material weight and incurs additional ongoing monitoring and maintenance requirements for the blade structure. Additionally, the joints typically are exposed to the environment and prone to wear from the environment, wind-borne particles, and other damage.
Prior one-piece wind blades have attempted to include higher strength fibers in the spars and skins, utilize bend-twist coupled composite structures to reduce lift in extreme wind load conditions, and various static and dynamic aerodynamic modifications to the wind blade surfaces. Additionally, wind blade manufacturers in the past have provided a limited range of fixed wind blade configurations to minimize engineering time and costs, manufacturing tooling and equipment, and to minimize testing for validation. Each configuration was designed to service the widest possible range of wind regimes. As a result, the prior wind turbine blades were rarely optimized to the wind conditions to be experienced by each specific wind turbine installation and not cost efficient for all installations. There remains a need for a wind turbine blade that is efficiently transported and provides efficient and cost effective service over a range of blade lengths and wind regimes. There further remains a need for the capability to optimize the structural properties of a wind blade configuration to a specific installation without resulting in expensive engineering and manufacturing changes.
A wind turbine blade is disclosed comprising a plurality of longitudinal composite members each having a fiber and resin layer around a predetermined cross-sectional shape and each comprising at least one longitudinal outer surface and at least one longitudinal mounting surface, each of the outer surfaces of the plurality of longitudinal composite members corresponding to a different portion of a desired airfoil shape, the plurality of longitudinal composite members assembled such that the outer surfaces of the composite members form at least a majority of the airfoil shape. The mounting surface of one longitudinal composite member may be positioned opposite the mounting surface of an adjacent longitudinal composite member with a fiber and resin layer there between.
The fiber and resin layer of the longitudinal composite members may include a braided sleeve comprising fibers selected from a group consisting of glass fiber, carbon fiber, and a combination thereof. The braided sleeve may comprise fibers having a bias angle in one direction less than the bias angle in the other direction. Alternatively or additionally, the fiber and resin layer of the longitudinal composite members may include a triaxial braided sleeve. The fiber layer of the longitudinal composite members may comprise axial features capable of intermeshing with an adjacent fiber layer in the assembly.
An outer skin may be positioned over the assembly of longitudinal composite members, the outer skin comprising a fiber and resin layer. The fiber in the fiber and resin layer of the outer skin may comprise a continuous, contoured braided sleeve.
The wind turbine blade may include at least one of the plurality of longitudinal composite members having a variable cross section along its length. Alternatively or in addition, each of the longitudinal composite members may comprise a plurality of segments joined end to end. Segments of the longitudinal composite members may be less than about 40 feet in length. In one example, at least one of the segments comprises a constant cross sectional shape along its length.
Also disclosed is a method of manufacturing a wind turbine blade comprising providing a plurality of longitudinal composite members each having a fiber layer around a predetermined cross-sectional shape and comprising at least one longitudinal outer surface and at least one longitudinal mounting surface, each of the outer surfaces of the plurality of longitudinal composite members corresponding to a different portion of a desired airfoil shape, and assembling the plurality of longitudinal composite members such that the outer surfaces of the composite members form a least a majority of the airfoil shape. The method may comprise providing an outer skin over the assembly of longitudinal composite members comprising a fiber and resin layer.
The method may include, prior to the step of assembling the plurality of longitudinal composite members, infusing resin into the fiber layer around each longitudinal composite member, and curing the resin.
In the method, the step of assembling the plurality of longitudinal composite members may comprise infusing resin into the fiber layer around each longitudinal composite member, then assembling the longitudinal composite members such that the mounting surface of one longitudinal composite member is opposite the mounting surface of an adjacent longitudinal composite member with a fiber and resin layer there between, and curing the resin.
The step of providing a plurality of longitudinal composite members may include over-braiding the fiber layer around the predetermined cross-sectional shape.
Where each of the longitudinal composite members comprises a plurality of segments, the method may further comprise the step of assembling the segments to form the plurality of longitudinal composite members. Additionally, prior to the step of assembling the plurality of longitudinal composite members, the method may include the steps of transporting the plurality of segments to a desired location, and assembling the segments to form the plurality of longitudinal composite members at the desired location. The method may comprise providing an outer skin over the assembly of longitudinal composite members comprising a fiber and resin layer.
A kit for making a wind turbine blade may comprise a plurality of segments adapted to be joined end to end to form longitudinal composite members, each having a fiber layer around a predetermined cross-sectional shape and comprising at least one outer surface, each of the outer surfaces of the plurality of longitudinal composite members corresponding to a different portion of a desired airfoil shape, the plurality of longitudinal composite members capable of being assembled such that the outer surfaces of the composite members form at least a majority of the airfoil shape.
The kit may include a fiber layer adapted for enveloping the longitudinal composite members after assembly for forming an outer skin comprising a fiber and resin layer. The fiber layer may be a continuous, contoured braided sleeve.
The longitudinal composite members may be adapted to be assembled by infusing resin into the fiber layer around each of the plurality of longitudinal composite members.
The above summary is not intended to describe each embodiment or every implementation of the present invention. A more complete understanding of the invention and its advantages will become apparent by referring to the following detailed description and claims in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.

Composite wind turbine blade and method for manufacturing same


A tire for mounting on rim with hump in which each bead:. a) contains a main wire, around which the carcass fabric is wound, and a secondary wire placed outside the carcass fabric; PA1 b) the inner diameter of the main wire after mounting on the rim is greater than the diameter of the top of the hump, and its maximum elastic elongation is at most equal to 1.5%; PA1 c) before mounting on the rim, the outer diameter of the secondary wire is less than the inner diameter of the main wire; after mounting on the rim, the inner diameter of the secondary wire is less than the diameter of the top of the hump; the inner diameter of the secondary wire after mounting on the rim is 1.5 to 3% greater than the inner diameter of the secondary wire before mounting on the rim and the maximum elastic elongation of the secondary wire is at least 3%.

The present invention relates to tires and, more particularly to a tire having two wires in each bead.
It is known to provide tires with two bead wires in order to avoid rotation of the tire on the rim or to prevent loosening of the bead of the tire on a pressure loss. Such embodiments are described, for example, in EP-A 168,754 and in JP-A 5,178,033.
The tire according to EP-A 168,754 is intended to be mounted on a rim, at least one bead seat of which is axially extended inward by an axial retention projection (called hump). The bead of that tire contains two wires, one of which is close to the toe of the bead, toward the inside of the tire, and the other ensures locking of the first in case of strong axial stresses. The two wires are preferably integrated by a carcass fabric to improve that cooperation. The resistance to loosening is therefore due essentially to the action of the second wire on the first, and the anti-loosening action is not always sufficient.
JP-A 5,178,033 describes a secondary wire applied against the rim, under a main wire or beside the main wire, in order to improve radial uniformity by avoiding eccentricity defects. That requirement is not involved in the problems of loosening.

Compagnie Generale des Etablissements Michelin - Michelin & Cie


A method and apparatus are provided for managing a bad run-time block in a multi-level cell flash memory. The apparatus includes a buffer-allotting module which allots a buffer in which data programmed in a least significant bit (LSB) of a cell is temporarily stored, a data-copying module which copies the data programmed in the LSB of the cell to the allotted buffer, and a bad-block-managing module which programs the copied data to a free block if a program error occurs in a page of the cell.

1. Field of the Invention
Apparatuses and methods consistent with the present invention relate to managing a bad run-time block in a multi-level cell (MLC) flash memory, and more particularly, to managing a bad run-time block in an MLC flash memory.
2. Description of the Related Art
Flash memories are widely used in mobile digital devices such as mobile phones, personal data assistants (PDAs), MP3 players, navigation devices, and digital cameras, and as a result there is an increasing demand for low-cost flash memories.
Current flash memories are a single level cell (SLC) NAND in which each cell can contain one bit of information. However, the use of an MLC NAND flash memory in which each cell can contains information various bits, which is superior to SLC flash memory in price and capacity, is increasing.
For example, in a SLC flash memory, a single cell can express the information "1" or "0", and in a two-level MLC flash memory, a single cell can express the information "00", "01", "11".
In addition, the MLC flash memory can express a variety of bit information on a cell in a bit split manner and in a page slit manner.
The MLC flash memory having the bit split manner can indicate the information on a variety of bits in the same page by using a single cell, and the MLC flash memory having the page split manner can indicate the information on the bits in several pages by using a single cell.
The flash memory can convert the cell status through an erase and program operation. If the cell status is not changed, an error is generated.
For reference, the term "program" used in the exemplary embodiments of the present invention, refers to the conversion of the bit information (from "0" to "1" or from "1" to "0") expressed in a cell in the MLC flash memory. Also, an error that occurs due to deletion or a program error can be discovered by reading the status register of a flash memory.
When the error mentioned above occurs, the MLC flash memory having a page split manner programs a specific page included in a cell, so that other page included in the identical cell can be influenced.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating configuration of a flash memory in the related art.
The flash memory can be divided into a user partition 110 and a reserved partition 120 which will substitute for a bad block 111 generated in the user partition 110. When a bad block 111c is generated in the specific block of the user partition 110, it is divided into a block-management module 130 which substitutes the corresponding bad block 111c with a free block of the reserved partition 120 and data buffer 140 which stores the data.
For example, in case of the MLC having a page split manner which allows two bits of information to be included in a cell, a page 4N+0 (111a) and a page 4N+2 (111c) are included in the same cell. Therefore, if a program error occurs while programming the page 4N+2 (111c), data of the 4N+0 (111a) can be damaged.
The block wherein an error has occurred due to the program error is changed into a bad run-time block.
For reference, the page 4N+0 (111a) is called an LSB page in a cell, and the page 4N+2 (111c) is called an MSB page in a cell.
In addition, in case of the MLC flash memory, a number of partial programs (NOP) is limited to one, and an order of page program in a block should be performed from the smaller number to the greater one.
The bad block may be generated by a program error or deletion error.
If the bad block 111 caused by a program error occurs in the user partition 110 illustrated in FIG. 1, a block-management module 130 selects a free block 121 which was not used in a reservation partition 120 and copies all data in the bad block 111 to the free block 121 in a page unit.
After the page 111c, in which a program error of the bad block 111 has occurred, is copied, the corresponding data stored in data buffer 140 is additionally copied to the free block 121. That is, a situation where the same page is copied twice in the free block 121 can occur.
The MLC flash memory having a page split manner can indicate several pages with a single cell. Therefore, other page included in the cell may be influenced if the specific page included in the cell is programmed. In addition, since the NOP of the MLC flash memory is limited to "1", the data trust cannot be secured.

Method and apparatus for managing bad run-time block in MLC flash memory


The invention provides an image processing system which can give different securities to data of respective receivers with a simple operation and, in this case, which can realize shortening of time for communication to a destination and suppression of use of memory resources. A plurality of regions preset in image data are related to destinations, code data constituting one of regions corresponding to the destinations or the other regions is replaced with code data which make pieces of information included in the regions invisible in the JPEG2000 file transmitted to the destinations, and the JPEG2000 file after the replacing process is transmitted to the destinations.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing system which can process a JPEG2000 file.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a conventional case in which information data is transmitted between devices on a network, various techniques have been devised in order to secure the security of transmitted information. For example, Japanese Patent laid-open Publication No. 2001-51905 discloses a technique in which setting for permission or inhibition of reference of a document is performed for each receiver on a transmitter. For example, Japanese Patent laid-open Publication No. 2002-218147 discloses a technique in which a document file is transmitted in a file format predetermined for each receiver.
However, in such techniques, permission or inhibition is set in units of documents, a specific region and other regions in a document cannot be distinctively processed. Even though all pieces of information in the document are not classified matter, that is, even though the document partly include nonconfidential information, a receiver who has been inhibited from receiving the pieces of information cannot see information at all.
As a conventional technique for ensuring a document security with discriminating a specific region and the other regions in the document, for example, a technique in which an ROI region set on an image can be compressed by means of a compression ratio different from that of another region in JPEG2000 format is disclosed in Japanese Patent lain-open Publication No. 2001-230947.
However, with the technique disclosed in Japanese Patent lain-open Publication No. 2001-230947, a region in which a document is permitted to be read or inhibited from being read must be set for each original every receiver. This setting operation is troublesome.

Konica Minolta Business Technologies, Inc.


A laparoscopic surgical method comprises obtaining a first instrument comprising an elongate shaft with a distal end and a proximal end connected to a first handle. The distal end of the first instrument is passed through a percutaneous incision. A surgical end effector is obtained having a distal end with operable jaws and a proximal end selectively attachable to and detachable from the distal end of the first instrument. A second instrument is obtained comprising a distal end and a proximal end connected to a second handle. The surgical end effector is loaded ex vivo on the distal end of the second instrument. The distal end of the second instrument with the loaded surgical end effector is passed through a second incision spaced from the percutaneous incision. The proximal end of the surgical end effector is attached in vivo to the distal end of the first instrument. Tissue is manipulated by actuating the handle of the first instrument to operate the jaws of the surgical end effector.

The present invention relates in general to surgical devices and procedures, and more particularly to minimally invasive surgery.
Surgical procedures are often used to treat and cure a wide range of diseases, conditions, and injuries. Surgery often requires access to internal tissue through open surgical procedures or endoscopic surgical procedures. The term "endoscopic" refers to all types of minimally invasive surgical procedures including laparoscopic, arthroscopic, natural orifice intraluminal, and natural orifice transluminal procedures. Endoscopic surgery has numerous advantages compared to traditional open surgical procedures, including reduced trauma, faster recovery, reduced risk of infection, and reduced scarring. Endoscopic surgery is often performed with an insufflatory fluid present within the body cavity, such as carbon dioxide or saline, to provide adequate space to perform the intended surgical procedures. The insufflated cavity is generally under pressure and is sometimes referred to as being in a state of pneumoperitoneum. Surgical access devices are often used to facilitate surgical manipulation of internal tissue while maintaining pneumoperitoneum. For example, trocars are often used to provide a port through which endoscopic surgical instruments are passed. Trocars generally have an instrument seal, which prevents the insufflatory fluid from escaping while an instrument is positioned in the trocar.
While surgical access devices are known, no one has previously made or used the surgical devices and methods in accordance with the present invention.

Method for exchanging end effectors In Vivo


A graph display device designed to facilitate editing of measurement results, composed of a statement input unit for inputting a statement in the form of given characters, a position input unit for inputting a desired display position of the statement, a position adjustment unit, a storage unit for storing measurement results, a logically operating unit and a display unit. A statement inputted through the statement input unit is adjusted to a display position inputted through the position input unit by means of the position adjustment unit to output statement image data, and the logically operating unit superposes the statement image data and graph image data outputted from the storage unit to generate composite image data effective to enable the display unit to display a composite image which is composed of the graph image and the statement image associated with a specific point of the graph image.

The present invention relates to a graph display device for use with a measurement instrument.
Conventional measurement instruments are constructed such that, during analysis or processing of measured results, a statement such as a note, comment, remark and reference, composed of a sequence of characters, is inputted into the device and is displayed at a fixed position on a graph field which indicates the results of measurement.
FIG. 2 shows one example of a display in conventional measurement instrument such as, for example, a thermal analysis instrument. On a graph 9 illustrative of the results of the thermal analysis, a general statement 7 including measurement condition, etc., which have been set during the course of measurement and a specific statement 8 such as a remark which can be inputted by the operator at a desired time in the form of a sequence of characters are displayed at predetermined or fixed locations. A second row of the specific statement 8 specifically refers to a dehydration reaction at 194.degree. C. on a TG (Thermogravimetry) signal curve 10 of the graph 9, and a third row of the specific statement 8 specifically refers to an oxidation reaction of carbon monoxide induced concurrently with a dissociation reaction at 552.degree. C., appearing on a DTA (Differential Thermal Analysis) signal curve 11 of the graph 9.
When organizing or editing measurement results in the form of a report, specific statements are often written in the form of sequences of characters onto the graph which shows the results of the measurement. However, in the above-noted prior art, the specific statements are written in fixed locations of the graph field and therefore the correspondence between each statement and a related point or curve of the graph of the measurement results cannot be readily recognized. Especially, as can be appreciated from the FIG. 2 example, it would be most advisable to place respective specific statements in close relation to respective associated points which indicate the reactions referred to by the specific statements. Therefore, in the prior art, the individual specific statements are manually written into the graph each time when editing the reports.


An optical device includes a semiconductor laser monolithically integrated on a substrate having a branched cavity extending above a plane that is coplanar with a base surface of the substrate, and an adjustable optical power light source for radiating light into the cavity of the semiconductor laser thereby controlling the operation of the semiconductor laser optically.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention is based on a semiconductor lasers, and in particular, to a semiconductor laser having a branched cavity.
2. Background Information
Such a semiconductor laser is disclosed in Electronics Letters, Feb. 15, 1990, Vol. 26, No. 4, pages 243-244. It is monolithically integrated on an n-doped indium phosphide substrate. The underside of the substrate is called the base surface. Above a plane that is coplanar with the base surface, there extends a cavity of indium gallium arsenide phosphide (InGaAsP). It is branched and, when seen from the top, has the shape of a "Y". The top view surface of the cavity may also have a different shape, for example the shape of a cross. Significant is that the cavity is contiguous. This can be described in the sense of a topological definition in that the top view surface of the cavity can be considered to be a "singly contiguous region" since it is not composed of several pieces, but of a single piece having a single edge. The cavity lies on the planar surface of an n-doped buffer layer of indium phosphide that extends above the indium phosphide substrate.
Further layers are provided above the cavity. Above the buffer layer, these layers and the cavity form a mesa which has been produced by etching. In the plane that is coplanar with the base surface, the mesa as well as the cavity have a Y shape.
Such a laser with a branched cavity is provided according to the above-mentioned publication as an electrically controllable light source for optical communications transmission systems. In particular, if its metal layer extending above the cavity is subdivided into several electrodes so that cavity regions are created which can be controlled by means of different operating currents, such a laser is distinguished by its emission wavelength being tunable over a very wide wavelength range. This characteristic is of major importance for the intended use as an electrically controllable light source.

Optically controllable semiconductor laser