A seat back frame assembly of the invention has side frame members (17, 17), an upper frame member (18), a lower frame member (19) and zigzag spring (15) mounted between the side frame members (17, 17). A side portion (27) of the lower frame member has a main connection portion (28) and a sub-connection portion (29), both of which are fixed to the side frame member (17). The main connection portion (28) is positioned below the zigzag spring (15). The sub-connection portion (29) is inclined toward a front upper side so that the sub-connection portion and the zigzag spring are at least partly overlapped with each other in a front-and-back direction.

The present invention relates to a seat back frame assembly of a vehicle seat, and more particularly to a reinforced framework of a frame assembly.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,796,954 discloses a seat back frame assembly of a vehicle seat. The frame assembly comprises a framework constituted by side frame members extending in a vertical direction, an upper frame member connecting upper ends of the side frame members and a lower frame member connecting lower ends of the side frame members, and zigzag springs provided between the side frame members.
The said first conventional assembly has an advantage capable of being formed light and an advantage capable of providing an improved comfort. However, the conventional assembly has a disadvantage of providing a low torsional rigidity. A torsional external force is strongly applied to a bonding portion between the side frame members and the lower frame member. For example, when a child sits on an armrest mounted to the side frame member, the bonding portion has to support the side frame member so as not to bend toward an front outer side with respect to the lower frame member.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,044,693 discloses a seat back frame assembly having a bracket mounted to the side frame member. However, the bracket of the second conventional assembly has no function of reinforcing the bonding portion between the side frame member and the lower frame member.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,193,881 discloses a seat back frame assembly provided with a center plate member, side plate members angled to extend forward from both sides of the center plate member, and reinforcing members reinforcing corner portions between the center plate member and the side plate members.
Since the third conventional frame assembly is constituted by the plates as a whole, the third conventional frame assembly has a higher rigidity than that of the first and second conventional assemblies. Further, the reinforcing member of the third conventional assembly is expected to further increase a rigidity of the framework. However, the third conventional assembly has a disadvantage of having a very heavy weight and a disadvantage of having a low comfort. In order to obtain an excellent comfort, it is necessary to support a seat back cushion by zigzag springs as described in the first conventional assembly. An immovable center plate member reduces a comfort.
An object of the present invention is to improve a rigidity of a seat back frame assembly without deteriorating a comfort obtained by zigzag springs.
This object can be achieved by a seat back frame assembly for a vehicle seat which is comprised of a pair of right and left side frame members extending in a vertical direction of the vehicle seat, an upper frame member connecting upper end portions of the side frame members to each other, a lower frame member connecting lower end portions of the side frame members to each other, spring means having an upper zigzag spring and a lower zigzag spring mounted between the side frame members, each of said side frame members having a main plate extending in a front-and-back direction of the vehicle seat and a sub-plate extending to an inside from a rear edge of the main plate, said lower frame member having a center portion and side portions positioned in both sides of the center portion, each of said side portions having a main connection portion extending to an outside from the center portion and a sub-connection portion integrally formed with the main connection portion, an outer end of said main connection portion being fixed to the main plate, an outer end of said sub-connection portion being fixed to the main plate, said sub-connection portion being inclined toward a front upper side so that the sub-connection portion and the lower zigzag spring are at least partly overlapped with each other in the front-and-back direction.

Seat back frame assembly of vehicle seat


An interlevel connector, a multilayer wiring board assembly, and method for making the same are presented. The interlevel connector includes a dielectric substrate having a plurality of through holes and a corresponding plurality of pultrusions. Each pultrusion includes a plurality of electrically conductive fibers and an electrically conductive or insulating host material carrying the plurality of fibers, each of the plurality of pultrusions being located in a respective through hole and having fibrillated portions extending from surfaces of the dielectric substrate. The interlevel connector is used in the construction of a multilayer wiring assembly in which first and second wiring boards having respective conductive portions are interconnected. The interlevel connector is located adjacent and between the first and second wiring boards, whereby the fibrillated portions of the pultrusion extending from the surfaces of the dielectric substrate contact the conductive portions of the first and second wiring boards. The wiring boards can be permanently or removably locatable adjacent the dielectric substrate.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention pertains to improvements in multilayer printed circuit or wiring boards, and, more particularly, to improvements in interconnections between multilayer printed circuits or wiring boards or the like, and to methods for making same.
2. References
"Button Connectors-Solderless, Low-Thermal Rise Interconnect For High-Speed Signal Transmission", MacCorquodale, Connection Technology, January, 1990, pp. 25-28, shows a button connecter for interconnection between multilayer printed circuit boards. The button connector is essentially a wad of crumpled wire, the cylindrical button being a mass of fine, springy, highly conductive wire that is fitted into a substrate through-hole by compression, thus limiting the necessity of solder. The dielectric substrate boards, loaded with the buttons, are placed between the circuit boards or components to be interconnected and clamped together.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,967,314 to Huggins, III shows the construction of a circuit board. A high density multi-level printed wiring board is disclosed having interlevel electrical connections made by via interconnect holes which are drilled or punched through only those layers of the wiring board that separate the two layers containing the conductors which are to be connected. The holes are filled with a low-resistance silver-filled conductive epoxy.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,584,456 to Oodaira et al. shows a method for producing a resistor from insulating material by local heating. The resistor is formed by locally heating a layer of insulating material between conductors to convert the heated material into a first resistor element. A second resistor element is formed to contact the first resistor element while measuring the resistance between the conductors, until a desired resistor composed of the first and second resistor element and having a predetermined resistance value is obtained.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,003,693 to Atkinson et al. shows a method for manufacturing electrical circuits within a carrier. The method provides an electrical circuit wherein a carrier, which is a film of insulating plastic material with a circuit pattern thereon, is supported in a mold and a molding material is applied by the application of heat and pressure to provide a substrate having a circuit embedded in or within a three-dimensional surface of the molded substrate.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,694,138 to Oodaira et al. shows a method of forming a conductive path within an insulated composition. The conductive path is formed by providing an insulating substrate having a surface region which is formed of an insulating composition. The insulating composition contains an organic polymeric material and at least one metal source. The surface region of the substrate is selectively heated along a predetermined pattern, thereby decomposing and evaporating the organic polymeric material at the heated portion and welding the metal in the heated portion so as to form a conductor path formed of metal.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,912,288 to Atkinson et al. shows a method of providing an electrical circuit molded within an insulated plastic surface. The method provides an electrical circuit on a surface of a three-dimensional shaped substrate of insulating plastic material, molded by the application of heat and pressure, so that the circuit is embedded in or within a surface of the molded substrate.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,841,099 and 4,970,553, to Epstein et al. and Orlowski et al., respectively, both assigned to the assignee of the present application show electrical components having conductive paths. A three-dimensional electrical component, having a first side and a second side formed from an electrically insulating polymer matrix capable of heat conversion to an electrically conducting polymer matrix, has at least one passageway from the first side to the second side having a tapered wall configuration with constantly changing cross-section of the passageway from the first side through the passageway to the second side and an electrically conducting path between the first side and the second side formed by the in situ heat conversion of the walls. The heat conversion of the electrically conductive paths are preferred to be completed by a laser.

Multilayer wiring board, interlevel connector, and method for making same


An arrangement for connecting a printed circuit to a plug of the type having a plurality of parallel contacts located on the edge of an insertion block provided with a resilient detent, includes a housing containing the printed circuit, and an opening in the housing for retaining the insertion block therein. A flexible extension of the printed circuit has parallel contacts formed thereon. The flexible extension extends at an angle through the opening so that the parallel contacts thereon make contact with the parallel contacts on an insertion block retained in the opening.

With the trend towards using flexible circuits in terminal devices, such as telephones, the interface between the device and external circuits is usually by standard teledapt cables. The standard method utilizes a telephone jack that can either be board mounted, flexible circuit mounted or connected to the printed circuit by wires. Each case had its drawbacks, either mechanical strength or further connection to the flexible circuit.
An object of the invention is to simplify the construction.


An object of the present invention is to provide an organic electroluminescent element containing an organic layer interposed between an anode and a cathode, the organic layer containing at least one light emitting layer, wherein the at least one light emitting layer contains a π-conjugated compound having an electron donor portion and an electron acceptor portion in the molecule; the π-conjugated compound has a direction vector from an atom having a HOMO orbital in the electron donor portion to an electron cloud of the HOMO orbital, and a direction vector from an atom having a LUMO orbital in the electron acceptor portion to an electron cloud of the LUMO orbital, and the two direction vectors form an angle θ in the range of 90 to 180 degrees; and the π-conjugated compound has a plurality of the electron donor portions or a plurality of the electron acceptor portions.

Organic electroluminescent (hereinafter referred to as "EL") elements (also referred to as "organic electroluminescence elements"), which are based on electroluminescence of organic materials, have already been put into practice as a new generation of light emitting systems capable of achieving planar light emission. Organic EL elements have recently been applied to electronic displays and also to lighting devices and display devices. Thus, it has been demanded further development of organic EL elements.
As an emission mode of an organic EL, there are two types. One is "a phosphorescence emission type" which emits light when a triplet excited state returns to a ground state, and another one is "a fluorescence emission type" which emits light when a singlet excited state returns to a ground state.
When an electric filed is applied to an organic EL element, a hole and an electron are respectively injected from an anode and a cathode, they are recombined in a light emitting layer to produce an exciton. At this moment, a singlet exciton and a triplet exciton are formed with a ratio of 25%:75%. Therefore, it is known that a phosphorescence emission type using a triplet exciton will produce theoretically high internal quantum efficiency compared with a fluorescence emission type.
However, in order to obtain high quantum efficiency in a phosphorescence emission type, it is required to use a complex compound having a rare metal of iridium or platinum in the center metal. This may induce an industrial problem of the amount of deposits or the cost of the rare metals in the future.
On the other hand, in recent years, new techniques relevant to a fluorescence emission type have been proposed to improve emission efficiency.
For example, Patent document 1 discloses a technique which is focused on a phenomenon wherein singlet excitons are generated by collision of two triplet excitons (it is called as Triplet-Triplet Annihilation (TTA), or Triplet-Triplet Fusion (TTF)), and which improves the emission efficiency of a fluorescent element by allowing the TTA phenomenon to occur effectively. Although this technique can increase power efficiency of a fluorescence emission material (hereafter, it is called as a fluorescent emission material or fluorescent material) from two to three times larger than the power efficiency of a conventional fluorescent material, the emission efficiency in TTA is not as high as that of the aforementioned phosphorescent material due to a theoretical limitation, because the rate of conversion of the excited triplet energy level to the excited singlet energy level will remain to about 40%.
Recent studies have disclosed a fluorescent material that employs a thermally activated delayed fluorescent mechanism (hereinafter also referred to as "TADF"). It is reported that it may be applied to an organic EL element (for example, refer to Patent document 2 and Non-patent documents 1 to 2). By making use of this delayed fluorescence caused by the TADF mechanism, theoretically, it is possible to achieve an internal quantum efficiency of 100% in fluorescence emission, which is similar to the phosphorescent emission.
In order to make appear the TADF phenomenon, it is required that a reverse intersystem crossing from the triplet state, which is produced with an amount of 75% by an electric field excitation in an amount of 75% at room temperature or at an emission layer temperature on the emission device, to the singlet state should be taken place. Further, by the mechanism that the singlet exciton produced by the reverse intersystem crossing emits fluorescence in the same way as the singlet exciton produced with an amount of 25%, it is theoretically possible to realize 100% internal quantum efficiency. In order to make appear this reverse intersystem crossing, it is necessary that the absolute value of the difference between the singlet excited level and the triplet excited level (hereafter, it is called as ΔEST) is very small. To obtain a minimum ΔEST in an organic compound, it is preferable that a HOMO and a LUMO in the molecule are not mixed and localized respectively.
For example, in the case of 2CzPN illustrated in "a" of FIG. 1, a HOMO is localized at a carbazolyl group at the 1 position and the 2 position of the benzene ring, and a LUMO is localized at cyano groups at the 4 position and the 5 position. As a result, the HOMO and the LUMO of 2CzPN may be separated, and ΔEST becomes very small as indicated in "b" of FIG. 1. Thus a TADF phenomenon will be produced. On the other hand, in the case of 2CzXy ("a" of FIG. 2) which is produced by substituting cyano groups at the 4 position and the 5 position of 2CzPN with methyl groups, the HOMO and the LUMO cannot be clearly separated as is seen in 2CzPN. As a result, ΔEST cannot be made small, and a TADF phenomenon will not be produced.
Further, it is known that an addition of the third component (an assist-dopant compound) which exhibits a TADF property into a light emitting layer composed of a host compound and an emission compound is effective to achieve high efficiency (Non-patent document 3). By producing 25% of singlet exciton and 75% of triplet exciton via an electric field excitation on an assist-dopant compound, the triplet exciton will produce the singlet exciton through the reverse intersystem crossing (RISC). The energy of the singlet exciton will be moved to the emission compound via an energy transfer. It is possible that the emission compound emits light. Consequently, theoretically, it is possible to emit light from the emission compound by making use of 100% of the exciton. It may achieve high emission efficiency.
However, the localization of the HOMO and the LUMO, which is a requirement for making appear the TADF phenomenon, will form an excited state having an intermolecular charge transfer (CT) property. This will become a factor of broadening an absorption spectrum or an emission spectrum. This broadening phenomenon becomes a fatal problem for a color designing of an organic EL element. The reason of this problem will be described in the following,
An electronic state of 2CzPN is schematically illustrated in "a" of FIG. 3. A molecule known as a TADF emission material (hereafter, it may be called as "a TADF compound") has a localized HOMO and a localized LUMO, and it has an imbalanced charge in the molecule. This charge imbalance will induce imbalance in the medium substance (for example, a solvent or a host compound, see "b" of FIG. 3). Therefore, as indicated in "c" of FIG. 3, the medium substance will be electrostatically adsorbed to the TADF compound. Interactions will be formed at a variety of positions and directions. As a result, an energy distribution in the excited state of the TADF compound will be spread, and it is known that an absorption spectrum or an emission spectrum will be broadened.
On the other hand, FIG. 4 illustrates a schematic diagram of an interaction between a phosphorescent compound and a host compound. As illustrated in "a" of FIG. 4, the phosphorescent compound (Ir(ppy)3) has a localized HOMO and a localized LUMO respectively placed in the inner portion and in the outer portion of the molecule. Since the HOMO portion exists substantially at an iridium metal in the center of the complex, it will not contribute to an electrostatic interaction with the surrounding medium. The LUMO distributed in the ligand will interact with the host compound ("b" of FIG. 4). Since it is localized in the outer side of the molecule, the location and direction of the interaction will be limited. Consequently, an energy distribution in the excited state of the phosphorescent compound will be restrained, and broadening of an absorption spectrum and an emission spectrum will become small compared with a conventional TADF compound ("c" of FIG. 4).
Accordingly, it is required a new molecular design for a TADF compound enabling to restrain an energy distribution in the excited state as the phosphorescent compound. A conventional organic EL element has not achieved all of the following properties at the same time: restrain of broadening of an absorption spectrum and an emission spectrum, high emission efficiency, and non-use of a rare metal.

Organic electroluminescent element, display device, lighting device, PI-conjugated compound, and light-emitting thin film


The present invention relates to liquid polyoxyalkylene compounds having improved flowability characteristics useful in a variety of industrial and personal care applications.

Polyoxyalkylene block copolymers are well known to those skilled in the non-ionic surfactant art. Specifically, U.S. Pat. No. 3,740,421 (Schmolka) assigned to BASF discloses aqueous gels prepared using a block copolymer of polyoxyethylene/polyoxypropylene suitable for pharmaceutical and personal care compositions. U.S. Pat. No. 3,639,574 (Schmolka) assigned to BASF discloses polyoxyethylene/polyoxypropylene block copolymers as gelling agents for hydrogen peroxide compositions. U.S. Pat. No. 4,465,663 (Schmolka) assigned to BASF discloses polyoxybutylene/polyoxyethylene block copolymers as gelling agents for aqueous gels useful in personal care and pharmaceutical applications. Some of these compounds are sold by the BASF Corporation under the PLURONIC.RTM. tradename.
Additionally, U.S. Pat. No. 4,272,394 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,411,810 disclose the use of polyoxyalkylene block copolymers in machine dishwashing applications. U.S. Pat. No. 4,925,988 discloses a nonionic surfactant employing a specific combination of alkanol, ethylene oxide and propylene oxide useful in an automatic dishwashing application. U.S. Pat. No. 5,374,368 describes the use of liquid EO/PO/EO triblock co-polymers (PLURONIC.RTM. L 31 and L 35 surfactants) in stable hydrogen peroxide releasing dental care compositions at levels of 55-90% by weight of the dental care composition. U.S. Pat. No. 3,740,421 discloses gel forming solid EO/PO/EO triblock copolymers useful in cosmetic and personal care formulations at levels of approximately 20-25% by weight. Preferred solid EO/PO/EO triblock copolymers have a molecular weight of 4,600-16,000. Said solid EO/PO/EO triblock copolymers form a gel when added to an aqueous solution. U.S. Pat. No. 3,867,533 discloses aqueous gel compositions containing solid EO/PO/EO triblock copolymers, having a molecular weight of 6,450-20,000 useful at levels of approximately 20% by weight. Said compositions are useful in preparing cosmetic formulations. U.S. Pat. No. 4,465,663 discloses clear aqueous cosmetic gels containing solid EO/BO(butylene oxide)/EO triblock copolymers at levels of approximately 20%. U.S. Pat. No. 5,035,880 discloses a stable dentifrice compositions containing a cetylpyridinium bactericide and EO/PO/EO solid triblock copolymers (PLURONIC.RTM. F 127 surfactant), and polyethylene glycol at levels of 15-80% by weight. U.S. Pat. No. 4,476,107 discloses a mouthwash containing EO/BO(butylene oxide)/EO triblock copolymers at levels of 0.5-5.0% by weight. U.S. Pat. No. 5,057,307 discloses oral hygiene gels containing non-ionic surfactants, coating substances; and viscosifiers. Said non-ionic surfactants are PLURONIC.RTM. F 108 and F 127 surfactants available from BASF Corporation, Mt. Olive, N.J. U.S. Pat. No. 5,256,396 discloses a topical composition comprising an EO/PO/EO solid triblock copolymer (PLURONIC.RTM. F 127 surfactant) used at a level of more than 10% to about 17% by weight. EPO-546-627A discloses mouthwash compositions comprising solid EO/PO/EO triblock copolymers such as PLURONIC.RTM. F 108, F88 surfactants at levels of 0.5-3% by weight. U.S. Pat. No. 5,073,368 discloses mouthwashes containing solid EO/PO/EO triblock copolymers such as PLURONIC.RTM. F 87 surfactant at levels of 0.1-3% by weight. WO 93/13750 discloses an ocular cleansing composition comprising solid PLURONIC.RTM. F 87 and paste PLURONIC.RTM. P 85 EO/PO/EO triblock copolymers. PLURONIC.RTM. P 85 surfactant is 4-9% by weight of the cleansing composition, PLURONIC.RTM. F 87 surfactant is 0.5-2% by weight of the cleansing composition. Finally, U.S. Pat. No. 5,096,698 discloses a dental creme composition containing a non-ionic triblock liquid EO/PO/EO copolymer or a solid triblock EO/PO/EO copolymer at levels of 0.1-5% by weight. Said copolymers help to prevent phase separation. PLURONIC.RTM. F 108 surfactant (solid) is most preferred, followed by PLURONIC (.RTM. F 87, PLURONIC.RTM. ) F 127, and PLURONIC.RTM. ) L 72 surfactants. U.S. Pat. No. 4,272,394 discloses novel, low foaming nonionic surfactant for machine dishwashing compositions. U.S. Pat. No. 4, 411,810 discloses a low foaming, low cloud point, nonionic surfactant for machine dishwashing compositions. U.S. Pat. No. 5,496,542, U.S. Pat. No. 5,374,368, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,424,060 disclose the use of polyoxyalkylene compound for formulating a stable percarbonate formulation as well as a dentifrice composition. U.S. Pat. No. 5,187,191 discloses polyoxyalkylene heteric block surfactants in agricultural formulations. Finally, JP 47-48366 B4 discloses a process for producing tasteless, liquid, heteric polyoxyalkylene compounds of molecular weight 1000 or higher. However, a major problem with these polymeric materials is that they have high pour points (more close to ambient temperatures) which limits their use in processing cosmetic and toiletry compositions. Furthermore, the polymers of the JP 47-48366, B4 application develop a greater degree of crystallinity which manifest itself as haze and precipitated solids upon storage.
Applicants have surprisingly discovered a method for producing liquid, heteric-block polyoxyalkylene compounds with significantly lower pour points (i.e. more close to freezing temperatures) which substantially increases their utility in personal care compositions. Furthermore, the polymers of the Applicant's invention when neutralized with common inorganic acids result in compositions that are essentially clear and virtually free from precipitated solids during storage. Applicants have achieved this by selectively controlling the distribution or placement of propylene oxide and ethylene oxide in the polymers of the Applicant's invention. Without being limited by theory, the Applicants wish to stress that it is particularly important to control the distribution or placement of C.sub.3 or higher alkylene oxides in the polymer chain, in order to effectively minimize or eliminate the formation of crystalline segments in the polymer. When the formation of crystalline segments in the polymer is allowed to occur, said crystalline segments fall out of solution resulting in a undesirable two-phase product. The Applicant's approach to overcome this problem in the art differs from the method disclosed in the JP 47-48366 B4 application wherein the alkylene oxides are randomly distributed throughout the polymer chain. Such polymers as disclosed in JP 47-48366 B4 comprised solely of a random distribution of alkylene oxides throughout the polymer chain are outside the scope of the Applicant's invention.

Liquid heteric-block polyoxyalkylene compounds having improved flowability characteristics


A radio frequency (RF) generating system for forming pulse plasma utilizes a plasma reaction device comprises a function generator, an amplifier, and an input port. The function generator generates a signal of time-modulated RF power according to a modulation function having a waveform, wherein the waveform gradually ascends at a rising edge and gradually descends at a falling edge. The input port receives the signal from the function generator and transmits the signal to the amplifier. The amplifier amplifies the signal to a predetermined level and then transmits the amplified signal to the plasma reaction device. A method for forming pulse plasma comprises the steps of generating a time-modulated RF power signal according to a modulation function having a waveform, wherein the waveform is shaped to gradually ascend at a rising edge and to gradually descend at a falling edge, amplifying the time-modulated RF power signal to a predetermined level, and transmitting the amplified time-modulated RF power signal to a plasma reaction device. In an embodiment of the present invention, the waveform is a half sine waveform, though other suitable waveforms include a half cosine waveform and a Gaussian pulse signal.

In the fabrication of integrated circuits, it is highly desirable in certain circumstances to use an etching process having a specific selectivity and a high aspect ratio to enable a higher degree of device integration. To that extent, the use of pulse plasma (e.g., time-modulated plasma) is an emerging technology that is under active development. For instance, in forming a polycide layer in an integrated circuit, it has been suggested that improved results are obtainable by using an etching method that utilizes pulse plasma technology. Particularly, it has been found that the notches and profiled defects in a pattern may be removed by applying time-modulated radio frequency (RF) power having a step function to the plasma etching when forming the polycide layer. The RF power is usually modulated into a step function by a repetitive on/off operation. This repetitive on/off operation of the RF power generates the step function in discrete repeating periods. Thus, the use of pulse plasma etching is a generally simple operation that may significantly reduce the notching and side attack during the etching of polycide or polysilicon.
FIG. 1 illustrates an RF generating system as in the prior art for generating time-modulated RF power for use in generating pulse plasma. The RF generating system 10 comprises an oscillator 12 for generating the RF power, an RF power amplifier 14 for amplifying the RF power to a required level, and a mixer 16 interposed between the oscillator 12 and amplifier 14 for receiving an external modulation function, such as a step function. Therefore, when the signaling step function is high, the RF power is passed on to the amplifier 14, and when the step function is low, no RF power is passed on to the amplifier 14. Accordingly, the RF power signal is modulated into a periodic pulse prior to being supplied to a plasma reaction device 20.
FIG. 2 shows a general waveform of the time-modulated RF power signal that is produced by the RF generating system 10 and applied to the plasma reaction device 20 of FIG. 1. The time-modulated RF power has a function F(.omega.) that can be expressed as Equation (1) below: EQU F(.omega.t)=f(.omega..sub.0 t).multidot.g(.omega.t) (1)
where F(.omega.t) is the function representing the time-modulated RF power, f(.omega..sub.0 t) is the continuously generated RF power, and g(.omega.t) is the modulation function (i.e., the step function). The RF power generated by oscillator 12 can be expressed as Equation (2) below: EQU f(.omega..sub.0 t)=A sin .omega..sub.0 t (2)
where A represents the amplitude and .omega..sub.0 represents the angular frequency of the applied RF power. An illustration of the waveform f(.omega..sub.0 t) is provided in FIG. 3A. The modulation function g(.omega.t) can be expressed as Equation (3) below: EQU g(.omega.t)=1 (0<t<T.sub.1), or EQU g(.omega.t)=0 (T.sub.1 <t<T) EQU g.omega.(t+T)!=g(.omega.t) (3)
where T denotes the period of the modulation function, and where 0<T.sub.1 <T. Further, .omega. denotes an angular frequency of the modulation function. Accordingly, g(.omega.t) has the form of a step function that will turn on the RF power for a predetermined time T.sub.1, and turn off the RF power for the remainder of the time period T. An illustration of the waveform g(.omega.t) is provided in FIG. 3B.
In order to analyze the frequency response of the function F(.omega.t) of the modulated RF power, the frequency response of the modulation function g(.omega.t) is analyzed first. Assuming that the ratio of a duty cycle of the modulated function g(.omega.t) is 50%, that is, T.sub.1 =T/2, then g(.omega.t) can be expressed as the Fourier series of Equation (4) below: ##EQU1## where k is a dummy symbol, also referred to as an index of summation. When f(.omega..sub.0 t)=A sin .omega..sub.0 t, then the waveform of the time-modulated RF power can be expressed as function F(.omega.t) in Equation (5) below:
Therefore, when the RF power F(.omega.t) of Equation (5) is modulated with the modulation function g(.omega.t) of Equation (4), a series of sidebands are formed adjacent to a carrier frequency. In the present case, the frequency and amplitude of the sidebands are .omega..sub.0 .+-.(2k-1).omega. and A/.pi..multidot.1/(2k-1), respectively. This is graphically illustrated in FIG. 4, wherein the frequency spectrum distribution of the function F(.omega.t) is illustrated with EQU F(.omega.t)=A sin .omega..sub.0 t.multidot.g(.omega.t) ##EQU2## respect to the mode number k. As can be gleaned from FIG. 4, the sideband modes .omega..sub.0 .+-.(2k-1).omega. corresponding to the frequency of the modulation function g(.omega.t) are generated around the applied carrier frequency .omega..sub.0.
When the time-modulated RF power is applied to the plasma reaction device 20, a high reflective wave is typically generated because the sideband, which has a multiplicity of frequencies, is generated over a wide bandwidth at modulation frequency intervals that are near the frequency of the RF power. The high reflective wave may be undesirable because it can damage the RF generating system 10, and thereby deteriorate the stability and reproducibility of the time-modulated RF power.
In order to reduce the effects of a high reflective wave, a matching network may be used. However, a matching network is generally tuned to a specific frequency for reducing the reflective wave at that frequency alone. Thus, a matching network may not be able to simultaneously reduce the reflective wave in a plurality of frequencies over a wide band width response, such as the one shown in FIG. 4. Therefore, the amount of RF power reflected by the pulse plasma device 20 may not be significantly reduced by a matching network because of the sideband. In severe cases, 80% or more of the applied RF power may be reflected.

Radio frequency generating systems and methods for forming pulse plasma using gradually pulsed time-modulated radio frequency power


An array-type light-receiving device includes a semiconductor substrate having a cleavage direction; a light-receiving surface disposed on the semiconductor substrate; and a plurality of pixels two-dimensionally arranged on the light-receiving surface in a first array direction and a second array direction, each of the pixels including a staked semiconductor layer including an optical absorption layer. The first and second array directions are tilted relative to the cleavage direction of the semiconductor substrate at a predetermined angle α, as viewed from above the light-receiving surface. In addition, the first and second array directions and the cleavage direction extend along the light-receiving surface.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an array-type light-receiving device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Japanese Patent No. 4771185 discloses a technique that relates to a light-receiving device having photosensitivity in the near-infrared region. The light-receiving device includes a stacked semiconductor layer on a semiconductor substrate. The stacked semiconductor layer includes an optical absorption layer and a diffusion concentration distribution control layer. The optical absorption layer includes a p-n junction. In addition, the optical absorption layer includes a multi quantum well (MQW) structure. The diffusion concentration distribution control layer is in contact with a surface of the optical absorption layer opposite the semiconductor substrate. The diffusion concentration distribution control layer has a smaller bandgap energy than that of the semiconductor substrate. The p-n junction is formed in the optical absorption layer by selective diffusion of a p-type impurity such as zinc (Zn) impurity. The impurity concentration in the diffusion concentration distribution control layer is reduced toward the optical absorption layer. The impurity concentration in the diffusion concentration distribution control layer is 5×1016/cm3 or less. The semiconductor substrate is an InP substrate.
An array-type optical detector on a S-doped InP substrate is disclosed in Joseph Boisvert, Takahiro Isshiki, Rengarajan Sudharsanan, Ping Yuan, Paul McDonald, "Performance of Very Low Dark Current SWIR PIN Arrays", Proceeding of SPIE Vol. 6940, 69400L-1 (2008). In order to form the array-type optical detector, a stacked semiconductor layer is formed on a 2-inch S-doped InP substrate by a metal-organic vapor phase epitaxy (MOVPE) method. The InP substrate has a (100) plane orientation. An array detector on a GaSb substrate is disclosed in Robert Rehm, Martin Walthera, Johannes Schmitza, Frank Rutza, Andreas Worla, Ralf Scheibnerb, Johann Zieglerb, "Type-II Superlattices—The Fraunhofer Perspective", Proceeding of SPIE Vol. 7660, 76601G-1 (2010). A stacked semiconductor layer for forming the array detector is formed on a 3-inch GaSb substrate by a molecular beam epitaxial growth (MBE) method.


Signals of different channels are combined into one mono signal. A set of adaptive filters, preferably one for each channel, is derived in a respective filter adaptation unit. When an adaptive filter is applied to the mono signal it reconstructs the signal of the respective channel under a perceptual constraint. The perceptual constraint is a gain and/or shape constraint. The gain constraint allows the preservation of the relative energy between the channels while the shape constraint allows more stability by avoiding unnecessary filtering of spectral nulls. The transmitted parameters are the mono signal, in encoded form, and the parameters of the adaptive filters, preferably also encoded. The receiver reconstructs the signal of the different channels by applying the adaptive filters and possibly some additional post-processing.

There is a high market need to transmit and store audio signals at low bit rate while maintaining high audio quality. Particularly, in cases where transmission resources or storage is limited low bit rate operation is an essential cost factor. This is typically the case, e.g. in streaming and messaging applications in mobile communication systems such as GSM, UMTS, or CDMA.
Today, there are no standardized codecs available providing high stereophonic audio quality at bit rates that are economically interesting for use in mobile communication systems. What is possible with available codecs is monophonic transmission of the audio signals. To some extent also stereophonic transmission is available. However, bit rate limitations usually require limiting the stereo representation quite drastically.
The simplest way of stereophonic or multi-channel coding of audio signals is to encode the signals of the different channels separately as individual and independent signals. Another basic way used in stereo FM radio transmission and which ensures compatibility with legacy mono radio receivers is to transmit a sum and a difference signal of the two involved channels.
State-of-the-art audio codecs, such as MPEG-1/2 Layer III and MPEG-2/4 AAC make use of so-called joint stereo coding. According to this technique, the signals of the different channels are processed jointly, rather than separately and individually. The two most commonly used joint stereo coding techniques are known as "Mid/Side" (M/S) stereo coding and intensity stereo coding, which usually are applied on sub-bands of the stereo or multi-channel signals to be encoded.
M/S stereo coding is similar to the described procedure in stereo FM radio, in a sense that it encodes and transmits the sum and difference signals of the channel sub-bands and thereby exploits redundancy between the channel sub-bands. The structure and operation of an encoder based on M/S stereo coding is described, e.g. in U.S. Pat. No. 5,285,498 by J. D. Johnston.
Intensity stereo on the other hand is able to make use of stereo irrelevancy. It transmits the joint intensity of the channels (of the different sub-bands) along with some location information indicating how the intensity is distributed among the channels. Intensity stereo does only provide spectral magnitude information of the channels. Phase information is not conveyed. For this reason and since the temporal inter-channel information (more specifically the inter-channel time difference) is of major psycho-acoustical relevancy particularly at lower frequencies, intensity stereo can only be used at high frequencies above e.g. 2 kHz. An intensity stereo coding method is described, e.g. in the European patent 0497413 by R. Veldhuis et al.
A recently developed stereo coding method is described, e.g. in a conference paper with the title "Binaural cue coding applied to stereo and multi-channel audio compression", 112th AES convention, May 2002, Munich, Germany by C. Faller et al. This method is a parametric multi-channel audio coding method. The basic principle is that at the encoding side, the input signals from N channels c1, c2, . . . cN are combined to one mono signal m. The mono signal is audio encoded using any conventional monophonic audio codec. In parallel, parameters are derived from the channel signals, which describe the multi-channel image. The parameters are encoded and transmitted to the decoder, along with the audio bit stream. The decoder first decodes the mono signal m′ and then regenerates the channel signals c1′, c2′, . . . , cN′, based on the parametric description of the multi-channel image.
The principle of the Binaural Cue Coding (BCC) method is that it transmits the encoded mono signal and so-called BCC parameters. The BCC parameters comprise coded inter-channel level differences and inter-channel time differences for sub-bands of the original multi-channel input signal. The decoder regenerates the different channel signals by applying sub-band-wise level and phase adjustments of the mono signal based on the BCC parameters. The advantage over e.g. M/S or intensity stereo is that stereo information comprising temporal inter-channel information is transmitted at much lower bit rates.
A problem with the state-of-the-art multi-channel coding techniques described above is that they require high bit rates in order to provide good quality. Intensity stereo, if applied at low bit rates as low as e.g. only a few kbps suffers from the fact that it does not provide any temporal inter-channel information. As this information is perceptually important for low frequencies below e.g. 2 kHz, it is unable to provide a stereo impression at such low frequencies.
BCC is able to reproduce the multi-channel image even at low frequencies at low bit rates of e.g. 3 kbps since it also transmits temporal inter-channel information. However, this technique requires computational demanding time-frequency transforms on each of the channels, both at the encoder and the decoder. Moreover, BCC optimizes the mapping in a pure mathematical manner. Characteristic artifacts immanent in the coding method will, however, not disappear.
Another technique, described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,434,948 by C. E. Holt et al. uses a similar approach of encoding the mono signal and side information. In this case, side information consists of predictor filters and optionally a residual signal. The predictor filters, estimated by a least-mean-square algorithm, when applied to the mono signal allow the prediction of the multi-channel audio signals. With this technique one is able to reach very low bit rate encoding of multi-channel audio sources, however, at the expense of a quality drop.
An approach similar to the above filtering approach is described in WO 03/090206 by Breebaart and Groenendaal. However, this approach uses a fixed filter applied to the mono signal and combined together with the non filtered mono signal via a matrixing operation. The matrixing operation is dependent upon a received correlation parameter and a received level parameter. The objective of such signal synthesis is to restore the correlation and the level difference of the original two channels. Because of the inherently fixed filtering operation, the signal synthesis has a very limited potential for signal reproduction and does not adapt to the signal characteristics. The approach can be regarded as an extension of the intensity stereo coding method discussed above, in which now a temporal component is conveyed to the decoder. Still, only the level and the correlation parameters allow a certain degree of adaptivity through a matrixing operation. This operation consists of a mere rotation and scaling of statically filtered signals, thus limiting the polyphonic reproduction ability. Another drawback of the approach is the fact that it is not based on a fidelity criterion, e.g. signal-to-noise ratio, which limits its scalability to transparent quality.
Finally, for completeness, a technique is to be mentioned that is used in 3D audio. This technique synthesizes the right and left channel signals by filtering sound source signals with so-called head-related filters. However, this technique requires the different sound source signals to be separated and can thus not generally be applied for stereo or multi-channel coding.

Constrained filter encoding of polyphonic signals


The present invention provides automated methods for cell body extension analysis, software for carrying out such methods, and detection devices comprising such software.

Drugs that promote neuron development, and thus neurite outgrowth, will be of use for treating a wide variety of diseases and trauma that result in neuropathy and nerve injury, including but not limited to spinal cord injury, neuropathy resulting from diseases such as diabetes and stroke, Parkinson's disease, and other forms of dementia including Alzheimer's disease.
The most frequently used methods for neurite outgrowth quantification and analysis are based on manual or, in some cases, on semiautomatic imaging tools for neurite tracing. Automated neurite tracing, however, is a prerequisite for the use of neurite outgrowth analysis in high content screening. Automated tracing of neurites in a population of cells is difficult due to ambiguities caused by neurite intensity variations and multiple neurite crossings, or tangles, which are created when a neurite cross itself or another neurite.
Thus, improved methods for analyzing neurites and neurite outgrowth would be of great value in the art.


A wire connector for connecting a printed circuit pad or line on a flat surface with an outlet wire. In one embodiment, the connector includes a connection member having a conductive member having a first end portion and a second end portion, and an insulting cover formed around the conductive member such that the first end portion and the second end portion of the conductive member are exposed outside the insulating cover, and a boot having a bottom portion, a top portion and a bowl-like body formed therebetween, where the bottom portion has a flat bottom surface, the top portion defines an opening, and the bowl-like body has a height defined the bottom portion and the top portion. As assembled, the insulting cover of the connection member is received and accommodated tightly by the opening of the boot such that the first and second end portions of the conductive member are respectively located outside and inside the boot.

All existing wire connectors and connection methods are limited to connect/bind two conductive wires. Among the most popular wire connectors, there are cap-shaped wire connectors, ceramic wire connectors, or simply insulating electrical tapes. However, no connecting device suitable for connecting one conducting area/line printed/formed on a flat surface with a regular conductive wire is available. An example of the conducting area/line is the outlet pads of an automobile's rear window defogger which disconnect to the outlet wire suppose to connect it to a power supply on an automobile.
Welding the wire to the isolated conducting surface can be done, however, it takes more tedious tools, time, and may cause damage to the surrounding area, e.g., a glass may not resist the heat involved in welding. Although under certain circumstance, conducting glue may be used between the wire and the conducting surface, however in certain cases, the contact area may be too small so that the biding may not be strong enough and long lasting, and also the glue between the two metals may introduce additional resistance, i.e., current drop which may cause local heating or conductivity reduction of the printed circuit.
Therefore, a heretofore unaddressed need exists in the art to address the aforementioned deficiencies and inadequacies.

Connector for connecting printed surface area or line with conductive wire


Traffic at an intersection, or other portion of a road, is detected, and the stop/go traffic signal apparatus at the intersection, or other portion is controlled based on vehicle types in the detected traffic. A vehicle type may be determined based on information collected by that vehicle's onboard telematics unit, or with a user's device in communication therewith. An input may be received from a user device, onboard the vehicle, to request changing the current stop/go configuration of the traffic signal. The request may be processed based on the determined vehicle type to determine whether or not to change the traffic signal in response to the request. The request may be accompanied by an offer of money, and if the request is not granted, the user device may forward another request associated with a different offer.

Traffic signals, also known as traffic lights, traffic lamps, signal lights, stop lights, or traffic control signals, are signaling devices positioned at road intersections to control competing flows of traffic. Traffic signals typically alternate the movement of the flows of vehicles by displaying lights of standard colors (e.g., red, yellow, and green). Traffic signals may use timers to implement fixed intersection cycling times. For example, a first traffic flow travelling in a particular direction may be permitted to pass through an intersection during a first time period and may be stopped during a second time period. The cycling times may vary based on the time of day and day of the week, or for other special circumstances such as a major event.
Traffic signals may be dynamically controlled based on detected traffic patterns. The traffic patterns may be detected, for example, using pressure sensors in a road or other vehicle sensors. Traffic signals may give more time to a traffic flow associated with heavy traffic, and the traffic signals may shorten or even skip another traffic flow that has little or no traffic waiting.
Traffic signals may give priority to special traffic, particularly emergency vehicles such as fire trucks, ambulances, and police cars. For example, a traffic signal may include a sensor to receive a radio-frequency signal and/or sounds transmitted by an emergency vehicle and may change based on detecting the emergency vehicle.


An optoelectronic device configured to operate at an electromagnetic radiation frequency having metal wire electrodes that are optically transparent as a result of the wires having an effective plasma frequency that is equal to or lower than the electromagnetic frequency at which the device operates. The effective plasma frequency of the wire is lowered by configuring the path of the wire between the terminal ends to be meandering, serpentine, U-shaped and in other non-linear configurations.

Optical absorption in metals is a fundamental loss process, which is difficult to avoid. When metals are nanostructured, the loss is typically more significant as the surface area increases and the structural size becomes comparable to the penetration depth of optical fields. In particular, when surface plasmons—collective oscillations of electromagnetic fields and free electrons in metal surfaces—are excited, energy dissipation can become even greater.
The absorption in metals often limits the efficiency of metal-based nanoscale devices. For example, in optoelectronic devices, such as nanophotovoltaic devices, light absorption in metal electrodes does not lead to electricity and decreases the efficiency of the device. In light emitting diodes, surface plasmons can be exploited to concentrate light but strong metal absorption remains a major source of losses in plasmon-mediated devices.
The problem of this parasitic absorption becomes critical when ultra-high efficiency devices are desired. Moreover, if the device operates over a broad band as in solar cells, metal absorption needs to be controlled over the whole spectrum of interest and this poses challenges.
When high refractive index materials and metals are used in a device, inserting a thin low index material between them often reduces absorption loss in metals. Moreover, metals are typically opaque at visible frequencies of light and become transparent only at frequencies higher than their plasma frequency, which is typically in the ultraviolet region. This unique optical property of metals has its origin in their free electron gas. Below the plasma frequency, the free electrons follow the electromagnetic oscillation of light and prevent the light from penetrating into the metal.
Oppositely, above the plasma frequency, the light wave oscillation is faster than the electronic movement and light can propagate in the metal. In many optical and optoelectronic applications, the frequency of light is typically well below the plasma frequency of the metals involved and light can penetrate only a few tens of nanometers into the metals.
It is also known that nanostructured metal-dielectric composites can become transparent. However, in this case, it has not yet been clear if light takes paths in the dielectric materials or actually penetrates into the metal. Only in the latter case, it would be possible for light to go into the dielectric regions surrounded by the metal. This property would be extremely useful for certain applications such as photovoltaics where the nanostructured active materials can be surrounded by metal electrodes. However, in typical nanostructured photovoltaic devices, a large surface to volume ratio causes serious losses of electric charge carriers due to their surface recombination.

Supressing optical loss in nanostructured metals by increasing self-inductance and electron path length


A surgical instrument comprised of a handle, a blade fixed to the forward end of the handle, and a spring-biased retractable sheath which is received within the handle. A mechanism is provided for retracting the sheath within the handle by depressing a single button on the upper surface of the handle, such that the sheath is retracted against the force of the spring as the button is depressed, and upon release of the button returns the sheath automatically to its released position covering the blade. Additionally, a mechanism is provided for resisting accidental exposure of the blade.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the construction of knives and other sharpened implements. The invention particularly relates to the construction of knives to be used a surgical instruments, and more particularly to the construction of scalpels having an integral cover to protect such implements from damage and from damaging their surroundings.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Surgical scalpels are extremely sharp cutting implements. The extreme sharpness of the blades renders them very hazardous when passing the scalpels back and forth between the surgeon and the operating assistant. It is obvious that extremely sharp scalpels can very easily cut a glove, and the skin beneath the glove; and, if the blade has already been used on a patient, there is an obvious danger of infection. Another difficulty with such extremely sharp knives is that the blades are very easy to ruin, for example, by the scalpel edge coming in contact with another instrument, an instrument tray or other hard surface.
There have been a number of attempts to overcome these problems. U.S. Pat. No. 2,735,176 discloses a veterinary surgical knife which comprises a hollow handle component having a slidably extendable blade. U.S. Pat. No. 4,730,613 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,663,846 disclose cutting instruments having a extendable blades. U.S. Pat. No. 4,491,132 discloses a sheath and a retractable surgical tool combination wherein the blade must be manually extended and retracted in relation to the sheath. U.S. Pat. No. 4,523,379 discloses a knife with retractable sheath, teaching a complex retraction mechanism wherein the sheath must be manually extended to cover the blade, and wherein the blade is exposed when the sheath is in its relaxed position. None of the foregoing are designed to be disposable items U.S. Pat. No. 4,735,202 discloses a disposable microsurgical knife having a locking blade guard which must be manually extended to cover the blade, and, when retracted, is designed to be removed completely from the knife. U.S. Pat. No. 4,414,974 discloses a disposable microsurgical knife having a glow-in-the-dark shroud which must be manually extended to cover the blade and when extended is not locked in place. U.S. Pat. No. 3,906,626 discloses a disposable surgical scalpel in which the sheath must be manually extended to cover the blade, and, once fully extended, is permanently locked in its extended position.
The surgical scalpel of this invention obviates many of the prior art problems. First, its mechanism is simple, inexpensive, and easy to assemble, making it ideal for one-time use. Second, in its released position, the sheath is automatically extended to cover the blade so that manual sheathing of the blade is unnecessary. Third, the blade cannot be accidentally exposed by bumping the sheath. Fourth, the knife can conveniently be simultaneously held and unsheathed with one hand.


A method and system for monitoring the behavior of an implanted pacemaker counts (records) the number of times that a given internal event or state change of the pacemaker occurs, and also determines the rate at which each event or state change thus counted occurs. The event counts and their associated rate are stored (recorded) in appropriate memory circuits housed within the pacemaker device. At an appropriate time, the stored event count and rate data are downloaded to an external programming device. The external programming device processes the event count and rate data, and displays a distribution of the event count data as a function of its rate of occurrence, as well as other statistical information derived therefrom. The displayed information, and its associated statistical information, allows a baseline recording to be made that establishes the implanted pacemaker's behavior for a given patient under known conditions. Such baseline recording of event counts in combination with the associated rate of occurrence of such event counts provides significant insight into the past behavior of the pacemaker as implanted in a particular patient. The past behavior of the pacemaker, in turn, may then be used to predict with a high degree of accuracy the future behavior of the pacemaker.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to implantable medical devices and methods, and more particularly to a pacing system and method for recording and reporting the occurrence of pacing events associated with the operation of an implantable pacemaker in combination with the respective rates of occurrence of such events.
One of the most common types of implantable medical devices in use today is the implantable pacemaker. Modern pacemakers are small, battery-powered electronic devices that monitor the activity of the heart to determine when the heart is naturally beating, and provide stimulation pulses to the heart when the heart is not naturally beating, thereby maintaining a prescribed heart rhythm or rate. Advantageously, a pacemaker may be implanted in a patient, and coupled to the patient's heart via appropriate pacemaker leads that are also implanted. By implanting the pacemaker and leads, the pacemaker becomes an integral part of the patient, and the patient is able to maintain a substantially normal life style without the bother and worry that typically accompany the use of external (non-implanted), life-sustaining medical devices.
Nearly all implantable pacemakers in use today, as well as similar implantable medical devices, can be configured by the attending physician in the physician's office. The process of configuring a pacemaker is commonly referred to as "programming." The programming process uses noninvasive telemetry to customize the operation of the pacemaker to fit the individual needs of the patient. Customization is achieved by adjusting a set of "pacemaker parameters" to values that cause the pacemaker to work in an optimum way for the particular patient within whom the device has been implanted.
Disadvantageously, as the complexity of new implantable devices has evolved over the past several years, it has become increasingly difficult for the attending physician, or other medical personnel, to determine how the pacemaker should be programmed in order to provide the most effective therapy for a given patient. This difficulty is particularly manifest with recent-generation pacemakers that tend to be more automatic and autonomous than earlier-generation pacemakers, which recent-generation pacemakers are controlled by input signals received from a multiplicity of internal sensors. For example, recent "rate-responsive" pacemakers provide stimulation pulses to a patient's heart, as needed, based on the input signals received from one or more physiological or other sensors that attempt to predict just how fast the patient's heart should beat in order to meet the patient's physiological needs.
A significant factor that makes the optimum programming of recent-generation pacemakers more difficult is the variation in each of the sensor inputs from patient to patient. Such variation is caused by numerous factors, including the patient's physical structure, the implant site, the particular disease or malady the patient has and its progression within the patient's heart or other body tissue, the drugs being taken by the patient to treat his or her condition, etc. Thus, to appropriately program the pacemaker for a given patient, the physician must anticipate how the pacemaker will operate given all of these variables, and given all the environments and activities that the patient is expected to encounter. Programming a modern pacemaker may thus comprise an extremely formidable task, for which task there is a critical need for programming aids to assist the physician in anticipating the pacemaker response for each particular patient.
It is known in the art to use programming aids and devices with implantable pacemakers to facilitate the physician's understanding of the pacemaker's programmed operation as its interacts with the patient's natural cardiac activity. For many years, the primary programming aid and source of diagnostic data for use in analyzing the operation of an implanted pacemaker has been the surface electrocardiogram (ECG), in which both pacemaker and heart activity are blended. From the ECG, the activity of the heart--including the contraction of the atria, the contraction of the ventricles, and the timing therebetween--could be displayed. From the pacemaker, the activity of the pacemaker--including when a heart contraction was sensed and when a stimulation pulse was generated--could likewise be monitored through the use of marker signals telemetered from the pacemaker to a remote (non-implanted) receiver, where such signals were processed and displayed as marks on the ECG waveform.
In recent years, specific programming devices have been developed that not only allow the pacemaker parameters to be noninvasively set to desired values, but that also allow the operation of the pacemaker and the heart to be monitored without having to obtain a surface ECG. Such is accomplished by transmitting an intracardiac ECG signal, either alone or in combination with marker signals. See e.g., U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,559,947; 4,596,255; 4,791,936; and 4,809,697.
Unfortunately, while such prior art programming devices have done much to facilitate communications with and analysis of implantable programmable pacemakers, they all suffer from one major drawback--they are limited to real-time data analysis. This is true even though some provide the capability of capturing a short segment, e.g., 30 seconds, of the intracardiac ECG signal, which intracardiac ECG signal, once captured, can advantageously be expanded, compressed, or otherwise processed in a desired manner in order to better examine it. Unfortunately, in order to properly assess some types of problems that may develop for a given patient having an implanted pacemaker, it is frequently necessary to examine the intracardiac signal, or at least the main components thereof, over a much longer period of time, e.g., days, weeks, or months. What is needed, therefore, is not only a programming device that facilitates the physician's ability to understand the interaction of the implanted device with the patient and to evaluate active clinical problems, but also a device that allows the physician to assess the performance of the system over an extended period of time, e.g., on the order of days, weeks, or months.
The commonly used solution to the above-described problem is to use a Holter Monitor, or equivalent external device. A Holter Monitor is essentially a recorder that is carried by the patient. The Holter Monitor senses the surface ECG signal and records it. Thus, after the data-collection period during which the Holter Monitor is used (usually 24 hours), the number of specific cardiac events that occurred, e.g., the number of ventricular contractions, may be determined.
Disadvantageously, Holter Monitors, and equivalent devices, are external devices that must be carried by the patient continuously throughout the monitoring period. Such carrying can be a nuisance and a bother to the patient. Further, such externally-carried recording devices suffer from numerous limitations. One of the main limitations is their inability to consistently identify the high-frequency pacing stimulus generated by the pacemaker. This is particularly the case when the pacemaker generates a bipolar pacing pulse, which pacing pulse is of relatively low amplitude and difficult to detect (compared to a unipolar pacing pulse). Thus, although the contraction of the heart may be recordable, there is no way of easily determining whether the contraction was a natural contraction or a paced contraction. Further, if a pacing pulse is generated and the heart does not respond to it (i.e., if there is a lack of "capture"), such event is not detectable.
Another limitation of Holter Monitors, and equivalent externally-carried recording devices, is that they have no way of monitoring, and hence recording, the internal state of the implanted pacemaker. A knowledge of the internal state of a pacemaker would be invaluable in determining the actual pacemaker behavior. Advantageously, the implanted pacemaker "knows" exactly when it paces and senses on each channel and how it is responding to every input signal. Thus, what is needed is an implanted pacemaker that is equipped to track and report its behavior over time; and, upon command, provide such information to an attending physician.
There are at least two prior art devices known to the inventors that attempt to address the above needs. On such device is the Cosmos.TM. 283-01 pacemaker marketed by Intermedics, Inc. of Angleton, Tex. The Cosmos 283-01, using a feature termed "Diagnostic Data.TM.," counts the number of specific cardiac events that occur during the monitoring period. See, Sanders et al., "Data Storage and Retrieval by Implantable Pacemakers for Diagnostic Purposes," PACE. Vol. 7, pp. 1228-33 (1984); and Levine, P. A., "Diagnostic Data: An Aid to the Follow-Up and Assessment of the Pacing System," Journal of Electrophysiology, Vol. 1, pp. 144-53 (1987). The other device is the CHORUS.TM. 6033 pacemaker marketed by ELA Medical, of Montrouge, France. Both of these devices, and similar devices described in the literature, see, e.g., U.S. Pat. No. 4,513,743 (van Arragon et al.), are thus able to determine the total number of occurrences of a selected cardiac event, e.g., the number of times that an atrial pulse is issued; or the number of times that an atrial-to-ventricular (AV) interval has a delay that falls within defined time limits. Disadvantageously, however, such devices do not record the frequency of occurrence of the cardiac events that are counted. This limitation prevents many necessary evaluations from being performed, such as the determination of sensor responsiveness and an assessment of chronotropic competence. What is needed, therefore, is an implantable medical device that not only detects and records the occurrence of specified cardiac events, and in particular pacemaker events or states, but that also determines and records the frequency of occurrence, or the rate, associated with each such detected and recorded event.
The present invention advantageously addresses the above and other needs.

Method and system for recording, reporting, and displaying the distribution of pacing events over time and for using same to optimize programming


Provided is an actinic-ray- or radiation-sensitive resin composition, includes a resin (P) containing a repeating unit (A) that when exposed to actinic rays or radiation, is decomposed to thereby generate an acid and a repeating unit (B) with a structure that when acted on by an acid, is decomposed to thereby increase its solubility in an alkali developer, and a compound (U) structured so that when the composition is formed into a film, the compound is unevenly distributed in a surface of the film.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an actinic-ray- or radiation-sensitive resin composition, a resist film therefrom and a method of forming a pattern therewith. The composition, resist film and method of forming a pattern according to the present invention can be used in, for example, a semiconductor production process for an IC, a photomask or the like, a circuit board production process for a liquid crystal, a thermal head or the like, a nanoimprint mold fabrication process and other photofabrication processes.
2. Description of the Related Art
Heretofore, the microfabrication by lithography using a photoresist composition is performed in the process for manufacturing semiconductor devices, such as an IC and an LSI. In recent years, the formation of an ultrafine pattern in the submicron region or quarter-micron region is increasingly demanded in accordance with the realization of high integration for integrated circuits. Accordingly, the trend of exposure wavelength toward a short wavelength, for example, from g-rays to i-rays and further to a KrF excimer laser light is seen. Further, the development of lithography using electron beams, X-rays, or soft X-rays such as EUV light, other than the excimer laser light, is now being promoted.
In particular, the lithography using electron beams is positioned as the next-generation or next-next-generation pattern forming technology. Resists of high sensitivity and high resolution are demanded for the lithography. Specifically, increasing the sensitivity is a very important task to be attained for the shortening of wafer processing time. However, the pursuit of increasing the sensitivity with respect to the resists for electron beams is likely to invite not only the lowering of resolving power but also the deterioration of line edge roughness. Thus, there is a strong demand for the development of resists that simultaneously satisfy these properties. Herein, the line edge roughness refers to the phenomenon that the edge at an interface of resist pattern and substrate is irregularly varied in the direction perpendicular to the line direction due to the characteristics of the resist, so that when the pattern is viewed from above, the pattern edge is observed uneven. This unevenness is transferred in the etching operation using the resist as a mask to thereby cause poor electrical properties resulting in poor yield. Especially in the nanoregion of 0.25 μm or less, the line edge roughness is now an extremely important theme in which improvement is to be attained. High sensitivity is in a relationship of trade-off with high resolution and good line edge roughness. How to simultaneously satisfy all of them is a critical issue.
With respect to development defects as well, suppression thereof is demanded. How to simultaneously satisfy all of high sensitivity, high resolution, good line edge roughness and development defects is a very important task.
The electron beam lithography utilized as a nanofabrication technology is now indispensable as a method of fabricating a photomask blank used in the production of a photomask for semiconductor manufacturing.

Actinic-ray- or radiation-sensitive resin composition, resist film therefrom and method of forming pattern therewith


An imaging system produces an accurately colored representation of any desired land portion of the Earth's surface based on its measured red and near infra-red radiation. The land's image is composed of a set of pixels, each colored to represent the color of a corresponding area of the land. In the course of generating the image, the system classifies each area of the land based on scan data produced by satellites measuring red and near-infrared radiation from each area of the land. The system associates a color with each land class and colors the image pixel corresponding to each area of the land with the color associated with its class. The system allows an operator to supply input calibration data controlling the color associated with each class. Through an iterative process of adjusting the calibration data so as to make colors in the land image produced by the system conform to known colors of representative areas of that land, the operator can make the system produce an accurately colored image of the entire land. The system also generates a color classification display illustrating how it relates color to land classification. The color classification map display helps the operator to determine how to adjust the calibration data.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to a system for creating accurately colored images of land areas based on limited spectral radiation data gathered by spacecraft orbiting and scanning the land, and in particular, the red and near infrared images available from present weather satellites.
2. Description of Related Art
Orbiting sensors and other imaging devices have generated large amounts of information about the Earth. Unfortunately a realistic, cloudless, true color global image of the entire Earth with sufficient resolution to identify many land features has not been produced. Satellites and aircraft have taken many high resolution photographs of portions of the Earth but such photographs are not extensive enough or sufficiently coherent to assemble an unobscured and undistorted composite Earth image. Many factors have conspired to prevent construction of a realistic composite color photographic image of the Earth. For example, much of the Earth's surface is usually obscured by clouds or haze. Even clear atmosphere increasingly obscures and distorts color and detail as the photographic view is directed away from vertical.
Various non-photographic imaging sensors have been deployed in space craft for monitoring weather and earth resources, but most such sensors provide only low resolution images or fail to scan the entire Earth. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Television Infrared Orbiting Satellites (TIROS) include Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometry (AVHRR) packages scanning the entire Earth approximately twice a day to produce five sensor data streams ("Channels") imaging the earth with a resolution of about 1 kilometer. The Channel One scanner senses the intensity of light radiation in the visible red spectrum between 580 and 680 nanometers in wavelength. The Channel Two scanner covers the "near-infrared" spectrum of radiation with wavelengths between 725 and 1,100 nanometers. Channels Three to Five sense infrared portions of the spectrum. Thus the five channels carry data streams representing five different images of the Earth sampling separate parts of the red through infrared portion of the radiation spectrum. The images are pixel-based and relatively high in resolution, with each pixel of the image representing the measured radiation intensity at a spot on the Earth about 1 kilometer in diameter.
The AVHRR system was designed primarily to monitor weather and temperature patterns in the oceans and the atmosphere, not to image the land surface in the visible spectrum. But the data it produces has been used for other purposes, for example to measure the amount of land-based vegetation. Since green plants absorb most red light while reflecting near-infrared light, the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), a measure of the difference between the red light intensity of Channel One and near-infrared intensity of Channel Two, has been used to image vegetation density. A high NDVI value indicates productive vegetation while a low NDVI value indicates bare soil, clouds, water or ice. However colors used to distinguish vegetated areas of the Earth from non-vegetated areas are arbitrary and do not represent the true colors of such areas.
There have been attempts to use the AVHRR data to produce color images of land portions of the Earth, but such attempts have been relatively unsuccessful, having failed to accurately model the relationship between land color and available AVHRR data. It is common to create a pixel-based image where each pixel is formed by mixing various levels of red, green and blue (RGB) components. One might use the red spectrum data from Channel One to control the intensity of the red component, NDVI to control the intensity of the green component, and various combinations of AVHRR data to control the intensity of the blue component. However, while the Channel One data accurately indicates the red component, the green component is only loosely related to NDVI and the blue component has not been accurately predicted by any previously known combinations of AVHRR channel data. Thus previous attempts to color images produced based on AVHRR data have provided only poor approximations of the true colors of the Earth. Such failures arise because there is no fixed, single-valued relationship between the limited spectrum radiation represented by AVHRR data and visible spectrum color. Except for its visible red spectrum portion, such radiation does not arise as a result of the land's color but from other characteristics of the land. Differently colored lands can and frequently do produce similar AVHRR radiation patterns.
What is needed is a method for producing high resolution images depicting true colors of land portions of the Earth's surface as accurately as possible from the limited spectrum scan AVHRR data currently provided by the NOAA.

System for generating color images of land


In the communication control unit lower layers communication control device includes first and second buffers. When MAC frames are received, these are input to the first buffer. By contrast, when LLC frames are received, these are first input to the second buffer, and then, transfered into a shared memory through output means. The second buffer operates as a ring buffer scheme and LLC frames can be received without missing any one after another in this unit, as long as the second buffer has enough capacity. Furthermore, only LLC frames are stored in the second buffer, thus enabling simplification of buffer management.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a communication control unit for a local area network. More particularly, it relates to a communication control unit which has a first and a second communication control means in order to execute higher and lower protocol layers separately.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Recently, communication control units, which are used in local area networks, have been decreased in size using the LSI technique. As the control of a MAC (Medium Access Control) layer has been carried out using LSIs, communication control units have become widely used, especially in the token ring system and the token bus system specified by IEEE standards.
As a result, a communication control unit in which MAC sublayer data and LLC (Logical link control) sublayer data are separately buffered, has been developed. MAC sublayer data (referred to as a MAC frame, below) should be processed inside the communication control unit which is made of LSIs, while LLC sublayer data (referred to as a LLC frame, below) should be processed in a higher layers control unit.
For example, in our report VLSI architecture for an IEEE 802.5 token-ring LAN controller", Tanaka et al., Custom Integrated Circuit Conference, 1989, a token-ring LAN control unit (TRC) which has two 128 byte FIFOs as buffers only for LLC frames and three FIFOs (two of which have 128 bytes and another has 40 bytes) as buffers only for MAC frames, is reported. Thus, the communication control unit is workable only for the MAC layer process because of the separation of buffers as described in this report.
On the other hand, in order to process communication data easier in a higher layers control unit, LLC frames should not be stored in a continuous memory area, but should be stored in divided memory areas (frame buffer areas, or FBs), each of which is comprised of tens to thousands of bytes. (This data structure is shown in FIG. 4 and the detail will be described in the explanation of embodiments.) Thus, if one unit is comprised of 128 bytes, an LLC frame having 10 K bytes is stored dividedly in 80 FBs. In order to gather up the data which are distributed into a plurality of FBs as mentioned above, a new data structure called the frame discriptor (FD) is used. This FD contains the whole length of an LLC frame, an FB address in which the beginning of the LLC frame is stored, their statuses, and so on. As a result, the communication control unit should not handle only the read-out of received data. The real operation of this LLC frame is as follows.
In a communication control unit, an FB list and an FD list are provided in advance to be used for receiving. When an LLC frame is received, DMA device begins to work under the control of a CPU which is incorporated in this control unit, so as to break up the LLC frame into a buffer size when it is transferred into buffers registered in the FB list. CPU sets an FD with the frame length, the FB address, and the status at the receiving end, and informs the higher layers control unit of these data through interrupt signals. In the case where a MAC frame is received, CPU descriminates the frame type. In other words, if the frame is found to be one which should be transferred to the higher layers control unit, it is processed in the same way as an LLC frame. Also, if the frame is found to be one which should be processed inside the unit, it is not written into memories.
According to the above mentioned structure of the prior art communication control unit, information regarding not only communication data but also various control data should be stored into memories. However, a usual DMA device cannot carry out such processes. So, those processes must be carried out in the CPU. Also, the final judgement regarding which frame must be stored into memories, should be carried out in the CPU. In the past, communication speeds were slow, so that the process time in the CPU did not have problems, because the time interval of receiving frames was relatively long. Recently, however, communication speeds have become faster and a large number of frames are received one after another. So, a reatively large time lag has arisen in the CPU process. According to this time lag, the activation of the DMA and the assignment of buffers occurs late. As a result, frames sometimes could not be received correctly by the communication control unit. In a TRC, for example, usually two FIFOs are provided for LLC frames. In this device, when a first frame has been received completely, the data are stored into the first FIFO. If a second frame is received during the output of the data from the first FIFO into memories, the data from the second frame are stored in the second FIFO. After the output from the first FIFO has been completed, the contents of the second FIFO is output. Thus, the continuous receiving of frames can be carried out in the TRC, using the two FIFOs alternatively. In this case, however, if the output from the second FIFO is late for the completion time of output from the first FIFO, the second FIFO overflows the data to cause a reception failure. Also, if the releasing of data from the first FIFO and the preparation for receiving the third frame are late, this third frame cannot be received at all by the first FIFO. Especially, in the case where short frames are received continuously, the handling interval requires a time shorter than the processing time, thus frequently causing receiving failures. In order to cope with this problem, increasing the number of FIFOs can be considered. It is, however, not a good solution because the increase of FIFOs requires the control circuit to become complicated and increase in size.

Communication control unit with lower layer protocol control and higher layer protocol control


Implementations are directed to receiving a set of training data including a plurality of data points, at least a portion of which are to be labeled for subsequent supervised training of a computer-executable machine learning (ML) model, providing at least one visualization based on the set of training data, the at least one visualization including a graphical representation of at least a portion of the set of training data, receiving user input associated with the at least one visualization, the user input indicating an action associated with a label assigned to a respective data point in the set of training data, executing a transformation on data points of the set of training data based on one or more heuristics representing the user input to provide labeled training data in a set of labeled training data, and transmitting the set of labeled training data for training the ML model.

Machine learning (ML) can be described as an application of artificial intelligence (AI), in which a ML model is built using algorithms that iteratively learn from training data. Training data can be described as known data points that include patterns, which the resulting ML model should predict. An example ML model can include, without limitation, a classifier that receives input data (e.g., an image), and assigns the input data to one or more classes (e.g., human, cat, dog, based on content of the image). Various techniques can be used to train an ML model.
An example training technique includes supervised learning, in which the training data is labeled, and the labeled training data is processed (e.g., using linear regression) to infer the ML model. However, to implement supervised learning, the training data, which may require relatively large data sets, must be accurately labeled. This can be a daunting, time-consuming, and resource intensive task, which requires a significant level of domain knowledge (e.g., labeling a drug with one or more conditions that the drug treats).

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

System for time-efficient assignment of data to ontological classes


A protection circuit including an energy-storage device, a fusible element, and an overvoltage modulation unit is provided. The energy-storage device stores a first energy and supplies the first energy. The fusible element connected in series with the energy-storage device for constituting a branch circuit. The overvoltage modulation unit is connected in parallel with the branch circuit, wherein when the branch circuit begins to have an overvoltage, an absolute value of a modulating current flowing through the overvoltage modulation unit is increased instantaneously, so that a second energy instantaneously released from the energy-storage device is applied to cut off the fusible element.

An instantaneous voltage may happen on any electronic device and is generally caused by a circuit fault, a clap of thunder, or an electrostatic discharging. Components usually used for an overvoltage protection in a circuit involve a diode, a metal oxide varistor (MOV), a multilayer varistor (MLV), a transient voltage suppresser (TVS), and a surge protector.
An overvoltage of a circuit usually occurs with an overcurrent. Generally, a fuse is an element used for an overcurrent protection.
A capacitor is an energy-storage device. In an inductive circuit, in order to increase the power factor and the efficiency, a power capacitor is usually connected in parallel to the power system for compensating virtual work. The damage reason of the power capacitor is the insulation deterioration caused by an overvoltage.
In order that both the deterioration of the energy-storage device and the safety problem induced therefrom are avoided due to the overvoltage, it is necessary to seek architecture of a simple circuit for protecting the energy-storage device.

Circuit and method for protecting energy-storage device