In order to reduce the mass of a primary structure of a mounting pylon for an engine of an aircraft, the mounting pylon includes a box and a rear sub-structure fastened to the box which includes two lateral panels, each equipped at its rear end with a first linking portion through which passes a first connection orifice that is designed to receive a connection pin of a lateral front wing attachment. The rear sub-structure is made in one piece and includes two opposite lateral flanks that are respectively fastened to the two lateral panels of the box by fastening elements. Each lateral flank has a second linking portion through which passes a second connection orifice that is aligned with the first connection orifice, and is also designed to receive the connection pin of the lateral front wing attachment.

In existing aircraft, the engines such as dual-flow, two-spool jet engines are usually mounted below the wing using complex mounting devices, also referred to as EMS (engine mounting structure) or mounting pylon. Mounting pylons of this kind are known for example from document FR 3 014 840.
The mounting pylons that are usually used have a primary structure, which is also termed the rigid structure. This primary structure generally has at least one portion in the general shape of a box, that is to say that it is made up of by joining lower and upper spars that are linked to one another by a plurality of transverse stiffening ribs which are located inside the box. The spars are arranged at the lower and upper faces while lateral panels close the box to form lateral faces. Angle stock can provide the mechanical connection between these constituent elements of the box, the transverse section of which is in the general shape of a quadrilateral, usually square or rectangular.
As is known, the primary structure of a mounting pylon is designed to allow the static and dynamic forces produced by the engines, such as weight and thrust but also the various dynamic forces, to be transmitted to the wing.
To that end, the mounting means are arranged between the wing element and the primary structure of the pylon. These are multiple wing attachments located in the rear portion of the primary structure. In certain embodiments, this primary structure is augmented by a rear sub-structure fastened behind the box. In this specific case, the front end of the rear sub-structure is fastened by means of bolts to the rear end of the box, and this front end is accommodated between linking portions provided at the rear of the two lateral panels of the box. Each linking portion is in the form of a lug which is provided with a connection orifice that accommodates a connection pin of a lateral front wing attachment.
In order to meet "fail-safe" safety requirements, it proves necessary to provide, for each lug, a secondary force path that can react forces for a certain time following failure of one of these lateral panel lugs of the box. This redundancy is generally ensured by installing, on the pylon, a backup lug that is pressed against the principal lug and is fastened to its associated lateral panel by bolts. Thus, the lateral front wing attachment connection pin passes through both lugs such that, in the event of failure of the main lug, the backup lug ensures that forces continue to be transmitted to the wing element of the aircraft.
Although this solution proves satisfactory from a structural and safety point of view, it does however have a large overall mass which is penalized in particular by the presence of the backup lugs and their means for fastening to the lateral panels of the box. There is therefore a need to optimize the design of the primary structure of the pylon so as to reduce its overall mass.
EP 2 426 051 A1 also describes an aircraft engine mounting pylon according to the prior art.

Lightweight primary structure for aircraft engine mounting pylon


A new suture depressor for suturing tissues without the risk of harm to the tissues commonly encountered with the use of forceps. The inventive device includes a handle having distal and proximal ends. A flattened portion is formed at the distal end at an acute angle relative to a longitudinal axis of the handle and includes a pair of spaced-apart projections which extend parallel one to the other from opposite ends of a flattened portion edge.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to suturing instruments and more particularly pertains to a new suture depressor for suturing tissues without the risk of harm to the tissues commonly encountered with the use of forceps.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The use of suturing instruments is known in the prior art. More specifically, suturing instruments heretofore devised and utilized are known to consist basically of familiar, expected and obvious structural configurations, notwithstanding the myriad of designs encompassed by the crowded prior art which have been developed for the fulfillment of countless objectives and requirements.
Known prior art suturing instruments include U.S. Pat. No. 5,176,691; U.S. Pat. No. 5,087,263; U.S. Pat. Des. No. 353,002; U.S. Pat. No. 4,961,741; U.S. Pat. No. 4,641,652 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,602,635.
While these devices fulfill their respective, particular objectives and requirements, the aforementioned patents do not disclose a new suture depressor. The inventive device includes a handle having distal and proximal ends, a flattened portion formed at the distal end and a pair of spaced-apart projections integrally formed at a flattened portion edge.
In these respects, the suture depressor according to the present invention substantially departs from the conventional concepts and designs of the prior art, and in so doing provides an apparatus primarily developed for the purpose of suturing tissues without the risk of harm to the tissues commonly encountered with the use of forceps.


A computer-implemented method, a computer program product, and a computer system for dynamically creating a composition reference video to support a user activity. In response to that a user selects a reference video for performing an activity, the computer system identifies a search query of a reference video. The computer system identifies personalized parameters of the user, based on a knowledge corpus user preferences of performing activities, and the search query. The computer system identifies appropriate videos and video transcripts in an online video repository and identifies textual contents through document and text search, based on a prediction about how the user is to perform the activity. The computer system draws series of images based on the textual contents. The computer system normalizes contents from the appropriate videos and the series of images and normalizes voices in the contents from the appropriate videos.

The present invention relates generally to dynamically creating a composition reference video, and more particularly to dynamically creating a composition reference video to support a user activity.
In many situations, users play videos to follow activities and instructional steps presented in the videos. For instance, if a user need to perform an activity (e.g., cooking) the user is not sure how to perform the activity, then the user may search online videos and follow an online instructional video to perform the activity. As one may see in live television shows, instructional videos of activities (such as cooking demonstration) with step by step in procedures of the activities.
In many cases, a user can not follow an available video blindly. Some changes may be necessary, because an actual specific activity to be performed is different from an activity performed in an available video. In an example of a cooking activity, a user may prefer well done or slightly over cooked meals; however, such a user preferred activity is not present in an available video. In a further example of a cooking activity, a user may like additional spicy ingredients, but an available video does not mentioned or present using such spices in an exact manner. In these cases, blindly following an available video and performing an activity may not be very useful in many ways.

Dynamically creating a composition reference video to support a user activity


An apparatus (10) and an associated method for testing an acceleration sensor assembly (14), which is preferably an accelerometer assembly. An electrical exciter (34) is operated in response to an excitation signal (32) from a signal generator (30). The exciter (34) applies oscillating excitation to the accelerometer assembly (14). An initial excitation is applied to the accelerometer assembly (14) by the exciter (34). The frequency of the initial excitation is varied over a range of frequencies via a signal (62) from a frequency range sweep function (56) to the signal generator (30). The output of the accelerometer assembly (14) is monitored during application of the initial excitation over the range of frequencies. A frequency value associated with a predetermined response in the output of the accelerometer assembly (14) is stored. The excitor (34) subsequently applies a test oscillating excitation at the stored frequency value to the accelerometer assembly (14). The output of the accelerometer assembly (14) is monitored during application of the test excitation. A determination function (72) determines whether the output of the accelerometer assembly (14) provides the predetermined response during application of the test excitation and provides an output signal (74) indicative of the determination.

Acceleration sensors are used within vehicles to control systems responsive to acceleration of the vehicle or responsive to acceleration of a component of the vehicle. For example, an acceleration sensor is used to sense acceleration which is indicative of a vehicle collision. One or more vehicle occupant restraint devices, such as air bag modules and seat belt pretensioners, are controlled in response to the sensed acceleration.
Another example of the use of an acceleration sensor in a vehicle is within an active suspension system of the vehicle. Acceleration of a sprung mass (e.g., the vehicle body) is sensed by the acceleration sensor. A hydraulic actuator is controlled in response to the sensed acceleration to enhance vehicle suspension performance.
It is possible to assess the condition of at least one type of acceleration sensor by electrically exciting the acceleration sensor, and thereby produce a response at the sensor's output. For example, one type of acceleration sensor is a capacitance-based accelerometer which has a seismic mass. The seismic mass moves in response to acceleration and also moves in response to electrical excitation. An electrical output signal is provided by the accelerometer in response to movement of the seismic mass. The capacitance-based accelerometer is tested by moving the seismic mass via an applied test (i.e., known) excitation and analyzing the output signal to see if an expected result occurs.
Often, acceleration sensor systems are mass-produced in large quantities. The large quantities correspond to the large quantities of vehicles within which the acceleration sensor systems are used. One type of acceleration sensor system which is often mass-produced has structure for testing its acceleration sensor without the aid of external equipment (i.e., the system performs a "self-test" on its acceleration sensor). A self-test acceleration sensor system can self-test its acceleration sensor as frequently as desired.
One approach used for self-test acceleration sensor system production is to configure all of the produced systems to have a standard (i.e., identical) test excitation. Unit-to-unit variation may occur among the outputs of several acceleration sensors in response to a standard self-test excitation despite the fact that all of the acceleration sensors are properly functioning.

Apparatus and method for testing an acceleration sensor


A framework for a security system is described. The framework may be used to track which security engines are available to enforce security policies. A security engine is a software resource that enforces security policies designed to help ensure that a vulnerability of an application or operating system cannot be exploited. The framework may be used to maintain a holistic view of a status of computing devices that a security system is configured to operate with. The framework may enforce security policies uniformly across components of a security system by providing an application program interface. The security system may broker security enforcement events and security policies. By providing these services, the framework presents a unified model for interactions between software components and the security system.

Users of application programs or operating systems sometimes inadvertently install software resources that misbehave or are malicious. Software resources include, e.g., application programs, user interfaces, device drivers, network protocol stacks, and other electronic information. As an example, users may install an application program that provides desirable functionality but may be infected with a virus that produces undesirable results. As a further example, the installed application program may be a Trojan horse. A Trojan horse is a program that provides useful functionality and otherwise appears to be innocuous, but is designed to be malicious or provide results unintended by its use. Indeed, any software resource may inadvertently behave in unintended ways because of programming errors, conflicts with other software resources, or a variety of other reasons.
When a software resource misbehaves or performs malicious activities, it may cause a variety of problems for users, other software resources, and an operating system that may be managing and coordinating multiple software resources. It would thus be highly desirable to provide a framework for a security system that reduces a likelihood of such problems.


A method of fabricating a thin film transistor is disclosed. First, a substrate is provided and a patterned polysilicon layer is formed on the substrate. A metal layer is formed on the patterned polysilicon layer. Then, a portion of the metal layer is removed so that the remaining metal layer beside the patterned polysilicon layer forms a source and a drain. A gate insulation layer is formed on the substrate to cover the source, the drain and the patterned polysilicon layer. A gate is formed on the gate insulation layer over the patterned polysilicon layer.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a pixel structure and thin film transistor and fabrication method thereof. More particularly, the present invention relates to a thin film transistor with a source and a drain made of metallic material and a pixel structure having the thin film transistor and the fabrication method thereof.
2. Description of Related Art
The rapid development of multi-media in our society comes as a result of the many advances in the technology for manufacturing semiconductor and display devices. For display device, thin film transistor liquid crystal display (TFT-LCD), with its high display quality, high spatial utilization, low power consumption and radiation-free operation, has gradually become one of the mainstream products in the market. In fact, thin film transistors have been commonly used inside the thin film transistor liquid crystal display.
FIG. 1 is a schematic cross-sectional view of a conventional thin film transistor. As shown in FIG. 1, the conventional thin film transistor 100 includes a substrate 110, a channel layer 120, a source 130, a first metal contact layer 130a, a drain 140, a second metal contact layer 140a, a gate insulation layer 150, a first dielectric layer 152 and a gate 160. The channel layer 120 is disposed on the substrate 110 and the source 130 and the drain 140 are disposed on the respective sides of the channel layer 120. The gate insulation layer 150 covers the channel layer 120, the source 130 and the drain 140. The gate 160 is located on the gate insulation layer 150 above the channel layer 120. The first dielectric layer 152 covers the gate insulation layer 150 and the gate 160. Furthermore, the first metal contact layer 130a and the second metal contact layer 140a are electrically connected to the source 130 and the drain 140 via the contact opening P1 and P2 respectively.
Conventionally, the channel layer 120, the source 130 and the drain 140 are fabricated using the following steps. First, a polysilicon layer (not shown) is formed over the substrate 110. After forming a gate 160 on the polysilicon layer, an ion implantation is carried out using the gate 160 as a mask to form the source 130 and the drain 140 in the polysilicon layer. Because the source 130 and the drain 140 are formed in an ion implantation, the production requires a longer time and a higher cost. Moreover, the source 130 and the drain 140 made of polysilicon material, and the first metal contact layer 130a and the second metal contact layer 140a for electrically connecting with the source 130 and the drain 140 are made of a different material. As a result, the contact resistance between the source 130 and the first metal contact layer 130a and the contact resistance between the drain 140 and the second metal contact layer 140a are high. When the dimension of the liquid crystal display panel increases in the future, the foregoing high contact resistance will cause more resistance-capacitance delay in signal transmission. Ultimately, the display quality of the liquid crystal display panel will be compromised.


An image forming apparatus includes a first mixer 24a that conveys developer in the first direction while stirring the developer. Recycled toner delivered from a delivery opening 116b of a photosensitive drum cleaner 116 is supplied to an upstream side of the first chamber that contains the toner that is to be supplied to a developing position on a photosensitive drum 103 to which a predetermined potential is applied by a developing roller 27 formed rotatable.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus that forms an image with use of a developer.
2. Description of the Related Art
Image forming apparatus that use a developer including toner form an image, for example, in the following manner. That is, first, an electrostatic latent image is formed on a photosensitive drum serving as an image carrier, and the latent image is developed by a developer unit. Then, the toner image thus obtained is transferred onto a sheet by a transfer portion, and the image is fixed onto the sheet by the fuser.
Of the image forming apparatus, a type which removes toner remaining on the photosensitive drum after transfer of a toner image onto a sheet by a cleaning unit, and recycles collected toner, which is to be called recycle toner hereinafter, is conventionally known.
In connection with the above, for example, a toner recycle mechanism is conventionally known. With this mechanism, recycle toner is returned directly into a developer unit as the recycle toner carried by the collecting mixer provided in the cleaning unit is conveyed by the coupling mixer provided between the cleaning unit and the developer unit.
With the above-described structure, the collected recycle toner is being supplied to the developer unit whenever the collecting mixer and coupling mixer are rotated.
The recycle toner to be re-used contains toner particles from which a unique external additive is partially peeled off, or toner particles to which an external additive peeled off from other particles are attached, or paper dust mixed thereinto. Therefore, as compared to fresh toner whose amount of the external additive is appropriately set, the recycle toner exhibits a slow rising in amount of charge. Further, in case where charging by friction (triboelectrification) caused by stirring is not sufficient, it is possible that the recycle toner is supplied to the photosensitive drummer without being charged at all.
Uncharged toner, due to lack of charge amount, may attach to other parts of the photosensitive drum than the latent image formed thereon, or it may scatter off from the photosensitive drum or paper sheet.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Developer apparatus, image forming apparatus and toner supplying method


A nozzle assembly for the water distribution tray of a humidifier has at least one arm which cooperates with a feature such as a slot on a tray wall, to hold the nozzle assembly in a desired position above a water distribution area of the tray. In a preferred embodiment, the nozzle assembly has two pairs of arms for mounting the nozzle assembly to the tray. Each pair of arms together form a wishbone shape. The arm ends of each pair can be deflected toward each other to permit the ends to enter a slot on the tray wall. When the arm ends are released within the slot, they latch with the slot to hold the nozzle assembly in the desired position.

In cold climates particularly where occupied spaces must be heated, air in these spaces tends to have low relative humidity. This is uncomfortable and sometimes even unhealthy. To remedy this problem, people use humidifiers to add humidity to the air in these spaces.
Humidifiers have a variety of different designs. There are small stand-alone units intended for a single room. Larger units are designed for permanent installation as a component of a central heating system. These add moisture to the stream of heated air passing through the furnace duct to the occupied space. The latter type of humidifier will be referred to as an "in-duct" humidifier hereafter. The humidifier whose description follows is an improvement to one common type of in-duct humidifier.
There are a number of different designs for in-duct humidifiers. The kind which is involved here has an air-permeable pad, typically made from a number of similarly sized layers of thin expanded aluminum sheet stacked to a thickness of perhaps 1.5 in. (3.8 cm.). The layers of aluminum sheet are bonded to each other so as to create a pad structure having a rectangular box-like shape. The pad is placed in or near the furnace duct so that air warmed by the furnace can flow through it. Water is allowed to drip onto the top surface of the pad at a rate which keeps the pad moist from top to bottom. The warm air passing through the pad evaporates water in the pad, adding humidity to the air.
The water drips onto the pad from what is called a water distribution tray, or simply a tray. The tray extends along the top surface of the pad and has a reservoir for holding a small amount of water. Water is fed to the tray from the building water supply, and flow is controlled by a solenoid valve. The tray has holes spaced along its bottom through which water flowing into the tray falls onto the top of the pad. By properly selecting the rate at which water is added to the tray, the pad can be kept moist from top to bottom. The pad, the tray, and a housing supporting them in the proper spatial relationship comprise the most important elements of an in-duct humidifier. It is important for efficient operation that the tray evenly distribute water across the entire width of the pad.
There are water distribution trays now known which have a number of holes distributed along the length of the tray and use individual ducts or channels each for conducting water to each hole. The idea apparently is that using individual channels to conduct water to the holes allows each hole to receive a full measure of the water, thereby assuring that the pad is evenly and fully soaked throughout. These designs do not always fully realize these goals and indeed may sometimes also cause further problems. For example, problems may arise that still prevent complete and uniform saturation of the pad. This may happen if the tray is not perfectly level, preventing an adequate amount of water to flow to all parts of the pad's top surface.
I have found that it is also important for all of the water in the tray to promptly drain onto the pad when water flow stops. This eliminates undrained pools of water which will continue to dry, depositing the minerals dissolved in this pooled water on the tray surfaces. Over time, these mineral deposits can build up to a level which interferes with the operation of the tray itself. The use of a number of individual channels to supply water to individual holes tends to exacerbate this problem.

Nozzle assembly for the water distribution tray of a pad-type humidifier unit


One inventive aspect relates to a method for forming hermetically sealed cavities, e.g. semiconductor cavities comprising fragile devices, MEMS or NEMS devices. The method allows forming hermetically sealed cavities at a controlled atmosphere and pressure and at low temperatures, for example, at temperatures not exceeding about 200° C. The method further allows forming sealed cavities with short release times, for example, release times of about a few minutes to 30 minutes. The method may, for example, be used for zero level packaging of MEMS or NEMS devices.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is related to microelectronic process technology, and more particularly to Micro- and Nano-Electro Mechanical Systems (MEMS and NEMS) process technology. The present invention relates to a method for forming a hermetically sealed cavity, for example a cavity comprising a MEMS or a NEMS device. Embodiments also relate to a wafer level encapsulation method for MEMS and/or NEMS devices.
2. Description of the Related Technology
Many micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) require a hermetic encapsulation under vacuum or under a controlled atmosphere and pressure in order to ensure a good performance and/or an acceptable lifetime of operation. The encapsulation has to be performed without influencing the device performance. This often requires low-temperature processing, the absence of any aggressive or corrosive agents during encapsulation and sealing, and avoidance of deposition of sealing material onto the MEMS device, as all these can cause damage to the device.
Two approaches for device encapsulation can be defined. A first approach is encapsulation during first level packaging. However, when following this approach the fragile, often freely movable, MEMS device is exposed to contamination during wafer dicing and subsequent cleaning. A second approach is zero level packaging or wafer level packaging, whereby the package is designed and fabricated at the same time as the MEMS device. Zero level packaging may be obtained by means of wafer bonding (e.g. wafer-to-wafer or die-to-wafer bonding) or may be based on surface micromachining techniques.
The most popular approach is based on wafer bonding. In this case, sealing is performed by connecting a device wafer and a capping wafer (or a capping die) in which a cavity is made or a stand-off ring is implemented, by use of a reflowable material. In the wafer bonding approach a substrate such as a Si wafer or a MEMS substrate, is used as a cap to close the cavity comprising the MEMS device. These wafers are thick and the sealing ring is large. Therefore, this packaging approach is space consuming. Moreover, batch processing is not possible.
A more compact way of hermetic sealing of a MEMS device is to make use of thin-film caps realized by surface micromachining. In this approach, access holes or channels may be formed in the thin-film caps which allow passing through of e.g. a MEMS sacrificial layer etchant for etching away a sacrificial layer for forming a cavity. After forming a cavity and, optionally release of a MEMS device present in the cavity, the channel may be closed, thereby sealing the cavity.
In EP 1 433 741 a zero-level packaging method is described based on closing an opening or openings in a membrane using a reflow material, the openings being located above an underlying cavity in a substrate. The method comprises depositing an intermediate layer onto the membrane layer whereby this intermediate layer narrows down the openings to be sealed. Next, a reflow layer is deposited on the intermediate layer under a first set of pressure and atmosphere conditions to further partially close the openings. Then, the reflow layer is reflowed under a second set of pressure and atmosphere conditions to close the openings by the reflow layer. The intermediate layer prevents reaction between the sealing layer and the membrane layer, is stable during reflow and narrows down the openings to be sealed due to the formation of a collar or shoulder. This method allows hermetic sealing of openings in a film at controllable atmosphere and pressure. When using this method, there is, however, a risk that material of the different deposited layers passes through the openings and that this material is deposited on fragile micro-devices, such as MEMS devices, that may be located in the cavity under the openings, thereby affecting proper working of such micro-devices.
In the above-described method process temperatures are typically higher than 600° C. A method for hermetically sealing cavities at a lower temperature is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 7,029,829. This document describes a low-temperature method for forming a micro-cavity on a substrate and is particularly useful to package MEMS devices in vacuum on the wafer level and to provide sealed feed-throughs to the outside world. According to this method, the temperature may not exceed 250° C. during the entire method. In this method, the opening or openings to be sealed are not located above the underlying cavity, but large side ports, also called "horizontal" access holes, are used. Because the opening or openings which are used for releasing sacrificial material to form the cavity are not located above the cavity, there is never a risk that the MEMS device in the cavity would be harmed by the materials used passing through the holes and being deposited onto the MEMS device in the cavity. However, a disadvantage of these side ports or horizontal access holes is that release times of several hours are required for forming the cavity.
In WO 2005/089348 a method is described for packaging MEMS devices at low temperatures (200° C. to 300° C.), wherein no access holes are used. In this process an overcoat layer is deposited on a sacrificial polymer layer that is removed prior to package sealing. Removing the sacrificial polymer layer is based on thermal decomposition, whereby the decomposition products of the sacrificial layer diffuse through the overcoat layer. This results in release times of several hours.

Method for forming a hermetically sealed cavity


The present invention provides an ESD device for protecting thin oxide layers in transistors or capacitors in an integrated circuit. In one embodiment, the ESD device includes a silicon-controlled rectifier (SCR), the SCR including a PNP bipolar transistor and a NPN bipolar transistor. The ESD device further includes first and second trigger devices coupled to the SCR and configured to simultaneously turn on the PNP bipolar transistor and the NPN bipolar transistor in response to an ESD pulse on the ESD device. The base of the NPN bipolar transistor is floating to allow a first external resistor to be connected between the base and emitter of the NPN bipolar transistor. A second external resistor can be connected between the base and emitter of the PNP bipolar transistor.

The present invention relates to electronic devices, and more specifically to electrostatic discharge (ESD) protection of integrated circuits.
Metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) devices, such as MOS transistors and MOS capacitors are important components in integrated circuits. Many MOS devices include thin gate dielectrics that are susceptible to ESD induced damage. As the thickness of gate dielectrics scales down in more advanced technologies, the gate dielectrics, such as gate oxide, can rupture at lower voltages. Therefore, protecting gate dielectrics from ESD damage is critical.
It is well known that ESD, especially the Charge-Device Model (CDM) type of ESD, can damage the gate oxide of a MOS device. Although ESD devices can be used to protect the gate oxide, oxide rupture can still occur if the ESD devices have higher trigger voltages than the oxide breakdown voltage. Even when the trigger voltages of the ESD devices are lower than the oxide breakdown voltage, there is still no guarantee that the oxide can survive fast ESD events such as the CDM type of ESD events if the ESD devices are not triggered fast enough to shunt the ESD energy away from the MOS device.

Fast trigger ESD device for protection of integrated circuits


The invention relates to a device for applying a marking to the human eye, in particular on the cornea, comprising a marking head (1) and a retaining device (2) that supports the marking head (1), wherein the marking head (1) comprises a marking element (4) and a support that retains the marking element (4) in a specifiable or changeable angular position, wherein the support is arranged in a rotationally fixed manner relative to the retaining device (2) or a reference line and wherein the marking head (1) can be detached from the retaining device (2).

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a device for applying a marking to the human eye, in particular to the cornea.
There is a need in principle for marking the cornea of the human eye, namely in preparation for ophthalmological intervention for correction of astigmatism, preferably for fixing a lens accurately on the iris.
2. Description of Related Art
Generic devices are already known in the art, generally under the designation "marking instrument".
A generic marking instrument is known from DE 20 2008 004 593 U1, in which this instrument serves to generate markings for ophthalmological surgery. The known instrument comprises a marking head which is pivotably connected to an instrument handle. A marking element provided on the instrument head is disposed so as to be adjustable in its angular position relative to a vertical weight, so that markings can be produced with an angular setting relative to the vertical.
The known generic device is exclusively in a hand-held surgical instrument. The marking head is firmly connected to the instrument. Because of the fixed co-ordination of the marking head with the instrument handle, the production of a marking is limited to the application of the specific instrument. Moreover there is always—inevitably—a relationship to the vertical, according to the selected setting. Moreover, the setting of the angular position of the marking element provided there is complex, and necessitates a separate tool, wherein for the setting the entire instrument should be positioned on a holding block.
The object of the present invention is to configure and to modify a device for applying a marking to the human eye, in particular to the cornea of the human eye, in such a way that with the simplest design it can be set simply in the angular position to discontinue and can be used both in conjunction with hand-held instruments and in conjunction with conventional devices from the field of ophthalmology.

Device for applying a marking to the human eye


Techniques are disclosed for phase detection in a phase-locked loop (PLL) control system, such as a millimeter-wave PLL. A PLL control system includes a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) circuit and a sub-sampling phase detector (SSPD). The VCO circuit is configured to generate an oscillating VCO output voltage based at least in part on an error signal generated by the SSPD. The error signal is proportional to a phase difference between an oscillating reference input voltage and the oscillating VCO output voltage. The SSPD includes a switched emitter-follower (SEF) sampling network, also referred to in this disclosure as an SEF circuit. In contrast to existing CMOS-based techniques, the SEF sampling network allows the SSPD to operate up to higher frequencies, for example, greater than 100 GHz, than possible using a CMOS sampler, and is also compatible with BiCMOS processes, which generally do not have access to advanced small-geometry CMOS.

A voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) is an electronic circuit that produces a periodic, oscillating electronic signal, such as a sine wave or a square wave. The oscillation frequency of a VCO is controlled by a direct current (DC) tuning control voltage input. When a VCO is used in a PLL control system, the tuning control voltage input of the VCO can be varied to provide the desired output phase and frequency of the VCO. However, if the output phase of the VCO drifts away from the desired phase, a compensatory adjustment must be made to the tuning control voltage. To achieve this, the PLL control system includes a phase detector that compares the phase of the VCO output voltage to the phase of a reference input voltage and adjusts the tuning voltage to keep the input and output phases in lock step or within a threshold number of degrees of each other. However, non-trivial issues associated with maintaining a phase-locked loop signal remain due to the limitations of existing designs, particularly with respect to millimeter-wave PLL systems where low phase noise is desired for maximizing the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR).

BAE Systems Information and Electronic Systems Integration Inc.


A curing station for curing a tread strip, having a flat curing mold; a gripper which grips a portion of the cured tread strip inside the curing mold; an actuating device which, at the end of the curing process, moves the gripper to gradually extract the cured tread strip from the curing mold; and a guide device which, as the cured tread strip is extracted, is positioned over the curing mold, and has a main roller, about which the extracted part of the cured tread strip winds, and a secondary roller smaller in diameter than, and positioned parallel to and alongside, the main roller.

Cold-retreading a tyre comprises removing the worn tread from the tyre, and applying a new, cured tread to the tyre carcass. Applying the new, cured tread to the carcass comprises winding a green-rubber cushion and a so-called PCT (Pre-Cured Tread) strip around the carcass; and the carcass, wound inside the cushion and the pre-cured tread strip, is then inserted inside an autoclave and cured further to grip the tread firmly to the carcass by means of the binding action of the cushion.
One example of a pre-cured tread strip, ready for application to a tyre carcass, is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,277,727A1. One example of a cold tyre retreading station employing the above method is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,368,439B1.
Constructing the pre-cured tread strip comprises extruding a green-rubber compound into a continuous green tread strip, which is then cut crosswise into a succession of green tread strips of given length. Each green tread strip is inserted inside a flat curing mold, in which it is cured; and, at the end of the curing process, the cured tread strip must be extracted from the curing mold by detaching the cured tread strip from the parts of the curing mold defining a negative of the tread pattern. The flat curing mold is normally equipped with a gripper, which is initially integrated in the curing mold, engages one end of the cured tread strip, and is lifted up and drawn along by an actuating device to gradually extract the cured tread strip from the curing mold.
Two examples of extracting a cured tread strip from a flat curing mold are described in Patent Applications US2004197432A1 and US2011148001A1.
As it is extracted from the flat curing mold, the cured tread strip bends roughly 180° with a small bend radius in the extraction area, thus subjecting the rubber to severe mechanical stress concentrated in the extraction area, and which may result in the formation of cracks (i.e. deep, narrow fissures) normally originating at the grooves in the tread pattern. In which case, the cured tread strip must obviously be scrapped.
One proposed solution, to reduce mechanical stress concentrated in the extraction area, is to employ a guide roller located over the curing mold, and about which the extracted part of the cured tread strip winds. The guide roller is mounted idly to rotate freely about its central axis, and also to move freely in a direction parallel to the curing mold. The guide roller forces the cured tread strip to bend 180° with a bend radius no smaller than the radius of the guide roller itself. So, a guide roller with a large enough radius prevents the cured tread strip from bending 180° with too small a bend radius, and so prevents severe mechanical stress, capable of forming cracks, from concentrating in the cured tread strip in the extraction area. Relatively large-radius guide rollers, however, have been found to impede extraction of the cured tread strip from the flat curing mold, by forming an overhead obstacle, with which the cured tread strip underneath collides in the extraction area.


A charged particle beam apparatus has a plurality of charged particle beam generating systems disposed in a chamber and a neutralizing coil for neutralizing a first charged particle beam generating system to control the magnetic field in the path of a charged particle beam generated by a second charged particle beam system. The first charged particle beam generating system comprises one or more electron beam lens barrels, and the second charged particle beam generating system comprises one or more focused ion beam lens barrels. The neutralizing coil controls an excitation current of the objective lens of a first electron beam lens barrel.

The present invention relates to a composite charged particle beam apparatus for forming at a predetermined region of a sample surface by irradiating a focused ion beam while scanning over a predetermined region of the sample, and/or observing the sample and/or performing an elemental analysis of the sample surface by irradiating the sample with a focused ion beam and detecting secondary particles and/or an x ray generated in response to irradiation of the sample with an electron beam.
A composite charged particle beam has been realized which is capable of observing and analyzing a sample surface while scanning a focused ion beam or electron beam across a predetermined region of the sample in a sample chamber or irradiating it without scanning (switching, simultaneous irradiation, simultaneous non-irradiation are possible).
This is convenient because a position at which forming is being performed by a focused ion beam can be observed at the same time by a scanning electron microscope and analyzed by EDS.
However, because gallium is generally used as a liquid metal ion source for a focused ion beam, if there is a magnetic field in the path of the focused ion beam, gallium isotopes or clusters are mass-separated, resulting in deterioration in focused ion beam resolving power.
However, when a focused ion beam is to be used, if an excitation current of an objective lens of an electron beam lens barrel is rendered 0, the residual magnetism does not necessarily become 0. Accordingly, in a focused ion beam lens barrel in which a resolving power of approximately several nm is obtainable, even slight residual magnetism is problematic.
There is a residual magnetism countermeasure which provides a magnetic shield at a tip portion of a focused ion beam lens barrel to prevent it from being affected by leakage of a magnetic field from an objective lens of an electron beam lens barrel.
Meanwhile, among known electron beam lens barrels there is an objective lens of an in-lens or semi-in-lens type which is capable of obtaining a high resolving power that is large in magnetic field within a sample chamber. However, the above-mentioned magnetic shield cannot make the objective lens magnetic field asymmetrical. Accordingly, it has been impossible to adopt such an objective lens in a composite apparatus.
Another problem is that if the excitation current of the electron beam lens barrel is rendered 0 each time the focused ion beam lens barrel is used, there is a disadvantage in reproducibility in electron beam focusing when the electron beam lens barrel is to be used again.
An object of the present invention is to prevent resolving power deterioration by focused ion beam mass separation due to magnetic field leakage onto a focused ion beam path from ground magnetism, from an EDS detector or from an electron beam lens barrel and/or to improve the reproducibility of electron beam focusing by reducing the effect of objective lens hysteresis of the electron beam lens barrel.
In order to solve the above-stated problem, the present invention provides, in a composite charged particle beam apparatus having in a sample chamber one or more first charged particle beam generating systems such as focused ion beam lens barrels and one or more second charged particle beam generating systems such as electron beam lens barrels, an electromagnetic technique for neutralizing the residual magnetism of an objective lens of a charged particle beam generating system, particularly an electron beam lens barrel, and a function of storing a state of one of the charged particle beam generating systems, particularly an electron beam lens barrel, the stored state comprising, for example, an excitation current value of the objective lens of the electron beam lens barrel.
The objective lens residual magnetism of an electron beam lens barrel is neutralized when switching from the electron beam to a focused ion beam, whereby resolving power deterioration due to focused ion beam mass separation is prevented. When switching back to the electron beam, a memorized excitation current is supplied to the objective lens so that the residual magnetism is neutralized and electron beam focusing reproducibility can be improved.

Composite charge particle beam apparatus


A gas for plasma reaction comprising a chainlike perfluoroalkyne having 5 or 6 carbon atoms, preferably perfluoro-2-pentyne. This plasma reaction gas is suitable for dry etching for formation of a fine pattern, for plasma CVD for formation of a thin film, and for plasma ashing. The plasma reaction gas is synthesized by contacting a dihydrofluoroalkane compound or a monohydrofluoroalkene compound with a basic compound.

With the advance in high integration and high performance of semiconductor devices such as VLSI (Very Large Scale Integrated Circuit) and ULSI (Ultra Large Scale Integrated Circuit), technical requirements for a gas for plasma reaction used in the production process of these semiconductor devices are becoming increasingly strict.
As a gas for plasma reaction used in the semiconductor devices, saturated fluorocarbons such as carbon tetrafluoride and perfluorocyclobutane have heretofore been widely used. However, it is said that saturated fluorocarbon gases have a long life in the air, i.e., a life of several-thousand years or more, and exert a considerable influence upon the global warming. Therefore, various novel fluorine-containing compounds have been developed as substitutes for saturated hydrocarbons.
However, in the case when compounds having a carbon-carbon double bond in the molecule such as, for example, perfluoro-1,3-butadiene or perfluorocyclopentene is used for dry etching a silicon compound layer such as a silicon oxide layer, good selectivity to a protective film such as polysilicon film and phoptoresist film has been of ten difficult to obtain under many etching conditions, with the result that fine patterns were difficult to form.
Perfluoroalkyne compounds having a carbon-carbon triple bond are used as raw materials for the production of fluorine-containing polymers, and pesticides and pharmaceuticals. Several processes for the production of such perfluoroalkyne compounds have heretofore been proposed.
For example, a process for synthesizing perfluoro-2-pentyne is described in J. Am. Chem. Soc., vol. 76, p 611 (1954) wherein hexachlorocyclopentadiene is treated with antimony trifluorodichloride to synthesize 1,2-dichloro-3,3,4,4,5,5-hexafluorocyclopentene; and, 2,3-dichloro-1,1,1,4,4,5,5,5-octafluoro-2-pentene as produced as a by-product in this synthetic process is dechlorinated with zinc to give perfluoro-2-pentyne. This process has a problem such that an antimony pentahalide, which is troublesome to handle, must be used for obtaining the raw material (i.e., 2,3-dichloro-1,1,1,4,4,5,5,5-octafluoro-2-pentene), and the yield of perfluoro-2-pentyne is low.
Processes for synthesizing perfluoro-2-pentyne by isomerization of perfluoro-1,2-pentadiene, perfluoro-1,4-pentadiene and perfluoro-1,3-pentadiene are described in J. Chem. Soc. (C), p 454 (1969); J. Org. Chem., vol. 30, p 3524 (1965); and J. Am. Chem. Soc., vol. 81, p 1767 (1961). These compounds used as a raw material are not readily commercially available, and the rates of isomerizing conjugated or non-conjugated carbon-carbon double bonds in these compounds into a carbon-carbon triple bond are low.
It is further described in J. Chem. Soc. (C), p 454 (1969) that perfluoro-2-pentyne was purified using a gas chromatography apparatus. However, the purity of thus-obtained perfluoro-2-pentyne is 96% at the highest. The gas chromatography apparatus cannot be used for purification in an industrial scale.
The above-mentioned synthetic processes and purifying processes for perfluoroalkyne compounds are drawn to synthesis and purification of a perfluoroalkyne compound having a chainlike structure with 5 carbon atoms, namely, perfluoro-2-pentyne. Such a perfluoroalkyne compound with a relatively low molecular weight has a moderate boiling point and good handling properties, and it is expected to be widely used. Thus, it is desired to develop an industrial process for producing this compound.

Gas for plasma reaction, process for producing the same, and use thereof


A local server has a connection to a client and to a remote server over the Internet. The local server receives a request for an audio file from the client and, in response, transmits a requests for the audio file to the remote server. Upon receiving the audio file, the local server transcodes the audio file received from the remote server and then transmits the transcoded audio file to the client. Transcoding may include changing the audio file type, compressing the audio file, reducing the number of audio channels, or reducing the sampling rate of the data. The local server determines the extent and type of transcoding to be performed on the audio file as the audio file is downloaded from the remote server. The extent and type of transcoding are based on the file formats which the client is capable of handling, the size of the requested audio file, the memory capacity of the client, the bandwidth of the connection between the local server and the client, and the desired level of audio quality. Transcoding may be performed on-the-fly while the requested audio file is being downloaded to the local server from the remote server and while the modified audio file is being downloaded from the local server to the client.

The number of homes and businesses using personal computers has increased substantially in recent years, and along with this increase has come an explosion in the use of the Internet and, in particular, the World-Wide Web ("the Web"). The Web is a collection of formatted hypertext pages and other data located on numerous computers around the world that are logically connected by the Internet. Although the Web has in the past been a source of primarily scientific and technical information, it is now a valuable resource for information relating to almost any subject, including business, entertainment, travel, and education, to name just a few. Advances in network technology, and especially in software such as "Web browsers" (software applications which provide a user interface to the Web), have made the Web accessible to a large segment of the population.
There are problems associated with certain current Web-related technology, however, which can make browsing the Web unpleasant. One such problem is latency. People commonly experience long, frustrating delays when browsing the Web, such as when one's computer is establishing contact with a Web server or downloading a requested file. There are many possible causes of latency, including heavy communications traffic on the Internet, slow response time of Web servers, and the large size of some files that are downloaded. Latency tends to be particularly apparent when downloading audio files, for example, which tend to be large in comparison to other file types. It is desirable, therefore, to provide a technique for reducing certain latencies on the Web, such as those associated with audio files.
The use of audio on the Web is becoming increasingly more popular. Numerous audio formats are currently in use on the Web, including .AU, .AIFF, .WAV, MPEG, MIDI, Mod, etc. Even live audio can be downloaded from certain Web sites, as provided for by the RealAudio file format. Unfortunately, many people browse the Web using equipment that lacks the capability to process many of these file types, due to limitations in hardware, software, or both. Hence, it is desirable to provide a technique by which a computer or other processing system can access and play audio in a variety of different formats without requiring special hardware or software.
In addition, it is desirable for a computer or other processing system to be able to play an audio file without having to wait for the entire file to be downloaded from a remote server. One factor which makes this capability difficult to provide is that many audio data formats use a data rate that is significantly higher than that of the communication link between the server supplying the audio file and the requesting computer. As a result, in many systems, the requesting (client) computer would tend to run out of audio data if it attempted to play the data before the file was completely downloaded. Although portions of the file might be downloaded into memory and played before the file has finished downloading, memory limitations in the requesting computer may render this approach impractical. Therefore, it is desirable to provide a technique to enable a requesting computer or other processing system to play audio data as it is being received from a remote Web server while reducing the amount of audio data that must first be downloaded into memory.

Transcoding data in a proxy computer prior to transmitting the audio data to a client


Techniques are described that allow DVR users to create program shortcuts to different types of media content from content providers. A program shortcut comprises a reference to another media content. A user may generate a shortcut so that the user may easily find and return to media content without performing a new search. In addition, techniques may be used to automatically generate program shortcuts for a user based at least in part to user-indicated preferences or actions. Shortcuts may be generated to media content that is related to a preferred genre or media type specified by a user. Shortcuts may also be generated to content that is determined to be similar to content that is often viewed or recorded by the user.

The approaches described in this section could be pursued, but are not necessarily approaches that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated herein, the approaches described in this section are not prior art to the claims in this application and are not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
The introduction of the DVR to the consumer world has revolutionized the way viewers watch and record media content. DVRs record television programs on one or more volatile or non-volatile computer-readable storage devices that is capable of storing a large number of media content. Because DVRs are usually box-like in shape, and are often found sitting on top of the television sets to which they are connected, DVRs typically are included in the broad category of devices referred to herein as "set-top boxes." Much like Video Cassette Recorders (VCRs), DVRs may receive one or more media content signals (which may represent television programs, movies, or any other type of media content) as input from antennas (for broadcasted content), cables (from a cable service provider) or satellite dishes (from a satellite dish service provider), and also output signals to a television set or other display device for display to a user. A DVR may also receive media content from broadband network connections that may be connected to one or more networks containing media content, including the Internet.
A user may instruct the DVR to schedule a recording of specified content that may be broadcasted or otherwise transmitted to the DVR at some future time. Thus, the user may schedule the automatic recording of the content in advance of the time that the DVR receives the content. For example, the user might instruct the DVR to record unspecified content that will be broadcasted on a specified channel beginning at a specified date and time and ending at another specified time. For another example, the user might instruct the DVR to record a specified showing (on a specified channel, and beginning at a specified date and time) of a specified movie, specified event, or specified episode of a multi-episode television series. For another example, the user might instruct the DVR to record the next to-be-broadcasted instance of a specified movie, specified event, or specified episode of a multi-episode television series without specifying the date, time, or channel on which that instance will be broadcasted. For another example, the user might instruct the DVR to record all (or all first-run) episodes of a multi-episode television series on a specified channel without specifying the dates or times at which those episodes will be broadcasted. For another example, the user might instruct the DVR to record all (or all first-run) instances of movies, events, or episodes of a multi-episode television series that are associated with a specified keyword, a specified actor, and/or a specified director without specifying the titles, channels, or broadcasting times of those instances. For another example, a user might also instruct the DVR to download specified content from a media content provider on the Internet for future viewing.
As illustrated in the above examples, a DVR allows a user to search for and schedule programs for recording in a variety of ways. As other types of media content, such as video on demand, downloading content from networks, and online video vaults become more widely available, a user's search to find media content that interest them becomes more complex. In fact, some users may feel overwhelmed by the volume and variety of media content that is available. Under this circumstance, when these users do encounter particular media content they wish to record, the users may not be able due to DVR storage space constraints or other reasons (e.g., the users wish to record a different particular media content). If the user waits to later add the particular media content to schedule a recording, the user has to retrace his previous steps to find the particular media content. This process may be very frustrating for users.
For example, suppose a user accesses a video on demand server to download and watch a recently released movie. It is quite possible that as the user browses for a first media content, he may encounter a second media content that also interests him. Yet, in some cases (e.g., due to DVR space constraints, schedule of other recording media contents, not wishing to pay for the content until the user is sure to watch the content, etc.), the user cannot record the second media content at that time. If the user decides to come back and schedule the second media content later, the user generally has to retrace their steps to find the second media content. This process may include navigating through various menu screens, repeating previously performed keywords searches, and other inconvenient details to find the second media content. Moreover, the user may navigate to an incorrect menu, misspell a keyword, or perform other minor errors. This results in the user becoming increasingly frustrated.


A rotorcraft is provided which includes a rotor hub, a rotatable universal joint which tilts said rotor hub, and a plurality of servo drives which rotate the universal joint. The plurality of servo drives preferably includes four servomotors coupled together in a velocity summing arrangement to produce a single motion output.

Since the development of the first operational helicopter (the Focke-Wulf Fw 61) in 1936, rotorcraft have become a staple of modern aviation. Because of their reliance on rotors to provide lift and thrust, these aircraft are able to perform vertical take-offs and landings, and to move forward, backward or laterally through the air. Consequently, rotorcraft are inherently more suited to a number of applications than their fixed-wing counterparts.
Modern rotorcraft have a number of critical components, including drive shafts, gears, rotors, engines, landing gear, flight controls, and electronic systems. Each of these components must operate independently and in concert to keep the rotorcraft airborne. Consequently, rotorcraft are characterized by multiple single-point failures.
Not surprisingly, rotorcraft experience a much higher accident rate than their fixed-wing counterparts. Thus, recent statistics have shown that the accident rate for helicopters is about 7.5 per 100,000 flight hours, compared to an accident rate of only 0.175 accidents per 100,000 flight hours for their fixed-wing counterparts. These accident rates may be significantly higher in more demanding applications, such as military operations, fire-fighting campaigns and rescue operations. In these applications, the rotorcraft may be required to operate in sub-optimal conditions and close to (or at) the limits of their design tolerances.

Driveline architecture for rotorcraft featuring active response actuators


A computing resource service provider may provide developers with access to a build service configured to generate compilation artifacts associated with software development projects. The build service may obtain a build description and source code suitable for generating the compilation artifact. The build service may then cause one or more build resources to be provisioned and included in a build instantiation using computing resources of the service provider. The build instantiation may generate the compilation artifact, using the one or more build resources, based at least in part on the obtained source code. The developer may then be provided with access to the compilation artifact generated by the build instantiation.

The use of network computing and storage has proliferated in recent years. The resources for network computing and storage are often provided by computing resource providers who leverage large-scale networks of computers, servers and storage drives to enable clients, including content providers, online merchants and the like, to host and execute a variety of applications and web services. Content providers, online merchants and developers, who traditionally used on-site servers and storage equipment to host their websites and store and stream content to their users, often forego on-site hosting and storage and turn to using the resources of the computing resource providers. The usage of network computing allows content providers and online merchants, among others, to efficiently and adaptively satisfy their computing needs, whereby the computing and storage resources used by the content providers and online merchants are added or removed from a large pool provided by a computing resource provider as needed and depending on their needs.
In addition, large open source software development projects (e.g., Chromium) may have thousands of contributors modifying source code associated with the software development project at any given time. Furthermore, other large software development projects may require collaboration between multiple software development teams which may be geographically disburse from one another and/or the computing resources of the service provider. Software development projects may also contain software code that may take a very long time (often on the order of hours or longer) to build on a software developer's personal computer or other computing resource accessible to the software developer. This may lead to delay and inefficiencies in the software development cycle. Software developers may mitigate some of these problems by purchasing high-power severs and other computing resources to reduce build time but this can be extremely expensive and difficult to do at scale. Furthermore, these high-power severs may remain idle between build projects, remaining under-utilized for long periods of time.

Build service for software development projects


The present invention provides a process for producing granular material useful as a phosphorus removal aggregate and involves the mixing of a pulverized calcium or magnesium oxide material with a dewatered clay waste material in a paddle or ribbon type mixer until reaching a state of a uniform consistency paste like material and then allowing such material to cure for several days while periodically mixing to expose new surface area thereof to the air to facilitate evaporation until the water content of the cured material is less than six percent.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to a process for the production of a phosphorus removal aggregate that is highly advantageous for removal of phosphorus from waste or storm water and more specifically concerns the production of such material from a fractionating sand mine waste product.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The prior art related to this subject matter is essentially divided into three different areas. First, stabilization of naturally occurring clay deposits for the general purpose of rendering them suitable load bearing soils, second, the production of lightweight aggregate materials from a variety of naturally occurring raw material and third, the mechanical incorporation of carbonates of calcium or magnesium in the aggregate material.
The literature describing stabilization of naturally occurring clays directed to the application or for the purpose of increasing soil stability is differentiated from the process and products of the present invention in that in such described applications, in-situ clays are never removed from their natural location and stabilization occurs through the creation of load bearing columns in one case, or in others, the creation of a load bearing crust within the top several inches or feet of the body to be stabilized. Such applications, by their very nature, are designed to facilitate the construction of roads or other structures in areas where this type of construction would otherwise be prohibited or at a minimum require the costly removal of the subsurface clay body and subsequent replacement with suitable construction quality soil.
In the case of the prior literature on the subject of manufacturing lightweight aggregate materials, it is important to note that the above process of the present invention is differentiated from other lightweight aggregate production processes in several significant ways. Traditional lightweight aggregates are produced by mining or otherwise extracting a natural deposit of clay which contains inherently incorporated organic matter, and firing that material in a rotary kiln. As such, the final product characteristics are dependent on the composition and make-up of the original clay deposit. The mining of natural deposits of clay produces as a starting material a clay of approximately 60%-80% solids, which starting material is thus suitable for immediate pyro-processing. However, it does have many disadvantages typically associated with the mining and extraction of naturally occurring mineral deposits including, but not limited to the remediation of the mining area, ecological disturbance, and the disposal of waste products.
The process of this invention, however, has none of those disadvantages. The starting material is itself a byproduct of mining activity. The use of such byproduct reduces the environmental impact of the mining activity in that were it not converted to a beneficial use product, it would require disposal in impoundment. As such, the process and associated products of this invention qualify as "green" products because as a result of their manufacture, environmental consequences are significantly reduced. In addition, the final products of the invention are capable of a degree of customization not available within the range of naturally produced lightweight aggregates. Products with greater mechanical strength, products with lower bulk density, products with greater insulating properties, than any product currently produced from naturally occurring clay deposits can be produced by use of the present invention with none of the environmental consequences normally associated with the production of lightweight aggregates from naturally occurring clay deposits.
The phosphorus removal aspect of this invention is novel over what is found in the prior art which consists of essentially using furnace slags naturally high in calcium or using man-made aggregates produced by the addition of limestone or calcium carbonate. Addition of either of these two materials would be a non starter in the instant process because they do not provide the initial dehydration provided by the addition of calcium oxide, a necessary element of such process. The initial dehydration or stabilization of the clay of this invention facilitates the additional processing into the various forms.
In the production of the phosphorus removal aggregate of the present invention, the only limitation on how much CaO can be incorporated is mechanical. The more CaO added, the more difficult it is to mechanically incorporate the CaO. However, the more CaO incorporated, the higher the sorption capacity the aggregate has for phosphorus.
One of the more relevant patents of the prior art is U.S. Pat. No. 6,627,083 B2 issued Sep. 30, 2003. But, the process disclosed therein differs from the present invention in that the clay it utilizes is a natural organic clay deposit in which carbonates of calcium or magnesium are incorporated as flux material. In contrast, the clay of the present invention does not contain any natural organic material, and as such is not by nature an expanding clay as the term is utilized generally in the production of lightweight aggregate materials. Further, the CaO thought to be bound or encapsulated in the ceramic matrix of the aggregate remains available to react with soluble phosphorus present in waste or storm water. In fact, the surprising result is that approximately 85% of the CaO is available to react, despite its encapsulation in the aggregate matrix.

Process for the manufacture of phosphorus removal aggregate from fractionating sand mine waste products


A digital down converter with equalization includes an analog to digital converter (ADC), a frequency divider, an FIR-decimator-I, an FIR-decimator-Q and a frequency corrector. In operation, after some preprocessing, the FIR-decimator-I performs signal transformation equivalent to a sequence of equalization, multiplication of the processed signal by a sine wave of a conversion frequency and low pass filtering, and the FIR-decimator-Q performs signal transformation equivalent to a sequence of equalization, multiplication of the processed signal by a sine wave of conversion frequency with a phase shift of 90° and low pas filtering. The transformed signals are applied to the frequency corrector, which provides a frequency shift of predetermined value with respect to a nominal carrier frequency of the applied analog input signal and generates an In-Phase output and a Quadrature output.

Down converters in wireless receivers perform a transformation of a radio frequency (RF) signal into a baseband signal centered at the zero frequency. In high performance equipment, digital down converters are used, making it necessary to convert an analog RF signal into a digital signal. Typically, a high speed ADC is used because of the high frequency of the RF signal.
High speed analog to digital converters are built as composite ADCs that consist of a number of interleaved sub-ADCs with a common input and sequential timing. In general, the amplitude and phase frequency responses of the different sub-ADCs are not identical, resulting in specific signal distortions, for example, the appearance of spurious frequency components. To prevent these distortions, equalization of the responses of the sub-ADCs is used (see, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 7,408,495).
A block diagram of a conventional digital down converter with an equalizer, is shown in FIG. 1. An RF signal applied to the input of an ADC, is transformed into a digital signal. The misalignment of the frequency responses of the sub-ADCs of the ADC, is corrected by an equalizer. An I/Q demodulator is constructed using two mixers with the same local oscillator frequency and with a phase difference of 90□. Low pass filters with following decimators produce two outputs labeled In-Phase (I) and Quadrature (Q).
The ADC equalizer and low pass filters in the block diagram of FIG. 1 are built usually as a conventional finite impulse response (FIR) filter. The most resource-consuming components of FIR filter are multipliers. Because of the difference between the RF signal frequency (usually several GHz) and the frequency of operation of present-day FPGA (up to 200-250 MHz), each multiplication in the FIR filter is carried out by a group of multipliers connected in parallel. The required number of multipliers becomes the main reason that makes it necessary to use in the equalizer design, more FPGAs and/or FPGAs of bigger size or, in some cases, makes the real time equalizer design impossible.
In a WiGig LAN communication system, it is suggested, for example, to use a super-heterodyne architecture with an intermediate frequency of 5.8 GHz. To process signals in such a frequency range, an ADC of a down converter should have a sample rate of 20 Gs/s or higher. With an FPGA frequency of operation of 200 MHz, each multiplication in an FIR filter requires 20000/200=100 multipliers operating in parallel, with an average length of an equalizer having about 80 taps. This means that implementing an equalizer requires 80×100=8000 multipliers. Such a number exceeds the resources of any available FPGA, with a consequence that a real time digital down converter under those described conditions is not possible.
It is possible to reduce to some extent, the required number of multipliers in the conventional down converter, of the type shown in FIG. 1, by embedding decimation within low pass filters between a shift register of an FIR filter and the multipliers (see, for example, J. G. Proakis and D. G. Manolakis, "Digital signal processing", p. 794). In such a design, the multiplications in the low pass filters are performed at lower sampling rates, with a consequent possibility to cut down the required number of multipliers. However, the amount of multipliers in the equalizer far exceeds the amount of multipliers in the low pass filters. For this reason, a reduction of the number of multipliers only in the filters, does not lead to a substantial decrease of the total number of multipliers in the down converter. In the block diagram of FIG. 1, equalization is carried out before down conversion by a unit that is common for both branches I and Q.

Digital down converter with equalization


A packet compression system of this invention includes: a reception unit for receiving at least one uncompressed packet, the uncompressed packet including a header and a payload of a second OSI layer, the payload of the second OSI layer including a header and a payload of a third OSI layer, the payload of the third OSI layer including a header and a payload of a fourth OSI layer, the payload of the fourth OSI layer including a codec signal; a compression unit for generating a compressed packet in which at least one the codec signal is inserted into the payload of the second layer without interposition of the third OSI layer and the fourth OSI layer by deleting the header of the third OSI layer and the header of the fourth OSI layer from the uncompressed packet; and a transmission unit for transmitting the compressed packet.

1. Field of the Present Invention
The present invention relates to a packet compression system for compressing a packet, a packet restoration system for restoring a packet compressed by the packet compression system, a packet compression method for compressing a packet, and a packet restoration method for restoring a packet compressed by the packet compression method. Specifically, the present invention relates to a packet compression system for compressing a packet which will be transmitted by a wireless LAN (Local Area Network) system, a packet restoration system for restoring a packet compressed by the packet compression system, a packet compression method for compressing a packet which will be transmitted by a wireless LAN system, and a packet compression method for compressing a packet compressed by the packet compression method. In addition, the present invention relates to a packet compression system for compressing a packet which will be transmitted between gateways or between inter-LAN connecting devices, a packet restoration system for restoring a packet compressed by the packet compression system, a packet compression method for compressing a packet which will be transmitted between gateways or between inter-LAN connecting devices, and a packet restoration method for restoring a packet compressed by the packet compression system.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, access point devices connecting a wireless LAN and a global area network such as the Internet have begun spreading at home, businesses and the like. Among these access point devices, what deals with an IP (Internet Protocol) telephone appears. Further, while the IP telephone is a dedicated device in one case, an OS of a personal computer supports functions of the IP phone in another case. The IP telephone uses a protocol such as a VoIP (Voice-over Internet Protocol). The VoIP normally uses a UDP/IP (User Datagram Protocol/Internet Protocol) as third and fourth OSI (Open Systems Interconnection) layers except for a time when the IP telephone is controlled. In addition, the VoIP uses an H.323 protocol, a SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) or the like as fifth and following OSI layers. The H.323 protocol or the SIP uses an RTP (Real-Time Transport Protocol) or the like for communication control, voice communication, and moving picture communication.
Further, voice data communication is held using the RTP or the like on the UDP/IP between wired LAN zones including gateways, inter-LAN connecting devices, and the like.
A prior art document of the present application is as follows:
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2001-325166.
In the conventional wireless LAN, in order to hold a VoIP communication between a wireless terminal and an access point device, only up to six wireless terminals can hold the VoIP communication even if all the other kinds of communications are not held.
According to, for example, IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) 802.11b, a normalized maximum total communication frequency is eleven Mbps. However, when a VoIP communication is held, a total used frequency band is actually at most about one Mbps.
These situations occur not only in a case where a voice communication is held using the VoIP but also in a case where a voice communication is held using the other protocol, and a case where a moving picture communication is held using a predetermined protocol.
Furthermore, because transmitting a codec signal in an RTP packet or the like in real time is important, the codec signal is short. Accordingly, an IP packet that includes the RTP packet is short, with the result that an occupation ratio of headers in the IP packet increases and transmission efficiency is disadvantageously deteriorated.

Packet compression system, packet restoration system, packet compression method, and packet restoration method


Provided is a method of enhancing toxicity of a glycolytic dependent compound towards a cell, tissue and/or organ e.g. a diseased cell, tissue and/or organ, the method comprises contacting Oxidized Regenerated Cellulose (ORC) and/or Oxidized Cellulose (OC); and a glycolytic dependent compound with the cell, tissue and/or organ. The ORC and/or OC; and the glycolytic dependent compound are contacted with the cell, tissue and/or organ in a non-blended form.

Oftentimes, pathological tissues, especially malignant cells, present a particular challenge in treatment due to the fact that current therapies are not highly selective to cells displaying atypical cellular characteristics. Diseases such as Epilepsy, Diabetes, Psychosis, Parkinson's Disease, Depression, Malaria, and diseases caused by Bacteria, Viruses (e.g. HIV/Aids, Hepatitis B Virus) have been managed with therapies that are dependent on the glycolytic pathway for targeting and treating the pathology. Studies have shown that unregulated glucose transporters can manifest into commonly recognized diseases (Shepherd PR and Kahn BB. "Glucose transporters and insulin action—implications for insulin resistance and diabetes mellitus". N Engl J Med. 1999; 341(4):248-57; Shah K. "The role of glucose transporters in brain disease: diabetes and Alzheimer's Disease". Int J Mol Sci. 2012; 13(10):12629-55). Therapies that selectively target glucose transporters can be effective in managing pathologies where a disease involves a change in the transport of glucose or in glucose consumption level.
A malignant (cancer) cell is a cell that exhibits, or is predisposed to exhibit, unregulated growth. Understanding the biological differences between normal and cancer cells is essential for the design and development of anticancer drugs with selective anticancer activity (Pelicano H. et al. "Glycolysis inhibition for anticancer treatment". Oncogene (2006) 25, 4633-4646). It was reported that many types of tumors display high rates of glucose uptake. Different hypothesis were proposed to explain this exacerbated glucose consumption, including the increase of hexokinase expression, the decrease of glucose-6-phosphatasemediated glucose dephosphorylation and/or the overexpression of sugar transporters (Calvo MB et al. "Potential role of sugar transporters in cancer and their relationship with anticancer therapy". Int J Endocrinol. 2010). Also, it is increasingly evident that oncogenes and tumor suppressors regulate altered energy metabolism. Oncogenic mutations culminate in the up-regulation of glucose transporters (e.g. GLUT 1, GLUT 3) thus facilitating increased glucose consumption by cancer cells, which in turn increases the rate of glucose metabolism. Conversely, the glycolytic/metabolic phenotype confers selective advantage to cancer cells by supporting uninterrupted growth (Ganapathy-Kanniappan S and Geschwind J F. "Tumor glycolysis as a target for cancer therapy: progress and prospects". Mol Cancer. 2013; 12:152).
In contrast to normal differentiated cells that rely primarily on mitochondrial oxidative phosphorylation to generate the energy needed for cellular processes, most malignant cells rely on glucose breakdown for ATP generation. This phenomenon or glucose dependency is called "the Warburg effect". The dependency of malignant cells on glucose breakdown makes them vulnerable to compounds that are dependent on glycolytic transports/channels called "GLUTs" and/or compounds that target particular enzymes and pathways that are involved in the breakdown/processing of glucose molecules as their mechanism of action. Accordingly, one possible avenue of treatment for tumors involves glycolytic dependent therapies, which affect malignant cells by targeting cells that are using disproportionately large amounts of glucose for metabolism. Glycolytic therapies are chemotherapy drugs that are dependent on the metabolism of glucose for targeting cellular processes or enzymes. Target-specific agents have major advantages over the traditional chemotherapeutic compounds in that the targeting agents interact with the key molecular players in cancer cells and have low toxicity to normal cells (Pelicano H. et al.).
There are a number of different GLUTs and a number of compounds that target particular GLUTs for treatment. The majority of cancers over-express the GLUT family members which are typically present in the corresponding non-cancerous normal tissue. Oftentimes, cancer cells also express GLUTs which under normal conditions would not be present in these tissues. The localization, expression and regulation of the GLUT family are tissue and oftentimes cell-specific. A review on the regulation and expression of GLUT family members and research data on GLUT expression in human cancers and in isolated human cancer cell lines is summarized in Medina R A, Owen G I. "Glucose transporters: expression, regulation and cancer". Biol Res. 2002; 35(1):9-26.
Examples of glycolytic Dependent therapies are: Imatinib/Brand name Gleevec (Protein Kinase Inhibitor, inhibits Hexokinase and G6PD activity); Daunorubicin-daunomycin/Brand name Cerubidine, DaunoXome (Amthracycline Topoisomerase Inhibitor); Cisplatin/Brand name Platinol, Platinol-AQ; Paclitaxel/Brand name Abraxane, Onxol (Microtubule Inhibitor); Doxorubicin/Brand name-Adriamycin, Doxil (Topoisomerase Inhibitor); 2-Deoxyglucose (Inhibits Hexokinase); Lonidamine (Inhibits glycolysis, mitochondrial respiration, and Hexokinase); 3-Bromopyruvate (Inhibits Hexokinase); Oxythiamine (Inhibits Pyruvate Dehydrogenase).
The above mentioned therapies are few examples of therapies that target particular enzymes and pathways that are necessary for cellular metabolism and function. Each of these therapies targets a particular stage of the cellular alterations thereby limiting the generation of energy/metabolism of the malignant cells, slowing growth and in many cases also leading to cell death. Sensitivity and specificity of glycolytic based therapies is dependent on metabolism of the therapies in cells. Cells that have high consumption of glucose are vulnerable to therapies that target enzymes and processes, involved in the breakdown/processing of glucose molecules. Typically, glycolytic therapies depend on the movement of glucose into the cells for their activity and are delivered systemically, with the intention that the compound will preferentially affect cancerous cells. However, there are a number of non-malignant cells and tissues in the human body that also use GLUTs for absorbing glucose for the production of ATP. Glucose transporters are found through a wide range of cells, in mammalian species. Cells that are particularly dependent on Glucose transporters for energy include the brain, retinal tissues, gonads, renal tissues, red blood cells etc. The dependence of some non-malignant cells on glucose makes them particularly vulnerable to therapies that target cellular processes or enzymes involved in the generation of energy. Even in cases where the malignant cells are absorbing large quantities there is still a quantity of the compound that is misdirected and absorbed by non-malignant tissues. This is problematic because the compounds are toxic to the tissues and cells they are absorbed to, resulting in cellular damage of non-malignant cells and in many side effects associated with chemotherapy and cancer treatments such as blindness, sterility, renal failure, pain, nausea and vomiting, fatigue, anemia, infections, etc.
Thus, there is a need to enhance delivery and targeting of therapies to pathological cells such as malignant cells, and increase the selectivity between the latter and normal cells.
Background art includes Agricultural and Biological Sciences, "Cellulose—Medical, Pharmaceutical and Electronic Applications", book edited by Theo van de Ven and Louis Godbout, ISBN 978-953-51-1191-7, Published: Aug. 29, 2013 under CC BY 3.0 license. Chapter 5 "Cellulose—A Biomaterial with Cell-Guiding Property" By Miretta Tommila, Anne Jokilammi, Risto Penttinen and Erika Ekholm, Pelicano H. et. al., Ganapathy-Kanniappan S and Geschwind J F., and Calvo M B et al.

Method of treating a disease using a glycolytic dependent compound


A membrane-introduction mass spectrometer (MIMS) device has a sample inlet assembly provided with a membrane held by an outer retaining ring across the entrance of a central passage, a porous metal frit backing the membrane, and a cylindrical support piece supporting the frit. In a preferred embodiment, the membrane is a 10-micron thickness layer of silicone evenly coated upon an inert polymer backing material. The porous frit is a titanium or steel sponge metal. The cylindrical support piece is made of titanium with small, drilled thru-holes to allow passage of gases and volatile organics into the mass spectrometer. The sample inlet assembly includes a high-pressure temperature probe for sensing fluid temperature to correct for temperature variations in membrane diffusion rates. The sample inlet assembly is provided as a front end to an underwater sampling probe.

Membrane-introduction mass spectrometry (MIMS) devices have been used to measure dissolved elements in natural and manmade fluid environments. The MIMS approach was first described by Hoch, G. and Kok B, "A mass spectrometric inlet system for sampling gases dissolved in liquid phase", 1963, Archives of Biochemistry and Biophysics, 101:160, and numerous improvements to the method have since been described and published. A recent variation on the MIMS device is described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 6,727,498 to Fries et al., showing a portable mass spectrometer for underwater use that includes a watertight case having an inlet and means for transforming an analyte gas molecule from a solution phase into a gas phase positioned within the case. To date, however, no MIMS device has been described that can successfully operate to high pressures (>400 bars) and great water depths (>4,000 m).

High pressure membrane introduction for a mass spectrometer


A device is disclosed that provides a multifunctional clip mounted on a portable, programmable, interactive apparatus. One embodiment of the device comprises a housing configured to be carried by a user, a display for displaying information to the user, an interface operable by the user, and fixed-arm clip. The user may hold the device with one hand with the fixed arm clip while operating the interface with the same hand.

The portable computing device is ubiquitous. Specific examples include cellular telephones and personal digital assistants, as well as inventory, delivery services, and other mobile applications. One primary limitation is the failure of the interface to provide easy operation by a user. For example, the typical interface of the prior art portable computing device requires the use of both hands. The failings of the prior art portable computing device are perhaps no where more evident than in applications where the user is mobile, such as sporting activities, inventory taking, and delivery applications.
The past decade has invoked a dramatic increase in consumer spending in the field of health and fitness products and sporting equipment. In the United States alone, an estimated 50 million people work out at least 3 times a week, over 27 million people play golf, and approximately 1 million people receive some kind of physical therapy every day. This has resulted in a strong demand for devices and methods that assist individuals in setting and reaching fitness goals. The currently available devices and methods however, fail to meet the needs of average consumers in many ways. This is especially true in the field of portable devices that may accompany an individual during their workout.
For example, prior art devices capable of being carried with a user on their physical fitness workout are severely limited in function and portability. Many of these devices are incorporated into a wristwatch and are only capable of calculating a runner's speed, time and distance. Other functions may include a heart rate monitor that connects to the wristwatch device. There is little or no feedback from these current devices and methods. Further these devices can only function in one specific mode of operation. See U.S. Pat. No. 6,002,982 that describes a device used to aid a user in their fitness workout.
More sophisticated prior art devices that do allow for operator interactions are not portable and are usually mounted to the exercise equipment. For example, see U.S. Pat. No. 6,066,075 to Poulton. Poulton's patent details a computer apparatus that provides feedback to an individual while the individual is on a treadmill. The structures and sensors necessary in this type of device are not intended to be portable.
In addition to the failures of the above devices, conventional portable devices do not provide an adequate means by which the portable device may function or be transported in a variety of manners. For example, a conventional PDA (personal digital assistant) must be held in the hand of the user and cannot operate in a "stand alone" manner. There is also no convenient way to carry or interact with a conventional PDA during some type of physical activity.
Therefore there is a need for a multi-functional mechanism that would allow for a portable device to be easily transported, provide one hand operation, and function in a variety of modes.

Portable interactive device integrated with housing and multi-purpose clip for physical fitness activity


Substituted tetralins, chromans and related compounds which, by inhibiting 5-lipoxygenase enzyme and/or blocking leukotriene receptors, are useful in the prevention or treatment of asthma, arthritis, psoriasis, ulcers, myocardial infarction and related disease states in mammals, pharmaceutical compositions thereof, a method of treatment therewith, and to intermediates useful in the synthesis thereof.

The present intention is directed to substituted tetralins, chromans and related compounds of the formula (I), depicted below, which by inhibiting 5-lipoxygenase enzyme and/or blocking leukotriene receptors, are useful in the prevention or treatment of asthma, arthritis, psoriasis, ulcers, myocardial infarction and related disease states in mammals. The present invention is also directed to pharmaceutical compositions, a method of treatment, and to intermediates useful in the synthesis of said compounds of the formula (I).
Kreft et al., in U.S. Pat. No. 4,661,596, describe compounds which are disubstituted naphthalenes, dihydronaphthalenes or tetralins having the formula ##STR1## wherein the dotted lines represent optional double bonds, R.sup.a is 2-pyridyl, 2-quinolyl, 2-pyrazinyl, 2-quinoxalinyl, 2-thiazolyl, 2-benzothiazolyl, 2-oxazolyl, 2-benzoxazolyl, 1-alkyl-2-imidazolyl or 1-alkyl-2-benzimidazolyl and R.sup.b is hydroxy, lower alkoxy, lower alkyl or perfluoro alkyl. Like the compounds of the present invention, these compounds inhibit lipoxygenase enzyme and antagonize the effects of leukotriene D4, and so are useful in the prevention and treatment of asthma.
The chemical nomenclature employed herein generally follows that of "I.U.P.A.C. Nomenclature of Organic Chemistry, 1979 Edition," Pergammon Press, New York, 1979.

Substituted tetralins, chromans and related compounds in the treatment and related compounds in the treatment of asthma, arthritis and related diseases


A fastener includes a shank having a first end and a second end. The fastener also includes a thread provided on the shank, the thread including a first region having a first thread angle and a second region with a second thread angle, at least a portion of the thread having said first thread angle. The fastener also includes an arcuate detent region in the shank between respective turns of the thread.

Fastener designs have been used to improve specific characteristics of fasteners in different materials. Ultimately, the fastener needs to bind one material to another securely and efficiently. Screw-type fasteners generally include a threaded shank with a tip at one end thereof and a head at the other end. The head is adapted to be driven by a tool to rotate the fastener. Some heads are designed to be recessed in a fastened material, while others are designed to clamp against the material so that the head protrudes above the surface of the bound material.
Particulate is generated when a fastener enters certain materials to be fastened. The particulate can impede the progress of the fastener in the material.