The invention relates to a card assembly apparatus for assembling PC cards and the like, and it is an object of the invention to provide a card assembly apparatus which makes it possible to reduce costs required for card assembly and to improve the throughput of card assembly. It has a top side processing portion 1 for performing predetermined assembly processes on a top side of a card and a bottom side processing portion 2 for performing predetermined assembly processes on a bottom side of a card. A supply magazine portion 10, a resin applying portion 20, a sheet inserting portion 30, a cover inserting portion 40, a thermo-compression bonding portion 50 and a compression bonding portion 60 are provided in the top side processing portion 1, and a resin applying portion 20xe2x80x2, a sheet inserting portion 30xe2x80x2, a cover inserting portion 40xe2x80x2, thermo-compression bonding portions 50xe2x80x2 and 50xe2x80x3, compression bonding portions 60xe2x80x2 and 60xe2x80x3 and a housing magazine portion 80 are provided in the bottom side processing portion 2 where those portions are listed above in the order of their X values increasing in the positive direction. There is also provided a transport portion 90 for transporting PC cards in a path extending from the supply magazine portion 10 to the housing magazine portion 80.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a card assembly apparatus for assembling PC cards and the like.
The present invention also relates to a card inspecting apparatus for conducting, for example, an electrical inspection of PC cards and, more particularly, to a card inspecting apparatus capable of performing steps of an electrical inspection from a card supplying step up to an inspection/ejection step.
Further, the present invention relates to a card magazine capable of housing a plurality of PC cards which is used for, for example, a card assembly apparatus for assembling PC cards and the like and a card inspecting apparatus for conducting an electrical test on assembled PC cards.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, there is increasing use of compact cards, including PC cards in compliance with PCMCIA (Personal Computer Memory Card International Association), which provide predetermined functions when inserted into personal computers (hereinafter abbreviated as xe2x80x9cPCsxe2x80x9d), audio and video apparatuses. Other compact cards other than PC cards include Compact Flashes (registered trademark of Sun Disk Corporation) and MMCs (Multimedia Cards) proposed by Multimedia Card Association. Those cards are used as storage devices having solid-state memories or data communication devices for modems, LANs (local area networks) and the like.
For example, card assembly apparatuses like that disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open (Kokai) No. H5-208577 have been used for steps of assembling such cards. In the disclosed card assembly apparatus, automation is achieved in steps of pressing, heating and cooling memory cards which have been manually tentatively bonded. A heat block is heated up in advance, and a pressing cylinder is elevated to press and heat memory cards between the heat block and itself. This melts bonding sheets which are thereafter thermally set to achieve final bonding. There is also provided a pressure adjuster which absorbs variations of the thickness of memory cards to apply a uniform pressure to a plurality of memory cards.
However, the above-described conventional card assembly apparatus automates only a part of card assembly steps and, for example, no mechanism is provided to apply reinforcement resin for filling a part of a gap between a substrate and a shield cover of a card. Therefore, the application of reinforcement resin is still troublesome in that an operator must manually apply the reinforcement resin to the substrate or shield cover of each card.
Further, since the conventional card assembly apparatus includes no mechanism for inserting an insulation sheet between a substrate and a shield cover, the insertion of an insulation sheet necessitates a manual step to be performed by an operator, which results in a problem in that the throughput of card assembly is reduced. Similarly, the insertion of a shield cover into a frame also relies on a manual operation because no mechanism is provided therefor, which is a factor that hinders improvement of yield of manufacture. Further, the operations of supplying card to be assembled to the assembly apparatus and collecting assembled cards also rely on operators. This results in a problem in that the need for operators"" intervention results in a cost increase and in that an idle time of the card assembly apparatus required to rest or replace operators reduces the throughput of card assembly.
At the final step of assembly, such cards are subjected to an electrical inspection using a card inspecting apparatus to see whether predetermined functions properly work or not. Since such a card inspecting apparatus performs a predetermined electrical inspection with the cards to be inspected inserted in a connector for electrical connection, a card inspecting apparatus having a card inserting/removing device, for example, as disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open (Kokai) No. H7-6220 is used. The disclosed card inspecting apparatus has a conveyor to transport manufactured memory cards sequentially. The conveyor holds manufactured memory cards on an upper surface thereof and feeds them in a predetermined direction to transport the memory cards to the card inserting/removing device.
A Memory card which has been transported to and stopped at the inserting/removing device by the conveyor is lifted up as a result of an upward movement of a table of a lift-up mechanism and is held at the same elevation as that of an eject connector. A contact piece of a pushing mechanism is driven for protrusion in the inserting direction of the memory card to be put into contact with an end face of the memory card, and the memory card is consequently pushed into the eject connector. When the electrical inspection of the memory card is completed, a button-pushing mechanism operates to push an eject button. As a result, the memory card is elastically projected from the eject connector by an urging mechanism provided in the eject connector.
In the above-described conventional card inspecting apparatus, however, memory cards must be manually placed on the conveyor one by one and must be manually picked up from the conveyor one by one again when the inspection is completed. This results in a problem in that the need for operators"" intervention results in a cost increase and in that an idle time of the card assembly apparatus required to rest or replace operators reduces the throughput of card assembly.
The above-described card inspecting apparatus has another problem in that it takes a considerable time to perform an inspection because only one card can be inspected at a time.
Further, while so-called input/output cards (hereinafter called xe2x80x9cI/O Cardsxe2x80x9d) such as modem cards, LAN cards, adapter cards for Smart Media, ISDN cards, ATA cards, and so on have a back connector to be connected to a telephone line, a LAN cable or the like in addition to a connector to be connected to a PC, the above-described conventional card inspecting apparatus does not accommodate any electrical inspection on the side of the back connector.
While the eject button of the above-described conventional card inspecting apparatus is pushed to remove a memory card from the eject connector when the electrical inspection is completed, the exterior of the eject button is formed using resin such as plastics which can be broken, and failure is likely to occur in the interior because of wear and the like. Further, since the interface connector of a memory card and the eject connector are mated with a considerably high mating force, the above-described eject button system has a problem in that a card may not be removed.
As described above, the operations of supplying cards to be assembled to the assembly apparatus and collecting assembled cards rely upon operators. Further, the supply and collection of memory cards to and from the card inspecting apparatus also rely upon operators. This results in a problem in that the need for operators"" intervention results in a cost increase and in a reduction of the throughput of the card assembly and inspection.
One known way for solving the above-described problems is the use of a magazine for housing a plurality of cards and a mechanical mechanism for picking up cards from the magazine without operators"" intervention to perform predetermined processes thereon. For example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open (Kokai) No. H5-46819 discloses a system in which cards are supplied from a magazine located at a card supply port of a card visual inspection apparatus. In this system, when a magazine becomes vacant as all cards therein are supplied, another magazine is moved in turn to the card supply port to start supply of cards therefrom. A card in the magazine is lifted up to an opening of the magazine with appropriate means, and air flows from nozzles blow lateral surfaces of the card to float the card. A picker provided with a vacuum absorption function at an end thereof is then moved into the vicinity of a top surface of the card to absorb and hold the card.
In the case of a conventional magazine as described above, air flows from nozzles blow lateral surfaces of a card to float the card and a picker having a vacuum absorption mechanism at an end thereof is moved into the vicinity of a top surface of the card to absorb, hold and transport the card. Therefore, the magazine must be open on the top side thereof and, when the magazine is dropped by mistake during transportation, the cards are scattered, which results in a potential problem in that the cards themselves are broken in the worst case.
Further, the above-described magazine does not have a configuration which allows a plurality of such magazines to be transported at a time.
Furthermore, since a considerably large die is required for the manufacture of the above-described magazine, there is a problem in that the manufacturing cost of the magazine is high.
It is an object of the invention to provide a card assembly apparatus which makes it possible to reduce the assembly cost of cards and to improve the throughput of card assembly.
It is another object of the invention to provide card assembly apparatus which makes it possible to perform steps of filling reinforcement resin, inserting an insulation sheet, inserting a cover and thermo-compression bonding continuously.
It is still another object of the invention to provide a card inspecting apparatus which makes it possible to reduce the inspect ion cost of cards and to improve the throughput of card inspection.
It is still another object of the invention to provide a card inspecting apparatus which makes it possible to inspect a plurality of cards at a time.
It is still another object of the invention to provide a card inspecting apparatus which makes it possible to perform an electrical inspection of cards having a back connector even on the side of the back connector.
It is still another object of the invention to provide a card inspecting apparatus to and from which a card can be smoothly inserted and removed at an electrical inspection.
It is still another object of the invention to provide a card magazine which makes it possible to reduce the assembly and inspection costs of cards and which contributes to an improvement of the throughput of card assembly and card inspection.
It is still another object of the invention to provide a card magazine which makes it possible to assemble or inspect a plurality of cards continuously.
The above-described objects are achieved by a card assembly apparatus comprising an assembly process portion for assembling a card by sandwiching a frame for holding a substrate with two shield covers on both sides thereof and bonding them together, and a supply magazine portion for sequentially supplying the frames for holding a substrate to the assembly process portion.
The above-described objects are achieved by a card assembly apparatus comprising an assembly process portion for assembling a card by sandwiching a frame for holding a substrate with two shield covers on both sides thereof and bonding them together, wherein the assembly process portion comprises a resin applying portion for applying resin to the substrate.
A card assembly apparatus according to the above-described aspect of the invention is characterized in that the resin applying portion has switching means to allow positions to apply the resin to be switched.
Further, the above-described objects are achieved by a card assembly apparatus comprising an assembly process portion for assembling a card by sandwiching a frame for holding a substrate with two shield covers on both sides thereof and bonding them together, wherein the assembly process portion comprises a sheet inserting portion for inserting a sheet on to the substrate. A card assembly apparatus according to the above-described aspect of the invention is characterized in that the sheet inserting portion has a sheet cutting die for cutting the sheet and in that the sheet cutting die can be replaced to provide an arbitrary configuration.
Furthermore, the above-described objects are achieved by a card assembly apparatus comprising an assembly process portion for assembling a card by sandwiching a frame for holding a substrate with two shield covers on both sides thereof and bonding them together, wherein the assembly process portion comprises a cover inserting portion for aligning the shield covers to be bonded to the frame for holding the substrate.
A card assembly apparatus according to the above-described aspect of the invention is characterized in that the cover inserting portion has a cover magazine for housing a plurality of shield covers to supply them to the frame sequentially. It is further characterized in that protective materials are interleaved between the plurality of shield covers housed in the cover magazine.
The above-described objects are achieved by a card assembly apparatus comprising an assembly process portion for assembling a card by sandwiching a frame for holding a substrate with two shield covers on both sides thereof and bonding them together, wherein said assembly process portion comprises a top side processing portion for performing assembly on the top side of the frame holding the substrate, a bottom side processing portion for performing assembly on the bottom side of the frame holding the substrate, and an inverting portion provided between the top side processing portion and the bottom side processing portion for inverting the frame holding the substrate.
Furthermore, the above-described objects are achieved by a card assembly apparatus comprising an assembly process portion for assembling a card by sandwiching a frame for holding a substrate with two shield covers on both sides thereof and bonding them together, and a housing magazine portion for housing cards assembled by the assembly process portion sequentially.
The above-described objects are achieved by a card inspecting apparatus characterized in that it has a conveyor for moving a supply magazine loaded with cards containing a substrate incorporating electrical parts and a vacant supply magazine loaded with no such cards which are placed thereon, a card supplying portion for picking up the cards from the supply magazine loaded with the cards, a transport portion for transporting the card pick up by the card supplying portion, an inspecting portion for performing a predetermined electrical inspection on the cards transported by the transport portion and a card housing portion for housing good ones among the cards which have been electrically inspected in the vacant supply magazine.
A card inspecting apparatus according to the above-described aspect of the invention is characterized in that a plurality of the inspecting portions are provided along a transport path of the transport portion. It is also characterized in that the inspecting portion have a plurality of connectors for measurement of a card having a plurality of connectors which are respectively connected to the plurality of connectors. The plurality of connectors for measurement are respectively connected to card-side connectors having an interface with, for example, a PC and to back connectors provided on the opposite side of the same. It is further characterized in that the inspecting portions have an eject mechanism for preventing movement of the connected card when the connectors of the card and the connectors for measurement are disconnected.
In a card inspecting apparatus according to the invention, a plurality of cards can be inserted in the supply magazine and set on the conveyor. When the supply magazine reaches the card supply portion, the cards can be pushed out by a push-out rod provided at the card supply portion into the transport portion sequentially, for example, starting with the card contained in the uppermost stage of the supply magazine. After all of the cards are supplied to the transport portion, the magazine is moved by the conveyor to the card housing portion where it can be then used as a vacant supply magazine for housing good cards which have passed the inspection.
Since a plurality of the inspecting portions are provided, different inspections can be simultaneously carried out on separate items for inspection. For example, in the case of a card for communication, an inspection on the communicating function can be separated from other functional inspections to decrease the inspection time, and a cost advantage can be achieved because there is no need for preparing a plurality of measuring apparatuses having the same function. When the same inspection is carried out at a plurality of inspecting portions, the inspection time can be decreased because a plurality of cards can be inspected simultaneously. Further, since the eject mechanism is provided to prevent movement of connected cards when the connectors of the cards and the connectors for measurement are disconnected, cards can be smoothly inserted to and removed from the connectors for injection at an electrical inspection.
The above-described objects are achieved by a card magazine capable of housing a plurality of cards, characterized in that it has a housing having a general configuration like a rectangular parallelepiped in which a top portion and a bottom portion are secured together through both lateral portions and in which a front portion and a rear portion are open and concave and convex portions provided on the top and bottom portions which engage each other when the housing is stacked with other housings with the opening at the front portion faced vertically upward.
The above-described objects are achieved by a card magazine capable of housing a plurality of cards, characterized in that it has a housing having a general configuration like a rectangular parallelepiped in which a top portion and a bottom portion are secured together through both lateral portions and in which a front portion and a rear portion are open, plates made of a metal provided at the lateral portions and a plurality of side wall portions made of resin secured in parallel to the plates.
A card magazine according to the above-described aspect of the invention is characterized in that it has guide rails formed on card housing sides of the side wall portions and chamfers in a mount-like configuration formed on the guide rails. Further, a card magazine according to the above-described aspect of the invention is characterized in that it has a stopper rod provided at the rear side for positioning cards and a gap for observing cards defined between the lateral portions and the stopper rod.

Card assembly apparatus, card inspecting apparatus and card magazine used therefor


A system for dispatching vehicles in a public transportation network may include a passenger monitoring system configured to monitor a number of passengers waiting at a stop in the transportation network, a vehicle dispatching system and a processing device. The processing device may apply a Markov Decision Process (MDP) model to determine a score for each of multiple decision rules, in which each score represents a number of passengers waiting at the stop at the end of a time interval, and use the scores to identify a number of waiting passengers at which a reserve vehicle should be dispatched. The system may use information received from the passenger monitoring system to determine a state at an instant of time, and determine whether a reserve vehicle should be dispatched based on the MDP model and cause the vehicle dispatch system to dispatch a reserve vehicle or retain a nominal vehicle.

This disclosure relates to methods and systems for dispatching vehicles in a public transportation network.
The Reinforcement Learning (RL) framework has promised to bring solutions to several applications such as slow server problems where arriving customers wait in a queue before obtaining service (e.g. call center operations, web server load balancing etc.), machine replacement problems in inventory management, and river swim problems where an agent needs to swim left or right in a stream. A recent goal in the RL framework is to choose a sequence of actions or a policy to maximize the reward collected or minimize the regret incurred in a finite time horizon. For several RL problems in operation research and optimal control, the optimal policy of an underlying Markov Decision Process (MDP) is characterized by a known structure. The current state of the art does not utilize this known structure of the optimal policy while minimizing the regret. Other systems attempt to optimize long range average reward, which has been previously shown to be disadvantageous in some scenarios to algorithms that minimize regret. In other RL systems, the transition probabilities and reward values are not known a priori, making it harder to compute a decision rule.
This document describes devices and methods that are intended to address at least some issues discussed above and/or other issues.

Method and system for dispatching of vehicles in a public transportation network


An optical receiver with an enhanced power capability and wide bandwidth is implemented by distributing a number of photodetectors along an optical transmission channel to convert respective portions of an optical signal into electrical signals. An electrical transmission line receives and accumulates signal inputs from the photodetectors. A velocity matching is established between the optical and electrical signals, allowing the photodetector outputs to accumulate coherently along the electrical transmission line, by loading the transmission line with distributed capacitance elements. The loading capacitances are preferably inherent in the photodetectors, which are designed and spaced apart from each other to yield the desired velocity matching. Possible photodetectors include p-i-n photodiodes with associated depletion layer capacitances, and metal-semiconductor-metal devices in which the capacitance is provided by interdigitated fingers that extend over an active optically absorbing layer on the waveguide from electrodes on either side.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to optical receivers in which an array of discrete photodetectors is employed to sense an input optical signal.
2. Description of the Related Art
Microwave and millimeter wave photodetector receivers are limited in their optical collection areas by the required bandwidth of the system. This limitation stems from the RC time constants of the photodiodes that are typically used for optical reception, since the photodiode depletion region capacitance is directly proportional to the area of its p-n junction. Accordingly, the device area must be scaled down as the desired operational frequency increases. This, however, limits the amount of optical power that can be converted to electrical current by the receiver before the nonlinearity of the conversion process causes unacceptable signal distortion, or the detector itself burns out. Photodetector structures are well known and are described, for example, in Wang, Introduction to Semiconductor Technology: GaAs and Related Compounds, John Wiley & Sons, 1990, pages 482-486.
A photodetection system that purports to achieve higher power capabilities is described in Taylor et al., "Traveling Wave Photodetectors", Optoelectronics Signal Processing for Phased-Array Antennas II, SPIE Vol. 1217, 1990, pages 59-63. In this system an RF electrical transmission line is used as the electrode of an elongated photodetector. To obtain a velocity match between the RF electrical signal and the optical signal, it is suggested that a dielectric overlay be provided on top of the transmission line, or that the transmission line be buried in the GaAs substrate. The latter approach is said to be capable of achieving an almost perfect phase matching between the phase velocity of the electrical microwave signal v.sub.m and the optical group velocity v.sub.o. However, in this reception system the electrical transmission line is an integral part of the optical detector, which prevents the transmission line from being optimized independent of the photodetector.
In De La Chapelle U.S. Pat. No. 5,001,336, issued Mar. 19, 1991, a number of different optical signals are summed electronically by a plurality of photodetectors connected in parallel. Although it is disclosed only in connection with the detection of a number of different optical signals, it might also be possible to use the system to sum portions of a single optical signal for increased optical power handling. However, the described receiver requires a separate optical fiber for each photodetector. Packaging the receiver would therefore be cumbersome, and the multitude of fiber optic pigtails that would be required would reduce the receiver's reliability. Furthermore, the length of each optical fiber would need to be precisely determined to preserve phase coherence between the RF signals from each detector.
A system that is used to modulate an optical signal with a modulating electrical input is described in Walker, "High-Speed III-V Semiconductor Intensity Modulators", IEEE Journal of Quantum Electronics, Vol. 27, No. 3, March 1991, pages 654-667. The system employs a loaded-line traveling-wave modulator in which an RF strip-line electrical transmission circuit is loaded with discrete printed circuit capacitors. The propagation of the electrical modulating signal is slowed so that it matches the propagation speed of the optical signal that is being modulated. The use of the velocity-matched structure is said to result in very high bandwidth-voltage ratios. However, the described system is for modulating, not receiving, optical signals.

High power capacity optical receiver apparatus and method employing distributed photodetectors


Methods, systems and apparatus for vehicle control, tracking, and reporting. In an aspect, vehicle parameters that describe the current operation of the vehicle are compared to profile parameters of a driver. If the vehicle parameters are not within the operational limits defined by the profile parameters, an out of profile parameter process is performed. The out of profile parameter process includes wirelessly sending a violation report to an administrator device.

This disclosure relates to monitoring the operation of an automotive vehicle.
Owners of vehicles desire that other drivers of their vehicles operate the vehicles in a responsible and safe manner. For example, parents want to ensure that their adolescent children are driving responsibly and obeying the traffic laws of their jurisdiction. Likewise, fleet owners want to ensure that their drivers are also driving responsibly and obeying the traffic laws of their jurisdiction.
Systems that facilitate monitoring vehicle operation, however, often report data that is of little interest to an administrator (e.g., a person that manages the monitoring of the vehicle) and require monthly service fees and a suite of web-based tools. Likewise, many of these systems determine that a policy violation occurs in response to a vehicle parameter (e.g., location) being out of a specified operational parameter. This can lead to unnecessary reporting to the administrator, and cause unnecessary actions on the part of the administrator.


A femoral implant includes a main shaft with a proximal end and a smooth distal end. A porous circumferential collar is provided between the proximal end and distal end, and a porous distally-extending portion extends distally from the collar to provide for additional bone ingrowth.

In total hip replacement, there are several designs which address different indications for hip replacement depending on the quality and geometry of the patient's bones. Hip implants generally replace the femoral head and the acetabular socket with the objectives of restoring stable pain-free motion. There are several different designs of femoral components. In some designs, just the surface of the femoral head is replaced, while other designs are composed of a stem and head-neck section.
With resurfacing designed femoral components, minimal bone is removed; however complications with implant loosening can occur due to the ability of the bone to support the implant. With the stemmed femoral components, the implant is fixed within the canal of the femur. The effectiveness of this design is dependent, at least in part, on the strength of the cancellous bone within the canal of the femur. Without proper strength, the stem can subside (sink) further into the canal creating instability and, in some cases, fractures. Both scenarios can result in undesirable revision surgery.


In use of an optical disk such as a Digital Versatile Disk (DVD) it is sometimes desirable to detect if a track jump occurs as quickly as possible after the occurrence. The optical disk format includes a pre-groove track structure which provides the frame work upon which data can be written to and read from the disk. The structure of the pre-groove track is utilized to detect the possible occurrence of an inadvertent track jump as soon as possible and in a time shorter than would be required to detect the track jump using only disk addressing data. The pre-groove track structure may be modified to enhance track jump detection, such as by positional codes in data line Segments of the track, or revolving coding schemes for the addressing data dibits.

When reading or writing data with an optical disk data recorder drive, such as DVD+RW, there is the possibility of having an inadvertent track jump due to mechanical or other disturbances. An optical disk such as a digital versatile disk (DVD) or compact disk (CD) is typically formatted with tracks formed from a single spiral groove, with each track being considered a 360 degree turn of the spiral. The tracks provide a framework for writing data onto the disk and reading data therefrom. When reading data, for example, a read head is aligned with a desired track of the disk and the data on that track is sensed as the disk rotates past the head. A track jump can be considered as relative displacement of the read/write head from the desired track. Track jumping occurs as a matter of course during operation of an optical disk, to move the read/write head from one disk location to another. Intentional track jumps under control of the disk drive controller typically involve accurate positioning of the read/write head in relation to the disk surface so that the head aligns with another known track at a known time. An unintentional track jump can occur, for example, when a mechanical disturbance of the disk drive causes the read/write head to lose alignment with the desired track of the disk at an unpredictable time and by an unknown radial displacement. Because the timing and displacement from the desired track is unintentional, the disk drive controller can be unaware that the desired track alignment has been lost and the controller may be unable to determine what displacement has occurred in order to correct or compensate for it.
If data is being written to a disk when an unintentional track jump occurs, this can have the undesired effect of overwriting of data on the disk track to which the read/write head has jumped. Accordingly, it is desirable to provide means by which a track jump can be detected. In particular, it is desirable to be able to detect the occurrence of such a jump in a time sufficiently short that the amount of good data that is unintentionally overwritten is sufficiently small to be recovered by a data error correction scheme.
Protection against inadvertent track jumps can be particularly relevant in portable data storage/retrieval applications, such as a camcorder, where there may be mechanical noise and frequent deliberate track jumps to avail of variable bit rate recording. In a less critical situation, track jump detection is valuable in portable data reading applications. A possible situation (for illustrative purposes) would be a many-hour long compilation of MP3 music titles, recorded on a (8-cm) DVD+RW disc. Accurate track jump detection in that case can reduce the likelihood of interruptions to the music during playback, and could also reduce the amount of data buffering which is employed between the read head and the output. A player could avail of the wobble addressing information to detect and correct inadvertent track jumps, and this may help compensate for the lower data signal available from phase change discs.

Detecting track jumps during reading or writing of data on an optical disk

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.


A tool for performing a computer action based on a user's touch on a touch screen. The user's touch is characterized by certain parameters which are compared to predefined parameters which correspond to the hand that was used to touch the screen and a specific computer action. If the parameters match, within a specific error tolerance, the computer action is performed.

Portable computing devices such as smart phones, tablet computers, and satellite navigation systems are becoming more prevalent. Comprehensive applications are being created to utilize the capabilities of these portable computing devices. Portable computing devices typically include a touch screen and a multitude of other sensors that allow for interaction between a user and the device.
Touch screens allow a user to make selections or move a cursor by touching the touch screen via a finger or stylus. In general, touch screens can recognize the size, shape and position of the touch and output this information to a host device. The host device may be a handheld computer, tablet computer, or smart phone. Some touch screens recognize single touches, while others can recognize multiple, simultaneous touches.
Touch screens typically include a touch panel, a display screen, and a controller. The touch panel is a clear panel with a touch sensitive surface. The touch panel is positioned in front of the display screen so that the touch sensitive surface covers the viewable area of the display screen. The touch panel registers touches and sends these signals to the controller. The controller processes these signals into data and sends the data to the host device. Any device that houses a touch screen generally provides an Application Programming Interface (API) that programs can call to utilize the data.
Proximity sensors are one type of sensor that can be included on a portable computing device to allow for user interaction with the device. For example, a proximity sensor can detect if a user is touching, or is close to touching the proximity sensor. The maximum distance that a proximity sensor can detect is defined as the "nominal range." The "nominal range" is sensor-specific and may be adjustable. Generally, data from a proximity sensor is accessed through an API provided with the portable computing device. The data is typically a Boolean value (yes or no) indicating whether the user is within the "nominal range" of the sensor.
Accelerometers and gyroscopes are other types of sensors that can be included on a portable computing device. Accelerometers and gyroscopes can allow a user to interact with the portable computing device by tilting, rotating, or otherwise moving the device. Accelerometers can detect a device's linear acceleration along the x, y and z axes. Gyroscopes can detect a device's angular acceleration around the x, y and z axes permitting precise calculation of pitch, yaw and roll. In general, data from an accelerometer and a gyroscope can be accessed by a program calling an API that is provided with the portable computing device. The data can be raw data from the sensors or data processed by the host device in the form of information regarding the position, rotation rate, direction of gravity, and acceleration of the portable computing device.

International Business Machines Corporation


A steel for heat treatment, which exhibits high strength and high toughness even when the heat treatment (such as quenching and tempering) of the steel is conducted under conventional conditions in an after stage. The steel for heat treatment contains C: 0.10 to 0.70 mass %, Mn: 0.1 to 3.0 mass %, Al: 0.005 to 2.0 mass %, P: 0.050 mass % or less, S: 0.50 mass % or less, O: 0.0030 mass or less, N: 0.0200 mass % or less, and one or more selected from the group consisting of Ti: 0.30 mass % or less and Nb: 0.30 mass or less with the balance being Fe and unavoidable impurities, and has a TH value of 1.0 or above as calculated according to the formula: ({Ti}/48+{Nb}/93) 104 and grain diameters of 10 μm or below. {Ti} and {Nb} refer respectively to the contents of Ti and Nb in precipitates of 5 to 100 nm in size as determined about their respective extraction residues.

Structural materials for use typically in automobiles and other transport equipment and in industrial machinery secure strength and toughness at certain levels by forming a steel for heat treatment supplied by a steel maker into a predetermined shape typically through press forming, and subjecting the formed steel to a heat treatment such as quenching and/or tempering. For providing a structural material having an especially high strength and high toughness, a technique has been proposed in which the steel is controlled to have a prior austenite (γ) grain size of 5 μm or less.
Typically, Patent Literature 1 (PTL 1) discloses a high-strength steel member which contains C: 0.25 to 0.35 percent by mass, Si: 0.5 percent by mass or less, Mn: 0.2 to 1.0 percent by mass, P: 0.01 percent by mass or less, S: 0.01 percent by mass or less, Al: 0.01 to 0.1 percent by mass, N: 0.002 to 0.01 percent by mass and Ni: 7 to 12 percent by mass, with the residue being Fe and inevitable impurities or which contains C: 0.25 to 0.35 percent by mass, Si: 0.5 percent by mass or less, Mn: 0.2 to 1.0 percent by mass, P: 0.01 percent by mass or less, S: 0.01 percent by mass or less, Al: 0.01 to 0.1 percent by mass, N: 0.002 to 0.01 percent by mass and Ni: 7 to 12 percent by mass and further contains one or more elements selected from the group consisting of Cr: 0.1 to 1.0 percent by mass, Mo: 0.01 to 1 percent by mass, Ti: 0.01 to 0.05 percent by mass, Nb: 0.01 to 0.05 percent by mass and B: 0.0003 to 0.005 percent by mass, with the residue being Fe and inevitable impurities. This high-strength steel member includes very fine grains of prior austenite with grain sizes of 5 μm or less, has a tensile strength of 1400 MPa or more and excels in resistance to delayed fracture.
PTL 1 discloses a process which includes the step of heating the steel to a temperature of 850° C. to 1000° C. thereby hot-working the steel, performing a finish working on the steel in a temperature range of 700° C. or lower and the martensite start point (Ms point) or higher at a reduction of area of 20 to 50 percent by mass and immediately cooling the steel; and the step of performing rapid heating of the steel as a subsequent heat treatment at a temperature equal to or higher than the Ac3 transformation point and equal to or lower than 900° C., and immediately cooling the heated steel.
Patent Literature 2 (PTL 2), for example, discloses a high-strength steel excellent in resistance to delayed fracture, which has a specific composition, has been quenched and tempered under specific conditions and has an austenite grain size in terms of ASTM No. 8.5 or more.
PTL 2 describes that the steel is heated to a temperature equal to or higher than the Ac3 transformation point, quenched and then tempered at a temperature equal to or higher than 580° C. and equal to or lower than the Ac1 transformation point under such conditions that PLN is 16.8×103 or more.
Independently for example, Patent Literature 3 (PTL 3) discloses a spring steel wire having a tempered martensite microstructure obtained from a specific composition mainly through quenching and tempering, in which the martensite grains include carbides having such shapes as to have an average aspect ratio of 3.0 or more.
PTL 3 describes that the heating in quenching and tempering is performed at a heating rate of 50° C. to 2000° C. per second for a holding time of 0.5 to 30 seconds.


The current invention relates to a computer-generated method for optimizing placement of advertising content across multiple different devices. The system can allocate advertising campaigns and plans to various inventory types based on the probability of accurate consumer matching. Consumer matching can be achieved by generation of look-alike models in a consumer's device graph to predict future consumption behavior. The system includes an interface through which an advertiser can access relevant information about inventory and success of a given placement.

Video advertisements are among the most advanced, complicated, and expensive, forms of advertising content. Beyond the costs to produce video content itself, the expense of delivering video content over the broadcast and cable networks remains considerable, in part because television (TV) slots are premium advertising space in today's economy. Furthermore, TV is no longer a monolithic segment of the media market. Consumers can now spread their viewing of video content, particularly premium content, across TV, DVR, and a menagerie of over-the-top and on-demand video services viewed across smart TVs, gaming consoles, and mobile devices, as well as traditional TVs.
In short, TV viewing is transforming to digitally distributed viewing, as audiences watch proportionately less live broadcasting and more in a video on demand (VOD) or streaming video format.
Adding online consumption to the list of options available to any given consumer, only leads to greater complexity to the process of coordinating delivery of video adverts to a relevant segment of the public. This complexity means that the task of optimizing delivery of advertising content today far exceeds what has traditionally been necessary, and what has previously been within the capability of experienced persons. The data needed to fully understand a given consumer is fragmented as each individual and household views more and more media in a disparate fashion by accessing a network of devices.
Nevertheless, for many companies, the analytical work that goes into developing an advertising strategy today still requires manual contributions by human analysts. This is especially the case for low volume purchasers of advertising inventory. Advertising strategies are also generally fixed, meaning approaches to advertising strategy are conditioned on certain assumptions that are inflexible and limited to what manual processes are able to achieve. The current state of advertising strategy is analogous to where financial trading was before the creation of financial strategy tools such as E-Trade, which facilitates automated buying, and financial advisors such as Fidelity for investment planning.
In today's advertising strategy, human analysts guide the selection of advertising inventory based on, for example, Excel data tables and other static data management tools. This results in inefficient selection of slots, and delays in responding to market trends. Consumers are not disparate silos of preference based on the device they are using, but the market for advertising treats them that way due to limitations in the available technology tools, most of which are incapable of quickly and accurately integrating disparate data sets. For example, today, TV consumption data exists separately from set top box owner data and TV OEMs. It follows that advertising strategies for TV are planned according to TV-specific criteria, and web and mobile advertising, which include sub categories such as social media, are each planned separately. Across the advertising industry, there are separate entities planning for different media platforms, such as set-top box, phone and desktop. Across the different media there exists disparate data, data systems, and data sources (vendors). Today, these device and media categories remain largely segmented when incorporated into advertising campaign strategies and planning.
Currently, some companies attempt to link together a set of devices related to a particular consumer, but they are not capable of treating the disparate data sources with any reliable level of data integration, or at a scale that is useful to advertisers. Identifying selections of devices by comparing and modeling incomplete user data against that of other similar users within the market segment is a partial solution to this issue, but current methods are not able to create associations at a level of granularity that is reliable or useful.
Today, probabilistic and deterministic methods are not widely utilized to associate mobile and computer devices to a precise audience, or household. One reason such methods are not more widely adopted is because of inefficient processing and pairing of data across different devices. For example, in order to predict consumer purchasing, viewing, and advertising interaction habits at a 1:1 level of an association between a user and their respective device, it is insufficient to assume that any single instance of device access is representative of that user's purchasing intent. This is due to modern day habits of media consumption—users consume media on a large variety of devices as well as via different media (such as Hulu, Netflix, or cable television). As such, a much more complex analysis that enables insight into the intersection of media consumption and a user's family of devices is necessary.
Another reason probabilistic and deterministic methods are not more readily available to gauge consumer purchasing habits is because access to user device data is not easily achieved. For example, under consumer privacy laws, it is unlawful to access a user's device without their explicit consent. Therefore, on a mass scale, it is often unknown what combination of devices a demographic of users use, and what media they consumed on their respective devices. This poses a large challenge for advertisers when determining which advertising inventory to purchase and how best to reach their target audience efficiently on a given category of device.
Today, the data systems that track consumer information for use in advertising targeting lack the ability to broadly combine and integrate transmutable and non-transmutable categories (i.e., requiring the integration of a plurality of membrane levels) of consumer data. Most data systems contain static, one-dimensional, homogeneous classifications of consumers. For example, a 29 year old who bought a car two years ago will be a consumer data point that will not adjust or be updated over time. While adjusting the age of this individual overtime time is simple, other transmutable characteristics such as desire to get married, pregnancy, or other lifestyle changes are not easy to assess or predict.
Accordingly, there is a need for a method of integrating and connecting data on a given consumer that is acquired over time from multiple different devices, and to use that integrated data in making reliable placement of advertising content across multiple devices.
The discussion of the background herein is included to explain the context of the technology. This is not to be taken as an admission that any of the material referred to was published, known, or part of the common general knowledge as at the priority date of any of the claims found appended hereto.
Throughout the description and claims of the application the word "comprise" and variations thereof, such as "comprising" and "comprises", is not intended to exclude other additives, components, integers or steps.

Cross-screen optimization of advertising placement


The stresses commonly induced in the dielectrics of integrated circuits manufactured using metal patterning methods, such as reactive ion etching (RIE) and damascene techniques, can be reduced by rounding the lower corners associated with the features which are formed as part of the integrated circuit (e.g., the interconnects) before applying the outer (i.e., passivation) layer. In connection with the formation of metal lines patterned by a metal RIE process, such corner rounding can be achieved using a two-step metal etching process including a first step which produces a vertical sidewall and a second step which tapers lower portions of the vertical sidewall or which produces a tapered spacer along the lower portions of the vertical sidewall. This results in a rounded bottom corner which improves the step coverage of the overlying dielectric, in turn eliminating the potential for cracks. For metal lines patterned by damascene, such corner rounding can be achieved using a two-step trench etching process including a first step which produces a vertical sidewall, and a second step which produces a tapered sidewall along lower portions of the vertical sidewall.

Current metal patterning methods, including reactive ion etching (RIE) and damascene techniques, use anisotropic etching processes that make it possible to produce patterns having features with dimensions on the order of sub-half micron in size. In practice, such anisotropic etching results in the development of sharp corners (i.e., when viewed through the cross-section of the metal layer).
For example, FIGS. 1A and 1B schematically illustrate integrated circuits 1, 2 which have been produced using an RIE process (FIG. 1A) and a damascene process (FIG. 1B), respectively. In each case, desired metallized features 3 (e.g., conductor lines formed of aluminum) are shown associated with a suitable substrate 4 (e.g., formed of SiO.sub.2). For the RIE-prepared integrated circuit 1 of FIG. 1A, an outer layer 5 (e.g., including Si.sub.3 N.sub.4 and SiO.sub.2) is applied over the features 3 and the substrate 4. For the damascene-prepared integrated circuit 2 of FIG. 1B, the metallized features 3 are received within trenches 6 formed in the substrate 4.
In practice, such processing results in sharp corners 7', 7" (seen through the cross-section of the metallized features 3), respectively, along the tops 8 and at the bottoms 9 of the metallized features 3. The sharp corners 7', 7" tend to cause high stresses in the surrounding dielectrics. These high stresses have been found to cause cracks in the final passivation layer. S. Lee & K. Lee, "The Optimization of Passivation Layout Structure for Reliability Improvement of Memory Devices," Jpn. J. Appl. Phys., Vol. 35, Part 1, No. 10, pp. 5462-65 (Oct. 1996). These high stresses have also been found to cause "cratering" in the fuses which have come to be formed on integrated circuits for various purposes, when such fuses are laser-blown.
In an effort to reduce stress-induced cracking, Lee et al. suggest increasing the passivation thickness. The authors recognize, however, that the beneficial effects of this suggestion are limited by a corresponding increase in the brittleness of a thicker layer. U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,416,048; 4,425,183; and 4,352,724 each suggest rounding of the top corners 7' to achieve various improvements in the etching of semiconductors. For U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,416,048 and 4,425,183, and as is further disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,780,429, the etched metallized features 3 can further be provided with sloping sides to achieve various other improvements. The sloping sides resulting from such manufacturing processes are formed, however, using the oxides of the metals which form the metallized features 3. Such formation has been found to yield moderately high leakage currents and, at times, to extend across the gap which must be preserved between the adjacent metallized features 3 (e.g., adjacent metal vias or lines).
Therefore, the primary object of the present invention is to reduce deleterious effects, such as cracking of the final passivation layer or "cratering" of the fuse layer of a manufactured integrated circuit, by reducing the high stresses which can be developed in the dielectrics which surround the features being formed on the integrated circuit. Another object of the present invention is to accomplish this in a way which is fully compatible with conventional metal patterning methods, including RIE and damascene techniques.

Integrated circuits having reduced stress in metallization

International Business Machines Corporation


A device for dispensing into a liquid at least one hydrophilic substance deposited thereon including a body having at least one surface area enhancer and at least one hydrophilic substance deposited on the at least one surface area enhancer, to form a coated surface enhancer, and the body. The hydrophilic substance deposited includes a high intensity sweetener, a nutritive sweetener, a flavoring agent, a drug substance, a vitamin, a mineral, and mixtures thereof.

Consumers differ considerably in the amount of sweetness that they prefer in foods and beverages. The amount of sweetness incorporated into a liquid during commercial production may not be adequate to satisfy some consumers while other consumers may find that the same amount of sweetness to be excessive. Therefore, there exists a long-felt need for mechanisms that consumers can use to increase the sweetness of a product at the time of consumption that is consistent with their personal preference, without introducing an additional caloric burden.
Methods for dispensing hydrophilic substances into a liquid are known. For example, adding sweetener to an unsweetened iced tea beverage will typically involve several steps—adding the sweetener to the unsweetened iced tea beverage followed by stirring to incorporate the sweetener to create a sweetened iced tea beverage. Such sweetener is typically in a powdered, liquid, or tablet form. Similar effort is undertaken when adding powdered or liquid beverage mix to a liquid, e.g., water, milk, alcohol, and the like.
The availability of high intensity sweeteners (HIS) provides novel technical routes to the delivery of sweeteners to individual servings of beverages. These new technical approaches are made possible by the minute quantities of these sweeteners needed to achieve adequate sweetening of individual servings. For example, sucralose is about 600 times as sweet as sucrose (table sugar or cane sugar). Therefore, one teaspoon of sugar (about 4 g) can be replaced by only about 6.7 mg of sucralose.
Although the very small quantities of high intensity sweeteners needed to sweeten individual servings of beverages offer new technical approaches, delivering this small amount of a sweetener to a disposable serving device also presents challenges. One common approach is the blending of the high intensity sweetener with non-sweet, bland materials, and then adhering these materials to a serving device. This introduces complexity in manufacture, and also introduces possibly unwanted caloric intake to the user's diet.
Sweetening individual servings of a beverage presents a challenge in many food service situations. Frequently, an individual packet of a sweetener is provided along with a serving of a beverage. The packet may contain sucrose, or alternatively may contain high intensity sweeteners such as sucralose, aspartame, or saccharin. The user must open the packet and empty the contents into the beverage, and then stir the beverage to obtain dissolution of the sweetener and its complete dispersion in the liquid mass. The residual packaging of the packet creates waste that may present disposal problems under many situations. Also, a device is needed to stir the liquid to which the sweetener has been added. This stirring device may be a reusable or disposable spoon. More frequently, especially in casual dining, convenience stores, or fast food situations a simpler stir stick is provided. This stick may be wooden, but more generally it is an extruded plastic object.
The multi-step process involved in satisfactorily adding a hydrophilic substance to a liquid has been addressed by many methods. Most of these methods combine a stirring device with the hydrophilic substance, e.g., sweetener, flavoring agent, coffee, cocoa, tea, and the like.
One such approach is directed to placing a free flowing hydrophilic substance inside a container having a receptacle for holding the substance. This approach is described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,154,418; 4,860,929; 4,986,451; 5,125,534; 5,440,976; and 5,866,185.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,154,418, which is expressly incorporated herein by reference, discloses, among other things, a spoon having two cavities. One cavity is covered by a mesh and is used to contain a material, such as, tea, coffee, or cocoa for making a beverage. A second cavity was purported to be in a handle of the spoon. This second cavity is used to deliver beverage components, such as, sweetener. Delivery of material from the second chamber is achieved by squeezing the spoon handle or shaft of the stir stick, thereby breaking a seal and permitting the contents to flow into the beverage by gravity.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,824,322, which is expressly incorporated herein by reference, discloses a flavored tubular stirrer for alcoholic beverages. The disclosed stirrer was described as having stirring and handle portions, and flavoring means for aqueous alcoholic beverages that is held to a stirring portion of the stirrer with at least part of the flavoring communicable with an alcoholic beverage in which it is placed through or at an exterior surface of the stirring portion. The flavoring means were described as being a natural extract, a solid, or be capable of being converted to solid form by being deposited on or sorbed by a carrier. The carrier was described as being a sugar, sorbitol, manitol, corn syrup solids, milk solids, monoglycerides or diglycerides, and the like. In addition, the perforations were disclosed as being pushed inwardly so as to provide projections to assist in holding the flavoring means in place therein.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,860,929 and 4,986,451, which are expressly incorporated herein by reference, allegedly disclose a dispensing device for soluble granular material. The device includes a tube containing a solid granular material. The tube being closed at both ends and having perforations along a portion of its length and having a paddle formed at one end. In this design and in the dry state, the granular material must be sized so as not to escape through the perforations while the granular material is in a dry state.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,125,534, which is incorporated herein by reference, discloses a multiple compartment dispenser that is capable of simultaneously dispensing multiple dry flavoring ingredients into a fluid. The dispenser described contains a chamber having a spine with a plurality of vanes or blades projecting therefrom that extend into a lower housing to form multiple compartments. The lower housing was described as being a dissolvable film, such as, gelatin or methylcellulose, that is formed to fit over the bottom portion of the spine and the associated horizontally projecting vanes. Each of the multiple compartments was described as being individually filled with a flavoring ingredient prior to dispensing. Flavoring ingredients included sugar, coffee, hot chocolate, and bouillon.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,440,976, which is incorporated herein by reference, allegedly discloses a device for dispensing natural and artificial sweeteners into a beverage. The device includes a tube having perforations and at least one separator disk positioned therein, and a solid sleeve formed to receive the tube. The tube is in the sleeve such that the tube may be urged forward dispensing a measured amount of sweetener into the beverage. Control of sweetness intensity was allegedly described as being further enhanced by providing calibration markers on the surface of the tube.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,866,185, which is expressly incorporated herein by reference, discloses a device including a tube including a soluble or dispersible material and a soluble coating formed on the outer surface of the tubular portion. The soluble coating can be sugar or an artificial sweetener and is dissolved when the coating comes into contact with liquid. The tube is also disclosed as having perforations to control the rate that the soluble material is dispersed in the liquid. The soluble material was described as being a variety of substances that are soluble in liquid, including flavors, such as, cherry, orange, grape, and fruit punch.
Another approach is directed to attaching a solid mass to a handle and dissolving the solid mass in a liquid. This approach is described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,869,555; 4,849,231; 6,399,126, and U.S. Pat. App. Pub. No. 20010038871.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,869, 555, which is incorporated herein by reference, discloses a soluble solid mass secured to a wooden stick. The solid mass was discloses as having a base mass and an optional flavoring mass. The base mass was described as being instant coffee crystals or particles, tea, cocoa, eggnog, and chocolate with binder material. The flavoring mass was described as being powdered milk and/or sugar that is held together by a binder material, which could be sugar or may be taste-free.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,849,231, which is expressly incorporated herein by reference, discloses a stirring rod having a stirring body that has a holder for holding a solid mass, e.g., sugar lump. More than one holder can be included in the body of the stirring rod. In addition to sugar lumps, sweetener tablets containing high intensity sweeteners, such as, aspartame or saccharin, powdered milk, coloring, and flavoring are disclosed. In another embodiment, there is disclosed a wooden stirring body that was immersed in a warm, liquid sugar or other substance, where a quantity of substance has remained adhered thereto, the quantity corresponding to a quantity of substance, for example sugar or sweetener, e.g,, aspartame, geared to an amount of beverage. After cooling, the solid piece of the substance is held by a holder. The quantity of substance to be added to the beverage was disclosed as being regulated by inserting the stirring rod more or less deeply into the beverage that is to be stirred.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,399,126, which is incorporated herein by reference, discloses a flavored beverage stirrer that includes a carrier and a cartridge. The cartridge was disclosed as being formed from a flavored material, which dissolves and adds flavor to a beverage.
U.S. Pat. App. Pub. No. 20010038871, which is incorporated herein by reference, discloses an embodiment wherein a predetermined quantity of a water soluble extract is sprayed onto the inner surface of a straw. The coated-interior of the straw will provide an agent of choice to be incorporated into a liquid.
The above approaches suffer from a number of drawbacks. In particular, due to the complexity of most of the above solutions, manufacturing costs and difficulties present obstacles to adoption. In addition, none of the solutions address the problem of increasing the dissolution rate of a hydrophilic substance while maintaining the same compact size of the device.


A developer for developing an electrostatic image has a toner containing a binder resin and a colorant. The binder resin is comprised of an AB-type block copolymer having segment-A and segment-B.. The segment-A has a copolymer structure comprised of a styrene monomer and at least one monomer selected from the group consisting of an acrylic monomer, a methacrylic monomer and a diene monomer, and the segment-B has a copolymer structure comprised of a styrene monomer and at least one monomer selected from the group consisting of an acrylic monomer, a methacrylic monomer and a diene monomer, provided that the segment-A and segment-B have copolymer structures different from each other.

1. Field of the invention
The present invention relates to a developer for developing an electrostatic image, used in a process by which an electrostatic image is developed to form an image, Such as electrophotography, electrostatic recording or electrostatic printing. It also relates an image forming method, a toner image fixing method and an image forming apparatus that make use of the developer.
2. Related Background Art
A number of methods as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,297,691, Japanese Patent Publications No. 42-23910 and No. 43-24748 and so forth are conventionally known for electrophotography. In general, copies are obtained by forming an electrostatic latent image on a photosensitive member by utilizing a photoconductive material and by various means, subsequently developing the latent image by the use of a toner, and transferring the toner image to a transfer medium such as paper if necessary, followed by fixing by the action of heat, pressure or solvent vapor.
Various met hods or techniques have been developed in relation to the above final step, i.e., the step of fixing the toner image to a sheet such as paper. A method must commonly available at present is the pressure heating system making use of a heating roller.
The pressure heating system making use of a heating roller is e method of carrying out fixing by causing an image-receiving sheet to pass over a heating roller whole surface is formed of a material having a releasability to toner while a toner image surface of the former is brought into contact with the surface of the latter under application of a pressure. Since in this method the surface of the heating roller comes into contact with the toner image of the image-receiving sheet under application of a pressure, a very good thermal efficiency can be achieved when the toner image is melt-adhered onto the image-receiving sheet, so that fixing can be carried out rapidly. This method is therefore very effective in high-speed electrophotographic copying machines. In this method, however, since the surface of the heating roller comes into contact with the toner image under application of a pressure, part of the toner image may sometimes adhere and transfer to the surface of the fixing roller, which may re-transfer to the subsequent image-receiving sheet to cause an offset phenomenon, resulting in a contamination of the image-receiving sheet. Thus, it is essential in the heating roller fixing system that no toner is adhered to the surface of the heat fixing roller.
Accordingly, under existing circumstances, it is sought to provide a binder resin for toner, having a broad fixing temperature range and high anti-offset properties.
Research has been conducted on two-color copying machines or full-color copying machines, and many of which have been put into practical use. For example, Journal of Electrophotographic Society, Vol. 22, No. 1 (1983) and Journal of Electrophotographic Society, Vol. 25, No. 1, p. 52 (1986) issued reports on color reproduction and gradation reproduction.
However, images formed by full-color electrophotography presently put into practical use are not necessarily satisfactory to those who have become accustomed to seeing color images that are not directly compared with actual things or objects as in television pictures, photographs and color gravures or that are made artificially more beautiful than actual things.
In the full-color electrophotography, development is carried out plural times using plural kinds of toners with different colors, and toner layers are superposed on the same support to form a full-color image. For this reason, binder resins used for color toners are required to satisfy conditions as itemized below.
(1) Fixed toner must be brought into an almost perfectly molten state such that the form of toner particles can not be distinguished, in order that the fixed toner does not cause irregular reflection of light to hinder color reproduction. PA1 (2) Since the toner layers are superposed, the binder resin must be transparent so that a different color tone in a lower toner layer has is not affected. PA1 a toner containing a binder resin and a colorant, said binder resin being comprised of an AB-type block copolymer having segment-A and segment-B; PA1 said segment-A having a copolymer structure comprised of a styrene monomer and at least one monomer selected from the group consisting of an acrylic monomer, a methacrylic monomer and a diene monomer, and said segment-B having a copolymer structure comprised of a styrene monomer and at least one monomer selected from the group consisting of an acrylic monomer, a methacrylic monomer and a diene monomer, provided that said segment-A and segment-B have copolymer structures different from each other. PA1 bringing a charging member to which a voltage has been externally applied, into contact with a latent image bearing member to statically charge the latent image bearing member, said charging member having a conductive rubber layer and a release film formed at least at a portion of said conductive rubber layer coming into contact with said latent image bearing member; PA1 forming an electrostatic latent image on the latent image bearing member having been statically charged; and PA1 developing said latent image using a developer to form a toner image; said developer comprising a toner containing a binder resin and a colorant, said binder resin being comprised of an AB-type block copolymer having segment-A and segment-B; said segment-A having a copolymer structure comprised of a styrene monomer and at least one monomer selected from the group consisting of an acrylic monomer, a methacrylic monomer and a diene monomer, and said segment-B having a copolymer structure comprised of a styrene monomer and at least one monomer selected from the group consisting of an acrylic monomer, a methacrylic monomer and a diene monomer, provided that said segment-A and segment-B have copolymer structures different from each other; PA1 transferring the developed toner image to a transfer medium from said latent image bearing member; and PA1 cleaning the surface of said latent image bearing member to remove toner remaining untransferred. PA1 said developer for froming said toner image comprises a toner containing a binder resin and a colorant, said binder resin being comprised of an AB-type block copolymer having segment-A and segment-B; said segment-A having a copolymer structure comprised of a styrene monomer and at least one monomer selected from the group consisting of an acrylic monomer, a methacrylic monomer and a diene monomer, and said segment-B having a copolymer structure comprised of a styrene monomer and at least one monomer selected from the group consisting of an acrylic monomer, a methacrylic monomer and a diene monomer, provided that said segment-A and segment-B have copolymer structures different from each other; and PA1 at least one of said pair of rollers opposingly brought into pressure contact comprises a roller substrate, an elastic layer provided on said roller substrate, an oil-resistant layer provided on said elastic layer and an anti-offset layer provided on, said oil-resistant layer; these layers having an elongation that is larger by degrees in order of the anti-offset layer, the oil-resistant layer and the elastic layer. PA1 a latent image bearing member capable of bearing an electrostatic latent image; PA1 a charging;means for statically charging said latent image bearing member; PA1 a latent image forming means for forming an electrostatic latent image on the latent image bearing member having been statically charged; PA1 a developing means for developing said electrostatic latent image to form a toner image on said latent image bearing member; PA1 a transfer means for transferring said toner image to a transfer medium from said latent image bearing member; PA1 a cleaning means for cleaning the surface of said latent image bearing member to remove toner remaining thereon untransferred; and PA1 a fixing means for fixing the toner image transferred to said transfer medium by the action of heat and pressure; wherein; PA1 said developing means retains a developer comprising a toner containing a binder resin and a colorant, said binder resin being comprised of an AB-type block copolymer having segment-A and segment-B; said segment-A having a copolymer structure comprised of a styrene monomer and at least one monomer selected from the group consisting of an acrylic monomer, a methacrylic monomer and a diene monomer, and said segment-B having a copolymer structure comprised of a styrene monomer and at least one monomer selected from the group consisting of an acrylic monomer, a methacrylic monomer and a diene monomer, provided that said segment-A and segment-B have copolymer structures different from each other.
As stated above, when used in monochrome copying machines, binder resins used for toner are required to give a broad fixing temperature range and high anti-offset properties. When used in full-color copying machines, binder resins are required not only to have a broad fixing temperature range but also to be transparent and to give a flat image surface when images are fixed.
In recent years, in the field ranging from monochrome copying machines to full-color copying machines, variety is also required, e.g., to take copies at higher speed, to shorten the heat-up time of the heating roller and to decrease power consumption.
In order to satisfy these requirements, it is necessary to provide a binder resin for a toner that permits low-temperature fixing, and also, as stated above, which provides a broad fixing temperature range, has an excellent transparency, and can provide a flat image surface when images are fixed.
Meanwhile, one can consider a method making use of pressure fixing toners. In this method, the binder resin can not melt when the toners are used as toners for full colors in which three or four colors are superposed to effect color reproduction, so that color-mixing performance becomes poor to give a dull, chroma-poor image. Hence, in the fixing step, heat must be applied to the extent that the binder resin can melt and achieve color mixture.
Only for the purpose of achieving low-temperature fixing, it is possible to decrease melt viscosity of binder resins for toners. For example, there is a method in which the molecular weight of resin or the glass transition point thereof is lowered. This method, however, may result in a poor storage stability of toner which tends to cause phenomena such as blocking between toners and melt-adhesion of toner to a developing drum.
Hitherto, for the purpose of expanding the fixing temperature range of vinyl polymers, methods in which an anti-offset agent is used are disclosed in Japanese Patent Applications Laid-open No. 58-14148, No. 58-72948, No. 59-174855, No. 59-174856 and No. 60-123855, and Japanese Patent Publications No. 52-3304, No. 52-3305, No. 55-52574 and No. 58-8505. These, however, are supplementary means, and may damage the transparency of the toner when applied to monochrome toners or may bring about a poor color mixing performance when applied to full-color toners.
Japanese Patent Applications Laid-open No. 56-158340, No. 58-86558, No. 58-203453, No. 59-88748, No. 59-226358, No. 60-45259, No. 60-45261 and No. 60-46566 and Japanese Patent Publication No. 60-2411 disclose binder resins for a toner that have a low-molecular weight component and a high-molecular weight component. Use of such resins has made it possible to expand the fixing temperature range to a certain extent, but, on the other hand, causes the problem that grindability is lowered or melt viscosity becomes excessively high at the time of heat kneading, because of the presence of high-molecular weight components such as gels. Particularly when such binders are used in full-color toners, a problem arises in that the smoothness of image surfaces when images are fixed is damaged, resulting in a poor color mixing performance.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,925,765 discloses a negative solid block toner wherein an AB type, BAB type or ABA type block copolymer is used as a charge control agent.
In this block copolymer, a copolymer comprising acrylic monomers or a copolymer comprising methacrylic monomers is used as segment-A and a copolymer comprising monomers selected from the group consisting of styrene, a substituted styrene, butadiene, and an acrylate and/or a methacrylate as segment-B.
It can be presumed that use of such a block copolymer as a binder resin for a toner causes the problems that the grindability in the preparation of the toner becomes poor which makes particle size distribution broad and also the environmental stability of toner becomes poor, because of the segment-A which is an acrylic copolymer or methacrylic copolymer.
Thus, it is very difficult to satisfy at the same time fixing at a low temperature, to expand the fixing temperature range and to maintain the properties of toner, i.e., storage stability, fluidity, durability, transparency, and smoothness of fixed-image surface.

Developer for developing electrostatic image, image forming method, toner imager fixing method and image forming apparatus


An image forming apparatus is provided. The image forming apparatus includes a single drive source, at least four photosensitive drums, a plurality of drum drive gears which are provided to correspond to the photosensitive drums, and a plurality of intermediate gears which are interposed between the drive source and each of the drum drive gears. A number of the intermediate gears provided for each of the photosensitive drums is same.

As an electrophotographic color laser printer, there is known a tandem color laser printer which includes four photosensitive drums corresponding to toner of four colors such as yellow, magenta, cyan and black, respectively.
In the tandem color laser printer, since toner images of those four colors are formed individually on the corresponding photosensitive drums substantially simultaneously, a color image can be formed at almost the same speed as that at which a monochrome image is formed in a monochrome laser printer.
An image forming apparatus which is a tandem color laser printer includes two motors, a pair of transmission gears provided for each motor and four drum gears provided for the transmission gears, respectively. In the image forming apparatus, the four drum gears are driven by the two motors through the transmission gears. Phases of the pair of transmission gears are shifted from each other by a predetermined angle and the drive of the motors is controlled so that the phases of the transmission gears are synchronized, and occurrence of color registration error can be reduced or prevented.
An image forming apparatus includes four drum drive gears corresponding to four photosensitive drums, respectively, three idle gears provided between the four drum drive gears, respectively so that each of the idle gears meshes with the pair of drum drive gears adjacent thereto, and a gear of a drive motor provided to mesh with one of the drum drive gears. According to this configuration, the driving force of the drive motor transmitted to the one of the drum drive gears is further transmitted to the three remaining drum drive gears via the idle gears and the drum drive gears, whereby the respective photosensitive drums are rotated.
In such a tandem color laser printer, toner images of four colors are overlapped sequentially. Therefore, in order to reduce or prevent color registration error occurring during the overlapping of the toner images, it is important that the toner images are overlapped with the same printing errors occurring in the respective colors. Accordingly, it is advantageous that the photosensitive drums corresponding to the four colors are driven under the same conditions.
In the image forming apparatus as described above firstly, the two motors are provided, and the drive of the two motors are controlled in order to synchronize the phases of the transmission gears. That is, the image forming apparatus needs the two motors and two sensors for controlling the drive of the two motors, which makes the configuration of the image forming apparatus complex. Additionally, this configuration causes increase in the production cost of the image forming apparatus.
In the image forming apparatus as described above secondly, since the number of gears provided between the motor and the photosensitive drums are different with each other, the production errors in the respective gears affect the photosensitive drums differently, and the photosensitive drums cannot be rotated in the synchronized manner, which causes a fear that color registration errors are generated.


A semiconductor switch device and a method of making the same. The semiconductor switch device includes a field effect transistor located on a semiconductor substrate. The field effect transistor includes a plurality of gates. Each gate includes a gate electrode and gate dielectric arranged in a loop on a major surface of the substrate. The loops formed by the gates are arranged concentrically. Each gate has a source region located adjacent an inner edge or outer edge of the loop formed by that gate and a drain region located adjacent the other edge of said inner edge and said outer edge of the loop formed by that gate.

This disclosure relates to a semiconductor switch device and to a method of making a semiconductor switch device.
Known RF (Radio Frequency) MOS (Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor) switches are based on a comb type layout. In this layout, the switch includes a gate that has a plurality of interconnected fingers. The fingers are interspersed with source and drain regions comprising elongate strips. Metal interconnects are provided to each source and drain region through a series of vias located at several points along each strip. Generally, the connection to the gate as made at one side of the device, at a common strip that interconnects each finger of the comb. The device may be surrounded by deep trench isolation (DTI). The DTI may be provided in the form of a mesh of trenches. This DTI implementation may generally increase the size of the device by a factor 2 or 3. Losses within such a switch may be relatively high. For instance, the isolation provided by the DTI surrounding the device does not affect substrate impedance within the device. The footprint of the active device itself may generally stay relatively wide and thus exhibit a lower substrate resistance, which may lead to higher insertion losses and a higher noise figure.
Scaling of such a device is also limited to adding additional fingers to the comb or by varying the length of the fingers.
Within a single-pole, single-throw (SPDT) switch there are several ways to provide electrostatic discharge (ESD) protection. One approach is to use ESD self-protected switches. In such an approach, only a first finger of the switch bears the ESD stress. The other fingers of the device do not participate in this respect because there is no domino effect in this kind of device. Because of this, the width of the first finger may be required to be relatively large, which may increase insertion losses and the noise figure of the device.


A slope etching process including dipping a pattern forming layer into a predetermined dipping solution containing an etching solution or wet etching and deionized water, so as to utilize a wet etching method only for isotropic etching. There is also provided a slope etching process including forming a photoresist pattern layer having inclined edges and etching the photoresist pattern layer together with the pattern forming layer by using a gas mixture containing an etching gas for dry etching and O.sub.2 gas, so as to utilize a RIE method only for anisotropic etching. According to the processes, it is possible to slope etch the pattern forming layer so as to form a pattern layer having a desired edge slope. Furthermore, the step coverage after process integration and productivity can be improved.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a slope etching process, and particularly to a slope etching process which provides a smooth slope for the pattern formed in manufacturing semi-conductor elements, thereby improving the step coverage.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In order to form a desired pattern in manufacturing semiconductor elements, photo processing and etching should be generally carried out. The etching is mainly classified into a dry etching process and a wet etching process, a suitable one of which is used depending on the existing conditions.
Recently, RIE (Reactive Ion Etching) method which is generally classified as the dry etching method is gradually being widely used in view of its convenience in processing over the wet etching method.
In forming a pattern, the conventional RIE method enables only anisotropic etching, so that the pattern of etched layer is formed such that its corner angle becomes about 90.degree..
The conventional pattern forming process utilizing the above-mentioned RIE method will now be described, in conjunction with FIGS. 1A to 1D.
First, a layer 2 for forming a predetermined pattern is deposited on a substrate 1, as shown in FIG. 1A. The layer 2 will be subsequently etched to form a pattern. On the layer 2, a photoresist 3 is coated and then radiated with ultra violet radiation under the condition that a photomask 4 is aligned on the photoresist 3 to be in contact therewith, in order to form a pattern layer 3a as shown in FIG. 1B. Thereafter, the layer 2 for forming a desired pattern is subjected to an etch utilizing the RIE method which is an anisotropic dry etch method. After the photoresist pattern layer 3a is removed from the etched pattern forming layer 2, a pattern layer 2a having corner angles of 90.degree. is formed, as shown in FIG. 1D. However, the pattern forming utilizing the conventional RIE method has a disadvantage that when a primary upper deposition layer 5 is coated on the pattern layer 2a etched according to the RIE method, the step coverage, that is the coverage of the deposition layer 5 over steps (the "K" portion in FIG. 2) formed at respective corners of about 90.degree. of the pattern layer 2a, becomes poor, after the process integration. Consequently, the pattern layer 2a formed by the RIE method and a second upper deposition layer 6 formed on the primary upper deposition layer 5 is subject to a short failure, thereby causing the productivity of semi-conductor elements to be reduced.
Also, the pattern forming process utilizing the conventional wet etching method will now be described, in conjunction with FIGS. 3A to 3D.
First, a pattern forming layer 8 to be etched is deposited on a substrate 7, as shown in FIG. 3A. On the layer 8, a photoresist 9 is coated. Then, the photoresist 9 is exposed to ultra violet radiation by using a photomask 10 printed with a predetermined pattern and developed to form a photoresist pattern layer 9a as shown in FIG. 3B. Thereafter, the wet etching is carried out as shown in FIG. 3C. At this time, the pattern forming layer 8 is isotropically etched. This is because the velocity V.sub.S of the etching which proceeds on the interface between the photoresist 10 and the pattern forming layer 8 and in parallel to said interface is substantially identical to the velocity V.sub.D of the etching which proceeds vertically to the surface of the element material (V.sub.S =V.sub.D). As a result, a pattern layer 8a is formed such that its lateral edges form an angle of 45.degree. to the surface of substrate 7. As the photoresist pattern layer 9a is removed, a desired pattern layer 8a is formed, as shown in FIG. 3D. However, the pattern forming utilizing the conventional wet etching process also has a disadvantage that when a primary upper deposition layer 11 is coated on the pattern layer 8a etched according to the RIE method, its step coverage over respective 45.degree. lateral edges of the pattern layer 8a becomes poor. Consequently, the pattern layer 8a and a second upper deposition layer 12 formed on the primary upper deposition layer 11 are subject to a short failure (at the portion "L" in FIG. 4). In particular, when the pattern layer 8a and the second upper deposition layer 12 form metal electrodes and the primary upper deposition layer forms an insulation layer, the pattern layer 8a and the second upper deposition layer 12 may be subject to a break down at the portion "L", thereby causing the productivity of semiconductor elements to be reduced.


Apparatus for processing digitized images, the apparatus being of the type comprising a matrix memory (104) of pixels (106) organized as N lines (108) by P columns (110), together with processing means (130) for determining which pixels (106) are in the excited state by reading the memory (104). The processing means (130) operate by determining and storing the address of an excited pixel (106) that occupies an extreme position in a line or a column position, by switching said pixel (106) to a non-excited state, and by reiterating these operations until none of the pixels (106) is excited.

In memory, an image may be defined by a matrix of pixels occupying N lines and P columns. In some cases, the sampled and digitized image is represented by a sequence of 0s and 1s disposed in lines and columns in the matrix and the proposed device then serves to directly locate memory cells that contain a 1 (or a 0).
In general, such digitized images are analyzed by reading the matrix memory sequentially and testing each pixel to determine whether it satisfies a predetermined condition. The term "excited" is used below to designate a pixel which satisfies the condition since, in general, the condition relates to whether the pixel is to be considered as being illuminated or not.
Such sequential reading necessarily leads to scanning the entire memory even if the number of excited pixels is small compared with the total number of pixels in the memory. This gives rise to a waste of time which considerably reduces the speed at which the image can be read.
The object of the invention is to provide a solution to this problem. To this end, the invention provides apparatus capable of processing only useful information, i.e. the excited pixels of a matrix memory.

Method and apparatus for processing digitized images

Office National d'Etudes et de Recherche Aerospatiales (ONERA)


In an embodiment, the present invention provides a seal with at least one sealing lip to seal a gap between a machine component and a housing, including: a main body made from resilient material, the main body being equipped such that it is electrically conductive and is covered with a jacket made from an electrically insulating material on at least part of its outer side. The jacket is assigned to at least those regions of the main body that are in contact with the machine component and the housing.

Seals, especially seals that are subject to dynamic loads, experience wear over their predicted lifecycle in the form of a variety of wear phenomena. The seal contact stress is reduced due to material fatigue and the contact pressure force also declines. The dimensions of the seal change as a result of wear and setting behavior. These processes lead to leaks in the first instance and ultimately cause the seal system to fail.
The possibility of incorporating a leak monitoring device in the seal to monitor leaks from seals is already known in the art. DE 10 2007 007 405 B4 discloses an electrical device for detecting the state of wear of a dynamic seal element. The seal element comprises an electrically conductive section and an electrically non-conductive section, which is in contact with the machine component to be sealed. The machine component is also electrically conductive. The electrically non-conductive sealing material becomes worn due to wear on the seal element, causing the electrically conductive sealing material to come into contact with the machine component. This closes an electric circuit, making it clear that the seal element is worn. The disadvantage of this embodiment is that it is not possible to detect gradual changes in the seal condition. It is only possible to establish that the limit of wear has been reached and that the seal element must be replaced.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.


An inner conductor contact for connecting one end of a braided inner conductor of a coaxial cable with one end of an inner conductor of a coaxial plug, with the inner cable conductor enclosing a core which is retracted relative to the end of the inner cable conductor, includes a support element insertable in the inner cable conductor and having the same diameter as the core. The support element is adapted for connection with the core at the core-near side thereof via a bolt and with the inner plug conductor at the core-distant side thereof by means of a prolongation which is connected to the support element via a conical shoulder and thus is of smaller diameter than the support element. The part of the inner cable conductor extending along the shoulder and prolongation is surrounded by a metal bushing which receives the respective end of the inner plug conductor to provide the electric connection between the inner cable conductor and the inner plug conductor.

The invention refers to an inner conductor contact, and in particular to an inner conductor contact for connecting one end of a braided inner conductor of a coaxial cable with one end of an inner conductor of a coaxial plug, with the inner cable conductor enclosing a core.
Conventional coaxial cables generally include a massive inner conductor, or an inner conductor made of litz wires or strands when high flexibility is demanded. Also known are coaxial cables which have an inner conductor woven about a core. The latter coaxial cables are generally used when transmitting high powers via a flexible cable and/or when requesting low attenuation because in this case only cables of great diameter are suitable. An inner conductor of litz wire would not be sufficiently flexible and too lossy in such circumstances.
In coaxial cables with braided inner conductor woven about a core, the latter is made either of a massive round plastic cord or of a stable plastic tube. Sometimes, also a complete coaxial cable is used as the inner conductor, however without insulating outer sheath so that the braided outer conductor of such a conventional coaxial cable (correspondingly smaller diameter) serves as inner conductor which is surrounded by the cable dielectric upon which the braided outer conductor is applied which in turn is enclosed by the insulating outer sheath.
A flexible coaxial cable of this type has the drawback that the contact i.e. electric (and mechanical) connection of the inner cable conductor with the cable-side part of the inner plug conductor is very difficult to accomplish. To date, either the inner cable conductor was soldered with the inner plug conductor or the connection was done by means of a collet chuck type device which is externally clamped upon the braided inner cable conductor. This type of connection represents, however, an area of electric discontinuity because the diameter of the collet chuck exceeds the diameter of the inner cable conductor. Even though it may be feasible, e.g. by increasing the diameter of the outer conductor, to essentially keep the characteristic impedance in the contact area constant so that the reflection in the contact area is kept within an acceptable range, the diametric jump still decreases the cutoff frequency of the arrangement of cable and plug compared to the cutoff frequency of the cable.

Inner conductor contact for coaxial cables with braided inner conductor


Improved STT MRAM source line configurations are provided. In one aspect, a STT MRAM array includes: a plurality of cells including magnetic tunnel junctions in series with field effect transistors; a plurality of word lines perpendicular to a plurality of bit lines; a plurality of source line segments spanning m+1 of the bit lines, wherein m of the bit lines include regular array bit lines, and wherein at least one other of the bit lines includes an extra bit line that is connected to the source line segments such that the source line segments span the regular array bit lines and the extra bit line. An STT MRAM device and a method for operating an STT MRAM device are also provided.

Spin Torque Transfer (STT) Magnetoresistive Random Access Memory (MRAM) is an attractive emerging memory technology, offering non-volatility, high performance, and high endurance. An STT MRAM memory cell generally includes a Magnetic Tunnel Junction (MTJ) in series with a Field Effect Transistor (FET) which is gated by a Word Line (WL). A Bit Line (BL) is connected to the MTJ and runs perpendicular to the WL. A Source Line (SL) is connected to the FET.
In standby, the WL, BL, and SL are held to ground. One cell along the BL is selected by raising its WL. When a sufficiently large voltage is forced across the cell from BL to SL, the selected MTJ is written to a particular (i.e., parallel or anti-parallel) state. The written state is determined by the polarity of this voltage (BL high versus SL high).
Wiring the SL within an STT MRAM array can present notable challenges. For instance, it is common to have the SL run parallel to the BL. However, to enable contact with the underlying FETs the SL has to be narrow (which undesirably increases resistance) and/or a larger cell is needed. Instead, running the SL perpendicular rather than parallel to the BL (and sharing the SL between adjacent rows) addresses these issues. However, such an arrangement results in some loss of cell selectivity since multiple bits share the same word line and source line. This loss of selectivity must be addressed in the operation of the array.
Accordingly, improved STT MRAM SL configurations would be desirable.