A maltopentaose producing amylase, and its derivatives modified by gene manipulation, can be expressed in E. col. These amylases facilitate the production of maltopentaose.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a maltopentaose (G5) producing amylases and derivatives thereof.
2. The Prior Art
Apart from glucose (glucoamylases) and maltone (.beta.-amylases), only very few maltooligosaccharides can be obtained directly in sufficient purity by hydrolysis of starch using amylases. On hydrolysis of starch, as a rule, .alpha.-amylases produce mixtures of glucose and lower molecular weight maltooligosaccharides (G2-G9). Purification of individual components from such mixtures is elaborate and costly. However, individual .alpha.-amylases have sufficiently high product specificity to enable the industrial production of defined oligosaccharides. To date, 3 G5 forming amylases have been disclosed:

Consortium fur elektrochemische Industrie GmbH


An antenna device, wireless communication device, and method to provide wide banded antenna tuning. The antenna device is configured to include a higher frequency range antenna element, a lower frequency range antenna element, a resonance switch, and high and lower frequency range coupler elements. The antenna device provides a high frequency switch stage and a low frequency switch stage. The high frequency switch stage includes the antenna device being configured to resonate at one or more frequencies within a high impedance bandwidth and the low frequency switch stage includes the antenna device being configured to resonate at one or more frequencies within a low impedance bandwidth. The antenna device further includes impedance tuning circuitry to modify the impedance bandwidths of both the low and high frequency bandwidths. The antenna device is configured to separately perform impedance tuning for each of a transmit signal and a receive signal.

With respect to handheld wireless devices, industrial design (ID) often takes priority over antenna performance. Therefore, antenna volume is often insufficient to contemporaneously cover all desired frequency ranges for certain communication techniques. Traditionally, tunable antennas have provided a way to circumvent this insufficiency by allowing an available impedance bandwidth to be moved in frequency to cover desired frequency ranges and still obtain acceptable Over the Air (OTA) performance. However, traditional tunable antennas are typically narrow banded and will only allow coverage of a limited number of frequency bands at any given time. This is often not suitable for devices supporting communication techniques that require wide coverage of frequency bands, for example coverage of multiple non-adjacent frequency bands in Carrier Aggregation (CA) with respect to Long Term Evolution (LTE) networks.
Bandwidth enhancing techniques can increase the impedance bandwidth of an antenna, which is advantageous for devices that support communication techniques requiring a wide coverage of frequency bands. However, many bandwidth enhancing techniques have traditionally not been considered practical solutions for use in tunable antenna concepts due to various complications associated with tunable antenna concepts.


An image recording device includes a support member, a print head, a tension adjustment unit, and a control unit. The control unit is configured: to move the print head to the retracted position; to control the tension adjustment unit to adjust the tension of the print medium to a print tension while the print head is positioned at the retracted position; to move the print head to the print position; to control the print head to execute printing; to move the print head to the retracted position, and to control the tension adjustment unit to release the tension of the print medium while the print head is positioned at the retracted position.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a technology for printing an image onto a print medium by using a print head that faces a support member for supporting the print medium, with the print medium being interposed between the support member and the print head.
2. Background Technology
Patent Document 1 describes an image recording device in which a print medium (a continuous sheet of paper) being conveyed from a paper conveyor unit to a paper puller unit is wound around and supported by a support member (conveyance drum) arranged between the paper conveyor unit and the paper puller unit. According to this image recording device, an imprinting head (print unit) that faces the support member, with the print medium interposed between the support member and the imprinting head, prints an image onto the continuous sheet of paper being supported by the support member. In an image recording device of such description, as is stated in Patent Document 2, it is also possible to execute, when appropriate, an operation in which the tension of the print medium is adjusted.
Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 10-086472 (Patent Document 1) and Japanese Patent No. 4328043 (Patent Document 2) are examples of the related art.

Image recording device, image recording method


A CPU of an overdubbing device plays back a music file recorded in a memory card of the device and outputs the file as a played-back audio signal while mixing the played-back audio signal with an external audio signal input from the outside, to thus perform overdubbing. A music file recorded through overdubbing last time is automatically set as a playback music file for the next time, and a selected state of means for selecting execution/nonexecution of overdubbing is maintained as the state of execution. As a result, overdubbing is enabled by twice operations of a record key, whereby the operation is made identical with operation performed during ordinary recording. Further, playback is performed by changing either playback speed or musical interval of the playback music file.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to an overdubbing device and, more particularly, to a device that plays back a recorded music file, to thus output a played-back audio signal, and that records the played-back audio signal while mixing it with an external audio signal input from the outside.
2. Related Art
There has hitherto been put forward an overdubbing apparatus that plays back a recorded music file, to thus output a played-back audio signal, and that records the played-back audio signal while mixing it with an external audio signal input from the outside.
For instance, JP 7-85593 A discloses an overdubbing function of reading audio data recorded in a recorder and writing mixed audio data back into the recorder by use of a buffer.
JP 2003-66999 A discloses an overdubbing function of mixing an audio signal input from a microphone with an MP3 audio signal of a source file in a memory card, storing a resultant mix as a mixed file in the memory card, and utilizing the mixed file as a new source file from the next time.
JP 2004-157260 A discloses an overdubbing function of repeating operation for mixing an input audio signal with a source file in a memory card, to thus create a first mixed file, and mixing the first mixed file taken as a new source file with an input audio signal, to thus create a second mixed file.
Moreover, JP 2006-11191 A describes a device having a musical performance control unit that merges music output from a synthesizer with voice input from a microphone and outputs the resultant and a game control unit that controls a game in accordance with operation of a remote controller in parallel with control of musical performance. In accordance with a result of evaluation made by a game evaluation unit, at least either the speed or voice of music is changed.
However, the related-art device encounters problems stemming from complication of operation, such as a necessity for operation for manually selecting a source music file (a source file) used when overdubbing is performed, a necessity for special key operation for performing overdubbing (e.g., a MIX key). In particular, when overdubbing is repeatedly performed, it is necessary to repeatedly perform the special operations; hence, complication becomes noticeable.
At the time of overdubbing operation, there are many desires to change a musical interval or playback speed of a source file to achieve synchronism with the musical interval and speed of an external audio input to be overdubbed. However, such a request cannot have been fulfilled in the related art. As a matter of course, it is easy to change playback speed by changing a sampling frequency. However, since playback and recording are simultaneously performed during overdubbing operation, the sampling frequency cannot be changed. A technique for changing only a musical interval or playback speed is employed in a karaoke machine, and the like, but overdubbing is not carried out. Further, when overdubbing for practicing a musical instrument, and the like, is performed, there are many desires to mute sound of the musical instrument included in a source file and overdub the file with sound played by a user. The related-art devices encounter a problem of a failure to meet such a variety of editorial requests.
The present invention provides a device that enables performance of overdubbing operation by simple operation and that enables edition at the time of overdubbing operation.


A lens barrel has a photographing lens, first and second cam frames, drive systems, respectively driving the first and second cam frames, and a group frame intervening between the drive systems. The advancing and retreating of the second cam are determined by the group frame driven by the first cam frame. When the first cam is moved in the direction of an optical axis of the lens while rotating, the group frame moves rectilinearly along the optical axis with a cam follower engaging with a cam groove. The second cam rotates together with the first cam in the same direction and is largely moved in a slanting direction by the cam follower engaging with the cam groove of the group frame. Thus, the advancing and retreating of a plurality of advanceable and retreatable frame members are increased. Consequently, the local length of the lens barrel is increased.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a lens barrel having a plurality of advanceable and retreatable frame members for supporting photography lenses.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, as zoom lenses have become increasingly longer in focal length, lens barrels have had to accommodate increasing amounts of advancing and retreating of lens groups. A zoom lens barrel proposed under such circumstances and disclosed in the Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2-89012 is adapted to drive first and second lens group supporting frames for larger amounts of advancing and retreating movements thereof by rotating a drive ring. Further, a first cam groove for moving the first lens group supporting frame back and forth and a second cam groove for moving a drive cam back and forth are provided in the drive ring. The second lens group supporting frame is driven through the drive cam to move back and forth.
However, in the zoom lens barrel disclosed in the Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2-89012, the first lens group supporting frame is directly driven by the drive ring to move back and forth, while the second lens group supporting frame is driven through the drive cam by the drive ring to move back and forth. Therefore, the advancing and retreating movements of the drive cam are about as much as those of movement of the first lens group supporting frame. Consequently, it is difficult to obtain large amounts of the lens groups. Further, this zoom lens barrel is not necessarily advantageous in the accuracy of the relative position between the first and second lens group supporting frames owing to the presence of the drive cam having a large lift amount.


Buffers are placed on selected nets coupled to input and output pins of entities in an IC device. This includes loading selected input and output pins of entities prior to respectively buffering nets of the entities and buffering in successive iterations, which includes setting artificial loads on selected input pins. The buffering in a current iteration is limited to i) buffering nets on the current iteration entity for receivers on the current iteration entity and ii) buffering nets on the current iteration entity directly coupled to respective nets of an immediately adjacent entity that has been buffered already in a preceding one of iterations, but only if the already buffered net is coupled to a receiver on its own net or a receiver on some other already buffered net via nets that have all been buffered via one or more of the preceding iterations.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to VLSI designs, and is particularly applicable to, although not necessarily limited to, signal buffering for signals that pass up and/or down through a concurrent hierarchy.
2. Description of Background
Buffer programs in hierarchical VLSI designs select locations for placing buffers wired in series between respective driving and receiver circuits. (The terms "buffer" and "repeater" herein are interchangeable.) Typically, such a buffer program does not take into account information beyond the bounds of a particular hierarchical level it is working on. Consequently, the buffer program can produce sub-optimal buffer placement solutions for buffers that cross boundaries of the hierarchical level. Examples of sub-optimal solutions include both too many buffers and not enough buffers between a driving and receiving circuit. The case of too many buffers occurs when the combined result of buffer programs executing in different levels of hierarchy introduces too many buffers, thus impacting slack. The case of not enough buffers occurs when the combined result of buffer programs executing in different levels of hierarchy docs not introduce sufficient buffering, impacting slew and possibly slack.
Solutions to this problem conventionally involve communication in which entities pass load values, which are typically capacitative load values, from adjacent levels of hierarchy to their neighbors) in either a tops-down or bottoms-up fashion, meaning that load values are passed down or up (i.e., always one way or the other, but not both) through the design hierarchy. For example, in an up-passing arrangement, load values may be passed from a macro entity up to a unit entity and from the unit entity up to a chip entity, which may be designated as a parent entity. Up-passing of load information has been common. This is partly because macros, being more primitive than units, tend to get done earlier in the design than units, and units tend to get done earlier than the chip. Another reason that load values are commonly passed upward is that timing tools often are used for this communication and they tend to analyze timing in a bottoms-up fashion. Einstimer is an IBM tool used for delay-based timing. TLT is an IBM tool used to create timing rules, which are used as input for Einstimer, for primitive macros or even units.
Stated another way, in hierarchical chip design, a lot of tasks occur concurrently on respective entities of the chip. To work on a variety of parts, i.e., entities, of the chip in parallel, there must be some predetermined rules about timing boundaries among entities and there must be communication among entities. It sometimes happens that when all the entities come together there is insufficient communication or there are ill conceived rules, resulting in had repeater spacing across the hierarchical boundaries, i.e., repeaters either placed too close to one another or too far apart.
The use of tinting tools to communicate load values from one entity to another gives rise to another issue besides the issue of suboptimal buffer spacing that arises from one-way communication. That is, timing tools generally take a long time to execute timing runs, since they take into account much detail and they run many different tests. For a large chip design, a timing analysis run by a conventional timing tool may take several days.

Automated method for buffering in a VLSI design

International Business Machines Corporation


A storage system for data words in which error correction bits are generated for each data word and are stored independently from the data word on a separate mechanically-driven medium. In another aspect, the storage system serves a wide high throughput parallel bus by storing different portions of each data word that appears on the bus in different asynchronous storage units.

This invention relates to storing digital data on mechanically-driven storage media, such as magnetic disks.
In a typical magnetic disk drive, several hard magnetic disks are mounted on a single rotating spindle. The storage space on each disk surface is organized in concentric tracks. The corresponding tracks on all of the disk surfaces form an imaginary cylinder. Each disk surface is served by a read/write head. All of the read/write heads can be moved together to any selected cylinder and can then store or retrieve data on the tracks that make up that cylinder.
Normally the magnetic disk drive is connected by a serial bus to a disk controller that, among other things, directs the read/write heads to move to the proper track, buffers data that is about to be stored on or has just been retrieved from the disk, assures that the data is stored or retrieved at the proper address, and performs serial error correction and detection on the data. Typically the disk controller serves a parallel input/output bus connected to a computer whose input/output port is, for example, 32 bits wide. Thirty-two bit words delivered over the bus are passed via the disk controller and serially loaded onto or retrieved from the disk drive. The throughput rate of the serial bus between the disk controller and the disk drive is roughly matched to the throughput rate of the parallel I/O bus between the computer and the disk controller.
In order to expand the total available storage space, multiple disk driver can be linked to a single controller in a daisy chain or star configuration.

Storage system using multiple independently mechanically-driven storage units


A quench boiler apparatus and process is disclosed wherein the hot effluent gases are indirectly cooled by contact with a central internal cold side, one or more internal bayonets and one or more waterwall tubes.

The present invention comprises an apparatus and process which are used to rapidly cool hot fluids. The apparatus comprises a means whereby a hot fluid is contacted on cooling surfaces to provide a rapid decrease in the temperature of the hot fluid. The cooling means is suitable for use with cooling fluids at elevated pressures. Further, the apparatus and process of the present invention rapidly cools hot gases without substantial pressure change in the process stream.
The cooling means has particular and advantageous application when used in conjunction with a process for the production of olefins by cracking hydrocarbon feeds, such as light naphthas at high temperature and short residence time, using a high radiant heat furnace having relatively short conduits of small diameter. The cooling means provides a rapid reduction in the effluent product gas temperature from the furnace without also incurring a substantial pressure drop.
Cracking furnace effluent gas temperatures are very high and at these high temperatures the cracking reactions proceed at a rapid rate. In order to substantially stop the reactions in the effluent gas to reduce the production of undesirable by-products, especially coke precursors such as pyrolysis fuel oil, it is beneficial to rapidly cool the effluent gas after it leaves the reactor to a temperature at which the reactions substantially cease. There are several conventional relatively high capacity means available for doing this, most of which have one or more drawbacks. Most commonly, the conventional means of cooling comprises shell and tube heat exchangers employing tube sheets which invariably result in substantial pressure loss of the effluent gas. This type of heat exchanger employs a tube sheet having multiple tubes at the inlet head which causes the formation of eddies and back-mixing. See FIG. 3.
The eddies are detrimental to the production of olefins for two main reasons. Firstly, the eddies increase the pressure lost at the inlet head, thereby raising the pressure at the reactor coil outlet and thus reducing the yield of olefins. Secondly, the eddies constitute volumes of backmixing with higher than average residence times. At the temperatures present in the inlet head to the cooling zone of the quench boiler, even small increases in residence time, i.e., as low as about 5 milliseconds, result in significant overcracking of the feed to tar and coke, and concomitantly in reactor shutdown for decoking operations.
Mention is also made herein of Woebcke, U.S. Pat. No. 3,910,347, which teaches a relatively low capacity quench boiler essentially tubular in shape and provided with a divergent inlet section having an angle of divergence of less than 10.degree.. While this device has met with considerable success in the industry to date, increasing demands of product selectivity, lower quality feedstocks and increased capacity requirements, have resulted in the need for improved relatively high capacity quench boilers which are also effective in heat recovery.
The cooling techniques and apparati of the present invention are particularly useful in the high capacity cooling of the effluent gases from a process for the thermal cracking of hydrocarbons. In the thermal cracking of hydrocarbons, in the process described hereinafter, the hydrocarbon feed can be heated to high temperature, maintained at high temperature for a short residence time and selectively converted to desired products. In accordance with the present invention, the hot gas reaction products are rapidly quenched or cooled in such a manner that the conversion is substantially stopped after the desired residence time. Still further, the apparatus of the present invention can be employed in further reducing the temperature of the reactor effluent to within about 100.degree. F. of the coolant medium, thereby providing an excellent means of heat recovery and steam generation.
Although the quenching apparatus and process of cooling of the present invention are particularly suitable for use in cooling the hot gas effluent issuing from a pyrolysis furnace, the concept can readily be applied to other processes for cooling hot product streams, for heat recovery and/or for heating fluids. The cooling means and process can be used for rapidly cooling hot gaseous products from other cracking processes. The quenching apparatus provides indirect cooling on surfaces. The apparatus is simple in design and easy to operate. The apparatus can be of any size and is normally designed for a specific processing facility. The apparatus can be vertical or horizontal. The cooling unit rapidly cools hot fluids while not substantially changing the pressure of the fluid. That is, the pressure of the cooled fluid at the outlet of the cooling is substantially the same as the inlet pressure. The material to be cooled can be upflow or downflow.


A device for purifying fuel comprises arc-shaped conductive plates facing each other arranged on the outer periphery of a fuel communication synthetic resin pipe interposed in a fuel supply pipe between a fuel tank and an engine, a protective cover for covering the outer peripheries of the arc-shaped conductive plates and an AC signal generator means coupled to a battery for applying a low frequency, low voltage and low current AC signal between the arc-shaped conductive plates. As a result, it is possible to provide a device for purifying fuel which is safe, easily controllable, of low cost and reliable.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a device for purifying fuel for improving the quality of a fuel such as gasoline, gas oil or heavy oil used in an engine of an automobile, etc., so as to purify exhaust gas.
2. Prior Art
There is a well-known device for purifying fuel such that disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 62-233468, wherein the device comprises a conductive coil covered by an oil-resistant and acid-resistant insulating cover in a the tank and a high voltage AC signal generator for applying a low frequency AC signal to the conductive coil.
The conventional devices set forth above, however, have problems that high voltage used therein is very dangerous, processing fuel in the fuel tank causes voltage fluctuation due to the change of the oil surface that prevents control, a huge amount of fuel has to be processed at the same time taking a long time and the conductive coil cannot be easily attached to or detached from the device.
Accordingly, the inventor previously invented a device for purifying fuel that applies an electromagnetic induction field generated by a low voltage and low current signal to fuel and/or water along the supply line thereof so as to be safe, easily controllable and of low cost (refer to U.S. patent application Ser. No. 07/893391 and U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/068693).
The invention set forth above, however, has a risk that the electromagnetic induction field insufficiently influences the fuel and consequently insufficiently purifies the fuel in case the fuel flows in supply pipes, etc., without filling the same since the conductive coil arranged outside the fuel is employed for applying the electrostatic field to the fuel or water by way of a low voltage and low current signal flowing therein.

Sagaru Nijyo Senbondori, Kamigyo-ku, Kyoto-shi, 602


A thin film magnetic head includes a slider having a first air bearing surface and a second surface made of a layer of an insulating material. The second surface has a first aperture formed in the insulating layer to expose a portion of the slider below the second surface layer. A reading/writing transducer is provided in the slider adjacent to the air bearing surface and has a first connecting link extending within the slider so that an end of the first link is exposed within the first aperture of the second surface layer. A first bond pad extends on the second surface of the slider and within the first aperture of the second surface layer. The first bond pad is electrically connected to the exposed end of the first link of the read/write transducer within the first aperture of the second surface layer.

The present invention relates to a flying type thin film magnetic head of a disc drive. In particular, the present invention relates to a top surface insulating layer of a thin film magnetic head slider.
Conventional thin film magnetic heads typically have a write/read transducer provided on a trailing end surface of the magnetic head slider. Each write/read transducer includes several bond pads located on a trailing end surface of the slider. The bond pads are provided for electrically connecting the read/write transducer with connecting wires extending from the control circuitry of the disc drive. However, providing the bond pads on the trailing end surface of the slider becomes a limiting factor on miniaturization of the magnetic head slider because connecting wires from the control circuitry need to be secured to the bond pads on the trailing end surface of the slider. This is a difficult, time consuming, and expensive process because of the small surface area available on the trailing end surface of the slider for making the electrical connections between the connecting wires and the bond pads. Moreover, in addition to this difficult electrical connection, a separate mechanical connection is required to connect the slider with the support arm carrying the slider.
FIG. 1 of the Ainslie et al. U.S. Pat. No. 4,789,914 illustrates a typical prior art configuration. However, the Ainslie et al. patent also discloses a thin film magnetic head head/slider in which the top surface of the slider includes a pair of contact pads 39 (see FIG. 3 of Ainslie patent) adapted for mechanically connecting the support arm with the slider and for electrically connecting the control circuitry of the disc drive with the connecting links from the read/write transducer. The read/write transducer is adjacent the trailing end surface of the slider and adjacent the air bearing surface of the slider. The solder contact pads 39 are connected to the read/write transducer and replace bond pads which were previously provided on the trailing end surface of the head/slider for electrical connection with connecting wires from the control circuitry.
Although placing solder contact pads 39 on a top surface of the slider provides a simpler mechanical and electrical connection, this design presents problems associated with signal quality resulting from ineffective electrical isolation between conductive components. In particular, the substrate of a slider is a conductive material and comprises a majority of the body of a slider. The contact pads 39 are also conductive and therefore must be electrically isolated from the conductive substrate of the slider. Accordingly, as shown in FIG. 10 of the Ainslie patent, an insulating layer 17 was introduced on top of substrate 1 and over a substantial length of the slider except for the trailing end portion of the slider adjacent the connecting posts 11 (connected to the read/write transducer). The insulating layer 17 has a terminal edge adjacent and positioned over the posts 11. This edge of the insulating layer in most prior art sliders typically extends across a full width of the slider.
Despite the introduction of the insulating layer 17, poor electrical isolation can occur between the contact pads and the conductive substrate 1 in a slider assembly like that of the Ainsle patent. In addition, poor electrical isolation can occur between separate contact pads (extending on the top surface of the slider over the insulating layer). These problems of electrical isolation are primarily caused by the configuration of the insulating layer formed on the top surface of the slider.
A prior art slider is provided in FIGS. 1 and 2 of this application to illustrate the problems caused by the current prior art configuration of the top surface insulating layer of the Ainslie-type slider. In particular, a prior art slider 10 shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 includes a conductive substrate 12 and a trailing end insulator 14 made of an alumina insulating material. An insulator 16 (analogous to layer 17 in the Ainslie patent) is provided on a top surface 15 of the substrate 12 and over the trailing end insulator 14 to form a top surface 19 of the slider 10. The insulator 16 includes a terminal edge 17 extending across the width of the slider and a side edge 18 extending along the length of the slider. A first bond pad 20 (analogous to the combination of layer 21 and 25 forming part of contact pads 39 as seen in FIG. 15 of the Ainslie patent) extends across a surface of the insulator 16 and across a top surface of the trailing end insulator 14. The first bond pad 20 is electrically connected to a first connecting link 22a (FIG. 2) (analogous to posts 11 in FIG. 15 of the Ainslie patent) extending up through the trailing end insulator 14, with the first link 22a having an end 22b exposed on the top surface of the trailing end insulator 14. A second bond pad 24 extends along a surface of the insulator 16 and on a top surface of the trailing end insulator 14. The second bond pad 24 is electrically connected to a second connecting link 26a which extends up through, and has an end 26b exposed on the top surface of, trailing end insulator 14.
The insulator 16 electrically isolates the conductive first bond pad 20 and the conductive second bond pad from the conductive substrate 12.
As shown in FIG. 2, the slider 10 includes a read/write inductive-type transducer 32 disposed below an end surface 31 of the slider 10 within trailing end insulator 14 adjacent an air bearing surface 33 of the slider. The first link 22a and second link 26a are electrically connected to the transducer 32.
Optimum operation of the read/write transducer 32 requires a high degree of electrical isolation between: conductive first bond pad 20 and the conductive substrate 12; conductive second bond pad 24 and the conductive substrate 12; and conductive first bond pad 20 and conductive second bond pad 24. However, this desired electrical isolation cannot always be achieved because a conductive metallic seed layer residue 28 sometimes remains after fabrication of first bond pad 20 and second bond pad 24, and can partially cover an edge surface 30 of the terminal edge 17 and the side edge 18 of the insulator 16. This conductive seed layer residue can reduce the impedance between respective bond pads 20 and 24 hampering the desired electrical isolation therebetween.
The conductive metallic seed layer (not shown) is used as an intermediate step to facilitate electroplating the bond pads 20 and 24. In the intermediate step, the seed layer is deposited over the entire top surface of the slider including the insulator 16, first link end 22b and second link end 26b, and the top surface of the trailing end insulator 14. After fabrication of the bond pads 20, 24, 34 and 36 (by electroplating conductive bonding material on the seed layer), any exposed seed layer is removed to yield the configuration shown in FIGS. 1 and 2. However, the current processes such as wet etching, sputter etching, and ion milling are not capable of reliably removing all of the exposed seed layer, and residual traces 28 of the seed layer thus remains on the edges 18 and 30 of the insulator 16. The seed layer residue 28 degrades the desired electrical isolation between the electrically active components, i.e., the bond pads and the substrate. In particular, the seed layer residue 28 can provide an unwanted electrical connection between bond pads 20 and 24, between first bond pad 20 and substrate 12, or between second bond pad 24 and substrate 12.
However, the seed layer residue alone does not cause the electrical isolation difficulties. Rather, the terminal edge 17 of the insulator layer 16 primarily creates the electrical isolation problems because the edge surface 30 of the terminal edge 17 is common to several separate conductive components. As seen in FIG. 1, the edge surface 30 is common to the conductive substrate 12, the conductive bond pads 20 and 24 as well as any other conductive bond pads such as bond pads 34 and 36. This commonality of edge surface 30 with all of the respective conductive components permits the conductive seed layer residue 28 on the edge surface 30 of edges 17 and 18 to degrade the desired high impedance between the respective conductive components, namely, the substrate 12 and bond pads 20, 24, 34 and 36.
Placing bond pads of a read/write transducer on a top surface of a slider provides considerable advantages. However, it is desirable to modify the currently known assembly of the top surface of the head/slider, particularly the top surface insulating pattern, to overcome the problems of ineffective electrical isolation between conductive bond pads such as bond pads 20 and 24, and between each of the respective conductive bond pads and the conductive substrate 12. These isolation problems are caused by the edge surface 30 of the insulator 16 being common to each respective electrically active components (e.g., substrate 12, bond pads 20 and 24) such that the conductive seed layer residue 28 on the edge surface 30 of edges 17 and 18 of insulator 16 degrades the desired high impedance between the respective electrically active components.

Insulator pattern for thin film head sliders


A method and apparatus for maintaining an artificial aquatic environment for supporting aquatic organisms comprises forming a water tank with a water drain outlet located on a bottom of the water tank, providing a water filter means adjacent a water fill line of the water tank, the water filter means having a water containment housing with a water inlet and a water outlet, the water containment housing extending above and below the water line of the water tank, the water inlet being positioned higher than the water outlet, the water inlet being positioned at or below the water fill line of the water tank, a filter element removably positioned between the water inlet and the water outlet within the water containment housing, connecting the water drain outlet to the water filter means with a water drain conduit means such that the water filter means and the water tank have a common water line when the water tank is filled with water to the water fill line, providing a pumping means to pump water from the water filter means into the water tank through a water conduit means, and connecting the water outlet of the water filter means to the pumping means with a water return conduit means, whereby debris and waste together with water in the water tank are forced through the water drain outlet by water pressure within the tank and travels through the water drain conduit means to the water filter means where the water is filtered to remove the debris and waste and then pumped by pumping means back into the water tank through the water return conduit means.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for maintaining an artificial aquatic system for supporting aquatic organisms.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Artificial aquatic systems such as aquarium tanks are well-known. Various artificial aquatic systems have been developed having so-called self-cleaning features. Such features include slanted bottoms for directing wastes towards a drain located at the end of the slant bottoms combined with perforated false bottoms above the slanted bottoms for selectively passing wastes, continuous filtration pumps located within the tank, as well as combination gravel bottom filtration systems. However, most of these systems employ elaborate filtration systems that suffer from lack of efficiency during operation resulting in the electrical water pumps used in these systems wearing out or becoming ineffective over time.
Other systems are simply too complicated and require expensive equipment to render them operational and are not commercially feasible to manufacture due to cost limitations. Other systems suffer from the fact that the filtration units employed are difficult to service in terms of replacing the filter elements.
Most, if not all, currently available self-cleaning aquarium systems are mechanically complex. Not only do they pose manufacturing and production problems, but they also suffer from intensive maintenance requirements. Thus, currently available self-cleaning aquarium systems require a high initial investment cost with continued high cost of maintenance.
Another drawback of currently available self-cleaning aquarium systems is that the configuration of the filtration systems employed in such aquarium systems imposes a limitation and restriction on the size of the aquarium tank. As such, large aquarium tanks either cannot be effectively cleaned or require modifications or multiple filtration units in order to effectively clean the vast quantities of water.
Accordingly, although there is a need for self-cleaning aquariums that are simple in design, easy to maintain, economic in terms of initial investment and continued maintenance, and not limited in size due to the configuration of the filtration system employed, presently available systems cannot fulfill such demands.
Of the current filtration systems that are available, most if not all are either ineffective in filtering any significant amount of water or are too complex and expensive. Additionally, the configuration of most current filtration systems require the disassembly of the filtration unit in order to change the filter element. Furthermore, the configuration of the various filters used in these filtration systems are such that there is no flexibility in terms of the filter media that can be used, i.e., the filter elements are not interchangeable between different filtration units. Moreover, most current filtration systems require pumps that have enough power to pump water from an aquarium tank, through a filter unit and back into the aquarium tank. Accordingly, for large aquarium tanks, large and powerful pumps are required in order to effect a sufficient rate of water flow through the filter unit in order to effectively filter and clean the water within the aquarium tank. The mechanical stress on pump units used in such filtration units due to back pressure from the tank and head pressure from the filtration unit and water line feeding back to the aquarium tank causes the motor in the pump units to wear out fairly quickly.
Accordingly, there is a need for a filtration system for an aquarium tank that answers to the drawbacks and disadvantages of the prior art filtration systems. There is also a need for a filtration system that can be easily adapted to fit any size aquarium tank and which is effective in filtering and cleaning the water in the aquarium tank without the costs and disadvantages associated with the prior art filtration systems. Moreover, there is a need for an effective filtration system for an aquarium tank that can accept a wide range of readily available and relatively cheap filter media and which can be used in conjunction with a relatively small water pump unit without sacrificing fast and efficient filtration and cleaning of water in the aquarium tank.

Method and apparatus for maintaining an artificial aquatic system


A magnetic disk apparatus arranged in a housing having a plurality of magnetic disks stacked on a rotating shaft, arms supporting thereon magnetic heads and adapted to be inserted between said magnetic disks, a rotary actuator for moving the arms, a housing forming at least a part of an arcuate-shaped shroud which substantially surrounds a portion of side surfaces of the magnetic disks so as to permit movement of the arms and which is concentric with the magnetic disks so as to define a gap between the shroud and the portion of the side surfaces of said magnetic disks. The gap defined between the outer peripheral end surfaces of the magnetic disks and the shroud is in a range of 0.1 mm to 0.6 mm.

The invention relates to a magnetic disk apparatus, and more particularly, a housing structure of a magnetic disk apparatus, which houses therein a plurality of stacked rotating disks for reading and writing information and a rotary actuator supporting a head for reading and writing information on the disks, such that the head is movable between the disks.
With conventional magnetic disk apparatuses, turbulence of an air flowing between disks causes vibration of the disks called xe2x80x9cflutterxe2x80x9d. When a head is positioned on a disk generating such flutter, the head is degraded in positional accuracy with respect to tracks for reading and writing of information.
As a prior art (1), Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. 10-162548 describes a method for forcedly generating an airflow directed to outer peripheries of disks from inner peripheries thereof. As a further prior art (2), there has been proposed a method for reducing a spacing between rotating disks and a housing called a xe2x80x9cshroudxe2x80x9d which surrounds the disks and is formed concentrically with the disks. Such a shroud is a part of the housing that is disposed in a magnetic disk apparatus to cover components such as magnetic disks, an actuator for positioning of a head, and the like, the shroud surrounding side surfaces of the disks.
An airflow generated around rotating disks includes a primary flow, in which air is dragged by revolution of the disks to flow in a circumferential direction, and a secondary flow, in which air in the vicinity of disk surfaces flows toward outer peripheries of the disks and air between the disks flows toward inner peripheries of the disks. Since the secondary flow involves unstable air turbulence, the prior art (1) is directed to suppressing the occurrence of flutter by generating a forced airflow directed toward the outer peripheries of the disks from the inner peripheries thereof so as to reduce the unstable airflow caused by the secondary flow.
The prior art (2) is directed to reducing flutter by decreasing a gap between disks and a shroud to suppress that incoming and outgoing of air on the top and bottom surfaces of disks, which would be produced in the event of the gap between the disks and the shroud being large, to prevent a pressure difference between the top and bottom surfaces from varying with the passage of time.
As a prior art (3), Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. 7-320478 describes a housing structure making use of an airflow circulating in a housing of a magnetic disk apparatus for other purposes than reduction of flutter, and discloses a method for removing dust by means of a filter and cooling an interior of the housing.
If the housing structure of a magnetic disk apparatus is the same, flutter caused by turbulence of an air flowing between disks increases substantially in proportion to a square of a disk radius and the number of revolutions of the disks. Therefore, a housing structure is needed, which reduces flutter having an adverse influence on head positional accuracy, in reduction of track intervals making magnetic disks high in capacity and in increase in the number of revolutions required for achieving high speed.
Provided that the housing structure of a magnetic disk apparatus is the same, the driving power for revolution of disks is substantially proportional to third power of the number of revolutions and fifth power of a disk radius. Accordingly, as with flutter mentioned above, it is necessary to obtain a housing structure that reduces an airflow tending to impose a burden on a rotating driving force, thus reducing a disk driving power in increasing the number of revolutions required for making the magnetic disk apparatus high in speed.
However, the method for forcedly generating an airflow directed toward outer peripheries of disks from inner peripheries thereof offers the following problem. Such method for forcedly generating an airflow directed toward outer peripheries of disks from inner peripheries thereof becomes ineffective because respective arms of a rotary actuator adapted to be inserted between stacked disks block the airflow directed toward the outer peripheries of the disks from the inner peripheries thereof if these arms have a thickness of half or more of an interval between the disks.
Also, the method, in which a gap between disks and a housing called a xe2x80x9cshroudxe2x80x9d and formed concentric with rotating disks is made small, offers the problem set forth below.
With the method, in which a gap between disks and a housing called a xe2x80x9cshroudxe2x80x9d and formed concentric with rotating disks is made small, one of the causes for occurrence of flutter can be dissolved because it is possible to suppress fluctuation of pressure difference with the passage of time, which is caused by incoming and outgoing of an airflow on top and bottom surfaces of the disks, even when arms of the rotary actuator are inserted between the disks. However, when the arms are inserted between the disks, they will block the primary airflow, which is dragged by the revolving disks to flow in the circumferential direction. As a result, a high pressure region is generated on an upstream side of the arms while a low pressure region is generated on a downstream side of the arms.
In addition, an air flowing in the circumferential direction on the upstream side of the arms is curved toward the inner peripheries of the disks by the arms to produce a high speed flow directed toward the inner peripheries of the disks. Since such flow directed toward the inner peripheries of the disks tends to return around tip ends of the arms to the outer peripheries of the disks, so it will merge with a flow on the downstream side of the arms to generate turbulence, so that pressure difference between the high pressure on the upstream side of the arms and the low pressure on a downstream side of the arms fluctuates. Such pressure fluctuation causes not only flutter but also a fluctuating force called xe2x80x9cwind turbulencexe2x80x9d tending to swing the arms. Such swinging of the arms is also responsible for degradation of the head positional accuracy in the magnetic disk apparatus.
Thus, either of the method for forcedly generating an airflow directed toward outer peripheries of disks from inner peripheries thereof, and the method, in which a gap between disks and a shroud is made small, disclosed in the prior art offers a problem that pressure fluctuation generated upon insertion of the arms between the disks cannot be reduced.
Meanwhile, the prior art (3) making use of an airflow circulating in a housing of a magnetic disk apparatus also offers a problem set forth below.
The low pressure region produced on the downstream side of the arms draws in air from outside of the disks. Therefore, when the shroud covers the downstream side of the arms to decrease a gap between the downstream side of the arms and the shroud, high speed airflow enters through the gap into spaces between the disks, thereby causing a significant pressure fluctuation. Presence of a flow passage connecting the upstream and downstream sides of the arms will reduce pressure difference between the upstream and downstream sides of the arms. Thus, pressure loss caused by the insertion of the arms between the disks is reduced, so that the driving power for revolution of the disks is correspondingly reduced.
However, when a flow passage connecting the upstream and downstream sides of the arms is defined in a rotating shaft of the rotary actuator or inside the voice coil motor for driving of the actuator, it inevitably results in a narrow flow passage with many curves, and so causes a considerable pressure fluctuation between disks for the similar reason as mentioned above. The foregoing flow passage is effective in removing dust and cooling the voice coil motor that generates heat. However, it is very likely that wind turbulence and flutter increase when airflow flows through the arm section and an interior of the voice coil motor, which are complex in structure tending to easily develop flow turbulence. In addition, it is unnecessary in a relatively small-sized magnetic disk apparatus to cool the voice coil motor.
Accordingly, an object of the invention is to provide a magnetic disk apparatus having a housing structure, which enables suppressing pressure fluctuation, which would occur when arms of a rotary actuator are inserted between the disks, to reduce flutter and wind turbulence.
Another object of the invention is to provide a magnetic disk apparatus having a housing structure, which can prevent generation of additional pressure fluctuation on upstream and downstream sides of arms, thus reducing driving power.
To these ends, the invention provides a magnetic disk apparatus comprising a plurality of magnetic disks stacked on a rotating shaft, arms supporting thereon magnetic heads and adapted to be inserted between the magnetic disks, a rotary actuator for moving the arms, a housing having an arcuate-shaped shroud, which surrounds the side surfaces of the magnetic disks so as to permit movements of the arms and which is concentric with the magnetic disks, a space opened from the shroud and located on a downstream side of the arms relative to an air flow, which is generated by the revolution of the magnetic disks and moves on surfaces of the magnetic disks, an opening provided on the shroud on an upstream side of the arms relative to the airflow and having a greater width than that of a gap defined between the magnetic disks and the shroud, and a cover, which constitutes a part of the shroud to cover a voice coil motor for driving the rotary actuator, and forms between the cover and an inner wall of the housing a bypass channel for providing communication between the opening and the opened space, and wherein the bypass channel has a linear section of a predetermined length extending from the opening.
The housing structure comprises a space not covered by the shroud and provided on a downstream side of the arms, and a channel, which connects an upstream side of the arms to the space not covered by the shroud and provided on the downstream side of the arms, the channel being provided with a linear section, which has a rectifying effect on an airflow and has a depth of five times or more a width of the channel and a length of five times or more the width of the channel.
According to a feature of the present invention, the bypass channel may be constructed to have a depth of 5D or more in a direction parallel to a rotating shaft where D is a spacing or width of the linear section.
According to another feature of the present invention, the bypass channel may be constructed to have a linear section having a length of at least 5D or more where D is a spacing or width of the linear section.
In accordance with a further feature of the present invention, the bypass channel may be constructed to have a linear section having a depth of 5D or more and a length of at least 5D or more in a direction parallel to a rotating shaft where D is a spacing or width of the linear section. In accordance with another feature, the cover may be configured to cover at least a side surface of the voice coil motor.
According to a still further feature of the present invention, the cover may be a component which encloses a coil section of the voice coil motor and at least a side surface of which is closed to prevent airflow from coming into the voice coil motor from the bypass channel.
Still further advantages of the invention will become apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art upon reading and understanding the following detailed description of the preferred and alternate embodiments.


In accordance with some embodiments, systems, methods and media for encoding and decoding signals used in time-of-flight imaging are provided. In some embodiments, a method for estimating the depth of a scene is provided, comprising: causing a light source to emit modulated light toward the scene based on a modulation function; causing the image sensor to generate a first value based on the modulated light and a first demodulation function of K modulation functions, including at least one trapezoid wave; causing the image sensor to generate a second value; causing the image sensor to generate a third value; and determining a depth estimate for the portion of the scene based on the first value, the second value, and the third value.

In recent years, time-of-flight (ToF) cameras have emerged as a popular 3D imaging technology in several scientific and consumer applications, such as robot navigation, motion capture, human computer interfaces, and 3D mapping. Impulse ToF (sometimes referred to as direct ToF) systems estimate scene depths by emitting a short light pulse into the scene, and directly measuring the travel time of the reflected pulse. For example, impulse ToF techniques were used in LIDAR systems designed nearly 50 years ago, and several current commercial range estimation systems are based on impulse ToF techniques as well. While these systems are conceptually simple, they often require expensive components (e.g., high-speed sensors) and large bandwidth. Consequently, impulse ToF systems may not be practical for many consumer applications. Continuous-wave ToF (C-ToF) imaging systems (sometimes referred to as indirect ToF), which usually include temporally modulated light sources and image sensors, typically only require low-cost and low-power components, do not require a large baseline for measuring depth, and thus, can potentially measure accurate 3D shape over a large range of standoff distances. These properties have made C-ToF systems preferred for many low cost and/or consumer applications.
One limitation of current C-ToF camera systems, however, is limited depth resolution, especially in low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) scenarios. Although the spatial resolution of these systems continues to rise with advances in image sensor technology, the depth resolution is fundamentally limited by noise, such as photon noise. One way to increase the SNR is to use a more powerful light source or to increase the capture time. However, this is not always possible as most devices, especially in consumer and outdoor settings, often operate on a tight power and time budget.
With the increasing popularity of these systems, efforts have been made to improve the accuracy that can be achieved with existing coding systems (e.g., sinusoid based modulation and/or demodulation). For example, techniques for mitigating depth errors in sinusoid coding based systems when the modulation functions are not perfectly sinusoid (e.g., due to the presence of higher order harmonics) have been explored. In parallel, techniques based on a few other specific modulation functions have been proposed, such as square functions, triangular functions, ramp functions, and pseudo random binary sequences. However, while these techniques and coding functions may incrementally improve the precision that can be achieved using C-ToF imaging systems, coding schemes that offer more precision are desirable.
Accordingly, new systems, methods, and media for encoding and decoding signals used in time-of-flight imaging are desirable.

Systems, methods, and media for encoding and decoding signals used in time of flight imaging

The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York


A cooling arrangement particularly for cooling a locking device arranged in a fuel feed opening of pressure gasification generators comprises a lock seat connected to the generator and a lock cone adapted for moving into and out of engagement with the lock seat and provided with a supply line to provide a cooling medium to the lock cone and a discharge line through which the used medium is drained off the lock cone. The lock cone is formed as a hollow body with a cooling chamber in its interior and is provided with guide means extending towards the lowermost area of the lock cone to direct the cooling medium into contact with the mostly overheated lowermost area of the lock cone positioned in a close relationship with the pressure gasification generator.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a cooling arrangement.
More particularly the invention relates to a cooling arrangement for locking devices in pressure-gasification reactors.
The solid-full locks in pressure-gasification reactors normally contain a lock cone situated in a lock-cone seat which is connected to a lock flange. The lock arrangement may be a part of the shutting-off device.
The known lock arrangements such as solid-fuel locks or ash locks mounted particularly in the zone of fuel feed of the pressure-gasification reactors are provided with a channel formed in the jacket of the pressure gasification reactor to receive a cold water which is passed through the reactor jacket.
The cooling effect achieved by so-called water jacket used in the known devices is not sufficient for chilling of all the components of the lock arrangement especially for those which comprise the lock cone and the lock-cone seat mounted on the flange of the pressure gasification reactor because cold water passing within the reactor jacket does not reach the lock arrangement which is normally positioned above the upper surface of the reactor jacket and thus does not fall into the cooling zone provided by the water jacket.
In the known pressure-gasification reactors the lock arrangements are designed for the temperatures up to 673.degree. K. Operational conditions can cause considerably higher temperatures particularly in the zone of fuel feed which, over longer periods of operation may reach a magnitude of 873K. Temperatures rising even above the aforementioned magnitude up to 1.273K. may occur during the operation of the pressure-gasification reactors. Such overheating causes the high thermal stresses on the components of the lock arrangement which may cause considerable deformation on the lock cone and lock-cone seats thereby causing defective sealing between the aforenamed components which leads inevitably to dangerous operative conditions.

Cooling arrangement for the locking device in pressure gasification reactors


In a sample introducing system that can be easily adapted to a variety of analytical conditions without being affected by a flow rate of gas introduced into an analytical device, can introduce an analytical sample into the analytical device without loss, and can contribute to a simple and highly accurate high-sensitivity analysis, a pretreatment device removes unnecessary components from an untreated sample gas containing the analytical sample. A treated sample gas that has been pretreated by the pretreatment device is introduced into the analytical device via a connection gas flow channel. A gas addition device that adds a carrier gas to the treated sample gas flowing toward the analytical device in the connection gas flow channel has a means for changing the addition flow rate of the carrier gas. Pressure fluctuations of the gas containing the analytical sample are restricted by a pressure adjusting device upstream of the gas addition device.

In recent years, concern about quality of living and working environment is risen, so that advanced analytical methods for measuring the composition and concentration of fine particles present in the atmosphere are sought. Further, in industries such as a semiconductor industry in which increased purity of material gases and atmosphere gas control in the manufacturing process are required, it is required to perform highly accurate analysis of the material gases containing fine particles and atmosphere gases in a simple manner.
Accordingly, analysis of analytical samples such as fine particles contained in a sample gas and specific gas components has been performed with analytical devices using highly sensitive analytical methods such as a gas chromatography spectrometry (GC-MS), an inductively coupled plasma analysis method (ICP method), and a microwave induced plasma analysis method (MIP method). For example, in the ICP method and MIP method, the analysis is performed by generating high-temperature plasma by using argon gas, nitrogen gas, helium gas and the like as a plasma gas, introducing an analytical sample into the plasma, and detecting signal variations from the plasma.
In order to analyze accurately the analytical sample contained in such sample gas, a pretreatment device is necessary that performs the pretreatment of removing unnecessary components from the sample gas. For example, when a sample gas containing a gaseous analytical sample is used, moisture, impurity gas components and the like other than the analytical sample contained in the sample gas are required to be removed as unnecessary components. Further, when a solution in which an analytical sample is dissolved in a solvent is converted into droplets floating in a spraying gas with a sprayer or the like and the spraying gas is used as the sample gas, it is required to remove moisture, solvent vapor and the like contained in the sample gas as unnecessary components.
A gas replacement device, a fine particle classification device, a drier or the like is used as the pretreatment device. For example, in the gas pretreatment device described in Patent Document 1, a sample gas is generated by converting a solvent having an analytical sample dissolved therein into a mist with a sprayer, the sample gas is heated to separate droplets into solvent vapor and an analytical sample, the sample gas is introduced in a tubular sealed filter made from a porous material, and the solvent vapor is removed by diffusion to the outside of the sealed filter. In the fine particle classification device described in Patent Document 2, in the process of electrically charging and classifying fine particles that are an analytical sample contained in the sample gas, gaseous contaminating components contained in the sample gas are removed and the fine particles are suspended in an atmosphere composed of a desired gas species. In the drier described in Non-patent Document 1, a sample gas is generated by converting an aqueous solution having an analytical sample into a mist, and moisture contained in the sample gas is removed via a non-porous membrane made of Nafion (trade name of Du Pont Co.; copolymer of perfluoro-3,6-dioxa-4-methyl-7-octene-sulfonic and tetrafluoroethylene).
A flow rate of gas containing an analytical sample introduced into an analytical device is changed correspondingly to the type or the like of elements constituting the analytical sample, in order to satisfy the optimum analytical conditions. For example, in a high-sensitivity analysis using plasma, in order to analyze a plurality of elements that are the objects of analysis and contained in the analytical sample, automatic tuning is performed to switch automatically the flow rate of gas introduced together with the analytical sample into the plasma. Further, in the mass analysis using the ionization action of plasma, the flow rate of gas introduced into plasma is automatically changed so as to prevent polyatomic ions having a mass number equal to that of the element that is an object of analysis from hindering the analysis.    Patent Document 1: Published Japanese Translation of a PCT Application No. H7-500416.    Patent Document 2: Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2001-239181.    Non-patent Document 1: Journal of Analytical Atomic Spectrometry, January 1998, vol. 13 (13-18).


The disclosure generally relates to position sensors, and more particularly to repair of carrier-phase cycle slips using displacement data. An apparatus for use in position sensing may include a displacement sensor, a positioning signal receiver, a memory, and a processor coupled to the displacement sensor, the positioning signal receiver, and the memory. The processor and memory may be configured to processor and memory are configured to detect a loss of lock of a first carrier tracking loop associated with the first set of carrier-phase measurements, wherein the first carrier tracking loop is associated with a first integer ambiguity, estimate, based on the displacement data, an ambiguity increment to the first integer ambiguity subsequent to the detected loss of lock, and resolve a second integer ambiguity associated with the second set of positioning signals based on the first integer ambiguity and the estimated ambiguity increment.

Communications networks offer increasingly sophisticated capabilities associated with the motion and/or position location sensing of a mobile device. New software applications, such as, for example, those related to personal productivity, collaborative communications, social networking, and/or data acquisition, may utilize motion and/or position sensors to provide new features and services to consumers. Moreover, some regulatory requirements of various jurisdictions may require a network operator to report the location of a mobile device when the mobile device places a call to an emergency service, such as a "911" call in the United States.
Such motion and/or position determination capabilities have conventionally been provided using Satellite Positioning Systems (SPS). SPS wireless technologies which may include, for example, the Global Positioning System (GPS) and/or a Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS). A mobile device supporting SPS may obtain positioning signals as wireless transmissions received from one or more satellites equipped with transmitting devices. The positioning signal may be used by the mobile device to estimate geographic position and heading. Some mobile devices may additionally or alternatively obtain positioning signals as wireless transmissions received from terrestrial based transmitters to estimate geographic position and heading and/or include one or more inertial sensors (e.g., accelerometers, gyroscopes, compasses, etc.) to measure an inertial state of the mobile device. Inertial measurements obtained from these inertial sensors may be used in combination with SPS signals to provide estimates of geographic position and heading.
However, conventional methods for combining inertial measurements and SPS signals have thus far been insufficient to effectively reduce error or location uncertainty. Accordingly, new techniques are needed for improving the speed and accuracy of position sensing.

Repair of carrier-phase cycle slips using displacement data


A universal weather-tight pickup-truck camper-top configuration facilitating easy detatchment by the driver alone; plus, provision of an optional rentable component facilitating rapid one-man deployment into a trolling-skiff. The skiff's structure is divided into bow/stern sections, the stern-section forming the primary outer portion of the camper-top, the bow-section being concealably nested in stow-position directly thereunder;--giving a clean appearance belying the uniquely advantageous dual-purpose functionality. The sections nest inverted upon special slide-rails atop a pickups' existing sidewall-gunnels, enabling manual telescopic translation of the respective bow-sections aftward, for lowering to the ground where mid-ship flanges are easily deployed into aligned position by a single operator. A special vertically sliding midship keywayed channeled guillotine seat member, intimately locks the interfacing hull-section flanges in water-tight position. A detachably hinged camper/hatch-panel facilitates the camper's aft accessibility, and doubles as a boat-windshield; and rugged polycarbonate windows in both bow/transom-panels facilitate rear-viewing during camper-top mode.

This invention relates to one-man removable camper-top configurations, dual-purpose skiffs, dual-prupose pickup-truck camper-tops; and more particularly, it relates to convenient one-man means of removing or reinstalling a pick-up truck's camper-top, and to those types of shell like hulls convertible into a more compact embodiment.
Heretofore, if one wished to detatch their pickup-truck's camper-top for functional use of the vehicle as a true pickup-truck to haul various large items, such as a stove or refrigerator, it has been considered a major chore; in as much as the shell is not only cumbersome and heavy, but the shell-structures are simply not really built with the impulsive notion in mind of quick and easy removal for an afternoon's access to the truck-bed. Additionally, there's also a need for a way to make use of the shell-structure as a portion of a sport-skiff type of recreational-boat.
Background research discovery provides some prior patent-art regarded as germane to this disclosure, for example U.S. Pat. No. 3,473,839 (filed: August 1967) teaches a "combined pick-up truck camper-body and houseboat", showing a rudimentary one-piece boat-hull inverted and positioned so that it's bow extends forward above the windshield of a 1967 style pick-up truck cab, while the stern portion extends well aftward of the truck's tailgate region. Below this arrangement are installed numerous separate planar panel-sections, some of which are windowed, making up a provisional pilot-house enclosure of the hull, once the entire assemblage were extricated from the vehicle and inverted right side up. Also provided is a planar panel which converts the windowed panel enclosure portion into a more conventional appearing camper-top, absent of the boat-hull portion; and in either embodiment, the installed assemblage is secured in place via four vertical turnbuckle devices at each corner of the rig. The structure does not appear to lend itself to one-man installation or removal.
In U.S. Pat. No. 3,522,967 (filed: March 1968) a "combination camper-top and houseboat" is shown, wherein again, the hull portion is inverted with the prow extending above the cab proximal to the windshield region. No explaination as to just how this fully assembled rig is manouvered as to install or remove it from the pick-up bed, even given a team of men; but in one mode of usage it's a houseboat floating on water, in the alternate mode of usage, it's shown installed inverted upon the truck as a happy-camber.
In U.S. Pat. No. 3,833,954 (September 1974) a "floatable telescoping transportable shelter" is tought, wherein three inter-nesting progressively smaller shell sections as shown to telescope out from retraction within the largest section,--until their perimeter flanges interlock to limit further extension therefrom. When once rendered fully retracted into a compact unitary appearing container, the nested assemblage is tipped 90-degrees over so that opposed wheels ride upon the ground, and a provisional hitch-structure is coupled to a separate conventional vehicle for drive away. Unfortunately, the stepped sections (when fully telescoped as a shelter) would not lend at all to a very efficient hull, owing to the hydrodynamic-drag imposed by the stepped configuration.
In U.S. Pat. No. 3,916,468 (filed: April 1974) a two or three section canoe-hull is tought, wherein each section is formed discretely as water-tight vessel portions, which are joined positively together via a dove-tailed tongue-and-groove arrangement at opposite lateral regions of the transverse abuting vertical-wall portions forming bulkhead like members. There is no contemplation as to spatially inter-nesting, or carrying upon a truck-bed.
In U.S. Pat. No. 3,933,112 (filed: November 1973) a camper-van appearing vehicle is festooned with boat-like appendages(attached prow, attached transom, etc.) purporting to convert a standard land-bus into an amphibious vehicle; including a separately removable roof-boat, again inverted to form a van-top portion.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,052,761 (filed: October 1977) a "cartop trunk boat" is tought, wherein three discretely floatable hull-units are compactly nested into a forth inverted section, thereby forming an enclosed container during cartop transit to the water-side. To deploy as a skiff-boat, the stern is lifted away and upturned to the ground; where the remaining sections are somehow lifted-up out of the next one, and arranged in forward tapering portions having smoothly abutted surface transitions, so that the forth section forms the bow. Then, each section is interconnected via tongue & groove entities provided at the bottom of the hull surfaces (a peg & hole indexing method is employed at the transversely opposed hull-sides thereto) to the abutting water-tight transome-wall of the adjoining section, so that a substantially rigid aggregate assemblage is attained. If the individual hull-sections are made of light-weight fiberglass or vacuum-formed ABS-sheets, this could possibly constitute a one-man operation. However, the number of repetitive hull-section assembly steps involved, would be rather laborious; to the extent that one would probably seldom enjoy it's use.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,220,370 (filed: November 1978) a pick-up truck-bed camper-top of rather conventional external appearance is shown, wherein is provided a second internally nested section also having four vertical walls; whereby vertical telescoping of the exterior section(having the roof portion), thus extends the height of the camper-top some 21/2-feet, serving to give a more comfortable interior spaciousness.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,236,474 (filed: October 1978) for a "convertible boat/canopy", is perhaps the most relevant of the prior patent-art, for it employs a quasi-catamaran style boat-hull aftward section in inverted attitude above right and left vertical side-panels, the panels of which rest upon the truck-bed's right and left side-walls. This arrangement disadvantageously positions the inverted-hull section considerably above the cab of the truck, resulting in a considerable amount of aerodynamic-drag. The patent's FIG. 16(exploded) shows how twin bow-sections are adapted into catamaran configuration; each section employing a vertically dove-tailed tongue-and-groove manner whereby the interior of the camper-modality is unfortunately taken-up by the storage therein of the two frontal-hull sections.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,289,348 (filed: September 1979) is shown a "van-top conversion & boat combination", wherein a so-called bubble-top(vertically extended) van is provided with another like shaped outer shell portion, which is removable and inverted for use as a small boat.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,420,181 (filed: June 1981) is shown an ordinary pick-up truck, wherein a small one-piece boat(having dual-hull appendages) is positioned bow-forward over the truck's bed. Included are dual-lateral fluid-cylinders, which either swing-up the aft end of the boat as a hatch, giving access to the truck-bed; or, the fluid-cylinders are also arranged on a longitudinal pivotal-axis, so that the operator may swing the entire boat aftward until the longitudinal-axis is perpendicular to the ground, where it may be detatched and lowered to the shore.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,522,143 (filed: January 1983) is shown a cabin-boat with an over-folding stern-section, enabling the boat to be converted into a towable trailer combination.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,789,196 (filed: September 1986) is shown an ordinary pick-up truck, wherein is provided an aftwardly extendible canvas accordian-pleated camper-top having variably spaced top-bow members sliding upon a longitudinal-extrusion bolted to the truck-bed gunwales; but no conversion to a boat modality is contemplated. Also, U.S. Pat. No. 4,789,197 (filed: June 1987) showed a like pick-up truck which bed portion is provided with a special inner-sliding(upon the truck-bed gunwales) retractable 3-section(2-slide) hard security-cover structure; but again which provides no conversion to a boat modality.
Finally, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,923,242 (filed: April 1988) is shown a pick-up truck-bed camper-top assembly having a special inverted-boat caping portion applied thereover, which is shaped in the form of a light-weight boat; whereby the stern aligns over the tail of the camper structure, while the bow aligns with the slope of the truck's windshield. Included are lateral tail-rollers on the cap, and struts joining the cap to the camper-top midship, act to guide the movement of the boat during both loading and unloading procedures.
Therefore, in view of the preceding patent-art, it is better understood that there is a need for a further improved product of this sort, which is the present subject of this instant invention to be known as the SHELLFISH.TM.-Combotop presently under auspices of the Matheson Mfg./Mkt. Co. of SanDiego, Calif.

Truck's one-man convertible camper-top/skiff


Wash-up device for an inking unit of a printing press, including guide bar brackets disposable on a frame of the printing press, is provided with holders for the wash-up device insertably received in the guide bar brackets, the holders being formed by end zones of an actuating shaft for displacing the wash-up device into engagement with a roller of an inking unit to be washed; the actuating shaft, when received in an inserted position in the guide bar bracket, being turnable out of an assumed angular position thereof, for effecting engagement of the end zones of the actuating shaft behind steps formed in the guide bar brackets, so as to fix the wash-up device in an insert position, the actuating shaft being further turnable for effecting engagement by the wash-up device with the roller of the inking unit to be washed.

Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a wash-up device for an inking unit of a printing press, including guide bar brackets which are disposed or disposable on a frame of the printing press and have holders of the wash-up device insertably accommodational therein.
Such a wash-up device has been disclosed heretofore in the published German Patent Document 42 15 355 A1. The wash-up device, prior to being placed in operation, is inserted in receiving slits formed in a guide bar bracket and, by means of a swivel device, is swivellable into different positions for the purpose of washing respective cylinders of a five-cylinder printing press or a satellite-type printing press. The construction of the thus disclosed, heretofore known wash-up device is quite complex.
Published Patent Document 38 975 of the former German Democratic Republic shows a wash-up device having a wash-up blade which is swivellable about a swivel axis into three positions.


A communication system includes a communication utilizing apparatus connectable to a communications network and service provision apparatus for making services available to the communications utilizing apparatus. An accounting device is associated with the communications utilizing apparatus and includes a digital data storage device arranged to store details of the receipt of services by the communications utilizing apparatus a signalling circuit arranged to receive, via the communications network, signals indicating a payment due in respect of services provided by the service provision apparatus, and a comparison device arranged to compare the received indications with data derived from the stored details.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to communication apparatus, and more particularly to communications apparatus for supplying and acquiring products and services from one or more suppliers of communications services or services offered over communications channels.
The invention is chiefly, but not exclusively, concerned with the supply of telecommunication services to a customer from one or more telecommunications suppliers.
2. Related Art
More particularly, the present invention is primarily concerned with the communication or billing or charging information. At present, different suppliers of telecommunications services charge on different bases. Suppliers of data network services (e.g. local area networks) often charge on a fixed rate basis, without taking any account of the amount of usage at the network. This makes accounting extremely simple. On the other hand, telecommunication companies have historically charged for network usage, and have evolved fairly complicated charging strategies which differentiate between local and national calls, calls at different times of day, and so on.
In many existing networks, communications bandwidth is a scarce resource, and hence such pricing strategies tend to reflect this by pricing at a higher rate services for which there is greater demand, so as to attempt to optimise the usage of the network. It is to be expected that there will continue to be a desire to make more efficient use of communications bandwidth in future. Our earlier international application number PCT/GB94/01128 (A24601), filed on May 24, 1994, published as WO94/28683, describes a telecommunications system in which customer terminal apparatus is arranged to negotiate xe2x80x9con the spotxe2x80x9d prices with different telecommunications suppliers. In the system described in that application (which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety) there may be no xe2x80x9cstandardxe2x80x9d tariffs; instead, each call (or other network service) may be priced individually.
Our earlier filed British patent application No. 94303092.4, filed on Apr. 28, 1994 (Agents reference A24847), and published as WO95/30317, discloses negotiation in an integrated telecommunications network, and is incorporated herein in its entirety by reference. Also disclosed therein is a visual user interface for service selection.
At present, the problem of charging communications users is a formidable technical challenge. Long gone are the days when it would have been possible to consider manual administration of accounts. Some of the issues involved are discussed in the British Telecommunications Engineering Journal, Volume 11, Part 4, January 1993 xe2x80x9cSpecial issue on billingxe2x80x9d. In that issue, some figures for the billing system operated by British Telecommunications plc are given as follows:
The system supports 23 million customers and produces 100 million bills a year. The bills itemise 15 million calls a day, and charge a revenue of £24 million per day. The billing system runs on 29 mainframe computers, and requires 1400 gigabytes of data on magnetic disks; 5 million lines of COBOL statements; 14 million screen exchanges every day; and 60 thousand connected terminals. At page 296 of that issue, it is disclosed that it is anticipated that 1.5 gigabytes of data need to be transferred through the network every night solely for the purpose of billing.
It will be apparent that the cost of billing is substantial. It has been estimated at over 10% of the revenue of many telecommunication companies, and much more than this in some cases. It seems likely that the cost and required complexity of billing systems will continue to increase in future, with the provision of ever wider ranges of telecommunications products and services and the proliferation of special rates and tariffs.
It is, of course, known (e.g. from GB 2001788) for user apparatus to log transactions, but since reconciliation is performed manually this merely increases the work to be performed by the user.
In EP-A-474 555 there is described multi-media communications apparatus, for example an ISDN terminal, which is configured to provide so-called xe2x80x9ccommunications management reportsxe2x80x9d so that communications charges and communication history can be used for communications management. The reports are, in effect, enhanced xe2x80x98journalsxe2x80x99 of the type produced by most fax machines: they may include the identity (number) of the party with whom communication was achieved, the type of service (video telephony, telephony, etc), the duration, time and date, and cost of the call can all be provided.
In EP-A-402302 there is described a credit card system designed to make the use of credit/debit cards cost effective even for very small value transactions. A vendor of low-cost products or services, such as newspapers, subway tickets, parking vouchers, has a terminal with a conventional credit card reader and an associated memory. When a user wants to use his credit card to buy a low-cost item, the card is read as usual, but a sum of money much greater than the cost of the item is xe2x80x9ctransferredxe2x80x9d from the computer of the credit/debit card issuing authority. The amount of this sum of money is stored in the memory of the retailer and is associated in the memory with the number of its relevant card. The cost of the item purchased is deducted from that stored sum. The next time that customer wants to buy a subway ticket from that vendor, he/she uses the credit card. This time, rather than again having to make a call to the computer of the credit/debit card issuing authority, the cost of the item is simply deducted from the amount held in the relevant memory section of the vendor""s terminal. Only when there is insufficient credit in that memory section to fund a desired payment does the terminal again contact the computer of the card issuing authority for a further, relatively large, transfer.
In EP-A-0341219 there is described an integrated automatic information and telephone point. This apparatus permits of the possibility of requested automatic information services being charged according to the criteria used for the charging of calls from telephone boxes.
In the paper xe2x80x9cIC Card-Based Advanced Man-Machine Interface for Public Switched Telephone Network Servicexe2x80x9d, by Mizusawa et al, published in Electronics and Communications in Japan, Vol.73, 1990, No.1, Part 1, pages 36-54, there are described various applications of smart cards. In particular, the paper is concerned with personal numbering. Conventional PSTN service records are briefly discussed.
In EP-A-0325564 there is described a technique to permit a remote computer terminal to display images relevant to alphanumeric data passed to the computer over a low bit-rate link, without the usual problems associated with image transmission over low bit-rate links. This is achieved by storing relatively large image-elements in the computer""s memory, which elements are then picked out and assembled in accordance with simple instructions transmitted to the computer in association with the relevant alphanumeric data.
In the article xe2x80x9cTelescript: the emerging standard for intelligent messagingxe2x80x9d, by J Hanckmann, published in PTR Philips Telecommunications Review, Vol.52, 1994, No.1, pages 15-19, there is described what are termed xe2x80x98remote procedure callsxe2x80x99, which make use of software agents. So-called xe2x80x98smart messagesxe2x80x99 are described in which a correspondent can send messages that contain smart buttons. The message appears on the screen of the receiving device and, when the recipient clicks on the button, an action is performed.
The present invention is intended to provide communications apparatus which offers the possibility of controlling the complexity of billing operations.
Accordingly, in one aspect, the invention provides a service user apparatus arranged to automatically log service transactions, and service provider apparatus arranged to transmit account data through a communications network, the user apparatus being arranged to compare the account data with stored transaction data and to reconcile the two.
In another aspect, the storage and/or comparison operations may be carried out by independent apparatus not owned either by the service supplier or the service user.
In the event of successful reconciliation, payment may be initiated (e.g. by a xe2x80x9csmart-cardxe2x80x9d held at the user apparatus).
Several advantages are achieved by the distribution of the account storage operation to the user apparatus. Firstly, data storage becomes more distributed, and hence the bottlenecks associated with storage of vast amounts of data centrally with the telecommunications suppliers (as at present) are reduced. Thus, this aspect of the present invention provides the technical benefits of parallel data processing.
There are also secondary benefits, since the customer is more easily able to rely upon accounting data which has been stored by his own apparatus, and is able also to process the stored data for his own purposes (for example, further distribution or charging of the cost).
According to a further aspect of the invention, the same technical principles may be applied within a network, to distribute the billing and accounting within the network rather than centralising it as at present.
In a further aspect of the invention, use is made of periods of low communications usage to transmit accounting information through the network.
In a further aspect of the invention, which may be used independently of the earlier aspects, the services to be acquired by customer equipment are described by codes communicated between customer equipment and supplier equipment via a communications channel, the codes being structured to permit comparison and selection between similar services. For example, the codes may, in one embodiment, specify functional attributes of the service in such a manner as to be descriptive of other services possessing those attributes. Additionally or alternatively, the codes may be hierarchically structured, consisting of both a generic and specific description of the service the subject of each code.
Thus, in this aspect, the comparison of similar but non identical services by customer equipment is facilitated, thus improving the negotiation processes described in our above referenced international application.
In a further aspect of the invention, which is preferably but not necessarily operated in conjunction with the preceding aspect, customer terminal apparatus for the acquisition of services (e.g. telecommunications services) or goods includes a visual interface which displays, for each service, a representative image xe2x80x9ciconxe2x80x9d), the different icons associated with different services being represented consistently so that similar services are similarly represented. Preferably, attributes of services are represented consistently, so that all icons representing a particular service type (for example video telephony) all have an identical common portion visually representing that service. Preferably, the customer terminal is arranged to display the icons in succession, the position in the succession of different icons being dictated by their similarities, so that a user of the terminal equipment may xe2x80x9cbrowsexe2x80x9d through a sequence of similar services represented by visually similar icons.
This aspect of the invention renders it possible to select between a very large number of different services which may be available in future via telecommunications media.
Other aspects and embodiments of the invention are as described or claimed hereafter, with advantages that will be apparent from the following.

Accounting system in a communication network

British Telecommunications public limited company