A binocular includes first and second rotatable bodies respectively accommodating two telescope systems, which are rotatable about two rotation axes for interpupillary adjustment. The binocular further includes a groove provided to the first rotatable body and a pin provided to the second rotatable body. The pin is in contact with the groove in such a manner that the contact member is slidable with respect to the groove. When one of the rotatable bodies is rotated, the other is also rotated due to the contact of the pin and said groove.

The present invention relates to a binocular with an interpupillary adjustment mechanism.
FIGS. 1 and 2 are a perspective view and an exploded perspective view of a conventional binocular having an interpupillary adjustment mechanism. As shown in FIG. 1, in such conventional binocular 100, eyepiece optical axes of left and right eyepiece portions 103 and 104 are respectively off-centered with object optical axes XL and XR of front-most lenses 101 and 102 of left and right object systems. The eyepiece portions 103 and 104 are swingable about the object optical axes XL and XR respectively, so as to vary the distance between left and right eyepiece portions 103 and 104.
As shown in FIG. 2, the binocular 100 includes left and right rotatable bodies 105 and 106 respectively accommodating left and right telescope systems. The left rotatable body 105 includes a front barrel 105a and a rear barrel 105c which are parallel but off-centered with each other and an intermediate barrel 105b provided between two barrels 105a and 105c. Similarly, the right rotatable body 106 including a front barrel 106a and a rear barrel 106c and an intermediate barrel 106b. The binocular 100 further includes a support arrangement (a front support 110 and a rear support 111) which supports the rotatable bodies 105 and 106 so that the rotatable bodies 105 and 106 can be rotated about the object optical axes XL and XR, thereby to swing the rear barrels 105c and 106c and to vary the distance between the eyepiece portions 103 and 104.
In order to synchronize the rotation of the left and right rotatable bodies 105 and 106, a pair of sector gears 107 and 108 are provided on facing curved walls of the intermediate barrels 105b and 106b. The sector gears 107 and 108 engage with each other. When an observer rotates one of the rotatable bodies 105 and 106, the other is also rotated due to the engagement of the sector gears 107 and 108. Thus, the interpupillary adjustment is symmetrical.
FIGS. 3A and 3B are rear views of the rotatable bodies, respectively showing the state the interpupillary distance is maximum and the state the interpupillary distance is minimum. As shown in FIGS. 3A and 3B, there is a space 120 between two facing curved walls of the intermediate barrels 105b and 106b. In order to minimize the binocular 100, it is preferable to utilize the space 120 for accommodating an operation knob (for example, a focus adjusting knob). However, since the sector gears 107 and 108 move into the space 120 as shown in FIG. 3B, it is difficult to utilize the space 120 for accommodating the operation knob.

Binocular with interpupillary adjustment mechanism


The present invention discloses a method and an apparatus for reducing power consumption in a network linking system. The apparatus comprises: a network linking interface device, including a media access controller (MAC), a gigabit physical layer (gigabit PHY), and a connector, through which the network linking interface device is coupled to an Ethernet by a network cable; a driving device, for driving and controlling the network linking interface device; and a load monitoring module, for monitoring the load for the network interface device so as to adjust the link speed according to the load. The method comprises steps of: determining the network linking interface device to be in an autonegotiation mode; performing autonegotiation; obtaining settings of a remote-end network linking interface device; linking at the highest usable link speed; enabling the load monitoring module; adjusting the settings of the network linking interface device according to the load of the network linking interface device; and performing autonegotiation again and linking at a proper link speed.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a method and a network apparatus and, more particularly, to a method and an apparatus for reducing power consumption in a network linking system. The apparatus comprises a network linking interface device, a driving device and a load monitoring module such that the load of the network can be monitored, the average load of the network within a predetermined time interval can be evaluated, the network parameters can be adjusted according to the average load, and thus the network link speed can be re-negotiated properly.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In recent years, with the high development in information-related industries, people have increasing needs for a higher operation speed as well as a higher data transmission rate on the network. In view of this, the industries have made lots of efforts to improve the data transmission rate on the network. For example, the early Ethernet providing a transmission link speed of 10 Mbps (mega bits per second) has been improved as the modern-day enhanced Ethernet providing a transmission link speed of 100 Mbps or even up to 1000 Mbps, i.e., 1 Gbps (giga bits per second).
To operate in coordination with the upgraded transmission rate of the network as well as the compatibility between the product specifications, some manufacturers have proposed various solutions. Please refer to, for example, FIG. 1, which is a block diagram schematically illustrating the configuration of a conventional network interface card (NIC). In FIG. 1, a computer 10 to be linked to the network comprises a network interface card 12, which includes: a media access controller (MAC) 121; an oscillator 125; a gigabit physical layer (gigabit PHY) 123; and a connector 127, through which the computer 10 can be linked to the Ethernet 14 by a network cable. The gigabit physical layer 123 provides linking for three different link speeds, including 10 Mbps, 100 Mbps and 1 Gbps, and performs data transmission on the network at a proper link speed according to the information and settings by negotiating with a remote-end network interface card.
When the network interface card 12 operates at a link speed of 1 Gbps, the gigabit physical layer 123 utilizes a phase-locked loop to multiply a 25-MHz clock signal from the oscillator 125 to be 125-MHz to serve as a system clock in the physical layer. In other words, all the operation modules in the physical layer operate at 125 MHz. On the other hand, if the selected link speed is 100 Mbps, the operation modules in the physical layer operates utilizes the 25-MHz clock signal provide by the oscillator 125 to operate at 25 MHz. Furthermore, when the network interface card 12 operates at a link speed of 10 MHz, the system clock in the physical layer is 2.5 MHz and the operation modules in the physical layer operate at 2.5 MHz. Therefore, the power consumption may varies according to the different operation clocks due to the three different link speeds. Based on the experimental results, the power consumption ratio indicating the comparison among different link speeds including 10 Mbps, 100 Mbps and 1 Gbps is 1:1.2:3. Evidently, the power consumption of linking at 1 Gbps is much larger than the other two cases.
For conventional network linking, after the network interface card is linked at a certain link speed, the fixed link speed is utilized until the linking is terminated. However, the data flow rate is not steady and the load may vary. It wastes of power when the network operates at a higher link speed under low data load.
Therefore, there is a need for reducing power consumption in network linking systems.

Method and apparatus for reducing power consumption in network linking system


A paint spraying nozzle assembly includes a housing having a top wall, a bottom wall a peripheral wall that has a peripheral outer shoulder such that the bottom wall has a greater diameter than the top wall. An opening extends through the bottom and top walls. The opening includes a top portion having a smaller diameter than a bottom portion of the opening. The top wall has a slot therein and the opening extends into the slot. An insert is mounted within the opening. The insert includes an upper section positioned within the top portion and a lower section positioned within the bottom portion. A bore extends through the insert and is aligned with the opening. The housing may be positioned in a retaining nut and secured against a spray gun head such that paint ejected outwardly of the spray gun travels through the bore and outward of the slot.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to spraying devices and more particularly pertains to a new spraying device for permitting high pressure paint spray nozzles to be constructed of a non-corrosive plastic material.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The use of spraying devices is known in the prior art. U.S. Pat. No. 5,749,528 describes a device that allows a user to reverse a spray tip with enhanced sealing effectiveness. Another type of spraying device is U.S. Pat. No. 3,907,202 which is adapted for withstanding paint feed pressures of 1,450 psi. Yet another such device is U.S. Pat. No. 4,273,287 which includes a nozzle aperture adapted for causing the stream of paint spray to be uniform.
While these devices fulfill their respective, particular objectives and requirements, the need remains for a tip assembly for a paint sprayer comprised of a plastic material so that the assembly is resistant to corroding. However, the use of such a material necessitates a particular design which still allows for even spraying and atomizing of the paint. Such a device should also prevent the build-up of static charge on the paint sprayer and be easily cleaned. Additionally, it is envisioned that such a device should be economically producible and lightweight in design.


A driving device is provided with: a power circuit in which it is possible to modify an output current value of an output terminal configured to have a load connected thereto; an output capacitor connected between the output terminal of the power circuit and a reference potential node; a switching element connected between the output terminal of the power circuit and the reference potential node; and a control unit that controls the output current value of the power circuit.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a driving device, a light-emitting device, a projection device and a control method.
2. Description of Related Art
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2008-234842 discloses a time-sharing (field-sequential) projection device.
The time-sharing projection device projects colored images by successively illuminating a display element with red light, green light, and blue light.
In particular, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2008-234842 discloses a projection device that successively lights a red light emitting diode, green light emitting diode, and blue light emitting diode with a single DC/DC converter.
The voltage is different when the red light emitting diode, green light emitting diode, or blue light emitting diode is lit, and these successively emit light by using a single DC/DC converter; therefore, the output voltage of the DC/DC converter fluctuates (see FIG. 6 in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2008-0243842). The DC/DC converter output voltage is lowest when the red light emitting diode is active, highest when the green light emitting diode is active, and second highest when the blue light emitting diode is active.

Driving device, light-emitting device, projection device and control method

Abstract: The control unit turns the switching element ON and OFF and controls the output current value of the power circuit during a period in which the switching element is ON such that the voltage of the output terminal of the power circuit during this period is equal to or lower than the voltage applied to the load during a period when this load is OFF.


A method of generating accessible content is described. Embodiments of the method identifies a plurality of channels for a multimedia communication session, generate a master timeline for the communication session, wherein the master timeline comprises a chronological ordering of events from each of the channels, and wherein each of the events is associated with event-specific audio data, and present the multimedia communication session to a user to enable the user to transition among the channels based on the master timeline.

The following relates generally to accessible content, and more specifically to generating and providing accessible content related to a multimedia presentation.
Millions of people worldwide are visually impaired. Many visually impaired people use accessibility features provided in software applications. In some cases, regulations encourage or require accessibility features to be provided by software vendors. For example, the American Disability Act (ADA) in the United States and corresponding regulations in other countries provide guidelines on accessibility. Such accessibility features enable physically disabled people to consume a wider variety of content, improve their education options, and achieve their professional goals.
Accordingly, accessibility features offered by software products are becoming increasingly important and popular. However, in many cases, accessible content generated from multimedia presentations does not include all of the content of the original presentation. In some cases, the content includes a main audio channel, but excludes slide content or other multimedia content. Therefore, there is a need in the art for improved systems and methods to generate and present accessible content.


A device including an input to receive a differential waveform pair from a transmission line, the differential waveform pair including a first waveform and a second waveform. The device also includes a repeater to generate a refreshed first output waveform and a refreshed second output waveform. The refreshed first output waveform is substantially similar to an inverted copy of the first waveform and is generated after a signal transition of the first waveform and after a complementary signal transition of the second waveform. The refreshed second output waveform is substantially similar to an inverted copy of the second waveform and is generated substantially simultaneously with generation of the first output waveform.

Noise sensitive signals are usually transmitted as a differential pair. The two signals of the differential pair are affected substantially in the same manner by noise and, therefore, taking the difference between the two signals at their destination may cancel a significant portion of the noise added to the signals during transmission.
If the differential pair signals are transmitted over long transmission lines, the signals may degrade due to noise caused by the parasitic series resistance, inductance, and coupling capacitance in the transmission lines. These parasitic elements attenuate high-frequency signal components more than low-frequency signal components and thereby cause a "smearing" or degradation of the waveform of the signals. If the transmission lines are sufficiently long, the degradation may cause the signals to be completely indecipherable by the time they reach the end of the transmission lines.
To overcome this degradation, repeaters may be inserted along the transmission line at regular intervals. FIG. 1 shows multiple differential repeaters 100 used to propagate differential inputs INA and INB along a differential transmission line 105. A termination block 110 is connected to the end of the transmission line 105 and may be optionally used to the end of the transmission line 105 and may be optionally used for interfacing the received differential signal with a receiving circuit (not shown).
FIG. 2 shows an example of a differential amplifier 200 that may be used as a differential repeater (e.g., 100 in transmission line 105). The differential amplifier 200 includes a DC current source 205, two output resistors 210, and two n-type transistors 215. The differential inputs, INA and INB, are amplified by the differential amplifier 200 which outputs them at OUTA and OUTB. However, the use of the differential amplifier 200 as a repeater suffers from several drawbacks.
First, the differential amplifier 200 exhibits high power dissipation caused by the constant current consumption of the DC current source 205. When multiple differential amplifiers 200 are used to drive transmission lines the resulting power dissipation worsens and may become intolerable.
Second, the differential amplifier 200 exhibits low-drive capability caused by the two output resistors 210 forming a low-pass filter with the transmission line capacitance. The attenuation of high-frequency signal components caused by the low pass filter may be lessened by decreasing the resistance of the output resistors 210. However, decreasing the resistance of resistors 210 requires a proportionate increase in the DC current source 205 that results in increased power consumption.
Third, skew between the two differential inputs INA and INB of the differential amplifier 200 may result. Skew may build between the inputs INA and INB because of a physical mismatch between the two transmission lines on which the signals travel. The skew distorts waveforms and progressively worsens as the differential signal propagates along the transmission line.
FIG. 3 shows an example of the distortion effect of skew on a differential signal A-B. The distortion effect progressively worsens as skew between the signals A and B increases as the differential signal travels along a transmission line. For example, no skew is evident when the signals are at the signal source 300. Some skew is apparent when the signals have traveled to the middle of the transmission line 305, and significant skew and distortion are shown when the signals have reached their destination 310. In addition, as skew builds, noise affects the two signals A and B unequally, thereby resulting in increased noise interference in the form of jitter.


A method for manufacturing a flexible display device includes forming a separation layer on a carrier substrate, laminating a flexible substrate having an area that is larger than an area of the separation layer, to the separation layer; forming a dummy pattern on and along an edge of the flexible substrate; exposing a portion of the separation layer by removing a portion of the flexible substrate at a side of the flexible substrate; and separating the separation layer and the flexible substrate from each other.

1. Field
The invention relates to a method for manufacturing a display device, and more particularly, to a method for manufacturing a flexible display device using thin glass as a substrate.
2. Description of the Related Art
A flat panel display includes a display unit which displays an image. The display unit includes a substrate, and a plurality of pixels disposed on the substrate. When a flexible substrate such as a plastic film is used instead of a rigid substrate such as glass, the flat panel display may have a bendable characteristic to be a flexible display device. The flexible display device may be an organic light emitting diode display, a liquid crystal display or an electrophoretic display.
During a process for manufacturing the flexible display device, the flexible substrate is positioned on a hard carrier substrate, and is separated from the carrier substrate after the display unit is formed on the flexible substrate. The carrier substrate supports the flexible substrate that is easily bent to maintain the flexible substrate in a flat state during a process for forming the display unit.

Method for manufacturing flexible display device


Devices, to be controlled by an application program (app) running on mobile computers of the users, are sold to the users through a variety of suppliers. The users are provided with a single generic app for controlling the devices. The app is then provided branding and advertising information about one supplier associated with the sale or service of the devices.

This section is intended to provide a background or context to the invention that is recited in the claims. The description herein may include concepts that could be pursued, but are not necessarily ones that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated herein, what is described in this section is not prior art to the description and claims in this application and is not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
It is common to use smartphone and computer applications also known as applications "apps" for the purposes of providing a user interface for controlling a device such as a car accessory. Such apps are generally designed for operating the devices and are provided by the device manufacturers. FIGS. 1 and 2 illustrate an example of an available car device system such as a remote starter working with an application.
Advertising is important in any industry and automotive aftermarket and car servicing industry is not an exemption to this rule. As many car accessories are installed by technicians, the end user typically does not get exposure to the advertisement typically available through packaging for other products. Hence, there exists a need for a system for car service providers and dealerships to effectively deliver the advertisement of their brand, products and services and promotions to appropriate end user.
While it is common to provide smartphone apps and websites that allow clients to receive marketing and/or product information, including information about product updates and maintenance, such websites and applications are typically used independently from the products. Furthermore, the information is provided through a client's action of seeking the information, through opening a link in an e-mail message or by opening an application or webpage, or by receiving a notification prompt associated with an application or RSS feed. This requires the user to voluntarily install an App or actively check the advertisement received via email. Hence, there exists a need for a system to better deliver advertisement to the end user and more effectively target the appropriate end user based on different factors such as technical information of the vehicle, the location of service provider, the location of the user's, and the available relevant promotions to avoid situations where an electrical vehicle user receives an oil change advertisement.
Moreover, there exists a need for a flexible system and method for providing customized advertisements to the end users in accordance with the criteria defined by a service provider.


This patent disclosure describes new non-linear carrier-pulse-width modulators for control of high power-factor boost rectifiers. In the new modulators, the switch duty ratio is determined by comparing a signal derived from the main switch current with a periodic, nonlinear carrier signal .nu..sub.c (t, .nu..sub.m). The shape of the carrier is selected so that the resulting input current follows the input voltage, as required for unity-power-factor rectification. A slowly-varying modulating input .nu..sub.m can be used to adjust the power level and to regulate the output dc voltage. The controller based on the new non-linear-carrier modulator has a number of advantageous properties: sensing of the input line voltage is eliminated; for current shaping, only sensing of the power switch current is needed; current shaping does not require an error amplifier with feedback loop compensation; the multiplier in the voltage feedback loop is eliminated; and the converter operates in the continuous conduction mode. The controller is potentially well-suited for integrated-circuit implementation. It can be expected that a dedicated IC based on the feed-forward modulators disclosed here would be simpler and would require less i/o pins than ICs currently available for power-factor correction, while offering comparable or improved performance.

______________________________________ GLOSSARY ______________________________________ Apparent Power The RMS current times the RMS voltage in a load. Boost Converter A switching power supply with an input inductor that stores energy and a shunt switch in parallel with the load. Produces a higher voltage at the output. Buck Converter A switching power supply that has a switch in series with an inductive- capacitive filter. Produces an output voltage lower than the input voltage Capacitor A capacitor stores electric energy, blocks the flow of direct current, and permits the flow of alternating current to a degree depending on the capacitance and the frequency. The voltage across a capacitor cannot change instantaneously. Current changes lead voltage changes in a capacitor. The relationship between current and voltage is: I = C dV/dt. Continuous Operation of a converter such that Conduction Mode switch turns on at non-zero current. (CCM) Converter A circuit for converting DC to AC. A circuit for converting AC to DC. A circuit for converting DC to DC. Current Injection Uses the instantaneous inductor current Control (CIC) as part of the control signals. Same as Peak Current Mode Control. Discontinuous Opposite of CCM. The switch turns on at Conduction Mode zero current. (DCM) Flyback Converter A buck-boost switching power supply with a single switching transistor that eliminates the output inductor. Energy is stored in the transformer primary when the transistor is conducting. When the transistor is off (the flyback period) the energy is transferred to the transformer secondary and load. Inductor An inductor stores electric energy, blocks the flow of alternating current to a degree depending on the inductance and frequency and permits the flow of direct current. The current through an inductor cannot change instantaneously. The relationship between current and voltage is: V = L di/dt. Peak Current Mode Uses the instantaneous inductor current Control as part of the control signals. Same as Current Injection Control. Power Factor The ratio of true power to apparent power as a percentage. Power factor is equal to the cosine of the phase angle between the current and the voltage when both are sinusoidal. Reactive Power The imaginary portion of apparent power. RMS Root mean squared. SMPS Switched Mode Power Supply Transformer A component that consists of two or more inductors which are coupled together by magnetic induction. The current and voltage are transformed across the transformer without changing the frequency. ##STR1## True Power The real portion of apparent power. ______________________________________

Non-linear carrier controllers for high power factor rectification


An output circuit comprising a pair of input-stage transistors supplied with an input signal, a pair of output-stage differential transistors constructing an output-stage differential circuit, a pair of wiring lines having first ends connected to the input-stage transistors, respectively, and second ends connected to the bases of the output-stage differential transistors and connecting the input-stage transistors and the output-stage transistors, respectively, a pair of input-stage constant current sources connected to the bases of the output-stage differential transistors, respectively, at the second terminals, and an output-stage constant current source connected to the output-stage differential transistors.

The present invention relates to an output circuit and output circuit device for driving a laser diode or the like at high speed.
A conventional output circuit for supplying a drive signal to a laser diode or the like at high speed comprises an emitter follower circuit and a differential circuit. The emitter follower circuit receives a differential signal input to the output circuit device. The differential circuit is driven by a signal output by the emitter follower. In the device, the power supply for the emitter follower circuit is located near the emitter follower transistor.
The output transistor incorporated in the output circuit device must be a large-size one so that the device may convert a high-frequency signal into a large output current. The large the output transistor, the greater its ground parasitic capacity. Ringing inevitably occurs when the output transistor operates at high speed. Hence, the differential transistors incorporated in the device may oscillate if their base terminals are electrically unstable. To remove this phenomenon, an integration circuit is used to abate the waveform sharpness of the signal input to the differential transistors. As a consequence, the output circuit device cannot supply a drive signal at high speed.

Output circuit and output circuit device


Enhanced memory circuits are described that maintain coherency between concurrent memory reads and writes in a pipelined memory architecture. The described memory circuits can maintain data coherency regardless of the amount of pipelining applied to the memory inputs and/or outputs. Moreover, these memory circuits may be implemented as dedicated hard circuits in a field programmable gate array (FPGA) or other programmable logic device (PLD), and can be supplemented with user-configurable logic to achieve coherency in a variety of applications.

This disclosure relates to a programmable integrated circuit, and particularly to embedded memory blocks in a programmable integrated circuit device—e.g., a field-programmable gate array (FPGA) or other programmable logic device (PLD). More particularly, this disclosure relates to an enhanced embedded memory block that maintains coherency between concurrent memory reads and writes.
It has become increasingly common to design PLDs to include embedded memory blocks in the form of dedicated hard memory blocks and/or out of soft configurable logic. Such embedded memory blocks may include a concentration of circuitry on a PLD that has been partly or fully hardwired to enable the storage and retrieval of data. Embedded memory blocks may be implemented using soft logic resources such as shift registers or configuration memory (CRAM) look-up table masks (LUT-masks). Embedded memories may also be available (or configurable) with varying sizes, widths, port-counts, and single vs. dual port and/or dual-clock read/write functionality.
Embedded memories store many different types of data and enable a variety of functions. For example, they are employed in a wide range of industrial, wireline, and wireless applications where they may be used for caching data or to maintain load/store tables for packet data, statistics, pointers, etc. Embedded memories are also often used as temporary first-in first-out (FIFO) storage between asynchronous sources and components that access and provide data at varying data widths and clock speeds.
Generally, to retrieve data from a memory, a read address and some control signals (e.g., a clock signal) are presented to the memory, and the stored data located at the specified read address is output one clock cycle later. For write transactions, a write address and write data along with related control signals are presented to the memory, and the write data is stored in the memory at the specified write address. For many existing devices, both transactions may be concurrent on separate ports.
In some applications, data read from memory ("read data") is pipelined for one or more clock cycles prior to being output. In these instances, the read address must be presented to the memory early so that the read data is available when expected, i.e., during the same clock cycle the read data would have been made available had there been no pipelining. This is necessary, for example, when a read-modify-write command is processed by a pipelined memory circuit—if the read data is not made available early, non-current read data will be modified and written back to the memory location. Presenting the read address early realigns the reads and writes so that the read data is output during the same clock cycle as the corresponding write data is committed to memory.
At the same time, however, presenting the read address to the memory early presents its own challenges. Data written to memory during one clock cycle usually only becomes available during the next clock cycle. Specifically, data written to memory must be committed by the end of a clock cycle in order for that data to be available for reading in the next clock cycle. Presenting the read address to the memory early may therefore result in non-current data being read from the specified memory location. In particular, the read data will not include any data written to the memory location during, or after, the clock cycle in which the read address is presented to the memory. The greater the amount of pipelining introduced into the memory, the more significant the problem.

Systems and methods for maintaining memory access coherency in embedded memory blocks


A plasma processing apparatus includes a processing container and a plasma generating mechanism including a high-frequency oscillator. The arrangement is configured to generate plasma within the processing container by using a high frequency wave oscillated by the high-frequency oscillator. In addition, an impedance regulator is configured to adjust impedance to be applied to the high-frequency oscillator. Further, a determining unit is configured to change the impedance to be adjusted by the impedance regulator and to determine an abnormal oscillation of the high-frequency oscillator based on (a) a component of a center frequency of a fundamental wave that is the high frequency wave oscillated by the high-frequency oscillator, and (b) a component of a peripheral frequency present at both ends of a predetermined frequency band centered around the center frequency of the fundamental wave in a state where the impedance is changed.

There is a plasma processing apparatus configured to excite plasma by using a microwave. The plasma processing apparatus includes a high-frequency oscillator such as, for example, a magnetron, and radiates a microwave oscillated by the high-frequency oscillator into a processing container so that a gas within the processing container is ionized to excite plasma (WO No. 2004/068917).

Plasma processing apparatus, abnormal oscillation determination method and high-frequency generator


Techniques to reduce transmit power required for transmission of messages from an access terminal to reduce interference to transmissions from other access terminals. In one aspect, messages to be transmitted are defined and/or coded such that they may be detected at different received signal qualities. The codewords may be defined having different distances to their nearest codewords. In another aspect, messages to be transmitted are assigned to different points in a signal constellation, with the points being located such that they may be received at different signal qualities. Codewords that may be received at a lower signal quality may be assigned to messages more likely to be transmitted at higher transmit power levels (e.g., when the access terminal is located further away) or to more frequently transmitted messages.

I. Field
The present invention relates to data communication. More particularly, the present invention relates to a novel and improved method and apparatus for transmitting messages in a wireless communication system.
II. Description of the Related Art
Wireless communication systems are widely deployed to provide various types of communication such as voice, data, and so on. These systems may be based on code division multiple access (CDMA), time division multiple access (TDMA), or some other modulation techniques. A CDMA system provides certain advantages over other types of system, including increased system capacity.
A CDMA system may be designed to support one or more CDMA standards such as (1) the "TIA/EIA-95-B Mobile Station-Base Station Compatibility Standard for Dual-Mode Wideband Spread Spectrum Cellular System" (the IS-95 standard), (2) the "TIA/EIA-98-C Recommended Minimum Standard for Dual-Mode Wideband Spread Spectrum Cellular Mobile Station" (the IS-98 standard), (3) the standard offered by a consortium named "3rd Generation Partnership Project" (3GPP) and embodied in a set of documents including Document Nos. 3G TS 25.211, 3G TS 25.212, 3G TS 25.213, and 3G TS 25.214 (the W-CDMA standard), (4) the standard offered by a consortium named "3rd Generation Partnership Project 2" (3GPP2) and embodied in a set of documents including "TR-45.5 Physical Layer Standard for cdma2000 Spread Spectrum Systems," the "C.S0005-A Upper Layer (Layer 3) Signaling Standard for cdma2000 Spread Spectrum Systems," and the "C.S0024 cdma2000 High Rate Packet Data Air Interface Specification" (the cdma2000 standard), and (5) some other standards. These standards are incorporated herein by reference. A system that implements the High Rate Packet Data specification of the cdma2000 standard is referred to herein as a high data rate (HDR) system. Proposed wireless systems also provide a combination of HDR and low data rate services (such as voice and fax services) using a single air interface.
In a wireless communication system, the transmit power required for a transmission is dependent on the propagation (or path) loss between a transmitting entity (e.g., an access terminal) and a receiving entity (e.g., an access point). As an access terminal moves further away from the access point, the path loss typically increases. Consequently, more transmit power is required so that the transmission can be received at the required signal quality for the desired level of performance (e.g., one percent frame error rate). However, the higher transmit power for this transmission causes more interference to the transmissions from other access terminals. The higher transmit power also causes faster depletion of battery power on mobile wireless devices. There is, therefore, a need in the art for a way to provide HDR services that minimizes interference and depletion of battery power.

Method and apparatus for transmitting messages in a wireless communication system


A camera height calculation method that causes a computer to execute a process, the process includes obtaining one or more images captured by an in-vehicle camera, extracting one or more feature points from the one or more images, identifying first feature points that exist over a road surface from the one or more feature points, and calculating a height of the in-vehicle camera from the road surface, based on positions of the identified first feature points.

In recent years, driving recorders that capture and record images of the front and rear of a vehicle have been widely spread. The images recorded by such a driving recorder is useful, for example, for keeping circumstances before and after occurrence of an accident as evidence and for analyzing conditions of an accident.
Technologies have been developed that recognize various objects from the images and estimate positions or forms of the objects. For example, a plane estimation method has been proposed which, based on three-dimensional coordinates of feature points extracted from a stereo image, detects an image similar to the image at each feature point position from images before and after a movement of an object and calculates a three-dimensional position of a plane on which the object moves from three-dimensional movement vectors of the feature points. As a technology applying semantic segmentation as an image recognition technology, a computer system has been proposed in which a source deconvolution network is adaptively trained to execute semantic segmentation.
Related techniques are disclosed in, for example, Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2006-105661 and Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2017-162456.

Camera height calculation method and image processing apparatus


An orthopedic appliance that is designed to assist in the reduction of an anterior dislocation, during a course of treatment given to a person who is laying horizontal on a table or similar elevated surface, with the affected arm hanging directly downward. The appliance eliminates the need for a person to grip or in any way consciously hold on to weighted objects, thereby allowing the patient to fully relax during the treatment procedure. The appliance comprises one or more forearm straps which are wrapped around the forearm of the person receiving treatment, where one or more weighted units are attached to the forearm straps, with extending supports so that the weights hang down, so that a direct downward pull on the affected arm is possible. Said weighted units may be attached to the forearm straps using one or more descending loops, in which weights such as dumbbells may be placed. In place of loops, weighted units may be hooked on to the forearm strap portion, with the weighted units supported so that they are positioned below the affected person's wrist and hand.

This invention relates to an orthopedic appliance that is designed to assist in the reduction of an anterior dislocation (sub coracoid dislocation) of a person's shoulder using what is known as the "Stimson Technique". Currently, hospitals and centers that provide medical assistance or treatment to persons involving dislocations of shoulders have turned to fixing weights of one type or another to a person's arm in order to achieve a downward pulling on the person's arm while they lay prone on a table or other surface. The maximum benefit of any weight utilized in this manner is realized by having the patient placed in a prone position on the edge of a table or gurney with the arm extending directly downwards. While the patient has weight pulling downward on their arm or hand, they are instructed to relax. The patients are expected to maintain this position for approximately ten to fifteen minutes, with muscle relaxation being a priority.
Hospitals and treatment facilities offering their services to injured persons have utilized weights anywhere from ten pounds up to twenty-five pounds, held by a person's hand to give the downward pull necessary to reduce the anterior dislocation. The weights that have been generally used have comprised such archaic methods as pails of water and dumbbells themselves that the person/patient is expected to hold. A bucket is used because the amount of weight can be varied proportionately to the volume of water placed into the bucket. The major drawback of such attempts has always been that the patient with the anterior dislocation is themselves forced to hold onto the weight, which can be a painful process to the patient, causing muscle relaxation to be more difficult to achieve.
Other methods such as providing traction to a person so that their arm is pulled upwards is shown and described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,616,637 (Caspari, et al.). This patent, which was issued in 1986, employs a forearm gripping device. The relevance of this prior art shows that a forearm can be wrapped with material to provide a means to grip the forearm while applying a pulling force. This particular device, however, had no means to direct the arm downwards and was more useful in simply holding an arm in an upward position during surgical procedures.
Various exercising devices exist, but which have not been readily utilized by medical treatment facilities. The common drawback for these existing exercising devices is the complexity of them and their inability to readily attach to an appendage concurrent with the inability to quickly and easily modify the amount of weight placed in the device or apparatus itself. U.S. Pat. No. 3,910,577 (Boyle) typifies a device which can be simply draped over a person's appendage containing pouches in which weights themselves may be placed therein. This would provide a resistance to upward movement to a person desiring to lift their leg or arm in an exercise maneuver. This particular device has little real use with the problem at hand in dealing with anterior dislocations, since there is no method for the Boyle device to be properly affixed to a person's arm for a direct downward pull on said arm.
Another device which was intended for use with a person's arm and hands in shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,109,908 (Pugh, et al.). In Pugh, the user is required to grip a handle which stabilizes a weight holder platform that is strapped to a person's forearm on one end. While the device's benefits for exercising a person's forearms are evident, this particular device would still require a user to grip the handgrip and to maintain a continuing grip on said handgrip during the entire process in which a dislocation is being reduced. Since the purpose of a proper device is both to provide a downward pull while achieving relaxation of the patient, relaxation is once again unable to be fully achieved due to the person's need to utilize the forearm muscles to employ their fingers to grip the device.
A weighted cuff is depicted in U.S. Pat. No. 4,384,714 (Kimura). In Kimura, there is a thick plate-like main body that is formed that has a plurality of elongated holes which can receive weighted rods. The number of rods inserted in the receiving holes dictates the extent of weight being implied by the device to a person's appendage. This device has the drawback for being unable to provide sufficient amounts of weight to adequately reduce a person's anterior dislocation properly. The device shown in Kamura tends to be one that would simply make a person's movements during exercise more difficult, thereby increasing the stress on muscles being exercised and giving the user of this the benefit of an increased physical workout in a shorter period of time. A subsequent weighted exercise apparatus is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 4,858,916 (Beaumont). The Beaumont apparatus is similar to that shown in Pugh, et al., in that the user has a strap around their forearm with a means to grip and hold on to the apparatus itself utilizing a gripping bar. Weights may be incrementally added or reduced depending on the user's desire. This invention has the same limitations as does Pugh with regard to reducing anterior dislocations. This device has no means for the user to relax their forearm muscles, thereby allowing their fingers to relax as well. This device has the same drawbacks and problems as does using a bucket of water.
A weighted exercise glove is depicted and described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,368,883 (Tiktin). In Tiktin, the glove has attachment points by which the user may affix weights on various fingers. The glove itself is designed primarily to exercise individual fingers and muscles and corresponding muscles in a person's forearm. This device would have some difficulty in having sufficient weight attached to reduce an anterior dislocation, since a great deal of stress would be required to be placed on individual fingers, rather than on the more durable forearm bone structure.
A somewhat similar device to the Tiktin patent is shown in U.S. Pat. No. number 5,004,227 (Hoffman). In Hoffman, an exercise apparatus comprises a glove like apparatus in which the back of the hand and palm area provides support for attachment of weights which are affixed within a pocket in the glove. This device has the drawback of being unable to position the weights directly downward of the arm itself so that if sufficient weights were utilized in the pouch area of the Hoffman apparatus, the pull on the arm would be off center from the arm, and fail to provide a direct downward pull. In addition, the pull should be limited to the arm, rather than the wrist alone. To maximize reduction of an anterior dislocation, the weight must be positioned so that it is providing a direct, downward pulling force uniformly around the circumference of the arm itself, rather than weights being distributed on one external side and providing a pulling force on only one side.

Orthopedic appliance to assist reduction of anterior dislocation of shoulder


An aqueous dispersion of 0.1 to 15 percent by weight of at least one phosphate ester and a copolymer formed by the coploymerization of a monomer mixture comprising:. a) 0.1 to 15 percent by weight of at least one dicarboxylic acid, PA1 b) 0.1 to 10 percent by weight of at least one functional monomer is represented by the following formula: ##STR1## where R.sub.1, R.sub.2 and R.sub.3 are hydrogen or a methyl group, R.sub.4 is an alkyl containing 1 to 4 carbon atoms, n is 0 or 1, X is selected from the group consisting of hydrogen, carboxyl, phenyl, aryl, alkyl or alkaryl groups containing 1 to 30 atoms, and Y is a nucleophilic group selected from --OH, --NH.sub.2 or ##STR2## or ##STR3## wherein R.sub.5 is a hydrogen, an alkyl containing 1-20 carbon atoms, or an aryl group, and PA1 c) more than 80% by weight of backbone monomers.

Printed fabrics, including non-woven, woven, and knitted fabrics, are often printed with pigments to produce an attractive design or color pattern on the cloth. The pigment printing basically uses pigments, thickeners, and binders, while pad dyeing typically consists of pigments and binders. The pigment printed fabric must have acceptable fastness properties. These performance requirements are evaluated by tests such as the hand, crock, and wash fastness. It is also desirable for the pigment system to have good redispersibility.
The binder for pigment printing or pad dyeing which meet the performance requirements have, until recently, contained formaldehyde or formaldehyde containing or generating compounds for crosslinking with the substrates. Recent efforts have been made to reduce the formaldehyde content of, or the free formaldehyde generated by, the binders, or to totally eliminate the formaldehyde component of binders, for environmental reasons. An example of a low formaldehyde-emitting binder for cellulose is U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,198,492 and 5,278,222, which are related patents, issued to Dennis P. Stack. Stack teaches an aqueous dispersion of discrete particles of a highly functionalized emulsion copolymer formed by the copolymerization of a mixture 10 phm to 60 phm of one or more water-soluble polymerizable olefinically unsaturated non-ionic organic compounds and the balance of the mixture being a mixture of comonomers, including one or more water-soluble olefinically unsaturated organic compounds having at least one carboxylate group therein and one or more water-soluble olefinically unsaturated carboxylic acid hydroxy esters or olefinically unsaturated amides. The highly functionalized emulsion copolymer is a low solids composition which is used in conjunction with a latex polymer to constitute a binder for cellulose. That is, Stack teaches a two part latex composition which constitutes the binder.


Methods and apparatus are provided for accessing the proper memory in processors having program and data memories with different sizes. In some embodiments, a processor is optimized for data access and has registers that are the same size as the data memories. When a program is compiled, some implementations identify when a pointer variable points to a piece of data (data memory) or a function (program memory) and synthesize different sized operations accordingly. The proper mode and size are assigned for each pointer. Methods of the present invention do not require annotation of functions. Existing code does not need to be modified and there is no opportunity to introduce errors. The invention does not require extra program memory to be located at directly accessible locations to store stub code.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to processors. More specifically, the present invention relates to methods and apparatus for accessing a memory on a processor.
2. Description of Related Art
Processors often store data and functions in different memories or in different parts of the same memory. The sizes of these memories may be different. In conventional processors, program and data memories are often implemented on a single device. However, in DSP processors, program and data memories are frequently implemented on separate devices with separate buses. Data memory is typically much faster and program memory is sometimes read only.
When parsing the source code written for such processors, a compiler must be able to recognize whether a pointer should be stored as a small or a large value ("near" or "far"). The compiler then generates the appropriate object code.
If the pointer variables used to store memory addresses cannot address the whole memory space, a programmer may decide to place a function in the directly addressable part of the memory space. This could be achieved, for example, by annotating the functions (or pointers to the functions) e.g., with explicit near/far declarations. This method requires extra programmer effort, both in initially labeling pointers and in re-labeling them if a function is relocated. Moreover, there is a danger that the programmer may fail to label a function correctly. For example, a "near" pointer may in fact end up requiring a large storage location.
Other systems have used the linker to detect all instances when the address of a program memory object is taken and to ensure that the object is stored as a small value so it can be handled by the code that is generated for data objects. Sometimes the linker inserts extra code so that only a stub of the program object is stored as a small value (i.e. a JUMP to the real memory location). This method consumes extra space and requires that at least some program memory be directly addressed.
It is therefore desirable to provide improved methods and apparatus for improving memory access efficiency.

Inferring size of a processor memory address based on pointer usage


The present invention provides a backlight module of display device, which includes: a back panel, a reflection hood arranged on the back panel, a backlight source arranged on the reflection hood, a reflector board arranged on the back panel, a light guide plate arranged on the reflector board, and a plastic frame coupled to the back panel and the light guide plate. Light emitting from the backlight source is reflected by the reflection hood into the light guide plate. The reflection hood includes a reflection section, an abutment section connected to the reflection section, and a bearing section connected to the abutment section. The abutment section is positioned against the back panel. The backlight source is mounted on the bearing section. The bearing section is positioned on the back panel. The backlight module of display device according to the present invention provides a light reflection hood to replace manual mounting of reflection surface thereby eliminating the yield problem caused by manual mounting operation and ensuring completeness of light reflection of the backlight source and thus ensuring light emission efficiency of the light guide plate while improving heat transfer performance of the backlight source.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a backlight module of display device, and in particular to a backlight module of a display device that ensures completeness of reflected light and also improves heat conduction performance of backlight source.
2. The Related Arts
An LED (Light-Emitting Diode) backlight module is generally classified as two types according to the position of light source, namely direct type and edge type. In backlighting of direct type, the light source is located exactly below an LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) panel for direct irradiation. Since it is possible to use a large number of light tubes, extremely high brightness can be realized. However, the cost is high and this makes generally available for TV modules that require great brightness. Backlighting of edge type positions a light source at an edge of a light guide plate and light from the light source is guided into the interior of the light guide plate to be subjected to total reflection by a reflection surface and refraction caused by grid spots on a bottom of the light guide plate in order to emit from a top surface of the light guide plate to serve as a planar light source of homogenous brightness for the LCD panel.
The state-of-the-art edge type backlighting comprises a planar mirror that is directly mounted to a plastic frame or a back panel and the commonly adopted way is to mount manually. Manually mounting may cause a problem in yield rate, and thus affecting reflection of LED light and lowering light emission efficiency.
Further, heat dissipation is another issue of backlight modules that requires constant improvement.

SHENZHEN CHINA STAR OPTOELECTRONICS TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD.


A housing (40) for a gear unit, the housing being formed by a moulding process including casting, pressure casting, injection moulding or like processes. The housing (40) of the invention comprises housing walls and support for bearing elements of a gear shaft, the housing walls (47) and support (45, 46) being formed in a mould wherein the support (45, 46) is connected to a wall (47) of the housing (40) and extends from that wall (47) in a direction in which the housing is removed or demoulded from the mould. Further, a surface of the support may be shaped to provide elements to hold a liquid lubricant and elements to direct that lubricant to and/or from the bearing elements of a gear shaft.

This invention relates to the support for a bearing arrangement in a housing formed by a casting, pressure casting, extrusion or injection moulding or like processes. Particularly but not exclusively the invention relates to the provision of supports for bearings for bevel or helical pinion shafts in a cast gear box housing in a so called flying gear design.


Data is transmitted from any one of a plurality of transmitters in synchronism with a first clock. A receiver receives the data in synchronism with the first clock and a second clock having a predetermined phase relationship with the first clock. Control information is previously held in the receiver regarding data reception conditions associated with the plurality of transmitters to control reception conditions of the receiver on the basis of the control information.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a signal input/output device for a computer, a communication apparatus, or the like and more particularly, to a data transmission system which adjusts a variation in propagation delay time (data skew) between data bits and a clock skew to realize high speed data transmission in data transfer between synchronous parallel input/output device.
2. Description of the Related Art
In fields relating to data transfer between LSI's of a computer or to high speed data transmission between computers, there has been a widely employed synchronous data transmission system in which input/output devices provided at signal send/receive sides are controlled by clocks having an identical frequency. Accordingly, in order to increase the performance of a computer or computer system, it is important to increase the synchronous data transmission rate.
For the purpose of increasing the data transmission rate of synchronous data transmission to be carried out through a plurality of conductors such as a cable or a bus, it is necessary to perform data transmission with a cycle shorter than the data propagation delay time between the input/output devices. However, even when the data transmission system is a wave pipelined transfer type, it is difficult to sufficiently increase the transmission rate between parallel input/output devices having a data width of a plurality of bits. This is because the presence of variations (skews) in the data and clock propagation delay time causes reduction of the transmission cycle to be limited.
For the purpose of realizing the reduction of the transmission cycle, a technique for adjusting the data and clock skews is required.
A data skew adjustment technique is disclosed in JP-A-5-75594, a paper entitled "ATM 156 Mb/s Serial Interface CMOS-LSI" reported in Proceedings of the 1992 Spring Meeting of the Institute of Electronics, Information and Communication Engineers, B-445, JP-A-1-320841, JP-A-1-296734 and JP-A-2-7736.
Meanwhile, for the purpose of reducing the clock skew, it is generally necessary to wire clock distribution paths from a reference clock generator to respective input/output devices with an accurately equal length through complex calculation or on a simulation basis. JP-A-6-12140 discloses a technique for eliminating the need for such equal-length wiring of the block distribution paths.
A data skew adjustment technique such as the one mentioned above is roughly divided into two methods which follow. That is, in the first method, a multi-phase clock which is synchronized with a reference clock is generated in a receiver and received data is synchronized with use of the clock for latching the received data at the optimum timing. In the second method, a variable delay circuit is provided for every bit of data received in a receiver to control a delay for each bit such that all of the bits can be synchronized, thereby reducing a data skew.
However, the first method is defective in that it is difficult to realize an accurate phase relationship in the multi-phase clock. For example, when it is desired to use a 4-phase clock to synchronize received data having a high transmission frequency of 100 MHz or a transmission cycle of 10 nanoseconds, clocks having phases shifted accurately by 2.5 nanoseconds are required. In the case of fixed delay elements, since the propagation delay times negligibly among manufactured elements, it is difficult to generate such a 4-phase clock. In the case of phase-locked loop (PLL), since the PLL requires generation of a high frequency signal, this causes the operation of an analog controller to be unstable, leading to the fact that the noise influence by a digital signal may become a bottleneck in the system design.
The second method is defective in that the circuit scale is made large. For finely controlling each bit in the data received with respect to delay thereof, this inevitably involves an increase in the number of delay stages in the variable delay circuit and correspondingly also involves an increase in the scale of the control circuit, which makes it difficult to apply this method to a data transmission system so as to have a data width of several bytes.
The first and second methods have a common defect, that is, these methods do not take application to bus type transmission systems into consideration. Any of the techniques disclosed is directed to only 1:1 data transmission between a single receiver and a single transmitter, but in the case of a bus type transmission system, it becomes necessary for a single receiver to be able to execute data transfer with a plurality of transmitters.
Further, in a 1:1 transmitter/receiver system for performing data transmission over more than several meters, its data skew is relatively large and it is impossible in the prior art to perform data transmission with a cycle shorter than the magnitude of the data skew, which also leads to hinderance of realization of a higher transmission rate.
The prior art clock skew adjustment technique has the following defect. The method of reducing a clock skew by realizing clock distribution paths connecting a reference clock generator and respective input/output devices by using equal length wiring is limited by its structural aspect, in addition to the fact that it requires a lot of troublesome labor and time. This is because the propagation delay time of clock distribution paths actually manufactured is susceptible to manufacturing fluctuation and external electromagnetic waves and thus it is impossible to remove the clock skew as the designer expects at the time of its design.
In the technique disclosed in the above JP-A-6-12140, each of the input/output devices has a local clock generator operated in synchronism with the respective input/output devices and the clock phase of the local clock generator is adjusted so that all of the input/output devices are operated in synchronism with clocks having the same phase.
However, even if it became possible to remarkably reduce the clock skew with use of this technique, it is difficult to increase the data transmission rate of a wave pipeline type data transmission system. This is because, even if the clock skew is so small, it is not clear in the wave pipeline type system to determine which phase that data arrived with. For this reason, for the purpose of realizing the wave pipeline type system, there is employed, in many cases, a source synchronization system in which a transmitter sends a clock simultaneously with its transmission data. In a source synchronization type receiver, however, a means becomes necessary for once latching received data in synchronism with the clock of the source (transmitter) and then for again synchronizing it with the clock of the receiver, which disadvantageously results in that a time necessary between the transmission and reception of the data increase by an amount corresponding to the synchronizing means.

Method and system for synchronizing data having skew


A method for creating an opening in a sheath, made of stretch film, that retains a goods stack arranged on a pallet. The pallet comprising an upper-side deck surface as support for the goods stack and lower-side support feet. The sheath engages under the support feet arranged in the region of the four outer edges of the pallet. At least one opening is in the sheath between two support feet . At least one opening is generated such that the sheath is first heated, the heated sheath is retracted from the pallet and then, still in the heated state, displaced upward. The upwardly displaced sheath is secured in its upwardly displaced position by cooling. The invention also relates to a shaping apparatus, and additionally to at least one heating device for carrying out the method.

A "stretch film" is understood hereinafter as an extensible film in the form of a tube. This stretch film can have been cut to length, for example, from a folded-together gusseted tube. The stretch film is then, for example, stretched as viewed in a circumferential direction by means of a gathering device so that the circumference is enlarged, and then, for example using a pull-over device, pulled by way of a vertical motion, usually from top to bottom, over a goods stack arranged on a pallet. The stretch film is pulled off from the pull-over device and, because of its return forces, abuts tightly against the outer side of the goods stack and the pallet. The stretch film is sometimes also referred to as a "banderole."
With a Euro pallet, a total of three rows each having three block-like support feet are provided, the three support feet of a row being connected to one another on the lower side by a runner board. With this configuration, the sheath engages under the lower side of the two outermost runner boards. The deck surface is usually made up of five deckboards. Transverse boards can also be arranged between the support feet and the deck surface.
The stretching process is a load-retaining process for retaining a goods stack arranged on a pallet. The stretch film is firstly stretched in order to be pulled over, and is then, in the stretched state, pulled from above over the goods stack arranged on the pallet. As a result, the goods stack is encased on its four sides and, if a stretch hood is involved, also on the upper side. In conjunction with a bottom sheet, protection of the goods stack on all sides is also possible.
For transport using industrial trucks, for example a fork lift, openings must be introduced in the lower region in order to pick up the pallet. These openings are usually produced by punching the fork tips into the sheath. A disadvantage is that the foot openings are not entirely free of the sheath. The pallet is therefore often not accepted by automated high-bay warehouses, since the obligatory placeability test of the foot openings between the support feet has a negative result. An attempt has also been made to remove the stretch film completely in the region of the pallet, in the region of that side of the pallet into which the fork tips of a fork life are to be introduced. The result is that the foot openings are completely open, but this has a considerable negative effect on load stability.

Method for creating at least one opening in sheath made of stretch film that retains goods stack arranged on pallet, and shaping apparatus for carrying out the method


A fuel-cell evaluation equipment includes a gas passageway for supplying gas to a fuel cell and a thermostat adapted to accommodate the fuel cell, wherein the gas passageway includes a first temperature regulator adapted to regulate the temperature of gas and a humidity regulator adapted to regulate the humidity of the gas. A thermostatic chamber of the thermostat regulates an inner temperature in the chamber according to a test condition. The thermostatic chamber is provided with a second temperature regulator into which gas flowing in the gas passageway flows. The gas flowing in the gas passageway is supplied to the fuel cell after heat exchange by the second temperature regulator.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a fuel-cell evaluation equipment, and more particularly to a fuel-cell evaluation equipment adapted to control conditions of gas to be supplied to the fuel cell.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, in order to develop a fuel cell applicable for use as a power source for devices such as cars with sharp load fluctuations or severe temperature fluctuations in use environment, it is desired to provide a fuel-cell evaluation equipment that is able to control conditions such as flow rate, temperature, and humidity of gas to be supplied to the fuel cell more largely and accurately.
Thus, to achieve the object, test equipment provided with a gas supply unit for evaluation tests as disclosed in JP 2004-273222A has been employed on a performance test for a fuel cell in the related art. The gas supply unit for an evaluation test disclosed in JP 2004-273222A heats or humidifies gas by means of so-called bubbling, whereby the gas is immersed in the water stored in a predetermined reservoir, a gas consisting mainly of hydrogen or oxygen that is used as active materials, thereby enabling to control temperature or humidity of gas to be supplied to a fuel cell.
According to the evaluation equipment of this structure, the evaluation test for a fuel cell is performed under various modifications of conditions such as an output condition or an operating atmospheric temperature.
However, the foregoing conventional fuel-cell evaluation equipment has such a problem that considerable changes of control range of parameter, which is a test condition for a fuel cell, renders the conditions such as the temperature of gas to be supplied to the fuel cell unstable and results in lowering the accuracy of the evaluation test.
Further, to make gas supply to a fuel cell be wildly changed, it is necessary to make a duct diameter for gas supply large so as to be able to supply a high flow of gas. In this structure, if and when the evaluation test is carried out with extremely small gas supply to a fuel cell, the gas remains in the duct for gas supply for long periods of time, resulting in a problem that large divergence of the temperature of gas supply from that of the testing conditions.
Still further, when a heater for heating gas employs one capable of heating a high flow rate of gas, the temperature of supplied gas with extremely small gas supply to a fuel cell is not well controlled, resulting in a problem that the accuracy of the evaluation test is lowered.


A defoaming apparatus comprises, in juxtaposition, a defoaming treatment chamber internally provided with a defoaming unit for defoaming, as a result of a rotation of a impeller in a casing having a suction port and discharge ports, by suctioning foam of a foaming liquid via the suction port of the casing and colliding the suctioned foam against an inner circumferential surface of the casing by centrifugal force of the impeller and a substantially closed-type tank for housing a foaming liquid, wherein the suction port of the defoaming unit is located in a foam phase region of the tank.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a defoaming apparatus for a foaming liquid, for example, an alkaline liquid after washing strips or the like, and specifically, it relates to a defoaming apparatus for defoaming by suctioning foam of a foaming liquid via a suction port of a casing by a rotation of an impeller in the casing and scattering the same by centrifugal force to collide against the inner circumferential surface of the casing.
2. Background Art
Priorly, as an apparatus for defoaming a foaming liquid by such a method, one as disclosed in Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Application No. H11-9903 has been known.
This prior art is for housing a foaming liquid in an open-type tank and defoaming foam of the foaming liquid by a defoaming unit provided on the tank. Illustration of an outline of the defoaming method is as shown in FIG. 7. In FIG. 7, A denotes a defoaming unit, and B denotes a foaming liquid housing tank. The defoaming unit A is provided with a casing C and an impeller D. E denotes a suction tube of the casing C in the defoaming unit A, F denotes a motor of the impeller D, and G denotes a discharge port of the casing C.
When the impeller D of the defoaming unit A is driven, air is suctioned into the casing C from the suction tube E and is discharged via the discharge ports G. In accordance therewith, foam on the liquid level of a foaming liquid in the tank B is suctioned into a casing C through the suction tube E. The suctioned foam is, by centrifugal force by a rotation of the impeller D, collided against the inner circumferential surface of the casing C and deformed. Liquid droplets generated by this defoaming fall from the discharge ports G into the tank B.
The tank B for housing a foaming liquid is an open type, and an inlet of the suction tube E is opened in a foam phase on the foaming liquid level in the tank B.
According to this prior art, an air flow produced by a rotation of the impeller D of the defoaming unit A is merely circulating in a relatively small region as shown by arrows in FIG. 7, therefore, a sufficient foam suctioning efficiency, that is, a sufficiently excellent defoaming efficiency cannot be expected. This is also apparent from the addition of modification such that the suction tube E is provided in plurality for the defoaming unit A, the suction tube E is made movable on the liquid level of the tank B, or foam on the liquid level of the tank B is raked up to the suction port of the suction tube by a scraper.


Described herein are D4 receptor-selective compounds of the general formula: ##STR1## wherein X.sub.1 is selected from CH.sub.2, NH, O and S;. X.sub.2 -- is selected from CH=, CH.sub.2 --, and N=; PA1 R.sub.1 to R.sub.8 are each independently selected from H, C.sub.1-4 alkyl, halo, cyano, nitro and halo-substituted C.sub.1-4 alkyl. and acid addition salts, solvates and hydrates thereof. Their use as ligands for dopamine receptor identification and in a drug screening program, and as pharmaceuticals to treat indications in which the D4 receptor is implicated, such as schizophrenia, is also described.

Neuronal cell receptors that bind the neurotransmitter dopamine constitute a group of at least five structurally distinct proteins that can now be produced using recombinant DNA techniques. These techniques have been applied to construct cell lines that incorporate the dopamine receptor in their membranes, to provide regenerable and homogeneous substrates with which chemical libraries can be screened to identify potential CNS-active drugs.
Recent evidence strongly implicates the dopamine receptor classified as D4 in the etiology of schizophrenia. It has been suggested that compounds capable of interfering with the function of this receptor, which is present in schizophrenics at levels that are six times normal, would be useful in the treatment of this disease (Seeman et al, Nature, 1993, 365:441). Therefore, it would be desirable to provide compounds that exhibit a high degree of affinity for the D4 receptor.
Some drugs currently on the market exhibit the desired affinity and antagonism for the D4 receptor. Yet because of their structure, these drugs interact also with related dopamine receptors, particularly the D2 receptor type, which results in significant side effects that include altered motor function and tachycardia. It would therefore be desirable to provide compounds that exhibit low affinity for the D2 receptor relative to the D4 receptor, a property herein referred to as D4 selectivity. It would also be desirable to provide compounds that exhibit high affinity and selectivity for the D4 receptor.
Products currently marketed to treat indications in which the D4 receptor function is implicated include the dibenzodiazepine clozapine, and the dibenzoxazepine isoloxapine each incorporating a tricyclic ring system. Analysis of their dopamine receptor binding profile has shown that the preference for binding the D4 receptor relative to the D2 receptor is about 10 fold, for both products. Similarly, both bind the D4 receptor with about the same affinity (Ki of approximately 20 nM). Other products, recently published in the scientific literature, have shown similar D4 to D2 selectivity and D4 affinity values.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a compound having an improved D4 selectivity profile.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a compound having an improved D4 binding affinity.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a compound having both an improved D4 selectivity profile and D4 binding affinity.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a pharmaceutical composition comprising a compound of the present invention, as active ingredient.

N- methyl piperazine compounds having dopamine receptor affinity


An apparatus for adjusting an optical component has a reference beam unit for emitting a reference laser beam L whose optical axis has established, and an optical axis unit detecting the optical axis and focal point of a reflected beam La from a parabolic mirror to which the reference laser beam L is applied. The optical axis unit comprises first and second pinhole plates spaced a given distance from each other and having respective small holes defined therein.

Laser optical instruments employing a laser beam include a laser beam machining device, a laser beam measuring device, etc., for example. Such laser optical instruments incorporate various optical components such as lenses, reflecting mirrors, etc. for guiding a laser beam to a predetermined applying position. Reflecting mirrors are available in various types including a plane mirror, a parabolic mirror, and an elliptical mirror.
When assembling laser optical instruments, therefore, it is desirable to make alignment adjustments accurately for layout adjustments, focal point measurements, etc. of various optical components in order to reliably perform high-quality laser machining processes and highly accurate laser measuring processes.
Generally, He—Ne laser is used to make such alignment adjustments. Specifically, a laser beam emitted from an He—Ne laser source is used as a reference beam for layout adjustments, focal point measurements, etc. of optical components. However, the laser beam emitted from an He—Ne laser source is problematic in that the absolute position of the laser beam cannot easily be obtained because there is no center (optical center) in the laser beam.
Laser beams do not have a definite configuration as they oscillate in longitudinal modes or transverse modes depending on the oscillator structure. Furthermore, a laser beam needs to be large in diameter in order to achieve desired parallelism between the laser beam and a mechanical axis. It has been pointed out that it is not possible to reliably obtain a sufficiently thin, parallel, and straight laser beam that is required as a reference beam.
In order to make accurate alignment adjustments of optical components, it is necessary to detect a sole accurate reflecting optical axis aligned with a mechanism axis. However, it is considerably difficult to accurately detect such a reflecting optical axis. As a result, it has been impossible to make highly accurate alignment adjustments of optical components.
It has been customary to measure the focal point of a focusing optical system such as a parabolic mirror, an elliptical mirror, or the like by actually applying reflected light from the focusing optical system to a wall or the like and directly observing how the applied light is focused.
However, the focal point of the focusing optical system varies depending on the parallelism of the light applied thereto, the layout of the focusing optical system, the surface accuracy thereof, and other elements, making it difficult to achieve a desired reproducibility of measurements. Consequently, the focal point of the focusing optical system cannot accurately be measured.
Laser optical instruments have a plurality of optical components mounted on an optical tabletop in alignment with the optical axis of a laser beam. Since it is difficult to make alignment adjustments of the optical components on the optical tabletop, the process of making alignment adjustments is highly complex and such alignment adjustments cannot be made with accuracy.
One solution is to make alignment adjustments of the optical components before the optical components are installed on the optical tabletop. However, even if the alignment adjustments of the optical components have been made accurately, the optical components may possibly be brought out of alignment with the optical axis due to assembling errors and mechanical errors. For this reason, highly accurate alignment adjustments of the optical components have not been possible in the art.

Method of and apparatus for adjusting optical component, and optical unit


An internal boosted voltage generator for a semiconductor memory device eliminates excessive increases in boosted voltage and reduces current consumption even though the power supply voltage increases. The internal boosted voltage generator includes a pumping portion for pumping a signal from an output node in response to a control signal, a precharging portion for precharging the output node of the pumping portion, and a controlling portion interposed between the pumping portion and the precharge portion. The controlling portion is a pulse generator that varies the precharge time of the precharging portion by varying the pulse with of an output signal according to the power supply voltage. The output signal of the controlling portion has a relatively narrow pulse width at high power supply voltages and a wider pulse width at low power supply voltages. Therefore, the device is not exposed to excessive stress even though the power supply voltage increases greatly.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an internal boosted voltage generator for a semiconductor memory device, and more particularly, to an active kicker for an internal boosted voltage generator.
2. Description of the Related Art
PNP type sense amplifiers have been used in conventional semiconductor memory devices. Recently, however, shared NP type sense amplifiers have been used to reduce chip size in semiconductor memory devices having high integration levels. Shared NP type sense amplifiers require a boosted voltage V.sub.pp for preventing data having a logic level of "1" from being lost during an active restore process due to the threshold voltage drop V.sub.t in an NMOS isolation transistor which isolates the bit line and the sense amplifier. Thus, an internal boosted voltage generator for generating the boosted voltage (hereinafter referred to as a "V.sub.pp generator") is required. The V.sub.pp generator is also used for word line drivers and a data output buffers, thereby improving the speed of the memory device.
The V.sub.pp generator is comprised of a main pump and an active kicker, wherein the main pump is for filling a V.sub.pp charge tank during a power-up state, and the active kicker, which is the subject of the present invention, is for supplementing the charge consumed during an active cycle.
FIG. 1 is a circuit diagram of a conventional active kicker. Referring to FIG. 1, the active kicker includes pumping means 10, precharging means 20 for precharging an output node N<bst> of the pumping means 10, and transferring means N3 for transferring the charge from the output node N<bst> to a node N<V.sub.pp >.
The pumping means 10 includes an inverter I2 and a capacitor C0 connected between an output node N<pump> of the inverter I2 and the output node N<bst> thereof. The input port of the inverter I2 is connected to an output node N<1> of an inverter I1 for inverting a control signal .phi.AKE.
The precharging means 20 includes an NMOS precharge transistor N2 having a source connected to the output node N<bst> of the pumping means 10 and a drain connected to a power supply voltage V.sub.cc, an NMOS transistor N1 having a source connected to a gate of the NMOS precharge transistor N2, that is, node N<pre>, and a gate and a drain both connected to the power supply voltage V.sub.cc. The precharging means 20 further includes a capacitor C2 that has one terminal connected to the node N<pre> and another terminal connected to the output node N<1> of the inverter I1. An internal power supply voltage IVC is used as the power supply voltage V.sub.cc, although an external power supply voltage may be used instead.
The transferring means N3 is comprised of an NMOS transistor having a drain connected to the output node N<bst> of the pumping means 10, a gate connected to a control signal .phi.TRAN and a source connected to the node N<V.sub.pp >.
In FIG. 1, C1, C.sub.pp and C.sub.cs represent parasitic capacitors. A switch is included for supplementing C.sub.cs by providing a consumed charge Q.sub.cs from the node N<V.sub.pp >.
FIG. 2 is an operational timing diagram of the active kicker shown in FIG. 1. Referring to FIG. 2, the operational principle of the conventional active kicker shown in FIG. 1 will be described. If the control signal .phi.AKE is initially in a logic "low" state, the node N<1> goes "high" to boost the node N<pre>, so that the node N<bst> is precharged to the level of the power supply voltage V.sub.cc. Then, if the control signal .phi.AKE is enabled to a "high" state, the precharge path is disabled, and the node N<pump> goes "high" so that the voltage of the node N<bst> is boosted to a predetermined level (hereinafter referred to as "V.sub.bst "). Then, the control signal .phi.TRAN is enabled to a "high" state to supplement the charge Q.sub.cs consumed during the active cycle through charge sharing between the node N<bst> and the node N<V.sub.pp >. The items induced based on the above concept can be expressed as follows. EQU V.sub.bst =V.sub.cc +V.sub.cc .times.C0/(C0+C1).apprxeq.2V.sub.cc( 1) EQU V.sub.pp =V.sub.cc .times.2C0/(C0+C.sub.cs) (2) EQU Q.sub.sp =C0.times.(V.sub.bst -V.sub.pp) or C.sub.pp .times.(V.sub.pp -V.sub.cs).apprxeq.C0.times.(2V.sub.cc -V.sub.pp) (3) EQU Q.sub.cs =V.sub.pp .times.(C.sub.pp .times.C.sub.cs)/(C.sub.pp +C.sub.cs)-V.sub.cc .times.C.sub.cs /2.apprxeq.C.sub.cs .times.(V.sub.pp -V.sub.cc /2) (4)
wherein V.sub.bst represents the voltage level of the node N<bst>, V.sub.pp represents the voltage level of the node N<V.sub.pp >, Q.sub.sp represents supplied charge, and Q.sub.cs represents consumed charge, respectively.
Hereinafter, problems associated with the conventional active kicker shown in FIG. 1 will be described with reference to FIGS. 3 and 4.
FIG. 3 is a clamp curve of IVC and V.sub.pp with respect to the external power supply voltage EV.sub.cc. IVC represents the output voltage of an internal voltage converter, that is, an internal power supply voltage, and V.sub.pp, as a boosted voltage, represents the voltage of the node N<V.sub.pp > shown in FIG. 1. For comparison, FIG. 1 also shows V.sub.pp ' which represents the voltage of the node N<V.sub.pp > of an active kicker in accordance with the present invention which is described below with reference to of FIG. 5. However, for purposes of explaining the problems associated with the conventional active kicker, the following discussion will only refer to the signals associated with the circuit shown in FIG. 1.
Generally, the difference between IVC and V.sub.pp is optimally set to about 2.5 V which is lower than the target operational voltage of 3.0 V for low V.sub.cc margin. Assuming that the optimal difference between V.sub.pp and IVC is .DELTA.0 when IVC is increased from 2.5 V to 3.0 V, the difference A between the changed V.sub.pp and IVC (referred to as .DELTA.1) can be expressed as follows, based on the above-referenced formula (2): EQU V.sub.pp (3.0 V)-V.sub.pp (2.5 V)=2C0/(C0+C.sub.cs).times..DELTA.V.sub.cc .apprxeq.1.6.times..DELTA.V.sub.cc ( 5) EQU .DELTA.1-.DELTA.0=2C0/(C0+C.sub.cs)-1!.times..DELTA.V.sub.cc .apprxeq.0.6.times..DELTA.V.sub.cc ( 6)
As shown from the above formulas, since the change in V.sub.pp is greater than that of V.sub.cc, that is, IVC, e.g., greater than about 1.6 times .DELTA.V.sub.cc, V.sub.pp is greatly increased when IVC is necessarily increased to 5 V or higher as required in the case where a burn-in-mode for testing the reliability of the semiconductor memory device is required. As a result, severe stress applied to the device. In addition, the large amount of charge required to increase V.sub.pp results in excessive current consumption.
FIG. 4 is a conceptual curve of the supplied charge Q.sub.sp and the consumed charge Q.sub.cs according to the change in V.sub.pp. Solid lines are for the conventional active kicker shown in FIG. 1. For comparison, dashed lines illustrate the operation of an active kicker in accordance with the present invention which is described below with reference to of FIG. 5. However, for purposes of explaining the problems associated with the conventional active kicker, the following discussion will only refer to the curves associated with the circuit shown in FIG. 1.
Referring to FIG. 4, in view of the active kicker, it is desirable that Q.sub.sp and Q.sub.cs have the same value so that the X-axis value of a point where two curves intersect with each other is at an optimum V.sub.pp. The above-described problems of the conventional active kicker are apparent from FIG. 4, that is, as V.sub.cc increases, the optimum V.sub.pp is greatly increased.

Internal boosted voltage generator of semiconductor memory device


A power transistor having an epitaxial layer within an isolation region is formed in a semiconductor substrate. A buried diffusion within the substrate with vertical diffusions contacting it form the isolation region. A drain, source, gate, and drift region are formed within the epitaxial layer such that a RESURF LDMOS transistor is formed having its source isolated from the substrate. Multiple power transistors may share the buried isolation region. A P type semiconductor substrate allows the power transistor and high performance CMOS circuitry to be formed on the same semiconductor die.

In the field of power integrated circuits much work has been done in the development of power transistors. Advancements were made enabling LDMOS power transistors (Lateral Double-diffused MOS transistor) to exhibit low "on-resistance" (RDSon) and high breakdown capability concurrently through a reduced surface field (RESURF) technique (J. A. Appels and H. M. J. Vaes, "High Voltage Thin Layer Devices (RESURF Devices)", IEDM Tech. Dioest, pp. 238-241, 1979).
In the past, RESURF LDMOS transistors commonly were used in low side driver applications because the transistor structure couples the source to the substrate which in turn is coupled to ground. (A low side driver configuration consists of a transistor with its source coupled to ground and its drain coupled to an output load.) Therefore, RESURF LDMOS transistors were not utilized in high side driver applications and other applications that mandated electrical isolation between the source and substrate. (A high side driver configuration consists of the drain of a transistor coupled to circuitry or a power supply and the source coupled to an output load.)
It is an object of this invention to provide a high power integrated circuit device with electrical isolation between source and substrate. It is another object of this invention to provide a RESURF LDMOS transistor structure that enables multiple RESURF LDMOS transistors to be formed on a single semiconductor die and remain electrically isolated form one another. It is another object of this invention to provide a RESURF LDMOS transistor structure that is compatible with high performance CMOS circuitry.
Other objects and advantages of the invention will become apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art having reference to the following specification together with the drawings herein.

Isolated resurf LDMOS devices for multiple outputs on one die