Devices, systems, kits, and methods for detecting and/or identifying a plurality of spectrally labeled bodies well-suited for performing multiplexed assays. By spectrally labeling the beads with materials which generate identifiable spectra, a plurality of beads may be identified within the fluid. Reading of the beads is facilitated by restraining the beads in arrays, and/or using a focused laser.

The present invention generally provides devices, compositions of matter, kits, systems, and methods for detecting and identifying a plurality of spectrally labeled bodies. In a particular embodiment, the invention provides systems and methods for detecting and identifying a plurality of spectral codes generated by such bodies, especially for measuring the results of high-throughput bead-based assay systems, and the like. The invention will often use labeled beads which generate identifiable spectra that include a number of discreet signals having measurable characteristics, such as wavelength and/or intensity.
Tracking the locations and/or identities of a large number of items can be challenging in many settings. Barcode technology in general, and the Universal Product Code in particular, has provided huge benefits for tracking a variety of objects. Barcode technologies often use a linear array of elements printed either directly on an object or on labels which may be affixed to the object. These barcode elements often comprise bars and spaces, with the bars having varying widths to represent strings of binary ones, and the spaces between the bars having varying widths to represent strings of binary zeros.
Barcodes can be detected optically using devices such as scanning laser beams or handheld wands. Similar barcode schemes can be implemented in magnetic media. The scanning systems often electro-optically decode the label to determine multiple alphanumerical characters that are intended to be descriptive of (or otherwise identify) the article or its character. These barcodes are often presented in digital form as an input to a data processing system, for example, for use in point-of-sale processing, inventory control, and the like.
Barcode techniques such as the Universal Product Code have gained wide acceptance, and a variety of higher density alternatives also have been proposed. Unfortunately, these standard barcodes are often unsuitable for labeling many "libraries" or groupings of elements. For example, small items such as jewelry or minute electrical components may lack sufficient surface area for convenient attachment of the barcode. Similarly, emerging technologies such as combinatorial chemistry, genomics research, microfluidics, potential pharmaceutical screening, micromachines, and other nanoscale technologies do not appear well-suited for supporting known, relatively large-scale barcode labels. In many of these developing fields, it is often desirable to make use of large numbers of compounds within a fluid, and identifying and tracking the movements of such fluids using existing barcodes is particularly problematic. While a few chemical encoding systems for chemicals and fluids have been proposed, reliable and accurate labeling of large numbers of small and/or fluid elements remains a challenge.
Small scale and fluid labeling capabilities have recently advanced radically with the suggested application of semiconductor nanocrystals (also known as C-Dot™ particles), as detailed in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/397,432, the full disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference. Semiconductor nanocrystals are microscopic particles having size-dependent optical and/or electromagnetic emission properties. As the band gap energy of such semiconductor nanocrystals vary with a size, coating and/or material of the crystal, populations of these crystals can be produced having a variety of spectral emission characteristics. Furthermore, the intensity of the emission of a particular wavelength can be varied, thereby enabling the use of a variety of encoding schemes. A spectral label defined by a combination of semiconductor nanocrystals having differing emission signals can be identified from the characteristics of the spectrum emitted by the label when the semiconductor nanocrystals are energized.
A particularly promising application for semiconductor nanocrystals is in multiplexed and/or high-throughput assay systems. Multiplexed assay formats would be highly desirable for improved throughput capability, and to match the demands that combinatorial chemistry is putting on established discovery and validation systems for pharmaceuticals. For example, simultaneous elucidation of complex protein patterns may allow detection of rare events or conditions, such as cancer. In addition, the ever-expanding repertoire of genomic information would benefit from very efficient, parallel and inexpensive assay formats. Desirable multiplexed assay characteristics may include ease of use, reliability of results, a high-throughput format, and extremely fast and inexpensive assay development and execution.
A number of known assay formats may currently be employed for high-throughput testing. Each of these formats has limitations, however. By far the most dominant high-throughput technique is based on the separation of different assays into different regions of space. The 96-well plate format is the workhorse in this arena.
In 96-well plate assays, the individual wells (which are isolated from each other by walls) are often charged with different components, and the assay is performed and then the assay result in each well measured. The information about which assay is being run is carried with the well number or the position on the plate, and the result at the given position determines which assays are positive. These assays can be based on chemiluminescence, scintillation, fluorescence, scattering, or absorbance/colorimetric measurements, and the details of the detection scheme depend on the reaction being assayed.
Multi-well assays have been reduced in size to enhance throughput, for example, to accommodate 384 or 1536 wells per plate. Unfortunately, the fluid delivery and evaporation of the assay solution at this scale are significantly more confounding to the assays. High-throughput formats based on multi-well arraying often rely on complex robotics and fluid dispensing systems to function optimally. The dispensing of the appropriate solutions to the appropriate bins on the plate poses a challenge from both an efficiency and a contamination standpoint, and pains must be taken to optimize the fluidics for both properties. Furthermore, the throughput is ultimately limited by the number of wells that one can put adjacent on a plate, and the volume of each well. Arbitrarily small wells may have arbitrarily small volumes, resulting in a signal that scales with the volume, shrinking proportionally with the cube of the radius. Nonetheless the spatial isolation of each well, and thereby each assay, has been much more common than running multiple assays in a single well. Such single-well multiplexing techniques are not widely used, due in large part to the difficulty in "demultiplexing" or resolving the results of the different assays in a single well.
For even higher throughput genomic and genetic analysis techniques, positional array technology has been shrunk to microscopic scales, often using high-density oligonucleotide arrays. Over a 1-cm square of glass, tens to hundreds of thousands of different nucleotides can be written in, for example, 25-.mu.m spots, which are well resolved from each other. On this planar test structure or "chip," which is emblazoned with an alignment grid, a particular spot's x,y position determines which oligonucleotide is present at that spot. Typically 3′- or 5′-labeled amplified DNA is added to the array, hybridized and is then detected using fluorescence-based techniques. Although this is a very powerful technique for assaying a large number of genetic markers simultaneously, the cost is still very high, and the flexibility of this assay is limited.
Once the masks have been written for the photolithographic process that builds the particular DNA sequences into a particular location on the chip, they are fixed and the addition thereto of new markers comes at a very high price. The extremely small feature size, and the highly parallel assay format, comes at the cost of the flexibility inherent in a common platform system such as the 96-well plates. In addition, the assay is ultimately performed at the surface of the chip, and the results depend on the kinetics of the hybridization to the surface, a process that is negatively influenced by steric issues and diffusion issues. In fact, small microarray chips are not particularly suited to the detection of rare events, as the diffusion of the solution over the chip may not be sufficiently thorough. In order to perform the hybridizations to the microarray chips more efficiently, a dedicated fluidics workstation can be used to pump the solution over the surface of the chip repeatedly; such instruments add cost and time to execution of the assay.
The use of spectral barcodes holds great promise for enhancing the throughput of assays, as described in an application entitled "Semiconductor Nanocrystal Probes for Biological Applications and Process for Making and Using such Probes," U.S. application Ser. No. 09/259,982 filed Mar. 1, 1999, the full disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference. Multiplexed assays may be performed using a number of probes which include both a spectral label (often in the form of several semiconductor nanocrystals) and one or more moieties. The moieties may be capable of selectively bonding to one or more detectable substances within a sample fluid, while the spectral labels can be used to identify the probe within the fluid (and hence the associated moiety). As the individual probes can be quite small, and as the number of spectral codes which can be independently identified can be quite large, large numbers of individual assays might be performed within a single fluid sample by including a large number of differing probes. These probes may take the form of quite small beads, with each bead optionally including a spectral label, a moiety, and a bead body or matrix, often in the form of a polymer. The reaction times and rare event identification accuracy of such beads may be quite advantageous, particularly when the beads are free-floating within a fluid, without being affixed to a surface.
Together with their substantial advantages, there will be significant challenges in implementing multiplexed, spectrally encoded bead-based assay techniques. In particular, determining multiplexed assay results by accurately reading each spectral barcode and/or assay result from within a fluid may prove quite problematic.
In light of the above, it would generally be desirable to provide improved systems and methods for sensing and identifying signal generating bodies. It would be particularly beneficial if these improved techniques facilitated the identification of a plurality of spectral codes generated by bodies disposed within and/or exposed to a fluid. To take advantage of the potential capabilities of spectral coding of multiplexed assay probes, it would be highly desirable if these enhanced techniques allowed detection and/or identification of large numbers of spectral codes and/or other signals in a repeatably, highly time efficient manner, while providing improved flexibility, ease of use, rare event/condition detection, and/or accuracy.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Spatial positioning of spectrally labeled beads


A surgical handpiece driver having a pumping chamber. The pumping chamber works by boiling a small volume of a fluid. As the fluid boils, it expands rapidly, thereby propelling a piston down the length of the pumping chamber. The piston may be attached to the operative shaft or rod of a surgical probe and produce reciprocal motion. Alternatively, the piston may be attached to a cam or gear to product rotary motion.

This invention relates generally to the field of ophthalmic surgery and more particularly to a pumping chamber for use with a surgical handpiece.
During many surgical procedures, particularly microsurgical procedures such as ophthalmic surgery, small mechanical devices or probes are inserted into the surgical field. These different probes have a variety of functions. For example, small scissors are often to used to cut fibrous tissue. Guillotine-type or rotary cutters are used to remove the vitreous from the posterior chamber of an eye or for opening the anterior capsule for cataract surgery. Prior to the present invention, these devices have all used pneumatic or electric drivers. Pneumatic drivers use air pressure pulses to force a plunger against a spring. When the pressure pulse decays, the spring forces the plunger back to its original starting point, thereby imparting reciprocal motion to the plunger. With these types of surgical systems, the pressure pulse is generated in the control console and can travel as far as two meters down the connecting pneumatic tubing before entering the probe. Compliance in the tubing causes degradation of the pressure pulse. Electrical drivers contain miniature electrical motors that can be heavy and relatively expensive, making them less desirable for disposable probes.
Therefore, a need continues to exist for a handpiece driver that is lighter, less expensive than the prior art drivers and that delivers sharp, consistent drive pulses, with faster cut rates and/or rise time.


A pump apparatus includes a pump chamber having a fluid inlet and a fluid outlet and a flexible impeller mounted for rotation within the pump chamber. The flexible impeller includes a plurality of radially extending vanes to contact a curved wall of the pump chamber, such that separate pump cavities are defined between adjacent vanes and the pump chamber wall. The fluid inlet and the fluid outlet are defined in the second end wall so that the curved pump chamber wall is uninterrupted.

Pumps for pumping relatively viscous liquids tend to require multiple bearings and dynamic seals for the drive shaft of the pump. These can wear relatively quickly, typically requiring the pump to be replaced. In addition, these additional components add to the complexity and cost of the pump.
It is desired to provide a pump which has a simpler design that requires fewer components.


An object of the present invention is to minimize the torsional vibration caused on the shafting of the wind turbine genarator system so as to operate the windmill stably.

A conventional wind turbine generator system according to a prior art has been as follows. A windmill is connected to a synchronous generator and power is generated as the windmill is rotated by wind energy and so the synchronous generator is driven by the windmill. The alternating current power generated by the synchronous generator is converted into direct current power by a converter and further converted into the commercial-frequency alternating current power by an inverter, and then supplied to an electric power system. A wind turbine genarator system having the above construction has been disclosed, for example, in the Patent Document 1.
[Patent Document 1]
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 2003-120504.

Abstract: A wind turbine genarator system according to the present invention, equipped with a synchronous generator connected to the shaft of a windmill, converter connected to the stator of the synchronous generator, and inverter connected to the converter and also to an electric power system, extracts the torsional vibration component of the shafting between the windmill and synchronous generator from the detected rotation speed of the synchronous generator, regulates the active component of the current command to the converter according to the vibration component, and controls so as to minimize the rotation speed variation of the synchronous generator.


Provided are certain amino triiodosilanes useful as silicon precursor compounds for the vapor deposition of silicon species onto the surfaces of microelectronic devices. In this regard, such precursors can be utilized, along with optional co-reactants, to deposit silicon-containing films such as silicon nitride, silicon oxide, silicon oxynitride, SiOCN, SiCN, and silicon carbide. The silicon precursors of the invention are free of Si—H bonds. Also provided is a process for preparing such silicon precursor compounds by the displacement of a halogen from tetrahalosilane compounds with secondary amines.

Low temperature deposition of silicon-based thin-films is of fundamental importance to current semiconductor device fabrication and processes. For the last several decades, SiO2 thin films have been utilized as essential structural components of integrated circuits (ICs), including microprocessor, logic and memory based devices. SiO2 has been a predominant material in the semiconductor industry and has been employed as an insulating dielectric material for virtually all silicon-based devices that have been commercialized. SiO2 has been used as an interconnect dielectric, a capacitor and a gate dielectric material over the years.
The conventional industry approach for depositing high-purity SiO2 films has been to utilize tetraethylorthosilicate (TEOS) as a thin-film precursor for vapor deposition of such films. TEOS is a stable, liquid material that has been employed as a silicon source reagent in chemical vapor deposition (CVD), plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) and atomic layer deposition (ALD), to achieve high-purity thin-films of SiO2. Other thin-film deposition methods (e.g., focused ion beam, electron beam and other energetic means for forming thin-films) can also be carried out with this silicon source reagent.
As integrated circuit device dimensions continually decrease, with corresponding advances in lithography scaling methods and shrinkage of device geometries, new deposition materials and processes are correspondingly being sought for forming high integrity SiO2 thin films. Improved silicon-based precursors (and co-reactants) are desired to form SiO2 films, as well as other silicon-containing thin films, e.g., Si3N4, SiC, and doped SiOx high k thin films, that can be deposited at low temperatures, such as temperatures below 400° C. and below 200° C. To achieve these low deposition temperatures, chemical precursors are required to decompose cleanly to yield the desired films.
The achievement of low temperature films also requires the use and development of deposition processes that ensure the formation of homogeneous conformal silicon-containing films. Chemical vapor deposition (CVD) and atomic layer deposition (ALD) processes are therefore being refined and implemented, concurrently with the ongoing search for reactive precursor compounds that are stable in handling, vaporization and transport to the reactor, but exhibit the ability to decompose cleanly at low temperatures to form the desired thin films. The fundamental challenge in this effort is to achieve a balance of precursor thermal stability and precursor suitability for high-purity, low temperature film growth processes, while maintaining the desired electronic and mechanical properties of the films thus produced.


A fixing solution for fixing toner to a recording medium, includes aliphatic ester held by solvent in a soluble manner, and having solubility or swelling property with respect to resin included in the toner.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a fixing solution, a capsule structure, a fixing method, a fixing device and an image forming apparatus, and, in particular, to a fixing solution, a capsule structure, a fixing method, a fixing device and an image forming apparatus, applying a fixing solution which is provided to toner so as to cause the toner to dissolve or swell, for fixing it to a recording medium.
2. Description of the Related Art
An image forming apparatus applied in a printer, a facsimile apparatus, a copier or such records an image such as characters, symbols or such on a recording medium such as paper, cloth, OHP sheet or such, based on given image information.
There are various types of such recording apparatuses. Thereamong, an electrophotographic type image forming apparatus has been widely applied for an office use since a high definition image can be rapidly recorded on ordinary paper thereby. For this type of image forming apparatus, a thermal fixing type has spread widely for fixing an image to a recording medium in terms of a fixing speed, a fixing image quality and so forth. According to the thermal fixing type, a toner on a recording medium is heated, melted and pressed, for fixing it to the recording medium. However, when the thermal fixing type is applied in the electrophotographic type of image forming apparatus, more than half of power consumption is consumed for heating a toner. In an environmental view point, a fixing device requiring a reduced power consumption is demanded.
Therefor, a wet-type fixing method of fixing a toner in such a manner that the toner is dissolved or swelled by a fixing solution, and is dried, has been proposed (see Japanese Laid-open Patent Application No. 59-119364, Japanese Patent Publication No. 3-45830, Japanese Patent No. 3290513 and Japanese Laid-open Patent Application No. 2000-122391, disclosing image forming apparatuses applying the wet-type fixing method). According to this method, heating processing required in the above-mentioned thermal fixing type, for dissolving a toner, is not required. Accordingly, this method is superior in a power saving viewpoint since a power consumption can be reduced. Further, since a worming up time, required in the thermal fixing type, is not required in the wet-type fixing method, quick starting is made possible.
However, in the wet-type fixing method, when fixing substance dissolving or swelling a toner is not uniformly included in a fixing solution, unevenness occurs in a contacting state between the toner and the fixing substance, penetration of the fixing substance in the toner delays, and thus, a fixing speed may degrade. Further, the fixing substance for dissolving or swelling a toner or a detergent is applied to mix the fixing substance in the fixing solution, odor may be generated therefrom. Accordingly, when fixing processing in this fixing method is carried out for a large quantity of printed matters, a user may have an unpleasant feeling thereby. As a result, an image forming apparatus applying the wet-type fixing method may not be suitable to be set in an office, a house or such, in which humans stay.

Fixing solution, capsule structure, fixing method, fixing device and image forming apparatus


A method, wireless receiver, and wireless communication system manage error correction of received wirelessly transmitted messages. A High Level network layer component identifies unique values within a message type associated with a communication link. The High Level network layer component determines a message signature associated with the message type. Decoding rules associated with the message type are generated by the High Level network layer component. The decoding rules include a set of acceptable/unacceptable errors associated with the message type. The decoding rules are sent via the High Level network layer component, to a component at a network layer that is lower than the High Level network layer component. The Low Level network layer component decodes, based on the decoding rules, at least a portion of a wirelessly transmitted message that has been received.

Wireless communication systems utilize error correction techniques to overcome corrupted transmissions. However, many of these techniques unnecessarily request retransmissions of corrupted messages. For example, conventional error correction techniques require every bit to be received correctly even if the importance of a bit is minimal. Requesting retransmissions in these situations wastes valuable bandwidth.
Therefore a need exists to overcome the problems with the prior art as discussed above.

Error correction management based on message type determination


A rotary electric machine is provided, which includes a rotor core, a plurality of permanent magnets embedded in the rotor core, and a stator core arranged so as to oppose to the rotor core. The plurality of permanent magnets include a pair of first permanent magnets. The pair of first permanent magnets are arranged so that first magnetic poles thereof having the same polarity oppose to each other and are separated from each other on both sides of a magnetic path of d-axis by a predetermined distance. The rotor core includes gaps formed within the magnetic path of the d-axis.

Conventionally, rotary electric machines in which permanent magnets are embedded in a rotor core thereof are known. For example, JP2001-069735A discloses such a rotary electric machine.
JP2001-069735A discloses the rotary electric machine including a rotor core, a plurality of permanent magnets embedded in the rotor core, and a stator core arranged so as to oppose to the rotor core. In such a rotary electric machine, the plurality of permanent magnets are arranged so that a magnet magnetic field axis and d-axis electrically intersect perpendicular to each other, and generate torque which is mainly comprised of a reluctance torque component by canceling a armature magnetic flux of q-axis by the magnet magnetic flux to increase a difference between the armature magnetic flux of the q-axis and the d-axis.


A band-pass filter written into an optical waveguide includes at least one Bragg grating creating coupling between two propagation modes. In one version the pitch of the grating is equal to the length of beating of these two modes, to create codirectional coupling for the LP01 and LP0i modes. In another version the grating couples the LP01 mode to any contradirectional radiation mode. The filter includes, at one point at least of the grating, an area in which one half-period of the grating is omitted to create a phase-shift of .pi. between the two coupled modes.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention concerns a band-pass filter written in an optical waveguide, which can be an optical fiber, a guide integrated into a semiconductor optical component or into the silica.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The formation of a filter in a waveguide is known in the prior art and consists in writing a Bragg grating into the guide. The prior art proposes various techniques for writing a grating of this kind into an optical fiber as disclosed in patents U.S. Pat. No. 4,474,427, U.S. Pat. No. 4,725,110, U.S. Pat. No. 5,104,209 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,367,588. Each technique is based on localized modification of the refractive index obtained by exposing the core of a fiber, typically doped with germanium, to spatially modulated ultraviolet light. An optical filter using a Bragg grating of this kind has a reflection spectrum with a peak centered on a wavelength called the Bragg wavelength. In transmission, a filter of this kind has a rejection band corresponding to the reflection peak.
The article "Long-period fiber gratings as band-rejection filters" by A. M. VENGSARKAR et al., published in OFC'95, PD4 (1995), describes a band-rejection optical filter in the form of a long-pitch Bragg grating (the pitch is in the order of one hundred .mu.m) written in an optical fiber from which the coating is locally removed. The pitch of the grating is chosen so that the fundamental mode guided in the core of the fiber is coupled at a given wavelength to a cladding mode which is then rapidly attenuated as it propagates in the cladding, because of losses at the cladding-coating interface.
French patent application n.degree. 95 14434 describes a band-pass optical filter written into a waveguide that has three Bragg grating portions and two intermediate areas. Each portion has a Bragg wavelength equal to the pass-band wavelength .lambda.p. The Bragg grating has a short pitch that produces contradirectional coupling between the go mode and the return mode of the fundamental mode. Each intermediate area creates a phase-shift of .pi. between these two propagation modes.
In some applications this filter does not procure a sufficiently wide rejection band on either side of the pass-band. Further, it has the drawback of necessitating an optical isolator on its upstream side to block propagation of the contradirectional mode.
French patent application n.degree. 96 02620 describes a band-pass filter formed by writing at least two long-pitch Bragg gratings into an optical fiber. The optical fiber is tapered to define two substantially adiabatic transition areas delimiting an intermediate area. A first long pitch Bragg grating is written in the intermediate area. A second long pitch Bragg grating is written in the transition area on the side receiving an optical signal. The effective index of the fiber in this area decreases along this transition area. The presence of the second grating in this area leads to coupling between the LP01 and LP02 modes over a large bandwidth and this results in rejection over a large bandwidth. The first grating produces codirectional coupling between the LP01 and LP02 modes at a wavelength which is a function of the pitch of the first grating. It produces an LP01 mode signal that conveys the power of the incoming optical signal for the wavelengths of coupling between the two modes by this first grating and an LP02 mode signal that is attenuated by leakage at the cladding-coating interface. This results in rejection over a very wide band, except for the band defined by the first grating. The combination of the two gratings therefore constitutes a band-pass filter.
The fabrication of this prior art filter has the drawback of necessitating the writing of two gratings instead of one.
The aim of the invention is to propose a band-pass filter that does not have the drawbacks of the prior art filters.

Band-pass filter in an optical waveguide

Alcatel Alsthom Compagnie Generale d'Electricite


A lens shading compensation coefficient compression device includes: a first differential block suitable for calculating a lens shading compensation coefficient between color channels and removing redundancy between the color channels; a second differential block suitable for calculating a lens shading compensation coefficient within color channels and removing redundancy within the color channels; and an entropy coding block suitable for performing entropy coding on remaining lens shading compensation coefficients and compressing the lens shading compensation coefficients.

1. Field
Various embodiments of the present invention relate to a lens shading compensation coefficient compression/decompression device and a method for compressing/decompressing lens shading compensation coefficients of a Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) Image Sensor (CIS). More particularly, to a lens shading compensation coefficient compression/decompression device and a method for compressing/decompressing lens shading compensation coefficients by using a lens shading compensation coefficient compression scheme and entropy coding between and within color channels.
2. Description of the Related Art
Since Lens Shading Compensation Coefficient (LSCC) having a one-dimensional (1D) structure is generally used for Lens Shading Compensation (LSC) of a Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor (CMOS) Image Sensor (CIS), the amount of data used in the LSCC is small. Thus, data compression is not required.
As the CIS is improved from lower resolutions to higher resolutions, more detailed and accurate LSC is necessary. However, the typical solution simply changes the LSCC to a two-dimensional (2D) structure, having an increased amount of data, and stores the LSCC.
Since the typical LSC method uses more data, the non-volatile memory capacity required and the chip area it occupies also increase. Therefore, it is a goal of the semiconductor industry to find ways to efficiently implement the CIS, reducing the amount of information that needs to be stored and minimizing the area required for storage space.

Device and method for compressing/decompressing lens shading compensation coefficient


A rigid conduit has a hard plastic exterior surface and electrical metallic tubing as the interior surface. The hard plastic exterior forms a smooth male fitting at one end of the conduit and a smooth female fitting at the other end of the conduit. Chemical solvent adhesives join together adjacent conduit sections, the hard plastic male and female fittings fusing together. The interior surface of electrical metallic tubing protects the exterior hard plastic material from damage caused during cabling of the electrical raceways. The exterior hard plastic protects the rigid conduit from corrosive environments, such as underground installations.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to electrical conduits and raceways and, more particularly, to such conduits and raceways as are resistant to physical damage. More specifically, the present invention relates to electrical conduits and raceways having a metal lining and an outer layer of PVC or like plastics.
2. Description of the Related Art
Underground installations of electrical raceways, conduit or duct banks for current carrying conductors are designed to be waterproof and corrosion proof. The majority are now fabricated out of PVC (Polyvinylchloride), and used to construct direct burial raceways that can run horizontal or vertical. When a change of course is required, bends are used to go left or right for horizontal runs and bends permit a change in direction of up and down for vertical runs.
Electricians are bound by the National Electrical Code to insure the safety and quality of electrical installations, with the Code offered for use in law and for regulatory purposes in the interest of life and property protection. As provided in ARTICLE 300.5 (4) ENCLOSURE OR RACEWAY DAMAGE, where the enclosure or raceway is susceptible to being physically damaged, the conductors shall be installed in one of the following: rigid metal conduit; intermediate conduit; Schedule 80 rigid nonmetallic conduit; or an equivalent.
Another set of requirements is present where it is anticipated that pull string will be used to pull rope through the raceway for wire pulls. In such environments, the materials used to fabricate the conduit must prevent the string or rope from cutting or burning through the interior radius of the bends. Openings resulting from such internal radius failure will expose the current conductors to water and corrosive elements outside of the raceway, as well as adversely impact the pulling process.
Overhead or exposed raceways are not subjected to the harsh environment of underground installations, permitting the use of Electrical Metallic Tubing (EMT), which has thinner walls than the rigid conduit used to construct all bends used in underground applications. Of course, the EMT walls in above-ground installations also must be sufficiently thick to permit wire pulls without encountering inner radius failure. Structurally suitable for such above ground applications, EMT is more cost effective than its underground counterpart: the thicker-walled, Galvanized Steel Rigid bends.


An apparatus for controlling the engine brake of a motor vehicle, adapted to control the intake air quantity of the engine so as to maintain the actual vehicle speed at a desired speed. The apparatus includes a device for avoiding acceleration of the vehicle during running on a downhill with the accelerator pedal released, and a device to permit deceleration of the vehicle during the subsequent running on an uphill road. The apparatus may include a device for increasing the engine brake force when the brake pedal is depressed, by fully closing the throttle valve and/or shifting down the transmission, to assure sufficient engine braking effect upon depression of the brake pedal on a downhill. The apparatus may include a device for updating the desired vehicle speed when the actual speed is lowered by depression of the brake pedal, to prevent acceleration of the vehicle after the brake pedal is released at the end of a downhill. The desired vehicle speed may be updated when the difference between the initially determined desired speed and the actual speed exceeds a given limit, or when the brake pedal is released.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to an apparatus for controlling an engine brake force of a vehicle equipped with an automatic transmission, and more particularly to such an engine brake force control apparatus capable of increasing the engine brake force when the vehicle is accelerated on a downhill with the accelerator pedal released, and/or controlling the engine brake force when the brake pedal is depressed after the accelerator pedal is released during running on a downhill.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
Generally, an automatic transmission of a motor vehicle is controlled so that the speed ratio of the transmission is changed in steps or continuously on the basis of the operating amount of the accelerator pedal and the opening of the throttle valve of the engine. An example of a shift pattern data map for shifting the automatic transmission having four forward-drive gear positions is illustrated in FIG. 9. This data map indicates shift-up and shift-down boundaries which are relationships between the operating amount of the accelerator pedal and the throttle opening. The solid lines in FIG. 9 show the shift-up boundaries, while the broken lines show the shift-down boundaries. According to this shift pattern data map, the transmission is shifted up depending upon the vehicle running speed, even when the operating amount of the accelerator pedal is zero, that is, when the accelerator pedal is in the released position. Therefore, the transmission may be shifted up when the driver releases the accelerator pedal during running of the vehicle on a downhill and the vehicle speed rises without a sufficient engine brake force applied. This shift-up action of the transmission further reduces the engine brake force, and tends to accelerate the vehicle. To solve this problem, the assignee of the present application proposed an engine brake force control apparatus as disclosed in Japanese Patent Application No. 3-352773 which has not been laid open at the time the present invention was made. In the proposed apparatus, the actual vehicle speed at the time the accelerator pedal is released by the driver to avoid acceleration of the vehicle is used as the desired vehicle speed, and the throttle opening is reduced to control the engine brake force such that the actual vehicle speed will not exceed the desired speed.
It was found, however, that the mere controlling the engine brake force for the vehicle speed not to exceed the desired speed may suffer from reduction of the vehicle speed unexpected to the vehicle driver, due to an excessive engine brake force, when the gradient of the downhill road is reduced. To avoid this phenomenon, the engine brake force should be controlled by increasing or decreasing the throttle opening so that the actual vehicle speed is made equal to the desired speed.
In the proposed control apparatus described above, the throttle opening is controlled to maintain the actual vehicle speed at or near the desired speed, even when the road gradient is changed from a downhill to an uphill. Usually, the driver expects some deceleration of the vehicle after the vehicle begins to run on the uphill. However, the above arrangement maintains the vehicle speed at the constant desired level, unexpectedly to the driver. That is, the driver expects that the acceleration of the vehicle is prevented or restricted by an engine brake force applied thereto when the accelerator pedal is released during running on a downhill, and also expects that the vehicle is decelerated on an uphill, but does not expect constant-speed running of the vehicle during the uphill running as achieved by an automatic cruising device.
The proposed control apparatus also suffers from a problem that when the driver depresses the brake pedal to further decelerate the vehicle after the accelerator pedal is released. In this case, the engine brake force will not be increased after the actual vehicle speed is lowered down to the desired speed, whereas the driver's desire to decelerate the vehicle is still large. Accordingly, the driver has to rely on the brake force produced by the brake pedal depressed by the driver. Thus, the initial depression of the brake pedal eventually requires an increased depressing force acting on the brake pedal, due to an insufficient engine braking effect during running of the vehicle with the accelerator pedal released. In some case, the engine produces a forward drive force, with no engine brake applied to the vehicle.
The proposed control apparatus further suffers from a problem that when the driver releases the brake pedal after the vehicle speed is lowered to a level desired by the driver, the engine brake force may not be sufficient, result in the vehicle speed rising back to the desired speed at the time the accelerator pedal was released. For example, when the driver depresses the brake pedal to decelerate the vehicle during running on a straight downhill and releases the brake pedal shortly before the lower end of the downhill which precedes a curve, the vehicle will be accelerate during the subsequent running along the curve, requiring the driver to again depress the brake pedal. Thus, the proposed apparatus is not satisfactory in terms of the ease of control of the vehicle equipped with an automatic transmission.

Apparatus for controlling engine brake force during vehicle running on downhill with released accelerator


A relay rack enclosure includes a top cover and bottom cover each of which has end walls which are detachably locked together. The locking structure includes a resiliently mounted cantilevered pawl having a locking tooth which is provided on one of the end walls for detachable engagement in a slot on the abutting end wall of the other cover. A panel is mounted to the covers by tabs in the covers fitting into slots in perpendicular extensions of the panel.

Various electronic components, such as printed circuits are mounted in enclosures which in turn are secured to rails of relay rack cabinets. Ideally, such enclosures should be easy to assemble with the electronic components therein and when necessary easy to disassemble. Conventionally, various types of fasteners, such as threaded fasteners are used to mount the top and bottom covers together. Once the enclosure is assembled it should also be easy to mount the enclosure in a reliable manner in the cabinet rack and similarly it should be easy to remove the enclosure. Such enclosure preferably should be shallow so that a large number of enclosures could be mounted in a single cabinet. Ideally such enclosures should also be inexpensive to make without detracting from their reliability.


Systems and techniques are disclosed for generating weighted machine learned models using multi-shard combiners. A learner in a machine learning system may receive labeled positive and negative examples and workers within the learner may be configured to receive either positive or negative examples. A positive and negative statistic may be calculated for a given feature and may either be applied separately in a model or may be combined to generate an overall statistic.

Conducting regression analysis based on a very large dataset may require an undesirably large number of resources. Regression analysis may correspond to a statistical process for estimating the relationships among variables. It may be used to predict or forecast a given action or event and may be based on analyzing historical or test data containing variables that contribute to the prediction and forecasting. Similarly, ranking content based on a very large dataset may also require an undesirably large number of resources.

Using specialized workers to improve performance in machine learning


Methods, systems, and apparatus make a determination of a level of integrity of a sample of biomolecules. For example, the determination of the integrity of RNA in a sample may be done in a fast and reproducible manner, such that the user can be assured of accuracy of a test (e.g. quantitative polymerase chain reaction qPCR) on the sample and compare results of different samples. The determination of integrity of an RNA sample is performed by comparing a size profile to reference size profiles (degradation standards) obtained from degradation over different lengths of times. As the reference scale of the level of integrity is derived from the actual degradation that occurs in a sample, high accuracy, reproducibility, and efficiency is provided.

This invention generally relates to electrophoresis systems, and more particularly to using an electrophoresis system to determine an integrity of the biomolecules in a sample.
Gene expression analysis is essential to an understanding of molecular processes involved in health and disease. The ability to accurately quantitate steady-state levels of RNA is critical for studying molecular mechanisms of gene expression regulation. RNA quantitation techniques (such as northern blots, DNA microarrays, and real-time quantitative PCR) rely on the use of not only pure, but also intact RNA (i.e. RNA of high integrity). High-throughput gene expression analysis requires rapid, reliable, and standardized evaluation of RNA integrity. Yet, the methods to accurately and objectively evaluate the integrity of RNA molecules, prior to embarking on time-consuming, labor intensive, and costly projects, are limited.
Spectrophotometric methods to evaluate RNA concentrations and purity are well established and widely used. Absorbance at 260 nm (A260) gives an accurate measure of RNA concentration, and the ratio A260/A280 is an accepted indicator of the purity of an RNA preparation with respect to protein or phenol contaminations. However, these methods by themselves may give misleading results because they do not give any information on DNA contamination, the degradation state, or integrity of the sample. While RNA concentration and quality are important parameters for successful downstream applications, RNA integrity is of utmost importance when applications involve RNA quantitation for gene expression studies such as quantitative real-time RT-PCR and cDNA microarrays. Using partially degraded RNA from various states of degradation will lead to varying and incorrect quantitation results, both in microarray experiments and real-time PCR experiments.
The traditional method for assessing the integrity of an RNA sample is by visual inspection after electrophoresis on a formaldehyde agarose gel in the presence of a fluorescent dye (or other luminescent agent), such as ethidium bromide. Observation of two sharp bands, one each for the large and small subunit ribosomal RNAs (rRNAs), with the intensity of the larger band being about twice that of the smaller band, is indicative of intact RNA. While this method is relatively quick and inexpensive, interpretation of the data requires a fair amount of experience, and is still prone to inconsistencies.
Another limitation of this technique using a formaldehyde agarose gel is a requirement of on the order of 200 nanograms (ng) of RNA to make an accurate assessment of its integrity. However, when RNAs are extracted from tissues (such as biopsies) that are available in very limited quantities, agarose gel analysis may not be possible.
A major improvement in RNA analysis occurred with the introduction of microfluidics-based electrophoresis systems that require as little as 100 pg of RNA to produce an electropherogram displaying two distinctive peaks of rRNAs. The digital data composing the electropherogram can be used for a series of computer-based analyses. For example, RNA integrity can be evaluated and quantitated automatically by comparing the area of the peaks corresponding to the rRNAs. In theory, a 28S/18S rRNA ratio close to 2 should be indicative of intact RNA. However, in reality, the rRNA ratio may not be very reliable, e.g., because the peak area measurements are dependent on the chosen start and end points of the peaks.
Because of the limited utility of and reproducibility of rRNA ratios to assess RNA integrity, an existing method (Schroeder et al. US 2006/0246577) attempts to provide a standardized scale for determining RNA integrity. This method obtains a very large number of electropherograms and has trained experts assign a RNA integrity number (RIN). A neural network then determines the features (8 total) of an electropherogram that correspond to certain RIN values. This method can take quite a long time to prepare, e.g., due to the very large number of electropherograms required, the need for evaluation by trained experts, and the computational demands of the neural network. Additionally, this method can provide inaccuracies (inconsistencies) for the researcher, e.g., due to variances in the expert-assigned numbers and varied samples used.
Therefore, it is desirable to have improved methods for determining an integrity of a sample of RNA or other biomolecules.


A method and system for communicating an event message between at least one client operatively connected to a peripheral device, the peripheral device being adapted to execute an event when selected by a user or a client. The method includes maintaining a table of event descriptors in the peripheral device, selectively adding entries to the table in response to receiving a preselected add event descriptor request from a connected client, selectively deleting entries from the table in response to receiving a preselected delete event descriptor request from a connected client, and the user selecting an entry from said table of event descriptors for executing the selected event.

The present invention generally relates to a method for communicating an event message between one or more client computers operatively connected to a peripheral device, and more particularly to a method for adapting the peripheral device to execute an event when selected by a client computer or a user.
It is common for a number of client computers to be connected to more than one peripheral, such as a printer and/or a scanner. This arrangement allows a number of client computers to share the services of the printer and/or the scanner. Such client computers can be personal computers or other computers and will be referred to herein simply as a client. It is becoming more popular to use a multifunction peripheral (MFP) to combine the functions of these peripherals into a single peripheral. As a result, the use of the MFP devices are becoming more sophisticated, creating the need for more efficient communications between the MFP device and the clients.
One prior method of input peripheral event communication involved polling and sending simple button press notifications. However, polling was inefficient because it used the communication bandwidth constantly rather than only when needed. There was also a tradeoff between responsiveness and increased bandwidth use because a prompt response to the user would require frequent polling, which made other communication, such as scanning or printing, take longer.
Another approach has involved adapting the input peripheral to allow the user to select the destination, and then sending the input data directly to that client computer. Another problem involved with this approach was that the client computer often needed to perform various setup steps before it was ready to receive the data. Furthermore, it often needed additional user input to route the data to the desired destination. Although the input could be performed at the client computer, the user was still required to input data in two different places. Alternatively, the input could be performed at the peripheral, but this required the peripheral to know all possible actions that the client computer might want to take with the data, which made it very difficult to add new functions to client computer software because of the necessity to change the peripheral at the same time.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide an improved method for more efficient communications of an event message between a peripheral device and a client connected to the network.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide an improved method in which the user is able to complete the entire input task at the peripheral device.
The present invention provides a method for communicating an event message between one or more clients operatively connected to a peripheral device, and more particularly to a method for adapting the peripheral device to execute an event selected by a client or a user. The user can complete the entire input task at the peripheral device.
In accordance with this invention, there is provided a method for maintaining a table of event descriptors in the peripheral device, selectively adding entries to the table in response to receiving a preselected add event descriptor request from a connected client, selectively deleting entries from the table in response to receiving a preselected delete event descriptor request from a connected client, and consisting of a user selecting an entry from said table of event descriptors for executing the selected event.

Method and system for communicating event messages between a peripheral device and a client computer


A gun locking and unlocking device, which may be configured to be disposed on or in a gun to alternatively prevent or enable firing, includes a data receiver, a data memory and a logic device for determining whether security data received by the receiver is the same, or substantially the saris, as data stored in the data memory. One or more separate electronic gun key devices are provided to transmit security data and gun control signals to the data receiver of the gun lock device. The logic device responds to the gun control signals transmitted by one of the gun key devices to lock or unlock the gun, respectively, when the received security data and the security data stored in memory are substantially similar. The logic device also automatically locks the gun when the gun is located more than a prescribed distance from the gun key device.

The present invention relates to a system for locking and unlocking a gun, such as a pistol or rifle, to prevent a person from firing an unlocked gun when he or she has not been authorized by the gun owner to do so.
The aforementioned U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/763,951, filed Feb. 11, 2013 (now U.S. Pat. No. 8,893,420) discloses a gun lock system which uses a "smartphone," such as an Apple "iPhone," with a suitable application ("phone app") as an "electronic key" to unlock a gun. The smartphone transmits biologic identification ("BioID") data about a person to an electronic lock on or in the gun which, in turn, matches it with pre-stored data and unlocks the gun if a proper match is found. This system allows only the gun owner (or some other person who is licensed or otherwise authorized), who has originally supplied their BioID data to the gun lock for storage, to use the gun. The system is difficult to compromise and yet allows the gun to be unlocked by any smartphone that can collect BioID data and transmit it to the gun. This system avoids the problem of unlocking a gun when the user's smartphone has been lost, stolen or broken or has been replaced by a new one, because any smartphone with a suitable app may be used as the electronic key.
With this system, as with any system for locking a gun for security purposes, the gun may be operated and fired by an unauthorized person once it has been unlocked by an authorized person. As an example, an unauthorized person might grab an unlocked gun away from the gun owner and use it against him or her in a hostile situation such as a burglary. It would be desirable in such situations to prevent a previously unlocked gun from firing.

Secure smartphone-operated gun lock with means for overriding release of the lock


Methods for finding patterns in symbol sequences and a computer readable medium having instructions for performing the methods. Symbol patterns common to each 2-tuple of sequences are represented by a position index numerical array (PINA) or a position index binary array (PIBA). A PINA is a set of position indices each denoting the location in a reference sequence where each symbol in the pattern occurs. A PIBA is a set of bits. Each bit corresponding to a symbol in the identified pattern has a first value. Patterns are combined using the PIBA representations of one tuple taken with the PINA representations of the other tuple. Arrays representing patterns in one tuple are interrogated by a PINA representing each pattern in the other tuple and those places having the first value are identified. The symbols in the reference sequence corresponding to the identified places in the PIBA define the pattern.

Prior art methods of discovering patterns of symbols in a family of symbol sequences are computationally intensive. The computational intensity is dependent upon the lengths of the sequences (i.e., number of symbols in each sequence) and the size of the alphabet (i.e., the number of distinct symbols found in each sequence). Running time (i.e., the number of computational steps required) for the prior art methods tends to increase in proportion to the product of the lengths of the sequences and decrease in proportion to the alphabet size.
Patterns that occur in (i.e., are common to) "q" number of sequences in a family of "k" sequences are said to have q "levels of support". For example, patterns that are common to two sequences are said to have a level of support of two. Patterns that are common to a greater number of sequences in a family are said to have a greater level of support. Patterns with greater levels of support are usually more descriptive of so-called "features", or properties, of the underlying system. In biology, for example, these features characterize chemical or physical properties of proteins or nucleic acids.
The method of published United States Patent Application 2003-0220771-A1, Vaidyanathan el al., assigned to the assignee of the present invention, discovers patterns in two or more sequences. The method of this application first discovers patterns of symbols in pairs of sequences, then finds patterns of symbols at increasingly higher levels of support based upon the patterns found in the pairs. The identity of the symbols in the patterns is retained throughout the practice of this method, and all calculations are done with the alphabet of those symbols. Retaining the symbol identity may detract from the efficiency of the method.
In view of the foregoing it is believed advantageous to be able to discover patterns common to two or more sequences in a family of sequences in a more computer-efficient manner.

Pattern discovery using PINA and PIBA arrays


A system for producing high and ultra high purity nitrogen comprising a first column for the production of nitrogen and a second column having a top condenser wherein boil off from the second column top condenser is turboexpanded to generate refrigeration for the system.

This invention relates generally to the cryogenic rectification of feed air and, more particularly, to the cryogenic rectification of feed air to produce high purity nitrogen and even ultra high purity nitrogen.
High and ultra high purity nitrogen is used extensively in the manufacture of high value components such as semiconductors where freedom from contamination by oxygen is critical to the manufacturing process. High purity nitrogen is generally produced in large quantities by the cryogenic rectification of feed air using a single column plant or a double column plant. The production of high purity nitrogen is energy intensive and any system which can produce high purity nitrogen with lower power requirements than heretofore available systems would be highly desirable.
Accordingly it is an object of this invention to provide a system for producing high and ultra high purity nitrogen by the cryogenic rectification of feed air which has lower power requirements than do heretofore available comparable conventional systems.
The above and other objects, which will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon a reading of this disclosure, are attained by the present invention, one aspect of which is:
A method for producing high purity nitrogen comprising:
(A) cooling feed air, passing cooled feed air into a first column, and producing by cryogenic rectification within the first column first high purity nitrogen fluid and first oxygen-enriched fluid;
(B) passing at least a portion of the first oxygen-enriched fluid into a second column and producing by cryogenic rectification within the second column second high purity nitrogen fluid and second oxygen-enriched fluid;
(C) warming second oxygen-enriched fluid to produce oxygen-enriched vapor, and turboexpanding the oxygen-enriched vapor to generate refrigeration;
(D) employing refrigeration from the oxygen-enriched vapor to cool the feed air; and
(E) recovering a portion of the first high purity nitrogen fluid as product high purity nitrogen.
Another aspect of the invention is:
Apparatus for producing high purity nitrogen comprising:
(A) a main heat exchanger, a first column, and means for passing feed air to the main heat exchanger and from the main heat exchanger to the first column;
(B) a second column having a top condenser, and means for passing fluid from the lower portion of the first column into the second column;
(C) means for passing fluid from the lower portion of the second column into the second column top condenser;
(D) a turboexpander, means for passing fluid from the second column top condenser to the turboexpander, and means for passing fluid from the turboexpander to the main heat exchanger; and
(E) means for recovering high purity nitrogen from the upper portion of the first column.
As used herein the term xe2x80x9cfeed airxe2x80x9d means a mixture comprising primarily oxygen and nitrogen, such as ambient air.
As used herein the term xe2x80x9ccolumnxe2x80x9d means a distillation or fractionation column or zone, i.e. a contacting column or zone, wherein liquid and vapor phases are countercurrently contacted to effect separation of a fluid mixture, as for example, by contacting of the vapor and liquid phases on a series of vertically spaced trays or plates mounted within the column and/or on packing elements such as structured or random packing. For a further discussion of distillation columns, see the Chemical Engineer""s Handbook, fifth edition, edited by R. H. Perry and C. H. Chilton, McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York, Section 13, The Continuous Distillation Process.
Vapor and liquid contacting separation processes depend on the difference in vapor pressures for the components. The high vapor pressure (or more volatile or low boiling) component will tend to concentrate in the vapor phase whereas the low vapor pressure (or less volatile or high boiling) component will tend to concentrate in the liquid phase. Partial condensation is the separation process whereby cooling of a vapor mixture can be used to concentrate the volatile component(s) in the vapor phase and thereby the less volatile component(s) in the liquid phase. Rectification, or continuous distillation, is the separation process that combines successive partial vaporizations and condensations as obtained by a countercurrent treatment of the vapor and liquid phases. The countercurrent contacting of the vapor and liquid phases is generally adiabatic and can include integral (stagewise) or differential (continuous) contact between the phases. Separation process arrangements that utilize the principles of rectification to separate mixtures are often interchangeably termed rectification columns, distillation columns, or fractionation columns. Cryogenic rectification is a rectification process carried out at least in part at temperatures at or below 150 degrees Kelvin (K).
As used herein the term xe2x80x9cindirect heat exchangexe2x80x9d means the bringing of two fluids into heat exchange relation without any physical contact or intermixing of the fluids with each other.
As used herein the term xe2x80x9ctop condenserxe2x80x9d means a heat exchange device that generates column downflow liquid from column vapor.
As used herein the terms xe2x80x9cturboexpansionxe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9cturboexpanderxe2x80x9d mean respectively method and apparatus for the flow of high pressure gas through a turbine to reduce the pressure and the temperature of the gas thereby generating refrigeration.
As used herein the term xe2x80x9csubcoolingxe2x80x9d means cooling a liquid to be at a temperature lower than the saturation temperature of that liquid for the existing pressure.
As used herein the terms xe2x80x9cupper portionxe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9clower portionxe2x80x9d mean those sections of a column respectively above and below the mid point of the column.
As used herein the term xe2x80x9chigh purity nitrogenxe2x80x9d means a fluid having a nitrogen concentration of at least 99 mole percent, preferably at least 99.9 mole percent, most preferably at least 99.999 mole percent. A particularly desirable form of high purity nitrogen is ultra high purity nitrogen which is a fluid having a nitrogen concentration of at least 99.999999 mole percent.

Cryogenic rectification system for producing high purity nitrogen


The invention includes method for monitoring and/or limiting the use of a data communications connection subject to payment between IP clients in a packet-switched connection network, in which method the operator terminal, such as a SIP system, of the signalling channel of the connection station of the client is set to control a traffic limiter, such as a firewall in the operator's traffic-relaying system between the source terminal and the destination terminal. The invention also includes a system for limiting the use of a data communications connection subject to payment, between IP clients, in a packet-switched connection network and a computer software product for limiting the use of a data communications connection subject to payment, between IP clients, in a packet-switched connection network.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method for monitoring and/or limiting the use of a connection, subject to payment, between IP clients in a packet-switched connection network.
The present invention also relates to a system for monitoring and/or limiting the use of a connection, subject to payment, between IP clients in a packet-switched connection network.
The present invention also relates to a computer software product for monitoring and/or limiting the use of a connection, subject to payment, between IP clients in a packet-switched network.
2. Description of Related Art
According to the state of the art, in operators' connection networks between IP clients, which have genuinely packet-switched connections, data communications connections can be provided customer specifically. It is possible to require that the customer's identifier and identifier verification data must be received before a customer can be provided with an individuated network connection. The quality parameters can be defined customer specifically. These quality parameters can, for example, define the characteristics of the data communications connections relayed over the individuated network connection. Such characteristics are, for example, the capacity of the data communications connection to be relayed, its delay, delay variation, and the loss and error ratio in the transmission of the data packets. Data communications connections ensuring the quality parameters are charged for on the basis of availability, the quantity of data transmitted, capacity, and/or the duration of the connection.
A drawback of the state of the art is the limited reliability of billing for Next Generation Networks, when the duration of the connection is used to charge for a data communications connection that ensures the quality parameters. The data communications connection between the clients and the signalling link set to monitor the use of the data communications connection are typically separate. In IP networks, data communications connections, such as IP voice connections, are set on the basis of data received over a signalling link, from the direction of the customer. Connection-duration-based billing uses data received from the customer's terminal over a signalling link. Information differing from reality, concerning the use of the data communications connection, can be received from the direction of the customer's terminal, for example, indicating that use of a set IP session has been terminated, even though in reality use of the relevant IP session has not been terminated. When using, for example, the known method disclosed in the network publication "Nat and Firewall Scenarios and Solutions for SIP" by J. Rosenberg et al., SIPPING WG, Jun. 24, 2002, the connection cannot be broken completely, only the granting of quality guarantees can be terminated.
A further drawback of the state of the art in terms of billing is the fact that, in a packet-switched IP network, anyone can form a connection with anyone else, without paying anything for this connection. This requires that the parties know each other's IP addresses. Solutions also exist, in which the operator has defined for or given the clients (unreliable clients) specific IP addresses. In this case, the clients are always treated as unreliable clients. In such solutions, fraud is easy, because after the closing request (BYE) given over the signalling channel, it is entirely possible to continue the connection, without paying the operator anything for this connection time or event. A customer generally uses data communications services in order to gain some benefit, which is not directly proportional to the quality of the available connection and/or to the amount of data transmitted over the connection. At present, billing for a network connection or data communications connection cannot be controlled in such a way as to be in proportion to the customer benefit. Thus, data communications resources cannot be allocated to provide the greatest customer benefit to their clientele, instead the use of data communications resources must be restricted using parameters that are of secondary importance to the customer.
The invention is intended to eliminate the defects of the state of the art disclosed above and for this purpose create an entirely new type of method for monitoring and/or limiting the use of a data communications connection.

Method, means and computer program product for controlling and/or restricting use of telecommunications connection


Methods, systems, and computer program products to warp a depth map into alignment with an image, where the image sensor (e.g., camera) responsible for the image and depth sensor responsible for an original depth map are separated in space. In an embodiment, the warping of the depth map may be started before the original depth map has been completely read. Moreover, data from the warped depth map may be made available to an application before the entire warped depth map has been completely generated. Such a method and system may improve the speed of the overall process and/or reduce memory requirements.

Depth maps and images together may constitute the primary input of many applications, such as video surveillance, video games (e.g., the Microsoft Kinect), hand gesture interpretation and other applications that take input unobtrusively from an un-instrumented user. Other related applications that take depth maps and images as input may include those that analyze the 3D environment around a sensor, for instance for autonomous control of a robot or vehicle or a safety monitoring system.
In some cases, the design of such applications may be easier if the depth map and image are registered or aligned, in the sense that the depth map is, or made to appear to be, produced by a depth sensor that is placed at the same physical location as the imaging sensor that produced the image. When this is the case, the pixels of the depth map may be put into correspondence with the pixels of the image, and vice-versa.
In practice, however, the depth map and the image are often produced by different sensors and consequently may be imaged from distinct physical locations. Fortunately, it may be possible to warp a depth map or image in such a way that it appears nearly as seen from a different center of projection.
In the drawings, the leftmost digit(s) of a reference number identifies the drawing in which the reference number first appears.

Systems, methods, and computer program products for low-latency warping of a depth map


Embodiments disclosed herein provide systems, methods, and computer readable media to provide roaming IP multimedia subsystem (IMS) access. In a particular embodiment, a method provides, in a communication interface, attaching a communication device to provide the communication device with access to a broadband access network associated with a visited domain of the communication device. The method further provides, in a proxy call session control element of a broadband services gateway (BSG), registering the communication device to access IMS services on behalf of an IMS core in the visited domain over the broadband access network, conveying Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) signaling between the communication device and the IMS core as a SIP proxy, and establishing a communication session between the communication device and the IMS core.

Many different services, from telephone, television, and Internet access, can now be provided by a broadband access connection. Each of these different services commonly operates independently, even if provided by the same entity, and are separated on the broadband access connection via independent virtual private networks (VPNs). Equipment at the customer premises functions as a broadband services gateway (BSG) to translate broadband communications for each service into communications that can be exchanged with service devices, such as a telephone device, television set, and personal computer.
Wireless devices, such as smartphones, are able to connect to a BSG in order to receive Internet access. However, in order to receive IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) services, such as voice, messaging, or other type of multimedia service, which are provided by a device's wireless network provider, the wireless device must communicate with the IMS from within the same network domain. Typically, this means the wireless device must communicate through the wireless network provider's network even though the BSG may be able to more effectively exchange communications for the IMS service.

Cooperative IMS access from a visited domain


An aliphatic polyester film which is synthesized from a glycol and an aliphatic polybasic acid having a melt viscosity of 2,000-100,000 poises at a temperature of 190.degree. C. and a shear rate of 100 sec.sup.-1, and having a melting point of 70.degree.-200.degree. C. The film is excellent in heat stability and mechanical strength as well as biodegradability when buried in the earth; and has low combustion heat than polyethylene and polypropyrene.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to polyester film having excellent heat stability and mechanical strength which are prepared by using aliphatic polyesters having a melt viscosity of 2,000-100,000 poise at a temperature of 190.degree. C. and a shear rate of 100 sec.sup.-1, and having melting point of 70.degree.-200.degree. C. with biodegradability and sufficiently high molecular weights, such as number-average molecular weight of 20,000. Particularly, the present invention relates to T-die flat film, air-cooling inflation film and water-cooling inflation film, which are formed by the above aliphatic polyesters.
2. Discussion of the Background
Conventionally, it is no exaggeration to say that high molecular weight polyesters (referring to polyesters having number-average molecular weights of at least 10,000) generally used for films, fibers and the like are limited to polyethylene terephthalete, a condensate of terephthalic acid (including dimethyl terephthalate) and ethylene glycol.
However, even though these films, when they are in the form of a simple blown film, have high stiffness and high strength due to the molecular structure of the terephthalic acid, non-oriented films are too brittle to be used as a film, and thus the films have been widely used after being had been oriented. Although oriented polyester film shows excellent transparency and strength, it has inferior heat sealing properties and thus for providing a heat seal packing use film, oriented polyester film has only been used in the form of a laminate with a polyolefin resin or film having high heat sealing capacity.
In order to improve the above mentioned drawbacks, in some examples 2,6-naphthalenedicarboxylic acid has been used instead of terephthalic acid, however, there has not been any example at all in which a polyester using an aliphatic dicarboxylic acid as the dicarboxylic acid has been molded into sheet, film or fiber form for practical use.
One of the reasons why the above mentioned polyester has not been practically used is that even if the aliphatic polyesters have crystallinity, most melting points of the above-mentioned aliphatic polyesters are 100.degree. C. or lower and they also have poor heat stability when they are melted. Of further importance is that the properties, particularly mechanical properties such as tensile strength, of these aliphatic polyesters are of an extremely low level; the polyester having the same level of number-average molecular weight as that of the above-mentioned polyethylene terephthalate shows much poorer properties, thus practical uses have not been found at all for these aliphatic polyesters.
It seems that the studies to possibly improve the physical properties of the aliphatic polyesters by increasing their number-average molecular weights have not made enough progress because of their poor heat stability.
Polyesters such as polyethylene terephthalate having no biodegradability, had a problem of requiring combustion treatment for their complete disposal, as simply disposing of it after use allows it to remain for a long time without being decomposed.
Particularly, in the packaging field, development of a film having high transparency, heat sealability, biodegradability for easy disposal and low combustion heat as well as high strength has eagerly demanded.
The object of the present invention is to provide polyester film, such as T-die flat film, air-cooling inflation film, water-cooling inflation film prepared by using aliphatic polyesters as their components which have sufficient high molecular weights for practical use, and excellent mechanical properties represented by thermal stability and tensile strength, and which can be decomposed by microorganisms and the light, and thus can be easily disposed of which provides only small amounts of combustion heat in disposal treatment after use, and which naturally possess heat sealing properties.


A speaker assembly membrane including a sound radiating surface (SRS) having a first material; a substantially planar SRS ring positioned concentrically outward from the SRS and having a second material; and a suspension member positioned concentrically outward from the SRS ring and having a third material. The second material is stiffer than the first material and the third material to locally stiffen an area surrounding the SRS and improve a breaking mode frequency of the membrane. In another embodiment, the speaker assembly membrane may include a diaphragm having a first material density; a substantially planar stiffening ring extending radially outward from an outer edge of the diaphragm and having a second material density; and a suspension member extending radially outward from an outer edge of the stiffening ring and having a third material density. The second material density is greater than the first material density and the third material density.

Whether listening to an MP3 player while traveling, or to a high-fidelity stereo system at home, consumers are increasingly choosing intra-canal and intra-concha earphones for their listening pleasure. Both types of electro-acoustic transducer devices have a relatively low profile housing that contains a receiver or driver (an earpiece speaker). The low profile housing provides convenience for the wearer, while also providing very good sound quality.
These devices, however, do not have sufficient space to house high fidelity speakers. This is also true for portable personal computers such as laptop, notebook, and tablet computers, and, to a lesser extent, desktop personal computers with built-in speakers. Such devices typically require speaker enclosures or boxes that have a relatively low rise (i.e. height as defined along the z-axis) and small back volume, as compared to, for instance, stand alone high fidelity speakers and dedicated digital music systems for handheld media players.
The drivers (earpiece speakers) for such devices therefore typically use a low profile diaphragm assembly, which is composed of two parts. Namely, a sound radiating surface (SRS) and a suspension member. The SRS vibrates axially thereby creating pressure waves outside the driver enclosure. The suspension surrounds and suspends the SRS within the enclosure and allows it to vibrate axially. Each of these moving parts, however, have natural structural resonances that can be excited at certain frequencies, which are typically different from one another. As a result, at certain frequencies (i.e. the breaking mode frequency) the SRS and the suspension member move out of phase with one another. Such out of phase movements, such as for example, when the suspension member moves to a greater degree than the SRS, result in an undesirable sound pressure output (i.e. drop in pressure) at the breaking mode frequency.


A mammalian cell gene expression vector system comprising (a) an episomal maintenance system (b), a strong promoter/enhancer, (c) a protein transactivation system and (d) DNA coding for a heterologous protein. The episomal maintenance and protein transactivation systems can include sub-elements located on the same or different plasmids within the cell expression system.

It is well known that various cell hosts such as microbial cells, yeast cells, insects cells and mammalian cells are capable of producing small amounts (milligram quantities) of specific proteins in relatively short periods of time. Also, it is known that proteins from different genetically engineered host cell systems generate proteins having different glycosylation profiles, depending on the cell used. For pharmaceutical applications in some cases it is desirable to product proteins that have glycosylation profiles that are similar to those found in humans. This is usually accomplished using a mammalian cell system since such systems produce proteins with glycosylations that are compatible with clinical applications. The disadvantage of using mammalian cells is that they typically require a longer period of time to produce an equivalent quantity of protein. Thus, it would be very desirable to have a genetically engineered mammalian cell expression system (for expressing heterologous proteins) that can express larger amounts of the protein in shorter periods of time.
It is known that various episomal maintenance elements can be introduced into a vector in a gene expression system to ensure replication. It is also well known that genetically engineered systems can and in many cases should include strong promoter/enhancer systems. In addition, it is well known that genetically engineered cell lines can include protein transactivation systems to enhance protein expression from DNA coding for a heterologous protein that is also incorporated into the system. Against that background, we are unaware of any attempts or suggestions to incorporate all four of the above elements or systems into a single mammalian cell expression system so that the combined advantages of all of the elements are present in a single and functioning system that expresses heterologous proteins. To our surprise, when the above combination was made using the techniques described below we found what appears to be a synergistic effect on protein expression. Representative examples for two heterologous proteins (designated IL-2SA and IL-4SA) are described below.


The present invention relates to a method of designing a Kaiser window filter. The filter is applied to an input image to generate a resized output image while preserving the information content of the input image. The method of mapping the output image space to the input image space of the present invention aligns the boundaries of the input image space with the boundaries of a set of new input pixels, and the coordinate points of the output pixels map to corresponding coordinate points of the new input pixels.

Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of digital signal processing and more specifically to a method of resizing (i.e., interpolating or decimating) an image while preserving the information content of the image, a method of designing a filter for resizing the image and a method of mapping the output image space to the input image space of the resized image.

Method for designing and applying a Kaiser window filter for enlarging or reducing an image


An electrical device including an opening in a low-k dielectric material, and a copper including structure present within the opening for transmitting electrical current. A liner is present between the opening and the copper including structure. The liner includes a superlattice structure comprised of a metal oxide layer, a metal layer present on the metal oxide layer, and a metal nitride layer that is present on the metal layer. A first layer of the superlattice structure that is in direct contact with the low-k dielectric material is one of said metal oxide layer and a final layer of the superlattice structure that is in direct contact with the copper including structure is one of the metal nitride layers.

1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to interconnect devices and structures for transmitting electrical current.
2. Description of the Related Art
As the technology node advances in semiconductor devices, RC delay is a major factor determining the performance of large scale integrated circuits. Use of copper (Cu) in integrated circuits reduces the line resistance, but an efficient barrier layer in preferred to prevent diffusion of copper (Cu) into the low-k dielectric typically used as a substrate and interlevel dielectric layer material.

Ultrathin superlattice of MnO/Mn/MnN and other metal oxide/metal/metal nitride liners and caps for copper low dielectric constant interconnects

INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION


A facsimile machine reads an image and stored the image data. The facsimile machine then receives information from the destination device on the image processing capabilities of the destination device. The facsimile machine performs color space conversion of the image data based on the image processing capabilities of the destination device before establishing a connection with the destination device, establishes a connection with the destination device and transmits the color space converted the image data to the destination device.

1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image communication apparatus that reads a color image and encodes data associated with the read color image before transmission to a destination.
2) Description of the Related Art
Recently, a facsimile machine having functions for reading and printing color images or a facsimile machine capable of transmitting and receiving color image data (color facsimile machine) has been widespread.
When the color facsimile machine is employed to transmit a color image in the art, read digital RGB signals (multi-valued data of R, G, B) are converted into color image data L*, a*, b* in LAB space and compressed before transmission to the destination.
When the color facsimile machine is employed to transmit an image, a color image is sent to the destination when it is a color facsimile machine. A monochromic image (binary image) is sent to the destination facsimile machine when it is a facsimile machine that has a function only for transmitting and receiving monochromic images (monochromic facsimile machine).
The transmission may be performed by the memory transmission. In the memory transmission, a draft image is read, a connection with the destination facsimile machine is established, information on different functions provided in that facsimile machine is acquired, and the draft image is transmitted.
FIG. 11 is a functional block diagram that shows a conventional image communication device 9. The image communication device 9 comprises a scanner 901, an A/D converter 902, a video compensator 903, an image quality processor 904, a transmission image generator 905, a coder 906, a storage section 907, a communicator 908 and a controller 909. This image communication device 9 is a color facsimile machine that has a network scanner function for compatibly connecting to a telephone line as well as to a LAN.
An operation of the image communication device 9 to perform color space conversion will be explained below with reference to the flowchart shown in FIG. 12. The scanner 901 reads a color draft image and generates analog RGB signals (step S901). The A/D converter 902 converts the analog RGB signals into digital RGB signals (multi-valued digital data of R, G, B) (step S902). The video compensator 903 performs shading compensation (step S903). The image quality processor 904 performs edge emphasis by a filtering operation (step S904).
Through the use of the color space conversion function of the transmission image generator 905, the digital RGB signals or color image data R, G, B in the digital RGB space are converted into color image data L*, a*, b* in LAB space (ITU-T standard data format for image communication devices) (the first color space conversion, S905).
The coder 906 converts (encodes) the color image data L*, a*, b* into JPEG image data (step S906). The storage 907 temporarily stores the JPEG image data (step S907).
The transmission image generator 905 has a transmission button; and when that transmission button is pressed down, the communicator 908 establishes a connection to the destination image communication device. The controller 909 can acquire information on a transmission resolution as well as information on the destination image communication device. The information on the destination image communication device is the information that indicates whether the destination is a device having a function for processing color image data in LAB space (generally an image communication device of a telephone line connection type) or a device (image communication device) of a network connection type having a function for processing color image data in sRGB space such as an Internet facsimile machine. This information acquirement is performed when the communicator 908 establishes a connection to the destination image communication device.
The controller 909 confirms whether a resolution conversion or a color space conversion is required according to the destination image communication device (step S908). When these conversions according to the destination are not required, JPEG image data stored in the storage 907 is transmitted to the destination image communication device by the communicator 908 (step S915).
When the resolution conversion or the color space conversion is required, the coder 906 decodes the coded data (step S909). First, when the color space conversion is required (step S910), through the use of the color space conversion function of the transmission image generator 905, LAB color space is converted into sRGB color space according to the destination image communication device (the second color space conversion, S911). When the resolution conversion is required (step S912), the transmission image generator 906 performs conversion of the resolution according to the destination (step S913). Then, the coder 906 re-encodes the color image data in sRGB color space to JPEG mode (step S914). The communicator 908 transmits the color image data thus re-encoded to the destination image communication device (step S915).
As for the memory transmission, it is not obvious before image reading when the destination is a color facsimile machine or a monochromatic facsimile machine. Therefore, the source color facsimile machine reads a draft image in a color mode and accumulates it in a memory unit. Then, after completion of connection to the destination facsimile machine, the color image data accumulated in the memory unit is sent when the facsimile machine is a color facsimile machine. In contrary, when it is a monochromatic facsimile machine, the color image data is converted into binary image data before it is transmitted.
When the destination image communication device is an image communication device of a network connection type such as an Internet facsimile (a device having a function for processing color image data in sRGB space), the image communication device 9 shown in FIG. 11 performs color space conversions twice in total, (1) a conversion from RGB color space into LAB color space by the scanner 901 at the time of reading a draft, and (2) a conversion from LAB into sRGB by the communicator 908 at the time of transmitting color image data.
As a result, an operational error due to the color space conversions (color space conversion operational error) increases and causes image quality deterioration such as variations in the color tone. In particular, when hardware is employed to configure the color space conversion function of the transmission image generator 905, it is generally required to simplify the hardware configuration suitable for an approximate operation mode, which increases the operational error.
The current international standard for color facsimile machines defines JPEG as a compression mode for transmission images. Therefore, it is convenient to accumulate draft images in JPEG format in a memory within a color facsimile machine as image data. Though, as the normal JPEG is of an irreversible compression type, it is impossible to restore to the draft image after encoding. The higher the compressibility of the JPEG image is increased, the more the image data can be accumulated in the memory within the color facsimile machine. In contrast, the image quality is remarkably deteriorated in the restored image.
In the image communication device 9 shown in FIG. 11, when the communicator 908 is employed for memory transmission and the destination is a monochromic facsimile machine, the transmission image generator 905 is required to convert the color image accumulated in the storage 907 into a binary image. Even when the color image is encoded into JPEG data at a level of permissible image quality deterioration on color image transmission, when it is converted into a binary image, an influence from the deteriorated image quality due to coding may appear in the restored binary image as a noise. Specifically, when the draft image is converted into JPEG image, characteristic noises named block noise and mosquito noise can appear at a higher compressibility on the edge of the restored image at obvious locations (specifically, on contours of characters, for example). Such the noises are remarkable particularly in the binarized image and dot-like noises appear around characters in the restored binary image (the image printed by the destination monochromatic facsimile machine).
A color draft image may be converted into a binary image at a certain resolution. It is also converted into a multi-valued image (color image) at the same resolution. In a comparison of both cases, an amount of information on visual identification when converted into the binary image is extremely less than that when converted into the color image. For example, even a sufficient resolution for facsimile transmission of a color image may lower the amount of information and reduce the visual identification when the brightness data is binarized at the same resolution.

Communication apparatus and image communication method