A container holder is provided which comprises a housing with a drawer having a container receiving recess. The drawer is mounted within the housing for movement between a stored position and a use position. An arm is mounted to the drawer for movement between a retracted position and an extended position and has a first portion which cooperates with the recess to define a container-receiving area of varying size. The arm can be selectively engaged with the drawer for retaining the arm in a number of adjustable positions between the retracted and the extended positions. The arm can be moved bi-directionally between the extended and retracted positions to releasably retain the arm in one of several discrete positions. The detent mechanism has a release leg adapted to contact the housing as the drawer is moved from the extended position to the retracted position to disengage the detent mechanism from the second portion of the arm. A bail for the container holder which is mounted to the housing so that the forward portion of the bail is lifted from a depending position to a retracted position as the drawer is moved into the housing.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a container holder for a vehicle interior and, more specifically, to a vehicle container holder with a pair of adjustable container-receiving arms which are selectively positionable in one of several discrete positions. In another of its aspects, the invention relates to a vehicle container holder movably mounted in a housing and having a bail which is movable to a retracted position as the container holder is moved within the housing.
2. Description of the Related Art
Container holders in an automobile are commonplace in contemporary vehicles. The container holders are used to store a beverage container so that the vehicle operator can operate the vehicle without concern over the spilling of the container. Consequently, a number of devices have been developed for retaining and supporting beverage containers used in automobiles.
Several prior patents disclose trays which may be slidably mounted below an automobile dashboard for movement between a retracted storage position below the dashboard and an extended position for use above or close to the leading edge of the front passenger seat. Such trays may be provided with fixed circular apertures for receiving beverage containers. Examples of these devices are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,825,611, issued Mar. 4, 1958, U.S. Pat. No. 3,606,112, issued Sep. 20, 1971, and U.S. Pat. No. 3,899,982, issued Aug. 19, 1975.
Other references disclose trays which may be swingably mounted below an automobile dashboard for movement between a storage position below the dashboard and position of use extending from the dashboard toward the seat. These trays also may be provided with fixed circular apertures for receiving beverage containers. Examples of the latter devices are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,772,934, issued Dec. 4, 1956, and U.S. Pat. No. 3,190,241, issued Jun. 22, 1965.
These prior art trays which support and retain beverage containers have complete and fixed circular apertures arranged in a side-by-side or front-to-back relation. This arrangement necessarily requires that the width or depth, respectively, of the tray be greater than the diameter of two beverage containers to allow enough area to enclose a pair of fixed, complete circular apertures. Such devices obviously occupy considerable space below the vehicle dashboard.
More recent container holders have included a drawer or tray slidably mounted within the dashboard or armrest of the vehicle. The drawer or tray has semicircular openings forming a portion of a cup receiving area and arcuate arms completing the cup receiving area. Many of these container holders have arms which are biased inwardly toward the drawer and which can be moved outwardly from an initial minimum position to an enlarged position to receive a cup of larger diameter than the cup receiving area. Examples of these cup holders are U.S. Pat. No. 5,259,580, issued Nov. 9, 1993 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,953,771, issued Sep. 4, 1990. Similarly, other cup holders have a cup receiving area formed by a body portion having semicircular openings and an arm which is biased to a closed or retracted position. These cup holders are expandable from a minimum size to a larger size by forcing the cup into the cup receiving area and moving the arm opposite the direction that it is biased. See U.S. Pat. No. 5,131,716, issued Jul. 21, 1992, U.S. Pat. No. 5,104,184, issued Apr. 14, 1992, U.S. Pat. No. 5,190,259, issued Mar. 2, 1993, and commonly-assigned U.S. Pat. No. 5,527,008, issued Jun. 18, 1996. The Lescoa '008 patent discloses a container holder having an arm which is pivotable to one of several discrete positions through a ratchet-type detent mechanism.
However, the prior art container holders have several limitations. First, the arms and perhaps a bail must be cammed into a retracted position as the drawer is moved into the housing against the bias of the springs which urge the arms outwardly therefrom, often causing scratching and other damage to exterior surfaces of the container holder and requiring a degree of force to move the container holder into the housing. Second, prior art container holders are often positionable in only one direction, i.e., container holder arms are always initially positioned in an outermost position and must be selectively positioned inwardly to achieve a desired intermediate position.


An imaging apparatus includes an imaging unit, a sample acquisition unit, a photographing state determination unit, a guide display generation unit and a display unit. The imaging unit acquires a subject image which is an image of a subject. The sample acquisition unit acquires a sample image. The photographing state determination unit calculates position and posture information indicative of an inclination relative to a horizontal plane and a height of the imaging unit. The guide display generation unit creates a guide display showing a method for photographing for approximating a composition of the subject image to a composition of the sample image based on the position and posture information. The display unit displays the guide display.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an imaging apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
A digital camera that presents advice for taking a well-composed picture has been known. For example, Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 2011-135527 discloses a technology concerning a digital camera that presents a preferred composition in accordance with a scene that a user attempts to capture. For example, this digital camera has a composition evaluation unit and a composition presenting unit. The composition evaluation unit evaluates a composition of a sample image, and the composition presenting unit superimposes a composition highly evaluated by the composition evaluation unit on a live view display and presents it. For example, a position of a person or a position of a mountain is superimposed on a live view display and presented in a display unit.

Imaging apparatus and methods for generating a guide display showing a photographing technique for approximating a composition of a subject image to that of a sample image


A processing apparatus externally receives a processing request and executes the requested processing. The processing apparatus transmits the result of the processing to a processing request source if a connection to the processing request source is maintained until the requested processing is executed. The processing apparatus stores the result of executing the processing in a memory if the connection to the processing request source is disconnected before the end of the requested processing. The processing apparatus transmits the processing result stored in the memory to the processing request source if the processing requested when the processing request is received is executed but is stored in the memory.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a processing method and apparatus that execute requested processing.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, it has become a common practice to establish cooperation between PCs and devices using Web service techniques for exchanging data among a plurality of apparatus via a network. A service receives a message to request service execution from a client, executes a service logic, and transmits a response message containing the execution result to the client.
If the connection between the service and the client is disconnected due to a network failure, time-out, or cancellation by the client after the service receives a request message, the service cannot interrupt the service logic execution processing. The service normally ends the processing when he or she notices disconnection in trying to write a response message after the end of the service logic execution. Therefore, the created response message is thrown away.
Under the circumstance, one conventional technique allows the use of information, cached without executing a service logic, under the control of a web service controller in response to a web service request (see US-2007-0174420).
This conventional technique uses a cache under all circumstances involved, so it is necessary to reserve memory sufficient to cache all types of information.


A structure for finding wrong assemblage of the metallic laminate type gasket according to the present invention is composed of a plurality of component sheets overlapping each other, in which small holes for finding wrong assemblage in number one less than the number of sheets to be laminated are bored on each sheet at a part so that, unless any one of the sheets is absent, the small holes are prevented from joining in line like one through hole, whereby whether lamination of the sheets is as complete as designed or not can be confirmed and, when any one of the sheets is absent and small holes join in line like one through hole to pierce through all sheets, wrong assemblage can be confirmed by mechanical or electrical means.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a structure for finding wrong assemblage of the metallic laminate type gasket composed of a plurality of component sheets overlapping each other.
2. Prior Art
As a conventional structure for finding wrong assemblage of the metallic laminate type gasket composed of a plurality of overlapping component sheets, known is such one that a part of at least one side of each sheet is exposed to the outside so as to be visually confirmed or a part of at least one side of each sheet is laid on a part of the other sheet in a step-like arrangement and exposed to the outside so as to be visually confirmed.
Generally, the operation to laminate component sheets of the metallic laminate type gasket is performed in such manner that the sheets are stacked in the order of laminate and taken one by one for assemblage, whereby wrong assemblage in most cases corresponds to the shortage of sheets caused when the sheets are presumed to be stacked correctly in number but, in reality, are not correctly stacked.
However, in the conventional known structure as above for finding wrong assemblage of the metallic laminate type gasket, since a part of at least one side of each component sheet is exposed to the outside, the number and order of exposed parts small in size must be visually confirmed and, thus, not only confirmation is greatly difficult but also sure finding is prevented by a problem as insufficient exactness in visual confirmation.
When manufacturing component sheets for the structure to find wrong assemblage of the metallic laminate type gasket, metallic dies in various shapes must be prepared because of difference between shapes of the component sheets and, therefore, cause a rise of cost.

Structure for finding wrong assemblage of metallic laminate type gasket


A conductor arrangement for an electrical connection includes a flexible multi-core internal conductor, an electromagnetic shield surrounding the flexible multi-core internal conductor, a thermoplastic hard plastic sheath surrounding a first portion of the flexible multi-core internal conductor, and a flexible corrugated tube surrounding a second portion the flexible multi-core internal conductor. A first portion of the thermoplastic hard plastic sheath includes an elongated flattened shape. A second portion of the thermoplastic hard plastic sheath includes an essentially round shape. The second portion of the thermoplastic hard plastic sheath is adjacent the first portion of the thermoplastic hard plastic sheath.

Conventional conductor arrangements are known in a wide range of embodiments. Cable clips or additional guide tubes are usually used for the purpose of fixed installation. In addition, the use of rigid solid conductors instead of flexible conductors is also usual for fixedly installed energy transmission connections, wherein said conductors are bent into a respectively desired shape before being installed.
In addition, with a view to simplifying the assembly thereof, an energy supply rail consisting of flexible and rigid portions, such as known from DE 10 2008 035 169 B3, is provided.
There is a need, however, to adapt a conventional conductor arrangement to a fixed installation.

Conductor arrangement for an electrical energy and/or data transmission connection


A method for determining relative spatial information between a first vehicle and a second vehicle, the method including monitoring a communication channel at the first vehicle and receiving a current communication signal sent by the second vehicle on the communication channel. The current communication signal is received at a received power level. A relative position between the first vehicle and the second vehicle is calculated. Input to the calculating includes an actual or estimated transmitted power level, and the received power level.

The present disclosure relates generally to determining relative spatial information between vehicles and, in particular, to the use of wireless communication information and characteristics to determine a relative position between vehicles.
Many Active Safety (AS) and Driver Assistance (DA) systems require relative position with respect to neighboring vehicles in order to protect or assist the occupants of the equipped vehicle. For example, an adaptive cruise control system utilizes a range measurement from the equipped, or host, vehicle to the lead vehicle to assist the driver of the host vehicle in maintaining a distance between the vehicles. In the case of adaptive cruise control, the host vehicle is equipped with a radar, lidar, or vision sensor to detect vehicles ahead. Other systems may utilize sensors mounted on the sides of the vehicle or in the roadway to obtain a relative position measurement between vehicles. Another method of determining relative position between vehicles involves the exchange of each vehicle's location as determined by a Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) receiver. This method may be utilized when both vehicles are equipped with a GNSS device. Examples of GNSS devices include a Global Positioning System (GPS) and a Galileo receiver.

Determining relative spatial information between vehicles


A high-voltage transistor includes first and second trenches that define a mesa in a semiconductor substrate. First and second field plate members are respectively disposed in the first and second trenches, with each of the first and second field plate members being separated from the mesa by a dielectric layer. The mesa includes a plurality of sections, each section having a substantially constant doping concentration gradient, the gradient of one section being at least 10% greater than the gradient of another section. It is emphasized that this abstract is provided to comply with the rules requiring an abstract that will allow a searcher or other reader to quickly ascertain the subject matter of the technical disclosure. It is submitted with the understanding that it will not be used to interpret or limit the scope or meaning of the claims.

High-voltage, field-effect transistors (HVFETs) are well known in the semiconductor arts. Most often, HVFETs comprise a device structure that includes an extended drain region that supports the applied high-voltage when the device is in the "off" state. HVFETs of this type are commonly used in power conversion applications such as AC/DC converters for offline power supplies, motor controls, and so on. These devices can be switched at high voltages and achieve a high blocking voltage in the off state while minimizing the resistance to current flow in the "on" state. The blocking or breakdown voltage is generally denoted as Vbd. The acronym Rsp refers to the product of the resistance and surface area, and is generally used to describe the on-state performance of the device. An example of a prior art HVFET having an extended drain region with a top layer of a conductivity type opposite that of the extended drain region is found in U.S. Pat. No. 4,811,075.
In a conventional HVFET the extended drain region is usually lightly doped to support high voltages applied to the drain when the device is off. The length of the extended drain region is also increased to spread the electric field over a larger area so the device can sustain higher voltages. However, when the device is on (i.e., conducting) current flows through the extended drain region. The combined decrease in doping and increase in length of the extended drain region therefore have the deleterious effect on the on-state performance of the device, as both cause an increase in on-state resistance. In other words, conventional high-voltage FET designs are characterized by a trade-off between Vbd and Rsp.
To provide a quantitative example, a typical prior art vertical HVFET (NMOS-type) may have a Vbd of 600V with a Rsp of about 16 ohm-mm2. Increasing the length of the extended drain would affect device performance by increasing Vbd beyond 600V at the expense of a higher Rsp value. Conversely, reducing the length of the extended drain would improve the on-state resistance to a value below 16 ohm-mm2, but such a change in the device structure would also cause Vbd to be reduced to less than 600V.
A device structure for supporting higher Vbd voltages with a low Rsp value is disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,754,310, 5,438,215, and also in the article entitled, "Theory of Semiconductor Superjunction Devices" by T. Fujihira, Jpn. J. Appl. Phys., Vol. 36, pp. 6254-6262, October 1977. In this device structure the extended drain region comprises alternating layers of semiconductor material having opposite conductivity types, e.g., PNPNP . . . . As high voltage is applied to the layers of one conductivity type, all of the layers are mutually depleted of charge carriers. This permits a high Vbd at much higher conducting layer doping concentrations as compared to single layer devices. The higher doping concentrations, of course, advantageously lower the Rsp of the transistor device. For example, in the article entitled, "A new generation of high voltage MOSFETs breaks the limit line of silicon" by G. Deboy et al., IEDM tech. Digest, pp. 683-685, 1998, the authors report a vertical NMOS device with a Vbd of 600V and a Rsp of about 4 ohm-mm2.
Another approach to the problem of achieving high-voltage capability is disclosed in the paper, "Realization of High Breakdown Voltage in Thin SOI Devices" by S. Merchant et al., Proc. Intl. Symp. on Power Devices and ICs, pp. 31-35, 1991. This paper teaches an extended drain region that comprises a thin layer of silicon situated on top of a buried oxide layer disposed on top of a semiconductor substrate. In operation, the underlying silicon substrate depletes charge from the thin silicon layer at high voltages. The authors claim that high values of Vbd are obtained as long as the top silicon layer is sufficiently thin, the buried oxide layer is sufficiently thick and the drift region doping concentration increases linearly from source to the drain. For instance, a lateral NMOS device with Vbd of 600V and Rsp of about 8 ohm-mm2 is obtained using this approach. The same authors have disclosed their technique of manufacturing the device with linearly graded doping concentration in U.S. Pat. No. 5,300,448. Similar approaches are taught in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,246,870, 5,412,241, 5,648,671, and 6,767,547.
Many conventional high-voltage transistors are designed to optimize breakdown voltage in the off-state. In the off-state, avalanche breakdown in high-voltage field-effect transistors typically occurs at the drain voltage at which the impact ionization integral (I) equals unity and the multiplication factor (M), defined as M=1/(1−I), approaches infinity. In the on-state, electron current flows through the drift region of the device. At high drain voltages, the electrons pass through regions of high electric field, causing impact ionization, which generates hole current in the device. If the hole current reaches a sufficiently high level, a parasitic bipolar transistor might become activated, leading to destructive breakdown of the device.
To maintain a high breakdown voltage in the on-state, the multiplication factor needs to be kept at a low level. This constraint places a limit on the maximum electric field for which the device can be designed, which limit may be less than optimal for high off-state breakdown voltage. Consequently, one problem in prior art high-voltage transistors is that the device suffers from low on-state breakdown voltage when the electric field is increased, and low off-state breakdown voltage (for a given drift length) if the field is reduced.
Although many of the device structures described above achieve high Vbd with relatively low on-state resistance as compared to earlier designs, there is still an unsatisfied need for a high-voltage transistor structure that optimizes both the on-state and off-state breakdown voltages of the device simultaneously.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

High-voltage vertical transistor with a multi-gradient drain doping profile


According to a first aspect of embodiments herein, the object is achieved by a method in a base station for handling a process of discovering a candidate user equipment for Device to Device, D2D, communication in a cell. The cell is served by the base station. The base station divides (200) the cell into a number of regions. The base station then assigns (201) to each one out of the number of regions, a channel resource for use in the region. The channel resource is for sending beacon signals in the process of discovering the D2D candidate user equipment.

Communication devices such as terminals are also known as e.g. User Equipments (UE), mobile terminals, wireless terminals and/or mobile stations. Terminals are enabled to communicate wirelessly in a cellular communications network or wireless communication system, sometimes also referred to as a cellular radio system or cellular networks. The communication may be performed e.g. between two terminals, between a terminal and a regular telephone and/or between a terminal and a server via a Radio Access Network (RAN) and possibly one or more core networks, comprised within the cellular communications network.
Terminals may further be referred to as mobile telephones, cellular telephones, laptops, or surf plates with wireless capability, just to mention some further examples. The terminals in the present context may be, for example, portable, pocket-storable, hand-held, computer-comprised, or vehicle-mounted mobile devices, enabled to communicate voice and/or data, via the RAN, with another entity, such as another terminal or a server.
The cellular communications network covers a geographical area which is divided into cell areas, wherein each cell area being served by a base station, e.g. a Radio Base Station (RBS), which sometimes may be referred to as e.g. "eNB", "eNodeB", "Nodes", "B node", Base Transceiver Station (BTS), or AP (Access Point), depending on the technology and terminology used. The base stations may be of different classes such as e.g. macro eNodeB, home eNodeB or pico base station, based on transmission power and thereby also cell size. A cell is the geographical area where radio coverage is provided by the base station at a base station site. One base station, situated on the base station site, may serve one or several cells. Further, each base station may support one or several communication technologies. The base stations communicate over the air interface operating on radio frequencies with the terminals within range of the base stations. In the context of this disclosure, the expression Downlink (DL) is used for the transmission path from the base station to the mobile station. The expression Uplink (UL) is used for the transmission path in the opposite direction i.e. from the mobile station to the base station.
In 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Long Term Evolution (LTE), base stations, which may be referred to as eNodeBs or even eNBs, may be directly connected to one or more core networks.
UMTS is a third generation mobile communication system, which evolved from the GSM, and is intended to provide improved mobile communication services based on Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA) access technology. UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (UTRAN) is essentially a radio access network using wideband code division multiple access for terminals. The 3GPP has undertaken to evolve further the UTRAN and GSM based radio access network technologies.
3GPP LTE radio access standard has been written in order to support high bitrates and low latency both for uplink and downlink traffic. All data transmission is in LTE controlled by the radio base station.
D2D Communication
Recent developments of the 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE) facilitate accessing local IP based services in a home, an office, a public hot spot or even outdoor environments. One of the important use cases for a local IP access and local connectivity involves the direct communication between devices such as user equipments in the close proximity of each other, typically less than a few 10 s of meters but sometimes up to a few hundred meters.
This direct mode or Device-to-Device (D2D) enables a number of potential gains over the traditional cellular technique where two devices communicates vi a cellular access point such as e.g. a base station because D2D devices are often much closer to one another than the cellular devices that have to communicate via the cellular access point.
One gain is capacity gain which may comprise reuse gain and hop gain. Regarding the reuse gain, D2D communication may provide reuse of radio resources such as e.g. Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplex (OFDM) resource blocks, reuse gain. Regarding the hop gain, D2D communication provides a D2D link providing a single hop between the transmitter and receiver points as opposed to the 2-hop link via a cellular access point.
Another gain is peak rate gain, which may comprise proximity gain. D2D communication may further provide high peak rates due to the proximity and potentially favorable propagation.
A further gain is latency gain. When the UEs communicate over a D2D link, base station forwarding is short cut and the end-to-end latency can decrease.
The first step in the establishment of a D2D link is that the devices discover the presence of their peer. During the discovery process, one device is assumed to be in D2D slave role, and the other user equipment in D2D master role. To implement peer discovery, the D2D master device broadcasts signals, indicating its capability to provide certain service, and the D2D slave device tries to discover the D2D master device which may provide a required service. These signals that the master device broadcasts are referred to as beacon signals. Note that a single device may play both roles, i.e. master and slave in different occasions, or even simultaneously.
In order to broadcast the beacon signals, master devices use so called Peer Discovery Resources (PDR). In prior art systems, such as e.g. Bluetooth™, the PDR are made up channel of resources such as time and frequency channel resources. The notion of PDR is also used in other systems such as the FlashLinQ system provided by Qualcomm. FlashLinQ enables devices to discover each other automatically and continuously, and to communicate, peer-to-peer, at broadband speeds without the need for intermediary infrastructure. Generally, when multiple master devises broadcast beacon signals that use the same or overlapping PDR:s, it is referred to as a PDR collision. When a PDR collisions occur, the performance of the discovery procedure typically deteriorates. In order to avoid collisions existing systems may use, for example, frequency hopping used in Bluetooth or other distributed randomized schemes.
Embodiments herein generally relates to a D2D peer discovery scheme in a cellular based network such as e.g., LTE. Different from pure distributed network, in the case of infrastructure-assisted D2D, the cellular network may mediate in the discovery process by recognizing when two devices have a reasonable chance of successful D2D link establishment, and coordinating the time and frequency allocations for sending/scanning for beacons.
RSRP Measurement and Uplink TA Procedure in LTE
In existing systems, such as the 3GPP LTE system, there are standardized procedures and measurements that allow the radio access network such as the base stations, to manage handovers, set a user equipment transmit power and control link adaptation, and coding scheme selection by the user equipment. The following components of these procedures and measurements are referred to herein. LTE is used as an example, but the person skilled in the art will recognize that similar measurements and associated procedures are defined for other cellular systems, such as GSM, WCDMA, HSPA or WiMax.
The cellular base station periodically transmits i.e. broadcasts, DownLink (DL) Reference Signals (RS) with known transmit power levels and characteristics. For example, in LTE the RS sequence carries unambiguously the cell identity.
The user equipments in the cell served by that base station perform measurements on the received RS. For example, in LTE the user equipments perform a measurement referred to as Reference Signal Received Power (RSRP). The RSRP is defined as the linear average in Watts of the DL RS across a channel bandwidth of the cell.
Typically, the user equipments in the cell are configured by the base station to report some of the results of their measurements, including the RSRP measurements. In fact, the user equipment may report on the RSRP measurements from multiple cells, not only the cell that the user equipment is camping on, in order to help the base station to build an understanding of the radio position of the user equipment.
Another procedure of relevance in the current context is the uplink Timing Alignment (TA) procedure. The purpose of the TA procedure is to ensure that a user equipment's uplink transmissions arrive at the base station without overlapping with the UL transmissions from other user equipments. TA is controlled by the base station by configuring a timing advance quantity at the user equipment transmitter, which indicates to the user equipment the relative time relative to the received DL timing. In essence, timing advance is an offset, at the user equipment, between the start of a received downlink subframe and a transmitted uplink subframe. In LTE, the granularity of the TA parameter is 0.52 micro seconds and may be a maximum of 0.67 ms. When the user equipment is close to the base station, the TA may be set to 0, while the maximum value corresponds to about 100 km cell radius.
The updates of the TA to counteract the effects of user equipment mobility, changes in the propagation environment, etc, are performed by a closed loop mechanism between the user equipment and the base station. The closed loop mechanism means that the base station measures the received UL timing of user equipment data transmissions and issues TA update commands to instruct the user equipment to adjust its transmission timing accordingly.
As a summary, in existing systems, the user equipment and base station continuously performs measurements. The measurement results allow the base station to continuously have knowledge about the user equipments relative "radio distance" or "radio position" in the cell, e.g. in terms of path loss, multicell geometry and the received UL timing of UL transmissions and corresponding TA value calculated by existing methods.
In US 2009/0013081 A1 a D2D Peer Discovery (PD) scheme is disclosed, which is implemented in an autonomous way, Autonomous Peer Discovery (APD). That is, without any control from a central point such as e.g., an access point or base station. A challenge in this scenario is how to enable two peer devices nearby each other to meet in time and frequency. Without any co-ordination, this is only possible via a randomized procedure such that the peers sending and scanning for beacons at different times and/or frequencies, after a certain amount of time discover each other with high probability. Two drawbacks of this scheme are as follows.
It requires lots of PD Resources (PDR) available for a master device, within which some are chosen for beacon broadcasting randomly. To avoid beacon transmission collision from multiple master devices, there should be a large number of PDR available, so it is not resource efficient.
To catch the possible beacon transmission in these many resources, the slave devises have to monitor all PDRs, which is not power efficient.
A possible solution to increase the resource and power efficiency may be to assign PDRs in a scheduled way, i.e., network-assisted PD, e.g., Location information based PD (LPD). A master device informs the network which services it offers. This information changes rather infrequently and the corresponding update rates are low. In addition, the device also provides its position to the network. The network transmits the location information of master devices together with a service identifier (e.g. expression) to slave devices, either via broadcast and/or unicast. If unicast is used, a slave device can be updated with location information of nearby master devices only. In this case even slave devices need to provide the network with their position to enable the network to filter out far away master devices. A slave device may even inform the network which services it is interested in to further reduce potential master devices
Since this method requires a slave device to keep monitoring location information using, for example, Global Positioning System (GPS), it would cause extra user equipment power consumption due to GPS signal reception. Other positioning technologies involve the continuous reception of technology specific signals implying a similar problem.
Further, since this method requires all user equipments, masters and slaves to report the location information to the base station with certain cycle, and the base station would send these information to all interested neighboring slave devices, it would cause large signalling overhead, especially when performed via user equipment specific signaling.

Method and arrangement for D2D discovery


A polypeptide, the amino acid sequence of which comprises a sequence as set forth in SEQ ID NO:2, including at least one mutation within the degron domain of the polypeptide encompassed between positions 1 and 35 of the sequence, wherein said at least one mutation reduces the susceptibility of the polypeptide to ubiquitin-proteasome degradation.

Hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs) are rare cells that have been identified in fetal bone marrow, umbilical cord blood, adult bone marrow, and peripheral blood, which are capable of differentiating into each of the myeloerythroid (red blood cells, granulocytes, monocytes), megakaryocyte (platelets) and lymphoid (T-cells, B-cells, and natural killer) cells lineages. In addition these cells are long-lived, and are capable of producing additional stem cells, a process termed self-renewal. Stem cells initially undergo commitment to lineage restricted progenitor cells, which can be assayed by their ability to form colonies in semisolid media. Progenitor cells are restricted in their ability to undergo multi-lineage differentiation and have lost their ability to self-renew. Progenitor cells eventually differentiate and mature into each of the functional elements of the blood.
HSC are used in clinical transplantation protocols to treat a variety of diseases including malignant and non-malignant disorders.
HSCs obtained directly from the patient (autologous HSCs) are used for rescuing the patient from the effects of high doses of chemotherapy or used as a target for gene-therapy vectors. HSCs obtained from another person (allogeneic HSCs) are used to treat haematological malignancies by replacing the malignant haematopoietic system with normal cells. Allogeneic HSCs can be obtained from siblings (matched sibling transplants), parents or unrelated donors (mismatched unrelated donor transplants). About 45,000 patients each year are treated by HSC transplantation. Although most of these cases have involved patients with haematological malignancies, such as lymphoma, myeloma and leukaemia, there is growing interest in using HSC transplantation to treat solid tumours and non-malignant diseases. For example, erythrocyte disorders such as β-thalassaemia and sickle-cell anemia have been successfully treated by transplantation of allogeneic HSCs.
The search for factors that can stimulate HSC self-renewal has proven difficult, but recent reports indicate that selected molecules (sonic hedgehog (Bhardwaj), jagged1 (Karanu, 2000), fibroblast growth factor 1 (de Haan, 2003) and Wnt-3a (Willert, 2003)) can both, support maintenance or induce modest expansion of HSC. However, to date the HOXB4 transcription factor has proven to be the most potent stimulator of HSC self renewal (Antonchuk, 2001; Antonchuk, 2002). Similar effect of retrovirally driven ectopic expression of HOXB4 has also been reported for human cells (Buske, 2002; Schiedlmeier, 2003). In addition, it has been shown that recombinant TAT-HOXB4 protein, when added to the HSC culture, could penetrate the cell membrane and provides significant HSC expansion stimuli (Krosl, 2003; US 2004/0082003) and similar effect of stroma cell derived HOXB4 on human HSC has also been reported (Ansellem, 2003). Human HSC, assessed with NOD/SCID SRC assay, can be efficiently and significantly expanded ex vivo using TAT-HOXB4 protein (Krosl, 2005a; Krosl, 2005b). One of the major advantages of TAT-HOXB4 expansion is the fact that it can be performed using recombinant protein, that is without possible drawbacks of gene transfer protocols (Baum, 2004; Modlich, 2005; Woods, 2006).
The major impediment for the use of HOXB4 in clinical setting with or without a PTD (protein transduction domain) such as that of the N-terminal of TAT is its short intracellular and extracellular half-life (40-60 minutes and 3-4 hours, respectively) (Krosl, 2003). With expansion times lasting 4-8 days, that translates into extensive culture manipulation increasing the risk of culture contamination. More stable HOXB4 molecules with similar HSC expansion capabilities would significantly increase its usability in clinical settings.
DNA binding activity of HOXB4 is required to induce HSCs expansion but not its collaboration with PBX1 (Beslu, 2004), even more PBX1 might be a negative regulator of HOXB4 (Krosl, 2003). More recently, the over expression of associated with the down regulation of PBX1 were shown to be able to sustained in vitro symmetrical (i.e. symmetrical division: production of two identical cells by opposition to asymmetrical division: division into one identical cell and one differentiated cell) self-renewal divisions of HSCs. Modulation of transcription of cell cycle regulators induced by HOXB4 over expression in primitive hematopoietic cells, was more pronounced with inhibition of PBX1 expression in these cells (Cellot, 2007) (see also co-pending US 2006/0121566).
The present description refers to a number of documents, the content of which is herein incorporated by reference in their entirety.

Mutated HOXB4 proteins with improved stability, and methods of use thereof


A ratcheting wrench head for use with a torque wrench has spaced apart first and second jaws extending from a base portion to define an opening for accommodating a bolt or nut to be rotated. A ratchet member is movably mounted in a through hole formed in the second jaw between an outer surface and an inner surface of the second jaw. A biasing member is located in the through hole of the second jaw and forces the ratchet member against a portion thereof. Inner surfaces of the first jaw and the second jaw are particularly constructed to enhance ratcheting performance of the wrench head relative to the bolt or nut. The through hole is formed with a dirt slot for enabling removal of foreign material from the wrench head.

The present disclosure relates generally to a hand tool and, more particularly, pertains to a ratcheting wrench head associated with a torque wrench for tightening or loosening a fastener, such as a bolt or a nut, without requiring separation of the wrench head from the fastener.
Wrenches are tools used to tighten or loosen bolts, nuts or the like, which are generally used when mechanical components are assembled or disassembled. Wrenches are classified into open-type wrenches and closed-type wrenches according to the shape of their heads, and open-type wrenches are classified into single open-type wrenches and double open-type wrenches. Specifically, the bolt or nut is tightened when a wrench is turned in one direction, and is loosened when the wrench is turned in an opposite direction.
In general, wrenches include a handle and a head. A handle is a type of bar that can be held by a user. A torque wrench is a special type of wrench that limits the amount of tightening force that can be applied to a bolt or nut. The torque wrench includes removable and replicable heads that can be used with different sized bolts or nuts. The head includes a base portion that extends from one end of the handle, and first and second jaws that extend in parallel from both ends of the base portion that face each other.
In regards to conventional wrenches, if a space sufficient to allow full 360-degree rotation of the handle is not available when the bolt or nut is tightened or loosened by being turned in the appropriate direction, a rotational stroke must be applied to the bolt or nut several times, and after each stroke is applied to the bolt or nut, the wrench must be repeatedly detached from the bolt or nut and returned to the initial position so as to apply another stroke.
In order to overcome the inconvenience of having to detach the wrench from the bolt or nut when a user applies sequential strokes in a particular direction, various ratchetable open-type wrenches have been developed in which one or both of the first and second jaws are provided with ratchet devices. These ratchetable open-type wrenches are currently not available for use with torque wrenches.
Unfortunately, known ratcheting wrenches continue to exhibit certain drawbacks in manufacturing and assembly which lead to decreased lifetime and problems in reliability of ratcheting performance in the wrenches. Such problems include cracking of the wrenches, faulty ratchet device operation due to accumulation of dirt and foreign particles therein, and lack of removability of the ratchet devices for replacement.
Accordingly, it is desirable to overcome the shortcomings of known ratcheting wrenches such as by improving the structure of the jaw design, providing for removal of accumulated foreign material and enabling access to and substitution of ratcheting components.


An iron-type golf club head comprises a head main body and a face plate attached thereto. The face plate has an annular outer edge portion fixed to the head main body, and a noncontact portion not contacting with the head main body. The noncontact portion includes a first thin part and a second thin part having a thickness less than that of the outer edge portion. The first thin part extends in a peripheral side along the upper edge, the toe-side edge and the lower edge of the face plate. The second thin part is formed to have a thickness less than that of the first thin part. The area of the first thin part is 10% to 35% of the area of the noncontact portion. The area of the second thin part is 65% to 90% of the area of the noncontact portion.

The present invention relates to an iron-type golf club head having high rebound performance.
Japanese Patent Application Publication Nos. 2012-166093, 2013-59680 and 2006-149964 each disclose an iron-type golf club head comprising a head main body and a face plate only a periphery zone of which is supported by the head main body.


Systems and methods are provided for managing server information data An information data management system obtains position information of each server baseboard from a controller storing the position information of the server baseboard, and establishes a corresponding relationship between the position information and an information data index of a rack server. The position information comprises slot information and rack information of the server baseboard. An information data configuring system obtains the position information, the information data index and the corresponding relationship between the position information and the information data index from the information data management system.

In modern enterprises, there is generally a large amount of enterprise information data of various kinds, especially for devices, pipelines and/or instruments. For example, with respect to a device, there is a device label and/or a device specification. Therefore, the enterprise information data should be indexed to be managed. Rack server, as one kind of enterprise information data, has been widely used in production and living of various fields and industries. Currently, multiple server baseboards are arranged on the rack server via slots. Thus, after the server baseboard is inserted into the rack of the rack server, a human operator such as a rack server manager has to number the information data of the server baseboard to manage the server baseboard. At present, it is required to bind the position information of each server baseboard on the rack server and an information data index to manage the information data of the server baseboards on the rack server. After the server baseboard is inserted into the rack server, a human operator needs to manually obtain the position information of the server baseboard. As such, the traditional manual way of managing the server information data is inconvenient and inefficient.

Method and system for managing server information data based on position information of a server baseboard

TENCENT TECHNOLOGY (SHENZHEN) COMPANY LIMITED


An energy management system (EMS) controls the energy flows in a vehicle by adapting pricing rules. In the EMS the price (Pm, P2, PB1) of the energy is variable dependent of the momentary supply of energy in a global energy system, i.e. the vehicle. Each auxiliary system (GEN, B, C) in the global energy system has in individual price limit, above which the auxiliary system (GEN, B, C) won't purchase any more energy. Some auxiliary systems (B) have variable price limits depending of those auxiliary systems parameters. The auxiliary systems (GEN, B, C) are represented in the EMS by activation agents (CA1, CA2, CAn, BA1, BAn), which have different behavior depending of what kind of auxiliary system they represent. Said activation agents (CA1, CA2, CAn, BA1, BAn) control the energy flows in the global energy system. In the EMS the energy systems are divided into two categories; energy main system and energy auxiliary systems.

The present invention relates to the field of energy management systems of a vehicle, and especially a vehicle with a combustion engine and a plurality of auxiliary systems.
Auxiliary systems are used in all modern vehicles. The auxiliary systems convert or consume) energy and their primary purpose is not to propel the vehicle. Examples of auxiliary systems are coolant pumps, oil pumps, air condition systems and fans. The operation of auxiliary systems represents about 3-30% of a vehicles fuel consumption, depending of the vehicle application and the operational environment.
Today, most of the auxiliary systems found in commercial heavy vehicles are not used in an energy efficient way. The control of different auxiliary systems is usually decoupled and sub optimised, which leads to an unnecessary high fuel consumption. Further, an individual optimisation of the auxiliary systems, leads to a poorer overall performance and problems in the interface between the different systems.
US2010/0322425 discloses an example of prior art energy management system used to manage energy to be supplied to a system.
There is thus a need for an improved system to control the energy auxiliary systems in an energy efficient way. Further, it is desired that such a system is low in developing and implementation costs.
It is desirable to provide an inventive system for energy management of a vehicle, which reduces the fuel consumption of the vehicle and which is easy to implement and at which auxiliary systems easily can be connected and disconnected, without the need for changes in the system control.
The invention grounds, according to an aspect thereof, upon the idea that the energy flows of a vehicle can be controlled dependent of the momentary supply and demand of energy in the energy system. By defining simple rules of how the energy is distributed, from the energy main system and to and between the auxiliary systems, a simple and efficient energy management system can be achieved. In the inventive EMS the energy is thereby traded between the energy main system and the auxiliary systems, wherein the primary energy source, i.e. the combustion engine, is the primary source of pricing. Basically, the price will be low when the combustion engine running with a high efficiency or during braking and the price high when the combustion engine running with a low efficiency. The auxiliary systems thereby purchases energy from the combustion engine when they have an energy demand, whereby the auxiliary systems has an individual price limit above which they do not purchase any energy.
The inventive EMS controls the energy flows in the vehicle by adapting the pricing rules. In the EMS the price of the energy is variable dependent of the momentary supply of energy in a global energy system, i.e. the vehicle. Each auxiliary system in the global energy system has an individual price limit; above which the auxiliary system won't purchase any more energy. Some auxiliary systems have variable price limits depending of those auxiliary systems parameters. The auxiliary systems are represented in the EMS by activation agents, which have different behaviour depending of what kind of auxiliary system they represent. Said activation agents control the energy flows in the global energy system in the EMS the auxiliary systems are divided into two categories; energy buffers and energy converters.
The energy main system provides the energy to the vehicle. The energy main system could be the fuel tank, the combustion engine, or the combustion engine including one or more auxiliary systems such as a cooling fan and a generator or an electric machine, wherein an electric machine is able to work as a generator or a motor.
The energy auxiliary systems are defined in two sub-categories; energy buffers and energy converters. An energy buffer is any system in the vehicle that can store energy, where the most obvious one is a battery. Other possible energy buffers are the cooling water, a pressure tank or the passenger compartment. All buffers are however not able to provide energy to other auxiliary systems, but just buffer within itself to reduce the future need of energy. For example the temperature in the passenger compartment can be allowed to oscillate within a range not noticeable fir the passenger. In periods with low price of the energy the temperature can be raised above the ideal temperature, such that the later on, the temperature can slowly decrease during period with higher price on energy. An energy converter converts energy from one form to another, such as a power steering device (electric energy to kinetic energy), a generator (kinetic energy to electric energy), a heater (electric energy to heat), a cooling fan (electric energy to kinetic energy) and/or any kind of actuator (electric energy to kinetic, energy).
The minimum setting of the inventive EMS comprises an energy main system, an energy buffer and an energy converter. However, any number of sub-system be added to the EMS, which will be able to manage the energy flows within the system with the same principles independently of how many sub-systems that is added to the minimum setting. For simplicity reasons a system with the minimum requirements having an energy main system, an energy buffer and an energy converter will be explained, wherein the energy main system comprises a combustion engine and an electric generator.
The energy main system is represented in the EMS by an energy main system activation agent (ms-agent). The energy buffer is represented in the EMS by an energy buffer activation agent (b-agent) and the energy converter is represented in the EMS by an energy converter activation agent (c-agent). The activation agents activate and deactivate their respective auxiliary system and controls that their energy needs is required through the EMS and that the energy is required from the energy source with the lower pricing, i.e. the energy main system or an energy buffer.
The ins-agent sets a first price for energy provided from the energy main system, wherein the first price is dependent of energy main system specific parameters. These parameters are dependent of how the energy main system is defined, but having the combustion engine as the energy main system, the parameters could be efficiency of the combustion engine, whereby the currency would be the amount of fuel needed, having the combustion engine and a generator as the energy main system the parameter would be the combined efficiency of these two components.
The b-agent purchases energy either from the ms-agent for said first price, or from another b-agent selling from a price lower than said first price, whereby the energy buffer is provided with energy from the source with the lowest price.
The b-agent sets a second price for energy provided from the energy buffer, wherein the second price is dependent of energy buffer specific parameters. Said energy buffer specific parameters preferably comprise a mean value of the purchase price of the purchased energy it the buffer and buffer efficiency.
The c-agent purchases energy from either the ms-agent or the b-agent dependent of which of the first price and the second price that is the lowest price. Obviously if there are more energy buffers connected to the system, the c-agent also can chose to buy from these, if they provide a lower price.
The b-agent and the c-agent has an individual price limit for purchasing energy, wherein the b-agent and c-agent just purchases energy if it can find a price which is lower than the individual price limit for that b-agent and c-agent respectively.
The inventive EMS ensures that the components that have the highest need always will be supplied with energy, and that that energy is taken from the most beneficial source. That is, if the combustion engine is driven in a mode with low efficiency, a component in the need of power will be delivered its power from one of the energy buffers in the system, with the condition that the energy buffer is a state of charge such that it can sell energy for a price lower than the inefficient working combustion engine. During periods of high pricing both from the combustion engine and the energy buffers, some systems might not be provided with any energy, if their individual price limit is lower than all the energy prices in the EMS.
All information needed between the activation agents is contained in the price and in the requested energy purchase. When price increases, purchase will decrease and individual system will use the content of their buffers. The primary source of pricing is the combustion, engine; the price will be low when running at high efficiency or during a braking operation, otherwise higher.
The inventive EMS further coordinates and optimises the operation of different auxiliary systems on a global level. Due to the inventive EMS the auxiliary systems are automatically and continuously adapted to the vehicles operation cycle. Adding further auxiliary systems to the vehicle and the EMS is easily done, since the individual auxiliary systems must act in the EMS under the same conditions as the existing auxiliary systems, wherein the need for manual tuning of added auxiliary systems are minimised. The newly added auxiliary system becomes an activation agent in the EMS, wherein the development costs for adding additional auxiliary systems to the global energy system can be reduced, due to the simple connection and adaption in a generic and structured control design.
Further, due to the inventive EMS, the different auxiliary systems are coordinated and optimised globally, wherein fuel consumption of the vehicle can be reduced, since the auxiliary systems uses the energy resources in the most efficient way.
Depending on how the energy main system is defined, some b-agents and c-agents can require energy for their auxiliary system directly from the ms-agent and some never directly there from. For example if the generator is comprised in the energy main system, the energy main system can deliver electric energy, wherein a plurality of b-agents and/or c-agents can purchase energy directly from the ms-agent. However, if the generator is not comprised in the energy main system, these b-agents and c-agents must purchase the energy needed for their auxiliary systems from the c-agent representing the generator in the EMS.
In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the individual price limit at which the activation agents seize to purchase energy is fixed for the c-agent and variable for the b-agent. Hence, energy converters represented by their c-agent has a priority order which is reflected in their individual price limn, the higher price limit an energy converter has, the more important it is for the vehicle that this auxiliary system are supplied with energy. For example, the heating of the passenger compartment has a lower individual price limit than the power steering. The fix individual price limit for the energy converters secures that the prioritised functions of the vehicle always can be supplied with energy.
For the energy buffer, the individual price limit is variable and preferable dependent of the state of charge for the energy buffer, such that if the energy buffer has a high state of charge its individual price limit is decreased and if the energy buffer has a low state of charge its individual price limit is increased. The variable individual price limit for the energy buffers secures that the energy buffer always is kept in a decent state of charge, such that there always is an energy buffer in the energy system.
It is preferred the variable price limit set by the b-agent depends on a state of charge of the energy buffer and the out price set by the b-agent. By including the out price of the energy from the energy buffer in the variable purchasing price limit for the energy buffer, a constant out price increase or decrease from the energy buffer is avoided.
As previously mentioned, further energy auxiliary systems of the vehicle can be connected to the inventive EMS, wherein additional energy auxiliary systems are connected to the EMS as converters and/or buffers. Wherein all buffers do not necessary have to be able to deliver energy to other auxiliary systems, just have the capacity to store energy and using it for its own function, for example the heating for the drivers/passenger compartment, which can allow an overheating, i.e. a higher temperature than the set one, during periods with cheap energy and allow a temperature below the set one during periods with expensive energy. Obviously the over and under heating is set such that it does not conflict with the comfort of the driver and/or passengers.
In a version of the inventive EMS, the EMS communicates with a travel computer of the vehicle, such that the EMS can predict an upcoming travel route. The travel computer can be any kind of travel computer, such as a satellite-based navigation system available for the driver of the vehicle or as a black box system just available to the vehicles ECU, Even though satellite-based navigation systems are the most common navigation systems, any other kind of navigation system based on other technology are possible. By using the information of from the travel computer, the EMS can have access to data of the upcoming route; such data could be topology data. The EMS can thereby predict future energy scarcities or abundances.
In a situation when the energy EMS has predicted future energy abundance, such as a long downhill slope, the EMS can add a tax to the first price, which thereby increases. By adding said tax, less purchases of energy is made directly from the energy main system, during the period that the tax is added, wherein the auxiliary system uses energy from the energy buffers, or does not purchase energy at all. Whereby the energy consumption will sink, since the state of charge of energy buffers consequently will sink. The total energy demand from the energy main system will slowly rise, wherein when the vehicle is in the state that it has an abundance of energy, all systems will be able to purchase energy and the state of charge of the energy buffers will increase, since cheap energy is available.
During these periods of abundance of energy, the EMS can subsidize the first price, in order to encourage a loading the energy buffers. A subsidize of the energy is could also be beneficial when conditions which influence the first price to rise are predicted, whereby the energy buffers can be filled before an energy scarcity is reached.
The boundaries of the energy main system can be defined as the combustion engine, or the combustion engine and a generator or even the fuel tank. Other boundary definitions are also possible. For example, if the fuel tank is the energy main system, a first energy converter would be the combustion engine, which purchases energy from the fuel tank for a first price and purchases energy to the generator for a second price, wherein the second price is dependent of the efficiency of the combustion engine. The generator purchases energy from the combustion engine for the second price and purchases energy to other auxiliary system for a third price dependent of the efficiency of the generator. However, in a preferred embodiment, the energy main system is defined as the combustion engine together with the generator, this because the energy flow from the fuel tank to the generator does not have an branches and flows only in one direction. Hence the first price set, i.e. out from the energy main system is dependent of the total efficiency of the energy main system.
The energy main system could even be comprised of a plurality of energy sources, which delivers energy to one common price dependent of the total efficiency of the energy main system. However, the EMS is adapted to a vehicle with a combustion engine, wherein such a plurality of energy sources comprises at least one internal combustion engine, such as a diesel engine.
An obvious energy buffer is a battery or a pack of batteries, wherein a plurality of batteries and/or other energy buffers can be connected to the EMS.
Common energy converters in an EMS adapted to a vehicle is an oil pump and/or a radio and/or a heating device and/or a steering servo and/or a braking servo, other all other not mentioned energy converters of a vehicle is also suitable to connect to the inventive EMS.


A system for regulating the voltage by switching capacitor banks and for preventing damage due to harmonic resonance in an AC power supply line after a capacitor bank is switched. The system includes a detector for detecting the harmonic distortion in the supply line, and multiple capacitor banks connected in parallel to the supply line. At least one switch is in series with each capacitor bank to connect or disconnect the capacitor bank to the supply line. A controller operates the switches and receives input from the detector. After a capacitor bank is switched to improve conditions in the supply line, the controller compares the total harmonic distortion to an action threshold and switches capacitor banks as programmed when the total harmonic distortion exceeds the action threshold for a predetermined period of time in order to avoid a resonant condition that could cause damage to equipment.

It is well known to electrical utilities and their industrial customers that alternating current (AC) electrical systems commonly have a reactive load, i.e. a load having an inductive or capacitive component. Most commonly the reactive load is inductive. Due to the effects of these loads and the elements of the electrical system, there is a difference between the real power available to the load and the apparent power supplied by the source. This difference is referred to as reactive power, measured in volt-amperes reactive or VAR. The power factor (PF) is the ratio of real power (W) over reactive power (VAR). It is preferable to maintain the power factor as close to one as possible. An inductive load causes a lagging reactive current since the voltage leads the current, and a capacitive load causes a leading current since the current leads the voltage.
Leading PF loads are caused by elements such as fluorescent lightbulbs; however, most industrial installations use significant numbers of motors or equipment, such as air conditioners, which cause inductive loads. This has a significant effect on the power factor for industrial users where it is known to have inefficient power factors as low as 0.6. This is undesirable from the utility or source's standpoint because the utility must supply the apparent power while only being able to charge for the real power percentage. Additionally, the excess, unused reactive power on the line causes excess losses and heat requiring larger equipment or more generation. Other effects may include poor voltage regulation at transformers or false signals to overvoltage regulation devices.
To encourage industries to maintain a power factor approaching one (unity), utilities often charge industries a premium for power supplied when the power factor falls below a set level such as 0.9. As such, it is also in the industries' best interest to maintain a power factor near unity. A near unity power factor also allows more constant and efficient transmission of power over smaller lines or allows more power to be distributed over the lines. Although possible for residential installations, normally residential users do not carry sufficient inductive loads to justify power factor compensation.
Capacitors installed at the industrial user's location are an efficient way to compensate for lagging current but traditionally have been subject to certain disadvantages. In particular, the compensation of a capacitor cannot be varied over time, while the inductive load may vary. Accordingly, the capacitor may be insufficient for a varied demand, or may provide excess correction leading to an overvoltage situation. Utility company or power engineers in the past have calculated the correction for an industrial user and installed single or multiple capacitors, but have not had the ability to adjust the capacitance in response to drastic changes in power factors or operation outside of the designed range.
Recently, the ability to dynamically add and subtract capacitors or capacitor banks has been envisioned using a microprocessor type of controller. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,670,864 to Marx describes a controller which measures the phase angle variation and adaptively connects or disconnects capacitor banks. U.S. Pat. No. 5,469,045 to Dove illustrates a high speed microprocessor which senses current and voltage and corrects the power factor by connecting and disconnecting capacitor banks.
Although these designs address some of the problems in correcting power factor, they do not solve all of the problems. In particular, a resonance problem can arise in a power system when a controller switches a capacitor into or out of a system. When a capacitor is switched, normally there is a ringing transient. This ringing transient should attenuate in a few cycles unless the frequency is the same as a harmonic generated by the customer thereby producing resonance which results in a high harmonic level. The percentage of harmonic energy or distortion is called the Total Harmonic Distortion (THD). If the THD is too high and remains that way, there can be damage to the system such as overload of the capacitor banks or insulation damage to the customers' equipment. Electrical customers are required to ensure that the THD does not exceed five percent (5%) due to their load. Utilities may charge customers a premium or, in a worst case, disconnect a customer if the THD is too high.
Normally a study is carried out to size the capacitor banks to the installation in order to minimize the probability of resonance. Unfortunately this model may be inaccurate, or changes may be made to the system which result in errors in the model and the potential for damage. Additionally the model becomes more complex when capacitor banks are dynamically switched into or out of the system. Accordingly, there is a need for an apparatus which can be used in combination with a capacitor bank switching controller, which minimizes or prevents electrical harmonic resonance thereby preventing high levels of THD due to resonance in an electrical system after a capacitor bank is switched.

Programmable logic controller for resonance control in complex capacitor switching


A method is disclosed for forming a hearing aid by the in situ molding of a room temperature curing material about hearing aid components. The in situ molding of the custom hearing aid provides an acoustical and comfort fit and minimizes processing involving multiple impression and casting procedures.

In recent years, hearing aids for hearing-impaired individuals and others who may desire amplified sound to their ear have enjoyed the advance of electronics.
In the past, hearing aids had an ear receiver connected by wires to the sound correction units either behind the ear (BTE) or placed in a pocket or on a belt of the individual. More recently, electronics has become sufficiently miniaturized to permit the entire hearing aid to reside in the ear.
Because the pinna of the ear is the natural sound gathering anatomy for human hearing, the presence of a receiver, amplifier, and transmitter within the pinna and external auditory canal has proven to be an acoustic advantage for the individual. Further, confinement of the ITE hearing aid within the pinna has been viewed as a cosmetic improvement over prior hearing aid constructions.
ITE hearing aids have been produced two ways: (1) a customized fitting to the individual's pinna and/or external auditory canal and (2) a series of stock modular canal aids designed to approximate the pinna and/or external auditory canal of most individuals.
A custom ITE hearing aid is conventionally made using a series of elaborate casting and recasting steps involving more than one visit by the individual to the hearing aid dispenser. A positive ear impression is made of the individual's pinna and external auditory canal which is used to create a negative impression at the hearing aid manufacturer, typically a remote location from the hearing aid dispenser. The negative impression is used to cast a positive impression of the pinna and external auditory canal which is subjected to grinding and polishing steps and assembly of electronic components therein. The assembled ITE hearing aid is returned to the hearing aid dispenser for fitting in the individual's ear. It is common for the fitting process to require several iterations to assure a comfortable fit for the individual. The acoustic fit of the rigid ITE hearing aid through all these casting-fitting operations becomes increasingly inaccurate. More than one individual having undergone the impression and fitting process has not used the hearing aid because of acoustic or structural discomfort.
Stock ITE hearing aids may minimize the number of visits by the individual to the hearing aid dispenser but do not provide an ITE hearing aid which is unique to the individual's pinna and external auditory canal. Thus, both acoustic and comfort fit may suffer.
Others have tried to provide a method for forming hearing aids.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,097,059 (Hoffman) discloses a method for forming in the pinna and external auditory canal a freely moldable mass of soft malleable acrylic resin having placed in its flat external surface a conventional receiver ring for a pocket, hip, or BTE hearing aid. U.S. Pat. No. 3,440,314 (Frisch) also discloses a method of forming a custom-fitted ear plug for a BTE hearing aid using a room temperature curing silicone rubber formed around a tube placed into the external auditory canal.
Methods of forming an ITE hearing aid are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,091,067 (Kramer et al.) and Voroba, "Hearing Instruments", Vol. 35, No. 1, 1984, pages 12-16. In Kramer et al., a silicone polymer is molded around a small diameter coring form and then pressed into the ear to form a body which conforms to the shape of the pinna and external auditory canal. Thereafter, an apertured component is embedded in the outer surface of the body and, after the composition is cured, the coring form is removed to leave a sound transmitting passageway extending through the receiver and between the apertured component and the ear canal. One embodiment discloses the apertured component to be a miniature speaker acoustically coupled with the sound transmitting passageway. Otherwise, the communications speaker is inserted into the apertured component.
The Voroba article describes the fabrication of a shell using a soft plastic material injected into the ear canal which is molded while an appropriately sized mandrel is pressed into the plastic material. The cavity formed by the mandrel may be fitted with a face plate which snap fits into the cavity and over the distal surface of the shell formed.
With the development of miniature electronic circuits and miniature electronic microphone and receiver transducers, it has become possible to minimize the number of operations needed to determine proper audiology to be used in a hearing aid. For example, Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company (3M) markets a hearing aid under the brand "Memory Mate" which uses electronics in the hearing aid to refine through electronic programming the hearing improvement needed for an individual.
It would be preferable for hearing aid dispensers, audiologists, and patients for the currently cumbersome process of preparing a custom fitted hearing aid to be streamlined. A complete, custom hearing aid which could be fitted in one office visit would maximize the convenience of users requiring hearing aids, would compress the time and cost to complete the formation of the hearing aid earmold for acoustical and comfortable fit, and allow completion of the sales transaction in a single visit to the merchant.
Notwithstanding these developments, more recently, methods of making ITE hearing aids have refined
on, positive casting custom process.
For example, U.S. Re. No. 33,017 (U.S. Pat. No. 4,617,429, Bellafiore) uses a dentist's material for making the positive impression, a dental material for making a negative cast, silicone material to cover and preset electronic components which are placed in the negative cavity before filling with acrylic material to mold the final ITE hearing aid.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,834,927 (Birkholz et al.) generates a cavity for electric components to be assembled at a manufacturer by providing a die having an overshell and cap which is inserted into the ear when making the positive impression. The removal of this die, overshell, cap combination provides a negative cavity of a constant dimension into which an electronic ITE module may be seated firmly and acoustically tight.
On the other hand, U.S. Pat. No. 4,871,502 (LeBisch et al.) discloses an otoplastic manufactured directly in the ear by using a die inside a deformable envelope in the ear and the supplying of flowing otoplastic material between the die and the envelope. After the otoplastic has set, die and the envelope are removed and a module of a hearing aid is inserted into the cavity created by the die.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,860,362 (Tweedle) discloses an open end ITE hearing aid shell with a non planar face plate. U.S. Pat. No. 4,870,688 (Voroba et al.) discloses a prefabricated ear shell assembly having a standard fabrication into which electronic components snap fit. The prefabricated shell assembly is a hollow rigid shell with a soft exterior having a cavity into which a variety of electronic components may be tested by the individual at the time of fitting. UK Patent Application 2 203 379 (Painter) discloses inserting a flexible walled membrane into the ear to conform to its surfaces and to serve as the envelope for inserting plastics material to mold to the shape of the ear surfaces. After cure and removal from the ear, the membrane is discarded and the earmold, preferably set in place with a central void, is fitted with an electronics module into the void.
One has disclosed a pre-fabricated hearing aid which may be attempted to be molded in situ in an exterior auditory canal. U.S. Pat. No. 4,712,245 (Lyregaard) discloses the use of a thin elastic layer attached as an envelope around a non-adjustable hearing aid case and sealed at both ends of the case. The space between the envelope and the case is filled with two-component curing ear impression material separated by a thin partitioning wall which can be ruptured under hand pressure to initiate curing. After the appropriate electronics is determined, a stock hearing device with impression material in the envelope is selected. The fitter ruptures the impression material partitioning wall and inserts the device into the ear canal for molding and curing of the impression material within the envelope.
But kneading of the two-part impression material within a confining space between the case and the envelope may not provide an appropriate impression of the pinna and external auditory canal, for Lyregaard emphasizes the ease by which a first fitting may be discarded and replaced by a subsequent fitting(s) using the same process with new component(s). Lyregaard limits the amount of impression material to conform to the convoluted pinna and external auditory canal to that amount contained between the case containing inflexible electronics components and the envelope sealed to the case in order to rely on a stock of modules of electronic components to fit his method of assembly.

Hearing aid and method for preparing same


A perforating gun has a gun carrier extending in a longitudinal direction and a loading tube located within the gun carrier. The loading tube extends in the longitudinal direction and a shape charge is supported by the loading tube. The shape charge has a casing, an explosive, and a liner, the casing opening in a first direction and having a centerline extending in the first direction, the first direction being essentially perpendicular to the longitudinal direction. A liquid implant is located adjacent to the shape charge in the first direction and intersecting the centerline.

To complete a well, one or more formation zones adjacent a wellbore are perforated to allow fluid from the formation zones to flow into the well for production to the surface or to allow injection fluids to be applied into the formation zones. A perforating gun string may be lowered into the well and the guns fired to create openings in a casing and to extend perforations into the surrounding formation.
The explosive nature of the formation of perforation tunnels shatters sand grains of the formation. A layer of "shock damaged region" having a permeability lower than that of the virgin formation matrix can form around each perforation tunnel. The process may also generate a tunnel full of rock debris mixed in with the perforator charge debris. The extent of the damage, and the amount of loose debris in the tunnel, may be dictated by a variety of factors including formation properties, explosive charge properties, pressure conditions, fluid properties, and so forth. The shock damaged region and loose debris in the perforation tunnels may impair the productivity of production wells or the injectivity of injector wells.
One method of obtaining clean perforations is underbalanced perforating, referred by Schlumberger proprietarily as "PURE". The perforating process results in a wellbore pressure which drops rapidly to a value below the formation pressure. This dynamic, or transient underbalance, cleans the perforation damage, thereby improving well performance.
There is a continuing need to improve that process to optimize fluid communication with reservoirs in formations of a well. The present application describes a number of embodiments addressing a number of issues associated therewith.

Device and method for reducing detonation gas pressure


A system and method for downloading substantially up to date versions of selected software from a plurality of software vendors over a network and for installing the software to a hardware unit includes a first software handling machine in the network configured to execute a download manager that sends a download transaction request including an identifier associated with the selected software over the network, and downloads and installs the selected software pursuant to a download/installation instruction, and also includes a second software handling machine in the network configured to execute a download supervisor to determine whether the requested download transaction is authorized, and, if so, to communicate a download/installation instruction to the download manager to enable it to download and install the selected software.

Multi-purpose or general purpose software handling machines such as personal computers (PCs), multimedia centers, personal digital assistants and the like, typically run software that has been obtained from many different software vendors. For example, a PC may be loaded and configured with an operating system distributed by one software vendor, a virus scanner distributed by another, and specialized applications and data distributed by still other software vendors. Likewise, services provided by a number of different vendors may also be enabled and configured on software handling systems.
As used herein, the term "software vendor" includes any entity that provides software or services, whether the software is licensed or sold, or distributed for free or is provided incidental to a service. The term "software," as used herein, includes computer instructions, data, or any other information that can be stored electronically, including media such as music, images, video, and the like, and specifically includes services.
Software is often revised to add features and capabilities, to effect service changes and to fix problems that have been discovered. These revisions are released from time to time and are made available in a variety of patches, updates, and product releases which typically can be downloaded from software vendor download servers such as Internet Websites. The revisions may be provided for free or may be sold. Unfortunately, the burden is frequently placed on software installers and users to ensure that the most up to date versions have been downloaded and installed.
The tasks of monitoring, locating, and gathering up-to-date software from a plurality of vendors can complicate the set up of software handling machines. For example, the vast majority of new PCs are sold or "bundled" together with a number of software products and services each of which may be provided by a different software vendor. The ever increasing number of software vendors has made it more and more difficult for PC vendors to monitor, track down, and obtain the latest software releases for their customers. In some cases these versions may even be impossible to provide. For example, some software vendors require customers to register their products in an on-line interactive session before granting access to fully enabled and up-to-date software products. Users can be irritated and confused by the need for such interactive sessions and may be reluctant to provide personal information to a plurality of software vendors. PC vendors typically bear the brunt of this frustration and thus continually seek ways to deliver new systems that are better configured and ready to use "out of the box."
Software downloads and installations are further complicated by the growing number of security keys and codes needed for authentication/authorization processes involved in product activation, installation and download of revisions. Authentication keys, which are often provided on software product packaging, can all too easily become misplaced, depriving users of software revisions to which they are entitled and further decreasing customer satisfaction.
All of the aforementioned problems, and many others, impede the efficient set up and maintenance of PCs and other software handling machines. Embodiments of the present invention address the foregoing problems by providing a system and method for managing the download and installation of software from a plurality of software vendors.

System and method for downloading software and services


A ceramic heater for a gas sensor has a heater substrate, a laminating substrate made of the same material as the heater substrate, and an electrode made of platinum and at least one lanthanide oxide disposed between the heater substrate and the laminating substrates. The ceramic heater exhibits improved durability without migration patterns, is free of cracks on the substrate, is free of short circuits in the heat electrode and is low in production cost.

1. Field of the invention
The present invention relates, in general, to a heater for heating an automobile sensor and, more particularly, to an improvement in durability along with the heater and the ceramic heater.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Owing to superior endurance at high temperature, ceramic heaters are useful for a plurality of purposes, especially, for automobile sensors. An automobile has a solid electrolyte air/fuel (A/F) sensor for detecting the oxygen content contained in an exhaust gas from the engine, in order to purify the exhaust gas and to enhance the fuel consumption ratio. Such sensor can respond only when it is heated to at least about 800 degrees centigrade.
For the respondence, a heater is adopted to elevate the temperature. The heater is generally made by constructing an electrode on a substrate with high thermal conductivity. The electrode consists typically of platinum in combination with additives. Recently, there has been a strong demand for low-resistant heaters which are capable of elevating temperature more rapidly. The low resistance can be accomplished by incorporating a variety of ceramic powders in the heater.
When Al.sub.2 O.sub.3, a typical material for the substrate, is sintered, sinter-aiding agents and/or grain-growth inhibitors are usually added because of its high sintering temperature Oxides, such as SiO.sub.2, MgO, CaO and the like, are used as these additives because it is easy for them to make Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 glassy upon sintering. Other additives exist for these purposes. For example, oxides of Periodic Table Group IIIa metal, for example, Y.sub.2 O.sub.3, are added for reducing the sintering temperature and ZrO.sub.2 for inhibiting grain growth of Al.sub.2 O.sub.3. However, heaters employing such Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 substrates, when used at high temperature under direct current high voltage (e.g. automobile power 12V), allow the alkaline metal ions contained in the substrates, that is, Mg.sup.2+, Ca.sup.2+, to migrate into the negative terminal and thereby to give rise to segregation. As a result, compounds with low melting points are produced, which cause cracks on the surface of the heater and thus, short circuits in the heater electrode.
In order to prevent the migration, a variety of techniques have been undertaken, e.g. high purity of Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 or small amount of Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 in Pt. However, these techniques can relieve the migration only to some degree and the purer Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 requires a higher sintering temperature.
Referring to FIG. 1, there is shown a heater which is presently commercially available. As shown in this figure, it consists of two laminating substrates 1, 5 between which a migration pattern 2, a heater substrate 3 and a heater electrode 4 are, in sequence, formed. The migration pattern 2 is interposed between the laminating substrate 1 and the heater substrate 3, with the aim of preventing the generation of cracks on the heater substrate 3 and short circuits in the heater electrode 4. This heater, however, is disadvantageous in that its construction is done by complicated processes, which results in high production cost.


In an image processor, an image of document is read by an image sensor. A reduction ratio of the image is set. Then, interpolation is performed on the image data between a pixel under interest and a pixel adjacent to the pixel under interest according to the reduction ratio. After the interpolation, pixel data in the image data are thinned out to an image data having a size determined by the reduction ratio, and an image is formed on a sheet of paper based on the thined-out data. Because the interpolation is performed before the thinning-out of the image data, defects in a reduced image such as vanishment of a narrow line are reduced, and image quality is improved.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processor such as a digital color copying machine having a function of enlarged copy and reduced copy.
2. Description of Related Art
A copying machine has a function to provide a copy with an enlarged or reduced image of a document. When a document image is enlarged, a number of image data read on a document is inflated, and the inflated data are interpolated. For example, in an apparatus explained in Japanese Patent laid open Publication No. 4-229765, a ratio of the inflated data is detected for each inflated data, and an appropriate filter is adopted according to the ratio. On the other hand, when a document image is reduced, data thinned out or a number of the data reduced according to a reduction ratio is used for reproduction. For example, when the number of the data is halved, the image data is thinned out every other pixel. Preferably, two memories are provided, so that image data can be written to one of the memories and read from the other thereof. Then, image data can be output continuously for image forming. Further, the image data is preferably stored in the memories after thinning-out, and the image data can be processed at a higher speed.
However, if a document image comprises dot images, a Moire pattern may happen when the reduction ratio is increased. Further, because the image data are thinned out in a simple way, the resolution of an image is deteriorated in proportion to the reduction ratio. Generally, in a monochromatic bi-level image, a ratio of white pixels is larger. Then, if image data is thinned out in such an image, a narrow line or a point may vanish in a reduced image, and this deteriorates image quality.


A compact row unit positioning structure includes a gear and mating toothed surface to positively position agricultural row units on an implement. An electric or hydraulic motor may be used to drive the gear and move row units individually or in groups to change row spacings, follow rows or move row units to a maintenance position. In one embodiment, position sensing structure such a row finder or GPS device connected to a controller operates the positioning structure. Automatic on-the-go row alignment may be implemented, and various row spacings, skip-row patterns or repair access positions may be provided either manually or automatically.

Agricultural implements often include tools or row units that must be aligned relative to a row of crop or tillage or seeding area in a field. For example, currently available cotton harvesters include row units supported from a lift frame and transversely adjustable on the frame to change row spacings. If a skip row pattern of planting is employed, the units may have to be repositioned to line up with the rows. Examples of transversely adjustable a row units are shown in commonly assigned U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,803,830; 4,896,492 and 6,079,192.
In many of the adjustable arrangements, a friction interface propels the units in a specified direction. If the friction surfaces are wet or if the unit is under a heavy side load, friction between the roller and a support rail on the frame may be insufficient to transfer the rotary motion into a force significant enough to move the units in the desired direction. The driving sheave will simply spin and the unit will not move.
Other harvester row unit designs include use of a hydraulic cylinder or similar arrangement to move the row units laterally to follow the planted rows in the field. An example of hydraulic cylinder controlled transverse adjustment is shown in the aforementioned U.S. Pat. No. 6,079,192. Such designs typically are very large and present space constraint problems. In addition, alternate brackets and cylinder positions must be utilized for varying row spacings and for unit cleaning operations.