A fuel circulation system of a diesel type engine configured to use carbonaceous aqueous slurry or emulsion fuels. The diesel type engine includes a fuel injection system which is fluidly connected to the fuel circulation system. The fuel circulation system comprises: at least one fuel feed pump comprising a positive displacement pump located in the fuel circulation system before the fuel injection system, the fuel feed pump configured to supply a controlled amount of carbonaceous aqueous slurry fuel to the fuel injection system; and at least one volumetric flow controller comprising at least one of a second positive displacement pump configured to operate in reverse as a positive displacement pressure let-down device, or a volumetric flow valve operated as a positive displacement pressure let-down device, the volumetric flow controller located in the fuel circulation system after the fuel injection system, the volumetric flow controller providing a controlled regulation of return flow/fuel system pressure from the fuel injection system from zero to maximum flow/pressure.

The following discussion of the background to the invention is intended to facilitate an understanding of the invention. However, it should be appreciated that the discussion is not an acknowledgement or admission that any of the material referred to was published, known or part of the common general knowledge as at the priority date of the application.
Current injection technology for conventional diesel and heavy fuel oil in diesel engines employs pressure atomisation of relatively low viscosity fuel. For heavy fuel oils the fuel viscosity is controlled to 5 to 20 mPa·s by heating (up to 165° C.) before the fuel enters the engine high pressure injection system. Low pressure fuel is provided at relatively constant pressure of 10 to 20 bar to the fuel system to provide a steady circulation and bleed of fuel oil to occur back to the hot service tank via a pressure relief valve/controlled pressure valve and spring loaded clack valves in the injectors. Clack valves in the engine automatically snap open after each injection enabling circulation of fuel through the injector, and snap shut once the injection event starts. This circulation facilitates maintaining the fuel system at elevated temperature, removal of air, and facilitates fuel switching, for example from heavy fuel oil to a lighter low sulphur grade when entering coastal waters.
An emerging technology is to use carbonaceous aqueous slurry fuels such as coal water slurries or bitumen water slurries to replace heavy fuel oil for diesel engines. It is noted that bitumen water slurries, such as MSAR (Multi-Phase Superfine Atomized Residue—an oil in water emulsion fuel), are essentially a slurry of solid bitumen particles in water at temperature below around 60° C., whereas at higher temperatures the bitumen is in the form of viscous droplets in water (i.e. an emulsion). The properties of these slurry and emulsion fuels are significantly different to diesel and fuel oils. For example, slurry and emulsion fuels have a tendency to destabilise and settle to form sludge or tarry deposits in the fuel system. These fuels are also much more abrasive and prone to cavitation than fuel oils, both of which cause accelerated wear of fuel system components such as the valve seats in pressure relief and clack valves. The intense turbulence and shear caused by these valves is also likely to accelerate destabilisation of the fuel resulting in agglomeration of the carbonaceous particles or droplets which increases the formation of deposits in the fuel system. Agglomeration and deposits affect atomisation and combustion efficiency and can lead to fuel system blockages. Fuel pressure can be controlled to the engine using a variable speed pump to avoid the use of pressure relief valves. However, during engine stops or load operation, the fuel is essentially deadheaded and maintained under high pressure without appreciable flow. In this mode of operation, destabilisation and other changes in fuel rheology can occur forming deposits along the fuel system which can subsequently dislodge when fuel flow resumes to collect and form a plug in the fuel system—especially where sudden changes in flow area or flow direction occur.
The production, transportation, storage and use of carbonaceous slurry and emulsion fuels therefore cause a number of technical problems which have discouraged commercialisation of this type of fuel.
Current art to avoid these settling and destabilisation problems have been similar to those for heavy fuel oil—namely to:
1). constantly circulate preheated fuel around the fuel system under a relatively constant fuel delivery pressure controlled by using a pressure relief valve on the circulation main after the injection pumps or HEUI-type booster injectors;
2). allow fuel to bleed fuel from the high pressure circuit of the fuel injector via an automatic spring-loaded bleeder/clack valve; and
3). use variable speed low pressure fuel pumps or fuel supply pumps.
A simplified schematic of a heavy fuel oil system is shown in FIG. 1.
The inventors have discovered that these current solutions are unlikely to be ideal for commercial operation of engines with carbonaceous slurries or carbonaceous emulsion fuels. The inventors have discovered that slurries and bitumen emulsions (effectively slurries at ambient temperature) behave adversely to 1) high shear or cavitation conditions such as experienced through pressure relief valves and throttling valves, and 2) to deadheading. In addition it has been discovered that these effects increase significantly with increased fuel temperature and by contamination of the circulating slurry from the use of seal oil to protect fuel pump plungers and valve spindles.
An additional problem with current diesel type engine configurations is the inability to perform complete and rapid flushing of the fuel system after the service tank without extended operation of the engine with the flushing fluid. What is not obvious is that flushing fluid for carbonaceous aqueous slurries is mostly likely an essentially incombustible fluid such as water or a suitable detergent mixture, as use of diesel or fuel oil for flushing can cause rapid agglomeration of carbonaceous particles in slurries or emulsions and fuel system blockages. In addition, even with a dual fuel injection system with a separate fuel system to operate the engine during flushing, excessive use of flushing fluid with low by-pass circulation systems are likely to be undesirable due poor combustion of diluted slurry fuel and the amount of flushing fluid entering the combustion chambers of the engine.
It would therefore be desirable to achieve at least one of the following:                reduce the degradation, destabilisation and agglomeration of carbonaceous aqueous slurry or emulsion fuels in engine fuel systems by maintaining a controlled flow of fuel around the fuel system without the use of pressure relief valves, automatic clack valves or deadheaded fuel pumps;        provide more efficient and controlled method of flushing of the fuel system to minimise the injection of flushing fluid into the engine;        minimise abrasive and cavitation wear of fuel system components; or        provide increased temperature control of the fuel provided to the engine to substantially eliminate the need for fully preheating the fuel to the service tank, and in some cases may avoid the need for a service tank for the slurry/emulsion fuel.

Fuel system for diesel engines using carbonaceous aqueous slurry and emulsion fuels

COMMONWEALTH SCIENTIFIC AND INDUSTRIAL RESEARCH ORGANISATION


A digital object navigation apparatus and method using gaze information of a user is provided. The digital object navigation apparatus may collect gaze information and gesture information of the user, may determine navigation information with respect to a digital object including a zoom rate, a rendering quality, or an intensity of an annotation, and may navigate in the digital object. The user may navigate in the digital object by only gazing without separate manipulation.

1. Field
Exemplary embodiments relate to a digital object navigation apparatus and method, and more particularly, to a digital object navigation apparatus and method that performs zoom-in/zoom-out based on gaze information of the user, performs quality rendering, and outputs an annotation.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, a frequency of utilizing a digital object, such as a picture, a motion image, a music and the like, increases along with development of digital devices. In general, a user may process the digital object by using a user interface, such as a keyboard, a mouse, and the like. However, it may be difficult to process the digital object in the case of a wall display to which the user is not able to input a command via the keyboard, the mouse, and the like. Also, in a case of a network-based digital TV, such as an Internet Protocol TV (IPTV), the user may have difficulty in utilizing an electronic program guide (EPG) and a widget for news, weather information, traffic information, financial information, and the like, from several hundreds of channels through a remote controller.
To overcome these difficulties, a method of tracing a motion of the user and reflecting the traced motion to adjust a real time output quality of the digital object has drawn a large amount of attention. However, a technology that effectively performs the method has not yet been developed.

Apparatus and method for navigation in digital object using gaze information of user


Internal pipe inspection apparatus is disclosed having a novel collapsible centralizer mechanism for an in-line pipe inspection head. The inspection apparatus is insertable into different size pipelines through a small, lateral service opening. The apparatus includes a compact inspection pipe head having a viewing assembly for imaging the interior of the pipe. The head is sized to pass through a standard lateral service opening substantially less in diameter than the diameter of the pipe. Various collapsible centralizing members are described for positioning the pipe inspection head viewing assembly substantially concentric with an axis of the pipe. The novel centralizers include multiple bendable support legs which are pivotally connected at different points to the inspection device such that each leg forms a substantially sinusoidal shape when extended and each leg collapses close to the inspection head and trailing ferrules when retracted for insertion into (or removal from) the pipe. The sinusoidal-shaped legs are selectively biased to their extended positions.

1. Technical Field
This invention presents devices and methods for inspection and repair of piping, such as fluid distribution means, and more particularly, devices and methods for inspecting gas mains without interrupting gas service during the testing operation. Certain novel collapsible support mechanisms (or centralizers) for such an inspection device are specifically described herein.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The transportation of natural gas, water, petroleum products, and other gases and fluids typically involves the use of pipelines, often of considerable lengths. Cross-country pipelines are, of course, of large diameters such as 12 inches, 24 inches and 30 inches in capacity. Such pipeline sizes are usually associated with the transporting of natural gas, and large sizes of pipes are normally fabricated of steel. In urban areas distribution of natural gas, and the distribution of manufactured gas in previous years, is accomplished through vast networks of smaller size buried pipe, principally of four, six, eight and ten inch diameters. While present installation of underground pipe utilizes plastic, particularly natural gas pipes of four, six and eight inch diameter size, thousands of miles of cast iron and steel pipe have been installed and buried over the years, and are presently in use for the delivery of natural gas. In most of the United States cast iron and steel gas distribution lines are often four inches in diameter and typically include many 90 degree corners. Common problems encountered with buried cast iron and steel pipe include deflection of the pipe caused by settling of the earth around the pipe, heaving due to frost (or forces applied to the earth around the pipe) causing leaking at joints or cracking of the line and, often, the collection of water therein. In addition, corrosion leaks in steel mains are common.
While numerous devices exist for the visual or other inspection of the interior of a pipeline, most, if not all, existing techniques have disadvantages which make their use at best inconvenient and, in all likelihood, difficult, time consuming and/or expensive. Many in-line pipe inspection devices and methods require, for example, in the case of gas pipe lines, discontinuance of service and/or severing of the main for insertion of the inspection device into an open end of the main, which is a complicated and costly process involving bypass and shut-off procedures. Obviously, this technique is expensive both in terms of the interruption to the gas service and the damage caused to the gas main. Inspection devices so inserted typically include a fixed centralizer feature for maintaining the in-line viewing assembly substantially concentric with the axis of the pipe.
In the above-incorporated application, entitled "Internal Pipe Inspection System," a collapsible centering mechanism is described for supporting the device inspection/repair head once inserted into a gas main. The novel inspection/repair head disclosed therein is inserted into a live gas main (without requiring an interruption of service to customers connected to the line) through an opening, such as an existing lateral service opening, in the line smaller than the internal diameter of the pipeline. To accomplish this object it is essential that the support mechanism for the inspection/repair head be readily collapsible and/or bendable. The extent of collapsibility is particularly significant for gas mains since lateral customer service lines typically tap into a main line via an opening that is one-third or less the size of the internal diameter of the pipeline. For example, one inch and one and one-quarter inch diameter lateral openings are common in four inch and six inch gas distribution mains in the United States.
One preferred centering technique described in the incorporated application is the use of rigid, outwardly biased legs extending from the central inspection/repair head and pivotally secured to the body so as to manually collapse thereto. If desired, skids can be hingedly secured to the free ends of the outwardly extending legs, again so as to collapse towards the main inspection/repair head when manually actuated (i.e., upon insertion and removal of the inspection/repair head through a restricted opening in the pipe). Various other centering approaches are also described therein.
Continuing research into an internal pipe inspection device such as described in the incorporated application has resulted in an improved support mechanism (centralizer) having a low profile mounting, simple design and ready adjustability to pipes of different internal diameter. This commercially significant design is a principal aspect of the present disclosure.

Centralizer for internal pipe inspection device


A content broadcast device for broadcasting a content, using a broadcast wave, the content broadcast device including a first supply section configured to supply service information to a content reception device through a predetermined network in response to a request from the content reception device, the service information including at least a broadcast schedule of metadata and location information that indicates where the metadata is located in the broadcast wave, and a broadcast section configured to broadcast, using the broadcast wave, the metadata, which includes at least a broadcast schedule of the content and location information that indicates where the content is located in the broadcast wave, in accordance with the broadcast schedule of the metadata, included in the service information, and broadcast, using the broadcast wave, the content in accordance with the broadcast schedule of the content, included in the metadata.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a content broadcast device, a content broadcast method, a content reception device, a content reception method, a program, and a content broadcast system. In particular, the present invention relates to a content broadcast device, a content broadcast method, a content reception device, a content reception method, a program, and a content broadcast system, which utilize a broadcast wave and realize a content download service for a specific user.
2. Description of the Related Art
The digitalization of television broadcast waves has allowed the more effective use of the bandwidths of the television broadcast waves. Therefore, not only have television programs been broadcasted using television broadcast waves but also various kinds of data have been able to be broadcasted simultaneously with television programs. Using this technique, for example, the transmission of data broadcasting and the transmission of updated data for a control program used for a television receiver or the like are performed.
In addition, for example, there has been proposed a content download service using a broadcast wave, in which a content different from a television program is broadcasted in accordance with a predetermined broadcast schedule and received and accumulated (downloaded) by a reception device, and the downloaded content can be utilized (reproduced) at an arbitrary time (for example, refer to Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2006-287769).
According to the content download service using a television broadcast wave, a user of a reception device that complies with the content download service can view a downloaded content at an arbitrary time.

Content broadcast device, content broadcast method, content reception device, content reception method, program, and content broadcast system


The present invention relates to medicine.. A method for treatment of cholelithiasis and chronic hepato- and cholecystopathies secondary to that disease consists in that the patient with concrements not in excess of 2 cm in size are instituted on the first day of treatment a diet which is not causative of deterioration of their general state, whereupon the patients' gastrointestinal tract is evacuated, a cholinolytic spasmolytic agent is administered, and tubage is performed, accompanied by oral administration of a vegetable oil; on the second day of treatment the patients are prescribed a meal of food which promotes a cholagogic effect, and abundant drink, whereupon the motor function of the intestine is stimulated until the concrements are eliminated.

Cholelithiasis is a rather widespread disease accounted for by the formation of gallstones in the gall bladder and the biliary ducts.
One state-of-the-art method for surgical treatment of cholelithiasis is known to be in extensive use nowadays, wherein the principal surgical interference is cholecystectomy, that is, ablation of the gall bladder. Such a surgical procedure may be combined with extraction of concrements from the biliary ducts followed by external or internal drainage of the common bile duct. Some other operative interventions may also be performed (cholecystectomy, cholecystostomy). Surgery on the gall bladder and biliary ducts requires definite indications in patients for a surgical interference and is far from ensuring steady convalescence (owing to the residual concrements that have remained unidentified).
Known in the present state of the art are also some methods for conservative treatment of cholelithiasis by administering a variety of medicinal agents promoting the litholysis process in the gall bladder and biliary ducts. Thus, for instance, a method for nonoperative treatment of cholelithiasis involves chemotherapy with the drugs made on the basis of some bile acids, that is, chenodeoxycholic and ursodeoxycholic (cf. a textbook "Nonoperative removal of gallstones from the biliary ducts using external drainage" by A. I. Nechai et al., 1987, Meditsina Publishers, Lenigrad, pp. 24-26 (in Russian). However, administration of the aforesaid drugs requires a prolonged (up to one or two years) treatment course. Moreover, the method discussed above is applicable only for dissolving small calculi of a definite nature, a positive result of treatment being noted only in 26 percent of the treated patients.

Method for treatment of cholelithiasis and chronic hepato- and cholecystopathies secondary to said disease


An instrument for scanning a specimen has a two-dimensional sensor array, the sensor array containing a mosaic color filter array or a scanning color filter array. The instrument can be operated in fluorescence or in brightfield. The scanning color filter array has the same color throughout each row with adjacent rows having different colors.

Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the fields of microscopic imaging of large specimens with particular emphasis on brightfield and fluorescence imaging, including photoluminescence and spectrally-resolved fluorescence. Applications include imaging tissue specimens, genetic microarrays, protein arrays, tissue arrays, cells and cell populations, biochips, arrays of biomolecules, detection of nanoparticles, photoluminescence imaging of semiconductor materials and devices, and many others.
Description of the Prior Art
The macroscope originally described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,381,224 is a scanning-laser system that uses a telecentric laser-scan lens to provide a wide field of view. Several embodiments are presently in use. These include instruments for fluorescence and photoluminescence (including spectrally-resolved) imaging (several other contrast mechanisms are also possible), instruments in which a raster scan is provided by the combination of a scanning mirror and a scanning specimen stage, instruments in which the specimen stage is stationary and the raster scan is provided by two scanning mirrors rotating about perpendicular axes, confocal and non-confocal versions, and other embodiments. A macroscope with fine focus adjustment was described in U.S. Pat. No. 7,218,446, and versions for reflected-light, fluorescence, photoluminescence, multi-photon fluorescence, transmitted-light, and brightfield imaging were described. The combination of a scanning laser macroscope with a scanning laser microscope to provide an imaging system with a wide field of view and the high resolution capability of a microscope was described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,532,873.
When the macroscope is used for fluorescence imaging, it has several advantages. Exposure for each fluorophore can be adjusted separately without changing scan speed by changing either laser intensity and/or detector gain (in the case of a detector comprised of a photomultiplier tube (pmt) followed by a preamplifier, both the pmt voltage (which changes pmt gain) and preamplifier gain can be changed). The ability to adjust the detection gain for each fluorophore separately allows the instrument to simultaneously collect multiple fluorophore images that are all correctly exposed. In addition, the appropriate laser wavelength can be provided to excite a chosen fluorophore, and excitation wavelengths can be chosen so they do not overlap detection wavelength ranges.
Several other technologies are used for imaging large specimens at high resolution. With tiling microscopes, the image of a small area of the specimen is recorded with a digital camera (usually a CCD camera), the specimen is moved with a computer-controlled microscope stage to image an adjacent area, an image of the adjacent area is recorded, the stage is moved again to the next area, and so on until a number of image tiles have been recorded that together cover the whole area of the specimen. Images of each area (image tiles) are recorded when the stage is stationary, after waiting long enough for vibrations from the moving stage to dissipate, and using an exposure time that is sufficient to record the fluorescence images. These image tiles can be butted together, or overlapped and stitched using computer stitching algorithms, to form one image of the entire specimen. Such images may contain tiling artifacts, caused by focus changes between adjacent tiles, differences in illumination intensity across the field of view of the microscope, barrel or pincushion distortion near the edge of the tiles, and microscope objectives that do not have a flat focal plane. For large specimens, thousands of tiles may be required to image the entire specimen, increasing the chance of tiling artifacts. Tiling microscopes are very slow for fluorescence imaging.
When tiling microscopes are used for fluorescence imaging, the areas surrounding each tile and the overlapping edges of adjacent tiles are exposed twice (and the corners four times) which can bleach some fluorophores. Exposure is adjusted by changing the exposure time for each tile. If multiple fluorophores are imaged, a different exposure time is required for each, so each fluorophore requires a separate image at each tile position. Multiple exposure of the specimen for imaging multiple fluorophores can also increase bleaching. After all tiles have been collected, considerable effort (both human and computer) is required to stitch the tiles together and correct each tile for illumination intensity and collection sensitivity changes across the field of view of the microscope (correction for variations in illumination intensity and collection sensitivity is sometimes called "field flattening"). Stitching tiles together is also complicated by distortion and curvature of field of the microscope objective, which occur near the edges of the field of view (just where stitching of tiles occurs).
Strip scanning instruments are also used for imaging large specimens. In these instruments infinity-corrected microscope optics are used, with a high Numerical Aperture (high NA) microscope objective and a tube lens of the appropriate focal length to focus an image of the specimen directly on a CCD or CMOS linear array sensor or TDI sensor with the correct magnification to match the resolution of the microscope objective with the detector pixel size for maximum magnification in the digitized image {as described in "Choosing Objective Lenses: The Importance of Numerical Aperture and Magnification in Digital Optical Microscopy", David W. Piston, Biol. Bull. 195, 1-4 (1998)}. A linear CCD detector array with 1000 or 2000 pixels is often used, and three separate linear detectors with appropriate filters to pass red, green and blue light are used for RGB brightfield imaging. The sample is moved at constant speed in the direction perpendicular to the long dimension of the linear detector array to scan a narrow strip across a microscope slide. The entire slide can be imaged by imaging repeated strips and butting them together to create the final image. Another version of this technology uses linear TDI (Time Delay Integration) array sensors which increase both sensitivity and imaging speed. In both of these instruments, exposure is varied by changing illumination intensity and/or scan speed.
Such a microscope is shown in FIG. 1 (Prior Art). A tissue specimen 100 (or other specimen to be imaged) mounted on microscope slide 101 is illuminated from below by illumination source 110. Light passing through the specimen is collected by infinity-corrected microscope objective 115, which is focused on the specimen by piezo positioner 120. The microscope objective 115 and tube lens 125 form a real image of the specimen on linear detector array 130. An image of the specimen is collected by moving the microscope slide at constant speed using motorized stage 105 in a direction perpendicular to the long dimension of the detector array 130, combining a sequence of equally-spaced line images from the array to construct an image of one strip across the specimen. Strips are then assembled to form a complete image of the specimen.
For brightfield imaging, most strip-scanning instruments illuminate the specimen from below, and detect the image in transmission using a sensor placed above the specimen. In brightfield, signal strength is high, and red, green and blue channels are often detected simultaneously with separate linear detector arrays to produce a colour image.
Compared to brightfield imaging, fluorescence signals can be thousands of times weaker, and some fluorophores have much weaker emission than others. Fluorescence microscopy is usually performed using illumination from the same side as detection (epifluorescence) so that the bright illumination light passing through the specimen does not enter the detector. In strip-scanning instruments, exposure is varied by changing scan speed, so present strip-scanning instruments scan each fluorophore separately, reducing the scan speed when greater exposure is required for a weak fluorophore. Varying exposure by changing scan speed makes it difficult to design a strip-scanner for simultaneous imaging of multiple fluorophores, where each channel would have the same exposure time, and present strip-scanners scan one fluorophore at-a-time. In addition, in fluorescence microscopy, relative intensity measurements are sometimes important for quantitative measurement, and 12 or 16 bit dynamic range may be required. For present strip scanners, this would require larger dynamic range detectors and slower scan speeds.
Before scanning a large specimen in fluorescence, it is important to set the exposure time (in a tiling or strip-scanning microscope) or the combination of laser intensity, detector gain and scan speed (in a scanning laser macroscope or microscope) so that the final image will be properly exposed—in general it should not contain saturated pixels, but the gain should be high enough that the full dynamic range will be used for each fluorophore in the final image. Two problems must be solved to achieve this result—the exposure must be estimated in advance for each fluorophore and for simultaneous detection of multiple fluorophores, the exposure time must be adjusted separately for each detection channel before scanning. For strip-scanning instruments, estimating the exposure in advance is difficult without scanning the whole specimen first to check exposure, and this must be done for each fluorophore. Instead of scanning first to set exposure, many operators simply set the scan speed to underexpose slightly, with resulting noisy images, or possibly images with some overexposed (saturated) areas if the estimated exposure was not correct. For macroscope-based instruments, a high-speed preview scan can be used to set detection gain in each channel before final simultaneous imaging of multiple fluorophores (see WO2009/137935, "Imaging System with Dynamic Range Maximization").
A prior art scanning microscope for fluorescence imaging is shown in FIG. 2. A tissue specimen 100 (or other specimen to be imaged) mounted on microscope slide 101 is illuminated from above by illumination source 200. In fluorescence imaging the illumination source is usually mounted above the specimen (epifluorescence) so that the intense illumination light that passes through the specimen is not mixed with the weaker fluorescence emission from the specimen, as it would be if the illumination source were below the specimen. Several different optical combinations can be used for epifluorescence illumination—including illumination light that is injected into the microscope tube between the microscope objective and the tube lens, using a dichroic beamsplitter to reflect it down through the microscope objective and onto the specimen. In addition, a narrow wavelength band for the illumination light is chosen to match the absorption peak of the fluorophore in use. Fluorescence emitted by the specimen is collected by the infinity-corrected microscope objective 115 which is focused on the specimen by the piezo positioner 120. Emission filter 205 is chosen to reject light at the illumination wavelength and to pass the emission band of the fluorophore in use. The microscope objective 115 and the tube lens 125 form a real image of the specimen on TDI detector array 210. An image of the specimen is collected by moving the microscope slide at constant speed using the motorized stage 105 in a direction perpendicular to the long dimension of the detector array 210, combining a sequence of equally-spaced, time-integrated line images from the array to construct an image of one strip across the specimen. Strips are then assembled to form a complete image of the specimen. When a CCD-based TDI array is used, each line image stored in memory is the result of integrating the charge generated in all of the previous lines of the array while the scan proceeds, and thus has both increased signal/noise and amplitude (due to increased exposure time) when compared to the result from a linear array detector. Exposure is also increased by reducing scan speed, so the scan time (and thus image acquisition time) is increased when using weak fluorophores. In addition, it is difficult to predict the best exposure time before scanning. When multiple fluorophores are used on the same specimen, the usual imaging method is to choose illumination wavelengths to match one fluorophore, select the appropriate emission filter and scan time (speed) for the chosen fluorophore, and scan one strip in the image. Then, the illumination wavelength band is adjusted to match the absorption band of the second fluorophore, a matching emission filter and scan speed are chosen, and that strip is scanned again. Additional fluorophores require the same steps to be repeated. Finally, this is repeated for all strips in the final image. Some instruments use multiple TDI detector arrays to expose and scan multiple fluorophores simultaneously, but this usually results in a final image where one fluorophore is exposed correctly and the others are either under- or over-exposed. Exposure can be adjusted by changing the relative intensity of the excitation illumination for each fluorophore, which should be easy to do if LED illumination is used. When multiple illumination bands are used at the same time, the resulting image for each fluorophore may differ from that produced when only one illumination band is used at a time because of overlap of the fluorophore emission bands, and because autofluorescence from the tissue itself may be excited by one of the illumination bands. Autofluorescence emission usually covers a wide spectrum and may cause a bright background in all of the images when multiple fluorophores are illuminated and imaged simultaneously.
A good description of strip scanning instruments, using either linear arrays or TDI arrays, is given in US Patent Application Publication No. US2009/0141126 ("Fully Automatic Rapid Microscope Slide Scanner", by Dirk Soenksen).
Linear arrays work well for brightfield imaging, but the user is often required to perform a focus measurement at several places on the specimen before scanning, or a separate detector is used for automatic focus. Linear arrays are not often used for fluorescence imaging because exposure time is inversely proportional to scan speed, which makes the scan time very long for weak fluorophores. In addition, exposure (scan speed) must be adjusted for each fluorophore, making simultaneous measurement of multiple fluorophores difficult when they have widely different fluorescence intensity (which is common).
TDI arrays and associated electronics are expensive, but the on-chip integration of several exposures of the same line on the specimen provides the increased exposure time required for fluorescence imaging while maintaining a reasonable scan speed. Simultaneous imaging of multiple fluorophores using multiple TDI detector arrays is still very difficult however, since each of the detectors has the same integration time (set by the scan speed), so it is common to use only one TDI array, adjusting exposure for each fluorophore by changing the scan speed and collecting a separate image for each fluorophore. Focus is set before scanning at several positions on the specimen, or automatic focus is achieved using a separate detector or focus measuring device.
Single-chip colour cameras (including those often used on ordinary optical microscopes to record an image of the specimen area seen in the field of view of the microscope) often use a mosaic Colour Filter Array (CFA) on the photosensors of an area detector that enables a single-chip camera to record a colour image. The most common CFA is the Bayer filter, named after the inventor, which arranges red, green and blue filters in a square grid (usually RGGB) of photosensors on the array (see U.S. Pat. No. 3,971,065). Bayer chose to use two green pixels in each set as luminance elements to match the sensitivity of the human eye. Data from each pixel only records one colour, so in order to obtain a full-colour image, the red, green and blue values for each pixel are calculated by interpolation using information from the surrounding pixels. This is called demosaicing, and several different demosaicing algorithms have been developed. Demosaicing may happen inside the camera (producing jpeg or tiff files), or outside using raw data from the sensor. Because of the computing power required for demosiacing, and the possibility of false colours and moiré, most tiling microscopes use separate array detectors to detect red, green and blue. Cameras for digital photography often use an optical low-pass filter in front of the detector array to reduce moiré and false colour caused by use of a Bayer filter, resulting in some loss of resolution. Other mosaic Colour Filter Arrays have been proposed, including one using a white (transparent) filter in place of one of the green filters in the Bayer array. White (transparent) pixels accept all wavelengths of light in the visible spectrum (they are panchromatic), and provide one bright pixel in each array of four pixels, increasing the sensitivity of the array. Other combinations of filters in the square mosaic grid include CYGM (cyan, yellow, green, magenta) and RGBE (red, green, blue, emerald). All require demosaicing.

Pathology slide scanners for fluorescence and brightfield imaging and method of operation


The present disclosure relates to an organic electroluminescent compound and an organic electroluminescent device comprising the same. The organic electroluminescent compound according to the present disclosure is contained in an electron transport layer and/or an electron buffer layer, so that an organic electroluminescent device having improved light-emitting efficiency can be manufactured.

An electroluminescent device (EL device) is a self-light-emitting display device which has advantages in that it provides a wider viewing angle, a greater contrast ratio, and a faster response time. The first organic EL device was developed by Eastman Kodak in 1987, by using small aromatic diamine molecules and aluminum complexes as materials for forming a light-emitting layer (see Appl. Phys. Lett. 51, 913, 1987).
An organic EL device (OLED) changes electric energy into light by applying electricity to an organic electroluminescent material, and commonly comprises an anode, a cathode, and an organic layer formed between the two electrodes. The organic layer of the organic EL device may comprise a hole injection layer, a hole transport layer, a hole auxiliary layer, a light-emitting auxiliary layer, an electron blocking layer, a light-emitting layer (containing host and dopant materials), an electron buffer layer, a hole blocking layer, an electron transport layer, an electron injection layer, etc. The materials used in the organic layer can be classified into a hole injection material, a hole transport material, a hole auxiliary material, a light-emitting auxiliary material, an electron blocking material, a light-emitting material, an electron buffer material, a hole blocking material, an electron transport material, an electron injection material, etc., depending on their functions. In the organic EL device, holes from the anode and electrons from the cathode are injected into a light-emitting layer by the application of electric voltage, and excitons having high energy are produced by the recombination of the holes and electrons. The organic light-emitting compound moves into an excited state by the energy and emits light from an energy when the organic light-emitting compound returns to the ground state from the excited state.
In an electroluminescent device, an electron transport material actively transports electrons from a cathode to a light-emitting layer and inhibits transport of holes which are not recombined in the light-emitting layer to increase recombination opportunity of holes and electrons in the light-emitting layer. Thus, electron-affinitive materials are used as an electron transport material. Organic metal complexes having light-emitting function such as Alq3 have been conventionally used as an electron transport material. However, Alq3 has problems in that it moves to other layers and shows reduction of color purity when used in blue light-emitting devices. Therefore, new electron transport materials have been required, which do not have the above problems, are highly electron-affinitive, and quickly transport electrons in organic EL devices to provide organic EL devices having high luminous efficiency.
Further, the electron buffer layer is a layer for solving the problem of decreasing in luminance caused by the change of a current characteristic of the device when exposed to a high temperature during a process of producing a panel. Thus, the characteristic of the compound comprised in the electron buffer layer is important. In addition, the compound used in the electron buffer layer preferably controls the electron withdrawing property and electron injection by LUMO (lowest unoccupied molecular orbital) energy value, thereby the efficiency of the organic electroluminescent device can be improved. Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2001-23777 A discloses an organic electroluminescent device using a compound in which a 5-membered heteroaryl containing nitrogen is condensed in an intermediate benzene ring of a phenanthrene backbone, as a host material.

Organic electroluminescent compound and organic electroluminescent device comprising the same


A method and system for displaying a list of documents on a desktop background on a computing device including assigning each user from a group of users to a group membership being selected from among a plurality of group memberships. An electronic file may be determined for users assigned to the selected group membership. The electronic file may be assigned as a desktop background on a computing device of each user assigned to the group membership, the assignment of the electronic file operable to cause the electronic file to be displayed as the desktop background, the electronic file including a predetermined listing of links of documents associated with the group membership.

Today, documents outlining "best practices" and other documents referred to as "white papers" may be found on seemingly every topic from software development to corporate governance. Procedure documents and other standards documents have been created to ensure that the best practices are able to be followed. Even routine tasks that a person performs daily on their job may have an associated procedure that lists the steps needed to be taken in order to perform the tasks. In some industries, such as telecommunications, technicians may be responsible for maintaining a product or device, and may use the procedure documents as a checklist while performing the task. Use of these procedure documents may be required by various industries in order to maintain important certifications or to be in compliance with codes or laws.
There are various standards organizations such as the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) that consist of committees and subcommittees that are responsible for developing standards in many different fields. In order to be certified as compliant with a particular standard, often it is necessary to prove, during an audit or otherwise, that all of an organization's members are using procedure documents, as required. Another common requirement may be that the latest version of a procedure document must always be used. To ensure that any changes to the procedure are available to all technicians or associates, the organization may implement a document control system to be accessed each time a procedure is to be used. Document control systems are commonly known in the art and provide version control and other benefits to documents of all types. Each time the technician or associate would like to access the document, the document control system must be accessed and the correct document located by a search or a similar method.
Various operating systems are commonly used today, with operating systems (OS) from MICROSOFT™, such as the WINDOWS XP™ operating system, being one of the most prevalent. A user of the WINDOWS™ OS is able to select a background for the desktop environment, commonly referred to as wallpaper. Generally, an image file with a JPG, GIF, or BMP file type is selected, but several other file types may also be selected, such as HTML. When the desktop is displayed, the selected background image file is presented along with icons for opening documents or applications and other items typically found on the desktop.
Currently, in order to locate a procedure document within some document management systems, a web browser or other application related to the document management system may be launched for the procedure document to be located. A search for the procedure document may also be necessary once the document management system is opened to locate the procedure document, as well. Not having the correct procedure document or the knowledge of which procedure documents are necessary can be inefficient and cause errors, mimizing the effectiveness of the best practices as embodied in the procedure document.

User specific desktop hyperlinks to relevant documents


A modular bathroom fixture of compact size and serving as a urinal and hand-washing basin, includes a flat rear panel adapted to permit wall-mounting, forwardly directed paired side panels, a horizontally disposed basin embraced by the side panels, and a urinal trough located below the basin. In operation, water from the basin drains by gravity flow into the urinal, thence downwardly again to a sewer discharge conduit.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to bathroom equipment, and more particularly concerns modular apparatus of compact size incorporating a wash basin and a urinal.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In many commercial establishments such as restaurants, retail stores, automobile service stations and sports stadiums, bathroom facilities are provided for the convenience of the patrons of the establishment. Because such bathroom facilities occupy valuable floor space, it is desirable to minimize their space requirements. In the realm of public transportation such as airplanes, buses and trains, not only are space requirements critical, but the amount of water that must be carried to service the bathroom is also a significant matter.
Compact, space-saving bathroom equipment has been disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,935,774 to Kemach; 3,015,827 to Iwata; 3,458,871 to Valcervo; 4,538,864 to Medrano; 4,653,128 to Canalizo; and 5,228,152 to Fraley. In addition to providing space-saving configurations, most of the devices of the aforesaid patents seek conservation of the use of water. However, such conservation is generally achieved by routing water by gravity flow from a wash basin to a toilet tank reservoir. It is also to be noted that, in securing the sought compact configuration and water-saving features, specialized constructions are required which are either costly or difficult to install.
It is accordingly an object of the present invention to provide a multi-functional bathroom fixture of compact construction.
It is another object of this invention to provide a bathroom fixture as in the foregoing object which conserves the use of water.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a fixture of the aforesaid nature which is easy to install into a small bathroom area.
It is yet another object of this invention to provide a fixture of the aforesaid nature which is of simple, durable construction amenable to low cost manufacture.
These objects and other objects and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following description.

Compact water-saving modular bathroom fixture


An improved radar receiver having side lobe blanking and coherent side lobe cancellation circuits in the main receiver channel and a control arrangement that overcomes the conventional problem that the side lobe blanking circuit will also blank a noise jammer signal even after the coherent side lobe canceller circuits have acquired the jamming energy. In this system, the side lobe blanking circuits are mechanized with a logarithmic amplifier and with a fast time constant circuit in an auxiliary receiver channel. The fast time constant is selected to match or be slightly longer than the acquisition time constant of the coherent side lobe cancellers. This implementation allows the side lobe blanking circuits to be energized at all times, thus simplifying the operational control of the system. In some arrangements in accordance with the invention the fast time constant may be varied as a function of the amplitude of the jamming signal in the main channel.

1. Field of Invention
This invention relates to radar receivers that overcome the effect of interfering noise sources and pulse sources and particularly to a receiver that is compatible with both coherent side lobe cancellation and side lobe blanking operation so as to blank out a minimum of possible target signals.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Coherent side lobe cancellers (CSLC) are designed primarily to cancel continuous jamming such as noise jamming or CW (Continuous Wave) jamming. Also incorporated with the CSLC circuit in many receiver systems is a side lobe blanking (SLB) circuit which is used primarily to blank interfering or jamming pulses which are of such a short time duration that the CSLC circuit cannot acquire and cancel these pulses. The coherent side lobe cancellation usually is performed in conventional systems immediately after the second converter and prior to the matched filter in the receiver, while the side lobe blanking is performed at the video output of the receiver. As a result, these two processes occur sequentially in the receiver processing chain and the conventional side lobe blanking circuit has been found to also blank the noise jammer even after the CSLC circuits have acquired and are cancelling the jamming signal. It would be a substantial improvement to the art to provide a compatible type system that allows the side lobe blanking circuit to blank only the leading edge of a noise jammer so that after the CSLC circuits have acquired the jammer, the SLB circuits are automatically deactivated except that the SLB circuits will still blank any pulse interference larger than the noise jamming signal that occurs during the jamming interval.


The application concerns a surface mount module adapted for transfer of a microwave signal between the module and a motherboard, the module comprising a substrate with a first microstrip conductor and a second microstrip conductor, wherein the two conductors are connected with a connection through the module. The module is distinguished in that the connection comprises the first microstrip conductor connected to a foil of electrically conducting material coated on the first side, the foil being surrounded by electrically conducting trenches running through the substrate from the first side to the second side forming a substrate integrated waveguide, wherein the trenches on the second side surrounds a second foil of electrically conducting material coated on the second side of the substrate and connected the second microstrip conductor. The application also concerns a coupling arrangement.

To produce fully industrial high frequency microwave radio systems, it is a must to make them in a Surface Mount (SMT) process. This is due to several reasons: to have as low "built-up-value" components in the final manufacturing as possible, in order to reduce cost, and to lift out chip-attach technologies and wire-bonding from "in-house-manufacturing" at radio-manufacturers, since such technologies tend to be hard to automate, which also drives cost.
There are many different types of modules for microwave radio system that may be desired to be connected to a motherboard. One example is a package which may contain some kind of microwave electronics such as a filter or a microwave integrated circuit. Another type of module may be a smaller board (e.g., a sub-board) carrying several electrical components. All such modules, however, have in common that they must be connected to the main motherboard in such a way that microwave signals can be exchanged between them efficiently.
In the prior art SMT microwave signal systems, the transferring of signals between a motherboard and a module, for instance a surface mounted package, is mostly based on connections from a microstrip to a Coplanar Waveguide to a microstrip. They work well up to around 40-50 Gigahertz (GHz) and with some limitations up to 60 GHz.
For microwave radios and automotive radar around 75-85 GHz and above another approach, Chip On Board (COB) solutions mostly are used, i.e. the chip is directly mounted on and electrically interconnected to its final circuit board, instead of first being incorporated in a package that then can be mounted on a desired board. However, the chip on board model means higher technology in the end manufacturing and such solutions are also harder and more expensive to repair.
Such Chip On Board concepts allow full SMT-manufacturing of products that can transfer microwave signals with a frequency of up to around 120 GHz.
The prior art surface mounted module systems, mentioned above, will now be described a bit more with reference to FIGS. 1 and 2. They are based on a microstrip at the motherboard and also inside the package and an inter-connection by a Coplanar Waveguide-system. In this way, the lower microstrip is lifted up to a higher microstrip. This concept gives losses and limitations when signal frequencies are passing somewhere around 40 GHz.
Such a prior art coupling arrangement 1 is shown in FIG. 1. It discloses a motherboard 2 comprising a substrate 3 and a microstrip 4. The motherboard 2 is connected to a surface mount module 5, said module comprising a substrate 6 and a micro strip conductor 7. The connection 17 between the motherboard 2 and the module 5 is shown encircled with an oval in the figure. A via-hole 18 is shown interconnecting an underside with an upper side of the substrate 6 of the module 5. In FIG. 1, X-X denotes a cross section through the connection 17; this cross section is detailed in FIG. 2.
The cross section X-X of the connection between the motherboard and the module can be studied further in FIG. 2. The motherboard 2 is connected to the module 5 via a coplanar waveguide 20. The coplanar waveguide 20 comprises two ground conductors 21 each comprising a solder pad on each of the motherboard and the module with solder in between. The ground can be seen transported from the motherboard ground plane 19 through the motherboard, by way of vias 22, to the upper side of the motherboard. The coplanar waveguide 20 further comprises, in the same plane as the ground conductors 21, a signal conductor 23 comprising the microstrip on the motherboard connected with solder to a via-hole 18 leading up to the microstrip 7 on the upper side of the module 5.
This prior art arrangement is straightforward, however the transmission of signals from microstrip to Coplanar Waveguide to microstrip is hard to maintain with a "smooth" flow at higher frequencies, which results in losses.


A method of estimating power flexibility for a climate system includes receiving a component power flexibility measurement from one or more components of the climate system, and aggregating the component power flexibility measurement from each of the one or more components of the climate system to determine a climate system power flexibility. A method of responding to a fast demand request from an electrical power source for a climate system is also disclosed.

Buildings, such as university buildings, office buildings, residential buildings, commercial buildings, and the like, incorporate one or more electrically powered systems and devices. The electrically powered systems and devices, or loads, can be powered at least partially by electricity supplied from a centralized electrical power source or utility ("electrical grid"). The electrically powered systems and devices communicate with the electrical grid regarding power demand and availability.

Method for responding to electrical power source request


The invention relates to the discovery that in an animal model of Parkinson's disease (PD), administration of granulocyte colony-stimulating factor (G-CSF) to rodents having 1-methyl-4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine (MPTP)-induced PD restored the function of dopamine neurons. In these animals, G-CSF treatment increased the number of dopamine neurons in the substantia nigra (SN), G-CSF treatment partially restored the nigrostriatal pathway, and G-CSF restored the function of dopamine to the level before MPTP treatment. The invention also relates to the discovery that treatment of a human patient with corticobasilar ganglionic degeneration, a rare progressive neurological disorder characterized by Parkinsonism and coritcal dysfunction, with G-CSF resulted in a significant improvement in the patient's Unified Parkinson's Disease Rating Scale evaluations as well as measures of activity of daily living. The invention further relates to the discovery that G-CSF treatment of a patient who had suffered an acute stroke resulted in a significant improvement in neurological function, the patient having minimal observable disability seven years later. The methods described herein can be used to treat PD in a mammalian subject (e.g., rodent, human) as well as other neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's disease, spinal cord injury, and stroke.

Neuronal death plays a critical role in most of the important neural pathologies, including stroke, epilepsy, Parkinson's disease (PD) and Alzheimer's disease. PD is a progressive neurodegenerative disease affecting about 1% of people over the age of 50. Its symptoms include slowness of movement, difficulty in initiating willed movements, rigidity and tremors. At the cellular level, it is characterized by a massive loss of dopamine (DA) neurons in the brain. Unfortunately, a cure does not yet exist for PD. Current treatments for mitigating the progression and symptoms of PD include levodopa combined with carbidopa, anti-cholinergic drugs, brain surgery, tissue transplant, and stem cell therapies currently under investigation.


There is provided a resin formulation comprising a resin precursor, a crosslinking additive, a photoinitiator, and at least one luminescent dye, wherein the crosslinking additive comprises a functional group selected from the group consisting of hydroxyl, alkoxyl, carboxylic acid, amine, amide, alkylacrylate, acrylate, epoxy, alkyl and heterocycloalkyl. The crosslinking additive of the resin formulation may help to homogeneously disperse the luminescent dye in the resin formulation and decrease the viscosity by improving the miscibility and polarity between the resin precursor and the luminescent dye, leading to an increase of solidification rate of the resin formulation during 3D printing such as stereolithography and digital light processing (DLP). There is also provided a method of preparing the resin formulation and uses of the resin formulation thereof.

Three-dimensional (3D) printing, also known as additive manufacturing, refers to the technology used for the rapid production of 3D objects directly from digital designs. During the 3D printing process, successive layers of materials are formed with software-controlled shape and thickness, which creates a 3-dimensional object. With the unique ability to create complicated 3D objects in a fast yet accurate manner, 3D printing technology is now widely used in mold fabrication, industry design, jewelry industry, architecture, and dental applications.
Among different 3D printing processes, Stereolithography (SLA) and Digital Light Processing (DLP) 3D printing techniques feature the use of a liquid photopolymer which is solidified during the printing process to form a solid 3D printed object. Due to the low cost and simple operation, numerous personal SLA/DLP printers are available in the market. Compared with fast growing 3D printing market, however, the availability of compatible liquid resins are limited. Despite recent efforts to develop new compatible materials for SLA/DLP printing such as transparent materials (PlasCLEAR by Asiga), direct casting materials (Super WAX by Asiga), and elastic resins for flexible prints (SPOT-E by Spot-A Materials) and etc., there exists only a few functional resins that are commercially available.
Luminescence materials such as organic and inorganic dyes have been widely used in lighting, decoration, biochemistry, analytical chemistry, and medicine. The ability to create complex 3D luminescent structures would not only expand the application of luminescence materials but also broaden the applications of current 3D printing technologies. Furthermore, there is a high demand to develop luminescent resin that can be used for 3D printing technology such as SLA and DLP, which would be important for exploring new applications of 3D printing techniques and for developing new printing products for home and industry applications. However, due to the low miscibility of luminescent dyes (both organic and inorganic) with a suitable 3D liquid resin, together with heavy light absorption of luminescent dyes in the photo-polymerization process, there are currently no commercially available luminescent resins.
One of the major problems faced in incorporating luminescent dyes into liquid 3D resins was the immiscibility of luminescent dyes in liquid resins. Moreover, luminescent dyes not only absorbed light during 3D printing, but also emitted strong luminescent light after excitation with the light source in the printing process. The luminescent light emitted from dyes interfered with the polymerization of the liquid resin and decreased printing accuracy. Therefore, it is a challenge to develop printable luminescent resins for the liquid based 3D printing techniques.
There is a need to provide a resin formulation that overcomes, or at least ameliorates, one or more of the disadvantages described above. There is also a need to provide a 3D print that overcomes, or at least ameliorates, one or more of the disadvantages described above.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

AGENCY FOR SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND RESEARCH


A box assembly includes a box unit having a box body, and a plurality of spaced apart limiting members. The box body is formed with a plurality of spaced apart positioning elements, and defines an inner space therein. The limiting members are disposed in the inner space, and are connected detachably and respectively to the positioning elements so as to be adapted to limit at least one panel thereamong.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a box assembly, more particularly to a box assembly that includes a box body formed with a plurality of positioning elements, and a plurality of limiting members that are connected detachably and respectively to the positioning elements for limiting at least one display panel thereamong.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIG. 1 illustrates a conventional box unit 9 for receiving liquid crystal display (LCD) panels therein so as to facilitate transport of the display panels from one working station to the next working station during processing of the LCD panels. The box assembly 9 includes a box body 91, and a cover 92 for covering a top opening in the box body 91. The box body 91 defines an accommodating space 93 therein, and has two opposite inner wall surfaces 911 that are formed with a plurality of pairs of ribs 912 which define a plurality of slots 94, each of which is adapted to receive an LCD panel 8.
As illustrated in FIG. 2, a plurality of the box units 9 can be stacked together on a support stand 96, and tied together using a plurality of straps 95. The assembly is then enclosed by protective paper panels 97, followed by tying with straps 98 on the protective paper panels 97.
The conventional box unit 9 is disadvantageous in that the box body 91 can accommodate only one single size of the LCD panels 8. As a consequence, different molds are required for manufacturing the box units 9 having different sizes, which results in an increase in manufacturing costs.


A remote pressure sensitive dump valve which includes a housing having first, second and third fluid ports, the first fluid port adapted for connection to a source of very high pressurized fluid, the second fluid port being adapted for connection to a remotely controllable fluid control valve and the third fluid port being adapted for connection to a conduit for dumping fluid back to a pump reservoir when the remote controllable fluid control valve is in the closed position. The housing includes a chamber in which is provided an elongated valve member which is reciprocal therein between first and second positions. The position of the valve member is directly responsive to the opened or closed condition of the remotely controllable fluid control valve. An annular valve seat is provided on the valve member and in the chamber so that when the valve member is moved to the first position, the first and second annular valve seats will be in engagement with one another and the remotely controllable fluid control valve will be open. When the remotely controllable fluid control valve is closed, fluid flow through the valve member will be halted to hydraulically cause a sufficient pressure imbalance between the opposite ends of the valve member to effect an automatic movement of the valve member from the first position to a second position wherein the first and second annular valve seats are separated to allow fluid to exit from the chamber to the return line.

Pumps capable of operating at extremely high pressures, namely, pressures in the range of 10,000 to 40,000 PSI have become an important facet in a number of industries. One industry includes water blasting wherein water is jettisoned from a small orifice nozzle at pressures in the range of 10,000 to 40,000 PSI and at a sufficient gallonage rate to effect a literal blasting of water against a surface for purposes of cleaning it and even including eroding it. Oftentimes, the nozzle arrangement is embodied in a hand gun with appropriate valving on the hand gun for facilitating fluid flow through the valve as well as halting fluid flow through the valve. When high fluid pressures are being utilized, extreme care must be taken to assure that when the hand held valve is turned OFF, the fluid within the conduit leading to the valve on the hand gun be appropriately vented so as to prevent a bursting of the conduit or valve body. Heretofore, conduits with pressures in the range of 10,000 to 40,000 PSI therein have required a dump or shut off gun to be utilized, namely, a hand held lance-gun having a dump or shut off flow feature associated therewith which causes fluid to be diverted to the atmosphere at a very low velocity immediately upon the closing of the valve to halt fluid flow to the nozzle. One of the drawbacks in this type of arrangement is, while in the dump mode, excessive water from the gun dump port is spilled into the work environment increasing liquid contaminant clean up and disposal requirements. In addition, when the shut off gun is used, the conduit extending between the pump and the hand gun still has the high pressure fluid contained therein, namely, fluid at a pressure of 10,000 to 40,000 PSI. If the conduit should be pierced, such as might happen when a vehicle runs over the conduit, there is the danger that the conduit will become violently manipulated by the exiting high pressure fluid to cause injury to personnel and/or equipment located within the region.
Accordingly, it is an object of this invention to provide a remote pressure sensitive dump valve that is adapted to be connected directly to the outlet port from a high pressure pump and to enable the use of hand held guns which are free of the provision of any auxiliary dump valve diverting blocked fluid flow to the atmosphere.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a remote pressure sensitive dump valve, as aforesaid, which when dumping the fluid flow from the pump in response to a closing of a hand held gun, the pressure in the conduit extending from the outlet of the dump valve to the gun is at a low pressure thereby minimizing the likelihood of injury to personal and/or damage to equipment located close by should the conduit be inadvertently severed.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a remote pressure sensitive dump valve, as aforesaid, wherein a dumping of the high pressure fluid (liquid) to atmosphere is hydraulically assured promptly upon the occurrence of a halting of the fluid flow through the dump valve to thereby prevent damage to the hose and/or hand gun.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a remote pressure sensitive dump valve, as aforesaid, wherein the dump valve is comprised of a minimum number of component parts thereby making the durability thereof and the maintenance thereof simple and easy.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a remote pressure sensitive dump valve, as aforesaid, wherein the pressure at which the dump valve is activated in controllable by the provision of at least one replaceable orifice plug in an end of a shiftable valve member remote from the fluid supply port on the dump valve and through which the fluid deliverable to the hand held gun must flow in order to assure a proper control movement of the valve member relative to a valve seat provided in the dump valve.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a remote pressure sensitive dump valve, as aforesaid, wherein a further replaceable orifice plug is provided in a return conduit into which fluid, here liquid, is dumped when the valve or the hand gun is closed, the cross-sectional area of the orifice in the further orifice plug is the same as the orifice in the orifice plug oriented on the valve member.


To realize a wireless communication system capable of keeping a beacon interval fixed, keeping transmission quality, and performing intermittence reception without fail. A wireless communication management device includes and transmits beacon time period information in a main beacon and a sub beacon. Then, a wireless terminal device divides transmission data based on the beacon time period information so that the transmission of the transmission data is finished before the transmission of a main beacon is started. Thereby, overlap of transmission timings of the beacon and the transmission data can be prevented and the beacon interval can be made fixed. This can keep transmission quality, makes the wireless terminal device to perform intermittence reception without fail, and improve the entire data transmission efficiency of the system.

Recently, wireless LAN systems, in which the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) 802.11b and IEEE802.11a are typical systems, are widely used. In the wireless LAN systems of the IEEE802.11 type, an autonomous decentralized system using a CSMS/CA (Carrier Sense Multiple Access/Collision Aviodance) scheme as an access scheme is used (for example, refer to a patent reference 1).
That is, FIG. 9 shows a protocol stack of the lower two layers in an OSI (Open System Interconnection) model of an IEEE802.11-type wireless LAN system, which is composed of a data link layer 901 and a physical layer 902.
The data link layer 901 is divided into a LLC (Logical Link Control) sublayer 903 and an MAC (Media Access Control) sublayer 904. In the IEEE wireless LAN system, a logical link control 905 under the IEEE802.2 is defined as the LLC sublayer 903, and the CSMA/CA scheme under the IEEE802.11 is defined as the MAC sublayer 904.
In addition, the physical layer 902 has two definitions, an IEEE802.11b (907) of a direct sequence type using a coding technique called a CCK (Complimentary Code Keying) in 2.4 GHgz band, and an IEEE802.11a (908) using an OFDM (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplex) technique in 5 GHz band.
FIG. 10 shows transmission/reception timings in a wireless LAN system using the CSMA/CA scheme of the IEEE802.11. This wireless LAN system is composed of a base station and first to fourth terminal stations, and the first, second and third terminal stations operate in a normal transmission/reception mode and the fourth terminal station operates in an intermittent reception mode.
The base station basically transmits beacons (BC1, BC2, BC3, . . . ) which are used for establishment of synchronization between the terminal stations and for notification of various control information at an interval of a beacon time period Ti. This beacon time period is divided into a period for non-conflict due to polling from the base station and a period for conflict due to conflict (conflict) between the terminal stations. The non-conflict period is notified by a beacon.
During the non-conflict period, only a terminal station specified by polling transmitted from the base station is allowed to perform transmission. For example, polling PL1 is polling for the first terminal station, and the first terminal station transmits a data packet DP1 in response to the reception of the polling PL1. The base station returns an ACK (acknowledgement) signal AC1 when receiving the data packet DP1 correctly. Similarly, polling PL2 is polling for the second terminal station, and the second terminal station transmits a data packet DP2 in response to the reception of the polling PL2. The base station returns an ACK signal AC2 when receiving the data packet DP2 correctly. As to data such as an AV stream which requires real-time property, it is periodically transmitted and received under the control of the base station during the non-conflict period, thus keeping QoS (Quality of Service) of transmission.
During the conflict period, on the contrary, each terminal station receives an ACK signal, and performs carrier sense after waiting for a waiting time based on a corresponding random number (hereinafter, referred to as random backoff time), and performs transmission while the other terminal stations do not perform transmission.
That is, when the first and second terminal stations having data which should be transmitted receives the ACK signal AC2, they carries out the carrier sense after waiting for the random backoff times t1 and t2, respectively. Since the random backoff time t1 of the first terminal station is shorter than the random backoff time t2 of the second terminal station, the first terminal station succeeds the carrier sense and transmits a data packet DP3. The base station returns an ACK signal AC3 for the success of the reception of the data packet DP3. The second terminal station which did not succeed the carrier sense performs the carrier sense again after the reception of the ACK signal AC3, and transmits a data packet DP4.
On the other hand, the fourth terminal operating in the intermittence reception mode receives each beacon transmitted from the base station by performing the intermittence reception at an interval of a beacon time period Ti by synchronizing with the base station. In a case where a beacon includes a call for the own station, the fourth terminal station stops the intermittence reception mode and goes back to the normal transmission/reception mode.
Patent reference 1 Japanese Patent Laid Open 11-74886 (the second to third pages, FIG. 11 and FIG. 12)
Here, due to transmission of a data packet from a terminal station in aforementioned CSMS/CA scheme of the IEEE802.11, transmission of a beacon from the base station may be delayed.
That is, referring to FIG. 10, the third terminal station transmits a data packet DP5 in the last of the conflict period of the beacon time period Ti starting with a beacon BC2. Since this data packet DP5 is transmitted over the beacon time period Ti, the base station has to receive the data packet DP5 to the last, and as a result, it can not transmit a beacon BC3 which was to be transmitted after the beacon time period Ti of the beacon BC2.
As a result, the base station transmits a beacon BC4 at a timing delayed from the beacon time period Ti by a delay time Δt, and therefore a beacon interval lengthens by the delay time Δt. This means that the start timing of a next non-conflict period is delayed, and thus the QoS during the non-conflict period can not be secured, which is a problem.
In addition, the fourth terminal station operating in the intermittence reception mode performs the intermittence reception of beacons at an interval of the beacon time period Ti by synchronizing with the base station. Therefore, if the beacon interval lengthens, a timing of the intermittent reception becomes different from a timing of transmission of a beacon and thus the fourth terminal station operating in the intermittence reception mode can not receive the beacon, which is a problem.


An airbag system is disclosed comprising a gas generator and an airbag having at least two inflatable airbag regions. The airbag regions are attached to the gas generator by an interconnecting a T-shaped connecting piece having symmetrically opposed outlet stubs with differently sized outlet cross-sections for inflating the airbag regions. In order to neutralize the thrust of the system in case of accidental fire, several means for controlling the outlet cross-section on at least one of the outlet stubs are disclosed.

The invention relates to an airbag arrangement comprising a gas generator and an airbag having at least two inflatable airbag regions, wherein both airbag regions are attached to the gas generator by interconnecting a T-shaped connecting piece having outlet stubs of different outlet cross-sections.
This type of airbag arrangement is described for example in EP 0 808 257 B1, in which the attachment for the gas generator is located between two airbag regions to be filled. Although a T-shaped connecting piece for connecting the gas generator to the two airbag regions to be attached is not explicitly presented, the necessity of a connecting piece configured in this manner, wherein the outlet channels of the connecting piece inevitably can or must be embodied differently as a function of the volume of the respectively attached airbag region, said outlet channels leading to the attached airbag regions, is evident to the person skilled in the art. An airbag arrangement of this type having front and rear airbag regions featuring different filling volumes is disclosed in GB 2 390 576 A, for example.
If it is necessary to store and, in particular, transport an airbag arrangement of this type prior to its assembly in a motor vehicle, it cannot be excluded that an unintentional triggering of the gas generator can occur due to external influences, such as in the event of an accidental building fire. There therefore exists a requirement on airbag arrangements of this type, that the airbag arrangement behave thrust-neutral in such a case, that is, no recoil effect that causes a movement of the connecting piece in the airbag arrangement to occur in one direction or the other. Since the T-shaped connecting piece must have different outlet cross-sections if a T-shaped connecting piece is to be used in an airbag arrangement described in GB 2 390 576 A, there exists the associated disadvantage that the requirement for a thrust-neutral configuration of the airbag arrangement cannot be met.
It is therefore the problem of the invention to equip an airbag arrangement having the features specified in the introduction in such a manner that, if the gas generator is triggered before the airbag arrangement is installed in a vehicle, no movement of the connecting piece will occur in spite of the fact that the outlet stubs of the connecting piece have differently acting outlet cross-sections when in the installed state.
The solution of this problem, including advantageous embodiments and developments of the invention, arises from the content of the claims, which follow this description.

Airbag arrangement having thrust-neutral outlet cross-sections of the gas generator


A light deflector which deflects incident light and emits the deflected light, by changing a refractive index of a liquid crystal: a pair of ITO films; a plurality of prisms which are provided between the pair of transparent electrodes and are arranged on a facing surface of one of the pair of transparent electrodes, the facing surface facing a surface of the other one of the pair of transparent electrodes; two spacers arranged between the pair of transparent electrodes, and having, in a direction from one of the pair of transparent electrodes toward the other, widths which (i) are greater than widths of the prisms and (ii) are identical to each other; and a liquid crystal which is provided, within a space between the pair of transparent electrodes, in a portion other than a portion where the prisms and the two spacers exist.

A light deflector which does not include a movable part, and uses an electrical liquid crystal deflector that utilizes a variation in refractive index of a liquid crystal caused by application of a voltage has been proposed (patent literature (PTL) 1).
A three dimensional (3D) stereoscopic image display device using the above-described light deflector has been proposed (PTL 2).

Light deflector, method of manufacturing light deflector, and liquid crystal display

Panasonic Intellectual Property Management Co., Ltd.


A shoe fastening device is arranged such that a protruding member disposed integrally on one of an upper cover and a band member is inserted into a receiving portion provided on the other of the upper cover and the band member to connect the band member and the upper cover, thereby fastening the upper cover through the band member. The shoe fastening device allows an optimum fastening condition to be simply obtained for the wearer with quickness.

The present invention relates to a shoe fastening device and a plate-shaped member thereof.
As conventional means of fastening an upper cover of a shoe, there are one in which an opening portion formed in the upper cover is fastened with a lace-like member and another in which the opening portion is fastened with a band-shaped member using a plate-shaped engageable fastener such as a velvet fastener.
However, in the conventional fastening means, if, for instance, the lace-like member is used, there is a drawback in that it is difficult to adjust the fastening force applied to the upper cover of the shoe. In other words, the fastening means using the lace-like member has a drawback in that, since an elongated lace-like member is used, it is difficult for the fastening force to be transmitted to a front portion of the opening portion which is formed in the upper cover, located closer to the toes, and therefore remote from the position at which the lace-like is tied, with the result that the range in which the fastening force can be adjusted is restricted to a region which is close to the position at which the lace-like member is tied. Accordingly, if an attempt is made to fasten, for example, the front portion of the opening portion which is located close to the toes, it is necessary to effect fastening sequentially from the front portion located close to the toes toward the tying position of the lace-like member. On the other hand, if an attempt is made to loosen the lace-like member which has been tightened, it is necessary to loosen it sequentially from the tying position of the lace-like member toward the front portion close to the toes. Hence, it is very troublesome to adjust the fastening force applied to the upper cover.
On the other hand, in the case of the conventional fastening means using a band-shaped member which makes use of a plate-shaped engageable fastener such as a velvet fastener, although the adjustment of the fastening force applied to the upper cover is facilitated, there is the drawback that a joining force of the fastener is lost at an early stage since foreign substances are liable to adhere to the engaging members of the engageable fastener.

Shoe fastening device and plate-shaped member thereof


An apparatus for measuring recirculation using thermodilution during extracorporeal blood treatment including a temperature varying unit arranged to cyclically heat and/or cool blood in a venous tube segment of the blood tube system for a quasi-continuous recirculation measurement; and a detecting device configured to measure a variation of a physical parameter resulting from the heating and/or cooling. The detecting device is arranged to detect, in a case free from recirculation, a first physical parameter and to detect, in a case afflicted with recirculation, a physical parameter varied by the cooling and/or heating of the blood by the temperature varying unit as a second physical parameter in the blood tube system. A method for measuring recirculation carries out appropriate steps.

In known methods for extracorporeal blood treatment or else blood purification, such as, for example, hemodialysis, hemofiltration and hemodiafiltration, a patient's blood is guided through an extracorporeal circulation. Usually a so-called shunt is inserted in the patient to form an access to the vascular system. In this case, a shunt is an arteriovenous connection in the forearm which can also be realized with an implant. For a dialysis treatment, the shunt is usually punctured by two syringes. Via the one syringe, the blood is guided from the patient for purification to the dialyzer. Via the second syringe, the purified blood is returned to the patient. If the blood flow in the extracorporeal circulation exceeds the blood flow in the shunt of the patient, this is resulting in recirculation during which part of the already purified blood is repeatedly guided from the shunt to the dialyzer. Reasons for this may be syringes that are not optimally inserted or stenoses in the shunt.
Therefore, the occurrence of a recirculation may serve for predicting an access failure, more exactly speaking may serve as a late predictor or a late basis of prediction. Since (shunt) recirculations usually are detrimentally accompanied by reduction of efficiency of the dialysis treatment, in the short run dialysis free from recirculation can be provided, to be sure. However, substantially occurrence of recirculation may be considered in favor of a better diagnosis of the shunt and, where necessary, an as quick initiation of revision as possible, as determinations of recirculation over a quite long period of time are capable of providing information about the condition of the shunt.
Known measures in the case of determinations of recirculation involve heating of a dialysate, for example a dialysate passing through a dialyzer, measuring of a temperature bolus and, respectively, a conductivity bolus at the dialysate outlet of a dialyzer after varying a physical or chemical parameter at the dialysate inlet, or apparatuses which require temperature sensors both in an arterial circulation segment and in a venous circulation segment. The size of the volume involved in the known measures, such as that of the dialysate, entails slow variations of a parameter considered in each case, however, and, as a consequence, inert system reactions which permit measurements at long time intervals only.
Said known measures thus are not adapted to provide any measuring values in quick or short time sequence and therefore are not suited for continuous or quasi-continuous measurement. So far, continuous or at least quasi-continuous measurements or the determination of an optimum blood flow on the basis of recirculation determination measurements performed continuously or quasi-continuously are not possible.

Apparatus and method for measuring recirculation


In one example, a Bluetooth enabled navigation device pairs with a mobile phone and then sends a plurality of tuning transmissions, each at a different transmission power gain amount, to a remote server using the mobile phone. These tuning transmissions are encoded using frequency tones that synthesize speech for transmission through the mobile phone and a voice channel of its wireless telecommunications network. The navigation device then tunes transmit power settings according to a received response to the tuning transmissions and uses the tuned transmit power settings for subsequent transmission to the remote server using this particular mobile phone.

Navigation devices (including Personal Navigation Devices (PNDs) and in-car electronic devices) output information to a user based on a location of the navigation devices. These navigation devices generally utilize the Global Positioning System (GPS) to determine the location, and then use speakers and/or displays to output map information, directions, etc.
To continue expanding and/or improving the features provided by navigation devices, there is a need to maximize opportunities for navigation devices to obtain network access, such as to the Internet. The disclosure that follows solves this and other problems.

Automatic gain control in a personal navigation device


4-aminocyclohexanol compounds, processes for their preparation, pharmaceutical formulations comprising these compounds and the use of substituted 4-aminocyclohexanol compounds for the preparation of pharmaceutical formulations and for the treatment of diverse indications, including, without limitation, pain.

The heptadecapeptide nociceptin is an endogenous ligand of the ORL1 (opioid receptor-like) receptor (Meunier et al., Nature 377, 1995, p. 532-535), which belongs to the family of opioid receptors and is to be found in many regions of the brain and spinal cord (Mollereau et al., FEBS Letters, 341, 1994, p. 33-38, Darland et al., Trends in Neurosciences, 21, 1998, p. 215-221). The peptide is characterized by a high affinity, with a Kd value of approximately 56 pM (Ardati et al., Mol. Pharmacol. 51, p. 816-824), and by a high selectivity for the ORL1 receptor. The ORL1 receptor is homologous to the μ, κ and δ opioid receptors and the amino acid sequence of the nociceptin peptide has a high similarity with those of the known opioid peptides. The activation of the receptor induced by nociceptin leads, via coupling with Gi/o proteins, to an inhibition of adenylate cyclase (Meunier et al., Nature 377, 1995, p. 532-535). Functional similarities of the μ, κ and δ opioid receptors with the ORL1 receptor are also present at the cell level in respect of activation of the potassium channel (Matthes et al., Mol. Pharmacol. 50, 1996, p. 447-450; Vaughan et al., Br. J. Pharmacol. 117, 1996, p. 1609-1611) and inhibition of the L-, N- and P/Q-type calcium channels (Conner et al., Br. J. Pharmacol. 118, 1996, p. 205-207; Knoflach et al., J. Neuroscience 16, 1996, p. 6657-6664).
The nociceptin peptide shows a pronociceptive and hyperalgesic activity after intercerebroventicular administration in various animal models (Reinscheid et al., Science 270, 1995, p. 792-794; Hara et al,. Br. J. Pharmacol. 121, 1997, p. 401-408). These findings can be explained as inhibition of stress-induced analgesia (Mogil et al., Neurosci. Letters 214, 1996, p 131-134; and Neuroscience 75, 1996, p. 333-337). In this connection it has also been possible to demonstrate an anxiolytic activity of nociceptin (Jenck et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 94, 1997, 14854-14858).
On the other hand, it has also been possible to show an antinociceptive effect of nociceptin in various animal models, in particular after intrathecal administration. Nociceptin inhibits the activity of kainate- or glutamate-stimulated dorsal root ganglia neurons (Shu et al., Neuropeptides, 32, 1998, 567-571) or glutamate-stimulated spinal cord neurons (Faber et al., Br. J. Pharmacol., 119, 1996, p. 189-190); it has an antinociceptive action in the tail flick test in the mouse (King at al., Neurosci. Lett., 223, 1997, 113-116), in the flexor-reflex model in the rat (Xu et al., NeuroReport, 7, 1996, 2092-2094) and in the formalin test on the rat (Yamamoto et al., Neuroscience, 81, 1997, p. 249-254). In models for neuropathic pain it has also been possible to demonstrate an antinociceptive action of nociceptin (Yamamoto and Nozaki-Taguchi, Anesthesiology, 87, 1997), which is of interest in as much as the activity of nociceptin increases after axotomy of spinal nerves. This is in contrast to conventional opioids, the activity of which decreases under these conditions (Abdulla and Smith, J. Neurosci., 18, 1998, p. 9685-9694).
The ORL1 receptor is moreover also involved in the regulation of further physiological and pathophysiological processes. These include, inter alia, learning and memory formation (Sandin et al., Eur. J. Neurosci., 9, 1997, p. 194-197; Manabe et al., Nature, 394, 1997, p. 577-581), hearing ability (Nishi et al., EMBO J., 16, 1997, p. 1858-1864), food intake (Pomonis et al., NeuroReport, 8, 1996, p. 369-371), regulation of blood pressure (Gumusel et al., Life Sci., 60, 1997, p. 141-145; Campion and Kadowitz, Biochem. Biophys. Res. Comm., 234, 1977, p. 309-312), epilepsy (Gutiérrez et al, Abstract 536.18, Society for Neuroscience, vol. 24, 28th Ann. Meeting, Los Angeles, Nov. 7th-12th, 1998) and diuresis (Kapista et al., Life Sciences, 60, 1997, PL 15-21). In a review article by Calo et al. (Br. J. Pharmacol., 129, 2000, 1261-1283) an overview of the indications or biological processes in which the ORL1 receptor plays or with high probability could play a role is given. There are mentioned, inter alia: analgesia, stimulation and regulation of food intake, influence on μ-agonists, such as morphine, treatment of withdrawal symptoms, reduction in the addiction potential of morphines, anxiolysis, modulation of motor activity, memory disorders, epilepsy; modulation of neurotransmitter secretion, in particular of glutamate, serotonin and dopamine, and therefore neurodegenerative diseases; influencing of the cardiovascular system, initiation of an erection, diuresis, antinatriuresis, electrolyte balance, arterial blood pressure, water retention diseases, intestinal motility (diarrhea), relaxing effects on the respiratory tract, micturation reflex (urinary incontinence). The use of agonists and antagonists as anoretics, analgesics (also in co-administration with opioids) or nootropics, and also as antitussives is furthermore discussed.
The possible uses of compounds which bond to the ORL1 receptor and activate or inhibit this are correspondingly diverse.