A method is presented for evaluating data to predict the future occurrence of a medical condition that is presently clinically occult or which has not yet occurred. Specifically, the method uses a neural network to analyze and interpret DNA flow cytometric histograms. A first set of DNA histograms taken from tumors from patients having known relapse rates are used to train the neural network, an then the trained network is applied to predict the relapse rates of patients using DNA histograms of tumors from those patients. Prognosis according to this method can be performed using only diploid histograms, using only aneuploid histograms, or using a combination of diploid and aneuploid histograms.

The present invention relates to a method for predicting the future occurrence of medical conditions that have not yet occurred or which are clinically occult.
Neural networks are well known and have been used to implement computational methods that learn to distinguish between objects or classes of events. The networks are first trained by presentation of known data about objects or classes of events, and then are applied to distinguish between unknown objects or classes of events. While neural networks have been applied in medicine to diagnose diseases based on existing symptoms, and to prescribe treatments for the diagnosed diseases, to date, there has been no application of such networks to predict future occurrence of disease which is clinically occult or which has not yet occurred, or to predict the relapse of disease that has presumably been cured.
Such prognostication is important in all branches of medicine. For example, it is useful in the field of oncology in order to improve the prediction of prognosis of patients so that appropriate therapy can be selected. This goal is of particular importance in the selection of treatment of breast cancer patients who are presumably rendered disease free after the removal of the primary tumor within the breast, and who have no pathological evidence of axillary lymph node involvement. Most of these patients will have been surgically cured, but a substantial minority will relapse.
Several recent studies suggest that certain breast cancer patients without axillary lymph node involvement can benefit by adjuvant chemotherapy or hormonal therapy. However, not all the individual patients actually benefit from this therapy, and a majority of these patients receive therapy that is not necessary.
Prior efforts to predict breast cancer prognosis use a number of biochemical, molecular biologic and biophysical input variables that can be used to describe the cells in a tumor. When such multiple input variables are available, typically various combinations of the input variables are assessed using multivariate analysis. Multivariate analysis is a powerful tool but suffers from the disadvantage that it is often unable to effectively analyze outcome based on a highly non-linear input variable. In addition it is at particular disadvantage in analyzing interactions between several non-linear variables (where for example multiple peaks and troughs of recurrence probability may exist). All of this is particularly true when a given input variable is included in one of two input states (as is commonly done in clinical medicine), with an optimum threshold or cut-point between the two states being determined by maximizing a likelihood function using regression analysis. While such multivariate analysis is not without advantage, it suffers from drawbacks because defining a single cut-point between two states of an input variable effectively ignores important non-linearities in the input variable. In addition, multivariate analysis can miss cross-correlation effects between input variables.
Other clinically occult diseases which have known multiple risk factors, for example, coronary heart disease or diabetes, would also benefit from improved prognostication methods.
Other methods have also proven to be important tools in the prediction of prognosis in breast cancer, and other tumor types. Such methods, known as DNA cytophotometry, process images of cells or cell components to quantitatively estimate a number of nuclear and cellular parameters. Of particular interest is DNA flow cytometry. The basis of DNA flow cytometry is the measurement of the level of DNA in individual cells. The technique results in DNA histograms indicating the number of cells having different levels of DNA. Conventionally, DNA histograms obtained through flow cytometry are interpreted as having cells in three basic regions: cells in the G1/G0 phase of the cell cycle before replication of DNA; cells in the S-phase which are actively replicating DNA; and cells in the G2/M phase of the cell after DNA replication but before cell replication.
Tumor cells are conventionally interpreted as diploid if they have a G0/G1 peak with a DNA content that is that of normal cells, if there are no other peaks in the histogram with an arbitrary cut-off percentage of counts (usually 10%) of that peak value, and if the G0/G1 peak in the histogram is narrow enough to be considered to represent cells of one population. S-phase counts of a DNA histogram lie in that region between the G0/G1 peak and the G2/M peak.
Several complex mathematical formulae have been developed to count the number of S-phase events while subtracting out events due to the tails of the G0/G1 and G2/M peaks, and while subtracting out the effects of contaminating cell debris. A particular sophisticated method known as SFIT uses second degree polynomials to perform this subtraction. These mathematical formulae are particularly complex for aneuploid histograms when they often have to deal with cell kinetics from cell populations that are both diploid and aneuploid. All of these mathematical approaches are however based on a mechanistic view of cells being in either the G0/G1, S or G2/M phases of the cell cycle.
As such, present techniques for analyzing DNA histograms resulting from flow cytometry ignore other patterns occurring in the DNA histograms which correlate with the risk of cancer relapse.

Method for predicting the future occurrence of clinically occult or non-existent medical conditions

Board of Regents, The University of Texas System


A method, a processing device, and a system for object tracking are proposed. The method includes the following steps. Imaging capturing is performed on an actual scene by using a primary camera and at least one secondary camera to respectively generate a primary image and at least one secondary image. Image stacking is performed on the primary image and the at least one secondary image to generate a stacked image. Position information and depth information of each object in the stacked image are computed. Whether there exist same objects among the objects in the stacked images is determined based on the position information and the depth information of each of the objects.

With the development of image processing technology and spatial positioning technology, the application of interactive displays has received increased attention. This kind of technology can produce interactive experience according to the user's operating requirements, and present information in a more intuitive way. However, the single-camera system covers a limited field of view and cannot meet the requirements for large-scale operations. The fisheye camera system will distort the image, making the human face difficult to recognize. Although the multi-camera system can cover a larger field of view, in cross-view face tracking, not only that it is necessary to perform a large number of computations on feature comparison, image stitching, and image recognition for the overlapping area of the field of view, there are concerns about repeated computation on human face.

Method, processing device, and system for object tracking

Industrial Technology Research Institute


A method and apparatus is provided for scheduling access to a common resource for a plurality of objects queued in a plurality of connection queues. Tokens associated with the connection queues are stored in scheduling queues. Each scheduling queue has a scheduling weight assigned thereto. Each connection queue has a connection weight value assigned thereto. A serving value is used to determine which scheduling queue to select. When a scheduling queue is selected, an object stored in a connection queue having an associated token stored in the selected scheduling queue is provided to the common resource. Tokens are moved among the scheduling queues as a function of the connection weight values, scheduling weights, and serving value. The objects queued in the connection queues may be fixed length cells or variable length packets. When the objects are variable length packets, a residual weight value is also maintained for each connection queue, the residual weight values being useful to prevent the connection queues from receiving an undue amount of service relative to their connection weights during each serving cycle.

There are different types of applications in an integrated service packet network such as an Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) network. Some applications, such as voice or real-time media stream, need to be transmitted with little delay and little delay jitter. Similarly, applications, such as remote log-in or on-line trading, can tolerate only small amounts of delay. Other applications, such as e-mail or FTP, can tolerate longer delays, and therefore do not need to be transmitted within a strict delay or delay jitter constraint. Because of the diverse range of acceptable delays for various applications, it is very important to support different levels of qualities of service (QoS) for these various applications. Also, it is important to allocate bandwidth among the connections in a fair manner so that a connection which is sending high rate or bursty traffic cannot occupy more bandwidth than it should be occupying. Thus, a scheduler should fairly allocate bandwidth among multiple connections according to their weights, so a connection sending traffic having an excessively high rate or bursty traffic will not adversely affect other connections.
In a system where a plurality of virtual connections (VCs) are competing to share a common resource (such as the same input port, output port, etc.), one way to control delay and fairly allocate that resource among the connections is to assign different weights to each VC and configure the system to serve the VCs according to their weights. Weight-based scheduling schemes have received a lot of attention, and many weight-based scheduling algorithms have been proposed, such as:                The General Processor Sharing (GPS) approach (See "A Generalized Processor Sharing Approach to Flow Control in Integrated Services Networks: The Single-Node Case," by Abhay K. Parekh and Robert G. Gallager, published in IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking, Vol. 1, No. 3, June 1993, p. 344–357),        The Weighted Fair Queuing (WFQ) approach (See the above-mentioned Parekh article),        The Worst Case Weighted Fair Queuing (WF2Q) Approach (See "WF2Q: Worst-case Fair Weighted Fair Queuing," by J. C. Bennett and H. Zhang, published in Proceedings of IEEE INFOCOM '96, p. 120–128),        The VirtualClock approach (See "VirtualClock: A New Traffic Control Algorithm for Packet Switching Networks," by L. Zhang, published in Proceedings of ACM SIGCOMM 1990, p. 19–29 and "Leap Forward Virtual Clock: A new Fair Queuing Scheme with Guaranteed Delays and Throughput Fairness," by Subhash Suir, G. Varghese and Cirish Chandranmenon, published on IEEE INFOCOM'97),        The Self-Clocked Fair Queuing (SCFQ) approach (See "A Self-Clocked Fair Queuing Scheme for Broadband Applications," by S. J. Golestani, published in Proceedings of IEEE INFOCOM 1994, p. 636–646),        The Delay Earliest Due Date (Delay-EDD) and Jitter Earliest Due Date (Jitter-EDD) approaches (See "Comparison of Rate-Based Service Disciplines," by H. Zhang and S. Keshav, published in Proceedings of ACM SIGCOMM 1991, p. 113–121), and        The Head-of-the-Line Earliest Due Date (HOL-EDD) approach (See "HOL-EDD: A Flexible Service Scheduling Scheme for ATM Networks," by M. Vishnu and J. W. Mark, published in Proceedings of IEEE INFOCOM 1996, p. 647–654).The entire disclosures of each of the above-cited publications are incorporated herein by reference.
The commonality of these algorithms is that each one is based on time stamps that are assigned to each incoming packet or to each packet queue. The packets are then sent according to a time stamp sorting result.
While the GPS approach is very flexible and provides perfect fairness (which thereby would give users widely different performance guarantees), GPS is an idealized approach which is not practical to implement because GPS assumes that the scheduler can serve multiple sessions simultaneously, and further assumes that packet traffic is infinitely divisible. The WFQ approach (which is also called packet-by-packet GPS, or PGPS) and the WF2Q approach are packet-by-packet disciplines which closely approximate the GPS approach. Both WFQ and WF2Q have attractive characteristics with respect to delay and fairness, but are impractical to implement because of the intensive computations that these approaches require. SCFQ and VirtualClock reduce the computation complexity of WFQ and WF2Q using an approximation algorithm to simplify the calculation of the virtual time. Because these two algorithms use the internally generated virtual time to reflect the progress of work in the system (rather than using virtual time generated in the hypothetical GPS system), the performance of these two algorithms is not as good as WFQ and WF2Q. Therefore, a need has existed within the art for a scheduling algorithm that can provide high performance with minimal computation complexity.
A major problem with these time stamp-based algorithms is the computation cost. FIG. 1 shows the basic configuration used in implementing time stamp-based algorithms. As packets arrive, a time stamp is attached thereto. Then, the packets are stored in the buffer. The algorithm needs to calculate virtual time for each packet or for each connection. Then, the algorithm requires that each packet or connection be sorted according to their time stamps in order to serve the packet or connection with the minimum time stamp. If no approximation method is employed, the computation cost for the time stamp-based algorithm is 0(log2N), where N is the number of backlogged queues. Because typical systems have thousands of VCs multiplexed into one link, the resultant high computation cost makes these algorithms impractical to implement in a high-speed system.
Another traditional scheduling algorithm that is often implemented is the Weighted Round Robin (WRR) approach. FIG. 2(a) depicts a conventional WRR algorithm. The backlogged connections 100 (labeled A–F) are connected in a ring. As can be seen, each connection has a weight, W, assigned thereto. A connection with weight 2 will get served twice as often as a connection with weight 1. In the example of FIG. 2(a), the scheduler can serve connection A three times (e.g. dequeue 3 packets from connection A) before moving on to connection B, which gets served twice. Thereafter, connections C, D, E, and F get served once, three times, once, and twice respectively as the scheduler moves from connection to connection. With this conventional WRR algorithm, a high weight connection may block a low weight connection, thereby increasing the traffic delay.
An improved WRR algorithm was proposed in "Weighted Round-Robin Cell Multiplexing in a General-Purpose ATM Switch Chip," authored by M. Katavenis et al. and published in IEEE J. Select Areas, Commun., Vol. 9, No. 8, p. 1265–1279, October 1991, the entire disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference.
FIG. 2(b) depicts the improved WRR algorithm. Rather than successively serving each connection by a number of packets equal to that connection's weight before moving on to the next connection, the improved WRR algorithm will move to the next connection after serving a previous connection by one packet. To serve the connections according to their weights, multiple "trips" around the connections may have to be made. As shown in FIG. 2(b), connection A (whose weight is 3) will get served by one packet. After such service, connections A's residual weight will be decremented by one. Next connection B (whose weight is 2) will get served by one packet, and then its residual weight will be decremented by one. This pattern will repeat itself as the scheduler moves from connection to connection, and makes a number of "roundtrips" equal to the highest weight assigned to a connection. Service to a given connection will occur in a roundtrip so long as that connection's residual weight is greater than zero. Once all connections have a residual weight equal to zero, the serving cycle will be reset with each connection being accorded its maximum weight. In FIG. 2(b), there will be 3 roundtrips. In the first roundtrip, the serving order will be ABCDEF. In the second roundtrip, the serving order will be ABDF. In the third roundtrip, the serving order will be AD. Thus, the overall serving pattern for a full serving cycle will be ABCDEF–ABDFAD.
The improved WRR algorithm serves connections more evenly in time, but still maintains the same serving frequencies. This algorithm can be easily implemented in hardware, and the computation cost for the serving position only has 0(1) of complexity. However, because it takes 0(log2N) time to search through the binary tree to find the next VC entry to serve, this scheme is not scalable to a high speed system. Also, the round robin techniques of FIGS. 2(a) and 2(b) are unable to guarantee fairness among different flows if variable length packets are served because the scheduler fails to take into account packet length when serving packets.
The Deficit Round Robin (DRR) technique shown in FIG. 3 addresses the unfairness using a deficit counter. As shown in FIG. 3, a weight W is assigned to each FlowID. Also, a deficit counter (D) is maintained for each FlowID. Initially, D is set equal to W. When a given FlowID is selected for service, the scheduler checks whether the D associated with that FlowID is larger than or equal to the length of the packet at the head of the FlowID's queue. If D is larger than or equal to that packet's length, the packet is served. Thereafter D is decremented by the packet's length, and the scheduler checks the next packet in FlowID's queue. As long as the packet at the head of FlowID has a length less than or equal to D, FlowID will continue to be served. If D drops below the packet's length, then D is incremented by W and the scheduler requeues the current FlowID at the end of the serving queue before proceeding to the next FlowID. The DRR technique shown in FIG. 3 can guarantee fairness in terms of throughput, but it allows burstiness, especially for FlowIDs having a large weight.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,101,193 issued to Ohba, the entire disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference, discloses a modified version of DRR that seeks to improve short-term fairness. FIG. 4 generally discloses the modified DRR technique of the '193 patent. As shown in FIG. 4, the scheduler maintain two queues: a serving queue and a waiting queue. Backlogged flows are initially placed in the serving queue. The scheduler selects each flow in round robin fashion. The packet at the head of the selected flow is served if the flow's D value is not less than the length of the packet at the head of the flow. When a packet from a flow is served, that flow's D value is decremented by the length of served packet. Thereafter, that flow is moved to the end of the serving queue. If the packet at the head of the selected flow has a length greater than D, then that flow's D value is incremented by W and the flow is moved to the end of the waiting queue. No packet is served at this time. Once the serving queue becomes empty, the scheduler treats the waiting queue as the serving queue and the serving queue as the waiting queue, and the process continues. This modified DRR scheme provides fairness through interleaved service, but it requires the scheduler to constantly check whether a flow's allocated weight has been exhausted before deciding whether to serve a packet.
Time-Wheel is another scheduling approach used in ATM systems. As shown in FIG. 5, several queues 102 are organized in a round topology. Each queue 102 contains zero or more backlogged connections (denoted as A, B, C, D, F, and G). Two time pointers, the time pointer 101 and transmission pointer 103 are employed to control the scheduler. The time pointer 101 moves clockwise from one queue to the next for each cell time. All connections behind time pointer 101 are eligible to be served. The transmission pointer 103, which also moves clockwise, either lags or steps together with time pointer 101. The connections in the queues pointed to by the transmission pointer 103 get served one by one. External controller 104 places the connections into one of the queues.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,041,059 issued to Joffe et al., the entire disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference, describes an improved Time-Wheel algorithm. The computation complexity of the Time-Wheel algorithm is independent of the number of VCs, and the scheduler can precisely pace the assigned bandwidth described in [i, m] (i cells and m cell time). However, several limitations hinder this approach. The first limitation being that the Time-Wheel scheme cannot serve more than m/i VCs. The second limitation being that fairness cannot be guaranteed when the bandwidth is oversubscribed. Therefore, the Time-Wheel approach also does not provide a scheduling algorithm suitable for high speed systems.
Because WFQ has several analytically attractive characteristics relating to delay and fairness, many simplified WFQ algorithms have been implemented. For example, the article, "A Queue-Length Based Weighted Fair Queuing Algorithm in ATM Networks," authored by Yoshihiro Ohba, and published in Proceedings of INFOCOM '97, 16th Annual Joint Conference of IEEE Computer & Communications Societies, the entire disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference, discloses a Queue-Length Based WFQ algorithm (QLWFQ) which maintains one common scheduling queue to hold credits for the VCs.
FIG. 6 depicts this QLWFQ scheme. One scheduling queue 108 queues credits for the connection queues 106. Each connection queue 106 has a weight assigned thereto. Each connection queue also has a length measured by the number of cells stored therein. By virtue of having a credit(j) queued in the scheduling queue 108, connection queue(j) will have a cell dequeued therefrom when credit(j) reaches the head of scheduling queue 108. Thus, each cell time, the scheduler takes the first credit from scheduling queue 108, and serves one cell from the connection queue corresponding to that credit.
Credits are updated in two ways. First, when an incoming cell arrives, a connection(i) is determined for that cell. A credit for connection(i) is added to the scheduling queue 108 if the length of connection queue(i) is less than or equal to the weight assigned to connection queue(i). Second, when an outgoing cell is taken from connection queue(j), the credit for connection queue(j) that is at the head of the scheduling queue is removed. If the length of connection queue(j) after dequeuing a cell therefrom is greater than or equal to the weight assigned to connection queue(j), then a credit for connection queue(j) is added to the back of the scheduling queue.
While the QLWFQ scheme reduces the computation complexity to 0(1), it may cause the head-of-line blocking due to bursty traffic, wherein a large number of credits for the same connection queue are added continuously to the scheduling queue. The other limitation of the QLWFQ scheme is that the scheduling queue must hold credits for all backlogged connections. For each connection, a number of credits up to the value of that connection's weight may be stored in the scheduling queue. When the weight granularity is doubled, the memory to hold the credits for the scheduling queue is doubled. Therefore, QLWFQ is not sufficiently flexible to support a wide range of granularities.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,014,367, issued to Joffe, the entire disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference, discloses a method that can provide a minimum service rate to each VC on a small selected time scale, with no limitation on the number of VCs it can support. There are two kinds of queues in the scheme, a waiting queue and a serving queue. The waiting queue becomes the serving queue when the present serving queue is empty. Both queues are FIFOs. The connections buffered in the serving queue are served one by one, and the scheduler decides on the basis of credits whether the VCs should reenter the serving queue or be moved to the waiting queue. The credit value is increased by the weight when the connection is moved to the waiting queue, and is decreased when the connection gets served by the scheduler. Under this scheme, the interval time between repeat service to a connection does not depend on its weight, but depends on the backlogged connections in the serving queue. In the high speed ATM network, where there are thousands of connections sharing one link, the latency under this scheme is quite high.
Another rate-based WFQ scheme is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,130,878 issued to Charny, the entire disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference. This scheme, which operates in the frequency domain, maintains a counter called "relative error" for each VC. Each cell time, the scheduler searches for the VC with the largest relative error, and serves that VC. Because this method involves sorting, there is a limitation on the number of VCs that can be supported in a high-speed ATM switch.
Yet another WFQ algorithm is disclosed by Chen et al. in Chen et al., "Design of a Weighted Fair Queuing Cell Scheduler for ATM Networks", Proceedings of Globecom 1998, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference. However, under this scheme for scheduling cells, each connection can only be assigned a weight that is a power of two. As such, the granularity of service provided to the connections is poor.
Therefore, a need exists within the art for a scheduler which can fairly allocate bandwidth among numerous connections without an excessive computation cost or a limit on how many connections the scheduler can support.

Method and apparatus for WFQ scheduling using a plurality of scheduling queues to provide fairness, high scalability, and low computation complexity


An apparatus for providing a pulsed radiation beam has a radiation source providing a pulsed radiation beam at a constant pulse repetition frequency. A beam deflector in the path of the pulsed radiation beam is actuable to redirect the pulsed radiation beam cyclically towards each of a plurality of beam intensity modulators in turn. A beam recombiner combines modulated light from each of the plurality of beam intensity modulators in order to form the modulated pulsed radiation beam at the constant pulse repetition frequency.

Pulsed lasers are widely used in applications ranging from surgical devices to lithography systems for forming electronic microcircuits. There are a number of types of devices conventionally used for pulsed laser modulation. These include, for example, devices that deflect a portion of the laser light or cause diffraction, such as various types of acousto-optical modulators (AOM) and electro-optical modulators (EOM). Other types of modulators operate using light polarization state, such as a liquid crystal (LC) modulator. Still other types of pulsed light modulators operate by mechanical action, obstructing some variable portion of the laser beam, actuated by devices such as voice coils, piezoelectric actuators, motors, and servo devices, for example.
Each type of modulator that is conventionally used for pulsed laser modulation has some limitations. For example, mechanical devices operate only within a range of speeds. Some types of devices, such as acousto-optical modulators, are effective only over a range of wavelengths.
One area of particular interest for pulse modulation is in UV lithography. The drive toward continually improved resolution for microcircuit fabrication has stirred interest in using shorter wavelengths, with particular interest in light in the deep UV region, typically less than about 250 nm. However, modulation of a pulsed laser beam in this range presents a number of problems that defy conventional solutions. One problem relates to the spectral range, which exceeds the range of modulator devices such as AOM and EOM devices. For example, typical EOM materials such as KD*P (Potassium Dideuterium Phosphate) or KDP (Potassium Dihydrogen Phosphate) exhibit relatively strong absorption at the UV wavelengths, which results in a lower damage threshold of the material over this spectral range. This eliminates these devices as potential modulators for UV lithography applications.
Another problem relates to high pulse rates. UV light at suitable power levels is efficiently provided by excimer lasers, which can operate at pulse rates of 5-6 KHz or higher. This well exceeds the response speeds of mechanical light modulators that would otherwise be operable in the deep UV range. Thus, the combination of very short wavelengths and relatively high pulse frequencies defies conventional light modulation solutions.
Conventional approaches to pulsed laser modulation, constrained with respect to speed and flexibility, in turn limit the capabilities of UV lithography technology. It is illustrative to consider a few salient examples of conventional approaches:                UK Patent Application GB 2155647A entitled "Controlled Exposure" by Suzuki describes conventional control of pulse energy by controlling the drive signal to the laser itself. This allows variation in pulse-to-pulse intensity, which is desirable for applications such as UV lithography. However, this type of direct modulation of the laser drive current would only be suitable for pulsed lasers only at speeds below a few hundred Hz. Moreover, even if faster response were possible, it is generally more desirable to operate the pulsed laser at a constant power output rather than to attempt continuous modulation of the laser power itself. For these reasons, this type of approach does not provide a workable mechanism for high-speed pulse modulation.        U.S. Pat. No. 4,970,546 entitled "Exposure Control Device" to Suzuki et al. describes the use of a spinning filter wheel that interposes a set of filters in the optical path. Each filter provides a different attenuation level to the light, so that a fixed pattern of attenuation is provided to the laser beam. Such a solution can be used to provide modulation for earlier pulsed laser sources at 500 Hz.        However, this solution would not be usable with laser sources more recently developed that operate at 5-6 KHz. Moreover, the attenuation provided with this type of solution yields a discrete fixed set of power levels in a repeated pattern. Other disclosures showing similar spinning filter wheel solutions include those of U.S. Pat. No. 6,476,905 entitled "Step and Scan Exposure System Equipped with a Plurality of Attenuator Blades for Exposure Control" to Li and U.S. Pat. No. 5,119,390 entitled "Energy Amount Controlling Device" to Ohmori.
Thus, although higher pulsed laser frequencies have been achieved in the past few years, lithography systems utilizing UV pulsed lasers have been unable to harness the additional potential this offers for enhanced exposure accuracy and processing speed. There is, then, a need for an apparatus that provides a high-frequency pulsed radiation beam wherein each pulse can be separately modulated.

Optical power modulation at high frequency


A synchronous dynamic random access memory subsystem includes two banks of connectors for receiving single or dual in-line memory modules. A clock is located in close proximity to the connectors and produces clock pulses having a known rise time. Clock wiring is placed between the clock and the connectors, and module wiring carries the clock pulses from the connectors to the memory. The wiring has an impedance and length such that the round trip delay time of clock pulses between the clock and the memory is less than the rise time of the clock pulses. The clock is preferably located between the two banks of connectors to reduce wiring length to a minimum and minimize coupled noise.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to high speed and low cost memory subsystems for synchronous dynamic random access memory (SDRAM). The invention is particularly directed to controlling the layout of high capacity SDRAM memory modules and the positioning of associated electronics in light of a known signal rise time to avoid problems related to transmission line effects.
2. Description of Related Art
Synchronous dynamic random access memory offers a significant increase in speed over conventional dynamic random access memory (DRAM). SDRAM memory often operates at speeds above 66 MHz and 100 MHz or faster SDRAM systems are expected to become widely used. This increase in speed, however, creates a new set of problems for memory subsystem design as transmission line effects become more important.
In any memory system, it is important to maintain the signal integrity of the address, control and clock signals, however, this is particularly difficult at the high speeds of SDRAM systems as transmission line effects begin to appear. To avoid transmission line reflections in SDRAM subsystems, a solution has been proposed requiring the use of series resistors, such as thin film buried resistors. This solution also requires resistive/capacitive termination, e.g. AC termination, at both ends of the wiring. This is a relatively complex and expensive solution to the problem. Furthermore, the resulting signals may still be poor to marginally acceptable at some points in the system.
Another approach to maintaining high quality signals in high speed SDRAM systems involves the use of specially designed buses and interfaces. However, this approach is also relatively complex and costly.
Yet another difficulty with high capacity SDRAM relates to the numerous address lines needed for the amount of memory to be accessed. For example, newer high capacity SDRAM is typically mounted in dual in-line memory modules (DIMMs) having 168 or 200 pins, although single in-line memory module (SIMM) implementations are also used. SDRAM also uses a few additional signals not needed for conventional DRAM, such as the clock signal. This adds to the number of connections that must be made in the memory subsystem.
The large number of required connections in modern SDRAM/DIMM systems requires space for the interconnecting wiring, which in prior memory subsystems has resulted in long distances between the SDRAM memory and components such as memory controllers, the clock and multiplexers. This causes problems with signal reflection due to the length of the wiring involved. The numerous connections and distances between the memory and the associated memory subsystem components of prior designs has resulted in long parallel wiring nets which creates many difficulties with cross coupling between the wiring, particularly when multiple banks of memory are used.
The problem of laying out the wiring for the large number of connections in an SDRAM system is doubled when a dual memory bank design is selected as compared to a single bank design. Some implementations of SDRAM systems have offered only a single bank of memory modules. A single bank design is simpler to design and produce, but offers less flexibility and performance than a dual bank design.
The present invention provides an SDRAM memory subsystem suitable for use with at least eight DIMMs of SDRAM high speed memory organized into two banks. The invention operates well at speeds up to at least 100 MHz and also allows complete compatibility with conventional DRAM DIMMs or SIMMs. Further, the present design is relatively inexpensive as compared to previously proposed solutions to the layout and transmission line problems. It may use the same DIMM connectors and motherboards as more conventional DRAM memory subsystem designs and does not require thin film buried series resistors on the DIMM for the data nets.
The layout and configuration of the wiring and support electronics in the memory subsystem of the present invention reduce the coupled noise between the large number of parallel data nets which has plagued prior implementations of dual bank designs.
Bearing in mind the problems and deficiencies of the prior art, it is therefore an object of the present invention to provide an SDRAM memory subsystem which is low cost and which does not require the use of series resistors.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide an SDRAM memory subsystem which does not suffer from poor signals due to transmission line effects.
It is another object of the present invention to provide an SDRAM memory subsystem design which offers a dual bank design with at least eight SDRAM DIMMs.
A further object of the invention is to reduce coupled noise in a multiple memory bank design.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a memory subsystem which may be used interchangeably with high speed SDRAM/DIMMs and more conventional DRAM memory.
Still other objects and advantages of the invention will in part be obvious and will in part be apparent from the specification.

High speed and low cost SDRAM memory subsystem

International Business Machines Corporation


Methods, systems, and devices for wireless communications are described. In some systems, a network may schedule a user equipment (UE) for multiple transmission/reception point (TRP) communication. The network may transmit a single downlink control information (DCI) message to the UE to dynamically configure multiple transmission configuration indicator (TCI) states for the multiple TRPs. In a first example, the DCI message may include a bit field indicating a set of antenna ports and the multi-TRP scheme for transmission. In a second example, the DCI message may include a separate field indicating the multi-TRP scheme (e.g., based on UE capabilities). In a third example, the DCI may indicate redundancy versions (RVs) for different TRPs in an RV field or across multiple fields. In a fourth example, the DCI may include an indication of a precoding resource block group (PRG) size that may be interpreted differently based on the indicated multi-TRP scheme.

The following relates generally to wireless communications, and more specifically to dynamic switching between different multi-transmission/reception point (TRP) schemes.
Wireless communications systems are widely deployed to provide various types of communication content such as voice, video, packet data, messaging, broadcast, and so on. These systems may be capable of supporting communication with multiple users by sharing the available system resources (e.g., time, frequency, and power). Examples of such multiple-access systems include fourth generation (4G) systems such as Long Term Evolution (LTE) systems, LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) systems, or LTE-A Pro systems, and fifth generation (5G) systems which may be referred to as New Radio (NR) systems. These systems may employ technologies such as code division multiple access (CDMA), time division multiple access (TDMA), frequency division multiple access (FDMA), orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA), or discrete Fourier transform spread orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (DFT-S-OFDM). A wireless multiple-access communications system may include a number of base stations or network access nodes, each simultaneously supporting communication for multiple communication devices, which may be otherwise known as user equipment (UE).
In some wireless communications systems, base stations may communicate with UEs using TRPs. For example, the network may communicate with a UE using a single TRP at a base station, using multiple TRPs corresponding to a same base station, or using multiple TRPs corresponding to multiple base stations. In cases where the network uses multiple TRPs to communicate with the UE, whether at the same base station or different base stations, the network may use a number of different multi-TRP schemes for the communication. Additionally, different communication schemes may require configuration of different scheme-specific parameters.

Dynamic switching between different multi-transmission/reception point schemes


A moving image recording apparatus is provided, which allows a user to enjoy reproducing a moving image by easily finding a corresponding desired scene from moving images. A moving image is recorded together with attribute information therefor. Division points at which the moving image breaks on a time base are detected, and the moving image is divided at the detected division points into scenes. The scenes into which the moving image is divided at the detected division points are joined to limit the number of scenes to not more than a predetermined value if the number of the scenes into which the moving image is divided exceeds the predetermined value. Still images are created from respective ones of the scenes the number of which has been limited, and the created still images are recorded as the attribute information.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a moving image recording apparatus and method, a moving image reproducing apparatus, a moving image recording and reproducing method, programs for implementing these methods, and storage media storing these programs.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, the diffusion of VTRs and video movies has led to the use of animated images as familiar media. Further, the advance of computer technologies has made it possible to store animated images in a randomly accessible storage medium such as a hard disk for accumulation and management. Consequently, users can enjoy reproducing arbitrary animated images from arbitrary portions thereof without any cumbersome operations such as replacement and rewinding of video tapes.
To manage a plurality of animated images, the users have imparted titles or keywords to these animated images. Alternatively, as described in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publications (Kokai) Nos. 10-243323 and 10-13773, the users have stored reduced-sized representative images of scenes as attribute information in association with the respective animated images and found a target animated image scene using the attribute information.
Further, the users have printed one favorable scene of a moving image using a video printer and labeled such scenes or enjoyed viewing them.
However, if the representative images of the scenes are displayed in a list as the attribute information using the conventional scene managing technique, which is intended mainly to edit the moving images, a huge number of representative images are generated if the moving image is divided into small scenes. Then, with a display apparatus such as a domestic TV or a display device of a portable terminal which has a lower resolution than the display of a personal computer, much time is required to select representative images. As a result, little time is left for reproduction and appreciation of the moving images, which is the original purpose of the scene management.
Further, according to the conventional scene management technique, there are few keys to selection of representative images. As a result, if some representative images of scenes are similar, a desired scene of a moving image cannot be accurately and quickly selected. Furthermore, if the user prints a list of the representative images to enjoy viewing it like an album, the printed similar images are not good to look at, and hence the printing can result in waste of ink or sheets.

Moving image recording apparatus and method, moving image reproducing apparatus, moving image recording and reproducing method, and programs and storage media


A silylated polymethylsilsesquioxane, that contains no more than 0.12 residual silanol per Si atom and has a predetermined number average molecular weight from 380 to 2,000 is obtained by silylating the silanol in a starting polymethylsilsesquioxane with the formula EQU (CH.sub.3 SiO.sub.3/2).sub.n (CH.sub.3 Si(OH)O.sub.2/2).sub.m. wherein m and n are positive numbers that provide the specified molecular weight and 0.034/(M.times.10.sup.-3).ltoreq.m/(m+n).ltoreq.0.152/(M.times.10.sup.-3)+ 0.10. The silylated polymethylsilsequioxanes of the present invention exhibit compatibility with silicone polymers, e.g., polydimethylsiloxanes. As a consequence, the silylated polymethylsilsesquioxanes of the invention can be used in a wide range of applications as, for example, a reinforcing filler for rubbers.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to: 1) compositions of silylated polymethylsilsesquioxane that are compatible with polymers, for example, polydimethylsiloxanes; 2) to a method for the preparation of said silylated polymethylsilsesquioxane compositions; and 3) to compositions that use the silylated polymethylsilsesquioxane compositions.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Silicone resins that contain 1.5 oxygen atoms per silicon atom are generically known as polysilsesquioxanes. Polysilsesquioxanes are highly heat-resistant and exhibit good electrical insulation properties and flame retardancy, and this good property spectrum has resulted in their use as resist materials and interlayer dielectric films in semiconductor fabrication (see, among others, "Shirikoon Handobukku" (English title: Silicone Handbook), edited by Kunio Itoh, published by Nikkan Kogyo Shinbunsha (1990)).
Methods are already known for the synthesis of polymethylsilsesquioxane. For example, polymethylsilsesquioxane can be synthesized by dissolving methyltrichlorosilane in the presence of an amine in a single solvent or mixture of solvents selected from ketones and ethers, adding water to this system dropwise to effect hydrolysis, and then heating to effect condensation (see Japanese Patent Publication (Kokoku) Numbers Sho 60-17214 (17,214/1985) and Hei 1-43773 (43,773/1989) and U.S. Pat. No. 4,399,266). Another synthesis example is taught in EP 0 406 911 A1 and Japanese Patent Publication (Kokoku) Number Sho 62-16212 (16,212/1987). These references teach the dissolution of a trifunctional methylsilane in an organic solvent; then hydrolysis by the dropwise addition of water to this solution at a temperature from -20.degree. C. to -50.degree. C. under an inert gas pressure of 1,000 to 3,000 Pa; and thereafter condensation by heating. Yet another synthesis example is disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid Open (Kokai or Unexamined) Number Hei 3-20331 (20,331/1991). This reference teaches the reaction, in organic solvent, of methyltriacetoxysilane with an equivalent amount of alcohol and/or water to synthesize the alkoxyacetoxysilane; polycondensation of the alkoxyacetoxysilane in organic solvent in the presence of sodium bicarbonate to give a prepolymer; and condensation of this prepolymer by heating in the presence of at least 1 catalyst selected from the alkali metal hydroxides, alkaline-earth metal hydroxides, alkali metal fluorides, alkaline-earth metal fluorides, and triethylamine. Yet another synthesis example is found in Japanese Patent Application Laid Open (Kokai or Unexamined) Number Hei 3-227321 (227,321/1991). This reference teaches the dissolution of alkali metal carboxylate and lower alcohol in a mixed liquid system that forms two phases (water and hydrocarbon solvent); the dropwise addition of methyltrihalosilane into this system to effect hydrolysis; and condensation by heating.
The polymethylsilsesquioxanes afforded by these methods share a characteristic feature: they are hard but brittle. Some of the preceding references even include tactics for addressing this problem. Japanese Patent Publication (Kokoku) Number Hei 1-43773 instructs regulating the fraction with molecular weight .ltoreq.20,000 (molecular weight as determined by gel permeation chromatography (GPC) calibrated with polystyrene standards) to 15 to 30 weight % of the polymethylsilsesquioxane.
However, even this does no more than enable the preparation of coatings with thicknesses of about 1.8 to 2.0 .mu.m. Similarly, the technology in EP 0 406 911 A1 can only provide films with maximum thicknesses of 3 to 3.5 .mu.m without cracking. At larger film thicknesses cracking occurs, and of course the flexibility that would permit the fabrication of an independent film is absent.
We have already discovered (see EP 786 489 A1 and WO 9707164) that a coating that combines flexibility with high thermal stability is provided by the cure of a polymethylsilsesquioxane having a molecular weight and hydroxyl content in specific ranges and preferably prepared by a special method.
A method for the silylation of the residual silanol in polysilsesquioxane is provided in, for example, J. Am. Chem. Soc., 1990, 112, pages 1931 to 1936. Japanese Patent Application Laid Open Kokai or Unexamined! Number Sho 61-221232 (221,232/1986) teaches a method for the preparation of silylated polysilsesquioxane comprising the use of silylating agent to terminate the reaction in the polysilsesquioxane synthesis method of EP 0 406 911 A1 and Japanese Patent Publication (Kokoku) Number Sho 62-16212. Japanese Patent Application Laid Open (Kokai or Unexamined) Numbers Hei 6-279586 (279,586/1994), Hei 6-287307 (287,307/1994), and Hei 7-70321 (70,321/1995) teach that stabilization can be achieved and gelation can be avoided by trimethylsilylation of the hydroxyl in polysilsesquioxane in which methyl constitutes 50 to 99.9 mole % of the pendant organic groups and crosslinking-reactive groups are present in the remaining organic groups. However, even without silylation the polymethylsilsesquioxane disclosed by us in EP 786 489 A1 and WO 9707164 does not gel during its preparation and can be stably stored at room temperature. Japanese Patent Application Laid Open (Kokai or Unexamined) Number Hei 5-125187 (125,187/1993) teaches that an increased storage stability can be obtained by trialkylsilylation of the hydroxyl in polysilsesquioxane having Mn.gtoreq.100,000 and methyl as 50 to 100 mole % of its pendant organic groups. The above-referenced Japanese Patent Publication (Kokoku) Number Sho 62-16212 also teaches that silylation of the hydroxyl in polymethylsilsesquioxane improves stability.


A motion compensation winch has a number of operating modes to launch and recover a boat and take into account wave movement. The winch has a cable drum for winding a cable thereon, a secondary gear reduction to rotate the drum, a primary gear reduction between a hydraulic motor shaft and the secondary gear reduction, a rotational sensor to sense direction of cable drum rotation, a load sensor to determine when a tension on the cable is above or below a predetermined value and a secondary clutch to disengage the cable drum and permit the cable drum to rotate freely. The winch has a manual mode for manual operation, and four operational modes, an automatic launch mode, a motion compensation mode to keep the cable taut while a boat rises and falls on waves, a free wheel mode and a recovery mode for recovering a boat that is rising and falling on waves.

In the past most hoisting devices used for lowering lifeboats and the like relied on a winch operator to lower a boat so that the boat reached the surface when the water level is rising rather than falling away. Otherwise the wave falls away under the boat so it is suspended by the cable again. It is also necessary to prevent slack occurring in the hoisting cable. If slack does occur, then when the wave falls away, the slack is taken up and a violent jerk occurs as the weight of the lifeboat is taken by the cable. This jerk action may cause undue stresses in the hoisting cable or in the hoisting connections to the lifeboat. Furthermore, such an action causes discomfort to passengers in a lifeboat.
Various types of winches have been devised to prevent the occurrence of slack in a cable and to prevent the jerk that occurs when the slack is taken up. One such hoisting device is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,928,925 which discloses a constant tension hoisting member with a separate cable tension sensing system. The hoisting device provides an automatic launching operation but not an automatic recovery arrangement. The winch disclosed in this patent utilizes a main motor and an auxiliary motor.
An aim of the present invention is to provide a winch for launching and recovering an object such as a boat from an active wave environment generally moving relative to a stationary or moving platform where the winch has a number of operational modes which operate separately from a manual operational mode. The operational modes include a launch mode, a motion compensation mode, a free wheel mode and a recovery mode.
It is a further aim of the present invention to provide a motion compensation winch which has a single hydraulic motor and utilizes primary and secondary gear reductions with primary and secondary clutches and incorporates a rotational sensor to sense when the load on the cable is either being raised or lowered by the wave and a load sensor to determine when the load on the cable is above or below a predetermined value. Both the load sensor and the rotational sensor are built into the winch, thus the winch is a completely independent unit suitable for retrofitting to any lifeboat davit or crane. There is no external cable tensioning device needed.
A still further aim of the present invention is to provide a motion compensation mode for a winch so that when a load has been launched and is supported by the water, the winch control lever may be placed in the hoisting position and the cable drum will take up the cable when the load rises and release the cable when the load lowers, always maintaining a tension on the cable. This motion compensation mode is used when a lifeboat or a buoy has been launched and prevents the object from drifting away from the launch platform.
There is also a recovery mode to recover a lifeboat or a buoy from an active wave environment, the load is recovered from the crest of a wave automatically without the operator having to pick the right moment. The recovery mode is selected when the winch is in the compensation mode, regardless of whether the load is rising or falling. The load is automatically recovered from the crest of a wave after rising up on the wave, once recovered, the winch is controlled in manual mode by operating the winch control lever.


A method for transmission of multiple, independent data packages across a single optical fiber utilizing both time division multiplexing and wavelength division multiplexing is described. The method includes transmitting a first data package across the single optical fiber at a first wavelength and transmitting a second data package across the same optical fiber at a second wavelength, in either the same direction or in a direction opposite as the first data package, wherein the second data package transmission may be concurrent with the first data package transmission. the method further includes separating the data package transmissions into two optical paths, filtering the second wavelength from a first of the two optical paths, detecting the first data package at the first wavelength, filtering the first wavelength from a second of the two optical paths, and detecting the second data package data at the second wavelength.

The field of the invention relates generally to fiber optic networks, and more specifically, to methods and systems for providing full avionics data services over a single fiber using two wavelengths. Full data services, at least it relates to an avionic computer, generally means transmission and/or reception of mission data (control and/or sensing), health maintenance status, and configuration data loading.
The electrical data links utilized in most aircraft incorporate a first twisted pair of conductors to transmit signals, and a second twisted pair of conductors to receive sensing and/or control data. In addition, interfaces for file transfer functions such as configuration data loading and health maintenance data are also required and utilized. While about 10% of aircraft data links are high speed backbones that often require full duplex operation such as a switched network, the other 90% are lower speed access networks that typically use half duplex operation on a multicast or bus network. Typically, aircraft sensing and/or control data is periodically transmitted (or received) and these messages are generally a fixed size. File transfer data messages are not periodic. Instead, file transfer data messages are transmitted on demand and are generally of irregular file size. Data loading messages are necessary to change the configuration of airborne computing equipment to adapt to different computing applications and flight missions.
Health maintenance messages are one type of file transfer data messages that are incorporated and utilized to report health status of aircraft equipment for fast maintenance action and avoidance of long turn around time at an airport. Due to increasing functionality and capability of avionic equipment, health maintenance and configuration data have increased exponentially for each new aircraft configuration. Navigation databases and intelligent engine messaging are relevant examples of applications with large amounts of configuration and health maintenance data.
Such data can take several hours to transfer, however, turn around times at airport terminals are generally limited to about fifteen minutes. It is relatively easy to contemplate that it is costly for an aircraft to be grounded for maintenance. Typically, health maintenance data is time shared with control data on the same data link. Therefore, bandwidth would be reduced and the latency and jitter of the critical control data would be increased to accommodate the additional health maintenance data traffic.
Ideally, multiple pairs of copper wiring are used to send and receive sensing data, control data, configuration data, and health maintenance data. In a typical scenario, a file to be transferred, such as a health maintenance data file, is disassembled into dozens or hundreds of smaller pieces, so the transmission of this data can be time multiplexed with control data in the same stream. These pieces must be reassembled into the health maintenance data file at the receiving end. When time multiplexed, configuration and health maintenance data is time shared with control data on the same data link. Transmission of health maintenance data, for example, reduces the bandwidth available for the control data in order to accommodate additional health maintenance data traffic. One possible result is additional latency and jitter of the critical control data, since the computer has to perform tasks to separate the different data types and disassemble (or reassemble) data files as mentioned above.
File transfer data messages such as health maintenance messages must either be time shared with control data on a single data link or enabled utilizing a separate data link. Although the loading of new configuration data for an article of aircraft equipment can be delayed and performed at a convenient time, such as when the subject computer is not in mission operation mode, the health maintenance data needs to be transmitted concurrently to provide for the desired goal of fast maintenance actions. It is desirable to perform configuration data loading processes in real time, for example, to reconfigure one or more avionics computers "on the fly" to adapt to different phases of a single flight.
Entities involved with health maintenance data have been requesting dedicated health maintenance data links, utilizing separate wiring, for some time to help reduce airline operation cost. For this desired simultaneous and non interfering operation, additional electrical cabling and connectors must be added to each aircraft computer (which are sometimes referred to as line replaceable units (LRUs)). Unfortunately, such a solution increases LRU and aircraft costs, increases aircraft weight, and affects volume, installation and maintenance considerations.

Methods and systems for providing full avionics data services over a single fiber


A DNA methylation editing kit comprises: (1) a fusion protein of inactivated CRISPR-associated endonuclease Cas9 (dCas9) having no nuclease activity and a tag peptide array in which plural tag peptides are linked by linkers, or an RNA or DNA coding therefor; (2) a fusion protein(s) of a tag peptide-binding portion and a methylase or demethylase, or an RNA(s) or DNA(s) coding therefor; and (3) a guide RNA(s) (gRNA(s)) comprising a sequence complementary to a DNA sequence within 1 kb of a desired site of methylation or demethylation, or a DNA(s) expressing the gRNA(s).

The methylation of cytosine in genomic DNA is a typical modification of epigenetics (epigenome) regulating gene expression. Possible regulation of the methylation of a particular gene enables elucidation of epigenome diseases such as cancer, production of models of the diseases, and its application to epigenome treatment. Currently, treatment of cancer using the demethylation of the whole genome with 5-azacytosine or the like is put into practical use. However, the treatment affects all genes, and therefore, some doubt remains as to safety concerns. Therefore, development of a technology for regulating the methylation of a particular site has been desired.
As such a technology for regulating the methylation of a particular site, a technology for demethylating a particular gene by using a protein obtained by fusing TALEN and the catalytic domain of TET1 which is an enzyme involved in demethylation has been previously reported (Non Patent Literature 1). However, it was very time-consuming due to use of TALEN, which is a genome editing technology of the previous-generation, and the degree of demethylation has not been very high.
Examples of new-generation genome editing methods include a method of using CRISPR/Cas (Non Patent Literature 2). Although use and application of an array in which plural peptide epitopes are linked, and scFv which is a single-chain antibody for signal amplification have been reported (Non Patent Literature 3) as a CRISPR/Cas genome editing method, the method has not been known to be applied to regulation of DNA methylation.

DNA methylation editing kit and DNA methylation editing method

NATIONAL UNIVERSITY CORPORATION GUNMA UNIVERSITY


To provide a sialon-based phosphor capable of forming a thin film by mixing it with a resin, and giving a uniform photoluminescent light with high light emission intensity, and to provide a method for producing a sialon-based phosphor not having excessively large agglomerated particles and a wide particle size distribution, there is provided a method for producing an α-sialon based phosphor represented by the formula:MxLnySi12−(m+n)Al(m+n)OnN16−nwherein M is at least one metal selected from Ca, Mg, Y and Li, Ln is at least one lanthanide metal selected from Eu, Dy, Er, Tb, Yb and Ce, ax+by=m (assuming that the valence of metal M is a and the valence of lanthanide metal Ln is b), 0<x≦1.5, 0.3≦m≦4.5, and 0<n<2.25), wherein the silicon nitride raw material used as the raw material is a silicon nitride raw material powder comprising amorphous silicon nitride and crystalline silicon nitride.

With recent implementation of blue LED in practical use, studies are being aggressively made to develop white LED by utilizing the blue LED. The white LED is low in power consumption and extended in life as compared with existing white light sources and therefore, its application to a liquid crystal panel backlight, an indoor or an outdoor illumination device, and the like, is proceeding.
The white LED developed at present is obtained by coating Ce-doped YAG (yttrium.aluminum.garnet) on the surface of a blue LED. However, the Ce-doped YAG has a photoluminescent wavelength in the vicinity of 530 nm and when this photoluminescent light and the light of blue LED are mixed to provide white light, the resulting color of the light is slightly blue-tinted and good white light cannot be obtained.
On the other hand, a sialon-based phosphor activated with a rare earth element is known to emit photoluminescent light with a longer wavelength (shifted to the red side) than the photoluminescent wavelength of Ce-doped YAG (see, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication (Kokai) No. 2002-363554). When this photoluminescent light of sialon-based phosphor is mixed with the light of blue LED, good white light can be obtained. In this way, practical use of a sialon-based phosphor material as a new phosphor material is expected.
However, the phosphor having the composition disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication (Kokai) No. 2002-363554 uses crystalline silicon nitride as the raw material and is produced by a hot-pressing method where the reaction into sialon is allowed to proceed while compressing the powder material. The sialon-based phosphor obtained by this method is in the lump form and is not suited for use as a phosphor powder.
The present inventors had attempted to obtain a sialon-based phosphor by mixing a crystalline silicon nitride powder with a calcium source, a rare earth element source and an aluminum source and firing it in an atmospheric pressure furnace. As a result, it was confirmed that a phosphor in the powder state can be obtained by selecting the appropriate particle size of silicon nitride and the reaction conditions, but the powder is a gathering of strongly agglomerated particles (hereinafter called a "agglomerated particles") and the agglomerated particles have a large diameter and a broad and non-uniform particle size distribution. A phosphor comprising such agglomerated particles is improper for forming a thin film by mixing it with a resin and also, the photoluminescent light emitted therefrom is non-uniform and insufficient in the photoluminescent intensity.
The present invention has been made to solve these problems and an object of the present invention is to provide a method for producing a sialon-based phosphor not having a broad size distribution. Another object of the present invention is to provide a sialon-based phosphor, obtained by the method, which can form a thin film and give uniform photoluminescent light with high light emission intensity.

Production method of sialon-based phosphor, and sialon-based phosphor


A single crystal semiconductor region is fabricated in a semiconductor wafer. The region is either cantilevered, supported at one or both ends, or midpoint, or supported at multiple locations. After a pattern and etch step, a dielectric fill step is performed to define the boundaries of the region in the semiconductor wafer. Oxygen or nitrogen is implanted in the semiconductor wafer on a surface area of the semiconductor wafer that corresponds to a top surface of the region. The annealing of the oxygen or nitrogen ions convert the silicon to an oxide or a nitride beneath the surface area. The silicon dioxide or silicon nitride is etched away to produce a semiconducting region of a single crystal material.

This invention relates to Microelectromechanical Structure, or MEMS, and the method of fabricating such devices.
Microelectromechanical Structures, or "MEMS" often consist in part, of polycrystalline semiconductor regions that are only partially attached to the underlying material. Such polycrystalline silicon regions, which may be cantilevered, center supported or supported at both ends are hereinafter referred to as "regions". They are typically formed by depositing polysilicon on a layer of sacrificial material such as a silicon nitride, silicon dioxide, or another dielectric. Often the polysilicon material, either doped or undoped as required by the design, is masked and patterned using a photolithographic process to define the desired structure(s). The underlying sacrificial layer is partially or totally removed, leaving the layer of polysilicon material unsupported except at selected support locations. This sequence of steps allows the fabrication of structures such as beams, which might be supported at one or both ends as well as diaphragms and other shapes and structures that are characterized by only being supported at selected points. In some MEMS, the polysilicon structure that is formed by the removal of the sacrificial layer may not be permanently attached, but may be constrained, allowing it even greater freedom. The use of polysilicon is sufficient in some applications, but the strength of polysilicon and its resistance to crack formation and associated mechanical failure are not as high as those of single crystal materials.
One prior art method for forming these regions involves depositing an etch stop layer of silicon nitride in direct contact with or above the semiconductor material substrate. Next a sacrificial layer of silicon dioxide is deposited on top of the etch stop layer of silicon nitride. A region of polysilicon is then deposited, masked, patterned and etched on the layer of sacrificial material. The underlying sacrificial layer of silicon dioxide is partially or totally removed, leaving the layer of polysilicon material "floating" and unsupported except at some locations.
The mechanical properties of these floating regions may become more important with the continuing miniaturization of integrated circuits. The ever increasing complexity of integrated devices having greater numbers of wiring channels coupled with the desire for packing chips closer together to minimize transmission delays, results in the need for multilayered and high channel density interconnect substrates. Also, with higher interconnect wiring density, the need for using insulators with low dielectric constants becomes more important for performance reasons. Insulators with the low dielectric constants include vacuum, gases such as air, and depending upon the temperature, single crystalline silicon. The present invention is also directed to fabricating interconnect substrates with air as the dielectric in a process which allows the formation of floating single crystal structures.
FIG. 1, to which reference should now be made, illustrates a representation of the sequence of steps used to manufacture the prior art microelectromechanical (MEMS) devices.
Starting with a semiconductor material substrate 12, in FIG. 1a, an etch stop layer 15 of silicon nitride is deposited in direct contact with the substrate, and then a sacrificial layer 1 of silicon dioxide is deposited on top of the etch stop layer 15 of silicon nitride.
Referring to FIG. 1b, A region of polysilicon 4 is then deposited, masked, patterned and etched on the layer of sacrificial material 1.
After the step illustrated in FIG. 1b, as shown in FIG. 1c, the underlying sacrificial layer 1 of silicon dioxide is partially or totally removed which leaves the layer of polysilicon material 4 "floating" and unsupported at some locations 5.
In a related area of art, air bridges are growing in importance with the advancement of speed requirements. An example of air bridges in five (5) layers is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,920,639 dated May 1, 1990, which is hereby incorporated by reference, describes "a method of building a multilevel electrical interconnect supported by metal pillars with air as a dielectric. The metal conductors and metal support pillars are formed using a photo-imagible polymer which serves the function of patterning and also provides a temporary support during construction."
Another useful invention is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,891,797 dated Apr. 6, 1999, which is hereby incorporated by reference, and states that "a process of manufacturing integrated circuits is disclosed for designing and implementing a hierarchical wiring system. The interconnection requirements are sorted and designed into a particular wiring level according to length. Support structures may be constructed to allow more flexibility in designing air bridge dimensions. The support structures may take the form of lateral ribs or intermediate posts, and may be fabricated of either insulating or conductive material. One integrated circuit described is a memory device, such as a dynamic random access memory."
U.S. Pat. No. 6,020,215 dated Feb. 1, 2000, which is hereby incorporated by reference, and describes "a microstructure comprising a substrate (1), a patterned structure (beam member) (2) suspended over the substrate (1) with an air-space (4) there between and supporting structure (3) for suspending the patterned structure (2) over the substrate (1). The microstructure is prepared by using a sacrificial layer (7) which is removed to form the space between the substrate (1) and the patterned structure (2) adhered to the sacrificial layer. In the case of using resin as the material of the sacrificial layer, the sacrificial layer can be removed without causing sticking, and an electrode can be provided on the patterned structure. The microstructure can have application as electrostatic actuator, etc., depending on choice of shape and composition."
The assembly of air bridges require inter-connecting surfaces as shown U.S. Pat. No. 6,060,381 dated May 9, 2000, which is hereby incorporated by reference and describes "an electronic part having an air-bridge interconnection with a flat air-bridge interconnection body, no interconnection loss, high Q and low power consumption. Also disclosed is a method of manufacturing such electronic parts. The flat air-bridge interconnection body is obtained by conducting two-stage selective plating including selective plating for forming posts on post base electrodes and selective plating for forming the air-bridge interconnection body."
Thus, it can be shown that there is a need for beams or bridges that are only partially supported. These beams have application in the microelectronical structure art as well as in the air bridge art.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Fabrication of diaphragms and “floating” regions of single crystal semiconductor for MEMS devices


Disclosed herein are formulations of fluoroquinolones suitable for aerosolization and use of such formulations for aerosol administration of fluoroquinolone antimicrobials for the treatment of pulmonary bacterial infections. In particular, inhaled levofloxacin specifically formulated and delivered for bacterial infections of the lungs is described. Methods include inhalation protocols and manufacturing procedures for production and use of the compositions described.

Antibiotics have been effective tools in the treatment of infectious diseases during the last half-century. From the development of antimicrobial therapy to the late 1980s, most bacterial infections occurring in patients in developed countries could be controlled unless the infection occurred in an organ or environment where antibiotics were difficult to deliver or were ineffective, such as bacterial infections of the circulatory system in sepsis patients, or bacterial infections of the lungs in cystic fibrosis. However, even in ordinary infections, in response to the pressure of antimicrobial usage, multiple resistance mechanisms have become widespread and are threatening the clinical utility of even the most aggressive antibacterial therapy. The increase in antimicrobial resistant strains has been particularly common in major hospitals and care centers. The consequences of the increase in resistant strains include higher morbidity and mortality, longer patient hospitalization, and an increase in treatment costs.
Bacteria have developed several different mechanisms to overcome the action of antimicrobials. These mechanisms of resistance can be specific for a molecule or a family of antimicrobials, or can be non-specific and be involved in resistance to unrelated antimicrobials. Several mechanisms of resistance can exist in a single bacterial strain, and those mechanisms may act independently or they may act synergistically to overcome the action of an antimicrobial or a combination of antimicrobials. Specific mechanisms include degradation of the drug, inactivation of the drug by enzymatic.
Modification and alteration of the drug target. There are, however, more general mechanisms of drug resistance, in which access of the antimicrobial to the target is prevented or reduced by decreasing the transport of the antimicrobial into the cell or by increasing the efflux of the drug from the cell to the outside medium. Both mechanisms can lower the concentration of drug at the target site and allow bacterial survival in the presence of one or more antimicrobials that would otherwise inhibit or kill the bacterial cells. Some bacteria utilize both mechanisms, combining a low permeability of the cell wall (including membranes) with an active efflux of antimicrobials.

Aerosolized fluoroquinolones and uses thereof


A method for producing an aluminum nitride sintered product according to the present invention includes the steps of (a) preparing a powder mixture that contains AlN, 2 to 10 parts by weight of Eu2O3 with respect to 100 parts by weight of AlN, Al2O3 such that a molar ratio of Al2O3 to Eu2O3 is 2 to 10, and TiO2 such that a molar ratio of TiO2 to Al2O3 is 0.05 to 1.2, but not Sm; (b) producing a compact from the powder mixture; and (c) firing the compact by subjecting the compact to hot-press firing in a vacuum or in an inert atmosphere.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an aluminum nitride sintered product, a method for producing such an aluminum nitride sintered product, and an electrostatic chuck including such an aluminum nitride sintered product.
2. Description of the Related Art
Electrostatic chucks have been used for holding wafers in semiconductor manufacturing equipment. Such electrostatic chucks include an internal electrode for applying a voltage and a dielectric layer placed on the internal electrode. When a wafer is placed on the dielectric layer and a voltage is applied to the internal electrode, an electrostatic attractive force is produced between the wafer and the dielectric layer. There are electrostatic chucks employing a monopolar system in which one internal electrode is contained and electrostatic chucks employing a bipolar system in which a pair of (that is, two) internal electrodes are contained so as to be spaced apart from each other. An electrostatic chuck employing the monopolar system is configured to produce an electrostatic attractive force by applying a voltage between the internal electrode of the electrostatic chuck and an external electrode placed outside the electrostatic chuck. An electrostatic chuck employing the bipolar system is configured to produce an electrostatic attractive force by applying a voltage to a pair of internal electrodes. As for such electrostatic chucks, there is a Johnson-Rahbeck type in which a wafer is attracted with a Johnson-Rahbeck force produced using a dielectric having a volume resistivity of about 108 to 1012Ω·cm.
Materials usable for such a Johnson-Rahbeck type electrostatic chuck are, for example, aluminum nitride sintered products disclosed in Documents 1 and 2. Specifically, Document 1 discloses an aluminum nitride sintered product containing aluminum nitride as a main component, containing 0.04 mol % or more samarium in terms of oxide, and including an aluminum nitride phase and a samarium-aluminum oxide phase. Document 2 discloses an aluminum nitride sintered product containing aluminum nitride as a main component, containing 0.03 mol % or more europium in terms of oxide, and including an aluminum nitride phase and a europium-aluminum oxide phase; and also an aluminum nitride sintered product containing samarium.    Document 1: U.S. Pat. No. 6,607,836 B    Document 2: U.S. Pat. No. 7,122,490 B

Aluminum nitride sintered product, method for producing the same, and electrostatic chuck including the same


A method for preparing a carbon fiber-reinforced cement material is here disclosed which comprises the step of using, as a reinforcing material, a carbon fiber from which a gas has been removed by replacing the gas captured in the fiber with water. This method permits providing the carbon fiber-reinforced cement material having a large reinforcing effect by the fiber.

(i) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a carbon fiber-reinforced cement material containing carbon fiber as a reinforcing material and having a high reinforcing effect, and it also relates to a method for preparing the above-mentioned carbon fiber-reinforced cement material.
(ii) Description of the Prior Art
Cement materials such as mortar and concrete are inexpensive and excellent in durability, fire resistance and other physical properties such as compression strength and stiffness. Thus, they have been widely used as construction materials and building materials. In these cement materials, tensile strength and impact resistance are low in contrast to the compression strength, and an energy absorption ability is poor. Accordingly, the cement materials have the drawback that they are "brittle" from the viewpoint of physical properties. In addition, the cement materials do not have any conductivity, and so when they are used as floor materials, a special treatment such as an antistatic treatment is required on occasion. For the purpose of solving these problems, fiber-reinforced cement materials reinforced with various fibers have been often used. Above all, much attention is paid to fiber-reinforced cement materials containing a carbon fiber as a reinforcing material which are characterized by having good chemical stability typified by alkali resistance, good heat resistance, large strength and elasticity, high conductivity and light specific gravity.
However, in the cement material reinforced with a short carbon fiber, the tensile strength and bending strength of the cement material are not sufficiently improved in proportion to the tensile strength which the carbon fiber inherently has, and there is the problem that values of the strength widely scatter in a series of products or even in one product. The cause of these drawbacks can be considered to be as follows: In the short carbon fiber-reinforced cement material, the adhesion of a cement matrix to the carbon fiber is not sufficient, so that the reinforcing ability of the carbon fiber is not exerted. In consequence, the tensile strength and the bending strength of the fiber-reinforced cement material do not depend upon the strength of the carbon fiber for the reinforcement but the adhesion or fixation between the cement matrix and the carbon fiber.
As attempts to improve the fixation of the carbon fiber in the cement matrix, there have been suggested a method in which the carbon fiber is oxidized with an oxidizing agent such as oxygen or ozone to make the surface of the fiber hydrophilic (KOJIMA et al., Tanso, No. 131, pp 161, 1987) and another method in which a fine cement and a fine aggregate are used to heighten dispersibility (SHIRAKAWA et al., the 4th, Concrete Engineering Annual Lecture Meeting, Lecture Booklet, pp 153, 1982). However, these methods are not satisfactory from the viewpoints of the performance and the manufacturing cost of the carbon fiber-reinforced cement material. Thus, a simple method for preparing the carbon fiber-reinforced cement material is desired in which characteristics inherent in the carbon fiber are utilized and the dependence upon the carbon fiber in the strength is heightened.
The present invention has been made under such a situation, and a major object of the present invention is to provide a method for preparing a carbon fiber-reinforced cement material having an enhanced fiber reinforcement effect by a simple process.

Carbon fiber-reinforced cement material and method for preparing same


A live caching system is described herein that reduces the burden on origin servers for serving live content. In response to receiving a first request that results in a cache miss, the system forwards the first request to the next tier while “holding” other requests for the same content. If the system receives a second request while the first request is pending, the system will recognize that a similar request is outstanding and hold the second request by not forwarding the request to the origin server. After the response to the first request arrives from the next tier, the system shares the response with other held requests. Thus, the live caching system allows a content provider to prepare for very large events by adding more cache hardware and building out a cache server network rather than by increasing the capacity of the origin server.

Streaming media is multimedia that is constantly received by, and normally presented to, an end-user (using a client) while it is being delivered by a streaming provider (using a server). Several protocols exist for streaming media, including the Real-time Streaming Protocol (RTSP), Real-time Transport Protocol (RTP), and the Real-time Transport Control Protocol (RTCP), which are often used together. The Real Time Streaming Protocol (RTSP), developed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) and created in 1998 as Request For Comments (RFC) 2326, is a protocol for use in streaming media systems, which allows a client to remotely control a streaming media server, issuing VCR-like commands such as "play" and "pause", and allowing time-based access to files on a server.
The sending of streaming data itself is not part of the RTSP protocol. Most RTSP servers use the standards-based RTP as the transport protocol for the actual audio/video data, acting somewhat as a metadata channel. RTP defines a standardized packet format for delivering audio and video over the Internet. RTP was developed by the Audio-Video Transport Working Group of the IETF and first published in 1996 as RFC 1889, and superseded by RFC 3550 in 2003. The protocol is similar in syntax and operation to Hypertext Transport Protocol (HTTP), but RTSP adds new requests. While HTTP is stateless, RTSP is a stateful protocol. A session ID is used to keep track of sessions when needed. RTSP messages are sent from client to server, although some exceptions exist where the server will send messages to the client.
RTP is usually used in conjunction with RTCP. While RTP carries the media streams (e.g., audio and video) or out-of-band signaling (dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF)), RTCP is used to monitor transmission statistics and quality of service (QoS) information. RTP allows only one type of message, one that carries data from the source to the destination. In many cases, there is a need for other messages in a session. These messages control the flow and quality of data and allow the recipient to send feedback to the source or sources. RTCP is a protocol designed for this purpose. RTCP has five types of messages: sender report, receiver report, source description message, bye message, and application-specific message. RTCP provides out-of-band control information for an RTP flow and partners with RTP in the delivery and packaging of multimedia data, but does not transport any data itself. RTCP is used periodically to transmit control packets to participants in a streaming multimedia session. One function of RTCP is to provide feedback on the quality of service being provided by RTP. RTCP gathers statistics on a media connection and information such as bytes sent, packets sent, lost packets, jitter, feedback, and round trip delay. An application may use this information to increase the quality of service, perhaps by limiting flow or using a different codec or bit rate.
One of the techniques for achieving high scalability is using cache proxies that are distributed near the network endpoints. Such network cache proxies are known as a Content Delivery Network (CDN) or Edge Cache Network (ECN). A CDN is a network of tiered cache nodes that can be used to distribute the content delivery. A CDN is most commonly used to reduce the network bandwidth, reduce the load on the origin server(s), and increase the response time of content delivery. A CDN tries to accomplish these objectives by serving the content from a cache node that is closest to the request that has requested the content. Each caching layer serves as a "filter" by caching and serving the requested content without having to go to the origin server (such as a web server) for every request. The Internet has built up a large infrastructure of caching proxies (and network routers with caching capabilities) that are effective at caching data for HTTP. Servers can provide cached data to clients with less delay and by using fewer resources than re-requesting the content from the original source. For example, a user in New York may download a content item served from a host in Japan, and receive the content item through a caching proxy in California. If a user in New Jersey requests the same file, the caching proxy in California may be able to provide the content item without again requesting the data from the host in Japan. This reduces the network traffic over possibly strained routes, and allows the user in New Jersey to receive the content item with less latency.
While this solution works for on-demand content, the same solution does not work for live content because live content is not available in cache proxies (by the virtue of being live content). So for streaming a live broadcast, such as watching a live NFL game in real-time, CDNs/ECNs cannot leverage their HTTP caching proxies, because a cached response is not available at the time users request the data. Instead, CDNs/ECNs deploy and manage proprietary media streaming servers, which significantly increases the cost of the solution to content providers. Attempting to deliver live broadcasts with existing caching proxy solutions would have the following effects. When the request arrives at the edge cache server, it results in a cache-miss. The edge server forwards the request to the parent cache server and the request, again, results in a cache-miss. The result is that the request reaches the origin server to get the content.
In a live broadcast scenario, if 10 million users are requesting to view, for example, the opening ceremony of the Olympics, then there are 10 million cache misses, and all 10 million requests will be forwarded to the origin server, which, without the capacity to handle the 10 million requests, will crash or at least perform very poorly. Networks of proprietary streaming servers managed by CDNs/ECNs are limited in scale relative to networks of caching proxies, which often results in a lack of capacity for events with large viewership, such as the 2009 U.S. Presidential Inaugurations. Thus, the lack of caching limits the number of contemporaneous viewers and requests that the servers can handle, and thereby limits the attendance of a live event. The world is increasingly using the Internet to consume live information, such as the record number of users that watched the opening of the 2008 Olympics via the Internet. The limitations of current technology are slowing adoption of the Internet as a medium for consuming this type of media content.

Network caching for multiple contemporaneous requests


An underwater celestial navigation beacon configured to provide position information is disclosed. The underwater celestial navigation beacon can include a data store configured to store an astronomical model of the moon. The underwater celestial navigation beacon can include an inertial measurement unit (IMU) operable to capture IMU data that includes three-axis acceleration data and three-axis rate gyroscopic data. The underwater celestial navigation beacon can include a controller. The controller can determine a latitude of the underwater celestial navigation beacon using the three-axis rate gyroscopic data. The controller can determine a longitude of the underwater celestial navigation beacon based on a gravitational pull of the moon, using the three-axis acceleration data and the astronomical model of the moon. The controller can determine the position information for the underwater celestial navigation beacon based on the latitude and longitude.

Marine navigation can involve the determination of position and direction of a marine vehicle, such as a boat, ship, autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV), etc. The position can include a latitude and longitude. The latitude (expressed in degrees) of a place on Earth is its angular distance north or south of the equator. The longitude of a place on Earth is an angular distance east or west of the prime meridian or Greenwich meridian. In the past, mariners would calculate latitude using a sextant, which would measure an angle between an astronomical object (e.g., the sun) and the horizon. In addition, in the past, mariners would calculate longitude also using a sextant. For example, the sextant could be used to measure a lunar distance between the moon and another celestial object (such as a star or planet), which could be used along with a nautical almanac to provide the longitude. In later years, longitude was measured using a marine chronometer, which is a precise timepiece used to determine longitude by accurately measuring the time of a known fixed location (e.g., Greenwich Mean Time, or GMT) and the time of the current location. For example, mariners would keep at least one marine chronometer on GMT to calculate their longitude from the Greenwich meridian, which was considered to have a longitude of zero degrees.
Reference will now be made to the exemplary embodiments illustrated, and specific language will be used herein to describe the same. It will nevertheless be understood that no limitation of the scope of the invention is thereby intended.


A system comprises a processor, a display, an operating system executable on the processor and an executable application that is separate from the operating system. The operating system provides settings that can be used to control access to a removable storage medium. The application provides a graphical user interface (GUI) that permits a user to select a security setting from among a plurality of selectable security settings and that causes the operating system to implement the user-selected security settings to control access to the removable storage medium.

Some computer systems permit access to a removable storage device. For example, many computers contain universal serial bus (USB) connections to which a USB device can be mated. USB devices include mice, keyboards, digital cameras, as well as storage devices. The user simply plugs the USB device into the corresponding USB connector on the computer and the computer provides access to the device. A security issue arises as the USB device can be used to copy data from the computer as well as to load viruses and other malicious data onto the computer.

Graphical user interface that permits the selection of a security setting to control access to a removable storage device

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.


In a utility vehicle, a storage space is formed by a first extension part of a front floor board and a second extension part of a rear floor board and by a sitting part of a seat.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a utility vehicle and, in particular, to a utility vehicle including a storage space provided under a seat in order to contain baggage.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the conventional art, an example of a utility vehicle including a storage space provided under a seat is described in US Patent Application Publication No. 2012/0223500. In the utility vehicle, in order to avoid dust, water, or the like from the outside of the vehicle, a container having a substantially rectangular parallelepiped shape whose upper part is open is provided under the seat so that the inside of the container is used as the storage space. Then, the opening part of the container is covered by the sitting part of the seat in a manner of being capable of being opened and closed.
Nevertheless, in the above-mentioned utility vehicle of the conventional art, the container has been provided for each seat. This has caused a problem of high material cost or high fabrication cost in the forming of the container. Further, at the time of access to the storage space, the sitting part of the seat had to be opened and closed. This has caused a problem that the storage space cannot easily be accessed in a state of sitting on the seat.