A method and apparatus is provided which reduces the equipment and time requirements for hard disk drive performance testing during manufacturing. This invention executes self-contained performance testing code that resides within the drive's manufacturing firmware, rather than relying on external testers. The invention involves exercising the drive's enqueue, dequeue, and command execution firmware, as well as the physical process of reading and writing data by simulating the host interface in code. The invention enqueues commands that typify the desired workload, allows a command ordering algorithm to sort the commands for execution, and allows the drive side code to execute the commands just as if an external host interface were attached. The invention is advantageous because the performance testing can be done by only applying power to the drive. The present invention also lends itself to performance tuning that can be done in manufacturing, to reduce drive-to-drive performance variations.

Disk drives are well-known components of computer systems. Advances in disk drive technology have led to substantial increases in storage capacity and faster access times. Along with the increased capacity and speed, customers are also demanding consistency in drive-to-drive performance.
Original equipment manufacturers typically set specific performance requirements for drives supplied by various vendors in a given drive generation. These performance requirements generally involve a 4% to 40% generation-to-generation performance improvement for each of several specific tests. In addition to meeting these requirements, drive vendors must insure that drive-to-drive variation requirements are also met. Typically, all drives from a single HDD supplier should perform within 5% of the overall supplier's mean performance. As data densities have typically doubled each generation, the challenge of manufacturing drives that yield similar performance is receiving a great deal of attention.
In order to meet the 5% drive-to-drive performance variation requirement, vendors can either select very achievable (i.e., low performance threshold) targets and "slow down" drives that exceed these requirements, or implement performance testing and passing criteria for use in the manufacturing process. Typically, generation-to-generation improvement requirements and the goal of being the best-of-breed vendor force disk drive manufacturers to shoot for very challenging performance targets. Therefore, vendors typically do not have much extra performance margin relative to the targets and do not have the luxury of reducing performance of faster drives to lower the mean performance.
In recent hard disk drive generations, performance tests and corresponding passing criteria have been put in place for use during the manufacturing process. Drives that do not pass the criteria after manufacturing are considered manufacturing fails and count against the overall drive yields. Overall drive manufacturing yields typically range from 40% to 80% depending on the number of heads and disks contained in the disk enclosure. These performance tests insure that the drive variation requirements are met by the overall drive population. The impact of the performance tests on the overall yields vary, but a yield reduction of 5% is typical for a given drive generation.
One problem with testing performance during the manufacturing process involves the cost and time requirements. This testing procedure requires approximately ten minutes, but there are a limited number of testing slots available at a given time, so the time requirements are even more significant. In addition to the raw time requirements, the equipment required to test drives on a large scale is very costly. Performance requirements are usually set for a workload that is very susceptible to drive variations and involves a specific queue depth. In order to maintain a certain queue depth (usually 16), a relatively fast initiator system must be used. Although manufacturing testers supply one initiator system per drive, the testers and testing software typically are not optimized for performance. For example, the test suite is typically executed from a script that may not be precompiled. For this relatively slow initiator system, it is difficult to maintain the desired drive queue depth for many workloads. This makes testing some workloads very difficult. As drive performance continues to improve, this problem becomes more and more severe, thus stressing tester requirements.
Thus, there is a need for a method and apparatus for testing the performance of disk drives during manufacturing which reduces equipment and time requirements.

Method and apparatus for automated analysis of hard disk drive performance

Hitachi Global Storage Technologies Netherlands B.V.


An untethered stylus is configured to cooperate with a location sensing device that generates a drive signal. The stylus includes transceiver circuitry disposed in a housing, which is configured to receive the drive signal and transmit a stylus signal for reception by the location sensor. Energy circuitry is disposed in the housing and energized by the drive signal. A reference frequency generator, disposed in the housing and coupled to the transceiver circuitry and energy circuitry, is configured to generate a number of reference frequencies based on a source frequency of the drive signal, the reference frequencies indicative of a number of stylus states and synchronized to the source frequency of the drive signal. The transceiver circuitry is configured to mix the reference frequencies with the stylus signal.

Personal computing systems of varying type and configuration typically provide one or more user interface devices to facilitate user interaction with such computing systems. Well known user interface devices include a keyboard, mouse, trackball, joystick, and the like. Various types of personal computing devices, such as tablet PCs, provide a pen apparatus that can be manipulated by the user, much in the same way as a pencil or ink pen.
Conventional computing devices that provide for user input via a pen or other pointer implement typically employ an electromagnetic inductive system. The electromagnetic inductive system usually comprises an electromagnetic pen or pointer apparatus and a digitizer in the form of a tablet. Changes in pen location relative to the digitizer's sensing surface are detected and location computations are made to determine the coordinates of the pen.

Untethered stylus empolying multiple reference frequency communication


A gas/liquid fuel nozzle assembly includes a premixing tube bundle having an array of mixing tubes, a fuel plenum delivering fuel to the mixing tubes, a cartridge tube disposed within the fuel plenum, and a liquid fuel cartridge disposed in the cartridge tube. The liquid fuel cartridge is spaced from the cartridge tube to define an annulus. The cartridge tube and the fuel plenum are constructed in fluid communication such that gas fuel in the plenum is injected into the annulus.

The invention relates generally to gas turbines and, more particularly, to a gas turbine operable in a dual fuel mode where a liquid cartridge air blast circuit is passively fueled for gas operation.
Gas turbine engines typically include a compressor for compressing an incoming airflow. The airflow is mixed with fuel and ignited in a combustor for generating hot combustion gases. The combustion gases in turn flow to a turbine. The turbine extracts energy from the gases for driving a shaft. The shaft powers the compressor and generally another element such as an electrical generator.
In some designs, the combustors operate with backup fuel such as liquid fuel. A liquid fuel cartridge is inserted through a micromixing fuel nozzle assembly upstream of a combustion zone. When the turbine is not running with liquid fuel, air is purged through the liquid cartridges. A problem with the existing design, however, is that the air in the liquid cartridges contributes to NOx production in the combustion zone, which is undesirable.
It would be advantageous to address this problem by bleeding gas fuel into an annulus of the liquid cartridge to mix with air during gas only operation of the turbine.

Liquid cartridge with passively fueled premixed air blast circuit for gas operation


In a steering apparatus, in accordance with a grip limit control process (30b′), it is determined whether or not a grip degree ε estimated by a grip degree estimation arithmetically operating process (30a) is less than a predetermined grip degree (ε′), and in the case that it is determined that an estimated grip degree (ε) is less than the predetermined grip degree (ε′), the process applies such a feeling that a steering operation by a steering wheel suddenly becomes light to a driver, by suddenly increasing an assist quantity by a motor (M), thereby notifying the driver of the matter that the grip degree of a steered wheel is close to a limit. Therefore, it is possible to transmit to the driver a probability that a side slip is generated by further turning the steering wheel 21 in the same direction as the current direction, thereby calling the driver's attention for steering. Accordingly, there is an effect that a stability of a vehicle behavior can be improved without applying any fear of insecurity to the driver.

When a vehicle is suddenly steered during running or the vehicle makes its way into a curve on a road in which a friction coefficient μ of a road surface grounded by a steered wheel (hereinafter, refer to "road surface μ") is small, a side slip and a spin of the vehicle tend to be generated. Accordingly, in the vehicle in recent years, there is introduced a vehicle stability control system for preventing the side slip mentioned above or the like so as to improve a stability of a vehicle behavior.
However, in accordance with the vehicle stability control system mentioned above, the side slip or the like is inhibited from being generated, by controlling a brake force in each of the wheels. Accordingly, if the system is activated, an unexpected brake feeling is applied to a driver although the side slip or the like can be prevented, so that there is a problem that a fear of insecurity is applied to the driver.
The present invention is made for the purpose of solving the problem mentioned above, and an object of the present invention is to provide a steering apparatus which can improve a stability of a vehicle behavior without applying any fear of insecurity to the driver.


The present invention relates to a method for treating metastatic breast cancer in an individual comprising administering to an individual in need thereof a dosing regimen which comprises administering to the individual nonpegylated liposomal doxorubicin, a taxane and a HER2/neu receptor antagonist, wherein the individual previously has been administered an anthracycline.

Breast cancer is one of the most common causes of cancer deaths in women. In the United States, it accounts for 30% of all malignancies that affect women, excluding non-melanoma skin cancer. About one-third of newly diagnosed patients will eventually recur and/or develop metastatic disease.
Approximately 25% of patients with breast cancer have tumors that over-express HER2. Data from large, international trials of adjuvant regimens for primary breast cancer in the pre-trastuzumab era have shown a significant survival benefit with anthracycline-containing regimens compared to non-anthracycline regimens in breast cancer patients who had strongly HER2+ tumors. An anthracycline based regimen is recommended in most cases for women with node positive breast cancer as well as high risk pre-menopausal women with node negative breast cancer.
Doxorubicin is one of the most active and versatile anticancer agents. It has an exceptionally broad spectrum of activity and plays a leading role in the curative and palliative therapy of a diverse group of malignancies, most notably breast cancer, lymphoma, soft tissue sarcoma, various pediatric malignancies, multiple myeloma, and advanced bladder cancer. However, doxorubicin is associated with serious and sometimes life threatening side effects. In particular, doxorubicin's use is limited by the potential for patients to suffer irreversible cardiotoxicity. The incidence of clinically significant cardiomyopathy or congestive heart failure rises with increasing lifetime cumulative doses of doxorubicin. For this reason, most clinicians limit a patient's lifetime cumulative dose of doxorubicin to 450 mg/m2 or less. Sub-clinical and occasionally overt cardiotoxicity may also occur at lower cumulative doses of doxorubicin, especially when the drug is given as part of a combination regimen that includes drugs such as cyclophosphamide or paclitaxel, as well as newer biologic therapies, including trastuzumab.
Clinically relevant cardiotoxicity has been a particular issue in combination regimens of doxorubicin and the taxanes, especially paclitaxel, and to a lesser extent docetaxel and albumin-bound paclitaxel (Abraxan®). Three-fold greater cardiac toxicity was seen in women receiving the combination of trastuzumab and an anthracycline (either doxorubicin or epirubicin) and cyclophosphamide (AC), compared with the rates of cardiotoxicity that would have been expected with AC or trastuzumab alone. The same clinical trials also suggested that despite the high rates of cardiac toxicity, the combination of anthracyclines with trastuzumab (and cyclophosphamide) might actually be more efficacious in the metastasized breast cancer (MBC) setting compared to the FDA-approved paclitaxel/trastuzumab regimen. In particular, improved efficacy with AC and trastuzumab compared with paclitaxel/trastuzumab was notable with respect to time to disease progression and overall survival.
Doxorubicin and trastuzumab are known to be cardiotoxic, and their concomitant combined use presents a significant risk of cardiotoxicity. The risk of cardiotoxicity from treatment with doxorubicin and trastuzumab is believed to be enhanced for patients who have received prior treatment with an anthracycline.
Patients with HER2+ breast cancer have been treated with nonpegylated liposomal doxorubicin in combination with paclitaxel and trastuzumab in Phase I and Phase II clinical trials. Patients who received prior administration of any anthracycline were excluded from these earlier trials, due to the anticipated cardiotoxicity from accumulated anthracycline dosing.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a method for treating metastatic breast cancer in an individual who has previously been administered an anthracycline.

Non-pegylated liposomal doxorubicin triple combination therapy


An I/O card for a computer system having a system bus and a first processor, includes a first connector, a second connector, a third connector, a second processor, each operatively coupled to an internal bus. The first connector is configured to detachably couple to the system bus. The second connector is configured to detachably couple to a storage device. The third connector is configured to detachably couple to a network. The second processor is configured to control at least a portion of a transfer of a diverse data object between said storage device and said network via said internal bus. A method of transferring a diverse data object between a storage device and a network is also disclosed.

The present invention relates generally to the storage and retrieval of multimedia information in a high speed ATM networking environment and more particularly to an input-output device that can be used as a multimedia server add-on to an existing personal computer or workstation.
One trend in personal and business computer systems is to provide the capability to send and receive multimedia data. Multimedia data includes audio, video, graphics, and facsimile as well as data files. These different types of multimedia are also referred to as diverse data objects, DDO. If these diverse data objects must be transmitted or received without perceptible delay to the user, the application requires real time data transmission, referred to as real time DDO. Traditional data services such as file transfer or electronic mail generally do not require real time data transmission. However, multimedia applications that integrate digital audio and video require certain minimum transmission times in order to provide the user the type of response (real time) that the user is accustomed to receiving. Users of multimedia services will not tolerate delays or interruptions in voice or video due to throughput delays on a communications network.
One critical element that comprises a typical communications service interface is the Quality of Service (QoS). A given communications system has defined QoS parameters that may include communications link setup time, end-to-end delay, data loss probability, and synchronization. From a user perspective, a guaranteed QoS means the reception of multimedia without perceptible delay or interruptions. Thus full motion video requires a higher QoS than electronic mail since electronic mail is a non-real time DDO and full motion video is a real time DDO. In essence, QoS is another name for network bandwidth management. Certain applications that are multimedia intensive require larger amounts of dedicated bandwidth in order to provide a guaranteed Quality of Service to the network user.
Multimedia data is often transmitted over some type of communications network. Typical networks include local area networks (LANs) such as Ethernet or FDDI, or wide area networks (WANs) such as the Internet or Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN). Personal computers and workstations with multimedia capability can connect to a communications network to transmit and receive diverse data objects.
The trend in networking technology is toward broadband integrated communications networks designed for bit transmission rates ranging from megabits to gigabits per second. A predominant driving force behind this trend is the large amount of digital data bandwidth needed to represent and transmit video and graphics data objects.
The broadband integrated services digital network (B-ISDN) is designed to support the high data rates necessary to transmit real time DDO. B-ISDN uses a type of data transfer known as asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) to transport data in blocks of data referred to as cells. ATM data transmission will likely take place over fiber optic networks due to the high data speeds and favorable wide transmission bandwidths of fiber optics. International standards are in place for high speed data transmission over fiber optics using a synchronous optical network referred to as SONET. SONET is a network service capable of delivering multiple channels of data from various sources in transmission rates that start at an optical carrier (OC) rate of 51.84 Mbps. Thus OC-1 is 51.84 Mbps. Two standard high speed SONET networks proposed are OC-3 at 155.52 Mbps and OC-12 at 622.08 Mbps. Since SONET networks will carry multimedia voice, video, and image as well as traditional data, the basic unit of 8-bit measure is referred to as an octet rather than a byte. In summary, SONET and ATM architectures are used in combination as part of the overall broadband ISDN network.
Workstations and personal computers have evolved with faster and larger semiconductor microprocessors and memories to be able to process the large amounts of digital data. The use of improved bus architectures including MCA, PCI, and ISA has also improved the data handling capabilities of personal computers and workstations. But even with the improvements in microprocessor, memory, and bus technology, it places a high demand on computer resources each time a multimedia application or stream of diverse data objects is transmitted or received by a computer system. The demands on a personal computer or workstation to process information increase once a connection is made to a high speed network such as broadband ISDN. This is particularly true if the primary data bus is used both for microprocessor communications to memory and I/O and external multimedia communications.
A direct connection to a high speed communications network is common for low speed applications using traditional analog modems and predominately non-real time applications. Traditionally, an optional communications card can be purchased for a PC or workstation to allow single user point-to-point communications. A major drawback of this approach, however, is that the add-on card uses the computer system bus for communications. Although acceptable at kilobit data transmission rates, true high speed transmission is extremely difficult using this approach.
In addition, it is useful in high speed networks to be able to manage Quality of Service requirements and multimedia transmission or reception requests with some type of communications server. Communications servers are devices connected to a given LAN or WAN network in order to manage communications. Traditional communications server functions include connection of one or more personal computers or workstations to a network, allocation of a channel or bandwidth for communications, and the ability to temporarily store data until it can be processed by the personal computer or workstation. A communication server can also be used to store multimedia for broadcasts retransmission to multiple users.
Heretofore, a dedicated server using dual state of the art Intel Pentium processors configured using NT server architecture is unable to support full speed ATM OC-3 data transmission speeds. It is therefore desirable to provide a method and architecture to relieve the host computer processor and memory of the responsibilities traditionally associated with network card interface support in order to construct a multimedia communications server capable of ATM speeds at OC-3 and higher data rates.
Most communication servers are dedicated servers, that is, they are dedicated to only the performance of communications management functions. A traditional multimedia server cannot be used as a personal computer or workstation, and in addition can be a costly component to add to a local area network.
The ability to match the amount of computing power, data bandwidth, or communication processing capacity to the amount needed for a given task is commonly referred to as scalability. When referring to the amount of data transmission bandwidth required for a given application, this scaleable concept is often referred to as bandwidth on demand. Thus when only a small amount of data must be transmitted over a computer network, only the amount of network bandwidth necessary to transmit the data is allocated to the application. Partitions of network capacity are called channels, and as an application's bandwidth requirements increase, the network can allocate more channels to that application.
Multimedia applications lend themselves well to scaleable network architectures. Scalability refers to the ability of distributed processing systems to add clients without degrading the overall performance of the system. For example, a host communications server can be used to provide for a scaleable number of simultaneous streams (playback) of a single copy of an object. One good example of this is video on demand. A multimedia server may have several hundred full length video movies stored in its memory. If a user were to demand from the network to view a given movie, a channel could be allocated to playback a single copy of the movie (object). As more users demanded to see the same movie, the communications server could then provide additional channels of video data as needed. In this manner, the multimedia server is scaleable.
Therefore, there is a need for a low cost solution for transforming a traditional personal computer or workstation into a high speed ATM multimedia server while preserving the personal computer or workstation functionality.

System for transferring diverse data objects between a mass storage device and a network via an internal bus on a network card


A vehicle speed calculator includes a vehicle speed calculation unit for calculating a vehicle speed from a traveled distance per unit time of a feature point in a captured image shot by a camera for capturing a road surface, a reference distance mark irradiation unit and an image reference distance detection unit. The reference distance mark irradiation unit irradiates a reference distance mark to the road surface in parallel with an optical axis of the camera. The reference distance mark is formed in such a manner as to have a reference distance in a longitudinal direction of a motorcycle. The image reference distance detection unit detects an image reference distance, the longitudinal length of the reference distance mark in the shot image. The vehicle speed calculation unit calculates the vehicle speed from the traveled distance using the image reference distance and the reference distance.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a vehicle speed calculator for calculating vehicle speed by shooting a road surface, and to a vehicle including the same. More particularly, the present invention relates to a vehicle speed calculator which provides improved calculation accuracy of vehicle speed even when there is a change in vehicle height, and to a motorcycle including the same.
2. Description of the Background Art
There is known technique for shooting a road surface with a camera attached to a vehicle so as to measure a traveling speed and angle of the road surface relative to the camera and use them as vehicle speed and posture information.
For example, the Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2007-278951 discloses an approach for projecting a grid-shaped mark onto a road surface and shooting the projected grid-shaped mark with a camera so as to detect the vehicle speed, posture and other information based on the size and change of the grid-shaped mark.
However, the grid-shaped mark projected onto a road surface undergoes a change, for example, in width with change in vehicle height, making it likely that an error will occur at the time of conversion of the traveling speed of feature points obtained by optical flow into vehicle speed.
The present invention has been made to overcome such drawbacks of the existing vehicle speed calculator. Accordingly, it is one of the objects of the present invention to provide a vehicle speed calculator that offers improved calculation accuracy of vehicle speed even in the event of a change in vehicle height.

Vehicle speed calculator, and vehicle including same


A projection lens system for projecting an image from a cathode ray tube (CRT) onto a screen is provided. The spherochromatic aberration of the system is reduced through the use of a first lens element which has (i) a positive power on axis and at least one aspheric surface which causes the positive power to become negative in the vicinity of the lens element's clear aperture, and (ii) a high dispersion. The first lens element is preferably composed of styrene.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to projection lens systems for use in projection televisions and, in particular, to improved projection lens systems having reduced spherochromatic aberrations.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Projection lens systems for CRT projection televisions have undergone continuing development during the past fifteen years or so. As a result, many of today's CRT projection televisions are equipped with fast lens systems which provide wide semi-fields of view.
Projection lens systems of this type generally include three lens units, i.e., a "first" or "A" lens unit located on the image side of the lens system of weak power, a "second" or "B" lens unit following the first lens unit of strong positive power, and a include three lens units, i.e., a "first" or "A" lens "third" or "C" lens unit following the second lens unit of strong negative power. See, for example, Betensky, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,300,817, 4,348,081, and 4,526,442.
To achieve half-angles of view greater than about 28.degree., a fourth lens unit (referred to herein as the "corrector" or "CR" (unit) is normally added between the strong positive and the strong negative units of the three unit configuration, i.e., between the B and C units. See Betensky, U.S. Pat. No. 4,697,892, and Moskovich, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,682,862, 4,755,028, and 4,776,681. This additional unit usually does not have much optical power; however, it must have at least one aspherical surface to correct for aperture dependent off-axis aberrations like sagittal oblique spherical and coma.
Color images for projection televisions are normally obtained by combining images from three color CRTs, i.e., a red CRT, a green CRT, and a blue CRT. So that the images from the three CRTs will lie substantially on top of one another at the viewing screen, i.e., to minimize color fringing, projection lens systems used in projection televisions are normally corrected for transverse chromatic aberration, i.e., the variation with wavelength of the height of an image point above the optical axis. Transverse chromatic aberration is also known as the chromatic difference in magnification or simply lateral color. This correction is usually achieved by locating the lens system's stop in the proximity of the B unit, e.g., at the middle of the B unit.
For many applications, the projection lens system does not need to be corrected for longitudinal chromatic aberration, i.e., the variation with wavelength of the location along the optical axis of an axial image point. Longitudinal chromatic aberration is also known as axial chromatic aberration or simply axial color. When not corrected by the lens system, this aberration is dealt with by physically adjusting the location of the lens system and its associated CRT with respect to the screen, i.e., by adjusting the front and back conjugates to compensate for the change in focal length of the lens system with wavelength.
The phosphors used in commercially available CRTs do not emit light at a single wavelength. In particular, green phosphors have significant sidebands in blue and red. Similar polychromaticity exists for red and blue phosphors, but to a lesser extent.
For certain applications, such as, high definition television, data displays, or systems which operate at a high magnification, lens systems which are fully or partially corrected for axial color are needed to avoid visible color fringing and/or loss of image contrast as a result of the color spread of CRTs. See, for example, Betensky, U.S. Pat. No. 4,815,831, Kreitzer, U.S. Pat. No. 4,900,139, and Moskovich, U.S. Pat. No. 4,963,007. Such fully or partially color corrected lens systems, however, are more complex and thus more expensive than non-color corrected systems. Accordingly, these systems are often not used in consumer applications.
Wessling, U.S. Pat. No. 5,055,922, discloses a less expensive approach for addressing the color spread problem. In accordance with this approach a filter material that absorbs at least some of the undesired CRT sidebands is incorporated in one or more elements of the lens system. Although this approach significantly reduces the light intensity in the sidebands, it does not completely eliminate them. Also, the filter material approach does not change the lens system's overall aberration behavior.
In addition to lateral and axial color, lens systems can exhibit an additional wavelength dependent aberration known as spherochromatism. This residual-type aberration involves changes in a lens system's spherical aberration with changes in wavelength. Basic spherical aberration for an uncorrected positive lens causes rays further from the axis to focus closer to the lens than rays closer to the axis.
A well-corrected projection television lens system will generally have little spherical aberration for light having a wavelength of around 546 nanometers, i.e., light in the yellow/green range. However, because of spherochromatism, spherical aberration at other wavelengths is often significant. In particular, spherical aberration will typically be substantially undercorrected over most of the aperture for blue light and substantially overcorrected for red light. As a result, the image produced by the projection lens has less contrast than it would have if these spherochromatic aberrations were not present.

Projection lens systems having reduced spherochromatism


The present invention provides a patterned retarder film and a display apparatus. The patterned retarder film is attached to a display panel of the display apparatus. The display panel comprises first, second and third sub-pixels arranged along a first direction, and the patterned retarder film comprises at least two phase retarders. First saw portions and second saw portions are disposed at two opposite sides of the phase retarders and adjacent to at least one of the first, second and third sub-pixels. In the present invention, the color shift problem can be prevented.

In the conventional display technology, when using a film-type patterned retarder film to display 3D images, a conventional patterned retarder film 20 is disposed at a light emitting side of a display panel 10.
Light rays emitting from display panel 10 and passed through a polarized film on a color filter (CF) substrate are transformed into linearly polarized rays. The linearly polarized rays passed through the patterned retarder film 20 are transformed into right handed circularly polarized rays and left handed circularly polarized rays.
When passing through a user's circular polarizer glasses, the right handed circularly polarized rays and left handed circularly polarized rays pass through a right eye glass and a left eye glass, respectively. Thus, the user can view right eye images and left eye images.
As shown in FIG. 1, the conventional patterned retarder film 20 includes at least two retarders 201, 202 in a rectangular strip shape. The at least two retarders are arranged in parallel. A boundary line 203 positioned between at least two retarders is formed between two sub-pixels of the display panel 10. For example, in the display panel 10, blue sub-pixels are positioned at one side of red sub-pixels, and the boundary line 203 is positioned between the blue sub-pixels and the red sub-pixels.
In practice, there are the following problems existing in the conventional technology.
As shown in FIG. 2, in the above-mentioned 3D display technology, the blue sub-pixels are positioned at an upper side of the boundary line 203, and the red sub-pixels are positioned at a lower side of the boundary line 203. Accordingly, the images viewed at an upper viewing angle are reddish, and the images viewed at a lower viewing angle are bluish, thereby resulting in a color shift problem.
As a result, it is necessary to provide a new technology to solve the problems existing in the conventional technologies, as described above.

Patterned retarder film and display apparatus

SHENZHEN CHINA STAR OPTOELECTRONICS TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD


An apparatus for sensing an occupant in a vehicle seat for a vehicle occupant restraint system is provided. The apparatus uses sensors to measure seat deflection to determine the presence, weight, and seated location of the occupant. The sensors are connected to a processor which controls air bag deployment. In one embodiment, the apparatus uses sensors that transfer linear movement to the processor. In another embodiment, the apparatus uses sensors that transfer linear to rotational movement of seat deflection to the processor.

1. Field of Invention
This invention pertains to an apparatus to sense seated occupants for a vehicle occupant restraint system. More particularly, this invention pertains to the use of sensors to measure seat deflection, and the use of electrical signals to determine if the person's weight and seating position are such that an airbag should be deployed.
2. Description of the Related Art
Air bags are important safety devices in modern motor vehicles. There have been, however, injuries associated with the actuation of air bags located in front of and to the side of the passenger seats of vehicles. The occupant of a passenger seat may be injured by the air bag if the occupant is a baby or child in a child seat, a small child, or a child or adult seated too close to the air bag on the front portion of the seat. Attempts to prevent actuation of air bags under unfavorable circumstances are known in the art.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,015,163, titled "System for Measuring Parameters Related to Automobile Seat," issued to Langford et al. on Jan. 18, 2000, discloses a system that determines whether an air bag should be deployed in the case of an automobile crash. The system uses flexible potentiometers placed in an X-Y grid to determine the weight and position of a person. Position and weight are determined by monitoring a group of flexible potentiometers, each positioned between two turns of a coil spring 74 in or under a seat cushion or seat surface. Langford also discloses a flexible potentiometer attached to the main surface of a leaf spring 100. As a load or force is applied to the spring, the flexible potentiometers produce a resistance change.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,474,327, titled "Vehicle Occupant Restraint with Seat Pressure Sensor," issued to Schousek on Dec. 12, 1995, discloses a system that disables actuation of an air bag when an occupant weight that is less than a minimum weight and/or a weight center is forward of a reference line. The seat occupant sensing system includes a voltage divider, having a fixed resistor 26 in series with a pressure sensor or variable resistor 28. Each sensor is mounted between polymer film sheets and includes a pair of conductive electrodes separated by a carbon layer such that the resistance between the electrodes changes as pressure changes. The type of variable resistor is not discussed.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,161,439, titled "Seat Belt Tension Prediction," issued to Stanley on Dec. 19, 2000, discloses a seat belt tension prediction system which includes an accelerometer and a seat weight sensor. The seat weight sensor includes a plurality of force sensitive resistive elements 42 which provide a variable electrical resistance responsive to the amount of force acting on the elements 42. The type of force sensitive resistive element is not disclosed.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,092,838, titled "System and Method for Determining the Weight of a Person in a Seat in a Vehicle," issued to Walker on Jul. 25, 2000, discloses the use of load sensor beams to detect a person seated in a vehicle seat. Strain gauges 104a-d, which are variable resistance strain gauges, are used to quantify the weight of the person sitting on the seat.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,513,830, titled "Method and Appartus for Disabling an Airbag System in a Vehicle," issued to Breed et al. on Feb. 4, 2003 discloses a method and apparatus for determining the position of a seat using a potentiometer 601. The potentiometer 601 is positioned along the seat track 602, and a sliding brush assembly 603 is used to determine the fore and aft location of the seat 610.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,232,243, titled "Occupant Sensing Apparatus," issued to Blackburn et al. on Aug. 3, 1993, discloses an occupant sensing apparatus having an occupant sensor 60 located in the bottom cushion 42 of an automobile seat 34. The occupant sensor 60 is a multi-layer piezoelectric film sensor 110.

Occupant sensor for a vehicle restraint system


A dual-sided rod bender for contouring a rod is disclosed. The rod bender may include a first handle and a second handle pivotably coupled together and extending in a longitudinal direction, respectively, from a proximal end to a distal end. A first side of the rod bender may include a first roller adjacent the distal end, a second roller adjacent the distal end, and a third roller disposed between the first roller and the second roller. A second side of the rod bender may include a fourth roller adjacent the distal end, a fifth roller adjacent the distal end, and a sixth roller disposed between the fourth roller and the fifth roller. The first side may be configured apply a first mechanical advantage to bend a rod and the second side may be configured to apply a second mechanical advantage to bend a rod.

Bone structures may be susceptible to a variety of weaknesses and/or diseases such as fractures, degeneration, dislocation, etc. Medical procedures to correct problems such as dislocation of a patient's vertebrae may be corrected through surgery. In various medical surgeries to correct alignment and/or dislocation of a patient's vertebrae, two adjacent vertebrae may be stabilized by means of an elongated fixing rod linking the two adjacent vertebrae. In some cases, the fixing rod used during surgery may need to be bent and/or contoured for accommodating the specific anatomy of a particular patient.


A first laser beam is emitted from a first laser oscillator in a pulsed manner at a high repetition frequency, and converged onto a substrate by a first intermediate optical system 2 so as to form a slit-like first beam spot. A second laser beam is emitted from a second laser beam oscillator in a pulsed manner to rise precedent to and fall subsequent to the first laser beam, and converged onto the substrate by a second intermediate optical system so as to form a second beam spot similar in configuration to the first beam spot and to contain the first beam spot. Crystallization of a semiconductor thin film on the substrate is carried out while the substrate or the first, second beam spots are moved. Thereby, the whole semiconductor thin film is formed into a crystal surface that has grown in one direction and free from ridges. Thus, the semiconductor thin film has an extremely flat surface, extremely few defects, large crystal grains and high throughput.

The present invention relates to a semiconductor thin film crystallization device and a semiconductor thin film crystallization method, for crystallizing semiconductor thin film by using laser.
In recent years, thin film transistors (hereinafter, referred to as TFTs) using polysilicon film have been drawing attention among TFTs under development. In particular, LCDs (Liquid Crystal Displays) or EL (Electro-Luminescence) Displays employ TFTs in which polysilicon film is used as elements for switching pixels or as elements that form part of the driver circuit for controlling the pixels.
Generally, as the method for obtaining the polysilicon film, amorphous silicon film is crystallized to provide polysilicon film. Recently, attention has been given particularly to a method of crystallizing amorphous silicon film by using laser light. In this case, crystallization by laser makes it possible to achieve the crystallization by heating only the semiconductor film such as the amorphous silicon film. Therefore, this method is an effective method for forming a crystallized semiconductor film on a substrate of low heat resistance such as glass substrates or plastic substrates. This crystallization method for semiconductor film by using laser light is disclosed in detail in JP 2001-44120 A (hereinafter, referred to as patent document 1), JP H11-307450 (patent document 2) and JP 2000-505241 A (patent document 3).
The patent document 1 describes a laser heat treatment device that improves the crystallinity by using a plurality of light sources. The document further describes, in particular, the use of an ultraviolet ray as a main light source and a pulsed beam emitted from a solid state laser as a subordinate light source.
The patent document 2 discloses a thin film reformer for performing crystallization with radiation of two types of laser light as in the laser heat treatment device of the patent document 1. The document 2 further describes, in particular, that laser light which does not show large absorption for semiconductor film but shows large absorption for the substrate, such as carbonic acid gas laser, is used to improve the crystallinity of the substrate, which makes it possible to improve the characteristics of transistors or the like fabricated on the substrate of improved crystallinity.
The patent document 3 discloses a crystallization process of a semiconductor region on the substrate wherein a linear or slit-shaped beam is applied to a semiconductor region on the substrate in the lateral direction so as to make such crystal growth that crystals of the semiconductor film are grown largely in the lateral direction. However, in the case of the crystallization process for the semiconductor region on the substrate disclosed in the patent document 3, the distance of lateral growth by one time irradiation is about 1 micron to 2 microns. Therefore, the above-described crystal growth needs to be repeated as required in order to crystallize a large-area semiconductor film.
Various laser devices are available for laser devices to be used for the methods described above. First of all, in terms of the form of oscillation, laser devices are roughly divided into pulsed laser devices that perform pulsed oscillation and continuous wave laser devices that perform continuous oscillation. Although both devices are used for crystallization of the semiconductor film, yet the pulsed laser devices are widely used for crystallization of semiconductor film because of an advantage capable of instantaneously giving large power.
Currently, pulsed oscillation type excimer laser devices are available as laser devices which are commonly used for crystallization of the semiconductor film. In the devices, the repetition frequency of pulsed oscillation is about 1 Hz to 300 Hz. The excimer laser device is large in output power, and the oscillation light is high in absorption coefficient for silicon film because of the oscillation light being ultraviolet rays. Moreover, the oscillation light of the excimer laser device is capable of instantaneously heating by virtue of their short pulse width. Thus, the excimer laser device has an advantage that making the semiconductor film fused does not involve so much increase in the substrate temperature.
However, excimer laser devices need such gas as krF (wavelength: 248 nm) or XeCl (wavelength: 308 nm) for oscillation, and gas supply units for these gases are expensive. Further, since replacement of gas, replacement of oscillating tubes, replacement of optical windows and the like are regularly necessitated. This disadvantageously leads to high maintenance cost.
Further, other laser devices with the medium given by argon gas or carbonic acid gas have also been used as gas laser devices. In particular, carbonic acid gas laser devices are high in efficiency, allowing high output power to be obtained with relatively small-sized equipment.
Besides, it is also possible to use laser light derived from an oscillation source given by a solid state laser device (a laser device that outputs laser light with a crystal rod used as its resonant cavity). Such solid state laser devices are given by commonly known ones, being exemplified by YAG lasers (which normally mean Nd:YAG lasers), Nd:YVO4 lasers, Nd:YAlO3 lasers, ruby lasers, Ti:sapphire lasers, glass lasers and the like. Since YAG lasers have a fundamental wave (first higher harmonic) whose wavelength is as long as 1064 nm, the second harmonic (wavelength: 532 nm), the third harmonic (wavelength: 355 nm) or the fourth harmonic (wavelength: 266 nm) is used in some cases. It is noted that the fundamental wave can be modified to the second harmonic, the third harmonic or the fourth harmonic by a wavelength modulator including nonlinear elements. The formation of those harmonics is performed according to known techniques.
Also, in some cases, the Q-switching method (Q-modulation switching method) is used. The Q-switching method is often used for the YAG lasers. This is a method that the Q value is abruptly increased from a sufficiently low Q value state of the laser resonator to produce a sharp pulsed laser of quite high an energy value. In this method, the repetition frequency of the pulsed oscillation is 100 to several tens kHz. These are known techniques.
Although various semiconductor film crystallization methods using laser devices have been proposed as described above, there have been also proposed methods for crystallizing a semiconductor film in combination with the plural kinds of laser devices as well as a single laser device.
Further, in the prior art, there have been provided many proposals for the method of crystallinity improvement and the method of throughput (processing speed per unit time) improvement in the process of performing the crystallization of semiconductor film by using laser light.
However, the prior arts described in the aforementioned patent documents 1 to 3 have the follow disadvantages.
Both the patent documents 1 and 2 describe that the crystallinity of the semiconductor film can be improved with the use of two types of laser light. In particular, the patent document 1 discloses in detail the relations among the irradiation intensity of laser light, the mobility of transistors and the size of crystal grains. However, as an example, the mobility is 100 cm2/Vs to 150 cm2/Vs at most, the value being very low as compared with single crystal silicon or the like.
This is because only using plural types of laser light does not allow acceleration of the crystal growth so much, and therefore, to achieve a drastic increase of the size of crystal grains, as stated in the patent document 1. As a consequence, it is impossible to improve the characteristics of transistors by improved crystallinity of the semiconductor film.
In the patent document 3, laterally elongated crystals are made, thereby, transistors are formed with the channel direction coincident with the growth direction of the crystals, which makes it possible to fabricate transistors having a mobility of 300 cm2/Vs to 400 cm2/Vs or over. However, the length of crystals grown by one-time irradiation is 1 micron to 2 microns as described above, and therefore, there is a need for stringing the crystals one after another, which leaves a great issue unsolved in terms of throughput.
Furthermore, in the prior arts disclosed in the patent documents 1 to 3, there occurs a protrusion, so called "ridge", at each grain boundary portion of the formed crystals. The ridge is caused by collisions of crystals that have grown in different directions. The ridge has a height comparable to film thickness of the semiconductor film to be crystallized. Then, if the channel portion of a transistor for example is formed at a portion where the ridge is generated, there occurs a phenomenon that electric fields concentrate to the ridge (protrusion) portion to incur a breakdown, which gives rise to an issue of deterioration in reliability of the transistors. Besides, the ridge portion is thick in film thickness and has defects concentrated thereabout, transistors whose channel is formed at the ridge portion are generally poor in characteristics and not for practicable use.
In addition, the patent document 3 discloses a method where a transistor is formed in no ridge region which is formed between lateral crystals after stringing the lateral crystals one after another. Though it is possible to form a transistor in no ridge region, deterioration of throughput is inevitable in ensuring large areas free from ridges. Besides this, transistors need to be placed so as not to overlap the ridges. In this case, the transistor is placed after the completion of crystallization and forming a pattern. Therefore, it is necessary to predict the ridge positions preparatorily with an extremely high accuracy and place the ridges so that interference with the ridges does not occur in the later process of forming the transistors. The placement accuracy of the ridges in such a case needs to be, generally, equivalent to that of the placement of the transistors. For this purpose, equipment for performing the crystallization process in semiconductor regions on the substrate generally requires a level of accuracy equivalent to that of exposers for pattern formation, thus the price of the equipment being very expensive.
In the method of forming the lateral crystal growth in the semiconductor regions on the substrate disclosed in the patent document 3, fabrication of flat crystals free from ridges is hard to achieve under practical conditions although achievable under certain limited conditions.
In order to manufacture high-performance thin film transistors, it is necessary to obtain crystals having flat surfaces, less defects and large crystal grains at high throughput. However, it is hard to make the crystals that satisfy these characteristics at the same time in the prior arts disclosed in the patent documents 1 to 3. That is, from the patent documents 1 to 3, it is impossible to obtain a practical crystallization method which satisfies both the obtainment of crystals having high-performance crystallinity: less defects and less grain boundaries and flat surfaces, and the capability of high throughput at the same time even if any types of laser light either alone or in combination is used. In other words, the prior arts disclosed in the patent documents 1 to 3 make it possible only to obtain crystals having a capability of fabricating thin film transistors for liquid crystal panel used at a level of 100 cm2/Vs to 200 cm2/Vs in mobility.

Semiconductor thin film crystallization device and semiconductor thin film crystallization method


A method of creating image palm prints is provided that comprises storing image data as a metafile within a clipboard storage facility (20). The metafile is then transferred to a memory device context (18). A portion of the image is then extracted using a boundary scan to discard background image data. The image is then converted into a device independent bit map and the device independent bit map is compressed to a predetermined size. The image palm print is then created by associating the compressed device independent bit map with the dimension data and palette information.

The display, storage and manipulation of graphic images is one of the most challenging problems facing modern data processing systems. The storage and display of high resolution images require the manipulation of tremendously large amounts of data. It is also difficult to provide a user wishing access to stored images with enough information about the stored images to allow the user to select a particular image from a large number of images. Prior systems have used a combination of written description of images and other indices to indicate the nature of a particular stored image.
One approach to indexing graphic images is the use of thumbprint images. Thumbprint images are either portions of an image or a greatly reduced rendition of a graphic image. Prior art thumbprint images have been difficult to produce and manage because of the differences in the graphics formats and the difficulty in accurately representing a larger image in a smaller format.
Accordingly, a need has arisen for a graphics processing system which addresses the problems and challenges associated with prior systems for manipulating, compressing and storing graphic image data.

Graphic image compression and storage system


A skid plate and cross member assembly for a vehicular frame includes a skid plate having a platform and a cross member having a body. A locking element, preferably having holes or slots, is formed in the body of the cross member. A moldable material in a moldable state is placed in a mold for the skid plate. The cross member is pressed into the moldable platform of the skid plate so that the locking element is immersed and the moldable material fills the voids of the locking element. After the moldable material has cured, the cross member is interlocked with the skid plate to form a lightweight skid plate and cross member assembly. This assembly is secured to side rails of a vehicular frame to protect lower components of a vehicle.

This invention relates in general to vehicular frames, and in particular to a skid plate and cross member assembly and method for forming such an assembly.
A vehicular chassis generally includes a frame assembly, wheels, and other machinery of a vehicle, on which a body is supported. The frame assembly is oftentimes formed from a pair of longitudinally extending side rails, usually arranged substantially parallel to each other. One or more cross members can be attached transversely between the side rails to form a rigid structure. Suspension components such as struts and shock absorbers can be seated on the frame assembly, while wheels and axles can be mounted to and supported by the frame assembly. The body is secured to the frame assembly. The body usually includes a powertrain compartment, a passenger compartment, and a storage compartment.
In certain vehicles, it is common to secure a skid plate between side rails or any structural support members. The skid plate protects the body and lower components of a vehicle from rocks and other debris which may be present on a roadway. Also, the skid plate protects the body when a vehicle "bottoms out" on an uneven surface. Many skid plates include a cross member which is attached to the skid plate and the side rails. In some instances, such a cross member and/or the skid plate support a powertrain component such as a transmission.
In order to support mounted elements and perform in the harsh environment of a vehicular underbody, the frame assembly and skid plate must be formed from strong materials. To meet this requirement, many conventional side rails, cross members, and skid plates are formed from a metallic material such as steel.
In order to improve fuel economy, automobile manufacturers have implemented design changes to reduce the weight of many vehicle components, including those in a frame assembly. It is desirable to reduce the weight of a vehicular frame assembly and skid plate, thereby reducing the overall weight of a vehicle. Furthermore, it is desirable to simplify the assembly of a cross member onto a skid plate.

Vehicular skid plate and cross member assembly


An in-vehicle navigation apparatus performs the following: according to an initial operation of a user to register a handsfree function, connecting a handsfree profile with a cellular phone and registering a handsfree function to be associated with the cellular phone; if the cellular phone has an audio visual function, displaying an audio visual function registration window for querying a user whether to register the audio visual function; and according to an operation of the user to register the audio visual function, connecting an audio visual profile with the cellular phone and registering the audio visual function to be associated with the cellular phone that was registered as being associated with the handsfree function.

An in-vehicle navigation apparatus has a Bluetooth (registered trademark) communication function along with a handsfree function. The in-vehicle navigation apparatus connects a handsfree profile (HFP) with a cellular phone having the Bluetooth communication function to thereby register a handsfree function (HF function) and become capable of providing the handsfree function (for instance, refer to Patent document 1).
Further, in recent years, some profiles other than the HFP are put in practical use as a profile connectable between an in-vehicle navigation apparatus and a cellular phone. An audio visual profile (AVP) is an example of such profiles. Conventionally, a user needs to perform a registration operation of a cellular phone for registering each of a HF function and an AV function into an in-vehicle navigation apparatus.
In such a configuration where registration operations of a cellular phone into an in-vehicle navigation apparatus are required individually for multiple functions, even after a registration operation is performed for registering a HF function, another registration operation is again required for registering an AV function. This poses a disadvantage in operability.                Patent Document 1: JP 2002-223288 A


An improved hearing aid and method that employs a combination microphone/speaker, sized to have the microphone inserted within the concha bowl of the outer ear and the speaker is inserted within which the opening of the ear canal such that it does not obstruct the same for more natural hearing.

1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to hearing aids. In particular, it relates to an improved hearing aid and method that employs a combination microphone/speaker, inserted within the opening of the ear canal and sized not to obstruct the same, and the microphone situated in the bowl of the concha.
2. State of the Art
Various hearing aids and earpiece devices are known in the art. Taenzer et al, U.S. Pat. No. 6,445,799B1 issued Sep. 3, 2002 provides a noise cancellation earpiece with an ear canal tube sized for positioning in an ear canal so that the ear canal is at least partially open for directly receiving ambient sounds. It is designed to send an inverse noise signal into the ear canal thereby substantially canceling the ambient noise in the ear canal. Takada, U.S. Publication No. 2003/0095677A1 published May 22, 2003 discloses a hearing aid adapted to primarily listed to a desired sound when a hearing impaired person makes conversation to others or is watching television. It employs bone conduction speakers connected with a headset yoke with a central magnetic pole surrounded by a voice coil to allow one to hear in noisy environments. Boesen, U.S. Pat. No. 6,718,043B1 issued Apr. 6, 2004 discloses a voice sound transmitting apparatus and system with a voice sound transmitting and receiving unit having an earpiece that is adapted for insertion into the external auditory canal of a user. The voice sound-transmitting unit includes a sensor, which may be a bone conduction sensor an air conduction sensor, or both. Prior to transmission, an additional processing modification or formatting of sensor output may be done. Stites, III, U.S. Pat. No. 5,208,867 issued May 4, 1993 discloses a voice transmission system and method for high ambient noise conditions employing an earpiece that fills the entire external auditory canal of a user. Stites, III, U.S. Pat. No. 5,327,506 issued Jun. 5, 1994 discloses another voice transmission system and method for high ambient noise conditions employing a similar type of earpiece that fills the entire external auditory canal of a user. Pluvinage et al, U.S. Pat. No. 5,987,146 issued Nov. 16, 1999 discloses an ear canal microphone providing an open ear canal hearing aid system. It has a plurality of ear canal tubes sized for positioning in an ear canal so that the ear canal is at least partially open for directly receiving ambient sounds. Fretz et al, U.S. Pat. No. 6,275,596B1 issued Aug. 14, 2001 discloses another open ear canal hearing aid system with the speaker positioned in the ear canal leaving it partially open. Anderson et al, U.S. Pat. No. 6,704,423B2 issued Mar. 9, 2004 discloses a hearing aid assembly having a directional microphone aligned in a forward direction mounted externally to a hearing aid body, which may have an in-the-canal or completely-in-the-canal mounting. Bauman, US Publication No. 2005/0078843 published Apr. 14, 2005 discloses a hearing aid system with a receiver sized to fit within the ear canal in an open-ear configuration. Puthuff, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 6,181,801 issued Jan. 30, 2001 discloses a wired open ear canal earpiece with a combined microphone/speaker inserted into the ear canal with a plurality of wires, which obstructs the ear canal. Feeley et al., U.S. Pat. No. 7,139,404 issued Nov. 21, 2006 discloses a BTE/CIC Auditory Device and modular connector system disclosing an interchangeable transmission lines.
Cited for general interest is the Bordewijk, U.S. Pat. No. 6,577,740B1 issued Jun. 10, 2003 disclosing a hearing aid for placement in an ear including a carrier, an enclosure, a microphone, a battery and a speaker inserted within the ear canal to totally obstruct the same. Valley et al, U.S. Pat. No. 4,259,547 issued Mar. 31, 1981 discloses a hearing aid with a dual pickup for use in a high noise environment.
None of the above references provides a hearing aid with a combination microphone/speaker arrangement positioned within the concha/ear canal, which provides an open ear canal hearing aid system for use with a variety of battery powered amplification hearing aid devices.

Concha/open canal hearing aid apparatus and method


In order to obtain a light-emitting device having a higher aperture ratio in pixels than that of the prior art, a source signal line and a current supply line to be connected with a pixel unit are switched by a switching circuit to use a common wiring line, so that the number of wiring lines in the pixel unit is reduced to realize the high aperture ratio.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a light-emitting device. More particularly, the invention relates to an active matrix type light-emitting device having thin film transistors (TFTs) over an insulator.
2. Related Art
In recent years, the technique of forming TFTs over a substrate has made drastic progress to develop the applications to the active matrix type display device (or the light-emitting device). Especially, the TFTs using a poly-silicon film have a higher field effect mobility (or simply, a mobility) than that of the TFTs using an amorphous silicon film of the prior art so that they can act at a high speed. Therefore, the control of the pixels, as has been made in the prior art by a driver circuit outside of the substrate, can be made by a driver circuit which is formed over the substrate common to the pixels.
This active matrix type light-emitting device is enabled by forming various circuits and elements over the common substrate to have various advantages such as the reduction in the manufacture cost, the size reduction of an electro-optic device, the rise in the yield or the drop of the throughput.
Moreover, there has been vigorously investigated the active matrix type light-emitting device (or the EL display) which has EL elements as its light-emitting elements. The EL display is also called either the organic EL display (OELD) or the organic light emitting diode (OLED).
The EL display is of the spontaneous luminescence type. The EL element has a structure in which an EL layer is sandwiched between a pair of electrodes (i.e., an anode and a cathode), and the EL layer usually has a laminated structure, as represented by the structure of "hole transfer layer/luminescent layer/electron transfer layer" proposed by Tang et al., of Kodak Eastman Company. This structure has such a high luminescence efficiency that most of the EL displays being investigated and developed adopt it.
The structure may be exemplified by another lamination of hole injection layer/hole transfer layer/luminescence layer/electron transfer layer, or hole injection layer/hole transfer layer/luminescence layer/electron transfer layer/electron injection layer over the anode. The luminescence layer may also be doped with a fluorescent pigment or the like.
Herein, all the layers to be interposed between the cathode and the anode will be generally called the "EL layer". Specifically, the EL layer means the layer which contains an organic EL material capable of establishing the EL (Electro Luminescence, as established by applying an electric field), and all the aforementioned hole injection layer, hole transfer layer, luminescence layer, electron transfer layer and electron injection layer are contained in the EL layer.
On the other hand, the luminescence to be obtained by the organic EL material is one (of fluorescence) at the return from a single excited state to the ground state or the other (of phosphorescence) at the return from the triple excited state to the ground state. The light-emitting device of the invention can adopt the EL element having either of the organic EL materials.
By applying a predetermined voltage to the EL layer having the aforementioned structure from the paired electrodes, moreover, the carriers in the luminescence layer are recombined to emit light. Herein, the light-emitting element, as formed of the anode, the EL layer and the cathode, will be called the EL element.
In the EL display, there are formed in a matrix shape a plurality of pixels, each of which has a thin film transistor (TFT) and an EL element. FIG. 17 shows a pixel of the EL display in an enlarged scale. A pixel 1700 is composed of a switching TFT 1701, a current controlling TFT 1702, an EL element 1703, a source signal line 1704, a gate signal line 1705, a current supply line 1706 and a capacitor 1707.
A gate electrode of the switching TFT 1701 is connected with the gate signal line 1705. On the other hand, one of the source region and the drain region of the switching TFT 1701 is connected with the source signal line, the other is connected with the gate electrode of the current controlling TFT 1702. A source region of the current controlling TFT 1702 is connected with the current supply line 1706 and a drain region of the current controlling TFT 1702 is connected with the anode or cathode of the EL element 1703.
Where the anode of the EL element 1703 is connected with the drain region of the current controlling TFT 1702, its anode is a pixel electrode, and its cathode is an opposed electrode. Where the cathode of the EL element 1703 is connected with the drain region of the current controlling TFT 1702, on the contrary, its anode is an opposed electrode, and its cathode is a pixel electrode.
Herein, the potential difference between the potential of the pixel electrode and the potential of the opposed electrode will be called the "EL driving voltage", which is applied to the EL layer.
Here, the capacitor 1707 need not always be provided. If any, the capacitor 1707 is connected with the current controlling TFT 1702 and the current supply line 1706, as shown in FIG. 17.
The potential (i.e., the supply potential) of the current supply line 1706 is held constant. The potential of the opposed electrode of the EL element 1703 is also held constant. This potential of the opposed electrode is given such a potential difference from the supply potential that the EL element may luminesce when the supply potential is applied to the pixel electrode of the EL element.
The switching TFT 1701 is turned ON with the selection signal inputted to the gate signal line 1705. Herein, the ON state of the TFT means that the drain current of the TFT takes a value of 0 or higher.
When the switching TFT 1701 is turned ON, the video signals, as inputted from the source signal line 1704, are inputted through the switching TFT 1701 to the gate electrode of the current controlling TFT 1702. Here, the inputting of a signal through the switching TFT 1701 to the gate electrode of the current controlling TFT 1702 means that the signal is inputted through the active layer of the switching TFT 1701 to the gate electrode of the current controlling TFT 1702.
The amount of the current to flow through the channel forming region of the current controlling TFT 1702 is controlled with a gate electrode Vgs or the potential difference between the gate electrode and the source region of the current controlling TFT 1702. Therefore, the potential to be applied to the pixel electrode of the EL element 1703 is determined by the level of the potential of the video signals, as inputted to the gate electrode of the current controlling TFT 1702. By the level of the potential fed to the pixel electrode, moreover, the luminescent luminance (i.e., the luminance of the light emitted by the EL element) of the EL element is controlled. In other words, the EL element 1703 is controlled in its luminance to effect the gradation display by the potential of the video signals inputted to the source signal line 1704.
In recent years, the reduction in the pixel size has been advanced to desire a finer image. This pixel miniaturization has increased the area for forming the TFT and the wiring line in one pixel thereby to reduce the pixel aperture ratio.
In order to achieve a high aperture ratio of each pixel in a regulated pixel size, therefore, it is essential to make an efficient layout of the circuit elements necessary for the circuit construction of the pixels.
In order to realize the active matrix type light-emitting device of the pixel aperture ratio, as described above, there has been desired a novel pixel construction.

Light-emitting device, and electric device using the same

Semiconductor Energy Laboratory Co., Ltd.


A method of evaluating a durability of a magnetic disk includes the steps of (a) obtaining conditions under which a sliding contact state of a first head with respect to a surface of a first magnetic disk stabilizes, and (b) causing a second head to make sliding contact with a surface of a second magnetic disk under the conditions and evaluating a durability of the second magnetic disk.

The present invention generally relates to methods and apparatuses for evaluating the durability of magnetic disks, and more particularly to a method and an apparatus for evaluating the durability of a magnetic disk which is used in a magnetic disk unit.
In the magnetic disk unit which uses one or more magnetic disks, the so-called Contact Start Stop (CSS) system is employed. According to the CSS system, a head makes contact with a surface of the magnetic disk when the operation of the magnetic disk unit starts and when the operation of the magnetic disk unit ends. For this reason, a protection layer is provided on the surface of the magnetic disk, but still, frictional wear of the magnetic disk occurs due to the contact between the head and the magnetic disk.
On the other hand, due to the increase in the storage capacity and the recording density of the magnetic disk and also due to the decrease in the size of the magnetic disk unit, the floating distance of the head from the magnetic disk is becoming smaller. In addition, in order to prevent the head from being attracted to the surface of the magnetic disk and to ensure floating of the head from the magnetic disk, the surface of the magnetic disk is not perfectly flat and undulations are intentionally formed to a certain extent on the surface of the magnetic disk. As a result, the probability of the head making contact with the magnetic disk has increased.
For this reason, the durability of the magnetic disk has recently become an important factor which affects the performance of the magnetic disk unit. Hence, there are demands to realize a method and an apparatus which can efficiently and accurately evaluate the durability of the magnetic disk.
Conventionally, there is a method which evaluates the durability of the magnetic disk by rotating the magnetic disk at a low speed and preventing the head from floating from the magnetic disk.
In addition, a magnetic disk endurance testing method is proposed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No.63-187422, for example. According to this first proposed method, the magnetic disk which is to be evaluated is rotated under vacuum of 100 mTorr or less, and the head is prevented from floating from the magnetic disk. Thus, the head makes sliding contact with respect to the surface of the magnetic disk, and the durability of the magnetic disk is evaluated by detecting the surface deterioration of the magnetic disk using an acoustic sensor.
Furthermore, a method of evaluating the head floating stability is proposed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No.59-11578, for example. According to this second proposed method, the pressure is decreased in a range of 100 Torr to 1 Torr, and the time it takes for the head to make sliding contact with the surface of the magnetic disk after making contact with the magnetic disk is measured. This measured time is compared with a time which is similarly measured with respect to a standard head, so as to evaluate the head floating stability.
According to the conventional method of evaluating the durability of the magnetic disk described above, however, it takes an extremely long time to check the deterioration of the magnetic disk caused by the sliding contact between the head and the magnetic disk because the magnetic disk is rotated at the low speed. In addition, it is necessary to first clean the surface of the magnetic disk before the deterioration of the magnetic disk can be checked. For this reason, there was a problem in that the durability of the magnetic disk cannot be evaluated efficiently according to the conventional method.
On the other hand, according to the first proposed method described above, the magnetic disk which is to be evaluated is rotated under the vacuum of 100 mTorr or less and the head makes contact with the magnetic disk in this state. Further, the evaluation of the magnetic disk is made under the vacuum of 100 mTorr or less, regardless of the head: and the magnetic disk which are used. Consequently, there were problems in that an expensive apparatus is required to realize the vacuum state of 100 mTorr or less, it takes time to obtain the vacuum state, and the evaluation of the magnetic disk cannot be made within a short time.
Moreover, according to the second proposed method described above, the head makes contact with the magnetic disk which is rotated under the pressure of 100 Torr to 1 Torr. In addition, the evaluation of the magnetic disk is made under the pressure of 100 Torr to 1 Torr, regardless of the head and the magnetic disk which are used. As a result, there were problems in that an expensive apparatus is required to realize the pressure state of 100 Torr to 1 Torr, and although not as long as in the case of the first proposed method, it takes time to obtain the pressure state of 100 Torr to 1 Torr, and the evaluation of the magnetic disk cannot be made within a short time. Furthermore, the object of the second proposed method is to evaluate the head floating stability, and no mention is made of the evaluation of the durability of the magnetic disk.

Method and apparatus for evaluating durability of magnetic disk


Techniques are described for assigning an application thread to a cache. A newly created application thread may be assigned to a plurality of caches. The cache assignment that optimizes performance may be determined. The newly created application thread may be associated with the determined cache.

Currently available computers may have processors that contain multiple instruction execution units, referred to as cores. Each core may process a stream of instructions, relatively independently from one another. More sophisticated computers may contain multiple processors, each of which may contain multiple cores. Multi-threaded application programs may make use of the plurality of independent cores by having each thread of the application program run on a different core. Thus, the individual threads may truly execute concurrently, as each core processes instructions independently of the other cores.

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Development LP


An apparatus which is useful in the separation of solids from a diluted, wet, concrete mixture has (a) a free-standing first container with a drain port and a top opening, (b) a strainer disposed within the first container, (c) a drain port shut-off valve, (d) a second container capable of providing a reservoir for recovered liquid, and (e) a transfer conduit for allowing effluent from the drain port of the first container to gravitate into the second container.

Concrete is a substance which is an amalgam of various materials, usually water, sand, gravel, cement, fiberglass, chemicals and other additives depending upon the concrete processing plant's abilities and the end user's desires. Concrete is commonly transported to a construction site in concrete mixture delivery vehicles, typically large trucks. The concrete within the delivery vehicles is typically prepared and retained within a large rotatable mixing drum. During transportation within the mixing drum, the concrete is in a wet, relatively fluid state. At the construction site, the wet concrete mixture is typically gravitated from the delivery vehicle via one or more pour chutes.
After substantially all of the concrete mixture is unloaded from the delivery vehicle, a considerable amount of wet concrete mixture continues to adhere to the pour chutes. In the past, this remaining wet concrete mixture was merely hosed off onto the ground. Today, however, the rinse water used to clean the pour chutes is considered a potential groundwater contaminant. Consequently, environmental laws generally prohibit the disbursal of such rinse waters onto the ground. All such rinse waters must be recouped and recycled without being allowed to flow into streets, storm drains or gutters or allowed to percolate into the soil.
One way of dealing with concrete mixture rinse waters at large construction sites is to deposit such rinse waters in a prefabricated lined evaporation pit. The construction of a prefabricated evaporation pit at smaller commercial and residential construction sites is not practical, however.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,741,065, 6,155,277 and 6,354,439 disclose a variety of equipment for allowing the removal of concrete chute rinse water in the delivery vehicle. However, each such proposed equipment requires the use of expensive and bulky hydraulic, pneumatic or electrical components which must be carried on the delivery vehicle. Such hydraulic or electrical components are expensive to purchase and maintain and awkward to carry on the delivery vehicle. Also, such hydraulic, pneumatic or electrical components leave the driver of the delivery vehicle vulnerable to hydraulic, pneumatic and electrical system failures which would prevent use of the equipment at the construction site. Still further, proposed equipment in the prior art frequently suffer from leakage of contaminated water during the disconnecting of hoses from collection vessels. Finally, several of the proposed equipment requires the use of the vehicle's mixing drum to store the recovered rinse water. Storing such rinse water in the mixing drum can adversely affect the integrity of the next load of concrete mixture prepared and transported within the mixing drum, unless the rinse water is thoroughly drained from the mixing drum prior to the preparation of the next batch of concrete mixture. From a practical standpoint, this is a major disadvantage of such proposed equipment because there is a strong temptation among individual concrete mixture preparation personnel to reuse the rinse water (already in the mixing drum) rather than to take the time to thoroughly drain and reconstitute the rinse water and to replace it in the mixing drum with fresh water.
Accordingly, there is a need for a concrete reclamation apparatus which avoids the aforementioned problems in the prior art in an efficient and inexpensive manner.


Methods for collecting information regarding a remote connector port that is connected to a patch panel connector port by a communications cable that has at least one data communications channel and a separate control channel are provided in which a first conductor of the separate control channel of the communications cable is biased to power an integrated circuit chip that is associated with the remote connector port. A first signal is transmitted over the separate control channel of the communications cable to the integrated circuit chip associated with the remote connector port. A second signal is received from the integrated circuit chip over the separate control channel of the communications cable in response to the first signal. The second signal includes information regarding the remote connector port.

Many businesses have dedicated communications systems that enable computers, servers, printers, facsimile machines and the like to communicate with each other, through a private network, and with remote locations via a telecommunications service provider. Such communications system may be hard wired through, for example, the walls and/or ceilings of a building using communications cables. Typically, these cables contain eight insulated copper wires that are arranged as four differential twisted pairs of wires that may be used to transmit four separate differential signals, although in some cases fiber optic communications cables may be used instead. Individual connector ports such as RJ-45 style modular wall jacks are mounted in offices throughout the building. The cables provide a communications path from the connector ports in offices and other rooms, hallways and common areas of the building (referred to herein as "work area outlets") to network equipment (e.g., network servers, switches, etc.) that may be located in a computer room. Communications cables from external telecommunication service providers may also terminate within the computer room.
Commercial data center operations also use hard wired communications systems to interconnect hundreds or thousands of servers, routers, memory storage systems and other associated equipment. In these data centers, fiber optic communications cables and/or communications cables that include four differential pairs of insulated copper wires are used to interconnect the servers, routers, memory storage systems and the like.
In both office networks and data center operations, the cables that are connected to end devices may terminate into one or more communications patching systems that may simplify later connectivity changes. Typically, a communications patching system includes a plurality of "patch panels" that are mounted on one or more equipment racks. As is known to those of skill in the art, a "patch panel" refers to an inter-connection device that includes a plurality of connector ports on a front side thereof. Each connector port (e.g., an RJ-45 jack or a fiber optic adapter) is configured to receive a first communications cable that is terminated with a mating connector (e.g., an RJ-45 plug or a fiber optic cable termination). A second cable is terminated into the reverse side of each connector port. With respect to RJ-45 patch panels, the second cable is typically terminated into the reverse side of the patch panel by terminating the eight (or more) conductive wires of the cable into corresponding insulation displacement contacts or other wire connection terminals of the connector port. With respect to fiber optic patch panels, the second cable is typically terminated into the reverse side of the patch panel by inserting a mating connector that terminates the second fiber optic cable into the reverse side of the fiber optic adapter. Herein, a "patch cord" refers to a communications cable that has at least one end which is terminated with a connector (e.g., an RJ-45 plug or a fiber optic cable termination). Each connector port on the patch panel may provide one or more communications paths between a first cable that is plugged into the front side of the connector port and a second cable that is terminated into the reverse side of the connector port. The patching system may optionally include a variety of additional equipment such as rack managers, system managers and other devices that facilitate making and/or tracking patching connections.
The patch cords in communications patching systems may be rearranged frequently. The patch cord interconnections are typically logged in a computer-based log that records changes made to the patch cord connections. The communications cable connections between patch panel ports and work area modular wall jacks are typically determined manually and recorded in the computer-based log. Thus, the computer-based log, if properly maintained, may keep of the end-to-end connections between work area wall jacks and the connector ports on network switches. However, technicians may neglect to update the log each and every time a change is made, and/or may make errors in logging changes. As such, the logs may not be completely accurate.
A variety of systems have been proposed for automatically logging the patch cord connections in a communications patching system, including techniques that use mechanical switches, radio frequency identification and the like. These patching systems typically use special "intelligent" patch panels and management hardware and/or software to detect patch cord insertions/removals at the patch panels and/or to read identifiers located on the patch cords or connector ports to facilitate automatic tracking of the patching connections. Typically, these systems require that all of the patch panels in the communications patching field have these automatic tracking capabilities. However, the available systems generally have one or more shortcomings.

Systems, equipment and methods for automatically tracking cable connections and for identifying work area devices and related methods of operating communications networks


An expandable keyboard in accordance with the present invention provides a full-size or expanded keyboard for typing which folds to minimize size during transport or storage, and can be converted to substantially twice its folded length for use. Its use of sliding segments permits a straight hinge line for folding. Its operating mechanism supports a large number of electrical interconnections between the hinged wing section or sections and the central platform, and provides for straight-line engagement as well as environmental and ESD protection of the mating electrical connectors. It permits the operation of removable modules such as PCMCIA cards or fixed circuitry such as speakers or keypads in the wing section or sections in both their open and closed positions. It includes a central keyboard assembly and a first assembly comprising a first segment and a first wing. The central keyboard assembly includes one or more keys and a platform. The first wing is pivotally connected along one side to one side of the platform about a first axis and is pivotable to a closed position where the first wing rests substantially on the platform and to an open position where the first wing provides an extension of the platform. The first segment is slidably connected to the first wing and is moveable to a first position which exposes the first axis and permits the first wing to pivot about the first axis and to a second position which covers the first axis and substantially prevents the first wing from pivoting about the first axis. The expandable keyboard may also include a second assembly comprising a second segment and a second wing, pivotally connected along one side of the platform about a second axis, which operates in the same manner as the first wing.

Keyboards are used in a variety of different portable and stationary applications, such as palmtop or hand-held computers, notebook computers, sub-notebook computers, digital organizers or personal digital assistants (PDAs), digital cameras with annotation or editing capability, data-capable mobile phones, video consumer game electronics, entertainment electronics, calculators, stationary telephones, and small form-factor stationary (desktop) computers, to enter text, numerical, and/or control information. In many of these portable and stationary applications, it is desirable for the overall size of the keyboards to be reduced when the keyboards and products are stored and transported, especially for portable applications. However, during use, it is desirable for the keyboards to conform to standard sizes to have a typical "feel" for ease and comfort of use. The overall size of the keyboard is particularly critical for text entry via "touch typing." As discussed below, a variety of different types of keyboards have been developed to meet these contradictory requirements with varying degrees of success.
One solution to achieve both small overall size during storage and transport and standard size during use is the "fixed segment", i.e. no sliding segments, folding keyboard design. Characteristic of these designs is that the keyboard is divided into segments which fold, but do not slide and with the keys maintaining a fixed position on the segment. They are then hinged in a manner that permits the keys to properly align when the keyboard is in the open position. Examples of this design are set forth in U.S. Pat. No. 3,940,758 to Margolin, U.S. Pat. No. 5,187,644 to Crisan, U.S. Pat. No. 5,278,779 to Conway et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,457,453 to Chiu et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,519,569 to Sellers, U.S. Design Pat. No. 254,554 to Genaro et al., U.S. Design Pat. No. 299,030 to Menn, U.S. Design Pat. No. 322,246 to Izaki, and U.S. Design Pat. No. 324,035 to Izaki which are all herein incorporated by reference.
One of the problems with this prior design is with the electrical interconnections between the central segment and the folding segment which arise from two issues. First, because the layout of a standard typing keyboard offsets the rows of keys, the ends of the keyboard segments present a "stepped" pattern. This complicates and limits the available methods of electrical interconnection between the segments and makes it very difficult to provide Electro Static Discharge (ESD) protection at the points of interconnection when the keyboard is in the folded state. The "stepped" pattern when the keyboard is in the folded state presents mechanical problems with providing a mechanically and aesthetically suitable protective cover, often dictating a complicated cover with multiple hinged segments to protect the exposed edges from ESD, environmental and impact damage. Second, the pivoting nature of the folding segment with respect to the central segment brings the one set of the interconnecting mating electrical connectors in towards the other set of connectors at an arc, rather than straight on, which imposes limitations on the interconnection methods. Typically, the electrical interconnection is made either by a flexible ribbon type connector or by interconnecting mating electrical connectors along the side of each segment which are joined together. Unfortunately, the flexible ribbon type connectors are subject to fatigue over time from the bending and can fray and break. Due to the arc-shaped path followed by the opening keyboard segment when opened, it is impossible to use an interconnection method that relies on mating connecting members approaching along a straight-line path, or upon continuous, uniform compression from the top to the bottom of the connecting region.
Another problem with this design is that when the folding segments are folded out from the central segment they are not securely held in place. As a result, the resulting expanded or full size keyboard is flimsy unless an additional locking mechanism is provided.
Another design to achieve both small overall size during storage and transport and standard size during use is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,267,127 to Pollitt which is herein incorporated by reference. In this design, the keyboard assembly is split in half and each half of the keyboard assembly can be slid along a keyboard axis between a split position and a connected position. The halves of the keyboard assembly are not folded with respect to each other.
One of the problems with this design is that the width or depth of the electronic product on which the halves of the keyboard assembly ride on and are stored on is still fairly large. It is a property of this design that the degree of expansion in the overall length of the keyboard is in proportion to the depth of the unit. As a result, overall size is not significantly reduced. Additionally, because the size is not significantly reduced, this design is not desirable for some smaller applications, such as handheld computers or mobile telephones.

Folding keyboard with sliding segments for electronic products


An adjustable height table having a top that can be vertically adjusted to various heights by a pair of telescoping legs and a counterbalance weight mechanism which includes a weight box and weights that can be easily added or removed by the user depending on the weight carried by the table top. A locking mechanism including a spring-urged threaded half nut and a stationary threaded rod enables the table top to be locked in place once a desired height is achieved.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an adjustable height table and, more particularly to an adjustable height table having an improved counterbalance mechanism including a plurality of different weights that provide an infinite range of uniform counterbalance capability so that the height of the table top can be easily adjusted, no matter what load is being carried by the table top.
2. Description of the Related Art
Modern office or industrial environments provide work stations having various types of functional furniture components. These furniture components include work surfaces and table tops utilized for various purposes, from drafting to clerical and word processing functions. These surfaces therefore must be able to support a variety of equipment such as typewriters and computer terminals, while at the same time be able to be vertically adjusted to accommodate a variety of tasks and a variety of users easily and effortlessly.
Tables having adjustable height table tops are widely known in the art. Many of these tables employ the use of telescoping legs and counterbalance mechanisms. These counterbalance mechanisms include a counterbalance spring or springs as disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,140,559, 4,559,879, and 4,981,085. Other means of adjusting the height of table tops include pulley and cable mechanisms as disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,559,879, 4,619,208, and 4,981,085.
Adjustable height tables are also known in the art to employ latch mechanisms which can include latch arms and push-pull cables as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,981,085. However, no adjustable height tables are known to easily and cost effectively employ a means of adjusting the height in an infinite number of positions by counterbalancing the myriad of loads that can be carried by the table tops, while at the same time providing a locking means to lock the height of the table top in a desired position and providing a means of easily and uniformly lifting the table top while preventing racking and obviating the need to disturb any item that may be on the table top, such as computer terminals or other heavy equipment.
Consequently, there exists a need to provide an adjustable height table that may be easily adjusted uniformly without disturbing the items that are on the table, while preventing racking and providing for a versatile means of counterbalancing the load carried by the table top that may be easily performed quickly and efficiently on location.