A resin granule mass including a plurality of resin granules, and a proportion of resin granules to which a magnetic foreign matter of 50 μm or greater is adhered in the plurality of resin granules is 30% or less.

A resin-processed product can be produced using a resin raw material. Resin particles and resin granules are known resin raw materials. Resin pellets or the like of approximately 2 to 3 mm are widely used as resin granules.
Resin pellets can be obtained by any one of the methods described in, for example, Patent Documents 1 to 3.
In the methods described in Patent Documents 1 and 2, a molten resin is extruded in the form of a strand from a strand die and cut by a pelletizer to obtain resin pellets. In the method described in Patent Document 3, a molten resin is extruded from a die in water, and cut and processed using a rotary blade provided near a surface of the die or in contact with the die to obtain resin pellets.
However, in a case where a resin is cut into pellets by a metal cutter such as a rotary blade, a part of the worn blade may adhere to or may be mixed in the resin pellets. The foreign matter which is mixed in and which has a magnetic property such as the mixed metallic foreign matter is called magnetic foreign matter.
The magnetic foreign matter has various sizes from several micrometers to several hundred micrometers. There is a case that a foreign matter has such a size that it is not easily visually distinguished. In a case where magnetic foreign matter adheres to or is mixed in the resin pellets, it affects the quality of a product produced by melt-processing the resin pellets. Therefore, it is necessary to remove the magnetic foreign matter from the resin pellets, or to remove the pellets having the magnetic foreign matter mixed therein from the resin granule mass.
In general, resin pellets are shipped after being packed in a flexible container. Therefore, confirming the presence of magnetic foreign matter for each resin pellet is not efficient and not industrially suitable.
Accordingly, a method of removing magnetic foreign matter from a packed resin granule mass, or a method of removing pellets having magnetic foreign matter mixed therein before packing in a flexible container has been examined. Or, a method of taking a resin granule mass out of a flexible container and removing magnetic foreign matter in using has been examined.
For example, in Patent Document 4, a device is described which is provided with a transport belt which transports resin pellets, a driving roll around which the transport belt is wound and which provides a driving force, and a driven roll which makes a pair with the driving roll and has a magnetic force. The device adsorbs and removes resin pellets having magnetic foreign matter mixed therein by a magnetic force of a magnet roll.
For example, in Patent Document 5, a method is described in which a magnet is disposed so as to satisfy a predetermined condition with respect to a flow path in which resin pellets flow to remove resin pellets having magnetic foreign matter mixed therein.
For example, in Patent Document 6, a method is described in which a transport gas is supplied from below side of the granules to remove a fine powder using a residence time in a device varying by the granules.
For example, in Patent Document 7, a method is described in which an image of falling granular matter is captured to discriminate a defective product using a color difference.


Vertical sectional shapes of portions in which condenser tubes of the upper tube bundle 51 and the lower tube bundle 52 are arranged, in vertical sections of the upper tube bundle 51 and the lower tube bundle 52, are formed to be approximately U-shapes, and a noncondensing air ejection duct 11 is provided to be positioned on a central joint portion of the U-shape of the upper tube portion 51 in an upstream side where circulating water flows first. At a portion in which the condenser tubes are not arranged between the upper and lower tube bundles, steam flow prevention plates 53 are provided to be positioned at both right and left sides of the noncondensing air ejection duct 11.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a condenser installed in a power generating plant and the like for condensing steam turbine exhaust.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIG. 6 and FIG. 7 show a schematic constitution of a conventional condenser, indicating a front elevational view and a side view of the condenser respectively. The condenser includes a huge condenser shell 1 having an approximately square-shape, and a steam turbine 2 is placed on an upper portion of the condenser shell 1. A large number of condenser tubes are housed inside the condenser shell 1, composing a large tube bundle 3.
The tube bundle 3 is supported by a plurality of tube support plates 4 provided along a longitudinal direction of the condenser tube as shown in FIG. 7. Condenser tube plates 5 are provided vertically at both end portions of the condenser tubes, and condenser water boxes 6 are continuously provided at the condenser tube plates 5. Besides, an entrance/exit 7 and an entrance/exit 8 for a circulating medium (generally, circulating water such as seawater, water from a, cooling tower or the like is used) at the condenser tubes are provided to the condenser water boxes 6.
According to the condenser having the above-mentioned structure, steam flowing to the condenser shell 1 from the steam turbine 2 as shown by an arrow in FIG. 6 performs a heat exchange with the circulating water passing inside the condenser tube bundle 3 through the condenser water box 6. The steam lost its latent heat is condensed and gathered to a hot well 9 in a bottom of the condenser shell 1. The circulating water absorbing heat is discharged outside through the condenser water box 6 at the other end of the condenser tubes.
Since a concentration of noncondensing air included in the steam increases gradually when the steam is condensed gradually with its latent heat lost by the circulating water while passing through the tube bundle 3 as described above, the steam which has high noncondensing air concentration is led to an air cooling zone 10 and condensed further to increase the noncondensing air concentration as much as possible. After that, the steam is ejected outside the condenser through a noncondensing air ejection duct 11 by an air ejector (not shown).
Next, technical problems in terms of the condenser and the methods for solving the problems of the conventional condenser will be explained.
In the condenser, steam condensation progresses by a temperature difference between the steam and the circulating water. The temperature whereat the steam is condensed is a saturation temperature for a steam partial pressure in a condensation surface. However, the steam partial pressure is lowered broadly by two factors, and condensation performance (heat exchange efficiency) is lowered by accompanied decrease of the temperature difference. One factor is a pressure loss caused by steam flow, and the other factor is increase of noncondensing air partial pressure by the condensation of noncondensing air mixed in the steam.
Therefore, a reduction of the pressure loss and a prevention of noncondensing air retention are important for achieving performance improvement in the condenser.
In general, exhaust pressure of the steam turbine has relation to the pressure loss of the condenser and the noncondensing air concentration inside the condenser. The exhaust pressure of the steam turbine is a pressure calculated by adding the steam pressure loss in the condenser to a pressure whereat the steam is condensed in the condenser tube bundle. Therefore, when the steam pressure loss in the condenser is large, the exhaust pressure of the steam turbine is increased and a turbine output is lowered, as a result of which, power generating efficiency is reduced. Thus, to keep the steam pressure loss low in the condenser and to lead the steam to the air cooling zone smoothly without steam retention in the condenser tube bundle are important technical problems as performance indexes of the condenser.
In the conventional condenser, two different types of forms mainly respond to these problems. One of them is to provide a steam passage space wide enough around the condenser tube bundles arranged comparatively centered. (For example, refer to Japanese Patent Laid-open Application No. Hei 8-226776.)
The other form is to provide a steam passage wide enough in the tube bundles arranged sparsely as a whole in a wide range. (For example, refer to Japanese Patent Publication No. Sho. 55-36915.)
Demerits of the former of these types of forms are that the whole size of the condenser is enlarged by taking the surrounding steam passage space widely and that the pressure loss is comparatively large because the steam passes by a large number of condenser tubes until reaching the air cooling zone. The demerit of the latter is that a steam retention area in the tube bundle tends to be made because a path of the steam in the tube bundle toward the air cooling zone is complicated.
The above-mentioned condenser shown in FIG. 6 and FIG. 7 is a one-path type condenser in which the circulating water flows in from one condenser water box 6 and flows out to the other condenser water box 6, however, there exist in general a two-path type condenser in which one condenser water box has an entrance and an exit for the circulating water and the circulating water turns back at the other condenser water box.
FIG. 8 shows a sectional construction of one example of the two-path type condenser of which tube bundle is divided into upper and lower bundles. This condenser is so constructed that the circulating water flows in from an upper bundle 31 provided above and flows out from a lower bundle 32 provided below, or on the other hand, that the circulating water flows in from the lower bundle 32 and flows out from the upper bundle 31. In addition, the upper and lower bundles are partitioned by a partition plate 33. (For example, refer to Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2001-153569.)
Since the outermost periphery length of the tube bundles is longer than the condenser having one tube bundle by dividing the bundle into two in such two-path type condenser, steam speed whereat the steam flows in the tube bundle is reduced. As a result, an effect that the pressure loss of the steam generated in the tube bundle is suppressed can be obtained. However, since the air cooling zone 10 and the noncondensing air ejection duct 11 are required to be provided at respective tube bundles by dividing the tube bundle into two, there exists disadvantages that a structure is complicated, and a manufacturing cost increases.


In a hydraulic method, tubes (3) of an heat exchanger are rolled in in tube plates (1), and rounded tube inlet pieces are formed from the same tube (3) by means of the same device in the same work operation. For this purpose, the tubes (3) are inserted into the bores (2) of a tube plate (1) and cut off with an excess length. The tube (3) is widened by means of a widening machine over the entire depth of the bore (2), so that the tube (3) adheres to the inner wall of the bore (2). At the same time, the projecting tube end (10) is pressed on the mandrel (4) of the widening machine in the direction of the tube plate (1) by means of a further hydraulic shaping device (11) with a swept-back shape (12) until the tube end (10) achieves a trumpet shape. The advantage of the method resides in shortening the operating time with a device which executes both widening and formation of the tube inlet piece hydraulically. Given that the tube inlet piece is produced from the same tube (3), no seam is produced between the tube (3) and tube inlet piece, thus avoiding a site of faltering flow.

1. Field of the invention
The invention relates to a method and a device for producing tubes of a heat exchanger, in particular a preheater in a power plant, the tubes being rolled in hydraulically in a tube plate and a rounded tube inlet being formed.
2. Discussion of Background
In heat exchangers used in power plants, the tubes through which water flows are fixed in tube plates by means of rolling-in techniques. For this purpose, a tube is firstly placed into a bore of a tube plate, and the mandrel of the rolling machine is then inserted into the tube and widens the tube in a plastic fashion such that said tube adheres to the inner wall of the bore. As a rule, the rolling-in fixes and seals the tube by means of the adhesive forces between the bore wall and the tube outer wall. The tightness of the connection between the tube and tube plate is improved by welding, the welded seam serving only as a sealing seam and contributing nothing to the adhesive forces. Mechanical and hydraulic rolling-in techniques are presently distinguished. Mechanical rolling-in typically extends in this case over a depth of 20 to 30 mm, which is mostly smaller than that of the tube plate. Rolling-in over the entire tube plate depth is certainly possible using this method, but proves to be time-consuming and, with some tube materials, difficult. The hydraulic rolling method, as carried out, for example, by the Teco tube expanders company in Wuppertal, Germany, uses hydraulic widening of the tube instead of mechanical widening. This permits widening without any problem independently of the tube material, and the fastening of the tube over the entire tube plate depth, the resulting strength of the connection being increased. Furthermore, hydraulic widening over the entire tube plate depth permits the use of thinner and more cost-effective tube plates, since such a widening means that the tube wall thickness can be regarded as a bearing part in the tube plate.
In preheaters used in power plants, in particular in high-pressure preheaters, damage due to erosion at the tube inlet occurs relatively frequently. Such damage is rectified successfully by so-called inserts. These inserts, as described in British Patent 1,141,239, for example, are trumpet-shaped structures which are fixed at the tube inlet by tube widening and project slightly above the surface of the tube plate. The trumpet shape of the inlet piece of the tube is also known by the term "bellmouth inlet". The round shape of the insert favors the inflow by reducing the radial velocity gradients at the transition from the water chamber to the tube, as well as reducing the shear forces at the tube inner wall. The resistance values of the inflow in the case of such a tube inlet are discussed, for example, in I. E. Idelchick, Handbook of Hydraulic Resistance, page 126, 2nd Edition, Springer Verlag (1986). A low resistance value has the effect, on the one hand, of reducing the inflow pressure loss and, on the other hand, of sparing the oxide layer of the tube and generally reducing the erosion and corrosion of the tube. In addition, the tube inlet pieces are produced in each case from erosion- and corrosion-resistant materials. By projecting beyond the tube plate surface by a multiple of the tube outside diameter, the inserts further yield the advantage that a "water cushion" which strongly reduces the erosion of the tube plate is formed in the region of the inflow field. However, it is disadvantageous with such inserts that, because of the rolling-in in the region of the rolling-in site, a site of faltering flow which increases the risk of cleavage cracks and corrosion forming on the latter is formed at the seam between the insert and tube. Finally, the subsequent fastening of inserts occasions additional costs.

Method and device for producing a tube in a tube plate


A liquid crystal display panel includes a plurality of scan lines, a plurality of data lines, a pixel array, a plurality of first common electrode lines and at least one second common electrode line. The first common electrode lines receive a common electrode signal through at least one first input node positioned at a first side of the pixel array. The second common electrode line receives the common electrode signal through at least one second input node positioned at a second side of the pixel array. In addition, at least one first common electrode line is electrically connected to the second common electrode lines in the pixel array.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a liquid crystal display panel, and more particularly, to a liquid crystal display panel where input nodes of a common electrode signal are positioned at different sides of a pixel array, and a common electrode signal is inputted into the pixel array through the input nodes positioned at different sides of the pixel array.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Please refer to FIG. 1. FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating a prior art liquid crystal display (LCD) panel 100. As shown in FIG. 1, the LCD panel 100 includes a plurality of scan lines G1-Gm, a plurality of data lines S1-Sn, a pixel array 110 and a plurality of common electrode lines Cs1-Csm. The pixel array 110 includes a plurality of pixels, where the pixels are interwoven by the scan lines G1-Gm and data lines S1-Sn.
In the operations of the LCD panel 100, a common electrode signal Vcom is inputted into the common electrode lines Cs1-Css through at least one input node (not shown) positioned at a left side of the pixel array 110. However, at a position far from the input node, such as a right side of the pixel array 110, the common electrode signal is easily influenced by voltages on the scan lines or the data lines and becomes unstable, further causing crosstalk and flicker phenomena.


A mobile computing device enabled by a customizable data cognition layer (DCL) software program to convert input information from a variety of sensors into real-time contextual messages is disclosed. The DCL software incorporates customizable software components known as plug-ins to expand the use of the mobile computing device.

Generally speaking, a worker is faced with many pieces of information in the course of their work. Each piece of information can be used individually or in combination to help the worker be more productive at their job. This information is often coded or in a raw state. In either case, the information may be hard to use. One way to increase productivity is to utilize a mobile computing device for collecting, aggregating, and inferring context from this information. The mobile computing device may then present timely and informative contextual messages to the user, thereby allowing the worker to become more knowledgeable and efficient.
Not all work environments are the same. As a result, the mobile computing device must also be highly configurable in order to address the particular requirements of a work environment.
A need, therefore, exists for a mobile computing device that utilizes customizable data cognition software to convert sensed information into timely contextual messages that are easily understood by a worker.

Mobile computing device with data cognition software


An organic light emitting device includes a first electrode and a second electrode, an organic layer including a light emitting layer between the first electrode and the second electrode, and an insulating film covering a rim of the first electrode from a surface thereof to a side surface thereof, and having an internal wall surface being in contact with the organic layer, and one or more corner sections in the internal wall surface with a ridge line thereof in parallel with the surface of the first electrode.

The present technology relates to an organic light emitting device having an insulating film as a device separation film under an organic layer and a display unit including the same.
In recent years, as one of flat panel displays, an organic light emitting display using an organic light emitting device have attracted attentions. Since the organic light emitting display does not need a backlight, the thickness and the weight thereof are able to be decreased. Further, since the organic light emitting display is a self-luminous type display, the view angle is wide and the power consumption is low. Further, the organic light emitting display is regarded as a display having sufficient response to a high-definition and high-speed video signal. Therefore, development of the organic light emitting display has been advanced toward the practical use thereof.
As a configuration of the organic light emitting device, for example, a configuration in which a first electrode, an organic layer including a light emitting layer, and a second electrode are sequentially formed over a substrate with a TFT (Thin Film Transistor), a planarizing layer, and the like in between has been known (for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2001-110575). On the rim of the first electrode, an insulating film (device separation film) to secure insulation between the first electrode and the second electrode is provided (for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication Nos. 2009-4347 and 2001-175200). The insulating film is provided in the moderately tapered shape for the purpose of preventing deterioration of device characteristics due to disconnection of the organic layer having a significantly small film thickness and the second electrode.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Organic light emitting device and display unit including the same


An adjustable orifice fitting carrier assembly for an orifice fitting having a receptacle and being interposed in a pipeline. The carrier assembly includes a carrier body receivable in the receptacle of the fitting to hold a flat, circular orifice disc having a center orifice therethrough, the orifice disc being perpendicular to the flow through the pipeline. A carrier holding plate is receivable in the receptacle and is in communication with the carrier body. An adjustment mechanism is provided to move the carrier body and the orifice disc in a first direction across the diameter of the pipeline while within the orifice fitting. An adjustment mechanism is also provided to move the carrier body and the orifice disc in a second direction across the diameter of the pipeline, perpendicular to the first direction, in order to concentrically align the center orifice with the axis of the pipeline.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention pertains to an adjustable orifice fitting carrier assembly for measurement of flow through a pipeline. In particular, the present invention pertains to an orifice fitting carrier assembly that may be adjusted to concentrically align the center orifice with the axis of the pipeline while the carrier assembly is in the fitting.
2. Prior Art
The flow of natural gas or other fluids through a pipeline may be measured by placing a restriction, such as an orifice plate, within the pipeline in order to cause a reduction in pressure or pressure drop as the fluid flows through the opening in the orifice plate. The pressure of the fluid drops abruptly as it flows through the orifice and it reaches a minimum value a short distance beyond. There is a relationship between the amount of this pressure drop and the rate of gas or fluid flow through the opening in the orifice plate. Pressure connections for attaching a differential gauge on both sides of the orifice plate are provided to measure the difference in pressure.
Periodically, because of wear and for other reasons, it will be necessary to remove and replace the orifice plate retained within the fitting. When the orifice plate is installed, the axis of the opening of the orifice plate must be at the center of the pipeline. The concentric positioning of the orifice plate is required to achieve an accurate flow measurement and because of regulations which require the concentric alignment. Additionally, regulations such as those recently promulgated by the American Petroleum Institution set forth the relative positioning of the orifice fitting to the carrier which holds the orifice plate. For example, the internal diameter of the carrier must not vary significantly from the diameter of the fitting.
There is a need, therefore, to provide a mechanism for the vertical and horizontal adjustment of the carrier assembly to permit concentric alignment of the bore of the orifice fitting with the pipeline.
It is a principal object and purpose of the present invention to provide a mechanism for the vertical and horizontal adjustment of the orifice plate to permit concentrical alignment of the bore of the orifice fitting with the pipeline.
It is an additional object and purpose of the present invention to provide a mechanism for vertical and horizontal adjustment of the carrier plate while the carrier assembly is in the field and within the orifice fitting.
It is a further object and purpose of the present invention to provide an adjustable carrier assembly to be used with existing orifice fittings.

Adjustable orifice fitting carrier for a pipeline orifice fitting


A fuel fill port device which contains overfill and prevents spillage, mounted by means of a flange through the deck or gunwale on pleasure boats or other marine vessels with internal fuel tanks. The device prevents spillage during fueling by means of an internal storage chamber, an internal sleeve, an independent tube and an independent compression spring located within the port device which together create a unique structure, which prevents overflow spillage during fueling by means of the device temporarily containing and storing the overfilled fuel and automatically flowing the stored fuel into the fuel tank. This is accomplished by strategically aligned chambers, sleeves, tubes and a spring which causes both the alignment and misalignment of positioned holes that when misaligned forms a storage chamber and when aligned forms a conduit directing the stored fuel into the fuel tank. The port device has a cap which when closed seals out all undesirable elements and when removed is tethered to the flange attachment that affixes this port device through the deck or gunwale of the vessel.

1. Field of Invention
This invention relates to a fuel filling port device used for filling internal fuel tanks on pleasure boats and other marine vessels. The device employs a controlled temporary storage chamber that contains the backed up overflowed fuel that occurs during fueling, for a period of time necessary to prevent spilling. Immediately thereafter the device automatically empties the fuel from said storage chamber back into the fuel tank, preventing spilling and subsequent polluting of our waterways.
2. Description of Prior Art
Internal fuel tanks on pleasure boats and other marine vessels have an air vent which allows air and fumes to escape into the atmosphere while fuel is being pumped into the fuel fill port and is displacing the air from within the fuel tank during the fueling operation. The air vent tube is approximately 0.5" diameter, while the fill port tube is approximately 1.5" diameter. As the fuel tank is being filled the boat or vessel tends to rock and list continuously, causing the liquid fuel to slosh back and forth continuously. As this occurs the liquid fuel reaches a level that tops the tank filling inlet, causing momentary false fills, forcing the incoming fuel to back up through the fill hose and spill out of the prior art fill port, spilling fuel both onto the boat and into the waterway. This spilling continues periodically during fueling, depending on the frequency and degree of the marine elements such as, wind, current, wakes from passing boats, and the very movement of the passengers on board. Finally, as the fuel tank actually becomes full, one final spill occurs, which combined with the prior spillage, causes substantial pollution of the surrounding waterway.
The spilling of gasoline fuel in addition to polluting, poses a further potential danger due to its flammability.
Presently, the most common prior art design of fuel filling ports on boats are flanged tubes that fit through and are mounted to the deck or gunwale of the boat above the fuel tank, and are attached below deck by a clamp to a hose that feeds the fuel into the fuel tank, which is commonly found below deck. The flange that enables attachment of the prior art fill tube to the deck or gunwale, is purposely designed with a half inch high circular containment wall on the outer perimeter of the flange with an opening in the wall of approximately three quarters of an inch facing toward the waterway. This is designed so, that when the prior art port fill tube becomes full and a fuel spill occurs the fuel is prevented from spilling into the boat and is directed to spill toward the waterway and away from the boat's interior. Additionally, most prior art fill ports have tethered caps that are attached from the underside of the cap to an attachment within the fill port tube opening, this tether is usually small chain links of sorts that tend to kink during the turning of the cap to unscrew and remove the cap, this kinking of the chain links causes an obstuction and subsequent difficulty of inserting the filling nozzle.
The present method using the prior art port tube to fill the internal fuel tank as found on most pleasure boats and other marine vessels is as follows:
a) The port fill cap is unscrewed, exposing the port fill tube opening, the fill nozzle attached to the fuel fill hose leading from the main pump at the fuel dock is inserted into the port fill tube opening. The trigger on the fill nozzle is then squeezed allowing fuel to flow through the fill port tube inlet, down the hose into the vessel's internal fuel tank. PA1 b) As the fuel filling process takes place, the floating vessel tends to list and rock in many directions caused by various marine elements including: wind, wake from other vessels, tidal currents, and movement from passengers on board. This rocking motion causes the boat to tip or list in various directions, causing the fuel to slosh back and forth and from side to side within the fuel tank, causing the fuel within the tank to momentarily rise up in the interior side of the tank where the filling is taking place, this action causes a momentary false fill and backs the fuel up the fill tube and causes spills out of the filling port tube, causing fuel spills even before the tank is full. PA1 c) As the fuel enters the fuel tank, the existing air within the fuel tank becomes displaced by the incoming fuel and this air is forced to escape via the through hull air vent. As a result of the above mentioned marine conditions however, the 0.5" diameter hose leading to the 0.5" diameter air vent cannot vent as rapidly as the incoming fuel being pressure fed through a 1.5" intake hose. This also results in a "false fill", causing a backup spill at the fill port. PA1 d) The above conditions may take place several times during the fueling process, depending on the frequency of motion caused by the said marine elements and the fuel tank configuration and capacity, eventually resulting in multiple spills during one fill. Studies investigating spillage, as well as observations of the fueling procedure at various busy fuel docks yielded the following results: the fuel dock attendants report that 80 out of 100 boats that are fueled will have spills of several ounces overflowing out of the filling port and into the waterway. For this reason most fuel docks keep cases of a soap product called "Liquid Dawn" available which, when applied directly onto a waterway affected by fuel spillage, helps to camouflage the pollution by dispersing the sheen caused by the fuel spill. The boat owners that were interviewed reported that they spill fuel as well most of the time during fueling. PA1 To prevent pollution by containing the back up of fuel in a containment chamber within the fill port. PA1 To allow the enforcement and monitoring of this type of pollution to become manageable. PA1 To allow ease of installation and replacement of prior art fuel fill port tube. PA1 To provide a fuel fill port device economically fabricated of material that will not be adversely affected by gasoline, diesel fuel and the marine environment.
The U.S. Department of Environmental Protection estimates there are 12 million marine engines in our nations waterways. If only three quarters of them are pleasure boats with internal fuel tanks, with an average of one fueling per week during a six month boating season, during which 75% of each fueling spills on average two ounces of either gasoline or diesel fuel, a tremendous pollution problem results. The above conservative figures, yield the following calculations: 105,468 gallons of gasoline and/or diesel fuel spill per fueling or per week nationwide resulting in a total of 2,531,250 gallons spilling into our waterways per six month boating season. This problem grows with every new boat purchased each year. While there are laws in place to prevent this pollution, they are not being enforced due to a lack of monitoring manpower.
This invention corrects the aforementioned problems by preventing this particular overflow spill pollution from taking place, during fueling.

Fuel fill port device that prevents overflow spills during fueling of marine vessels


The procedure of the present invention estimates a correction rate for elimination of a positional shift between the multiple first images, executes correction with the estimated correction rate to eliminate the positional shift between the multiple first images, and combines the multiple corrected first images to generate the second image. The procedure selects a target pixel among pixels included in the second image, and detects multiple adjacent pixels respectively in the multiple first images, which adjoin to the selected target pixel. The procedure then selects an image as a composition object or a composition object image with regard to the target pixel among the multiple first images according to the multiple adjacent pixels, and calculates a pixel value of the target pixel based on the composition object image. The procedure excludes the first image that includes a certain adjacent pixel out of the multiple adjacent pixels, which is detected to have a motion relative to one base image selected among the multiple first images, from the composition object image with regard to the target pixel. This arrangement of the invention enables generation of a high-resolution still image by taking into account motions of image parts.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a technique of generating a high-resolution image from multiple low-resolution images.
2. Description of the Related Art
The user of a digital video camera (hereafter may simply be referred to as 'video camera') often demands to capture one scene or frame during reproduction of a moving picture and generate a higher-resolution image than the resolution of the image of the captured frame (hereafter referred to as the 'frame image'). Here the terminology 'resolution' means the density of pixels or the number of pixels included in one image.
One typical method of generating the higher-resolution image combines multiple low-resolution images. Combination of multiple low-resolution images is expected to enhance the quality of a resulting composite image, compared with simple resolution conversion of only one image.
For example, a proposed technique in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Gazette No. 2000-244851 selects one frame image as a base frame image among (n+1) consecutive frame images, computes motion vectors of the residual n frame images (subject frame images) relative to the base frame image, and combines the (n+1) frame images based on the computed motion vectors to generate one high-resolution image.
Images of multiple frames included in the moving picture may have a 'positional shift' or a 'motion'. Here the 'positional shift' represents a positional change between multiple frames that is eliminated by uniformly moving the whole image, for example, an image shift due to an unintentional hand movement. The 'motion' mainly represents movement of a certain subject in the image, that is, a local change in the image. The motion includes both a direct movement of a subject, such as a person or an automobile, and a relative movement of the subject due to a parallax caused by a moving camera.
The prior art technique gives consideration to the motion between the multiple frames in the moving picture (corresponding to the 'positional shift') but does not take into account the motion in the moving picture. A resulting composite image may accordingly have an undesirable image overlap of an identical image part with motions. There is accordingly a demand to generate a high-resolution still image from multiple low-resolution frame images included in a moving picture without causing any image overlap of an identical image part with motions.
This problem is not intrinsic to composition of multiple low-resolution images included in a moving picture but is generally found in composition of multiple low-resolution images arrayed in a time series.

Generation of high-resolution image based on multiple low-resolution images


A speech codec operating at low data rates uses an iterative method to jointly optimize pitch and gain parameter sets. A 26-bit spectrum filter coding scheme may be used, involving successive subtractions and quantizations. The codec may preferably use a decomposed multipulse excitation model, wherein the multipulse vectors used as the excitation signal are decomposed into position and amplitude codewords. Multipulse vectors are coded by comparing each vector to a reference multipulse vector and quantizing the resulting difference vector. An expanded multipulse excitation codebook and associated fast search method, optionally with a dynamically-weighted distortion measure, allow selection of the best excitation vector without memory or computational overload. In a dynamic bit allocation technique, the number of bits allocated to the pitch and excitation signals depend on whether the signals are "significant" or "insignificant". Silence/speech detection is based on an average signal energy over an interval and a minimum average energy over a predetermined number of intervals. Adaptive post-filter and the automatic gain control schemes are also provided. Interpolation is used for spectrum filter smoothing, and an algorithm is provided for ensuring stability of the spectrum filter. Specially designed scalar quantizers are provided for the pitch gain and excitation gain.

For many applications, e.g., mobile communications, voice main, secure voice, etc., a speech codec operating at 4.8 kbps and below with high-quality speech is needed. However, there is no known previous speech coding technique which is able to produce near-toll quality speech at this data rate. The government standard LPC-10, operating at 2.4 kbps, is not able to produce natural-sounding speech. Speech coding techniques successfully applied in higher data rates (>10 kbps) completely break down when tested at 4.8 kbps and below. To achieve the goal of near-toll quality speech at 4.8 kbps, a new speech coding method is needed.
A key idea for high quality speech coding at a low data rate is the use of the "analysis-by-synthesis" method. Based on this concept, an effective speech coding scheme, known as Code-Excited Linear Prediction (CELP), has been proposed by M. R. Schroeder and B. S. Atal, "Code-Excited Linear Prediction (CELP): High Quality Speech at Very Low Bit Rates", Proc. Int. Conf. Acoust., Speech, and Signal Processing (ICASSP), pp. 937-940, 1985. CELP has proven to be effective in the areas of medium-band and narrow-band speech coding. Assuming there are L=4 excitation subframes in a speech frame with size N=160 samples, it has been shown that an excitation codebook with 1024, 40-dimensional random Gaussian codewords is enough to produce speech which is indistinguishable from the original speech. For the actual realization of this scheme, however, there still exist several problems.
First, in the original scheme, most of the parameters to be transmitted, except the excitation signal, were left uncoded. Also, the parameter update rates were assumed to be high. Hence, for low-date-rate applications, where there are not enough data bits for accurate parameter coding and high update rates, the 1024 excitation codewords become inadequate. To achieve the same speech quality with a fully-coded CELP codec, a data rate close to 10 kbps is required.
Secondly, typical CELP coders use random Gaussian, Laplacian, uniform, pulse vectors or a combination of them to form the excitation codebook. A full-search, analysis-by-synthesis, procedure is used to find the best excitation vector from the codebook. A major drawback of this approach is that the computational requirement in finding the best excitation vector is extremely high. As a result, for real-time operation, the size of the excitation codebook has to be limited (e.g., <1024) if minimal hardware is to be used.
Thirdly, with the excitation codebook, which contains 1024, 40-dimensional random Gaussian codewords, a computer memory space of 1024.times.40=40960 words is required. This memory space requirement for the excitation codebook alone has already exceeded the storage capabilities of most of the commercially available DSP chips. Many CELP coders, hence, have to be designed with a smaller-sized excitation codebook. The coder performance, therefore, is limited, especially for unvoiced sounds. To enhance the coder performance, an effective method to significantly increase the codebook size without a corresponding increase in the computational complexity (and the memory requirement) is needed.
As described above, there are not enough data bits for accurate excitation representation at 4.8 kbps and below. Comparing the CELP excitation to the ideal excitation, which is the residual signal after both the short-term and the long-term filters, there is still considerable discrepancy. Thus, several critical parts of a CELP coder must be designed carefully. For example, accurate encoding of the short-term filter is found important because of the lack of excitation compensation. Also, appropriate bit allocation between the long-term filter (in terms of the update rate) and the excitation (in terms of the codebook size) is found necessary for good coder performance. However, even with complicated coding schemes, toll-quality is still hardly achieved.
Multipulse excitation, as described by B. S. Atal and J. R. Remde, "A New Model of LPC Excitation for Producing Natural-Sounding Speech at Low Bit Rates", proc. ICASSP, pp. 614-617, 1982, has proven to be an effective excitation model for linear predictive coders. It is a flexible model for both voiced and unvoiced sounds, and it is also a considerably compressed representation of the ideal excitation signal. Hence, from the encoding point of view, multipulse excitation constitutes a good set of excitation signals. However, with typical scalar quantization schemes, the required data rate is usually beyond 10 kbps. To reduce the data rate, either the number of excitation pulses has to be reduced by better modelling of the LPC spectral filter, e.g., as described by I. M. Transcoso, L. B. Almeida and J. M. Tribolet, "Pole-Zero Multipulse Speech Representation Using Harmonic Modelling in the Frequency Domain", ICASSP, pp. 7.8.1-7.8.4., 1985, and/or more efficient coding methods have to be used. Applying vector quantization, e.g., as described by A. Buzo, A. H. Gray, R. M. Gray, and J. P. Market, "Speech Coding Based Upon Vector Quantization", IEEE Tran. Acoust., Speech, and Signal Processing, pp. 562-574, October, 1980, directly to the multipulse vectors is one solution to the latter approach. However, several obstacles, e.g., the definition of an appropriate distortion measure and the computation of the centroid from a cluster of multipulse vectors, have hindered the application of multipulse excitation in the low-bit-rate area.
Hence, for the application of CELP codec structure to 4.8 kbps speech coding, careful compromise system design and effective parameter coding techniques are necessary.


A molding machine for manufacturing a shaped article which is comprised of a polymeric material and formed in a mold cavity between first and second mold halves of a mold assembly. At least one spring-loaded ejector member is provided in the first mold half and serves to eject the shaped article therefrom. The ejector member is movable toward and away from the second mold half and operates when the two mold halves are being opened. At least one resilient member urges the ejector member toward the second mold half. The resilient member exerts a resilient force to the ejector member, which is smaller than a tightening force of the mold halves. A method for manufacturing a shaped article comprised of a polymeric material includes providing at least one ejector member in the first mold half of the molding machine such that as the mold halves are opened, the ejector member urges the insulator away from the first mold half in which the ejector member is disposed. In one embodiment, the insulator is ejected by use of an ejection member having a distal end that is curved, thereby minimizing damage to the composite insulator.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a molding machine for manufacturing shaped articles comprised of a polymeric material, such as composite electrical insulators. More particularly, the present invention pertains to an apparatus for reliably removing a shaped article from the mold halves, which is compact and simple in structure.
2. Description of Related Art
There is known a composite electrical insulator which can be obtained by integrally providing an elongate core rod of fiber-reinforced plastics (FRP) with a sheath and sheds by injection or transfer molding of appropriate polymeric material having an electrically insulating property, such as silicone rubber, ethylene propylene copolymer (EPM), ethylene propylene diene copolymer (EDPM), polyurethane, etc. Such a composite insulator has been actually put into practical applications, particularly in any use environment which can draw out various functional advantages of the composite insulator.
In order to manufacture composite insulators, there is typically used a mold assembly which includes upper and lower mold halves defining a mold cavity when they are tightened and thereby closed. The polymeric material for the composite insulator tends to remain attached to the mold halves, even when a releasing agent is applied to the inner surface of the mold cavity before the molding step. Thus, when the molding halves are being opened, the composite insulator as a whole or in its end portion may remain attached to the upper mold half. When the entire composite insulator remains attached to the upper mold half, the composite insulator has to be removed from the upper mold half by performing a troublesome manual operation on the parting surface on the lower side of the upper mold half, while carefully preventing the composite insulator from being dropped onto the lower mold half. On the other hand, when the end portion of the composite insulator remains attached to the upper mold half, the composite insulator may be applied with a severe twisting force or it may be dropped onto the lower mold half during the opening process of the mold, so that the core rod and/or sheds of the composite insulator may be subjected to deformation or damages.
In order to avoid these drawbacks, it has been a typical practice to insert an appropriate tool into a space between the upper and lower mold halves as they are slightly opened, so as to urge the composite insulator against the lower mold half while displacing the upper mold half away from the lower mold half, and thereby remove the composite insulator from the upper mold half. On this instance, when the composite insulator is in tight attachment to the upper mold half, it may still be applied with a severe twisting force during removal of the composite insulator.
An alternative approach is to temporarily connect retainer rings to the end portions of the core rod, which are then detachably connected to the lower mold half so that the composite insulator can be forcibly removed from the upper mold half as the latter is displaced away from the lower mold half. However, this approach requires additional manual steps to be performed during preparation of molding and upon removal of the composite insulator.

Method and molding machine for manufacturing shaped articles comprised of polymeric material


A digital broadcasting receiving apparatus has a signal level detecting circuit; a peak detecting section; an abnormal peak deciding section; a specified peak deciding section; a prescribed in-band power deciding section; and makes a decision as to whether a signal being received is a digital broadcasting signal or not according to decision results output form the signal level detecting circuit, the abnormal peak deciding section, the specified peak deciding section and the prescribed in-band power deciding section.

Digital terrestrial broadcasting makes transmission parameters such as a modulation scheme and a code rate of inner code variable using a TMCC (Transmission and Multiplexing Configuration Control) signal, thereby enabling hierarchical transmission. For this reason, a conventional digital broadcasting receiving apparatus makes a decision as to whether there is any receivable digital broadcasting signal in a certain frequency band depending on whether the TMCC signal is present or not. However, to decide as to whether the TMCC signal is present or not, a problem arises of taking a time to make the decision because of the necessity for establishing synchronization of the TMCC signal.
To solve the foregoing problem, a conventional digital broadcasting receiving apparatus is known which has a signal level detecting means for making a decision as to whether the signal level of the data output from a data demodulation means for demodulating a received signal is smaller than a predetermined threshold or not, and which selects the next channel at once when the signal level of the data is less than the threshold (see Patent Document 1, for example).
In addition, a device is known which has an analog broadcasting detecting means for detecting the video carrier and audio carrier of an analog broadcasting signal, and a digital broadcasting signal detecting means for dividing the band into several bands, for calculating signal levels in the respective bands, and for making a decision as to whether the difference between the highest and lowest levels among the calculated signal levels is within a prescribed range; and which decides the received signal with the analog broadcasting detecting means, selects the next channel at once when the signal is an analog broadcasting signal, and decides, when the signal is not an analog broadcasting signal, the signal with the digital broadcasting signal detecting means (see Patent Document 2, for example).
Furthermore, another device is known which has the signal level detecting circuit described in Patent Document 1, the analog broadcasting detecting means and the digital broadcasting detecting means described in Patent Document 2, and which causes the analog broadcasting detecting means, signal level detecting means and digital broadcasting detecting means to make a decision as to the received signal in this order (see Patent Document 3, for example).
Patent Document 1: Japanese Patent No. 3538056.
Patent Document 2: Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2003-69907.
Patent Document 3: Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2006-24994.
The conventional digital broadcasting receiving apparatuses are configured as described above. As for the apparatus described in Patent Document 1, since the analog broadcasting signal has certain power, it makes a decision as to whether the TMCC signal is present about the analog broadcasting signal as well. For this reason, it has a problem of being unable to reduce the search time so much. In addition, as for the apparatus described in Patent Document 2 or 3, since it requires a dedicated tuner for detecting the analog broadcasting signal, it has a problem of becoming larger. Furthermore, since it divides the band into several bands, calculates the signal levels in the respective bands, and makes a decision as to whether the received signal is digital broadcasting signal or not depending on whether the difference between the highest and lowest levels among the calculated signal levels is within the prescribed range, a problem arises of erroneously detecting the noise produced by equipment used simultaneously as the digital broadcasting signal if the noise has certain power in the band.
The present invention is implemented to solve the foregoing problems. Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a digital broadcasting receiving apparatus capable of carrying out search operation at high speed by distinguishing the digital broadcasting signal from the other signals accurately in a short time.

Digital broadcasting receiving apparatus


A method and apparatus for receiving burst data in an OLT of an EPON are provided. The method includes the steps of: a) receiving burst data from the plurality of ONUs; b) generating a multipoint control protocol (MPCP) LOS signal for reducing a synch time of the burst data; c) reducing the synch time in response to generation of the MPCP LOS signal; and d) recovering the received burst data by performing a code-group sort in a period where the MPCP LOS signal is not generated.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for receiving and processing burst data in an optical line terminal (OLT) of an Ethernet passive optical access network, and more particularly, to a method and apparatus for receiving and processing burst data for improving a burst mode receiving performance in an optical line terminal (OLT).
2. Description of the Related Art
As the number of Internet users using wireless communication has abruptly increased, high-speed Internet technologies have been evolved to provide faster Internet services to users. A wireless local area network (LAN) is one of representative technologies for providing high speed Internet services to users. The wireless LAN has shortcomings of a large gap between a wide area network and an end user and a bottleneck problem of a bandwidth at the end users. In order to overcome the bottleneck program of the bandwidth, a passive optical network (PON) was introduced recently. Such a PON technology may be classified into an ATM PON (APON) and an Ethernet PON (EPON). The EPON technology is a control chip technology that allows users to access a Fiber to the Home (FTTH) network, which is capable of providing various communication services including Internet, Internet TV, digital TV and telephone with affordable cost, through one optical fiber.
FIG. 1 is a diagram illustrating a structure of Ethernet passive optical network (EPON) according the related art. The EPON is a system that transfers a signal to an end user through an optical cable network. The EPON is classified into FTTC, FTTB and FTTH according to a location of termination.
Referring-to FIG. 1, the EPON includes an optical line terminal (OLT) 10 cooperated with a communication service provider side such as an IP network, a broadcasting network, or a TDM network, and an optical network unit (PNU) 20 connected to a user terminal 30 placed at a user end of an optical access network, such as STB or PC. The EPON uses an optical fiber and generally has a point-to-multipoint tree structure. An optical star coupler/splitter 40 may split an optical signal transferred to an Ethernet passive optical network system according to whether the light thereof is upstream or downstream. The split signals are transferred through a plurality of optical fibers, or the split signals are coupled and transferred through one optical fiber. As an example, a method of transmitting data in EPON will be described with reference to FIG. 2.
The EPON transmits data using an Ethernet frame as a transmission unit. In an upstream path, each of ONUs 20 is allocated to a time slot dynamically or fixedly, and transmits data to a common OLT 10. An optical star coupler 40 multiplexes the data outputted from each of the ONUs 20 and transmits them to the OLT 10. ON the contrary, in the downstream path, when the OLT 10 transmits a downstream, the optical star coupler 40 inverse multiplexes the downstream and transmits them to each of the ONUs 20.
The OLT 10 recovers burst data transmitted in a burst mode from an ONU 20 through an upstream. Since the EPON is a technology for high speed Internet service, the Internet speed would be significantly influenced if a time of restoring burst data delays. Such a delay also wastes the bandwidth of the upstream channel. The delay is mainly caused by a time required for restoring transmitting data from an ONU at an OLT, and a laser on/off time of an ONU. A sum of such times except the time of transmitting data is a guard time.
Therefore, it is required to reduce a clock and a data restoring time when the OLT 10 receives burst data. However, a conventional EPON only considers the allocation of synch times.
Generally, a receiver of an OLT in an EPON system uses an Ethernet SerDes chip. According to the type of the Ethernet SerDes chip and a method of using the same, a CDR time of about 200 nano seconds to about several nano seconds is required. The CDR time becomes a synch time by being added to an OLT optical receiving level recovery time. If the CDR time is significantly lengthened, the synch time becomes lengthened, accordingly. Also, if the synch time becomes lengthened, a upstream band would be wasted as much as the lengthened synch time, and if the number of branches increases, the overhead becomes also bigger as much as the increased number of the branches.

Burst data reception method and apparatus in EPON

Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute


In a material bond for a composite product composed of a fiber-reinforced material and a further material, such as an anode for an x-ray tube, wherein the fibers of the fiber-reinforced material exhibit a preferred orientation, and wherein the magnitude of the coefficient of thermal expansion of the fiber-reinforced material is direction dependent and depends on the preferred orientation of the fibers, the preferred orientation of the fibers is aligned, at least in a boundary region between the fiber-reinforced material and the further material, such that the coefficient of thermal expansion of the fiber-reinforced material and the coefficient thermal expansion of the further material are approximately equal along this boundary region, in which the bond is formed.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention concerns a composite product composed of a fiber-reinforced material and a further material of the type wherein the magnitude of the coefficient of thermal expansion αc/c of the fiber-reinforced material is direction dependent and depends on the preferred orientation of the fibers. The invention moreover concerns an anode for an x-ray tube in which such a composite material with a bond is used.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Material bonds are used in order to be able to combine mechanical or physical properties of individual materials in a common component (composite product). The individual materials can be of different types, such as, for example, natural materials such as wood, building materials such as cement, or materials such as synthetics (plastics). Composite materials also can be used, for example, with concrete reinforced with steel mesh (known as reinforced concrete), with foils reinforced with textiles, or fiber-reinforced materials, for example glass fiber-reinforced plastic or carbon fiber-reinforced graphite. Fiber-reinforced materials also make use of a combination of the various advantages of the materials of which they are composed. For example, the elongation of a tear of the fiber-reinforced material in the direction of the fiber orientation is increased by a high elongation at the break of the fibers. Analogously, for example, a high elasticity can be achieved. Fiber-reinforced materials combine such advantages of the fibers with the advantages of the other material, for example a lower weight. The physical and mechanical properties of fiber-reinforced materials, such as elongation at a break, elongation at a tear, heat conductivity, expansion factor or electrical conductivity, vary dependent on direction, and depend on the fiber orientation.
Material bonds are used, for example, in aerospace, where extraordinarily resistant and elastic structures are required with, at the same time, the lowest possible weight. They also are used in the construction of buildings and bridges where, with the most cost-effective materials possible, static, highly stressable, and moreover long-term stable constructions are required. To combine various electrical properties, material bonds are used in the production of electrical circuit boards composed of isolators and conductors. A further example is the use of material bonds in anodes for x-ray tubes, in order to achieve a combination of advantageous mechanical properties (for example low weight and high stability) and physical properties (for example high heat conductivity and suitable coefficient of thermal expansion).
Depending on the area of application, material bonds are subject to extraordinarily severe thermal stresses. The problem occurs that the materials in the composite product can exhibit different thermal expansion factor that, most notably, lead to large mechanical tensions between the bonded materials given changing temperatures. The tensions can lead to warping of the component, to tears, chipping, flaking or spalling, or to the separation of connected materials. Such thermal problems can already occur in the production process when these involve changing, possibly very high, temperatures. It can occur, for example, that, in thermally aided coating processes, no layer bonding at all can be achieved between the materials, and thus no material bond is produced.
This problem has an effect in a particularly pronounced manner in anodes for x-ray tubes. These are struck by electrons from the cathode of the x-ray tube and generate x-ray radiation from the kinetic energy of the incident electrons. The anode is thereby significantly heated by the electron bombardment. In order to spread the thermal load on the surface of the anode, rotating anodes are typically used in which a circular focal path on the surface of the anode is used in place of a fixed focal spot to generate the x-ray radiation. The anode is rotated by a shaft that normally is composed of a heat-resistant material, for example molybdenum. An anode plate sits on the shaft that, for example, can likewise be composed of molybdenum, or of graphite, and that has a focal path coating suitable for generation of x-ray radiation. This can be formed, for example, of tungsten or from a tungsten-rhenium alloy. Alternatively, the anode plate can be formed of the same material as the focal path coating, as an integrated component. The use of anode plates made of graphite has the advantage that the heat produced on the focal path coating can be well distributed and removed due to the large heat capacity and heat conductivity of graphite, and can be well radiated away due to its heat radiation properties.
In addition to the thermal stress, x-ray tube anodes are also subjected to a significant mechanical stress. The anode (thus focal path, anode and shaft) typically rotates with a rotation speed of just under 3000/min, which makes a strong, precise and stable positioning of the shaft necessary. In order to keep destabilization of the positioning of the shaft low, light anode plates are advantageous. For this reason graphite exhibits advantages in comparison to metals such as molybdenum or tungsten, due to its lower specific weight. The mechanical load of the rotation positioning multiplies given the use of the x-ray tube in computed tomography (CT), in which the x-ray tube is rotated around the patient with rotation speeds of more than 100/min. Depending on the arrangement of the anode or of the shaft, additional mechanical high-stressing centrifugal forces and corolis forces occur.
Given the increased mechanical stresses as a result of the rotation of the anode itself, as well as the entire anode in the CT, and the increased thermal stress given momentary, extreme increases of the x-ray output, most of all in CT applications, the stability of anode plates made of graphite is increasingly critical. Furthermore, the predominant tendency is toward further increases of the CT rotation speeds. The reduction of the individual image times required as a result of this in turn requires an additional increase of the momentary output, and thus an additional increase of the thermal stress. In the future, materials that are even more stressable than is already the case today will be required.
A material that exhibits a high thermal stressability, a low weight and excellent mechanical properties is carbon fiber-reinforced graphite. This material therefore would be an ideal material for a material bond with, depending on the application, further materials to be selected. In particular, graphite would also be an ideal material for a material bond for application in x-ray anodes. However, due to the different coefficient of thermal expansion, production of a stable material bond between carbon fiber-reinforced graphite and the focal path coating (which includes a transition metal such as tungsten) has not been able to be achieved, much less used. The same is true for many other fiber-reinforced materials that should be bound with additional material, and that have proved to be insufficiently stable either in the production or in the subsequent application. The advantages that would arise from a composite of fiber-reinforced materials with further materials thus far have not been realized.

Composite product with a thermally stressable bond between a fiber reinforced material and a further material


An electromagnetic-wave shielding and light transmitting plate 1 comprising an antireflection film 3, an electromagnetic-wave shielding film 10, a transparent substrate 2, and a near-infrared ray blocking film 5, wherein they are laminated and united by using intermediate adhesive layers 4A, 4B and a pressure-sensitive adhesive 4C, and the peripheries thereof are covered by a conductive sticky tape 7. The electromagnetic-wave shielding film 10 has a conductive foil 11 formed by pattern etching on a substrate film 13, is processed to have antireflection function by forming a light absorbing layer 12 on the conductive foil 11, and is subjected to a matting process to form small irregularities by roughening the surface of the light absorbing layer 12. A display panel is manufactured by bonding this electromagnetic-wave shielding film 10 to the front surface of a plasma display panel body. Accordingly, an electromagnetic-wave shielding and light transmitting plate and a display panel can be obtained which not only have excellent electromagnetic-wave shielding function but also provide high antireflection effect and have high level of transparency and high level of visibility, thereby providing distinct images.

PDPs (plasma display panels) utilizing discharge phenomenon have been used as display panels for television sets, office automation apparatuses such as personal computers and word processors, traffic control signs, signboards, and other display boards.
The display mechanism of a PDP basically comprises two glass plates, a large number of discharge cells formed by partitions between the two grass plates, and fluorescent substrates within the respective discharge cells. The fluorescent substrates are selectively excited to emit light by discharge, thereby displaying characters and/or figures. An exemplary embodiment is shown in FIG. 16. In FIG. 16, reference numeral 21 designates a front glass, 22 designates a rear glass, 23 designates partitions, 24 designates display cells (discharge cells), 25 designates auxiliary cells, 26 designates cathodes, 27 designates display anodes, and 28 designates auxiliary anodes. Disposed in each display cell 24 is a red, green, or blue phosphor (not shown) which is a film-like form attached to the inside thereof. These fluorescent substrates emit light by electrical discharges when a voltage is applied between electrodes.
From the front surface of the PDP, electromagnetic waves with frequency from several kHz to several GHz are generated due to applying voltage, electrical discharge, and light emission. The electromagnetic waves are required to be shielded. In addition, for improving its display contrast, reflection of external light at the front surface is required to be prevented.
In order to shield such electromagnetic waves from PDP, conventionally, a transparent plate which has functions such as electromagnetic-wave shielding function is disposed in front of the PDP.
Electromagnetic-wave shielding material as mentioned above is also utilized as a window of a place where a precision apparatus is installed, such as a hospital or a laboratory, in order to protect the precision apparatus from electromagnetic waves for example from cellular phones.
A conventional electromagnetic-wave shielding and light transmitting plate typically comprises transparent substrates such as acrylic boards and a conductive mesh member like a wire netting or a transparent conductive film and is formed by interposing the conductive mesh member or the transparent conductive film between the transparent substrates and uniting them.
A conductive mesh member which is employed in the conventional electromagnetic-wave shielding and light transmitting plate is a 5- to 500-mesh member having a wire diameter from 10 to 500 μm and an open area ratio (open area percentage) less than 75%. The electromagnetic-wave shielding and light transmitting plate employing such a conductive mesh member has low light transmittance of 70% at the most.
Moreover, a display comprising an electromagnetic-wave shielding and light transmitting plate with such a conventional conductive mesh member easily allow the production of moiré patterns due to relations between its patterns and pixel pitch.
As means for solving these problems, it has been proposed to use a pattern-etched conductive foil as an electromagnetic-wave shielding layer instead of the conductive mesh (JP 2000-174491A). An electromagnetic-wave shielding and light transmitting plate provided with the pattern-etched conductive foil having desired line width, distance, and mesh configuration has excellent electromagnetic-wave shielding characteristics and a high level of light transmittance and can prevent moiré phenomenon.
The pattern etching of this conductive foil is achieved by bonding a metal foil onto a surface of a transparent substrate film, attaching a photoresist film to the metal foil with pressure, and etching into a predetermined pattern through pattern exposure and etching steps. Accordingly, the metal foil is provided as a film laminated on the substrate film.
An electromagnetic-wave shielding film comprising such a laminated film of the metal foil/the substrate film can not have sufficient visibility because light is reflected at the surface of the metal foil.

Electromagnetic-wave shielding and light transmitting plate, manufacturing method thereof, and display panel


A strategy for suppressing specifically or partially specifically an endogenous gene and introducing a replacement gene, said strategy comprising the steps of:    1. providing suppressing nucleic acids or other suppression effectors able to bind to an endogenous gene, gene transcript or gene product to be suppressed and    2. providing genomic DNA or cDNA (complete or partial) encoding a replacement gene wherein the suppressing nucleic acids are unable to bind to equivalent regions in the genomic DNA or cDNA to prevent expression of the replacement gene.The replacement nucleic acids have modifications in one or more third base (wobble) positions such that replacement nucleic acids still code for the wild type or equivalent amino acids.

Studies of degenerative hereditary ocular conditions, including Retinitis Pigmentosa (RP) and various macular dystrophies, have resulted in a substantial elucidation of the molecular basis of these debilitating human retinal degenerations. Applying the approach of genetic linkage, x-linked RP (xlRP) genes have been localised to the short arm of the X chromosome (Ott et al. 1990). Subsequently, the gene involved in one form of xlRP was identified. Various genes involved in autosomal dominant forms of RP (adRP) have been localised. The first of these mapped to 3q, close to the gene encoding the rod photoreceptor protein rhodopsin (McWilliam et al. 1989; Dryja et al. 1990). Similarly, an adRP gene was placed on 6p close to the gene encoding the photoreceptor protein peripherin (Farrar et al. 1991a,b; Kajiwara et al. 1991). Other adRP genes have been mapped to discrete chromosomal locations; however the disease genes as yet remain uncharacterised. As in xlRP and adRP, various genes involved in autosomal recessive RP (arRP) have been localised and in some cases molecular defects characterised (Humphries et al. 1992; Farrar et al. 1993; Van Soest et al. 1994). Similarly, a number of genes involved in macular dystrophies have been mapped (Mansergh et al. 1995). Genetic linkage, together with techniques for mutational screening of candidate genes, enabled identification of causative dominant mutations in the genes encoding rhodopsin and peripherin. Globally, about 100 rhodopsin mutations have been found in patients with RP or congenital stationary night blindness. Similarly, approximately 40 mutations have been characterised in the peripherin gene in patients with RP or macular dystrophies. Knowledge of the molecular aetiology of these retinopathies has stimulated the generation of animal models and the exploration of methods of therapeutic intervention (Farrar et al. 1995; Humphries et al. 1997).
Similar to RP, osteogenesis imperfecta (OI) is an autosomal dominantly inherited human disorder whose molecular pathogenesis is extremely genetically heterogeneous. OI is often referred to as 'brittle bone disease', although additional symptoms including hearing loss, growth deficiency, bruising, loose joints, blue sclerae and dentinogenesis imperfecta are frequently observed (McKusick, 1972). Mutations in the genes encoding the two type I collagen chains (collagen 1A1 and 1A2) comprising the type I collagen heterodimer have been implicated in OI. Indeed hundreds of dominantly acting mutations have been identified in OI patients in these two genes, many of which are single point mutations, although a number of insertion and deletion mutations have been found (Willing et al. 1993; Zhuang et al. 1996). Similarly mutations in these genes have also been implicated in Ehlers-Danlos and Marfan syndromes (Dalgleish et al. 1986; Phillips et al. 1990; D'Alessio et al. 1991; Vasan NS et al. 1991).
Generally, gene therapies utilising viral and non-viral delivery systems have been used to treat inherited disorders, cancers and infectious diseases. However, many studies have focused on recessively inherited disorders, the rationale being that introduction and expression of the wild type gene may be sufficient to prevent/ameliorate the disease phenotype. In contrast gene therapy for dominant disorders requires suppression of the dominant disease allele. Notably many of the characterised mutations causing inherited diseases such as RP or OI are inherited in an autosomal dominant fashion. Indeed there are over 1,000 autosomal dominantly inherited disorders in man. In addition, there are many polygenic disorders due to co-inheritance of a number of genetic components which together give rise to the disease state. Effective gene therapies for dominant or polygenic diseases may be targeted to the primary defect and in this case may require suppression of the disease allele while in many cases still maintaining the function of the normal allele. This is particularly relevant where disease pathology is due to a gain of function mutation rather than due to reduced levels of wild type protein. Alternatively, suppression therapies may be targeted to secondary effects associated with the disease pathology, for example, programmed cell death (apoptosis), which has been observed in many inherited disorders.
Strategies to differentiate between normal and disease alleles and to selectively switch off the disease allele using suppression effectors such as antisense DNA/RNA, PNAs, ribozymes, or triple helix forming DNA, targeted towards the disease mutation may be difficult in many cases—frequently disease and normal alleles differ by only a single nucleotide. A further difficulty inhibiting development of gene therapies is the heterogeneous nature of some dominant disorders—many different mutations in the same gene give rise to a similar disease phenotype. Development of specific gene therapies for each of these may be prohibitive in terms of cost.
Suppression effectors have been used previously to achieve specific suppression of gene expression. Antisense DNA and RNA has been used to inhibit gene expression in many instances. Modifications, such as phosphorothioates, have been made to oligonucleotides to increase resistance to nuclease degradation, binding affinity and uptake (Cazenave et al. 1989; Sun et al. 1989; McKay et al. 1996; Wei et al. 1996). In some instances, using antisense and ribozyme suppression strategies has led to reversal of a tumor phenotype by reducing expression of a gene product or by cleaving a mutant transcript at the site of the mutation (Carter and Lemoine 1993; Lange et al. 1993; Valera et al. 1994; Dosaka-Akita et al. 1995; Feng et al. 1995; Quattrone et al. 1995; Ohta et al. 1996). For example, neoplastic reversion was obtained using a ribozyme targeted to an H-ras mutation in bladder carcinoma cells (Feng et al. 1995). Ribozymes have also been proposed as a means of both inhibiting gene expression of a mutant gene and of correcting the mutant by targeted trans-splicing (Sullenger and Cech 1994; Jones et al. 1996). Ribozymes can be designed to elicit autocatalytic cleavage of RNA targets; however, the inhibitory effect of some ribozymes may be due in part to an antisense effect due to the antisense sequences flanking the catalytic core that specify the target site (Ellis and Rodgers 1993; Jankowsky and Schwenzer 1996). Ribozyme activity may be augmented by the use of, for example, non-specific nucleic acid binding proteins or facilitator oligonucleotides (Herschlag et al. 1994; Jankowsky and Schwenzer 1996). Multitarget ribozymes (connected or shotgun) have been suggested as a means of improving efficiency of ribozymes for gene suppression (Ohkawa et al. 1993). Triple helix approaches have also been investigated for sequence-specific gene suppression—triplex forming oligonucleotides have been found in some cases to bind in a sequence-specific manner (Postel et al. 1991; Duval-Valentin et al. 1992; Hardenbol and Van Dyke 1996; Porumb et al. 1996). Similarly, peptide nucleic acids have been shown to inhibit gene expression (Hanvey et al. 1992; Knudson and Nielsen 1996; Taylor et al. 1997). Minor groove binding polyamides can bind in a sequence-specific manner to DNA targets and hence may represent useful small molecules for future suppression at the DNA level (Trauger et al. 1996). In addition, suppression has been achieved by interference at the protein level using dominant negative mutant peptides and antibodies (Herskowitz 1987; Rimsky et al. 1989; Wright et al. 1989). In some cases suppression strategies have lead to a reduction in RNA levels without a concomitant reduction in proteins, whereas in others, reductions in RNA have been mirrored by reductions in protein.


A method for shadow detection in an image comprising multiple color channels is disclosed wherein said image is compared with a background image. Said image and said background image comprises the same multiple color channels, have an exposure of a common background and are divided into a plurality of corresponding evaluation areas. For each combination of two color channels, a shadow region is defined in the two-dimensional coordinate system spanned by the two color channels. For each image evaluation area to be evaluated and for each combination of two color channels, the method comprises checking if a difference value between a first value pair defining values of said two color channels in the image evaluation area and a second value pair defining the values of said two color channels in the corresponding background evaluation area falls within said shadow region in said coordinate system.

1. Technical Field
The present subject matter relates to a method for shadow detection in a multiple colour channel image and to a traffic surveillance facility utilizing a method for shadow detection in a multiple colour channel image. The present subject matter may, for example, be advantageous in the field of computer vision, more specifically in the process of segmenting a foreground from a stationary background.
2. Background Art
Many image analysis applications, e.g. in traffic surveillance, include dividing an image into a foreground and a background. In traffic surveillance, the foreground is normally a passing vehicle that is to be detected, tracked or identified and the background, such as a roadway, is usually known. However, if a foreground object casts shadows on the background, these shadows are often incorrectly detected as part of the foreground object instead of as part of the background. Such incorrect segmentation of foreground and background may cause problems e.g. in the process of tracking vehicles.
A known method of detecting shadows in colour images is to define a shadow interval for each colour channel relative to the background, i.e. to define an interval of deviation from each background colour channel value corresponding to a shadowed background. Usually, the three dimensional hue-saturation-lightness (HSL) colour space is used, or sometimes the red-green-blue (RGB) colour space. The shadow intervals can be set manually or by an algorithm that calculates the most suitable interval values from a large number of test images in which regions manually have been marked as shadow or non-shadow. A region or pixel in the image is classified as shadow if each of its colour channel values falls within the defined shadow threshold of that colour channel.
However, even if the shadow intervals are thoroughly and very carefully selected, this approach does not result in perfect shadow detection—the box in three-dimensional colour space that results from the shadow interval defined in each colour channel does not correspond very well to the usually irregular, elongated worm-shape of the true shadow volume. Hence, the method of defining a shadow interval for each colour channel always leaves a trade-off between incorrectly classifying part of the foreground pixels as shadow and incorrectly classifying shadow as foreground. One solution could be to instead define and use a three-dimensional shadow volume in three-dimensional colour space, since a three-dimensional volume has the ability to provide an exact reflection of the true shadow volume. The three-dimensional shadow volume could be found by analysing a large number of test images where regions manually have been marked as shadow or non-shadow. However, storing the three-dimensional shadow volume would be a problem for today's computers—a three-dimensional lookup table with reasonable resolution would become extremely large, larger than what is manageable by today's standard computers. An alternative which requires less storage space than a three-dimensional lookup table is to store the shadow volume as a mathematical expression. However, mathematical descriptions such as spheres or ellipsoids cannot entirely reflect the typical irregular worm-shape of true shadow volumes and would hence lead to misclassifications.

Shadow detection in a multiple colour channel image


An advertising technique includes communicating messages to a mobile device that are rendered on the mobile device for the purpose of advertisement. The advertisement is rendered based on the occurrence of an advertisement event, such as an inbound telephone call, the elapse of time, entering a pre-defined geographic area, or the like.

Mobile advertising, in which advertisers connect with consumers through their cellular telephones, personal digital assistants (PDA) and other mobile devices, has exploded in recent years. For example, an advertiser may encourage cellular telephone users to participate in trivia contests or enter sweepstakes, thereby opting into a marketing campaign which enables the advertiser to send those users coupons or promotional offers.
Mobile advertising is still in its infancy, however, and merchant use of mobile advertising and its many advantages has not been fully exploited. Accordingly, many more innovative and effective uses of this mode of advertising may yet be possible, particularly methods which allow advertisers to target the delivery of advertisements narrowly with respect to the time and place at which those advertisements are rendered, and the manner in which they are rendered.


Methods and systems are provided for making an ophthalmic lens. The present methods and systems are effecting in coupling two mold sections together at two or more discrete regions. Embodiments of the methods and systems form a bore that extends completely through one of the mold sections and only partially through the other mold section. During formation of the bore, the mold material in proximity to the bore being formed becomes molten and diffuses from the bore. A portion of the molten mold material is provided at a contact point between the two mold sections and when the molten material cools, the material forms a spot weld between the mold sections. By forming multiple hollow spot welds in a mold assembly, the two mold sections can be securely coupled to each other during the manufacture of an ophthalmic lens, such as a silicone hydrogel contact lens.

One method of manufacturing ophthalmic lenses, such as intraocular lenses and contact lenses, is by cast molding. Cast molding of contact lenses is well known. See, for example, Appleton, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,466,147, Morris, U.S. Pat. No. 6,405,993, and Dean, U.S. Pat. No. 6,732,993.
In a contact lens cast molding process, a single mold assembly for molding a single contact lens product includes a female mold section having a concave optical surface defining an anterior surface of a lens to be made, and a male mold section having a convex optical surface defining a posterior surface of the lens to be made. Thus, when the male and female mold sections are assembled together, a contact lens shaped cavity is formed between the concave surface of the female section and the convex surface of the male section.
A process for cast molding a lens is as follows. A polymerizable lens material, for example a monomeric material or other lens precursor material is placed on a concave surface of a contact lens mold section. This is usually done by dispensing a volume of a lens precursor material onto a mold half or mold section.
Once filled, a second mold section is placed in contact with the first mold section to form a lens shaped cavity containing the lens precursor material.
One type of coupling of the first mold section and second mold section utilizes an interference fit between the first and second mold sections. For example, the second mold section may be held in place relative to the first mold section by a pressure fit provided by a portion of the first mold section acting on a portion of the second mold section.
Another type of coupling is referred to as a point contact coupling. With point contact mold sections, the first and second mold sections are placed in contact with each other, and require an additional coupling mechanism to hold the two mold sections together. For example, two point contact mold sections can be held together by physically clamping the mold sections together. Or, two point contact mold sections can be held together by fusing a portion of the two mold sections together. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,759,318 describes the use of ultrasonic energy to secure two mold sections together.
The type of coupling used to form the contact lens mold assemblies often relates to the type of material used to produce the mold sections. For example, more elastic or flexible polymeric materials, such as relatively non-polar or hydrophobic polymeric resins, may be used to form interference fit mold sections. In comparison, more rigid or inflexible polymeric materials, such as relatively polar or hydrophilic polymeric materials, may be used to form point contact mold sections.
After closing the two mold sections to form a contact lens mold assembly, the contact lens precursor material is cured for example, by applying heat and/or light or other suitable polymerizing means to the filled mold assembly, thereby producing a polymerized contact lens product between the mold sections. The contact lens product is then removed from the mold sections. The contact lens product is often an unfinished contact lens which is subjected to one or more finishing steps, for example, conventional finishing steps such as extraction and/or hydration, to produce the final contact lens.
In the formation of silicone hydrogel contact lenses, the use of relatively hydrophilic polymeric resins or polar resins, such as Soarlite S (Nippon Gohsei Ltd., Japan), is beneficial in producing silicone hydrogel contact lenses with ophthalmically desirable surface wettabilities without requiring a surface treatment or polymeric internal wetting agent in the contact lens. One obstacle associated with cast molding processes involves maintaining the appropriate placement and fixation of the mold sections, particularly after the lens precursor material has been placed between the mold sections and prior to polymerization thereof. When ultrasonic energy is used to secure two mold sections together, opacification, pitting, or bubble formation in the lens cup (e.g., the region of the mold section containing the lens precursor material) may occur. Further, it may also be difficult to form a mold assembly in which the lens precursor material has a substantially uniform thickness, or in other words the lens does not have an undesired prism due to thickening of the lens precursor material at one region of the lens cup relative to another different region.
In addition, because of the potentially fragile nature of the polymerized contact lens product, the mold sections should be separable without causing breakage of or damage to the lens product.
Thus, more effective, more reliable methods and systems for manufacturing lenses, for example methods and systems for coupling mold sections during manufacturing of contact lenses, are needed.

Methods and systems for forming ophthalmic lens mold assemblies

CooperVision International Holding Company, LP


A recording method for a disc-shaped recording medium formed by cementing two disc members having a recording layer on one surface, a diameter of approximately 12 cm and a thickness of approximately 0.6 mm, includes the steps of generating a digital audio signal that is generated by performing a .SIGMA..increment.-modulation for converting an analog audio signal with a sampling frequency set to a multiple of the standard compact disc sampling frequency fs=44.1 kHz, and recording the generated digital audio signal to the disc-shaped recording medium.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to recording methods for disc-shaped recording media, reproducing apparatuses for disc-shaped recording media, and disc-shaped recording media. In particular, this invention relates to a method for recording to a disc-shaped recording medium in which a digital audio signal is recorded, an apparatus for reproducing from a disc-shaped recording medium in which a digital audio signal is recorded, and a disc-shaped recording medium in which a digital audio signal is recorded.
2. Description of the Related Art
Compact discs are in wide use as a type of recording medium to which an audio signal is converted and recorded in the form of a digital signal or from which medium such an audio signal can be reproduced. According to the standard for compact discs, an analog audio signal is sampled corresponding to each right or left channel at a sampling frequency of fs=44.1 kHz, and each sample is converted and recorded as a 16-bit digital signal.
In the compact disc, an analog audio signal which is to be recorded corresponding to each channel is processed such that its frequency band of not less than 22 kHz is filtered due to the above-mentioned limited sampling rate in the standard. Therefore, the harmonics originally included in a sound are limited, which thus causes a deterioration in tone quality such as a lack of natural sense.
Another standard in which a sampling frequency of 96 kHz corresponding to each channel where each sample is recorded as a 24-bit signal has been proposed. Although some improvement has been observed, deterioration in tone quality cannot be avoided even when this standard is employed, similar to the former standard due to limited harmonics.
In addition, recently for analog-to-digital or digital-to-analog converters, a converter employing the .SIGMA..increment.-modulation method in which quantized noise is concentrated within a high frequency by providing a quantizer in a feedback loop, has been widely noticed. This converter is used for recording to or reproducing from compact discs.
FIG. 1 is a system block diagram showing the flow of an audio signal recorded or reproduced with respect to a compact disc using the .SIGMA..increment.-modulation method, based on the standard for compact discs.
A .SIGMA..increment.-converter 11 converts an analog signal "Au" into a digital audio signal "Da" having 1 bit per sample (this digital audio signal having 1 bit per sample is hereinafter referred to as the "1-bit audio signal") by using a sampling frequency of 64.multidot.fs (=2.8224 MHz). The 1-bit audio signal is supplied to a digital filter 12. This digital filter 12 performs thinning-out (down-sampling) with respect to the supplied signal for conversion into a digital audio data "Db" having 16 bits per sample by using the sampling frequency denoted by fs, which data satisfies the standard for compact discs.
The digital audio data Db is supplied to an encoding circuit 13, in which processes such as scrambling and error-correcting-encoding and eight-to-fourteen modulation are performed with respect to the supplied data, so that the processed and modulated data is recorded as serial data by a recording optical head (not shown) to a disc-shaped recording medium 14.
The serial audio data recorded to this disc-shaped recording medium 14 is read by a reproducing optical head (not shown) to be supplied to a decoding circuit 15. This decoding circuit 15 converts the serial data into parallel data, and performs processes such as de-scrambling and error-correcting-decoding to form reproduced digital audio data "Dbp" having 16 bits per sample by using the sampling frequency fs.
This reproduced digital audio data Db is supplied to a digital filter 16, in which interpolation (over-sampling) is performed with respect to the supplied data in response to the thinning-out on the recording side, and the interpolated output data is supplied to a .SIGMA..increment.-modulator 17. The .SIGMA..increment.-modulator 17 converts the supplied data into a 1-bit audio signal "Dap" by using a sampling frequency of 64.times.fs.
The 1-bit audio signal Dap from the .SIGMA..increment.-modulator 17 is supplied to an analog low-pass filter 18 to be restored to an analog audio signal "Aup".
When the .SIGMA..increment.-modulation is used in analog-to-digital and digital-to-analog conversion as described above, a wide dynamic range is obtained with a small number of bits by increasing the sampling frequency.
However, according to the case shown in FIG. 1, in the recording mode the digital filter 12 performs thinning-out with respect to the digital audio data having 16 bits per sample at the sampling frequency fs based on the standard for compact discs, while in the reproducing mode the digital filter 16 performs interpolation. Accordingly, a computing error occurs in the process in which the data passes through the digital filters 12 and 16, and this error causes a deterioration in tone quality.
On the other hand, with the development for practical use of media having a large capacity and a high transfer rate, recording methods and apparatuses for a digital audio signal sampled at a greater number of bits and at a higher frequency have been proposed, compared with the present standard for compact discs at a sampling frequency of fs=44.1 kHz and 16 bits per sample. Such circumstances cause increasing dissatisfaction with the tone quality of the compact disc, and as a result, enthusiasm for realizing the next-generation of compact discs has increased.
As the next-generation of compact discs will not be limited to audio-use, Toshiba Corporation and Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. in Japan have proposed a type of disc for realizing a recording capacity of 5 GB on one surface (referred to as the "SD (super density disc) standard" hereinafter), where the disc has a thickness of 1.2 mm formed by cementing two thin discs being 12 cm in diameter and 0.6 mm thick, similar to the present compact disc. Also, Phillips in the Netherlands and Sony Corporation in Japan have proposed another type of disc for realizing a recording capacity of 3.7 GB on one surface (referred to as the "MMCD (multi-media compact disc)" hereinafter), which has a single-disc structure of the same size as the present compact disc. In addition, a further type of disc realizing an intermediate recording capacity of 4.7 GE on one surface, between the SD standard and the MMCD standard, has been proposed.
These types of discs have been proposed as digital video discs (referred to as "DVDs", hereinafter) or data memories for computers.

Method of recording on a disc medium a .SIGMA..DELTA.-modulated signal with a sampling frequency times 44.1 kHz