Vibration induced errors in sensors are predicted based on a measurement of vibration power spectra. Accelerometer samples are used to estimate vibration power spectral densities. A calibration procedure using suitable vibration stimulus provides the ability to estimate sensitivity coefficients to be used to compensate for the vibration induced error. The vibration power spectrum estimates are combined with previously obtained calibration coefficients to generate real time vibration-induced error corrections. Vibration bias sensitivity coefficients are estimated in a controlled environment to ensure their accuracy to compensate the sensor in real-time applications using acceleration measurement devices such as accelerometers mounted to a rigid sensor assembly shared with the sensor to be compensated. Vibration bias estimates are then used to correct the outputs of the sensors(s) being compensated for vibration-induced error.

The present invention relates to sensors, and in particular to the compensation for vibration-induced error affecting the operation of such sensors.
Inertial sensors, such as gyroscopes and accelerometers, are often adversely affected by vibrations. They may be very sensitive to such vibrations. In fact, vibration sensitivity can often be a dominant performance limiting error source. Many inertial sensors rely on micro-electromechanical sensor (MEMS) devices which utilize vibratory mechanisms for rate/acceleration sensing. These types of sensors have shown evidence of significant vibration sensitivity problems.
Inertial sensors are often used in environments that inherently subject the sensors to significant vibrations. These include use in aircraft and weapons, where the power plants and environment serve as significant sources of vibration. For example, a commonly used resonant beam accelerometer that is often viewed as a one milli-g accuracy sensor can exhibit bias shifts on the order of several milli-g""s under typical operational vibration environments.
For inertial sensors which exhibit vibration sensitivity, the most common effect is a slowly varying low frequency error component which changes as a function of the applied vibration spectrum. In some applications, such as a global positioning system (GPS) aided inertial system, the effect of the vibration induced bias shift can be trimmed or estimated such as by use of a Kalman filter. However, when the vibration level or spectrum shape changes significantly, the vibration-induced error also changes, diminishing the value of any previously obtained calibration.
In the case of an inertially guided munition launched from an aircraft equipped with a high quality inertial navigation system (INS), an in-flight transfer alignment and calibration procedure is usually performed prior to release of the guided munition. During this period, velocity differences (or related quantities) between the aircraft INS and the weapon INS are processed by a Kalman filter to initialize the attitude and heading of the weapon INS, and to estimate some of its inertial sensor errors, typically including the gyro and accelerometer bias errors. The vibration spectrum present at the weapon inertial measurement unit is strongly driven by its captive-carry environment, such as a wing-store station or weapon bay. During the captive carry, the weapon""s inertial sensor bias errors will be affected by the vibration environment. However, after release of the weapon, a significantly different vibration environment will exist, leading to gyro and accelerometer bias shifts due to a change in the vibration-induced errors. Depending on its magnitude, this change can negate any benefit of the pre-launch weapon inertial measurement unit calibration. There is a need to minimize the detrimental effects of such changes in vibration environment.
Other factors can also cause such bias shifts. Anything that causes a change in the vibration environment of a sensor can result in a bias shift. Changes in speed of any vehicle having such sensors can result in different vibration environments due to aerodynamic differences and also due to mechanically based resonant frequency changes. This can by observed by any passenger in a car, especially older cars, as it approaches speeds that are higher than intended, or equipment of the vehicle changes through damage. Vibration environments can also change as engines are operated at different revolutions per minute, or depending on the overall load condition of the vehicle.
There is a need for a better mechanism to compensate for vibration-induced errors affecting inertial sensors. There is a further need to compensate for changes in vibration environments that affect such sensors. There is a need for such compensation to be performed both accurately and quickly.
A factory calibration procedure is performed by subjecting a sensor to suitable vibration stimulus, thereby exposing sensitivity coefficients relating vibration power levels at various frequencies to the bias-like error of the sensor. In the real-time application of the sensor, accelerometer samples are collected and used to characterize the actual vibration environment, specifically, the amount of vibration energy in various portions of the frequency spectrum. Predicted sensor vibration-induced error is calculated based on the measured vibration spectrum and the previously-obtained factory calibration coefficients. The predicted vibration-induced error is then applied as a compensation to the sensor output.
In one embodiment, high rate vibration measurement samples from the accelerometers are provided as the input to a power spectral density estimator. The vibration power spectrum estimates are then combined with previously obtained calibration coefficients to generate the real time vibration-induced bias correction. Vibration bias sensitivity coefficients are estimated in a controlled environment to ensure their accuracy to compensate the sensor in real-time applications.
In a further embodiment the high data rate vibration samples are obtained using acceleration measurement devices such as accelerometers mounted to a rigid sensor assembly shared with the sensor to be compensated. Vibration bias estimates are then combined with outputs from both a plurality (typically three or more) of gyros and a plurality of accelerometers, which combined form an inertial measurement unit.
In yet a further embodiment, a digital signal processor is used to perform calculations to obtain the vibration power spectral density and then provide the sensor vibration-induced error estimates in real time at a high rate. Still further embodiments utilize software to perform the calculations, or further combinations of hardware, software and firmware.


A recorded voice test signal is transmitted from a transmitting end of a mobile communication system, and in a test unit at the receiving end a frame generator is synchronized with the received signal. Each frame of the signal is evaluated in computing circuits on the outputs of the frame generator, which calculate characteristic values of each frame which are then subtracted from calculated characteristic reference values of the frames stored in a memory. The differences between these characteristic values are fed to a neural network which classifies the quality of the difference signals as Good, Medium and Bad, and a defuzzyfication logic circuit further refines the quality classification output, whereby the transmission quality throughout the mobile communication system can be reprodicbly rated for a system quality rating.

In mobile radio communication networks and particularly in digital networks (such as GSM) the quality of transmission can vary within a wide range depending on the location (distance to the next base station), the travelling speed and the environment (buildings, mountains etc.) of the mobile station at a certain instant. It is important for the operator of such networks to know where the reception quality is unsatisfactory in order to be able to improve the network by appropriate measures.
So far there are known two types of methods for checking the transmission quality of mobile telephone systems: One can be qualified as "manual" method and the other as "automatic" method. In the "manual" method an expert is driving a car through the area to be assessed while listening e. g. to the news transmitted via the mobile communication system. The expert is continuously writing down his opinion on the quality of reception. E. g. he classifies the reception quality--on the basis of his experience--into different rating classes such as "good", "acceptable" and "bad". It is evident that the results of this method are not reproducible. Various experts have different assessments even under similar conditions. Even if the same expert drives along the same route at different times, the results may differ and it is not possible to determine, whether the difference was just in the assessment or whether it was in the actual transmission quality.
The "automatic" method is based on the fact that e. g. the bit error rate of digital transmissions is a known and measurable quantity. The error rate is therefore used for rating the transmission quality. Tests have shown that the bit error rate and the audible transmission quality (in the sense of the intelligibility of a transmitted sentence) often do not correlate: The bit error rate may be acceptable or good, whereas the intelligibility is bad and vice versa. The bit error rate assessment is only viable for a digital transmission system. An analog speech transmission cannot be rated by this method.
There are other automatic methods for determining the transmission quality of a channel. GB-1 455 712 e. g. teaches comparing the input and the output signal of the system and determining some sort of quality according to the signal difference. A definition of the quality is not disclosed. The prior art document EP-0 114 463 teaches transmitting a plurality of tone signals, digitizing the received signal and determining the Fourier transform of the tone signals in order to determine the transmission quality.
The problem of the known techniques for rating the transmission quality is, that the basical correlation between the transmission quality of a specific physical or software parameter (tone signal, error signal, bit error rate etc.) and the rating done by a test person is unsatisfactory.

Method and apparatus for automatically and reproducibly rating the transmission quality of a speech transmission system


In accordance with the present invention, there is provided a DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) fragment which encodes the MmeI type II restriction endonuclease enzyme. This one polypeptide possesses two related enzymatic functions; namely an endonuclease activity which recognizes the DNA sequence 5′-TCC(Pu)AC-3′ and cleaves as indicated by the arrows:

The present invention relates to a DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) fragment, which fragment codes for one polypeptide possessing two related enzymatic functions, namely an enzyme which recognizes the DNA sequence 5′-TCC(Pu)AC-3′ and cleaves the phosphodiester bond between the 20th and 21st residues 3′ to this recognition sequence on this DNA strand, and between the 18th and 19th residues 5′ to the recognition sequence on the complement strand 3′-AGG(Py)TG-5′ to produce a 2 base 3′ extension (hereinafter referred to as the MmeI restriction endonuclease), and a second enzymatic activity that recognizes the same DNA sequence, 5′-TCC(Pu)AC3′, but modifies this sequence by the addition of a methyl group to prevent cleavage by the MmeI endonuclease. The present invention also relates to a vector containing the DNA fragment, a transformed host containing this DNA fragment, and an improved process for producing MmeI restriction endonuclease from such a transformed host. The present invention also relates to a process for identifying additional DNA fragments that encode enzymes having the same general properties as MmeI but potentially having unique DNA recognition sequences. This process depends on the use of the amino acid sequence of the MmeI enzyme presented in this application, or subsequently on the additional sequences identified through this process. The invention also relates to additional DNA fragments, identifiable through the process described, each of which encodes a polypeptide having significant amino acid sequence similarity to the MmeI polypeptide. The polypeptides encoded by these DNA fragments are predicted to perform similar functions to MmeI. Specifically, they are predicted to possess the dual enzymatic functions of cleaving DNA in a specific manner at a relatively far distance from the specific recognition sequence and also modifying their recognition sequences to protect the host DNA from cleavage by endonuclease activity. An example of such an enzyme identified by this process is CstMI (see U.S. application Ser. No. 10/616,689, filed concurrently herewith). CstMI was identified as a potential endonuclease because of its highly significant amino acid sequence similarity to MmeI. CstMI recognizes the sequence 5′-AAGGAG-3′ and cleaves the phosphodiester bond between the 20th and 21st residues 3′ to the recognition sequence on this DNA strand, and between the 18th and 19th residues 5′ to the recognition sequence on the complement strand 5′-CTCCTT-3′ to produce a 2 base 3′ extension.
Restriction endonucleases are a class of enzymes that occur naturally in prokaryotes. There are several classes of restriction systems known, of which the type II endonucleases are the class useful in genetic engineering. When these type II endonucleases are purified away from other contaminating prokarial components, they can be used in the laboratory to break DNA molecules into precise fragments. This property enables DNA molecules to be uniquely identified and to be fractionated into their constituent genes. Restriction endonucleases have proved to be indispensable tools in modern genetic research. They are the biochemical 'scissors' by means of which genetic engineering and analysis is performed.
Restriction endonucleases act by recognizing and binding to particular sequences of nucleotides (the 'recognition sequence') along the DNA molecule. Once bound, the type II endonucleases cleave the molecule within, or to one side of, the sequence. Different restriction endonucleases have affinity for different recognition sequences. The majority of restriction endonucleases recognize sequences of 4 to 6 nucleotides in length, although recently a small number of restriction endonucleases which recognize 7 or 8 uniquely specified nucleotides have been isolated. Most recognition sequences contain a dyad axis of symmetry and in most cases all the nucleotides are uniquely specified. However, some restriction endonucleases have degenerate or relaxed specificities in that they recognize multiple bases at one or more positions in their recognition sequence, and some restriction endonucleases recognize asymmetric sequences. HaeIII, which recognizes the sequence 5′-GGCC-3′, is an example of a restriction endonuclease having a symmetrical, non-degenerate recognition sequence; HaeII, which recognizes 5′-(Pu)GCGC(Py)-3′ typifies restriction endonucleases having a degenerate or relaxed recognition sequence; while BspMI, which recognizes 5′-ACCTGC-3′ typifies restriction endonucleases having an asymmetric recognition sequence. Type II endonucleases with symmetrical recognition sequences generally cleave symmetrically within or adjacent to the recognition site, while those that recognize asymmetric sequences tend to cleave at a distance of from 1 to 20 nucleotides to one side of the recognition site. The enzyme of this application, MmeI, (along with CstMI) has the distinction of cleaving the DNA at the farthest distance from the recognition sequence of any known type II restriction endonuclease. More than two hundred unique restriction endonucleases have been identified among several thousands of bacterial species that have been examined to date.
A second component of restriction systems are the modification methylases. These enzymes are complementary to restriction endonucleases and they provide the means by which bacteria are able to protect their own DNA and distinguish it from foreign, infecting DNA. Modification methylases recognize and bind to the same nucleotide recognition sequence as the corresponding restriction endonuclease, but instead of breaking the DNA, they chemically modify one or other of the nucleotides within the sequence by the addition of a methyl group. Following methylation, the recognition sequence is no longer cleaved by the restriction endonuclease. The DNA of a bacterial cell is modified by virtue of the activity of its modification methylase and it is therefore insensitive to the presence of the endogenous restriction endonuclease. It is only unmodified, and therefore identifiably foreign, DNA that is sensitive to restriction endonuclease recognition and cleavage. Modification methyltransferases are usually separate enzymes from their cognate endonuclease partners. In some cases, there is a single polypeptide that possesses both a modification methyltransferase function and an endonuclease function, for example, Eco57I. In such cases, there is a second methyltransferase present as part of the restriction-modification system. In contrast, the MmeI system of the present application has no second methyltransferase accompanying the endonuclease-methyltransferase polypeptide.
Endonucleases are named according to the bacteria from which they are derived. Thus, the species Haemophilus aegyptius, for example synthesizes 3 different restriction endonucleases, named HaeI, HaeII and HaeIII. These enzymes recognize and cleave the sequences 5′-(W)GGCC(W)-3′,5′-(Pu)GCGC(Py)-3′ and 5′-GGCC-3′ respectively. Escherichia coli RY13, on the other hand, synthesizes only one enzyme, EcoRI, which recognizes the sequence 5′-GAATTC-3′.
While not wishing to be bound by theory, it is thought that in nature, restriction endonucleases play a protective role in the welfare of the bacterial cell. They enable bacteria to resist infection by foreign DNA molecules such as viruses and plasmids that would otherwise destroy or parasitize them. They impart resistance by binding to infecting DNA molecules and cleaving them in each place that the recognition sequence occurs. The disintegration that results inactivates many of the infecting genes and renders the DNA susceptible to further degradation by exonucleases.
More than 3000 restriction endonucleases have been isolated from various bacterial strains. Of these, more than 240 recognize unique sequences, while the rest share common recognition specificities. Restriction endonucleases which recognize the same nucleotide sequence are termed "isoschizomers." Although the recognition sequences of isoschizomers are the same, they may vary with respect to site of cleavage (e.g., XmaI v. SmaI, Endow, et al., J. Mol. Biol. 112:521 (1977); Waalwijk, et al., Nucleic Acids Res. 5:3231 (1978)) and in cleavage rate at various sites (XhoI v. PaeR7I, Gingeras, et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 80:402 (1983)).
Restriction endonucleases have traditionally been classified into three major classes; type I, type II and type III. The type I restriction systems assemble a multi-peptide complex consisting of restriction polypeptide, modification polypeptide, and specificity, or DNA recognition, polypeptide. Type I systems require a divalent cation, ATP and S-adenylosyl-methionine (SAM) as cofactors. Type I systems cleave DNA at random locations up to several thousand basepairs away from their specific recognition site. The type III systems generally recognize an asymmetric DNA sequence and cleave at a specific position 20 to 30 basepairs to one side of the recognition sequence. Such systems require the cofactor ATP in addition to SAM and a divalent cation. The type III systems assemble a complex of endonuclease polypeptide and modification polypeptide that either modifies the DNA at the recognition sequence or cleaves. Type III systems produce partial digestion of the DNA substrate due to this competition between their modification and cleavage activities, and so have not been useful for genetic manipulation.
MmeI does not require ATP for DNA cleavage activity and it cleaves to completion; thus it can be classified as a type II endonuclease. Unlike other type II enzymes, however, MmeI consists of a single polypeptide that combines both endonuclease and modification activities and is sufficient by itself to form the entire restriction modification system. MmeI also cleaves the farthest distance from the specific DNA recognition sequence of any type II endonuclease (as does CstMI of this application). MmeI is quite large and appears to have three functional domains combined in one polypeptide. These consist of an amino-terminal domain which contains the endonuclease DNA cleavage motif and which may also be involved in DNA recognition, a DNA modification domain most similar to the gamma-class N6mA methyltransferases, and a carboxy-terminal domain presumed to be involved in dimer formation and possibly DNA recognition. The enzyme requires SAM for both cleavage and modification activity. The single MmeI polypeptide is sufficient to modify the plasmid vector carrying the gene in vivo to provide protection against MmeI cleavage in vitro, yet it is also able to cleave unmodified DNAs in vitro when using the endonuclease buffer containing Mg++ and SAM.
There is a continuing need for novel type II restriction endonucleases. Although type II restriction endonucleases which recognize a number of specific nucleotide sequences are currently available, new restriction endonucleases which recognize novel sequences provide greater opportunities and ability for genetic manipulation. Each new unique endonuclease enables scientists to precisely cleave DNA at new positions within the DNA molecule, with all the opportunities this offers.

Recombinant type II restriction endonucleases, MmeI and related endonucleases and methods for producing the same

Abstract: 5′-TCCRAC(N20)↓-3′ 3′-AGGYTG(N18)↑-5′and a second enzymatic activity that recognizes the same DNA sequence, 5′-TCC(Pu)AC-3′, but modifies this sequence by the addition of a methyl group to prevent cleavage by the MmeI endonuclease activity.


A fitting for fastening a cable (2) to a wall (1) is indicated, which comprises a base (6) to be fastened to the wall (1) and a cap (7). The end of the base (6) which in the installed position faces away from the wall has a trough (8) for receiving the cable (2), which in the installed position is closed by the cap (7). The base (6) has three separate faces (9, 10, 11) which form the corners of a triangle for the attachment to the wall (1). The part of the cap (7) which in the installed position is applied against the cable is elastically deformable.

1. Technical Field
The invention concerns a fitting for fastening a lengthwise object to a wall, comprising a base that is attached to the wall, which has a trough for receiving the object in the end that faces away from the wall in the installed position, and a cap to be fastened to the base which in the installed position closes off the trough by being applied against the object.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the sense of the invention "lengthwise objects" may be cables of all kinds or tubes. Radiating high frequency cables--in the following called RHF cables for short--have special significance because long lengths of them are routed in tunnel paths. The following considers the routing of RHF cables as representative of all other possible applications.
RHF cables are used for example for the transmission of information between trains and fixed stations. To that end they must be installed in relatively accurate positions along predetermined paths, for example on the wall of tunnels. This requires fittings which are easy to install and securely hold the RHF cables. In addition the fittings must be designed so that damage to the relatively sensitive RHF cables can be prevented during installation.
The fitting known from the DE-U-9 212 516 uses fittings which comprise a support bracket that can be closed by a cover. There is a space between both parts for receiving an RHF cable. A closed surface of the support bracket can be screwed to a wall by means of a foot. The cover is fastened to the support bracket by a nonmetallic hinge which allows it to swing and be locked to the bracket. In the RHF cable receiving space, spring elements are fastened for tolerance balancing to the support bracket as well as to the cover, which in the installed position are applied against the RHF cable.

Fitting for fastening a lengthwise object to a wall


A lens assembly for transmitting an optical signal has a light-emitting element that diffuses the optical signal and a collimator lens that converts the optical signal diffused out of the light-emitting element from its diffused light into parallel light. The device also has a condenser lens that gathers the parallel light output from the collimator lens to focus the parallel light into an opening of an optical waveguide. The opening is provided in an end of the optical waveguide. An optical axis of the condenser lens is shifted toward the other 10 end of the waveguide by a predetermined distance with respect to an optical axis of the collimator lens.

The present invention relates to a lens assembly and an electronic apparatus using the same. More specifically, the present invention relates to a device for transmitting an optical signal as the lens assembly and the like that are preferably applicable to any signal transmission between semiconductor chips such as large scale integrated (LSI) circuits.
Elements such as transistors and capacitors produced on a silicon substrate in an LSI chip at a front end thereof or blocks including such the elements have been wired and connected to each other at a back end thereof for transmitting a signal and supplying power by electric transmission using metal line produced on an insulating substrate. Accompanying, however, with speed-up in element operation based on current enhanced micromachining of scale, namely, high performance of a micro processing unit (MPU), a large amount of data, to be received in the chip, is necessary for being processed very rapidly, so that operation clock speed of the chip is remarkably increased.
Various issues have been arisen in metal wiring that electrically distributes the data and operation clock signal. As typical issues, have been risen any register and capacitor (RC) signal delay based on resistance and parasitic capacitance of the metal wiring, any impedance mismatching, electromagnetic/compatibility (EMC)/electromagnetic interference (EMI), any signal degradation due to cross talk or the like, any transmission error, increase of consumed power that is necessary for transmitting a signal based on any remarkable enhanced micromachining, increase of wiring length based on multilayer, deterioration of yield rate and the like.
As one of implementation techniques to solve such the issues, an optical interconnection between chips that LSI chips on a board are directly and optically connected to each other has been known. In order to realize such the optical interconnection between chips, an optical I/O package such that a beam output from a vertical cavity-surface emitting laser (hereinafter, referred to as "VCSEL") is once collimated to focus at its incident to the waveguide has been proposed (see institute of electronics, information and communication engineers (IEICE) transaction C, pp. 793-799 (2001) Vol. J64-C, No. 9). FIG. 1 shows a configuration of a lens assembly, i.e., a device 500 for transmitting an optical signal as the optical I/O package. This device 500 has a VCSEL 511, as a light-emitting element, for diffusing an optical signal, a lens base 512 of VCSEL side, a collimator lens 513 for converting the optical signal diffused out of the VCSEL 511 from its diffused light into parallel light, a condenser lens 521 for gathering the parallel light output from the collimator lens 513 to focus the parallel light into an opening 531 of an optical waveguide 530, which is provided in an end of the optical waveguide 530, and a lens base 522 of waveguide side.
The optical signal (laser light) 540 diffused out of the VCSEL 511 is incident into the collimator lens 513, through the lens base 512, by which it is converted from its diffused light into the parallel light. The parallel light is also incident into the condenser lens 521 by which the parallel light is focused into the opening 531 of an optical waveguide 530, which is provided in an end of the optical waveguide 530, through the lens base 522. A mirror surface 532 having an inclined angle of 45 degrees then reflects the optical signal that has been focused into the opening 531. The waveguide 530 then guides the reflected optical signal along it.
According to the device 500 for transmitting the optical signal, for example, as shown in FIG. 2, even if a manufacture tolerance occurs and the waveguide 530 is shifted with respect to the VCSEL 511, a light path of the optical signal that is incident to the condenser lens 521 is also bended so that it is focused into the opening 531 of the waveguide 530, thereby configuring a lens module that is flexibly applicable to such the tolerance and has less transmission loss. It is to be noted that dotted line shown in FIG. 2 indicates positions of the condenser lens 521, the lens base 522, the waveguide 530 and the like if no manufacture tolerance occur.
The device 500 for transmitting the optical signal, shown in FIG. 1, can get sufficient coupling efficiency in transmission of the optical signal (laser light) from VCSEL 511 up to the opening 531 of the waveguide 530. If, however, perfect reflection of the optical signal that has been incident to the mirror surface 532 in the waveguide 530 is considered, it may be considered that a part of the optical signal passes through the mirror surface 532, not reflected by it, according to a shift direction of the parallel light that is incident to the condenser lens 521.
For example, it may be considered that, as shown in FIG. 3, occurrence of any manufacture tolerance causes parallel light that is incident to the condenser lens  521 to be shifted in a direction, "a" shown in FIG. 3 (that is, a reverse direction of a shifted direction, "b" shown in FIG. 2). In also this case, the device 500 can also get sufficient coupling efficiency in transmission of the optical signal (laser light) from the VCSEL 511 up to the opening 531 of the waveguide 530.
An incident angle of the optical signal, which has been focused into the waveguide 530, with respect to the mirror surface 532 becomes near 90 degrees with respect to this mirror surface 532. If a region in which the mirror surface 532 perfectly reflects the optical signal is estimated to αa as shown in FIG. 4, light that stays in a region αb, out of the region αa, fails to be reflected by the mirror surface 532 and passes through this mirror surface 532, so that the waveguide 530 cannot guide and transmit it. Thus, all the light within the region αb will be loss. In other words, an issue has been arisen such that when an incident angle of optical signal to the mirror surface 532 in the waveguide 530 is near 90 degrees, it is difficult to satisfy a perfect reflection condition by the mirror surface 532, thereby increasing loss in the amount of light.
Further, in order to decrease light that falls outside the region αa, it is estimated that NA of input light to the waveguide 530 is decreased. It is generally designed to make a light source and the mirror configured so as to become a conjugation relationship therebetween (i.e. to form an optical image thereon) in order to adjust angle shift in the light source, the collimator lens, and the waveguide. Herein, in order to decrease NA of the condenser lens 521, it is necessary to expand focal distance of the condenser lens 521.
Relationship between a focal distance of imaging lens and imaging factor is represented as following equation: imaging magnification=focal distance S2 of image side/focal distance s1 of object side (see FIG. 5). Thus, the focal distance of imaging lens (focal distance of image side) and the imaging magnification have proportionality relation so that the larger the focal distance of condenser lens 521, the imaging magnification of an image of light source in the mirror surface 532 becomes larger. In other words, if NA of the condenser lens 521 becomes smaller, a size of the image of light source (hereinafter, referred to as "focal diameter") in the opening 531 of the waveguide 530 becomes larger.
FIG. 6 shows a case where NA of the condenser lens 521 becomes smaller. In this case, as shown in FIG. 7A, all the light of optical signal 540 stays within the region αa. In this case, however, NA of the condenser lens 521 becomes smaller, so that loss on amount of light occurs since the focal diameter Da fails to be included in the opening 531 of the waveguide 530. It is to be noted that a focal diameter Db shown in FIG. 7B indicates one relative to NA of the condenser lens 521 shown in FIG. 3.
Thus, if, in the device 500 for transmitting the optical signal, which has been shown in FIG. 1, NA of the condenser lens 521 becomes smaller in order to reduce the loss on the mirror surface 532 in the waveguide 530, an amount of light rejected at the opening 531 of the waveguide 530 increases while if NA of the condenser lens 521 becomes larger to make its imaging magnitude smaller in order to reduce an amount of light rejected at the opening 531 of the waveguide 530, an amount of the light passing through the mirror surface 532 increases without performing any perfect reflection on the mirror surface 532 when any manufacture tolerance occurs.

Lens assembly and electronic apparatus using the same


A cylindrical unit of varying lengths which stores sports balls, with unit capable of attaching to any solid object in a vertical position, close to a sports court or storage area. The unit also serves as a ball transporter, carried in a horizontal or vertical position, with attached handles allowing sports balls to be moved from one sports site or storage area, another. A one piece unit with an opening at one end only, therefore reducing the sports balls exposure, to ball depleting weather, and offers security, by allowing the open end to be locked by a transverse rod across the open end. Balls are contained in storage unit by protrusions located internally, at the open end, positioned at the greatest apex of the ball allowing sports balls to be completely enclosed within the storage unit. Protrusions hold the ball at a distal position within storage unit allowing balls to be loaded and unloaded easily with a single hand. A rod the length of the storage unit has attached a cross of equal diameter as the storage unit. The rod runs internally and centrally the length of the storage unit, exiting the closed end acting as a ball indicator moving parallel to the storage unit as balls are inserted and removed.

This invention relates to the storage of sports balls close to the proximity of play thus making a convenient storage area while protecting the balls from the elements of the weather, when not in play, in addition, the unit can be used for storage and transporting sports balls from court to court.

Sports ball storage, transporter and dispenser for court played games


Provided are a network-based high performance SAP monitoring system and method, including a hardware engine selecting packets to be updated from input packets by performing session-based filtering and pattern matching on the input packets, identifying to which application protocol belongs among dynamic information and action gateway (DIAG) protocol, remote function call (RFC) protocol, and hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) protocol, and adding identification information of the identified application protocol to the packet to be uploaded and a software engine including a DIAG processor processing the DIAG protocol, RFC processor processing the RFC protocol, and HTTP processor processing the HTTP protocol, when receiving the packet added with the identification information from the hardware engine, referring SAP application protocol identification information, extracting data transmitted and received between servers of an SAP client and one of the DIAG processor, RFC processor, and HTTP processor, thereby sorting and processing the three types of SAP application protocol such as the DIAG protocol, RFC protocol, and HTTP protocol.

One or more embodiments of the present invention relate to a network-based SAP monitoring system, and more particularly, to an SAP monitoring system and method, in which identification for all three types of SAP application protocols is processed in a single system.
SAP, which is Enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution most widely used in the world, has a client-server structure. Through continuous updates up to now, SAP supports application protocols for three types of client-server communication. Application protocol used for communication between an SAP graphical user interface (GUI), which is a most basic SAP client application program, and a server supports hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP)-based data communication through a TCP/IP-based dynamic information and action gateway (DIAG) protocol developed while being optimized for a data transaction structure with a unit SAP GUI screen, a web-based SAP GUI service, and an SAP GUI for JAVA/HTML module considering extensibility of application development. In this case, a data payload structure transmitted and received is identical to a data payload structure of a DIAG application protocol. In addition, data communication through remote function call (RFC) application protocol is also supported. A data payload structure used in the RFC application protocol differs from that of the DIAG application protocol. FIGS. 1 and 2 are configuration views illustrating a payload of a DIAG data packet and a payload of an RFC data packet analyzed and reconfigured by reverse engineering, respectively.
As described above, SAP (herein, SAP is the name of a solution, made of initials of system, application, and products in the data processing and the number of a vendor manufacturing the solution) supports data communication through HTTP and RFC in addition to DIAG application protocols, which is necessary to be network-based monitored. In addition, due to the nature of SAP, applications with respect to managerial resources of an enterprise, that is, inventory control, purchasing control, production management, sales management, personnel management, financial management, managerial accountings, etc. are combined with one another in an integrated database in real time. In a regard of accessing sensitive information necessary for being restricted in enterprises, it is very necessary to regularly monitor inquiries and accesses unauthorized internal sources and information. Traffics occurring on network caused by a large amount of data transactions occurring while using managerial resources in various fields, in case of enterprises or companies employing several hundreds or thousands of staffs, reach a degree of from several tens to several hundreds Mbps or several Gbps.

Network-based high performance SAP monitoring system and method


A system for determining the angles of elevation and azimuth of a source of collimated energy comprises a detector consisting of an annular entrance opening in an opaque structure, and an annular segmented optical detector spaced from and axisymmetric with the opening. Laser, or other collimated light energy passing through the opening illuminates all, or particular portions of the segmented detector depending on the direction and angle of incidence of the energy, thereby providing all of the information necessary to determine the elevation and azimuth of the source of the energy.

There is a need for an angle of arrival laser detection system that provides a wide field of view and that can resolve the direction of incident laser illumination to less than a degree in both elevation and azimuth. Currently, there are non-coherent laser detectors that have a large field of view (2 Pi Steradians). These systems use both imaging and non-imaging optics. In systems using imaging optics, use is made of multiple apertures with lenses to focus the incoming laser light and display the image (a spot) on a focal plane to determine the X, Y and Z coordinates. These focused systems provide good resolution, but require lenses and sufficient signal processing to convert a focused spot into X, Y, and Z components, and then into polar coordinates. The primary disadvantage of these systems is their cost and complexity.
In the systems which are non-imaging, a single detector element is placed in each aperture to detect incident radiation. Comparison between the received energy from adjacent apertures is then converted into a digital count that represents the energy at each aperture and an algorithm similar to that used in mono-pulse radar is used to define the direction of the source of maximum energy intensity. While the non-imaging systems are simpler than imaging systems, the resolution is not as good as the focussed system, and signal processing requires analogue to digital conversion, and then a comparison with the received signal power from adjacent apertures to compute the direction of maximum received power. Current systems which use this technique can resolve the direction of an incident laser source to some degree, but the signal processing technique is a multi-step process in that the incident energy through each of a plurality of adjacent apertures is first detected in an analog detector; then each analog signal is digitalized; all of the digital outputs from the adjacent apertures are then compared to determine the "best fit" resultant, which is then used to determine the direction vector of the source of maximum intensity. There are several disadvantages to this approach. First improved resolution requires multiple overlapping apertures, and in addition, the signal processing techniques that are required are susceptible to intensity modulations that could cause false results. As a result of using amplitude comparison techniques, these variations will then result in increased error in determining the correct direction vector.

Collinated light direction sensor system

The United States of America as represented by the Secretary of the Air Force


An absorbent article includes a compressed groove provided on a body-side surface of a sanitary napkin includes a pair of lateral groove segments extending substantially in the longitudinal direction symmetrically about a longitudinal center line and a pair of rear groove segments converging rearward from respective rear ends of the pair of lateral groove segments so that the compressed groove as a whole presents an elongated shape which is angular rearward. The rear side groove segment has a curve conforming, in the vicinity of its rear end, with an arc of a circle having a predetermined radius and inscribed to the rear side groove segment. A bottom covering region extending rearward from the rear end of the rear groove segment has a predetermined thickness and is adapted to be folded along the longitudinal center line so that the bottom covering region can become convex on the side of the body-side surface. A distance between a pair of proximal ends of the rear side groove segment as measured in the transverse direction is in a predetermined range and a distance from the pair of proximal ends to the rear end of the rear groove segment as measured in the longitudinal direction is in a predetermined range.

The present invention relates to an absorbent article and, more particularly, to an absorbent article such as sanitary napkin having an improved fit to the wearer's bottom.
Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2001-8971 (hereinafter referred to as "REFERENCE") discloses an absorbent article which is substantially longer than is wide, comprising an absorbent layer, a leak-barrier layer, a front region formed with one or two leak-barrier groove (s) extending in the longitudinal direction and a rear region formed with three or more leak-barrier grooves. In this article, sealing strength along the leak-barrier grooves is set to 50 cN/30 mm or higher to prevent a possible leak of body fluids due to break and/or peeling off of a topsheet from an absorbent pad.
However, in view of the fact that a zone extending behind the leak-barrier grooves has substantially the same thickness as the remaining zone, any effective and thoughtful consideration for the purpose of improvement in the leak-barrier effect can not be found in this article of prior art. More specifically, even though the zone extending behind the leak-barrier grooves is folded in a transverse direction under a pressure laterally exerted on this zone as the article is put on the wearer's body, it will be difficult for the fold to fit into bottom cleft. Consequently, it will be difficult to prevent body fluids from leaking along the bottom cleft.


The present invention provides a method for varying and controlling the chemical composition and physical properties of the uranium oxide solids produced by the thermal conversion of UF.sub.6. The method allows the production of predominantly UO.sub.2, U.sub.3 O.sub.8, or UO.sub.3 interchangeably from the same reactor simply by controlling the hydrogen and oxygen contents of the feed relative to uranium. The temperature profile of the thermal reactor is established by specifying the preheat of the feed prior to mixing, the feed composition, and the reactor wall temperature to thus vary and control the physical properties of the resulting solids according to the end use of the uranium product.

Traditional conversion of UF.sub.6 involves one or more hydrolysis and reduction reactions utilizing oxygen and hydrogen bearing compounds. Experience shows that the conversion pathways are not straightforward and involve multiple intermediate uranium compounds. Hence, one step conversions involving multiple reactants, as shown by one of the following familiar reactions, are unlikely: EQU UF.sub.6 +3H.sub.2 +O.sub.2 .fwdarw.UO.sub.2 +6HF (1)
and EQU UF.sub.6 +2H.sub.2 O+H.sub.2 .fwdarw.UO.sub.2 +6HF (2)
The most commonly observed uranium intermediates generated by traditional conversion technologies are UF.sub.4 and UO.sub.2 F.sub.2 as shown by the following pairs of reactions: EQU UF.sub.6 +H.sub.2 .fwdarw.UF.sub.4 +2HF (3) EQU UF.sub.4 +2H.sub.2 O.fwdarw.UO.sub.2 +4HF (4)
and EQU UF.sub.6 +2H.sub.2 O.fwdarw.UO.sub.2 F.sub.2 +4HF (5) EQU UO.sub.2 F.sub.2 +H.sub.2 .fwdarw.UO.sub.2 +2HF (6)
or EQU UO.sub.2 F.sub.2 +H.sub.2 O.fwdarw.1/3U.sub.3 O.sub.8 +1/6O.sub.2 +2HF (7)
Other reaction scenarios include UF.sub.5, UOF.sub.2, and UOF.sub.4. Uranium intermediates that the overall efficiency of the conversion process and largely determine the overall requirements and conditions for achieving the final uranium oxide product. For example, reactions (3) and (5) are rapid and unambiguous. On the other hand, reactions (4), (6), and (7) are traditionally slow and difficult to drive to completion without higher temperatures and large stoichiometric excesses of H.sub.2 and H.sub.2 O. It is well known by those skilled in the art that uranium intermediates also largely establish the physical properties of the final uranium oxide product.
The conversion of UF.sub.6 to UO.sub.2 has generally been pursued mainly by companies in the nuclear fuel business. For the most part, existing processes emphasize low-to-moderate operating temperatures with equipment designed to prepare chemically reactive UO.sub.2 suitable for a specific applications, i.e., the production of ceramic-grade UO.sub.2 for the fabrication of nuclear fuel. In most cases, uranium intermediates are deliberately formed via reactions (3) and (5), above, at relatively low temperatures, i.e., 200.degree.-300.degree. C. and the intermediates subsequently reacted in a second reactor via reactions (4) and (6), above, at moderate temperatures, i.e., 500.degree.-700.degree. C. These processes require large excesses of water and hydrogen to drive the reaction to completion. Moreover, even with the large stoichiometric excesses, extended processing times--on the order of hours--are required to bring about a reasonably high conversion efficiency of the intermediate to final product.
Representative of the numerous U.S. patents directed toward processes for the dry conversion of UF.sub.6 to uranium oxides is, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,830,841 and the U.S. patents listed therein. These patents describe processes for converting UF.sub.6 to uranium dioxide in furnaces, rotary kilns, fluidized beds or the like.
It is noted that U.S. Pat. No. 4,830,841 is concerned with a multiple step process for preparing UO.sub.2 from UF.sub.6 by reacting UF.sub.6 with steam to produce submicron uranyl fluoride powder, fluidizing a bed of uranium oxide material with a mixture of steam, hydrogen, and inert gas at about 580.degree. C. to about 700.degree. C. Thereafter, the submicron uranyl fluoride powder is introduced into the fluidized bed of uranium oxide material so that the uranyl fluoride powder is agglomerated, densified, fluidized, defluorinated, and reduced to a fluoride-containing uranium oxide material which is removed from the fluidized bed. Lastly, the fluoride-containing uranium oxide material is then contacted with additional hydrogen and steam at elevated temperature to obtain UO.sub.2 essentially free of fluorine.
In another prior art process, described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,260,575 entitled "Single Step Process for Preparation of Uranium Dioxide from Uranium Hexafluoride," a single step thermochemical process for the direct conversion of UF.sub.6 to a high density refractory UO.sub.2 fuel is described. This process requires reacting the UF.sub.6 with H.sub.2 O and H.sub.2 O at a very low pressure (.about.10 torr) on a hot surface, typically an Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 tube, maintained at 1200.degree.-1500.degree. C. in a resistance heated furnace to produce UO.sub.2. While this process deposited UO.sub.2 product as sub-micron powder, dendritic crystallites, and solid approaching theoretical density, it required extremely large excesses of water (20-30 times stoichiometric). Reduced pressure, diluent gases, and controlled feed configurations were required to prevent condensation of undesired intermediate uranium solids. Only UO.sub.2 was produced and the physical properties of the solids were not controlled. Also, it was difficult to recover the solids from the experimental system from the inside of the ceramic tube where they were formed. See also Nuclear Applications 1 (6), pp 584-588, December 1965.
In another process, a single fluidized bed reactor was demonstrated for the preparation of dense spherical UO.sub.2 particles from UF.sub.6 utilizing a cyclic mode to perform two discreet chemical unit operations. Unlike the low-temperature hydrolysis process for converting UF.sub.6 to UO.sub.2, the conversion reactor was operated at higher temperatures, e.g., 650.degree.-700.degree. C. to avoid the formation of undesirable UO.sub.2 F.sub.2, forming uranium products of UF.sub.4 and U.sub.3 O.sub.8. Thereafter, the intermediates were reacted with additional quantities of steam and H.sub.2 (with the UF.sub.6 flow discontinued) to form only UO.sub.2. Variation of the steam/UF.sub.6 molar ratio was observed to produce changes in the relative proportions of UF.sub.4 and U.sub.3 O.sub.8 formed during the UF.sub.6 feed period. While the cyclic process is simpler than the traditional UF.sub.6 conversion approaches, it is not normally efficient and is not generally preferred over a continuous process. See ANL-6902, I. E. Knudsen, et al, December, 1964.
None of these prior art processes or technologies provide for a single dry process that directly produces super-dense UO.sub.2, U.sub.3 O.sub.8, or UO.sub.3 and allows for the production of uranium oxide particulates of variable physical properties to enhance the industrial viability of the uranium oxide product or make a more environmentally stable uranium product for long term storage or permanent disposal. It is therefore a primary object of the present invention to provide such a process. Other objects of the present invention will become apparent to a person skilled in the art from a reading of the following preferred embodiments and appended claims and by reference to the accompanying drawing described hereinafter.

Method for the control of the composition and physical properties of solid uranium oxides


An implantable electrode is provided for treating tissue in a patient with energy. In one variation of this embodiment, the implantable electrode includes a shaft having a length sufficient to extend from outside a body of the patient to adjacent a tissue site to be treated, an electrode core attached to a distal end of the shaft capable of delivering a form of energy to the tissue site, one or more wires which extend from a proximal end of the shaft to the electrode core such that an energy source external to the patient can be coupled to the wire for delivering energy to the electrode core, and a head formed at least in part of a soluble and porous material which at least partially surrounds the electrode core and becomes conductive when contacted with an energy conducting liquid. According to this variation, the shaft also includes a lumen for delivering energy conducting liquid from outside the body to the head.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an electrode for damaging tissue within a patient's body and more particularly to an electrode which damages tissue by delivering a conductive fluid and radio frequency energy to a selected site within a patient's body.
2. Description of Related Art
It is often desirable to damage tissue at selected sites within the body without open surgery. For instance, when treating malignant tumors, abscesses, or infected tissue, a physician wants to destroy the tissue within a patient's body. In open surgery the physician opens the patient and attempts to physically remove the targeted tissues. However, open surgery can cause additional complications such as infection. Thus, several closed surgery techniques have been developed for damaging tissue. For instance, radiating the patient from an external source has been tried. Unfortunately, since the source is external, the radiation can not be sufficiently localized to the targeted tissue, thus, healthy tissue which has not been targeted can be damaged.
A recent technique which provides more localized treatment of the target tissue involves introducing a radio frequency (RF) electrode into the target tissue. In this technique, the physician places the electrode within the target tissue using techniques such as fluoroscopy, ultrasound, or manual palpitation. The physician then applies RF energy to the electrode which heats the tissue surrounding the electrode. Tissue is generally sensitive to heat such that high levels of heat or simply sustained heat can damage or destroy it. Once the physician has applied a desired amount of energy, the treatment is complete and the physician withdraws the electrode.
There are several difficulties with this technique. For instance, tissue adjacent to the electrode begins to desiccate very quickly, particularly when there is a high current density on the surface of the electrode. Once the tissue desiccates, the ability of that tissue to conduct RF energy is reduced. Thus, once the tissue becomes desiccated around the electrode, the ability of the electrode to treat tissue remote from the surface of the electrode is diminished. As a result, this technique is most effective for treating tissues which are closest to the surface of the electrode.
Another difficulty can arise when the physician must perform successive treatments. Often, the first treatment does not completely destroy the target tissue and additional treatments are required. To perform additional treatments, the physician must attempt to reinsert the electrode into the same target tissue. To do this, the physician often wants to puncture the same point on the patient's skin. However, scar tissue is often present from the previous surgery, thus, the physician usually does not want to puncture the same point again and must puncture the skin in a new location. This means the electrode will not approach the target site from the same angle and may result in imprecise placement of the electrode.
For the above reasons, there is a need for a method and device which can locally damage target tissue without open surgery. The method and device should allow the physician to easily treat tissue remote from the surface of the electrode. Further, the method and device should allow a physician to easily treat the same area of the target site each time a treatment is performed.


A method of monitoring radioactive emissions which includes obtaining a data set, the data set including a record of an event together with an indication of the time of the event and/or the detector which detected the event. The method also includes processing the data set by analyzing the whole of the data set according to a first set of criteria to provide a first analysed data set and analysing the whole of the data set according to a second set of criteria to provide a second analysed data set, one or more criteria of the second set being different to the criteria of the first set. The first set of criteria and the second set of criteria both include a first time period and a second time period.

1. The Field of the Invention
This invention concerns improvements in and relating to monitoring, and in particular, but not exclusively, in relation to monitoring of radioactive materials.
2. The Relevant Technology
WO00/67044 provides an improved method for collecting information on emissions arising from radioactive materials. The present invention concerns developments in the processing of such information and/or the uses to which it can be put.


A method for the co-production of silica and at least one other useful industrial chemical such as ethanol, comprises the steps of: pre-treating siliceous plant matter derived from plants, such as horsetail weeds from the genus Equisetum, to create a feedstock having exposed cellulose; placing the feedstock in a reactor containing a biological agent effective to break down the cellulose into at least one useful organic chemical reaction product and a silica-containing co-product; separating the at least one useful organic chemical product from the reactor; separating the silica-containing co-product from the reactor; and refining the silica-containing co-products into silica or other industrially useful silicon containing products. The biological agent may be an anaerobic thermophyllic bacteria, enzymes, or a co-mixture of enzymes and yeast.

There is currently great interest in finding energy sources that are alternatives to petroleum and coal, since we are currently running out of such resources, and perhaps more importantly, because it is becoming increasingly apparent that the burning of these non-carbon-neutral energy sources may be contributing to global climate change.
One area of alternative energy production that has received significant attention is photovoltaics, the conversion of light into electricity, most commonly using silicon based solar cells. Elemental silicon (Si) is produced via the Carbothermic Process, whereby silicon dioxide (typically quartz) is chemically reduced in an electric arc furnace at temperatures in excess of 1400° C. The reducing agents used in this process are carbonaceous, typically coal, charcoal, petroleum coke and wood chips. The net chemical reaction for Si production is:SiO2+2C→Si+2CO
One major problem with the current art is that, based on the low purity of starting materials, the Si product often contains high levels of undesirable elemental impurities. Such "Metallurgical Grade" (MG) silicon is often only 98% pure, and is entirely unusable in this form for the production of solar cells. One commonly employed method for purifying this MG silicon is to convert it through a high temperature reaction to the low boiling point compound trichlorosilane (SiHCl3), purify this chemical by distillation, then back-convert the SiHCl3 to elemental silicon in the presence of hydrogen gas at temperatures of ca. 1100 to 1200° C., generating HCl gas as a by-product. This purification process is very expensive due to energy requirements, chemical handling requirements, etc. In addition, the cost of the final silicon is approximately 5 to 10 times that which is desired for photovoltaic applications. Furthermore, the purity of the final product far exceeds the requirements for solar-cell manufacture.
A second method for producing photovoltaic (PV) grade silicon is by purifying or "upgrading" MG silicon to a level acceptable for solar-cell manufacture without the need for SiHCl3 as an intermediate. However, two silicon impurities that greatly degrade the performance of solar cells, Boron (B) and Phosphorus (P), cannot readily be removed from silicon using commonly employed methods in the art of silicon purification, such as directional solidification.
Although many novel processes have been devised to selectively remove B and P from MG silicon, these methods are expensive, since the MG silicon starting material must be re-melted to above 1400° C. prior to purification, increasing the final silicon cost due factors such as energy, labor, capital equipment and yield losses.
It would be highly desirable and advantageous to either synthesize PV grade Si directly from high-purity starting materials, or use such high-purity starting materials to prepare Si that requires a minimum of post-synthesis purification prior to use in the manufacture of solar-cells. Attempts have been made to prepare PV grade silicon by beginning with high-purity natural quartz and carbon sources. However, the disadvantages of this method include the need to mine the quartz and crush it into smaller pieces prior to reduction to elemental silicon. These steps further increase the cost of the starting material and are a potential source of further impurity introduction. Also, the geological source of the quartz material may be a significant distance from the location of final silicon manufacture, further increasing costs due to transportation. Furthermore, quartz, being a crystalline form of SiO2, is a known cause of the disease silicosis, which results when dust from such materials is inhaled.
There exist methods for isolating biogenic silica, that is, SiO2 that is developed or assimilated in the cell structures of living organisms, from plants or parts of plants, such as rice hulls. These isolation methods typically involve burning the rice hulls and recovering the siliceous ashes for further use (Pitt, U.S. Pat. No. 3,889,608, and U.S. Pat. No. 3,959,007; Mehta, U.S. Pat. No. 4,105,459). However, this method of biogenic silica recovery tends to fuse or incorporate undesirable inorganic elements such as B and P into the silica during this high temperature processing, as well as reduce surface area of the silica due to pore collapse and closure. Furthermore, in many embodiments the silica derived from rice hulls is further refined by dissolving the silica in strong base, then precipitating it out of solution by the addition of acid (Stephens et. al, U.S. Pat. No. 6,375,735; U.S. Pat. No. 6,638,354; and U.S. Patent Application Publication US 2003/0097966; Kang, U.S. Pat. No. 6,843,974; Connor and Rieber, U.S. Pat. No. 5,078,795, U.S. Pat. No. 5,008,021; Rieber et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,833,940; Shipley, U.S. Pat. No. 6,406,678).
Isolation of biogenic silica during the strong acid hydrolysis of rice straw has also been reported (Farone and Cuzens, U.S. Pat. No. 5,782,982). Sugars derived from this process are separated and purified prior to metabolic conversion into ethanol. The silica isolated from this strong acid hydrolysis process is dissolved using strong base, the supernatant liquid isolated and silica re-precipitated by lowering the pH of the supernatant liquid using acid. A major disadvantage of this methodology is the need to isolate the silica using strong bases and acids, which is very expensive due to the requirements of chemical storage, handling and disposal.
Biogenic silica derived from rice hulls has been used as a starting material for the preparation of silicon (Amick, U.S. Pat. No. 4,214,920). In these methods, rice hulls were typically first washed with water and/or dilute hydrochloric acid prior to being heated in either an inert or an oxygen atmosphere between 600° C. and 800° C. to carbonize or remove organic components, yielding a siliceous product that was then used to produce silicon. The chief disadvantage of these methodologies is the elimination or carbonization of organic materials such as cellulose from the rice hulls via simple burning, instead of isolating these materials and using them as feedstocks to create other economically valuable organic co-products. In addition, rice hulls, being very low density, are very expensive to transport, and any process utilizing rice hulls is consequently practically limited to a location close to rice-growing agricultural areas.
A second area of alternative energy production that has received significant attention is ethanol generation employing yeast fermentation of high-starch seeds from plants such as corn and wheat. However, there are significant problems with this method of ethanol production. For instance, this technology uses "food crops" and therefore competes with human and farm animal food supplies. Growing and harvesting of these crops is also "energy intensive" in terms of land preparation, the use of fertilizers and pesticides, irrigation requirements and the energy required to harvest and transport the crop materials to central processing locations. It has been estimated that it can take as much as 30 to 50 gallons of petroleum to produce one acre of corn for ethanol generation. In addition, there are concerns that agriculture techniques used to grow such crops may have long-term destructive effects such as soil erosion and water table contamination. Furthermore, there are limited ranges of suitable land where such crops can be cultivated. Also, the current art of utilizing grain crops such as corn to produce ethanol fuel is only economically viable through the generation of co-products, such as residual materials that may be sold for uses such as animal feed.
An alternative method of creating ethanol fuel from biomass involves the use of cellulose as a feedstock. There are currently two major methods of producing ethanol from such feedstocks: 1) a "Two-Step" process whereby the cellulose is broken down either enzymatically or chemically to glucose or cellobiose, followed by fermentation to ethanol by yeasts, and 2) a "One-Step" process whereby the cellulose is metabolized directly to ethanol under anaerobic conditions by cellulolytic thermophilic bacteria. One significant problem with current cellulose ethanol production is that many feedstocks (e.g., wood sources, grasses, etc.) contain a large percentage (as high as 30%) of lignin, a dense material which encapsulates the cellulose constituents, severely inhibiting or preventing access to this cellulose for breakdown into sugars by hydrolysis using enzymes or ethanol-producing microbes. Consequently, extensive pre-processing of cellulose-containing feedstocks such as wood is required to make the cellulose readily accessible to hydrolysis. Such pre-processing methods include mechanically reducing the size of the feedstock (e.g., converting wood to sawdust), harsh chemical treatments to separate the lignin from the cellulose, etc. These methods are highly energy intensive, can create significant amounts of chemical waste, and produce large quantities of lignin-based by-products, which have limited industrial value and are toxic.
There is accordingly a need for additional methods for producing silica and ethanol from plant material, which overcome at least some of the disadvantages associated with prior art methods.

Methods for co-production of ethanol and silica from equisetum


Embodiments of the invention relate to determining the position of a hand-held object from the acceleration of the hand-held object. In an embodiment, a measure of the displacement of the hand-held object is derived in part from a measure of an acceleration of the hand-held object. A measure of a position of the hand-held object is generated based on the displacement of the hand-held object, and is output.

A data input device such as a mouse includes a mechanism that tracks the movement of the mouse. The movement of the mouse is used to position an on-screen indicator (e.g., a cursor) as is desired by a mouse user. However, many conventional data input systems are not equipped to support cutting edge applications, such as graphics applications, that require three-dimensional tracking of the input device in order to position a three dimensional on-screen indicator among other shortcomings.
A conventional mouse can include a metal or plastic housing or casing and a ball that sticks out of the bottom of the casing. The mouse can be rolled on a flat surface, and can have one or more buttons on the top of the casing, and a cable that connects the mouse to a computer. As the ball is moved over the surface in any direction, a rotary sensor (electromechanical transducer) sends impulses to the computer that causes a mouse-responsive program to reposition an on-screen indicator (e.g., a cursor) on a display screen. The positioning is generally relative to some variable starting place. By noting the current position of the cursor on the display screen, a user can readjust the position of the on-screen indicator with precision by moving the mouse.
An optical mouse uses a light-emitting diode, an optical sensor, and digital signal processor (DSP) in place of the conventional mouse ball and electromechanical transducer discussed above. Movement is detected by sensing changes in reflected light, rather than by interpreting the motion of a rolling sphere.
The optical mouse takes microscopic snapshots of the surface upon which the mouse is positioned at a rate of more than 1,000 images per second. When the mouse is moved, the image of the surface changes. The tiniest irregularities in the surface can produce images that enable the sensor and DSP to generate usable movement data. The best surfaces reflect but scatter light, such as for example, a blank sheet of white drawing paper.
Conventional mouse systems have many shortcomings that are traceable to their aforementioned reliance on the use of mechanical balls and rotary sensors or optical pickups to determine position. Those devices that employ mechanical balls and rotary sensors invariably have moving parts that require cleaning. Moreover, devices that rely on optics require special surfaces in order for them to function properly. It should be appreciated that some surfaces do not permit the proper functioning of the sensor and DSP because the irregularities in the surfaces are too small to be detected, e.g., unfrosted glass. In addition, as discussed above, many conventional devices do not support cutting edge applications, such as graphics applications, that require three-dimensional tracking of the input device to position a three-dimensional on screen indicator.

Methods and systems for determining the position of a hand-held object from the acceleration of the hand-held object

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.


A system for monitoring use of a tool. The system may include an RFID tag coupled to the tool. A collar may be removably coupled to the tool and configured to be de-coupled from the tool prior to the tool being used. An RFID reader may be coupled to the collar and configured to transmit a first alert signal when the RFID reader is out of transmission range from the RFID tag.

Oil and gas well tools and equipment are distributed to various locations around the world. The tools and equipment are often expensive to purchase, and as such, one cost-efficient option may be to rent the tools or equipment rather than buy them. The payment structure for rental/license agreements for oil and gas tools or equipment often times is based upon the amount of time the tools or equipment are actually used, which presents challenges for licensors in tracking the actual use of the tools or equipment to generate maximum license revenue.
There is a need, therefore, for systems and methods for monitoring the use of rental tools and equipment. In particular, there is a need for systems and methods for monitoring the use of rental tools and equipment in the oil and gas industry.

High level RFID solution for rental tools and equipment


A non-uniform axisymmetric damper device is provided, comprising a first portion that extends radially outward from an outer surface of a flange protrusion, and is spaced from and concentric with the flange protrusion. Further, a second portion of the damper device is provided with an inner surface coupled to an outer surface of the first portion and a non-uniform outer surface extending radially outward from the first portion. Accordingly, a light-weight damper is provided that allows for resonance suppression in six degrees of freedom.

Dampers to curb moan noise in a cabin of a motor vehicle are sometimes provided between a differential gear box and a drive shaft of the vehicle. However, these dampers are generally heavy, uniform axisymmetric dampers that merely provide resonance suppression related to torsion experienced by the associated components. This type of damper may be expensive and degrade fuel economy, as it adds considerable weight to the vehicle.
The inventors have recognized the issues with the above approach to reduce moan noise and offer a system to at least partly address them. In one embodiment, a non-uniform axisymmetric damper device comprises a first portion extending radially outward from an outer surface of a flange protrusion, spaced from and concentric with the flange protrusion; and a second portion with a uniform inner surface coupled to an outer surface of the first portion and a non-uniform outer surface extending radially outward from the first portion. Further, the outer surface of the second portion includes a first and second thick section of equal thickness that are spaced from one another in a radial direction by a first and second thin section of lesser thickness than the thick sections.
In this way, the non-uniform construction of the damper of the present disclosure results in a lower weight damper than uniform axisymmetric damper devices, as the thinner sections are formed with less material than the thicker sections. Further, the thicker or thinner sections may be composed of a lighter material than their thinner or thicker counterparts, allowing for further weight-saving. This decrease in material usage and resulting decrease in damper weight allows for lower production costs and enhanced fuel economy. In addition, the present disclosure may offer several advantages. For example, adjusting the non-uniform characteristics of the damper allows it to be tuned to provide resonance performance in six degrees of freedom, including torsion, bending, and translations.
The above advantages and other advantages, and features of the present description will be readily apparent from the following Detailed Description when taken alone or in connection with the accompanying drawings.
It should be understood that the summary above is provided to introduce in simplified form a selection of concepts that are further described in the detailed description. It is not meant to identify key or essential features of the claimed subject matter, the scope of which is defined uniquely by the claims that follow the detailed description. Furthermore, the claimed subject matter is not limited to implementations that solve any disadvantages noted above or in any part of this disclosure.

Non-uniform axisymmetric driveline/axle damper


A roller bushing assembly (21d, 21e, 21f) designed to enable a low tolerance, frictional fit within an out-of-round or otherwise distorted support member (5, 9) includes a bushing member (29a, 216) having an outer surface (102) machined to provide various axially spaced, annular grooves (127-130, 132 and 242-250). Between or directly adjacent respective ones of the annular grooves (127-130, 132 and 242-250) are defined a plurality of axially spaced and radially extending ribs (113-122 and 232-240). The axial outermost ribs (113, 122 and 240) are preferably elongated relative to the remaining ribs (114-121 and 232-239) and have annularly chamfered portions (124, 125 and 252). The ribs (113-122 and 232-240) are adapted to shear upon mounting of the bushing member (29a, 216) within an out-of-round or otherwise distorted support. By providing the shearable ribs (113-122 and 232-240), the bushing assembly (21d, 21e, 21f) can be effectively mounted within a greater range of varying sized support members. In accordance with a first embodiment, the bushing member constitutes a sleeve (29a) within which is mounted at least one bearing unit (33, 34). The shearing of the ribs (113-122) assures that the bearing unit (33, 34) will not be excessively pre-loaded in a radial direction.

The present invention pertains to the art of bushings and, more specifically, to a bushing assembly particularly adapted for use in attaching a leaf spring of a vehicle suspension to a truck chassis. The invention is also directed to an improved method of installing a bushing assembly in a leaf spring suspension system or other support.
It is widely known in the vehicle art to utilize leaf springs in vehicle suspension systems. In particular, it is common to utilize leaf springs in rear suspension assemblies for both light and heavy-duty trucks. In such a suspension arrangement, the leaf spring is attached to a chassis of the truck at terminal support locations. More specifically, each end of the leaf spring is bent to form a spring eye which is attached to the chassis through a support member, generally constituted by either a bracket or a shackle. The leaf spring is preferably attached to the support member via a bushing assembly in order to provide rotational movement between the end of the leaf spring and the support member. Such rotation is desirable in order to provide enhanced suspension characteristics. Conversely, if the ends of the spring are supported in a fixed manner, such as when the spring/support connection freezes up, the leaf spring would essentially act as a cantilevered spring and thus provide deteriorated suspension characteristics.
In seeking to provide a high quality leaf spring support arrangement designed to maintain desirable suspension characteristics for prolong periods, improvements in the design of roller bushings utilized in connecting a leaf spring to a suspension support have been proposed. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,562,348 is directed to a compact roller bushing assembly, designed to rotatably connect an eye of a leaf spring to a chassis bracket, which generally requires less scheduled maintenance than prior known arrangements while sustaining relative rotation between the leaf spring and the truck chassis. Although this patented arrangement does provide an assembly which prevents the spring/support connection from freezing up and can be readily retrofitted to existing suspension systems, the arrangement does present some problems. For instance, the typical eye of a leaf spring often tends to be either too small or "out of round", i.e., not perfectly cylindrical, such that the tolerances between the outside diameter of the bushing assembly and the inside diameter of the spring eye can be extremely small. In this situation, a spring eye expander must be used to install the roller bushing assembly within the spring eye. This is the preferred installation method outlined in the '348 patent. However, such an installation method can place extra pressure on the roller bushing assembly, directly through the outer sleeve thereof, which can lead to various system problems. For instance, roller bearings, which are typically pre-mounted within a bushing sleeve, may be forced or shelled out of the bushing sleeve upon installation of the sleeve within the spring eye. In addition, the radial forces exerted on the bearing assembly can deform the sleeve and bearings such that the insertion of a chassis bracket pin therein is made difficult. In other words, the sleeve and bearing assembly become too small to allow the pin to be removed or reinstalled. Furthermore, the overall bearing and pin life can be significantly reduced if excessive pre-loads are applied to the bushing assembly. Such a pre-loading problem can occur, for example, when a bushing sleeve is forced into an out-of-round or small (low side of tolerance) spring eye thereby causing excessive radial forces to be applied to the sleeve which deforms the cylindrical shape of the inner surface of the sleeve. This deformation, in turn, can crush the bearing assembly and lead to premature failure thereof.
Therefore, this prior proposed roller bushing system may have practical limitations regarding its use in connection with spring eyes which are out-of-round to a certain degree at a low side of a tolerance fit range. In addition, considering that a rather extreme tolerance, i.e., in the order of 0.0005 inches (0.0127 cm), must be established between the outside surface of the bushing assembly and the support in order for the sleeve of the bushing assembly to be properly secured in position, the applicability of this system may also be effectively limited to a rather small tolerance range between a given bearing sleeve and support.
In the art of bearings in general, additional proposals have been made directed to establishing an interference connection between a bearing assembly and a support, even when the bearing is to be mounted in an out-of-round support member or journal. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,365,256 discloses a process in which several coating layers of a shearable material are applied and heat cured to an outer race of a bearing prior to mounting of the bearing within an irregularly surfaced or contoured support aperture. In accordance with this patented arrangement, the various layers can be readily sheared when the bearing is forced into the support aperture such that any gaps between an outer surface of the bearing and an inner surface of the support are filled by the shearable material. Unfortunately, this arrangement suffers from various drawbacks, including the additional material and manufacturing costs associated with applying coating after coating of extra material on either the outer surface of the bearing or, presumably, the inner surface of the support member or journal. In addition, as the shearable material is made from a different material than the bearing itself, this interface is susceptible to degradation which would result in undesirable relative rotation between the outer bearing race and the support.
Other proposed solutions to this problem of establishing a suitable fit between a bearing and a support are presented in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,429,927 and 4,671,680. According to each of these patented arrangements, a support or journal is provided with a plurality of radially inwardly extending protrusions prior to receiving the bearing. These protrusions are able to either elastically or plastically deform to accommodate dimensional discrepancies between the components.
Unfortunately, such arrangements are not practical in the truck suspension environment due to the fact that the protrusions would have to be correspondingly formed in the spring eye portion of the leaf spring itself, which is the out-of-round portion of the entire assembly. Not only would it be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to accurately form such protrusions in a newly formed spring eye, but such an arrangement would certainly not be applicable in retrofitting existing suspension systems in need of bushing repair.
Based on the above, there exists a need in various environments for a bushing assembly including a sleeve which can be effectively, frictionally received within a support member without unduly pre-loading bearings mounted internally in the sleeve. More generally, there exists a need for a bushing assembly including a bushing member that can be effectively frictionally mounted within an internal bore of a support member, even when the bore has a size and shape within a predetermined tolerance range from an ideal size and shape. There particularly exists a need in the art of vehicle suspensions for a bushing assembly which can be mounted, without the use of a pre-loading expander, in an out-of-round or small tolerance spring eye of a leaf spring. In addition, there exists the need for a roller bushing assembly which can be installed in an out-of-round eye of a leaf spring while still establishing a tight frictional fit with the spring eye so as to present an improved roller bushing assembly having an increased useful life with minimal maintenance.


A memory chip has a signal line and a complex impedance which is connected to the signal line for termination of the signal line. A memory having such a memory chip and a method for operating a memory chip are also described. The memory chip on the memory having a signal line that is terminated with a complex impedance.

Modern computer systems typically include a processor and a memory device which stores information accessed by the processor. During system operation, the processor may issue access commands to the memory device to access the stored information. The access commands issued by the processor may include read and write commands. For each received access command, the memory device may process the received access command and use the access command to access a memory array which contains the information stored by the memory device.

Memory chip having a complex termination


A stripping system that includes a securement device including a receiver platform and an engagement platform sized to receive at least a portion of a large diameter cable having an outer jacket defining a thickness of at least 0.5 mm. The engagement platform translates relative to the receiver platform to secure the cable to the securement device. The system includes a cutting device including a receiver platform that includes a first cutting apparatus and an engagement platform that includes a second cutting apparatus. The receiver platform is sized to receive at least a portion of the cable. The engagement platform translates relative to the receiver platform to move the second cutting apparatus toward the first cutting apparatus to define a cutting interface that is sized to partially sever the outer jacket such that at least a portion of the 0.5 mm thickness of the outer jacket remains partially intact.

Cables and cords generally include a protective outer jacket or coating disposed around one or more internal components of the cable for purposes of shielding the internal components from external exposure. The one or more internal components of a cable or a cord are shielded from external exposure to prevent damage to the internal components and/or protect other external components from direct contact and/or exposure to the internal components.
Electrical cables may include one or more electrical conductors extending within an outer jacket of the electrical cable. To access the internal components of the cable, the protective outer jacket may be partially removed (i.e., stripped) to thereby expose the a portion of the internal components (e.g., conductors). With the protective outer jackets generally being formed from a durable coating material, removing the outer jacket typically requires use of a cutting instrument and manual separation of the weakened portion of the outer jacket from the remaining jacket in a particular manner to avoid damage to the internal components surrounded by the outer jacket. Manually cutting, gripping, and pulling the outer jacket to expose the internal components encapsulated therein may be difficult for a user, may expose a user to potential injury, may be excessively time consuming, may be inefficient, and/or may result in damage to the electrical cable. This may particularly be prevalent when the cable includes a protective outer jacket having a relatively large thickness, such as, for example, large diameter cables.

Cable stripping systems, devices, and methods for performing the same


An optical node capable of automatically detecting its interconnectivity is disclosed. The node includes a light switch, a light source, light detector, a control circuit having a unique identification. The node sends its identification via each of its ports and also listens to each of its ports for identification from other nodes. The node may store the interconnectivity information, forward the interconnectivity information to another node, or forward the interconnectivity information to a path router.

The present invention relates to the art of data networks. More particularly, the present invention relates to data networks using optical switches.
Because of ever increasing bandwidth requirements, data networks utilizing optical transmission systems are becoming popular. Optical transmission systems have a larger bandwidth compared to electrical transmission systems.
FIG. 1 illustrates a simplified optical switching network 100 including a plurality of input lines represented by lines 102a, 102b, and ellipsis 102c (collectively, "102") and a plurality of output lines represented by lines 104a, 104b, and ellipsis 104c (collectively, "104"). In the network 100, three optical nodes NA 110, NB 120, and NC 130 are illustrated. Although only three nodes are shown, the switching network 100 may include hundreds or even thousands of interconnected optical nodes.
Node NA 110 has an optical switch 112, a control circuit 114, and a plurality of input lines and output lines, or ports, designated, for convenience, NA0 to NAn where n is an integer. Typical values for n may be 15, 63, or 255. The ports—NA0, NA1, . . . and NAn—are ports of the node NA 110 as well as the ports of the switch 112. The switch 112 may utilize micro mirrors, liquid, or gaseous elements (generically, "switching element") to direct or reflect optical signals from a first port to a second port. Typically, the ports are bi-directional but is sometimes uni-directional. The control circuit 114, connected to the switch 112, controls the state of the switching elements to implement Node NA 110 as described herein above is known in the art.
Nodes NB 120 and NC 130 are similarly configured to node NA 110, and their ports are similarly denoted herein. A path router 140 is connected to nodes NA 110, NB 120, and NC 130. The path router 140 contains physical path topology of the network 100 necessary to make connections as requested. The path router 140 contains the physical network topology of how the switches are connected.
For instance, in order for the path router 140 to successfully direct an input signal at input line 102b to an output line 104b, the path router 140 needs to know that (1) the input line 102b feeds into port NA1; (2) port NA9 is connected to port NB1; (3 port) NB8 is connected to port NC7; and (4) port NC9 is connected to the output line 104b. With the information, the path router 140 signals node NA 110 to route its port NA1 to its port NA9, signals node NB 120 to link its port NB1 to its port NB8, and signals node NC 130 to link its port NC7 to its port NC9. The physical path topology information may be entered directly into the path router 140 or supplied by an external controller system (not shown), connected to the path router 140.
In the illustrated configuration, port NA9 is connected to port NB1 (connection 150) and port NB8 is connected to port NC7 (connection 152). The other ports of nodes NA 110, NB 120, and NC 130 may be connected to ports of nodes not show in FIG. 1. As the number of nodes, thus the ports, grows in the network 100, the number of possible connections grows exponentially. It is not uncommon to have a network with hundreds or even thousands of ports. Prior art requires that the physical topology be configured manually.
Without a correct topology of the network 100 as defined by the connection information of the routing table, the network 100 does not operate effectively.
The processes of manually defining the full network physical path topology for the path router 140 are susceptible to error. For example, an optical path can be made to an unintended port or to an unintended node. Or, incorrect data may be entered into the path router 140. The problem is exacerbated by the fact that networks are becoming increasingly large and complex.
Moreover, when new nodes are installed, connections are modified, or when error in connection information is suspected, the entire network must be manually analyzed, and the topology manually reconfigured. No dynamic or automated procedure exists to determine the network topology.
Accordingly, there remains a need for an improved technique to determine the connections and topology of an optical network.

Avago Technologies Fiber IP (Singapore) Ptd. Ltd.


Reduced-ethanol perfume compositions according to the invention comprise specific combinations of acrylates/VA copolymer and acrylates copolymer in an aqueous base or delivery vehicle. The perfume compositions according to the invention are easy to manufacture and provide an aqueous perfume composition that preserves aromatic integrity (intensity, duration and range), even in emulsion form. The most advantageous use of compositions of the invention are as parfums, eau de parfums, eau de toilettes, and colognes. However, the invention may also find use in many types of fragranced products, such as those used on the skin and hair of humans or animals, in cleaning products of all types, in air deodorizers, air fresheners, and more.

The overwhelming majority of liquid perfume compositions use alcohol, typically ethanol, as a solubilizer for aromatic ingredients that are usually included in the composition in the form of fragrant oils. Products with concentrations of ethanol between 50 and 95% by volume are common. The use of ethanol solubilizer renders a transparent perfume composition. Nevertheless, the use of ethanol has its drawbacks. These include, but are not be limited to, acute contact dermatitis. Furthermore, ethanol is classified as a volatile organic compound (VOC). For some time, there has been an effort to reduce the level of VOC's in the ambient environment. Other drawbacks are apparent in cultures where the use of alcohol is strictly regulated or prohibited on religious grounds.
There have been efforts to reduce or eliminate alcohol from perfume products. For example, water-based perfume products are known, but these have not gained widespread acceptance for reasons related to performance and aesthetics. One problem is that perfuming ingredients tend to be insoluble in water due to their hydrophobic nature. Attempts to address this by forming emulsion compositions have been tried. See, for example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,803,195; 5,374,614; 6,403,109; 6,774,101; US2003/0186836; US2004/0209795; U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,226,901; 7,655,613; 7,846,889; 8,343,521; 9,301,910. However, many emulsion perfume compositions have their own drawbacks. For example, the use of too much surfactant can lead to skin irritation, a tacky feel, and alter the perception of the aromatic ingredients. This is especially true for microemulsion compositions, which use a relatively high concentration of surfactant, but macroemulsions and nanoemulsions may also suffer from the same problem. As a result, water-based perfume compositions have, in general, not provided the same intensity, duration and range as traditional ethanol based fragrances. Regarding loss of intensity, we mean that the aroma of a water-based fragrance tends to be less potent, than a traditional perfume. Regarding decreased duration, we mean that water-based perfume compositions are perceptible to the human nose for a significantly shorter time than a traditional ethanol-based perfume composition. Range, as used herein, is sometimes referred to as olfactive linearity. Regarding loss of range, we mean that following application to the skin or other surface, the blend of aromatic notes given off by aqueous-based perfume compositions is not maintained, even when some fragrance is still perceptible. Thus, there is still a need for an aqueous-based perfume composition having comparatively little ethanol, yet preserving aromatic integrity (intensity, duration and range). The present invention provides such compositions in emulsion form. To the best of our knowledge, the prior art does not disclose or suggest the compositions of present invention, specifically water-based perfume compositions comprising 4.5% to 18.5% of acrylates/VA copolymer and 0.25% to 1.0% of acrylates copolymer by weight, as disclosed herein. Nor does it disclose ratios of these materials as disclosed herein, nor their usefulness in preserving the performance of perfume compositions.