A duty-cycle distortion self-correcting delay line has an even number of programmable delay lines connected in series between a data signal input and a data signal output. Each programmable delay line is paired with a corresponding inverting element. A data signal propagated from the input to the output is passed un-inverted in half of the delay lines and is passed inverted in the other half of the delay lines. When the data signal is a square wave clock signal, a duty cycle distortion caused by the delay lines passing the un-inverted signal is cancelled by a duty cycle distortion caused by the delay lines passing the inverted signal. The inverting elements may be XNOR or XOR gates connected to an anti-aging signal input which, when asserted, maintains all of the delay lines in order to avoid differential aging effects leading to acquired duty cycle distortion.

Very-large-scale integration (VLSI) is a method of producing an integrated circuit having a very large number of transistors. Complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) is one technique for making integrated circuits such as microprocessors, memory, and digital logic circuits. Many digital logic circuits are implemented using p-type metal-oxide-semiconductor logic (PMOS) and n-type metal-oxide-semiconductor logic (NMOS) which respectively use p-type and n-type metal-oxide-semiconductor field effect transistors (MOSFETs).
Typical synchronous digital logic circuits employ a clock signal to synchronize circuit actions. A typical clock signal takes the form of a square wave having a fixed duty cycle and frequency, wherein the duty cycle designates the ratio of the pulse width to the pulse period, and a clock pulse designates a single period of the square wave. Circuits synchronized to the clock signal respond to one or more "transition edges", which may include either the rising edge, the falling edge, or both the rising and falling edges of the clock signal square wave. When a circuit is responsive to both the rising and falling edges, it is said to operate at a double data rate (DDR).
A delay line is a common design technique used to adjust clock or data edges in a digital circuit. A delay line is typically a regular structure comprising a chain of delay elements such as buffers. The signal is delayed by the length of the delay element thus enabling adjustment of the transition edge or edges to the desired timing window. Usually, the amount of adjustment is process, voltage, and temperature dependent, and therefore delay lines are sometimes programmable wherein the effective number of delay elements in the chain can be adjusted via external controls. The length of a delay line may be expressed in terms of the number of delay elements engaged, or "delay taps".
Duty cycle distortion (DCD) is a variance between the duty cycle of a clock pulse at the destination as compared to the duty cycle at the source. DCD occurs when the propagation delay of the rising edge is different from the propagation delay of the falling edge. DCD can be a result of aging including a degradation of device performance over time due to effects such as electro-migration (EM) or negative bias temperature instability (NBTI). The speeds of aging for PMOS and NMOS transistors are non-symmetrical and are dependent of the state of the transistors. For example, a metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) ages faster when it is "on" than when it is "off".
Duty cycle distortion is a concern when the delay line is used on a clock signal and both rising and falling edges are used, as in a double data rate interface. In such a case, a delay line is typically used to adjust the clock edges to align with data edges within the budgeted timing window. If DCD is too large (i.e., propagation delay of the rising edge is very different from that of falling edge), it may not be possible to align both rising and falling edges of the clock to data. In order to meet the timing specification, DCD must be minimized.
A single delay element in a delay line can be designed with minimal DCD—that is, the propagation delay of a rising edge is equal to the propagation delay of a falling edge within predefined tolerances—and is thus said to be balanced, for a particular process corner (meaning an extreme of possible circuit fabrication parameters). It is, however, difficult to maintain minimal DCD across all process corners. For example, if a delay element is balanced in the slow-slow (SS) or fast-fast (FF) process corner, DCD usually increases in the fast-slow (FS) or slow-fast (SF) process corners. Furthermore, DCD can accumulate and become very large as the delay line becomes longer. For example, a 0.5 picosecond DCD in a single delay element can add up to hundreds of picoseconds when the delay line is hundreds of elements long.
Moreover, due to the non-symmetrical nature of the aging effect for PMOS and NMOS transistors, a perfectly balanced delay line may still develop DCD over time.
It remains desirable, therefore, to develop improved techniques for reducing duty cycle distortion in digital circuit clock signal delay lines.

Duty-cycle distortion self-correcting delay line


A liquid crystal display module includes: a liquid crystal display panel; an array of light sources emitting different color lights; and a light guide plate for mixing the different color lights emitted from the light sources, wherein the array of light sources is arranged near a middle of a rear surface of the light guide plate.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a liquid crystal display module, more particularly, a liquid crystal display module for improving display quality.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a liquid crystal display (LCD) device includes a liquid crystal display module and a driving circuitry for driving the liquid crystal display module. The liquid crystal display module includes a liquid crystal display panel having liquid crystal cells arranged in a matrix between two glass substrates, and a back light unit for irradiating light through the liquid crystal display panel. In addition, optical sheets for directing the light from the back light unit toward the liquid crystal display panel in a vertical direction are arranged on the liquid crystal display module. The liquid crystal display panel, the back light unit and the optical sheets should be engaged with each other so as to be integral to prevent light loss and protected from damage due to external impact. Thus, a case is provided for the LCD device to enclose the back light unit and the optical sheets as well as the edges of the liquid crystal display panel.
FIG. 1 is an expanded perspective view illustrating the related art liquid crystal display module. FIG. 2 is a sectional view illustrating the liquid crystal display module taken along line I–I′ in FIG. 1. Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2, the liquid crystal display module 1 includes a main support 14, a back light unit and a liquid crystal display panel 6 stacked inside of the main support 14, and a top case 2 for enclosing the edge of the liquid crystal display panel 6 and the side surface of the main support 14.
The liquid crystal display panel 6 includes an upper substrate 5 and a lower substrate 3. Liquid crystal materials are injected between the upper substrate 5 and the lower substrate 3. The liquid crystal display panel 6 is provided with a spacer (not shown) for maintaining a cell gap between the upper substrate 5 and the lower substrate 3. The upper substrate 5 of the liquid crystal display panel 6 is provided with a color filter, a common electrode and a black matrix(not shown). Signal lines, such as a data line and a gate line (not shown) are formed on the lower substrate 3 of the liquid crystal display panel 6. A thin film transistor (TFT) is formed adjacent to a crossing of the data line and the gate line. The TFT switches a data signal from the data line to the liquid crystal cell in response to a scanning pulse (i.e., a gate pulse) from the gate line. A pixel electrode is formed in a pixel region defined between the data line and the gate line.
A pad area is formed at one side of the lower substrate 3 and has pads connected to each of the data line and the gate line. A tape carrier package (not shown) having a driver integrated circuit mounted thereon for applying driving signals to the TFT is attached onto the pad area. The tape carrier package applies data signals from the driver integrated circuit to the data lines. Further, the tape carrier package supplies the scanning signal to the gate line. An upper polarizing sheet is attached onto the upper substrate 5 of the liquid crystal display panel 6 and a lower polarizing sheet is attached onto of the rear side of the lower substrate 3 of the liquid crystal display panel 6.
The main support 14 is made from a mold material, and its inner lateral wall is molded into a stepped coverage face. The stepped coverage face has a securing part in which the back light unit and the liquid display panel 6 are disposed. The liquid crystal display panel 6 and the back light unit are stacked in the securing part of the main support 14.
The recent trend in the back light unit is towards small size, thin thickness and lightweight. Pursuant to this trend, an LED array has been used as a light source, which is advantageous in a power consumption, thickness, weight and brightness in comparison with a fluorescent lamp that is used as a light source for the back light unit.
The back light unit includes: first and second light guide plates 10 and 20, which are stacked in two layers to face the liquid crystal display panel 6; a first light-emitting diode(LED) array 30a arranged to face one side surface of the first light guide plate 10; a second LED array 30b arranged to face the other side surface of the second light guide plate 20; a reflection sheet 12 arranged on a rear surface of the first light guide plate 10; and a plurality of optical sheets 8 stacked between the second light guide plate 20 and the liquid crystal display panel 6. FIG. 3 is a perspective view illustrating the related art light-emitting diode array. The first LED array 30a includes a plurality of LED driving circuits 34a and a printed circuit board (PCB) 32a on which the LED driving circuits 34a are arranged in parallel, as shown in FIG. 3. Each of the LED driving circuits 34a includes an LED, which functions as a point light source, for emitting an incoherent light color, such as a red light, a green light or a blue light, and a control circuit for controlling the emission of the LED. The first LED array 30a is arranged to face the incident surface provided at one side surface of the first light guide plate 10.
The second LED array 30b has configuration elements and a structure identical to that of the first LED array 30a shown in FIG. 3. For instance, the PCB 32 and the plurality of LED driving circuits 34a of the first LED array 30a correspond to PCB 32b and a plurality of LED driving circuits 34b of the second LED array 30. Accordingly, an explanation of the second LED array 30b will be substituted with the explanation of the first LED array 30a. The second LED array 30b is arranged to face the incident surface provided at the other side surface of the second light guide 20.
Lights generated from each of the first and the second LED arrays 30a and 30b are irradiated to the first and the second light guide plates 10 and 20 via the incident surfaces of the first and the second light guide plates 10 and 20, respectively. Each of the first and the second light guide plates 10 and 20 converts a path of the light incident from each of the first and the second LED arrays 30a and 30b to be perpendicular to the liquid crystal display panel 6.
A scattering pattern 15 is provided on a rear surface of the other side of the first light guide plate 10 and is separated from the first LED array 30a. The scattering pattern 15 reflects the light irradiated from the first LED array 30a via the incident surface of the first light guide plate 10 and scatters the lights to diffuse toward the second light guide plate 20. The scattering pattern 15 is separated by the designated distance d1 from the incident surface of the first light guide plate 10 to mix the red, green and blue color lights irradiated from the first LED array 30a so as to convert them into a white color.
A scattering pattern 25 is provided on a rear surface of the other side of the second light guide plate 20 and is separated from the second LED array 30b. The scattering pattern 25 reflects the light irradiated from the second LED array 30b via the incident surface of the second light guide plate 20 and scatters the light to make it diffuse toward the optical sheets 8. The scattering pattern 25 is separated by the designated distance d2 from the incident surface of the second light guide plate 20 to mix the red, the green and the blue color lights irradiated from the second LED array 30b into a white color.
The reflection sheet 12 is located at the rear surface of the first light guide plate 10, and serves to re-reflect the light incident thereto through the rear surface of the first light guide plate 10 into the first light guide plate 10, thereby reducing a light loss. In other words, the light irradiated on each of the first and the second light guide plates 10 and 20 that progresses toward a lower surface of the first and the second light guide plate 10 and 20 is reflected by the reflection sheet 12 to be redirected toward the liquid crystal display panel 6.
Each of the optical sheets 8 diffuses the lights provided from the first light guide plate 10 and the second light guide plate 20 and converts the paths of the lights to be perpendicular to the liquid crystal display panel 6, to thereby improve light efficiency. To this end, a lower diffusing sheet is stacked on the second light guide plate 20 for diffusing the light provided from the first and second light guide plates 10 and 20 into the entire area, first and second prism sheets for converting a progress angle of the light diffused by the lower diffusing sheets to be perpendicular to the liquid crystal display panel 6, and an upper diffusing sheet for diffusing the lights going through the first and second prism sheets to irradiate light onto the liquid crystal display panel 6. Thus, the lights from the first and second light guide plates 10 and 20 are irradiated via the optical sheets 8 to the liquid crystal display panel 6.
The top case 2 is manufactured in a shape of a square band having a plane part and a side part. The top case 2 encloses the edge of the liquid crystal display panel 6 and the main support 14.
As described above, since the LED driving circuits 34a and 34b emit incoherent colored lights, such as red light, green light and blue light, the LED driving circuits 34a and 34b are separated by at least a designated distances d1 and d2 from each of the first and the second light guide plates 10 and 20 to mix the red, green and blue lights into white light. For this reason, the scattering patterns 15 and 25 provided at the first and second light guide plates 10 and 20 are formed to separated by the designated distances of d1 and d2 from the incident surfaces of the first and the second light guide plate 10 and 20, respectively.
If the LED driving circuits 34a and 34b emitting the red, green and blue lights are used as light sources, then brightness of the lights from the first and second light guide plates 10 and 20 becomes uneven because partial areas of the first and second light guide plates 10 and 20 are used as regions in which the red, green and blue lights are mixed into a white light whereas the lights are scattered only at the remaining areas. In other words, light 36a emitted from the LED driving circuit 34a of the first LED array 30a arranged at the side surface of the first light guide plate 10 is scattered by the scattering pattern 15 provided at the first light guide plate 10 and the scattered light 38b then progresses toward the liquid crystal display panel 6. Also, light 36b emitted from the LED driving circuit 34b of the second LED array 30b arranged at the side surface of the second light guide plate 20 is scattered by the scattering pattern 25 provided at the second light guide plate 20 and the scattered light 38b then progresses toward the liquid crystal display panel 6.
The above-mentioned back light unit of the related art liquid crystal display module 1 has a drawback of increased thickness and weight since a set of two light guide plates 10 and 20 are used to obtain a uniform brightness. Furthermore, since the light 36a from the first light guide plate 10 goes through the second light guide plate 20, the brightness of the related art liquid crystal display module 1 becomes lower. The lowered brightness deteriorates a display quality of the liquid crystal display module 1.
FIG. 4 shows an arrangement of a back light unit employing a color mixing light guide plate. To solve the problems that the thickness of the back light unit becomes thick and brightness becomes uneven, there has been proposed a back light unit employing a light guide plate 40 for a color mixing as shown in FIG. 4. The color mixing light guide plate 40 doesn't require an area in which the red, green and green lights are mixed into white light as in the related art light guide plates 10 and 20 shown in FIG. 2. Thus, the back light unit can be made with one color mixing light guide plate 40 and therefore, it is possible to decrease the thickness of the back light unit. Further, by arranging the first and the second LED arrays 30a and 30b shown in FIG. 1 at both side surfaces of the color mixing light guide plate 40, the brightness of the light irradiated to the liquid crystal display panel 6 can be uniform. However, in the arrangement that a light source is arranged at the side surface of the color mixing light guide plate 40, light efficiency is low, so that brightness is lower accordingly. Thus, such an arrangement is still disadvantagous in that display quality of the liquid crystal display module deteriorates.


The innovation disclosed and claimed herein, in one aspect thereof, comprises systems, methods and computer program products that enable provisioning of a hybrid cloud services solution to predetermined users. The innovation enables provisioning to be completed with a integration layer component and a provisioning component that integrate rules, such as enterprise-wide or industry-wide rules into out of band touch points, even touch points that the user may not be aware of, and may typically not be called upon to be aware of.

The U.S. Department of Commerce National Institute of Standards and Technology (herein "NIST") describes cloud computing as a model for enabling convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction. NIST goes on and notes that cloud computing promotes availability and is composed of five essential characteristics (on-demand self-service, broad network access, resource pooling, rapid elasticity, and measured service); According to NIST, cloud computing traditionally comes in three service models (Software as a Service ("SaaS"), Platform as a Service ("PaaS"), and Infrastructure as a Service ("IaaS")); and, traditionally is deployed in one of four deployment models (private cloud, community cloud, public cloud, or hybrid cloud).
Critically, per NIST, government and industry must begin adoption of this technology in response to difficult economic constraints. During this adoption process, NIST warns that cloud computing technology may challenge many traditional approaches to datacenter and enterprise application design and management. However, adoption alone is not enough, and the Executive Summary of the U.S. Government Cloud Computing Technology Roadmap, Volume 1, Release 1.0 (Draft) in November 2011 characterizes cloud computing as a "profound economic and technical shift (with) great potential to . . . stimulat[e] innovation in IT solutions."

Creating augmented hybrid infrastructure as a service


An onboard navigation apparatus provides travel guidance on a road including a plurality of roadways heading in the same direction. The road specifically includes a special roadway such as a carpool lane having no exits to other roads, an ordinary roadway having exits to the other roads and a predetermined traveling-path changing area provided as a sole area allowing a vehicle to change a traveling path thereof between the special roadway and the ordinary roadway. The apparatus determines a present position of a vehicle, determines whether the detected position is in the special roadway or in an ordinary roadway. The apparatus provides, in addition to normal travel guidance, information on the traveling-path changing area existing ahead of the vehicle on a display, when the detected position is in the special roadway.

A conventional navigation apparatus detects the present position of a vehicle by using a GPS or the like while the vehicle is traveling, displays the present position over a road map on a display unit, and sets a proper route from the present position to a destination as guidance toward the destination. Such a navigation apparatus contributes to easier driving. It is to be noted that, as driving guidance, the proper route from the present position to the destination is shown in a color different from other roads on the map on the display unit or shown by a thick line on the display unit. Besides such a proper route, the driving guidance also enlarges the display of an intersection, which the vehicle enters next, and outputs guiding sounds in order to lead the driver to the destination.
In addition, in a process to set the proper route from the present position to the destination, in general, Dijkstra's method or a technique conforming to the method is adopted. More specifically, the cost (or the evaluation value) of each route from the present position to the destination is computed by using information on links between nodes. When the calculation of the cost of every link from the present position to the destination is completed, links providing a minimum total cost are connected to each other to set a route from the present position to the destination. In a process to set a route from the present position to the destination, however, a road on which the vehicle is not allowed to travel is not included in the route. Examples of such roads are a one-way road or a road specially provided for pedestrians. If information on link interconnection reveals such vehicle-travel restrictions, the route from the present position to the destination can be set by exclusion of roads each subjected to the restrictions.
The vehicle-traveling restrictions established for roads such as a one-way road and a road specially provided for pedestrians do not necessarily apply to all vehicles uniformly. As an example, one of road systems seen in freeways in big cities mainly in the U.S. includes a HOV lane (carpool lane). A carpool lane is provided to recommend car sharing for the purpose of reducing the number of vehicles traveling on roads. Specifically, only a high occupancy vehicle (HOV) having a plurality of passengers therein is allowed to travel along a carpool lane. When the driver of a vehicle is the only passenger in the vehicle, the vehicle is subjected to the vehicle-traveling restriction established for the carpool lane. In the U.S., there are relatively many vehicles not having passengers other than the driver. Thus, in comparison with ordinary roadways, the traffic of a carpool lane is light. As a result, a vehicle with one or more passengers besides the driver is allowed to travel along a carpool lane and hence capable of substantially shortening the travel time.
In some cases, a carpool lane is provided separately from an ordinary roadway, which does not require that a traveling vehicle have at least one passenger besides the driver of the vehicle. However, such a carpool lane may coexist with an ordinary roadway on the same road as two lanes having the same traveling direction. That is, the road is divided into lanes by one or more lines, or the lanes are merely partitioned from each other by a partitioning line (or a lane mark). In some cases, the carpool lane and the ordinary roadway are partitioned from each other by a guard rail. In this case, a vehicle is allowed to change its traveling path from the carpool lane to the ordinary roadway or vice versa only in a predetermined traveling-path changing area. That is, a vehicle is allowed to leave the carpool lane and enter the ordinary roadway or vice versa only in the predetermined traveling-path changing area.
On the other hand, an exit from a freeway including a carpool lane and an ordinary roadway to another road is provided and available only to the ordinary roadway of the freeway. By viewing a display appearing on a navigation apparatus as the display of a map showing the vicinity of a vehicle or by using a route navigation function, the driver of a vehicle traveling along a carpool lane may be aware of the fact that the vehicle is approaching such an exit of the freeway. Nevertheless, the vehicle is not capable of entering the ordinary roadway from the carpool lane. This is because there is no point to depart from the carpool lane and enter the ordinary roadway or there is no point of changing a traveling path from the carpool lane to the ordinary roadway. As a result, in some cases, the vehicle inevitably travels past the exit of the freeway. In particular, in the case of a freeway provided in a big city as a freeway having a number of ordinary roadways, this problem arises more often.
In order to solve the above problem, a vehicle traveling along a carpool lane should return to an ordinary roadway in well advance of taking an exit. When there are several points to depart from the carpool lane and enter the ordinary lane prior to such an exit of the freeway and the vehicle return to the ordinary roadway through an early departure point, the distance of traveling along the carpool lane unavoidably becomes short, raising another problem of not being capable of traveling with a high degree of efficiency. This problem is raised not only in a vehicle traveling along a carpool lane, but the problem is also raised in a vehicle traveling on an ordinary roadway subjected to a restriction on the traveling direction.
A solution addressing such a problem is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,804,604 (JP 2001-183159A). In accordance with this solution, by including road information provided as map data and carrying out navigation processing by using the map data, a vehicle is capable of traveling along a carpool lane with a high degree of efficiency. This is because a navigation operation is carried out by considering restrictions on changing a traveling path from the carpool lane to an ordinary roadway and vice versa or restrictions on departing from the carpool lane to enter an ordinary roadway and vice versa.
Even when navigation processing is carried out by using navigation data created by taking carpool lanes into consideration, the solution still has the following problems.
(1) The solution assumes that the present position is on a carpool lane without determining whether the present position is on a carpool lane or an ordinary roadway. Thus, when a traveling-path changing area, which allows a vehicle to change its traveling path from a carpool lane to an ordinary roadway, exists ahead of the vehicle, the driver of the vehicle is merely informed of the existence of the traveling-path changing area. Accordingly, when the vehicle driver notified of the existence of the traveling-path changing area is capable of correctly determining whether the present position is on a carpool lane or an ordinary roadway, the notice of the existence of the traveling-path changing area may be useful to the driver in its own right. It is very likely, however, that the driver of the vehicle is not capable of correctly determining whether the present position is on a carpool lane or an ordinary roadway. For a driver not capable of correctly determining whether the present position is on a carpool lane or an ordinary roadway, a navigation apparatus also capable of providing user-friendly guidance is preferable.
(2) For example, a vehicle has departed from a carpool lane of a freeway to enter an ordinary roadway of the same freeway in an attempt to leave the freeway through an exit of the freeway to travel on another road. In this case, it is possible to consider that there is no necessity to inform the driver of the existence of the traveling-path changing area allowing the vehicle to change its traveling path from a carpool lane to an ordinary roadway thereafter or, when there is such necessity, the degree of the necessity is considered to be extremely low. In accordance with the above solution, however, when a traveling-path changing area allowing a vehicle to change its traveling path from a carpool lane to an ordinary roadway exists ahead of the vehicle, the driver of the vehicle is notified of the existence of the traveling-path changing area. Thus, for the driver of a vehicle, the notice of the existence of the traveling-path changing area is not required or, when required, the notice will be guidance of a low level of necessity.
(3) It is difficult for a position detection unit using the GPS to determine a lane, on which the present position of a vehicle is located, with a high degree of precision. A communication between an onboard device mounted on the vehicle and on-road devices provided on a road can be carried out to determine the type of a lane, on which the present position of a vehicle is located. However, this solution to the problem is based on the assumption of complete infrastructure equipment including the on-road devices provided on a road. Thus, from the practical point of view, this solution to the problem is difficult to implement.
Real implementation of a carpool lane has been taken into consideration so far. However, the same problem is also raised in a road structure wherein 'a plurality of roads having the same traveling direction has a configuration including a special roadway having no exits to other roads and an ordinary roadway having exits to other roads, and a vehicle is allowed to change its traveling path from the special roadway to the ordinary roadway or vice versa only in a predetermined traveling-path changing area.' Examples of the special and ordinary roadways are respectively an express lane and a local lane, which exist in the East-Coast areas of the U.S.

Navigation apparatus, method and program for vehicle


The present invention provides a septal defect closure device (10) having a first occluding disk (30) having a first flexible membrane (32) attached to a first frame (34) and a second occluding disk (20) having a second flexible membrane (22) attached to a separate second frame (24). The first frame has at least two outwardly extending loops joined to one another by flexible joints. These loops are attached to the first membrane to define taut fabric petals when the first disk is in a deployed configuration. A central portion of the first membrane is joined to the central portion of the second membrane via a joining segment, which may comprise a conjoint disk. The flexible joints of the first frame are received within the joining segment. This septal defect closure device provides enhanced retrievability.

Considerable efforts have been made to develop remotely deployable occluding devices which can be used to occlude body passageways without requiring significant surgical intervention. A number of researchers have attempted to develop a safe, reliable device which can be deployed through a catheter to occlude a septal defect, such as atrial and ventricular septal defects in the heart. Many of the same devices are used in connection with occluding patent ductus arteriosis (PDA) defects.
One of the first practical systems for reliably occluding septal defects using a transcatheter approach was developed by Dr. Gladwin S. Das and is described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,334,217 and 5,578,045 (the teachings of both of which are incorporated herein by reference). All of the devices designed for minimally invasive septal defect occlusion prior to Das' development were cumbersome and relatively difficult to deploy. Most of them were also mechanically complex, greatly increasing the chance of mechanical failure. The simplicity of the Das design greatly facilitated delivery and reduced the likelihood of any mechanical failure of the device.
Briefly, the Das occluder includes a pair of occluding disks attached to one another. In one embodiment illustrated in that patent, each of the disks comprises a membrane with an elastically deformable frame carried about its periphery. The frame is capable of being collapsed so the device may be delivered through a catheter, but is said to be flexible enough to elastically deploy the membrane upon exiting the catheter. The central portions of the two membranes may be attached to one another to define a central "conjoint disk."
In deploying the Das device, the frames of the two disks are collapsed and the device is inserted into the distal end of a delivery catheter. The catheter is passed through the septal defect to be occluded and the first of the two disks is urged out of the catheter for elastic deployment. The second disk is then urged out of the distal end of the catheter on the other side of the defect to position the central conjoint disk within the defect to be occluded.
While the Das device has proven to be a remarkable advance over the state of the art, it has become clear that some further refinements may be advantageous. In particular, the Das device can be a little difficult to retract once deployed. The Das patents discuss a system for holding the occluder on the distal end of the delivery device using a tether. This permits an operator to retain hold of the device in the event of an improper deployment so the device does not float free within the patient's heart or vascular system. Unfortunately, though, it has proven relatively difficult to reliably and safely retract an inappropriately deployed device back into the lumen of the delivery catheter. While it may be possible to retract the right occluding disk (the second disk to exit the catheter) by retaining a grip on the frame of that disk, it can be much more difficult to retract the left disk (the first occluding disk to be deployed) back into the catheter.
A number of other researchers have attempted to provide improved occlusion devices which can be delivered through a transcatheter approach. For example, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,741,297, Simon discloses a device which has a series of arms used to stretch two separate pieces of fabric. In addition to the single wire joining both of the membranes, the membranes are bonded directly to one another, with the bond being spaced well inwardly of the frame. (This relationship is perhaps best seen in FIGS. 2 and 3.) Simon does not discuss in any detail how this device would be retracted if improperly deployed.
Shaw et al. propose a system for manufacturing occlusion devices which are based on some of the same concepts underlying the Das occluder. In particular, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,879,366, Shaw et al. utilize a pair of membranes which are deployed utilizing a wire frame (38 and 54). These two membranes are joined together at an "attachment point 70" which is formed by sintering a relatively small disk 48 of a bonding polymer. As best seen in FIG. 6B, this attachment point is spaced well inwardly of the two frames and represents a relatively small portion of the overall surface area of the occlusion device. This can make it more difficult to center the device within the defect. This also appears to make it more difficult to retract the device back into a catheter once the second disk has been deployed.

Retrievable septal defect closure device


A semiconductor component includes a field effect transistor structure in a SiC semiconductor body having a gate structure at a first surface of the SiC semiconductor body and a drift zone of a first conductivity type. A zone of the first conductivity type is formed in a vertical direction between a semiconductor region of a second conductivity type and the drift zone. The zone is spaced apart from the gate structure and is at a maximal distance of 1 μm from the semiconductor region in the vertical direction.

In semiconductor components having field effect transistor structures and a drift zone, pn junctions between the drift zone and body regions of the field effect transistors form an intrinsic body diode. If the body diode is operated in the forward direction, then a bipolar charge carrier flow through the body regions and the drift zone is established. Electrical properties of the body diode, such as e.g. threshold voltage, forward voltage and current-carrying capacity, result from the doping and the dimensions of doped regions at semiconductor/metal junctions, which are in turn defined with regard to the transistor properties sought.
It is generally endeavoured to improve properties such as the avalanche robustness, the breakdown strength and the on resistance of components.


A method for providing a virtualization system includes receiving a plurality of virtualization system requirements from a customer that include a plurality of information handling systems (IHSs), at least one storage, and a plurality of configuration details. A primary IHS and a secondary IHS are designated, and configuration data, an application interface, and a primary IHS operating system are provided on the primary IHS. Following physical connection of the plurality of the IHSs and in response to activation of the primary IHS, a primary IHS first boot process initiates the application interface that then automatically activates the secondary IHS and uses the configuration data to automatically configure the at least one storage. In response to activation of the secondary IHS, a secondary IHS operating system on the secondary IHS initiates a secondary IHS first boot process that automatically configures virtualization software installed on the secondary IHS.

The present disclosure relates generally to information handling systems, and more particularly to the provision of a virtualization system on a plurality of information handling systems.
As the value and use of information continues to increase, individuals and businesses seek additional ways to process and store information. One option is an information handling system (IHS). An IHS generally processes, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data for business, personal, or other purposes. Because technology and information handling needs and requirements may vary between different applications, IHSs may also vary regarding what information is handled, how the information is handled, how much information is processed, stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the information may be processed, stored, or communicated. The variations in IHSs allow for IHSs to be general or configured for a specific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing, airline reservations, enterprise data storage, or global communications. In addition, IHSs may include a variety of hardware and software components that may be configured to process, store, and communicate information and may include one or more computer systems, data storage systems, and networking systems.
Some consumers may utilize an IHS or a plurality of IHSs to create virtualization systems that may include a virtual IHS and/or a plurality of virtual IHSs, some of which may be identical to each other with regard to, for example, virtual hardware and/or software on the virtual IHSs, and some of which may be different from each other with regard to, for example, virtual hardware and/or software on the virtual IHSs. A virtual IHS is a software implementation of a physical IHS that executes programs like the physical IHS. For example, a virtualization layer may be installed on an IHS or a plurality of IHSs that allows multiple operating systems to run concurrently within virtual IHSs on the IHS or IHSs, dynamically partitioning and sharing the available physical resources of the IHS or IHSs such as, for example, the central processing unit (CPU), storage, memory, input and output (I/O) devices, and/or a variety of other resources known in the art. While the virtual IHSs may run on an single IHS, they behave as though they were separate IHSs. A plurality of virtual IHSs may be different from each other with regard to operating system configuration information such as, for example, IHS name, user accounts, network settings, etc., even though the plurality of virtual IHSs are identical in every other respect. The provision of these virtualization systems raises a number of issues.
Typically, a customer who orders a virtualization system from an IHS manufacturer is required to set up the virtualization system themselves. For example, the customer who orders the hardware and software for the virtualization system may need to physically connect all of the components of the virtualization system, configure the storage arrays, create Logical Unit Numbers (LUNs) on the storage arrays, configure the virtualization software, and perform a plurality of other tasks known in the art for setting up a virtualization system. Such actions require the customer either possess significant knowledge of the various hardware and software components involved in the virtualization system, or pay the manufacturer or some other third party to physically set up the virtualization system.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide for improved virtualization system provision absent the disadvantages discussed above.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.


Approximate string matching of a target string to a trie data structure in which the trie data structure has a root node and generations of child nodes, each node representing at least one character in an alphabet to provide a lexicon of words and word fragments. Traversing the trie data structure includes starting from the root node by comparing each node of a branch of the trie data structure to characters in the target string and adding characters traversed in a branch of the trie data structure to a gathered string to provide suggestions of approximate matches. If a node is reached that is flagged as a node for a word or a word fragment and, and if the target string is longer than the gathered string, the method loops back to the root node, and continues the traverse from the root node. At each node, the system determines if there is a correction rule for one or more characters in the remainder of the target string from the current node, and if so, applies the correction rule to the target string to obtain a modified target string.

Approximate matching for a string of characters has applications in many areas. One area is spell-checking applications which locate words which are closely similar to a series of letters found in a text. Suggestions of correct spelling in a chosen language are found and displayed for a user to choose from. Another application of approximate searching is searching for a query correction in a search engine. Also, approximate matching for a string of characters may be used in a non-language based application, for example, close matches in a database may be required. Some of the known methods of approximate string matching are described below.
Linear searches can be carried out in which the target string is compared to each dictionary entry. Edit distance, n-grams, or other criteria can be used to reject candidates. This has the disadvantage that it is a very slow method of searching.
Partial enumeration using a hash function is another method. A special hash function is used which is invariant for certain types of mistakes. For example, the "soundex" function used by Oracle Corporation returns a phonetic representation of a string. This method inherits common drawbacks of hashing in which the quality depends on the function used, its performance may deteriorate to linear in the case of a high level of collisions, and there is additional space required to build the hash table.
The segmentation approach (n-gram method) is based on the assumption that the target string and candidates should have common substrings. The index is built from substrings of certain length (n-grams) and therefore it is possible to avoid a linear search in most cases and therefore this is faster than a linear search.
The classic spell-checker method is based on the modification of a target word according to known correction rules and performing simple look up in the dictionary. This method is suitable only for closed classes of applications. However, the method does have the advantage of bringing context to the process.
Trie data structures are used to carry out string searches particularly through large texts. The term "trie" stems from the word "retrieval". Trie structures are multi-way tree structures which are useful for storing strings over an alphabet. Trie structures are used to store large dictionaries of words. The alphabet used in a trie structure can be defined for the given application, for example, {0,1} for binary files, {the 256 ASCII characters}, {a,b,c . . . x,y,z}, or another form of alphabet such as Unicode, which represents symbols of most word languages.
The concept of a trie data structure is that all strings with a common prefix propagate from a common node. A node has a number of child nodes of, at most, the number of characters in the alphabet and a terminator. The string can be followed from the root to the leaf at which there is a terminator that ends a string. In this way a trie-based dictionary can be built for a lexicon. For example, an English-language dictionary can be stored in this way. A trie-based dictionary has the advantage that the data is compressed due to the common entries for prefixes and possibly postfixes. A method of scanning a trie-based dictionary in order to recover approximate matches is called a trie walker.
IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering August 1996 (Vol. 8, No. 4) pp. 540-547, H. Shang, T. H. Merrett, "Tries for Approximate String Matching" describes a method of approximate string matching based on the usage of a trie-based dictionary. The lexicon of the trie-based dictionary is stored as a finite state machine i.e. along a path in the digital tree or trie as described in Proceedings of the International Symposium on Cooperative Database Systems for Advanced Applications, Kyoto, 1996. World Scientific, 1996. T. H. Merrett, H. Shang, Xiaoyan Zhao: "Database Structures, Based on Tries, for Text, Spatial, and General Data", pp. 507-515.
The computational complexity of approximate string matching is a recurrent problem. The approximate matching procedure is a non-deterministic trie walker with rejects. Its computational complexity for a certain target word depends only on the target word length and the average distribution of the degree of a dictionary graph group, which is not much correlated to the dictionary size for natural languages. Thus, the complexity remains sub-linear to the size of the dictionary in practice for natural languages, i.e. with the growth of dictionary size the number of operations tends to be proportional to the length of the target word rather than the number of dictionary entries.
Approximate string matching in a trie-based dictionary also allows the combination of exact and approximate word matching. These advantages plus the fact that trie indexes contract prefixes and possibly postfixes and thus are compact in storage are the reasons of prevalence for this method of approximate matching.
Along with the advantages stated above, the trie-based method has drawbacks. One of the drawbacks is that it is not possible to use the method in its pure form for certain applications as natively it operates out of context. The only context available is the dictionary lexicon, which is not enough. For example, in order for spell-checkers to provide intelligent suggestion, they should rely on a set of common phonetic errors for a certain language, character similarity during optical character recognition (for example, i and l, cl and d, m and rn), or close layout of certain keys on a keyboard. This form of context is not provided in the known method.
Another example of an improvement provided by bringing the context into the process is the "Did you mean?" functionality of search engines. Suggestion of an alternative query can be found by substituting different fragments of the query with relevant synonyms while performing approximate match in the dictionary of previous queries. Thus context dependent correction rules are needed along with approximate match methods in order to bring context and improve intelligence by better narrowing and ranking of the set of result suggestions.
However, combining the application of text correction rules and practical non-deterministic traversing of the trie is a complicated task which historically has been performed in several passes as described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,616,704.
Another drawback is related to a prevalent practice of storing word fragments along with stand-alone words, particularly, although not exclusively, in applications for natural language processing for languages like German, Dutch, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, Dutch, Icelandic, Afrikaans, etc. This practice permits the creation of compact dictionaries. A disadvantage to this approach is that the methods of approximate matches for compound words in dictionaries of word fragments do not match exact decompounding methods and require separate implementations.
A further drawback is that the implementation of suggestion gathering depends on the technique used for error value computation. While traversing the dictionary, the trie walker gathers suggestions, which conform to a predefined error tolerance as described in the reference IEEE Transactions on Knowledge and Data Engineering August 1996 (Vol. 8, No. 4) pp. 540-547, H. Shang, T. H. Merrett, "Tries for Approximate String Matching". Paths where the error value exceeds the error tolerance are rejected by the trie walker.
There are two prevalent techniques for error value computation in practice. For natural language applications, the notion of edit distance is used. Edit distance is a minimum number of changes such as replacement, insertion or deletion of one symbol, which have to be made to match two strings. There is one more operation, which has to be considered for spell aid applications—transposition of two symbols. The second prevalent method of error value computation is sequence-oriented. It is based on the calculation of the number of common substrings of fixed length or n-grams. This method is used in areas such as computational biology, in particular in DNA sequence matching as described in reference R. C. Angell, G. E. Freund, and P. Willett, "Automatic spelling correction using a trigram similarity measure", Information Processing and Management, 19:255-261, 1983. Thus, there is an open option for the technique for error value computation in approximate string matching in a trie-based dictionary which is desirable to preserve.

Method and system for approximate string matching

International Business Machines Corporation


There is provided an optical laminate that significantly suppresses the warping of a liquid crystal panel and can realize high contrast. An optical laminate of the present invention includes: a polarizing film having a thickness of 10 μm or less; and a reflective polarization film. A liquid crystal panel of the present invention includes: a liquid crystal cell; and the optical laminate of the present invention. According to another aspect of the present invention, an optical laminate set is provided. The optical laminate set includes: a first optical laminate that is the optical laminate of the present invention as described above; and a second optical laminate including a polarizing film having a thickness larger than the thickness of the polarizing film of the first optical laminate by 5 μm or more.

An increase in screen size of an image display apparatus typified by a liquid crystal display apparatus and the thinning of the apparatus have been progressing in recent years. The following problem arises in association with the increase in screen size and the thinning. The warping of a liquid crystal panel occurs, and as a result, display unevenness or light leakage occurs. To solve such problem, a technology involving adjusting the thickness of the protective layer of a polarizing film in each of optical laminates to be placed on both sides of a liquid crystal cell (Patent Literature 1) or a technology involving adjusting the moisture content of each of the optical laminates (Patent Literature 2) has been proposed. However, the technologies each still have large room for improvement in terms of the suppression of the warping of the liquid crystal panel.

Optical laminated body, optical laminated body set, and liquid crystal panel using optical laminated body or optical laminated body set


According to some demonstrative embodiments, there is provided herein a fertilizer granule including a fertilizer dust and one or more binders wherein said granule comprises a single strength of at least 2.5 kg/gran and a single strength after humidity chamber 24 hours, 79% RH of at least 0.5 kg/granule.

To grow properly, plants need nutrients (nitrogen, potassium, calcium, zinc, magnesium, iron, manganese, etc.) which normally can be found in the soil. Sometimes fertilizers are needed to achieve a desired plant growth as these can enhance the growth of plants.
This growth of plants is met in two ways, the traditional one being additives that provide nutrients. The second mode by which some fertilizers act is to enhance the effectiveness of the soil by modifying its water retention and aeration. Fertilizers typically provide, in varying proportions, three main macronutrients:
Nitrogen (N): leaf growth;
Phosphorus (P): Development of roots, flowers, seeds, fruit;
Potassium (K): Strong stem growth, movement of water in plants, promotion of flowering and fruiting;
three secondary macronutrients: calcium (Ca), magnesium (Mg), and sulphur (S);
micronutrients: copper (Cu), iron (Fe), manganese (Mn), molybdenum (Mo), zinc (Zn), boron (B), and of occasional significance there are silicon (Si), cobalt (Co), and vanadium (V) plus rare mineral catalysts.
The most reliable and effective way to make the availability of nutrients coincide with plant requirements is by controlling their release into the soil solution, using slow release or controlled release fertilizers.
Both slow release fertilizers (SRF) and controlled release fertilizers (CRF) supply nutrients gradually. Yet, slow release fertilizers and controlled release fertilizers differ in many ways: The technology they use, the release mechanism, longevity, release controlling factors and more.
Solid fertilizers include granules, prills, crystals and powders. A prilled fertilizer is a type of granular fertilizer that is nearly spherical made by solidifying free-falling droplets in air or a fluid medium. Most controlled-release fertilizers (CRFs) used in commercial nurseries are prilled fertilizers that have been coated with sulfur or a polymer. These products have been developed to allow a slow release of nutrients into the root zone throughout crop development.
Nutrients are released out of coated fertilizer prills through osmosis at a rate that is positively correlated with increased temperature. The release rates are associated with the type and/or thickness of the coating on the fertilizer prill granule.
CRF fertilizers are available with different longevities. Most manufacturers have products with 3, 6, 9, or 12-month release periods. Products with different longevities are manufactured by blending fertilizer prills of different coating thicknesses: the thinner coated prills release nutrients first and then the thicker-coated prills release nutrients later. Short-term crops such as annuals would probably require 3-month release products and longer-term crops such as woody perennials would require fertilizer products with a 12-month release period.
Since powdered or crystalline fertilizer materials give rise to a lot of dust, with all the attendant loss and nuisance (dust emission during handling at ports and in warehouses and workplaces, poor product flowability, caking tendency during storage and transportation, segregation of components, scattering by wind during the spreading on the fields), most fertilizers are consolidated into larger particles with more suitable properties by means of different processes, commonly named "granulation".
Three different methods are usually used to enlarge the fertilizer powders and to produce granules:                the wet granulation method, named also pan granulation method or tumble agglomeration method. The fertilizer powders are enlarged by the chemical reaction through the presence of a liquid medium or by a binder. It produces the granular compound fertilizer where all the ingredients are incorporated into the formulation before it is formed into granules, so each individual granule contains all of the nutrients in the correct ratio. The granulation is done either inside a drum granulator, or a pan granulator, or a mixergranulator. The main drawbacks of this granulation method are that it is expensive both to install (this process requires mainly a granulator, a dryer and a cooler) and, on account of the energy required for drying, to run as well; it is also rather lacking in flexibility, because changing the formulation entails stopping the plant to reset many of the process parameters, and that can take some time. Most manufacturers of compound fertilizers, therefore, have to restrict their product range to a few standard grades. The grades available on the market are in fact a compromise: they do not necessarily have the correct nutrient balance for all combinations of crop, soil and climate. The economics of farming is nowadays so finely balanced that there is a growing demand for small batches of custom-formulated fertilizers, but not at the inevitable high cost of producing them in a wet granulation plant.        an alternative which takes a certain popularity in the past compared to the wet granulation is the bulk-blending process. Here, a fertilizer is formulated by merely mixing together granules of the individual fertilizer materials. Individually, of course, the granules have very different nutrient contents. The mixtures may also segregate during loading and transport, further compounding the problem of uneven distribution. The main advantages of bulk blending are that it uses a cheap installation, it can quickly and easily be switched to make different grades over a wide range, and it can operate on a limited number of basic granular fertilizer materials, such as urea, DAP and granular potash, which are plentiful and therefore relatively cheap.        the third method is compaction-granulation process which has gained popularity in the recent years compared to both previous ones. It combines some of the advantages of both wet granulation and bulk blending. Many amorphous solid fertilizer materials, including some that are difficult to granulate by conventional means, can be consolidated in any desired proportions by the simple application of a mechanical pressure. No added moisture is required, so there is no need for a dryer (a large and expensive item of equipment in its own right) or its substantial energy requirement. Changing the formulation is a very quick and simple procedure. The technique may also be used to enlarge single materials, as potash (potassium chloride) in particular, which cannot be granulated by the conventional drum or pan granulation methods.
During the process of granulation, a binder is usually used. There are various reasons for using a binder in the granulation process:

Binders for the granulation of fertilizers


An energy-saving environment-friendly digital lettering machine comprises a conveying mechanism, a rewinding mechanism and a machine base, wherein the machine base is provided with a working platform, and the conveying mechanism and the rewinding mechanism are respectively arranged on the left side and the right side of the working platform; the lettering machine further comprise a lettering mechanism, the working platform is provided with at least one lettering mechanism, and each lettering mechanism is arranged on the working platform through a corresponding mounting base, wherein the conveying mechanism, the lettering mechanism and the rewinding mechanism are all electrically connected with a control system of the lettering machine. This equipment combines the X-axis moving assembly and the Z-axis moving assembly with the lettering assembly, the lettering assembly can move in the horizontal direction and the vertical direction, and the lettering cutter engraves patterns on the material part.

The die cutting machine, which is also called beer machine, cutting machine and CNC punching machine, is mainly used for die cutting (full-break and half-break), indentation and gold stamping operation, lamination and automatic waste discharge of some corresponding non-metallic materials, adhesive stickers, EVA, double faced adhesive tapes, electronic and mobile phone rubber mats and the like, wherein the die cutting machine applies certain pressure through a stamping plate by using a steel knife, a metal mold or a steel wire (or a stencil engraved from a steel plate), and roll and cut a printed product or a paperboard into a certain shape, therefore the die cutting machine is an important equipment for packaging, processing and forming after printing. The main parts of the die cutting machine are a die cutting platen and a press cutting mechanism, wherein the working principle of the die cutting machine is as follows: the die cutting work is finished under the action of pressure, in short, the die cutting pressure is generated by the pressing of the movable platform and the upper fixed platform.
The prior art discloses a die cutting machine (application number: 201720826920.8), and the die cutting machine according to the utility model includes a feeding portion, a die cutting portion and a material receiving portion, wherein the die cutting portion includes a base and a briquetting, a coupling mechanism is provided between the briquetting and the base, the coupling mechanism is provided with an adjusting module which is used to adjust the interval distance between the briquetting and the base, so that the interval distance between the base and the briquetting is able to be effectively adjusted through adjustment of the adjusting module, therefore the die cutting machine is enable to satisfy the needs of different die cutting products. According to the needs of different products, the knife molds of different models or sizes can be replaced, which further expands the application scope of the die cutting machine, and makes the die cutting machine be better adapted to the cutting of different products.
The above mentioned die cutting machine is consistent with the existing die cutting machine, which is to make the printed matters or other paper products into a die cutting stencil for cutting according to a pre-designed pattern, so that the shape of the printed matters is no longer limited to straight edges and right angles. The die cutting tools for traditional die cutting production are combined into the die cutting stencil according to the pattern required by the product design, and the printed matters or other plate-shaped blanks are rolled and cut into required shapes or cutting marks under the action of pressure.
The prior art further discloses a die cutting mechanism (application number: 201410857534.6) for a web compound die cutting machine, which comprises a die cutting frame, wherein a die cutting tool magazine is mounted on the top of the die cutting frame, an upper die cutting platform and a lower die cutting platform are mounted in the die cutting frame, and one side edge of the die cutting frame is equipped with a paper pulling upper roller and a paper pulling lower roller which are arranged in a rolling manner. A paper beating device is mounted on the other side edge of the die cutting machine frame. The die cutting tool magazine is used for mounting die cutting tools of various specifications, so that the die cutting tools are convenient to replace.
However, each time the traditional die cutting machine processes a product, it needs to make a matched corresponding die cutting tool, then load the die cutting tool in the die cutting machine upper stencil through a double-sided adhesive tape or a clamping position, and place a film below the die cutting machine upper stencil, and then manually adjust the punching size thereof, so that a large amount of manpower is consumed, a large amount of debugging materials are wasted, a large amount of waste products are generated, and the waste of resources is not beneficial to environmental protection; and this kind of debugging mode completely depends on the technical level of debugging personnel, it takes a large amount of time to produce matched die cutting tools and debug the machine before the material part are formally processed, so that the working efficiency is reduced.
Further, in the process of producing the die cutting tool, each die cutting tool needs to use a corresponding PVC board or wood as the fixed frame of the cutting tool, so that a large amount of PVC boards and wood are wasted. Meanwhile, in the production and processing process of PVC board and wood, it will also lead to a large number of waste water, waste gas and noise, which is not conducive to environmental protection.
The service life of the common die cutting tool is usually between hundreds of thousands of lathing and millions of lathing, making die cutting tool will also generate corresponding cost, and debugging the machine also needs to waste a certain amount of material parts, therefor the production cost is high, the die cutting tool is not suitable for small-batch production, and the production efficiency is reduced.

Energy-saving environment-friendly digital lettering machine

SHENZHEN REBORN PRECISION MACHINERY CO., LTD.


In a photomask for use in forming a resist pattern by projection exposure of a resist through the photomask, a phase shifter has a first edge part whose image is to be transferred and a second edge part whose image is not to be transferred. A light attenuator is provided to cover the first edge part. The light attenuator may include an array of opaque stripes arranged at a pitch of not more than the limit of resolution, i.e., 0.5.times..lambda./NA, where .lambda. represents the wavelength of light used for the projection exposure, and NA represents the numerical aperture of an optical system used for the projection exposure. In another embodiment, the light attenuator is formed to cover a shifter edge part in alignment with a line of a transmission mask. In a further embodiment, one or more light attenuators having different transparency are used to obtain lines of a resist pattern having different widths.

The present invention relates to a method of forming a resist pattern by projection exposure employed in a process of fabricating semiconductor devices, and in particular to photomasks used in such a method.
In optical lithography by projection exposure, various methods have been proposed which can form fine resist patterns to cope with the increase of the packing density of the semiconductor devices. One technique drawing attention is the phase-shifting mask method.
The phase-shifting mask method is disclosed in Japanese Patent Kokoku Publication No. S62-59296.
In the phase-shifting mask method, a phase-shifter in the form of a transparent thin film which shifts the phase of light passing therethrough is disposed partially over a photomask. At the edge of the phase-shifter (the boundary between the area covered by the phase-shifter and the area not covered), the light which passed through the phase-shifter and the light which did not pass through the phase-shifter are 180.degree. out of phase from each other, interfere with each other, and lower the light intensity on the wafer, so that the part of the resist along the edge of the phase-shifter is effectively "unexposed" to the light. By the use of the phase-shifter, the resolution of the projection exposure method is improved.
It is however necessary to provide a measure to eliminate the undesired lines of the resist pattern corresponding to edges of the phase shifter whose images are not desired to be transferred. One measure is to use two photomasks, a first one having the phase shifter, and a second one having an opaque pattern of a transmission mask uncovering the undesired part of the edges of the phase shifter, so that the part of the resist corresponding to the undesired part of the phase shifter edge is exposed during the exposure using the second photomask. This method has shortcomings in that the number of exposure steps as well as the number of photomasks are increased.
Another problem with the prior art phase shifter method is that resist pattern having lines with different width could not obtained.

Method of forming resist pattern and photomask therefor


In a method for operating an internal combustion engine, a first data quantity is derived based on a signal of a first sensor which detects the pressure in a first combustion chamber of a plurality of combustion chambers, and a second data quantity is derived based on a signal of a second sensor, which second data quantity is a function of the pressure variation in at least one of the plurality of combustion chambers. The first data quantity and the second data quantity are functions of the pressure variation in the same combustion chamber, and a drift of the second sensor is ascertained from a change over time in the second data quantity with respect to the first data quantity.

In a method for operating an internal combustion engine described in published German patent document DE 102 27 279, a pressure sensor which detects the pressure in a cylinder (guide cylinder) of the engine is associated with this cylinder. Furthermore, the engine has a structure-borne noise sensor, which indirectly detects the pressure changes in the individual cylinders. The pressure variation plays an important role in combustion control according to this known method: the agreement of the detected combustion chamber pressure with the combustion chamber pressure obtained from the signal of the structure-borne noise sensor is verified for the guide cylinder. If, during a certain period of time, the ascertained pressures differ by more than a certain value, an error message is output, which informs the engine's user of a certain wear condition.
An object of the present invention is to provide a method in which the engine performance quantities required for combustion control or regulation may be ascertained economically, yet precisely.

Method for operating an internal combustion engine


The invention provides an osteosynthesis and compression screw that is self-boring and self-tapping for the purpose of coaptation of small bone fragments. The screw comprises:                a proximal portion formed by a screw head provided with an outside thread;        an intermediate portion having no thread; and        a distal portion provided with an outside thread.Wherein:        each of the screw head and the distal portion includes at least one groove, firstly extending over the entire axial length of its thread, and secondly being formed through each thread in such a manner to form tapping means; and        the terminal zone of the distal portion is provided with preparation means for preparing a housing in the bone fragments for receiving the intermediate and distal portions of the screw.

When dealing with broken bone fragments of small size, such as those of the phalanges or the toes, the small size of the bones or bone fragments concerned poses difficult problems to be solved by the practitioner in charge of reducing the fracture and then putting the bones into place with sufficient compression to ensure that the fracture is properly resorbed.
In order to ensure rapid osteosynthesis between two bone fragments, leading specifically to the rapid formation of a high quality bone callus enabling a rapid return to normal function, it is necessary for two small bone fragments to be positioned and fixed relative to each other with relative longitudinal compression being established between the two bone fragments.
Clearly, given the very small size of the bone fragments concerned, and the correspondingly small size of the osteosynthesis screws used, it is difficult to establish longitudinal compression between the two bone fragments concerned.
It is particularly important and difficult to master this type of surgical act, given that the manipulations imposed by the small size of the bones and the screws are fiddly, and given that the small bone fragments need to be positioned relative to one another and compressed and put into final position with very great precision since the purpose is to restore total mobility functions, such as handling functions or walking, in particular when dealing with bones of the hand or of the foot.
It is thus already known to use staples that are put into place directly on the two bone fragments to be joined together. Such a technique is poorly adapted to the type of surgery under consideration insofar as putting staples into place relative to the pieces of bone does not make it certain that the bone fragments to be joined together are properly positioned. In practice, it is not possible with staples to obtain fixing and compression.
Proposals have already been made to use osteosynthesis screws of the kind used for coaptation of bones of large size and suitable not only for joining bones together, but also for performing the additional function of applying longitudinal compression.
Thus, proposals have already been made to use an osteosynthesis and compression screw comprising a proximal portion formed by a screw head provided with an outside thread and presenting a diameter greater than that of the remainder of the screw. The screw presents an intermediate portion without any thread in order to improve relative sliding between the bone fragments for joining together while the screw is being screwed in, and said intermediate portion is followed by a distal portion which is also provided with an outside thread.
Such screws improve surgical operating conditions greatly because of the improve ease with which they can be put into place.
Nevertheless, such screws still suffer from drawbacks associated in particular with a certain number of additional actions that the surgeon needs to perform such as prior drilling of a hole in order to ensure that the threads of the screw hold strongly both in the distal portion and in the proximal portion having the head of larger diameter. This increases the number of actions the surgeon needs to perform and therefore increases the duration of the operation.
Considerable improvements have been provided to screws of this type but they relate essentially to increasing the compression ability of such screws, for example by incorporating a two-start distal thread, without taking account of total time required for surgery but while maintaining excellent holding strength and compression properties.
Conventional self-boring and self-tapping surgical screws are also known, with the tapping portion of such a prior screw nevertheless being restricted to the distal portion thereof. Screws known in the prior art possess a screw head that is not threaded and that must specifically be embedded in the bone by previously making a suitable recess using a special tool. Such screws thus require an additional tool to be used which implies an additional act leading to increased manipulation, to additional risk of accidents or faulty installation, and, in all, lengthening the time required for surgery.

Self-boring and self-tapping screw for osteosynthesis and compression


A transmission range valve replaces a traditional spring bias with a pressurized fluid bias to prevent an unintended range change in the event of a significant fluid pressure decrease or loss. Because pressurized fluid is used both for biasing the range valve and for shifting the range valve to effect an auxiliary section range change, a pressure drop or loss of supply pressure will not result in a change of state of the range valve as may occur with prior art spring biased valves.

Compound vehicular transmissions having a main section connected in series with an auxiliary section are well known in the art. Typically, the main section is shifted directly with a shift lever connected to a shift bar housing or single shift shaft while the auxiliary section, whether a range section, splitter section, or combined range/splitter section, is shifted remotely using one or more valves and pistons. An auxiliary section ratio change may be indicated by the position of the shift lever, or may be initiated by a separate switch on the shift lever, such as a hi/lo range switch and/or a hi/lo split switch.
Since the range section typically utilizes synchronized jaw clutches, various systems have been developed to assure that a range shift is initiated and completed while the main section is in neutral to prevent undue wear and/or damage to the range section synchronized jaw clutches. Systems which prevent or delay initiation of a range section shift until the main section is in neutral are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,654,268; 3,138,965; 3,229,551; 4,060,005; 4,450,869; 4,793,378; and 4,974,474 the disclosures of which are hereby incorporated by reference. A valve assembly for protecting the range section synchronized jaw clutches in the event that the main section shift is completed before the range section shift is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,193,410, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,193,410 discloses a valve assembly which controls pressurizing and exhausting of a differential area piston to control the force applied to shift the range section based on the neutral/engaged condition of the main section. The valve assembly uses a valve which is spring biased to a first position for engaging a high speed auxiliary section ratio with a relatively high force. The spring bias is overcome by pressurized fluid to shift the valve to a second position for engaging a low speed auxiliary section ratio. However, if the fluid pressure decreases below a predetermined threshold for any reason, such as a system leak or compressor malfunction, the spring bias may shift the valve to the first position resulting in an unintended ratio change in the range section.


A circuit board having a load is inserted into a chassis of a digital system while the system remains in operation. During insertion, a ground potential is provided to the circuit board. Next, one or more voltage potentials are provided, however, no electrical path is provided from the voltage potentials, through the load, to ground. An enhancement voltage is provided to the circuit board, allowing the load to charge. Finally, a backplane is connected to the circuit board after the load has charged. The circuit board includes a soft start circuit that allows the load to charge gracefully after the enhancement voltage is provided. In one embodiment, the soft start circuit includes an RC circuit connected to a switch which gradually turns on as the RC circuit charges, thereby providing an electrical path from the circuit board load to ground through the switch. The switch may be a MOSFET. Once the circuit board load is charged, connecting the backplane bypasses the MOSFET, thereby eliminating nearly all quiescent current flow through, and associated power dissipation in, the MOSFET. The circuit board is extracted from the chassis of the digital system by first disconnecting the backplane. When this occurs, the MOSFET is no longer bypassed by the backplane connection and quiescent current again flows through the MOSFET. Next, the enhancement voltage is removed, allowing the MOSFET to gradually turn off as the RC circuit discharges, thereby removing the electrical path from the load to ground. The voltage and ground potential are then removed.

Computers, digital switches, and other digital systems are becoming ever more present with the high technological boom of the late twentieth century. A vast majority of these digital systems utilize various types of circuit boards that are installed in a chassis of the digital system. The circuit boards typically contain circuitry that supplements system operations and aids in enhancing system performance.
Invariably it is necessary to replace circuit boards due to system upgrades or circuit board failures. The process of replacing (or swapping) a circuit board is carried out by extracting the circuit board from the digital system chassis, and replacing it with another circuit board. Originally systems had to be powered-down while inserting or removing a circuit board. System power-downs were necessary in order to prevent voltage spikes that could potentially damage the new circuit board. However, in applications that required non-stop operation, it was impracticable to power down the system in order to change circuit boards. Therefore, a method for installing or removing circuit boards during continuous system operation was needed.
In response to the need for non-stop system operation during circuit board replacement, "hot swap" circuit boards began to be developed. Hot swap circuit boards typically integrate "hot swap" circuitry which allows the digital system to remain powered during circuit board insertions or removals by controlling circuit board voltages during insertion and removal.
Traditional hot swap circuit boards control board voltage by using various methods. Such methods include the use of discrete logic, proximity sensors, and other types of electrical techniques. However, electrical methods for hot swap control have various drawbacks. Many hot swap circuit designs require power to be dissipated at all times during circuit board operation. This type of design places limitations on circuit board voltages and currents. Other hot swap designs require high chip counts or feedback control systems. Consequently, hot swap methods that are currently available are complex, area consuming, and expensive.


Various embodiments include an apparatus for operating a software-defined network having a number of network elements comprising: a memory unit storing an image of the software-defined network; a control unit programmed to use the stored image as a basis for controlling forwarding of data streams by the number of network elements; and a comparison unit programmed to compare the stored image against a network image published in a ledger of a blockchain.

A typical software-defined network is formed from multiple network elements, such as for example SDN switches, that are controlled by a control apparatus, such as for example an SDN controller. The SDN switches identify data streams on a data level of the network and forward them according to data stream rules implemented in the SDN switches. The SDN controller communicates with the SDN switches on a control level of the network to implement data stream rules in the SDN switches on the basis of a network image stored in the SDN controller. Multiple virtual network areas or client network areas may be set up in the software-defined network. There is the intention of SDN-based distributed networks or wide area networks (WAN) in which multiple physical subareas are controlled by a respective SDN controller. This requires a comparison of the network image between the SDN controllers to form client network areas spanning multiple subareas.
An attacker gaining access to the network image can manipulate data streams in the network. Conventionally, the network image is therefore protected locally in a private area. This is inconsistent with the desire to compare the network image against further control apparatuses of a WAN.

Apparatus, system and method for operating a software-defined network


A method for optimizing production of sheet-metal parts, the production comprising cutting out and singularizing the sheet-metal parts and bending the sheet-metal parts, wherein the method includes: (A) training a neural network, which is executed on a Monte Carlo tree search framework, by means of supervised learning and self-play with reinforcement learning; (B) recording constraints for the sheet-metal parts, the constraints comprising geometric data of the sheet-metal parts; (C) creating an optimized production schedule by way of the neural network; and (D) outputting the production schedule.

Sheet-metal parts occur in a wide variety of products in a wide variety of geometries. To produce products containing sheet-metal parts, the sheet-metal parts are cut from a large metal sheet, singularized, deburred, bent, joined, coated and/or assembled.
The sheet-metal parts are produced in what are known as jobs. A job includes:                i) the production of one cut-out, singularized, bent and/or assembled sheet-metal part; or        ii) the production of multiple cut-out, singularized, bent and/or assembled sheet-metal partsby a predefined production deadline.
The individual sheet-metal parts should be cut out from the metal sheet so that as little remaining material (scrap) from the metal sheet as possible is left as waste. Since the sheet-metal parts for different jobs may have different geometries, it may be advantageous, for the purpose of scrap optimization, to provide for sheet-metal parts for different jobs together on one metal sheet to save space.
However, the resultant mingling of jobs over time increases the complexity for production scheduling. On top of this, production of the sheet-metal parts may be carried out on multiple identical or similar production machines. By way of example, there may be provision for multiple identical or similar bending machines for bending the singularized sheet-metal parts. The production machines should be operated at as high a capacity as possible.
Production scheduling, that is to say the scheduling of when which sheet-metal part is machined on which production machine, becomes very complex as a result of the variables described, in particular in the case of events such as production machine failures, urgent jobs and/or production machine capacities that are being released.
Optimum production scheduling is referred to as solving a job shop scheduling problem (JSSP). Solutions and approaches to solutions in this regard can be found in the following publications:
[1] F. Pfitzer, J. Provost, C. Mieth, and W. Liertz, "Event-driven production rescheduling in job shop environments", in 2018 IEEE 14th International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering (CASE), IEEE, 2018, pp. 939-944;
[2] M. Putz and A. Schlegel, "Simulationsbasierte Untersuchung von Prioritäts-und Kommissionierregeln zur Steuerung des Materialflusses in der Blechindustrie";
[3] L. L. Li, C. B. Li, L. Li, Y. Tang, and Q. S. Yang, "An integrated approach for remanufacturing job shop scheduling with routing alternatives.", Mathematical biosciences and engineering: MBE, vol. 16, no. 4, pp. 2063-2085, 2019;
[4] M. Gondran, M.-J. Huguet, P. Lacomme, and N. Tchernev, "Comparison between two approaches to solve the job-shop scheduling problem with routing", 2019;
[5] J. J. van Hoorn, "The current state of bounds on benchmark instances of the job-shop scheduling problem", Journal of Scheduling, vol. 21, no. 1, pp. 127-128, 2018;
[6] S.-C. Lin, E. D. Goodman, and W. F. Punch III, "A genetic algorithm approach to dynamic job shop scheduling problem", in ICGA, 1997, pp. 481-488;
[7] T. Yamada and R. Nakano, "Scheduling by genetic local search with multi-step crossover", in International Conference on Parallel Problem Solving from Nature, Springer, 1996, pp. 960-969;
[8] B. M. Ombuki and M. Ventresca, "Local search genetic algorithms for the job shop scheduling problem", Applied Intelligence, vol. 21, no. 1, pp. 99-109, 2004;
[9] E. S. Nicoara, F. G. Filip, and N. Paraschiv, "Simulation-based optimization using genetic algorithms for multi-objective flexible jssp", Studies in Informatics and Control, vol. 20, no. 4, pp. 333-344, 2011;
[10] L. Asadzadeh, "A local search genetic algorithm for the job shop scheduling problem with intelligent agents", Computers & Industrial Engineering, vol. 85, pp. 376-383, 2015;
[11] B. Waschneck, A. Reichstaller, L. Belzner, T. Altenmüller, T. Bauernhansl, A. Knapp, and Kyek, "Optimization of global production scheduling with deep reinforcement learning", Procedia CIRP, vol. 72, pp. 1264-1269, 2018;
[12] M. Botvinick, S. Ritter, J. X. Wang, Z. Kurth-Nelson, C. Blundell, and D. Hassabis, "Reinforcement learning, fast and slow", Trends in cognitive sciences, 2019.
Furthermore, WO 2017/157809 A1 has disclosed the practice of providing for production scheduling using an optimization unit and a distribution unit, which is separate therefrom.
Despite extensive efforts, the complexity of the job has meant that satisfactory production scheduling has not been able to be attained to date, however.

Method and apparatus for optimized production of sheet-metal parts


A liquid crystal display apparatus has a junction panel obtained by joining a plurality of liquid crystal display panels so that display surfaces of the liquid crystal display panels become flush. The liquid crystal display panels each have picture elements for displaying images by transmitting and shielding a transmitting light, a black matrix for shielding a light which enters a position where the picture elements do not exist and a zonal sealing member for sealing liquid crystal into each picture element. A width of the sealing member on the junction surface where the liquid crystal display panels are joined is set so as to be narrower than a width of the black matrix. Joints of displayed images on a border of the liquid crystal display panels of the junction panel can be made inconspicuous, and quality of displayed images on the junction panel which is a big screen can be improved.

Conventionally, in order to display an image on a large screen by a liquid crystal display apparatus, a junction unit has been formed by joining a plurality of liquid crystal modules as a liquid crystal display element so that one image has been displayed by using the junction unit.
As to methods for joining such a junction unit, a method for joining a plurality of liquid crystal modules which is arranged such that a liquid crystal is injected between at least two substrates (Japanese Examined Patent Publication No. 62-8771/1987 (Tokukosho 62-8771)) as a first method, and a method which uses a plurality of substrates, which are joined to one another, on one side and which uses one substrate with a large area on an opposite side (Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 1-213621/1989 (Tokukaihei 1-213621)) as a second method are suggested.
In the first method, as shown in FIG. 23, a front substrate 41 and a rear substrate 42 which have a rectangular plate-like shape are laminated by applying sealing resin 43 to all three sides of the substrates except for a side to be joined. As a result, an opening is formed on an end of the side to be joined. Here, in order to applying an electric field to liquid crystal 44, an electrode 41a is formed on the front substrate 41 and an electrode (not shown) on the rear substrate 42.
Successively, in the first method, the liquid crystal 44 is injected into gaps among the front substrate 41 and the rear substrate 42 and the sealing resin 43 from the opening, and the opening is temporarily sealed with an adhesive material 46, such as soft solder, epoxy resin, so that liquid crystal modules 45 are produced. Thereafter, the sealed end of each liquid crystal module 45 are deposited on each other so that the junction unit is formed.
Meanwhile, in the second method, as shown in FIG. 24, an adhesive 52 composed of polymeric materials is applied to ends of a pair of substrates 51, on which an electrode and a driving circuit for applying an electric field to liquid crystal are previously formed, and the ends of each substrate 51 are stuck by pressure so as to be joined by the adhesive 52.
A junction distance between ends of each substrate 51 which have been joined in such a manner is approximately 50 .mu.m, so it is set smaller than a size of one picture element of the liquid crystal display apparatus. On the junction end of each substrate 51 which has been joined in such a manner, the adhesive 52 is protruded from the surface of each substrate 51, so this causes irregularities of the gap between the substrates 51 and a counter substrate 53.
Therefore, in the second method, a laser beam 54 is irradiated to the protruded portion of the adhesive 52 so that the protruded portion of the adhesive 52 is removed, and the height of the protruded portion at a junction section between each substrate 51 is lowered to not more than 5 .mu.m. Thereafter, the counter substrate 53 and each substrate 51 are laminated so that a gap for injection of the liquid crystal 55 is formed, and the liquid crystal 55 is injected into the gap so that the liquid crystal display apparatus is produced.
However, in the conventional first method, immediately after the liquid crystal 44 is injected into the gaps, the opening of the gaps is temporarily sealed with the adhesive material 46 so than the liquid crystal modules 45 are produced. Then, the liquid crystal modules 45 are connected to each other, so it is difficult to control a sealing shape and a dimension of its junction section, namely, a shape of the adhesive material 46, thereby, arising a problem that secureness of sufficient sealing adhesive strength by the adhesive material 46 is difficult.
In addition, in the first method, in the case where a width of the junction section is set larger than a pitch of a picture element in order to secure the sufficient sealing adhesive strength, since the pitch of the picture element between the liquid crystal modules 45 changes greatly, images formed by each liquid crystal module 45 become something strange, so the images is difficult to see.
Therefore, in the first method, since the sealing shape of the junction section of the joined liquid crystal modules 45 directly influences quality of displaying, sealing pattern formation with high accuracy and high precision is required, thereby arising a problem that it is troublesome to produce a liquid crystal display apparatus having a large screen.
In addition, in the first method, in the case where epoxy resin is used as the adhesive material 46, a solvent included in the adhesive material 46 is dissolved out, and it may cause deterioration in characteristics of the liquid crystal 44. The deterioration in characteristics of the liquid crystal 44 adversely affects the quality of displaying, namely the quality of displaying is deteriorated.
Meanwhile, in the above-mentioned second method, in order to maintain high image quality, the height of the protruded portion at the junction section between the substrates 51 is lowered to not more than 5 .mu.m, but a special process, such as a laser process is required for removing the height of the protruded portion between the substrates 51. As a result, not only process of production is complicated but also costs of production becomes expensive.
In addition, in the second method, since the liquid crystal 55 is injected into the gap with a large area, not only a large-sized injection unit is required but also it takes much time and trouble to uniformly inject the liquid crystal 55 into the gap.

Liquid crystal display apparatus and producing method thereof