A method of forming a MOS transistor in an upper surface of a semiconductor substrate. A gate oxide layer covers the upper surface of the substrate. A gate stack including one or more thin film layers covers the gate oxide layer. A gate electrode pattern is partially etched into the gate stack, the partial etching step being completed before any of the gate oxide layer is exposed. Sidewall spacers are formed on edge surfaces of the partially formed gate electrode. Source and drain regions are created by ion implantation using the partially etched gate electrode and the sidewall spacers as a mask. The sidewall spacers are removed and lightly doped drain regions are formed by ion implantation using the partially etched gate electrode as a mask.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates, in general, to process for fabricating MOS integrated circuits, and, more particularly, to MOS or CMOS integrated circuits having a lightly doped drain (LDD) structure in which a portion of the drain nearest the channel is less strongly doped than other regions of the source and drain.
2. State of the Art
In the manufacture of high density integrated circuits using metal oxide semiconductor field effect transistor (MOSFET) technology, as device dimensions decrease, there is a need to create shallower source and drain junctions. However, correspondingly abrupt or steep n+ doping profiles in NMOS transistor lead to increased electric fields in the device channel in a region adjacent to the drain. The high electric field causes electrons in the device channel to gain significant energy and be injected into the gate oxide. This phenomenon is also known as the "hot carrier" effect that leads to long term device degradation, threshold shifts, and poor reliability.
In lightly doped drain (LDD) structures, regions of the source and drain near the channel are less heavily doped than regions of the source and drain farther away from the channel. The lateral grading of the n+ doping profile provided by lower doping near the gate electrode reduces the electric fields near the drain, improves the speed and reliability of the device, lowers the gate-source and gate-drain capacitance, and minimizes hot electron injection into the gate.
In a conventional LDD process, the gate electrode is used as a mask for the n− LDD implantation. Subsequently, sidewall oxide spacers are formed creating a narrower open region laterally spaced from the gate electrode in which a heavier source/drain implant is performed. In this manner, the LDD region is formed and the sidewall spacer can be retained preventing the damage caused by the sidewall spacer removal.
In processes in which the heavily doped drain is formed after the LDD implant, the LDD region will be subject to all thermal processing required to anneal and drive in the heavier drain implant. This loss of control results in diffusive broadening of the LDD region during high temperature treatments. However, the high dose source/drain implants, which in the conventional LDD process are performed after the LDD implant and spacer formation, must be annealed at high temperature to remove ion implantation damage.
Alternative processes are known that form the LDD region after the source/drain implant. In one process, the LDD region surrounding the gate electrode is masked with a layer slightly thicker than the gate to protect regions of the silicon adjacent to the gate electrode. Regions of the silicon further out are then doped with a first doping process and the mask removed to allow a lighter doping of the regions nearer the gate with a second doping process. In another known LDD process, a region of silicon dioxide is formed as a sacrificial or disposable spacer along the sides of the gate electrode and the silicon left exposed by the spacer is heavily doped to form source/drain regions. The disposable spacer is removed to expose regions near the gate previously covered by the spacers. The regions near the gate are then lightly doped with a second doping process.
Unfortunately, the etch used to remove the spacers causes damage in the gate oxide. Damage to the gate oxide significantly impacts yield and reliability. Another problem in the conventional processes using sidewall spacers is that substrate damage occurs in the LDD region during the sidewall spacer etch. Sidewall formation is accomplished by anisotropic etching using plasma techniques. Exposed silicon during the plasma etch is damaged requiring subsequent anneal, or damage removal processing to eliminate leakage and other electrical deficiencies caused by the defects. What is needed is a lightly doped drain process that allows formation of the heavily doped source/drain and sidewall due to sidewall spacers and the associated anneal processes while allowing independent control of the thermal budget for the LDD region.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.


A microwave inlet for introducing microwaves (coaxial waveguide) and a microwave launcher for generating volume-wave plasma are arranged on one side in a vacuum chamber, and a movable metal plate is arranged opposite to the microwave launcher on the other side in the vacuum chamber. The microwave launcher has a sandwiched structure where a quartz plate is sandwiched by a perforated plate having many holes of a specified diameter. Microwaves are introduced from an external microwave generator to the microwave launcher in, for example, oxygen gas, a mixture of helium gas and oxygen gas, a mixture of argon gas and oxygen gas, or a mixture of oxygen gas and nitrogen gas to change the spatial distribution of the electric field intensity, whereby the volume-wave plasma discharge is diffused to the entire inner space of the vacuum chamber by microwaves leaking through the holes in the perforated plate. The sterilizing method and the device of this invention use microwave discharge plasma that enables sterilization inside a perforated resinous package, such as a package of medical instruments in a vacuum chamber.

Conventional disinfection and sterilization methods for medical instruments and disinfection methods for foods in packages and bags for foods include dry-heat sterilization, steam under pressure sterilization, radiosterilization, ethylene oxide gas sterilization and plasma sterilization.
Dry-heat sterilization uses high temperatures of 160 to 180° C. or above and this application is limited to metal and glass products. Sixty minutes are required to complete dry-heat sterilization. Steam under pressure sterilization also uses high temperatures and these applications are also limited to metal and glass products. Twenty minutes are required to complete steam under pressure sterilization. Moreover, this method cannot be used for humidity-sensitive materials (such as paper). Radiosterilization has the risk of a health hazard to the human body. Radiosterilization is not effective to areas where the radiation does not reach. Ethylene oxide gas sterilization requires very careful handling due to the toxicity and flammability of the gas used. The difficult disposal of residual materials after sterilization also poses a problem.
Various plasma sterilization techniques have been announced including, for example, the Publication of Unexamined Utility Model Application No. 57352-1994 and the Publication of Unexamined Patent Application No. 135571-2003. In principle, most of them use a high temperature to sterilize and as such involve handling problems. Some techniques use inert gases such as argon gas and chlorine gas in vacuum to generate gas plasma using a high-frequency power supply to sterilize the target objects. Chlorine gas is toxic and plasma occurs on the surface of the discharging electrode, and is not effective.
As described above, conventional plasma sterilization techniques use surface-wave plasma. The inside of a package is difficult to sterilize and as such sterilization is limited to the exterior of the package. These techniques are not applicable to resinous medical instruments such as catheters and injection devices and medical instruments that require sterilization of their insides such as vacuum tubes for drawing blood. The objects that can be sterilized are also limited due to thermal problems related to plasma irradiation. Other sterilization methods have various limitations and hazards due to their use of high temperature, high pressure and toxic gas. There has been a growing demand for a sterilization method that uses low temperature, low pressure and safe procedures and is capable of high-speed sterilization.

Microwave plasma sterilizing method and device


The subject matter described herein is generally directed towards tracking and recovering a disk allocation state. An on-disk log of operations is maintained to describe operations performed to an in-memory partial reference count map. Upon a crash of a host computing device during a checkpoint operation to an on-disk complete reference count map, the on-disk log of operations is used to undo and then redo the operations, or just redo the operations. In this manner, a disk allocation state prior to the crash is recreated in the on-disk complete reference count map with atomicity and crash consistency.

An allocation map tracks storage usage on a storage device (e.g., a storage disk). The allocation map is a data structure used to indicate whether units of storage in the storage device have been allocated or not allocated. For example, an allocation bitmap may be a free space bitmap defined by a bit array to indicate, by a "0" or "1", whether a particular unit of storage in the storage device is free for writing (not allocated) or not free for writing (allocated).
Various data storage systems have been developed to manage on-disk data structures in an attempt to maintain the allocation bitmap with atomicity and durability. These systems often require complex processes for these attempts, while also using a significant amount of memory. Additionally, existing systems have difficulty achieving crash consistency in the allocation map.

Tracking and recovering a disk allocation state


A replacement torque converter clutch (TCC) apply valve for regulating the application of the torque converter clutch within an automatic transmission. The present TCC apply valve includes a valve piston having an expandable seal located at the primary wear location within the valve body to reduce hydraulic leakage. The valve piston also includes an internal fluid gallery formed therein in fluid communication with an annular groove wherein the expandable seal resides. Whenever the present TCC apply valve is actuated, TCC signal pressure enters the fluid gallery in the valve piston under pressure and urges the expandable seal in a radially outward direction into contact with the mating bore to minimize hydraulic fluid leakage during the apply cycle of the torque converter clutch. The valve piston also includes a control land having a substantially increased axial length with annular lubrication grooves, which improves stability and accuracy in operation.

The present invention relates generally to the field of hydraulic circuits within an automatic transmission of a land vehicle and, more particularly, to a Torque Converter Clutch (hereinafter "TCC") Apply Valve for GENERAL MOTORS 4T65-E and other similar transmissions that directs torque converter fluid pressure to the TCC apply and release circuits to actuate the torque converter clutch.
Automatic transmission systems of the prior art have a hydraulic circuit sub-system which includes at least a hydraulic pump, a valve body having fluid conducting passageways or circuits, input and exhaust ports formed within the fluid circuits, and a plurality of "spool" valves so-called because of their resemblance to sewing thread spools. Such spool valves are comprised of modified, cylindrical pistons which alternately open and close fluid ports within the valve body to regulate the flow and pressure of automatic transmission fluid (hereinafter "ATF") within the fluid circuits to actuate various components of the transmission. It will be understood that in describing hydraulic fluid circuits, ATF usually changes names when it passes through an orifice or control valve in a specific circuit.
ATF leakage within the TCC apply and release circuits occurs due to the constant oscillation and abrasive action of the TCC apply valve within the mating bore of the aluminum valve body, which results in a loss of converter apply pressure. The loss of pressure in the apply circuit causes TCC slippage, converter shudder, and eventually an overheated and/or burned torque converter. Thus, the present invention has been developed to resolve these problems and other shortcomings of the prior art.
There are known prior art patents and a pending patent application that are available in the field of hydraulic control valves. One example of a torque converter clutch (TCC) apply valve is disclosed in pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/187,092 to Stafford (currently on appeal) which discloses a TCC apply valve including an apply piston having an expandable seal installed thereon at the primary wear location within the valve body to reduce ATF leakage. This valve piston also includes an internal ATF gallery with radially extending passages formed therein in fluid communication with an annular groove wherein the expandable seal resides. Whenever the present TCC Apply Valve is actuated by the TCC solenoid, TCC signal pressure forces ATF into the gallery in the apply valve piston and further urges the seal radially outward into contact with the bore to minimize ATF leakage during the apply cycle of the torque converter clutch.
Another example of a hydraulic valve having a structural feature in common with the present invention is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,736,747 to Stafford which teaches a forward clutch control valve assembly for a Ford AX4N transaxle including a primary control land having an increased outside diameter and axial length, which replaces the narrow forward stem of the original equipment valve piston. The increased axial length of the primary control land on this valve piston is based on the limits of axial travel of the piston within the cylindrical bore wherein the valve piston resides during operation. This forward clutch control valve assembly also provides a substantially increased control land-to-bore surface contact ratio and an increased end face surface area. As a result this present forward clutch control valve assembly is substantially less prone to bending and/or seizure within its mating bore during operation.
While these devices fulfill their respective, particular objectives and requirements, the aforementioned patents do not disclose the Torque Converter Clutch Apply Valve of the present invention, which substantially departs from the conventional concepts and designs of the prior art.


An apparatus for cavity enhanced optical detection having an improved flow cell is provided. Sensitivity of the cavity resonance condition to changes in refractive index of an analyte flowing through the flow cell is reduced. More specifically, the round trip optical path defined by the resonant cavity intersects a curved cavity input mirror at a point. This point has a location on the input mirror that is substantially independent of the refractive index of the analyte. In this manner, changes in sample refractive index do not lead to misalignment of the resonant optical cavity.

Optical detection is the determination of the presence and/or concentration of one or more target species within a sample by illuminating the sample with optical radiation and measuring optical absorption, induced fluorescence, and/or optical scattering by the sample. Optical detection has a wide variety of applications, including spectroscopy and liquid chromatography, and a correspondingly wide variety of optical detection methods are known. Cavity enhanced optical detection entails the use of a passive optical resonator, also referred to as a cavity, to improve the performance of an optical detector. Cavity enhanced absorption spectroscopy (CEAS) and cavity ring down spectroscopy (CRDS) are two of the most widely used cavity enhanced optical detection techniques.
The intensity of single-mode radiation trapped within a passive optical resonator decays exponentially over time, with a time constant τ, which is often referred to as the ring-down time. In practice, it is desirable to ensure that only a single resonator mode has an appreciable amplitude, since excitation of multiple resonator modes leads to multi-exponential radiation intensity decay (i.e., multiple time constants), which significantly complicates the interpretation of measurement results. The ring-down time T depends on the cavity round trip length and on the total round-trip optical loss within the cavity, including loss due to absorption and/or scattering by one or more target species within a sample positioned inside the cavity. Thus, measurement of the ring-down time of an optical resonator containing a target species provides spectroscopic information on the target species. Both CRDS and CEAS are based on such a measurement of τ.
In CRDS, an optical source is usually coupled to the resonator in a mode-matched manner, so that the radiation trapped within the resonator is substantially in a single spatial mode. The coupling between the source and the resonator is then interrupted (e.g., by blocking the source radiation, or by altering the spectral overlap between the source radiation and the excited resonator mode). A detector typically is positioned to receive a portion of the radiation leaking from the resonator, which decays in time exponentially with a time constant τ. The time-dependent signal from this detector is processed to determine τ (e.g., by sampling the detector signal and applying a suitable curve-fitting method to a decaying portion of the sampled signal). Note that CRDS entails an absolute measurement of τ. Both pulsed and continuous wave laser radiation can be used in CRDS with a variety of factors influencing the choice. The articles in the book "Cavity-Ringdown Spectroscopy" by K. W. Busch and M. A. Busch, ACS Symposium Series No. 720, 1999 ISBN 0-8412-3600-3, including the therein cited references, cover most currently reported aspects of CRDS technology.
Single spatial mode excitation of the resonator is also usually employed in CEAS, (sometimes called integrated cavity output spectroscopy (ICOS)), but CEAS differs from CRDS in that the wavelength of the source is swept (i.e., varied over time), so that the source wavelength coincides briefly with the resonant wavelengths of a succession of resonator modes. A detector is positioned to receive radiation leaking from the resonator, and the signal from the detector is integrated for a time comparable to the time it takes the source wavelength to scan across a sample resonator mode of interest. The resulting detector signal is proportional to τ, so the variation of this signal with source wavelength provides spectral information on the sample. Note that CEAS entails a relative measurement of τ. The published Ph.D. dissertation "Cavity Enhanced Absorption Spectroscopy", R. Peeters, Katholieke Universiteit Nijmegen, The Netherlands, 2001, ISBN 90-9014628-8, provides further information on both CEAS and CRDS technology and applications. CEAS is discussed in a resent article entitled Incoherent broad-band cavity-enchanced absorption spectroscopy by S. Fiedler, A. Hese and A. Ruth Chemical Physics Letter 371 (2003) 284–294.
In cavity enhanced optical detection, the measured ring-down time depends on the total round trip loss within the optical resonator. Absorption and/or scattering by target species within the cavity normally accounts for the major portion of the total round trip loss, while parasitic loss (e.g., mirror losses and reflections from intracavity interfaces) accounts for the remainder of the total round trip loss. The sensitivity of cavity enhanced optical detection improves as the parasitic loss is decreased, since the total round trip loss depends more sensitively on the target species concentration as the parasitic loss is decreased. Accordingly, both the use of mirrors with very low loss (i.e., a reflectivity greater than 99.99 per cent), and the minimization of intracavity interface reflections are important for cavity enhanced optical detection.
Cavity enhanced optical detection can be used for solid, liquid, aerosol, or gaseous samples. For gaseous samples, intracavity interfaces are typically not present, so there are no corresponding interface reflection losses to contribute to round trip parasitic loss. However, intracavity interfaces are typically present for solid or liquid samples. For example, contamination of the mirror surfaces by aerosols i.e., liquid and/or solid particulate containing gas samples can create problems so that these samples are generally enclosed in an intracavity cell. This cell will create interfaces (e.g., windows) within the optical resonator. Similarly, the boundaries of a solid sample are per se intracavity interfaces. Likewise, for a liquid sample contained in a flow cell present within a cavity, the interfaces between the liquid and the inner wall of the flow cell as well as the exterior wall surfaces of the flow cell are all intracavity interfaces. U.S. Pat. No. 6,452,680 teaches the minimization of intracavity reflection loss when examining solid or liquid samples by positioning the sample such that optical radiation circulating within the optical resonator is, insofar as possible, incident on the sample-induced interfaces at an angle approximating Brewster's angle and is p-polarized relative to these interfaces. Since reflection is minimized for p-polarized incidence on an interface at
Brewster's angle, this arrangement significantly reduces reflection-induced parasitic loss. FIG. 1a is a schematic illustration of this cell configuration.
A variation of the design shown in FIG. 1a is shown in FIG. 1b, which design is also known to the prior art (K. Snyder and R. N. Zare, "Cavity Ring-down Spectroscopy as a Detector for Liquid Chromatography" Analytical Chemistry, Vol. 75, p 3086–3091 (2003). In this design the liquid flow channel is tilted within the cell so that the light beam strikes each surface at the correct Brewster's angle for the specific interface (e.g. air→fused silica→liquid→fused silica→air). With the appropriate polarization of light, the interface reflections are minimized, thereby allowing the light to pass back and forth through the cell multiple times, resulting in a relatively long ring-down constant. In the example shown in FIG. 1b, using a fused silica cell and water as the sample liquid, angle e is 7.9° and angle a is 55.6° so that the light refracts through the cell, hitting each interface surface at approximately Brewster's angle for minimum reflection. The system shown in FIG. 1b provides some advantage relative to the arrangement of FIG. 1a in that by tilting the flow channel within the cell the light path is incident on all interfaces at approximately Brewster's angle.
However, the arrangements shown in FIGS. 1a and 1b both suffer from a drawback in that a change in the refractive index of the sample can cause the cavity to become misaligned and potentially unstable. A detailed discussion of cavity stability can be found in Chapters 19 and 20 of "Lasers" by A. E. Sigman, University Science Books Sausalito, Calif., 1986. Variability of the sample refractive index is especially pertinent for liquid chromatography applications, since the sample refractive index will frequently change as a separation proceeds, especially in the many cases where it is desirable to use various solvents having different refractive indices to perform sequential or different separations in the same instrument. In addition, variation of sample temperature and/or pressure can also cause changes in the sample refractive index. This same analysis applies to the situation where the light source wavelength λs is changed from the original design wavelength to λd (λd≠λs) In this case the light will travel along different paths in both the flow cell (e.g.,glass) and the fluid sample. This is a significant limitation if it is desired to use the system with a broadband or tunable source of radiation.

Flow cell for optical detection having reduced sensitivity to refractive index variation


An antenna (100) includes an array of telescoping elements (402a–d) connected to and by a conductive disk (404) that feeds a signal to the elements (402a–d) from a matching circuit (506) within a body section (412). Each element (402a–d) has a joint (602, 604) making it individually angularly bendable. The body section (412) is attached to a swivel assembly (414) for adjusting the angle of the array (402a–d). A coaxial cable runs from the matching circuit (506), through the swivel assembly (412) and to a connector (502) within a connector assembly (422) for attachment to a radio.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates in general to antennas and more particularly, to portable line-of-sight array antennas.
2. Description of the Related Art
The ability to reliably communicate from one location to another is important in many situations, but few have the potential to be as important than those communications that occur between military personnel in the field of battle. Soldiers must be able to wirelessly communicate reliably and efficiently with others.
Wireless communication is accomplished through use of a radio connected to a radiating element, or antenna. An antenna is an impedance-matching device used to absorb or radiate electromagnetic waves into the environment. The function of the antenna is to "match" the impedance of the propagating medium, which is usually air or free space, to the source of the radio waves, i.e., output of the radio.
Antennas are available in many different shapes and sizes. The particular shape and size of an antenna designed for a particular application depends on many factors, such as the frequency or range of frequencies being received and transmitted, the expected environment the antenna will endure, size limitations, power efficiency limitations, application particulars, and many more.
Communication between two stations on the ground is most easily accomplished with radiating elements commonly called "monopoles" or "dipoles." A dipole has two elements of equal size arranged in a shared axial alignment configuration with a small gap between the two elements. Each element of the dipole is fed with a charge 180 degrees out of phase from the other. In this manner, the elements will have opposite charges and common nulls, or points of no charge. A monopole, in contrast, has only one element, but operates in conjunction with a ground plane, which mimics the missing second element.
One of the characteristics of antenna transmission is "polarization," which describes the physical plane the signal is transmitted. A dipole or monopole oriented in a vertical position, with reference to the horizontal orientation of the earth's surface, radiates signals in a straight line with a vertical polarization, know as line-of-sight ("LOS"). For a second antenna to receive maximum signal strength, it too must have a vertical orientation. As the receiving antenna is rotated away from vertical, its maximum receive power diminishes until the antenna reaches a horizontal orientation (perpendicular to the transmit antenna), at which time the maximum receive power reaches zero. It is therefore necessary to be able to orient a first antenna to match the orientation of a second antenna to maximize transmission and reception power, or "gain" between the antennas.
"Man-Pack" radios are mobile radios designed to be carried or worn on a person and are commonly used by Military or Paramilitary soldiers in the field on the move or at halt. A configuration of an antenna often found in Man Pack radios is a helical antenna, called a "helix". In its simplest form, a helix is a conducting wire wound in the form of a screw thread and propagates radio frequency (RF) waves with a vertical polarization.
Helix antennas are attractive for Man Pack portable radio applications because of the antenna's relatively small size. The helix antenna axial length is shorter than the traditional resonant monopole, which is typically ¼ of a wavelength (λ) or a dipole antenna, which is typically ½λ. A normal-mode helix antenna length is very short (nL<<λ), typically only 0.1 λ.
The helix antenna, although useful, has several shortcomings. One shortcoming is a helix antenna is fixed in length and width dimensions and has an appreciable weight. To be portable, the helix antenna must be disassembled when carried and reassembled when deployed, which takes several minutes for each process. In combat situations, each minute is critical to avoid loss of lives. Another shortcoming is the helix antenna has a series loss resistance of the long spiral conductor is substantial, thereby consuming power. In portable mobile applications power is limited to what can be easily carried in the field.
Alternative to a helix antenna is a lightweight, compactable, telescoping antenna that is similar in construction to a telescoping antenna found on automobiles or cellular phones. Telescoping antenna systems, although useful, are not without their shortcomings. Once shortcoming is a telescoping antenna works efficiently only over a narrow band of frequencies. Effective communication in the field requires systems that function over a broad range of frequencies. The advent of multi-octave Man Pack broadband hand-held radios requires a broadband antenna. Therefore, the standard telescoping antenna is incompatible with the new generations of broadband radios.
Accordingly, a need exists to overcome the shortcomings with the prior art and to provide a portable, lightweight, efficient, high gain, broadband, line-of-sight antenna communication system that can easily be deployed in the field.

Portable telescoping line-of-sight array antenna


A vehicle driving control system has an automatic driving mode that enables traveling without a driver's operation. The vehicle driving control system includes a driver monitor that monitors a driver in a vehicle compartment, and detects a driver state, a driver state determining unit that determines, based on the driver state, whether the driver is in a state capable of driving normally, a retreat mode controller that controls a retreat mode that causes an own vehicle to travel for retreat to a place where the own vehicle can safely stop when it is determined, during traveling under the automatic driving mode, that the driver is not in the state capable of driving normally, and a retreat mode canceler that cancels the retreat mode when it is determined, during the travel for retreat, that the driver has returned to the state capable of driving normally.

The technology relates to a vehicle driving control system having an automatic driving mode for enabling traveling without requiring a driver's driving operation.
A system having an automatic driving mode for enabling traveling without requiring a driver's driving operation has been recently developed to be put into practical use for vehicles such as automobiles. In an automatic driving vehicle as described above, when a system determines that it is difficult to continue automatic driving due to malfunction of the vehicle or the like, a driver is required to take over driving and perform manual driving.
In order to reduce a risk that a driver is not capable of taking over driving in spite of such a takeover request from an automatic driving mode to manual driving due to deterioration of the driver's physical condition or the like, it has been known that a vehicle is provided with a retreat mode for automatically stopping the vehicle on behalf of the driver, for example, as disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication (JP-A) No. 2016-196285.


A method and apparatus are disclosed for controlling a buffer in a digital audio broadcasting (DAB) communication system. An audio encoder marks a frame as “dropped” whenever a buffer overflow might occur. Only a small number of bits are utilized to process a lost frame, thereby preventing the buffer from overflowing and allowing the encoder buffer-level to quickly recover from the potential overflow condition. The audio encoder optionally sets a flag that provides an indication to the receivers that a frame has been lost. If a “frame lost” condition is detected by a receiver, the receiver can optionally employ mitigation techniques to reduce the impact of the lost frame(s).

Proposed systems for providing digital audio broadcasting (DAB) in the FM radio band are expected to provide near compact disk (CD)-quality audio, data services and more robust coverage than existing analog FM transmissions. Digital audio broadcasting systems compress an audio signal using a digital audio encoder, such as a perceptual audio coder (PAC). Perceptual audio coders reduce the amount of information needed to represent an audio signal by exploiting human perception and minimizing the perceived distortion for a given bit rate. Perceptual audio coders are described, for example, in D. Sinha et al., "The Perceptual Audio Coder," Digital Audio, Section 42, 42-1 to 42-18, (CRC Press, 1998), incorporated by reference herein
Digital radio will be offered in a single channel and multiple channel form. The single channel form will use the existing infrastructure of FM broadcasting. Each digital audio channel is broadcast in the bandwidth allocated to one FM channel. Until such time as a transition to an all-digital DAB system can be achieved, many broadcasters require an intermediate solution in which the analog and digital signals can be transmitted simultaneously within the same licensed band. Such systems are typically referred to as hybrid in-band on-channel (HIBOC) DAB systems, and are being developed for both the FM and AM radio bands.
FIG. 1 illustrates a conventional DAB communication system 100. As shown in FIG. 1, the DAB communication system 100 employs a radio transmission link 130 that is typically of a fixed bit rate. The bit rate of the audio encoder 110 on the other hand is typically variable, depending on the complexity of the current audio signal and the audio quality requirements. On average, the bit rate of the audio encoder 110 is equal to or less than the capacity of the transmission link 130, but at any given instance the bit rate of the audio coder 110 may be higher. If data from the audio encoder 110 was applied directly to the transmission link 130, data would be lost each time the instantaneous bit rate of the encoder 110 exceeded the capacity of the transmission link 130. In order to prevent such a loss of data, the output of the encoder 110 is buffered into a first-in-first-out (FIFO) buffer 120 before being applied to the transmission link 130. If the instantaneous bit rate of the encoder 110 is higher than the bit rate of the transmission link, the amount of data in the FIFO buffer 120 increases. Similarly, if the instantaneous bit rate of the encoder 110 is lower than the bit rate of the transmission link 130, the amount of data in the FIFO buffer 120 decreases. The encoder 110 (or encoder bank) typically contains a control loop that modifies the bit rate of the encoder 110 and prevents the encoder 110 from overflowing or underflowing the FIFO buffer 120. Overflow causes a loss of bits, while an underflow wastes some of the capacity the transmission link 130.
As a result of this scheme, the transmission delay is also variable. The delay between the time when an audio packet is first written into the FIFO buffer 120 and the time when the packet is actually received by the receiver 150 depends, among other factors, on the amount of data that is currently stored in the FIFO buffer 120. However, the audio decoder 170 at the receiver 150 needs to get audio packets at a fixed rate (of packets per second) in order to play continuously. Therefore, it is necessary to buffer the audio data at the decoder 170 as well as using a buffer 160. When the receiver 150 is first powered up or is tuned to a new channel, the decoder 170 begins to play only after a certain initialization period, during which time packets are received and stored in the decoder-input buffer 160. After the decoder 170 begins playing, the decoder 170 consumes packets from the input buffer 160 at a fixed rate, while at the same time new packets arrive and are stored in the same buffer 160. The decoder input-buffer 160 has to have enough capacity so that even in the worst case of minimal delay and largest packet size, the buffer 160 will not overflow. In addition, the initialization period has to be sufficiently long to accumulate enough packets in the buffer 160 so that the buffer does not become empty due to transmission delays.
If the number of data bits in the encoder buffer 120 gets higher than the size of the decoder buffer 160, an overflow condition occurs since the frame at which this condition occurs will not arrive in time at the decoder 170 to be decoded. It is difficult to design a perceptually good bit-allocation scheme for an audio encoder 110 that guarantees that the number of data bits in the encoder buffer 120 stays within a specified range. Typically, high bursts of quantization noise are added to prevent the danger of buffer overflow. The perceptual effect of this is referred to as bit-starvation and frequently leads to a severely distorted audio signal. Nonetheless, if there is a danger that the buffer will overflow, then the audio encoder 110 typically introduces high noise bursts into the audio signal in order to use less bits for encoding. In the extreme case where a buffer overflow cannot be prevented, bits are wasted for a frame that is known to not arrive in time at the decoder.
A need therefore exists for an improved buffer control technique that does not waste bits when it is known that a frame will not arrive in time to be processed by the decoder. A further need exists for an improved buffer control technique that allows a decoder to employ mitigation techniques to minimize the impact of one or more dropped frames.

Method and apparatus for controlling buffer overflow in a communication system


An embroidery frame provided with an upper frame, a lower frame that clamps a workpiece cloth with the upper frame, a hinge openably linking the upper and lower frames, a clamping unit that presses the upper frame to the lower frame, an auxiliary frame which is fitted in an inner side of the upper frame and which downwardly presses the workpiece cloth clamped between the upper and lower frames, and a regulating mechanism which is fitted in the upper frame and which regulates the upward movement of the auxiliary frame with respect to the upper frame.

Conventionally, an embroidery frame has been used that retains an embroidery workpiece cloth in a stretched manner. The embroidery frame clamps the workpiece cloth between an inner peripheral surface of an outer frame and an outer peripheral surface of an inner frame. Therefore, the problem with such embroidery frame is that creases are formed when the workpiece cloth is removed from between the outer and inner frames. Also, the outer frame is equipped with a clamping screw for adjusting the size of the outer frame. Therefore, whenever the workpiece cloth is attached to or detached from the embroidery frame, the clamping screw needs to be operated in order to adjust the size of the outer frame. This impairs workability of the sewing process.
On the other hand, embroidery frames that retain the workpiece cloth between upper and lower frames have been suggested. In such embroidery frames, the workpiece cloth is less prone to creasing, since the workpiece cloth is clamped between the lower surface of the upper frame and the upper surface of the lower frame. However, since the embroidery frame is constructed to simply press the upper frame against the lower frame, sufficient tension cannot be applied to the workpiece cloth clamped between the upper and lower frames. Also, cloth retainability is inferior to embroidery frames constructed by the outer frame and the inner frame. Thus, during the sewing process, the workpiece cloth is gradually pulled inwardly by the thread tension of embroidery patterns, leading to pattern distortion and impairment of sewing quality.
Such being the case, embroidery frames equipped with an auxiliary frame that further downwardly press the workpiece cloth clamped between the upper and lower frames have been reduced to practice. For example, JP-A-8-243280 discloses a sewing cloth-retaining frame of a clamp type provided with a base frame (lower frame), a first presser frame (upper frame), a second presser frame (auxiliary frame), a first clamp mechanism that presses the upper frame against the lower frame, and a second clamp mechanism that presses the auxiliary frame against the lower frame. The lower frame is provided with a first receiving portion, an elevated portion formed as an elevated stage in the inner peripheral portion of the first receiving portion, and a second receiving portion formed as a lowered stage in the inner peripheral portion of the elevated portion. After fixing the workpiece cloth to the lower frame by pressing the upper frame against the first receiving portion of the lower frame by the first clamp mechanism, when the auxiliary frame is pressed against the second receiving portion of the lower frame by the second clamp mechanism, the auxiliary frame downwardly presses the workpiece cloth in uneven levels in the inner peripheral portion of the upper frame. Thus, the workpiece cloth is retained in a sufficiently stretched state.
However, in the above constructed embroidery frame, in addition to the clamp mechanism that presses the upper frame against the lower frame, a clamp mechanism that presses the auxiliary frame to the workpiece cloth is required. This leads to an increase in the number of parts, consequently increasing the complexity as well as the weight of the embroidery frame.


An LED lamp includes a lamp holder, a heat sink, a plurality of LED modules, a cover, an envelope and a sealing cushion. The lamp holder has a connecting portion at a bottom thereof adapted for engaging with a lamp socket to fix the LED lamp in position. The heat sink is disposed on the lamp holder. The LED modules are attached to a circumference of the heat sink. The cover is coupled to a top of the heat sink. The envelope encloses the heat sink and the LED modules therein and has a lower end engaging with the lamp holder and an upper end engaging with the cover. The sealing cushion is provided between at least one of the combinations of the lamp holder and the envelope, and of the cover and the envelope to prevent an entry of foreign matter.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an LED lamp, and more particularly to an improved LED lamp having a sealed structure to prevent an entry of mist, dust, rainwater and other foreign matter into the LED lamp.
2. Description of Related Art
An LED lamp is a type of solid-state lighting that utilizes light-emitting diodes (LEDs) as a source of illumination. An LED is a device for transferring electricity to light by using a theory that, if a current is made to flow in a forward direction through a junction region comprising two different semiconductors, electrons and holes are coupled at the junction region to generate a light beam. The LED has an advantage that it is resistant to shock, and has an almost eternal lifetime under a specific condition; thus, the LED lamp is intended to be a cost-effective yet high quality replacement for incandescent and fluorescent lamps.
When the LED lamp is used in the outdoors for illumination, mist, dust, rainwater or other foreign matter is prone to creep into the LED lamp, which may cause electric leakage or short circuit of the LED lamp, or a contamination of the LEDs used in the LED lamp.
What is needed, therefore, is an improved LED lamp which has a simple and novel structure, whereby the LED lamp is suitable to mass-manufacture and has an improved waterproof configuration for preventing rainwater, dust, etc. from creeping into the LED lamp.

Fu Zhun Precision Industry (Shen Zhen) Co., Ltd.


For a mobile terminal and a method for controlling charging thereof, when the remaining power amount of a power supply, including first and second power sources, is less than a minimum power consumption amount required for a call, power is charged using the second power source. The remaining power amount resulting from the charging is compared with a power consumption amount corresponding to a callable time, and information that is associated with the callable time corresponding to a result of the comparison is outputted.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mobile terminal which is capable of charging power using only a solar cell among a plurality of power sources in a low power state, and a method for controlling charging thereof.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
Terminals may be classified into mobile/portable terminals and stationary terminals according to whether they are movable. Mobile terminals may also be classified into handheld terminals and vehicle mount terminals according to whether they can be directly carried by users.
As the functionality of such a terminal is diversified, the terminal has been implemented in the form of a multimedia player having complex functions including, for example, photographing or video capturing, music or video file playback, game play, and broadcast reception.
In order to support and increase the functionality of such a terminal, it may be considered to improve hardware parts and/or software parts of the terminal.
A conventional mobile terminal, when the remaining power amount thereof is below a certain reference (this state will hereinafter be referred to as a low power state), may notify the user of the level of the remaining power amount using a remaining power amount notification icon, output a low power state notification text using a popup window or notify the user that a specific application cannot be driven due to lack of the remaining power amount.
However, in the above-mentioned mobile terminal, no detailed description is given of how the mobile terminal charges power using only one power source (for example, a solar cell) in the low power state in the case where the terminal includes a plurality of power sources.
In addition, in the case where the above-mentioned mobile terminal charges power using only the solar cell among the plurality of power sources in the low power state, it does not provide any information based on the remaining power amount resulting from the charging, with the exception of a power icon.

Mobile terminal and method for controlling charging thereof


A crescent PLOT column is disclosed, including a capillary column having an inlet, an outlet, a bore, and an inner surface surrounding the bore and extending between the inlet and the outlet. A layer of particles is localized on a radial portion of the inner surface. The layer of the particles includes a radial thickness decreasing from a center of the radial portion to a periphery of the radial portion, forming a crescent shape in a radial frame of reference. A method for preparing the crescent PLOT column is disclosed, including loading the capillary column with a fluid including a carrier and particles such that the fluid is contained within the capillary column. The capillary column and the fluid contained within the capillary column are subjected to a centrifugal force. The carrier is removed, and a layer of the particles is localized on the radial portion of the inner surface.

PLOT columns have been advantageously used for analysis of volatile compounds in gas chromatography. These columns provide high selectivity, which enables optimization of analysis time and increases in laboratory efficiency.
PLOT columns include a column with a thin layer of porous material coating the internal surface of the column. The porous material may be selected based on the materials to be separated, but the retention times for materials in the PLOT columns depend not only on the porous material, but also the column surface on which the porous material is deposited. PLOT columns have been prepared using molecular sieves, alumina, and porous polymers. The PLOT columns may be coated with the porous material using a suspension of the porous material, and then removing the suspension medium to yield a stable uniform layer, or the porous layer may be formed by in-situ polymerization or other chemical reaction.
Generally, the porous material in PLOT columns forms a layer 5-50 μm thick on the inner walls of the column, but these layers tend to be fragile, and the particles of the porous material may dislodge and move during operation. This movement of particles may contaminate detectors, damage valves, increase noise, or even obstruct the column or connectors used. Attempts at improvements in these respects have been disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,793,920 (which discloses a porous plug to catch eluting particles, but which is subject itself to pressure drop-causing blockages), and U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,599,445, 5,607,580, 5,609,756, 5,620,603, and 5,630,937 (which disclose using siloxane polymers to bond the porous material).
Standard commercial techniques for PLOT column production employ coating processes that deposit a full concentric coated inner surface of the column. Scientific literature describing these coating techniques stress the need for a uniform and even thickness layer throughout the column.
Standard commercial techniques employ evaporation-based mechanisms, where vacuum and/or heat is applied and the liquid-gas interface of the solvent propagates down the column as the solvent evaporates. As the solvent front moves further down the column and away from the column opening, the conductance of the volatized solvent decreases and the vacuum in turn decreases. The linear loss of vacuum pressure and the increase in flow resistance results in a practical limit to the length of column that may be prepared as a PLOT column. Standard commercial techniques relying on heat and vacuum also take several hours to achieve for comparatively short lengths of column (30 meters). Deposition procedures relying on localized solvent removal often exhibit irregularly coated surfaces. This is due to the turbulent solvent boiling and off-gassing at the liquid-vapor interface where the PLOT layer is deposited.
There are also practical limits to the inner diameter and length of the column able to be prepared with conventional techniques, because the evaporation-deposition process is dependent on the ability to apply consistent low pressures and evenly remove solvent along the full axial length of the column. As the column length increases, the pressure differential greatly increases from the open end of the column and the site down the column where the evaporation is occurring.
The inner surface of the column may have chemical activity toward select analyte compounds. It is possible to first deactivate, or chemically coat the full inner surface of the column prior to deposition of the crescent. It is also possible to employ a chemical coating that is 'sticky' as well as inert. This technique was described in U.S. Pat. No. 9,075,068, in which adhesive traps were localized to the capillary ends or coated over the PLOT layer itself. In the latter case, the chromatographic behavior of the underlying PLOT layer is likely compromised.
With respect to fugitive PLOT particles that are generated during use, the particles may be generated anywhere along the length of the PLOT coated surface, but the prior art solutions all describe particle trap-like devices, where the trap is localized at the column ends. This inherently results in a smaller trap capacity with respect to the PLOT layer within the column, and the requirement the particle trap ends or 'tails' be adequately long enough to ensure the capture of all fugitive particles. The presence of unique particle trap 'tails' also eliminate the possibility of trimming the columns, which is a common practice in the GC analysis during initial installation and follow-on column maintenance practices. Also when particle traps are connected, the application in vacuum detection systems is problematic as the connections are difficult to create a sufficiently good seal.
Accordingly, it would be desirable to provide PLOT columns and methods for forming PLOT columns not suffering from the above-described drawbacks.

Crescent plot columns and methods for preparing crescent plot columns


A control is provided for a friction stir welding apparatus comprising a pin tool which includes a shoulder and a rotating pin extending outwardly from the shoulder of the pin tool and which, in use, is plunged into a workpiece formed contacting workpiece members to stir weld the members together. The control system controls the penetration of the pin tool into the workpiece members which are mounted on a support anvil. The control system includes a pin length controller for controlling pin length relative to the shoulder and for producing a corresponding pin length signal. A pin force sensor senses the force being exerted on the pin during welding and produces a corresponding actual pin force signal. A probe controller controls a probe extending outwardly from the pin, senses a parameter related to the distance between the probe and the supporting anvil and produces a corresponding probe signal. A workpiece standoff sensor senses the standoff distance between the workpiece and the standoff sensor and produces a corresponding standoff signal. A control unit receives the various signals, together with a weld schedule, and, based on these signals and the weld schedule, controls the pin length controller so as to control pin penetration into the workpiece.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to friction stir welding apparatus wherein a rotating pin tool is plunged into workpieces to create a weld, and, more particularly, to a penetration control system for the pin tool of such a friction stir welding, apparatus.
2. Background of the Invention
A friction stir weld machine is used to join two metal workpieces together. The two metal workpieces to be joined are positioned in a butt join configuration and clamped into this position. As indicated above, a friction stir weld is formed by plunging a rotating shouldered pin tool into the two closely fitting metal workpiece faces until the shoulder of the pin tool contacts the work surface. The initial pro be depth of the distal end of the pin of the pin tool is less than the required weld depth, and rotation of the pin within the workpiece provides frictional heating of the metal and produces a plasticized column of metal around the distal, probe end of the pin. The pin tool is moved in the direction of welding and, as this happens, the leading face of the probe end of the pin crushes the plasticized material and forces this material to the back of the pin. At the same time, the pin tool applies a substantial downwardly acting mechanical forging force. This force consolidates the weld metal into the weld joint at the trailing end of the tool.
Currently, pin tools for friction stir welding are of a fixed pin length. In commonly assigned U.S. Pat. No. 5,893,507 (Ding et al), the subject matter of which his hereby incorporated by reference, there is disclosed an automatically adjustable pin tool for friction stir welding wherein the pin tool automatically adjusts for welding materials of varying thicknesses and wherein the pin can be incrementally withdrawn from the workpiece to thereby eliminate any keyhole or crater in the weld.
In friction stir welding, it is important to control the plunge depth of the pin of the pin tool into the weld joint in order to produce the desired precision weld. This control is not possible with current systems. Mechanical systems wherein movement of the pin is controlled using a manual crank wheel do not provide sufficient control precision.
In accordance with the invention, a control system is provided for precisely controlling the depth or location of the distal end of the stirring pin of a rotating pin tool of a friction stir welding machine or apparatus so as to control the penetration of the pin into the workpiece.
According to the invention, there is provided, in a friction stir welding apparatus comprising a pin tool including a shoulder and a rotating pin extending outwardly from the shoulder of the pin tool, a control system for controlling penetration of the pin tool in a workpiece comprising contacting workpiece members which are to be joined by stir welding and which are mounted on a support anvil, the control system comprising: a pin length controller for controlling pin length relative to the shoulder and for producing a corresponding pin length signal; a pin force sensor for sensing the force being exerted on the pin during welding and for producing a corresponding actual pin force signal; a sensor for sensing a parameter related to the position of the shoulder of the pin tool; and for generating a shoulder position signal based thereon; and a control unit for receiving said pin length signal, said pin force signal, and said shoulder position signal, and for, based on said signals, controlling the pin length controller so as to control pin penetration ,into the workpiece.
The apparatus preferably further comprises a workpiece standoff sensor for sensing the standoff distance between the workpiece and the standoff sensor and for supplying a corresponding standoff signal to said control unit.
Advantageously, the control unit further receives a signal related to a weld schedule for the welding apparatus and further controls the pin length controller based thereon.
Preferably, the apparatus further comprises a probe controller for controlling a probe extending outwardly from said pin, for sensing a probe parameter related to the distance between the probe and the supporting anvil and for supplying a corresponding probe signal to said control unit. Advantageously, the probe parameter comprises probe force. Alternatively, or in addition, the probe parameter comprises probe position.
In a preferred embodiment, the shoulder position parameter comprises shoulder force. Alternatively, or in addition, the parameter comprises depth of shoulder penetration.
Preferably, the apparatus further comprises an actuator for moving the pin relative to the shoulder and the system further comprises a linear encoder for sensing the actual length of the pin, and the pin controller determines the difference between the actual pin length and a desired pin length and controls pin position based on this difference.
Advantageously, the control system further comprises a motion controller for controlling driving of the actuator, and the actuator includes an incremental encoder for supplying an actual velocity signal to the motion controller, the motion controller further receiving the pin length signal from the linear encoder.
The apparatus typically includes adjustable pin tool gearing driven by the actuator for determining the pin length and, preferably, the control system further comprises limit switches associated with the pin tool gearing for supplying limit signals to the motion controller.
Further features and advantages of the present invention will be set forth in, or apparent from, the detailed description of preferred embodiments thereof which follows.

System for controlling the stirring pin of a friction stir welding apparatus

The United States of America as represented by the Administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration


A method and apparatus for assembling and organizing media objects is described.

Users often want to put together multiple digital media objects, such as digital photographs, for transfer or for storage. In the prior art, these digital media objects are either displayed next to each other, in a row, or in a two-dimensional array. However, as images get larger, and have higher resolutions, by displaying images in this manner, the detail of the images is obscured. Alternatively, on a smaller display screen such as a handheld device, the multiple image objects are each displayed on a separate page. Again, the user cannot easily visualize all of the images, while seeing how the images fit together.

Method and apparatus for creating, assembling, and organizing compound media objects


A vehicle wheel bearing apparatus has an outer member and an inner member. Double row rolling elements are freely rollably contained between the outer and inner raceway surfaces of the outer and inner members, via cages. Seals are mounted between the outer and the inner members. A backup seal is fit onto the outer circumference of the outer side end of the outer member. The backup seal has a metal core that includes a cylindrical fitting portion and an upstanding portion that extends radially outward from the fitting portion. A sealing member is integrally adhered to the metal core. The sealing member has a side lip formed so that it extends radially outward from the metal core and inclines toward the inner side surface of the wheel mounting flange to slidably contact the flange, via a predetermined interference.

The wheel bearing apparatus supports a wheel of a vehicle that freely rotationally supports a wheel hub that mounts a wheel, via a double row rolling bearing, are known for driving wheels and driven wheels. Due to structural reasons, the inner ring rotation type is used for driving wheels and both inner ring rotation type and outer ring rotation type are used for driven wheels. There are four generation types of the wheel bearing apparatus. In the first generation type, the wheel bearing includes a double row angular contact ball bearing etc. fit between a knuckle, forming a part of a suspension apparatus, and a wheel hub. In the second generation type, a body mounting flange or a wheel mounting flange is directly formed on the outer circumference of an outer member. In the third generation type, one inner raceway surface is directly formed on the outer circumference of a wheel hub. In the fourth generation type, the inner raceway surfaces are formed on the outer circumferences, respectively, of a wheel hub and an outer joint member.
Seals are mounted in the bearing portion to prevent leakage of lubricating grease sealed within the bearing and to prevent rain water or dusts from entering into the bearing from the outside. Recently, a maintenance free idea has been adopted in automobiles and thus it is desirable to further extend the operational life of the wheel bearing apparatus. Under the circumstances, it has been found, after the verification of damages from recovered bearings that the main causes of damage to the wheel bearings is due to sealing defects rather than peeling of structural elements of the bearing. Accordingly, it is believed that the operational life of the bearing can be extended by improving the sealability and durability of the seals of the bearings.
Various seals have been proposed to improve sealability. One example of a prior art wheel bearing apparatus incorporating such a seal is shown in FIG. 10. In the description below, the term "outer side" defines a side that is positioned outside of a vehicle body (left-hand side in drawings). The term "inner side" defines a side that is positioned inside of a vehicle body (right-hand side in drawings) when the bearing apparatus is mounted on the vehicle body.
The wheel bearing apparatus is a third generation type for a driven wheel. It includes an outer member 51 integrally formed with a body mounting flange 51b on its outer circumference. The flange 51b is to be mounted on a knuckle (not shown). Its inner circumference includes double row raceway surfaces 51a, 51a. An inner member 55 includes a wheel hub 53 formed with one inner raceway surface 53a on its outer circumference. The one inner raceway surface 53a is arranged opposite to one of the double row outer raceway surfaces 51a, 51a. A cylindrical portion 53b axially extends from the inner raceway surface 53a. An inner ring 54 is press fit onto the cylindrical portion 53b of the wheel hub 53. The inner ring 54 is formed with the other inner raceway surfaces 54a on its outer circumference. The other inner raceway surface 54a is arranged opposite to the other of the double row outer raceway surface 51a, 51a. Double row balls 57, 57 are freely rollably contained between the outer and inner raceway surfaces, via cages 56.
Hub bolts 52a are equidistantly arranged along the periphery of the wheel mounting flange 52. The inner ring 54 is axially secured relative to the wheel hub 53 by a caulked portion 58. The caulked portion 58 is formed by plastically deforming radially outwardly the end of the cylindrical portion 53b of the wheel hub 53. Seals 59, 60 are mounted on opposite ends of the outer member 51 to prevent leakage of lubricating grease sealed within the bearing and to prevent rain water or dusts from entering into the bearing from the outside.
As shown in an enlarged view of FIG. 11(a), an outer side seal 59 has a metal core 61 and a sealing member 62 integrally adhered to the metal core 61, via vulcanized adhesion. The metal core 61 includes a cylindrical press fit portion 61a press fit into the outer member 51. An inner portion 61b is bent radially inward from the press fit portion 61a and has a C-shaped cross-section.
The sealing member 62 is made of an elastic member, such as synthetic rubber, and is adhered to the inner portion 61b of the metal core 61. Its radially innermost end extends around the radially inner circumferential edge of the metal core 61. The sealing member 62 has radially inner and outer side lips 63, 64. The lips 63, 64 are bent radially outward and press against a ground surface of a base of the wheel mounting flange 52. The sealing member 62 further includes a radial lip 65 positioned radially inside of the inner portion 61b of the metal core 61. The lip 65 is adapted to press against a ground round corner portion 66 of a base portion of the wheel mounting flange 52.
In addition to the outer side seal 59, a shielding plate 67, forming an outside seal, is mounted on the outer side outer circumference of the outer member 51. The shielding plate 67 includes a cylindrical portion 67a, fit on the outer member 51, and an upstanding flange portion 67b. The plate 67 has a substantially L-shaped cross-section. The flange portion 67b is arranged opposite to the base end of the wheel mounting flange 52, via a predetermined gap, to form a labyrinth seal 68.
The labyrinth seal 68 prevents rain water or dusts from entering into the bearing. Thus, it is possible to have a sufficient sealing effect if the interference of the side lips 63, 64 of the outer side seal 59 is set small to reduce the rotational torque caused by the contact of the seal 59 against the wheel hub 53 and to contribute to improve fuel consumption (see Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 147298/2005).


An object is to prevent the partial pressure of oxidative gas over time in an FOUP mounted on an FIMS system and left open. A surface purge unit is provided on a side opposite to the opening of the FOUP in such a way that wafers supported in the FOUP is located between the opening and the surface purge unit. The surface purge unit ejects inert gas from a plurality of vent holes provided in its surface toward the opening. Uniform purging or replacement of the interior of the FOUP with inert gas can be achieved by creating inert gas flow from an inert gas supply part extending over a surface in the direction from the interior of the FOUP toward the opening along the wafer surface.

Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a pod or an airtight container called FOUP (Front-Opening Unified Pod) in which wafers are housed, which is used in what is called an FIMS (Front-Opening Interface Mechanical Standard) system for transfer between semiconductor processing apparatuses. The present invention also relates to an FIMS system that also functions as a purge system that performs purging operation for cleaning the interior of the pod.
Description of the Related Art
The pod to which the present invention is directed includes a body part in which wafers are to be housed and a lid that closes the opening of the body part. The operations of opening and closing the lid of the pod and the transfer of wafers into/out of the pod are performed through a mini-environment in which a transfer robot with which a semiconductor processing apparatus is equipped is provided. A load port apparatus has a wall partly defining the mini-environment and having an opening portion leading to the mini-environment, a pod table on which a pod is placed with its opening directly facing the opening portion of the wall, and a door part that closes and opens the opening portion of the wall.
Typically, the interior of the pod loaded with wafers or the like is filled with dry nitrogen or the like gas that is controlled to be highly clean to prevent the entry of contaminants and oxidative gases etc. into the pod. However, while wafers in the pod are transferred to one of various kinds of processing apparatuses to undergo certain processing, the interior of the pod and the interior of the processing apparatus are kept in communication with each other. Consequently, the gas in the processing apparatus and the mini-environment enter the interior of the pod, and there is a possibility that oxygen and/or moisture in the gas may adhere to the surface of the wafers.
Oxidative gases such as oxygen form an ultrathin oxide film on the surface of the wafers or on the various kinds of layers formed on the wafers. There is a possibility that the presence of such an oxide film may prevent micro devices from having desired characteristics. A possible countermeasure to this is to introduce a gas with a controlled partial pressure of oxidative gas such as oxygen into the pod to prevent an increase in the oxygen partial pressure. A specific method is disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 11-307623. In the apparatus disclosed in this patent literature, a pod is provided with a tower-shaped gas supply nozzle projecting into the interior of the pod, and gas is supplied into the pod through a porous sintered material to fill the pod with inert gas.
In the apparatus disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 11-307623, the increase in the partial pressure of the oxidative gases is reduced by the supply of inert gas through the tower-shaped nozzle. It is generally the case that when wafers in the pod are to be actually subject to various processing, the lid is kept open until processing on all the wafers in the pod is completed. In this case, since down flow having high flow rate is created in the mini-environment in communication with the pod, in order to satisfactorily prevent diffusion of oxidative gases from the mini-environment into the pod, it is necessary to supply a large quantity of inert gas.
In conventional semiconductor devices, even if the flow rate of the supplied inert gas is so low as to lead to an increase in the partial pressure of oxidative gases such as oxygen, the degree of oxidation of wiring has been below a level to be addressed as a problem. However, with slimming of wiring in semiconductor devices in recent years, a further reduction in the oxygen partial pressure is required in order to prevent oxidation of thin wiring, even when the lid is kept open during consecutive wafer processing, during which no serious problem occurs with previous semiconductor devices. In view of the apparatus disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 11-307623, in order to ensure a flow rate in inert gas supply high enough to reduce the increase in the oxygen partial pressure, it is preferred that the use of a porous sintered material having a high conductance be eliminated. Supplied inert gas is introduced only one-dimensionally and only by diffusion, and therefore there may arise problems of uneven distribution of gas in purging and limited replacement efficiency.


The present invention provides an indeno[1,2-b]phenanthrene compound having suppressed hole transport ability. The indeno[1,2-b]phenanthrene compound represented by the general formula [1] described in claim 1 is provided. In the formula [1], R1 and R2 each represent a hydrogen atom or an alkyl group. X1 and X2 each represent a substituent selected from the group consisting of a hydrogen atom, an alkyl group, a methoxy group, and a cyano group. A1 represents a monovalent or a divalent aromatic hydrocarbon group. A2 represents a monovalent or a divalent aromatic hydrocarbon group or a monovalent or a divalent heteroaromatic group. n represents an integer of 0 to 4. When n is 2 or more, a plurality of A2 may be identical to or different from each other.

An organic light emitting element is an electronic element having an anode, a cathode, and an organic compound layer provided between those electrodes. In the organic light emitting element, holes and electrons, which are injected from the respective electrodes, are recombined with each other in the organic compound layer to generate excitons, and when the excitons are returned to the ground state, light is emitted. Recent advancement of organic light emitting elements has been significant, and thin and lightweight light emitting devices having a low drive voltage, various light emitting wavelengths, and a high speed responsibility can be achieved.
Among the organic light emitting elements, a phosphorescent light emitting element is a light emitting element which includes a phosphorescent light emitting material in an organic compound layer and which can emit light derived from triplet excitons. However, the light emitting efficiency and durability life of the phosphorescent light emitting element are still required to be improved, and in particular, improvement in carrier balance in a light emitting layer has been desired.
As one fused polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon compound used as a constituent material of the organic compound layer, indeno[1,2-b]phenanthrene (also called "1′,2′-naphtha-2,3-fluorene") may be mentioned. In PTL 1 has disclosed that the following non-substituted compound is used as a fluorescent light emitting dopant.

However, the non-substituted indeno[1,2-b]phenanthrene proposed in PTL 1 has a high planarity, and hence, the intermolecular stack is intensive. In addition, since having a small molecular size, the non-substituted indeno[1,2-b]phenanthrene has a low glass transition temperature. Hence, an organic light emitting element in which the non-substituted indeno[1,2-b]phenanthrene is introduced into a host of a light emitting layer may not have an excellent element performance.

Indeno[1,2-b]phenanthrene compound and organic light emitting element including the same


The present invention relates to substituted 1,4-dihydro-4-oxoquinolines having antiviral activity. The substituents are present at positions 1, 2 and at least one of 5-8 positions of the quinoline ring.

The enteroviruses, rhinoviruses and hepatovirus are three groups within the family Picornaviridae which cause a wide range of human viral disease. The enterovirus group comprises 67 distinct serotypes, including 3 strains of poliovirus, 23 group A and 6 group B coxsackieviruses, 31 echoviruses, and 4 the newer numbered enteroviruses. Enteroviruses cause a broader range disease syndrome including "summer flu", upper respiratory illness, acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis, hand, foot and mouth disease, myocarditis, aseptic meningitis, and poliomyelitis. Hepatitis A virus (HAV) was provisionally classified as enterovirus type 72. However, later studies have demonstrated several characteristics that distinguish HAV from other picornaviruses. It is concluded that HAV is a unique member of the family Picornaviridae, resulting in its classification into a new genus, Hepatovirus. HAV is a common cause of both sporadic and epidemic acute hepatitis in humans, produces substantial morbidity. Among the agents of viral hepatitis, HAV is most prevalent, but it is clinically less important than the hepatitis B and C virus. The clinical manifestations of HAV infection in humans can vary greatly, ranging from asymptomatic infection, commonly seen in young children, to fulminant hepatitis, which in some cases can result in death.
Human rhinovirus (HRV), which include over 100 different serotypes are the most important etiological agents of the common cold. Infection of the upper respiratory tract by members of the HRV group represents perhaps the most common viral affliction of humans, accounting for some 40 to 50% of common colds. Although HRV-induced upper respiratory illnesses often mild and self-limiting, severe disease can occur in subjects predisposed to respiratory problems, such as asthmatics. From an economic standpoint, rhinovirus infections of humans represent a significant health problem in terms of numbers of physicians' office visits, costs associated with symptomatic treatments and days lost from work and school.
Thus, infections with more than 200 different serotypes of picornavirus cause significant morbidity and mortality. The vast serotypic diversity of these viruses precludes development of vaccines for the control of human infection by these virus groups except for poliovirus and hepatitis A virus. Currently, there is no specific antiviral therapy to treat or prevent picornavirus infections.
Rotaviruses are the single most important etiologic agents of severe diarrheal illness of infant and young children world-wide. Although diarrheal diseases are one of the most common illness of infant and young children throughout the world, they assume a special significance in less developed countries, where they constitute a major cauase of mortality among the young. Rotavirus infection produces a spectrum of responses that vary from subclinical infection to mild diarrhea to a severe and occasionally fatal dehydrating illness. At present, neither a vaccine nor specific antiviral medication has been discovered for human rotavirus infections.
We have found that a group of 1,4-dihydro-4-oxoquinoline derivatives have a potent antiviral activity against picornaviruses and rotaviruses.


A towelette product is provided usable for cleansing/make-up removal which includes a stack of folded flexible towelettes impregnated with a fluid composition, a pouch for storing the stack of towelettes and an outer container surrounding the pouch and having walls more rigid than the flexible sheet forming the pouch. A dispensing aperture is formed in a deck panel of the pouch. A seal is adhesively arranged over the dispensing aperture to minimize fluid evaporation and control foreign objects from contaminating the towelettes. The outer container is defined by top, bottom, front, rear and side walls, the top wall having an opening with left and right flanking panels, the opening of the container and dispensing aperture of the pouch being aligned to allow towelette removal. A lid is hingedly attached to the outer container which in a closed position overlies the opening and at least a portion of the flanking panels. In a second embodiment of the seal for the pouch, a support saddle is provided to overlay and adhere to the deck panel and both side panels. A cut-out portion is hingedly attached near a rear portion of the support saddle. The cut-out portion is adhesively reclosable and aligned over the dispensing aperture. The support saddle provides rigidity to the respective panels of the pouch against which it adheres. Collapse in the face of a decreasing stack of form-retaining towelettes is prevented by the support saddle structure.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention concerns a towelette product and a package for dispensing towelettes.
2. The Related Art
Fluid impregnated pads, sheets and tissues (collectively defined as towelettes) are established articles of commerce. They are generally utilized for personal hygiene, cosmetic purposes and household cleaning applications. Volatility of the fluid requires packaging which avoids evaporation. Problems arise where a stack of towelettes are packed together in a common container. Dispensing of a single item requires resealability of the container to prevent the remaining articles from drying out. Notable advances in the art include the following disclosures.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,156,493 (Julius) describes a reclosable dispenser packet with moisture impregnated towelettes stored within a semi-rigid or flexible walled container. One of the embodiments includes a dispensing opening covered by a hinged flap with a pressure sensitive adhesive border on an undersurface for resealability over the opening.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,790,436 (Nakamura) discloses a resealable dispenser-container for wet tissues. A deformable pouch containing a stack of the tissues is held rigid with the assistance of a shape maintaining member even after most of the tissues have been dispensed. Suitable shape maintaining members include an outer box surrounding the pouch fixed with an adhesive on an undersurface of the box roof which prevents pouch wall collapse. A second embodiment is a U-shaped frame inserted within the pouch. Both of these solutions present either cost or manufacturing difficulties.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,531,325 (Deflander et al.) describes a pouch for storing interleaved tissues with a resealable flap opening. The pouch is housed in a rigid outer container which in its closed position is sufficiently air-tight to prevent exchange of air between contents of the container and the outside atmosphere. An anti-slip member such as a glue strip is attached to the pouch and projects through a hole in the bottom of the container to prevent the latter from slipping on a support surface. The air-tight outer container requires considerable plastic material in its construction. Not only is the container heavy but the relatively large amount of plastic presents an environmental disposal issue.
Evident from the foregoing selection of technology is the need for improved, more commercially oriented solutions to the pouch deflation problem.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a towelette product which can dispense towelettes one at a time and be resealable.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a towelette product which after having dispensed most of a stack of towelettes is substantially as efficiently resealable as in its initial fully towelette filled position.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a towelette product and a related method capable of efficiently cleansing and removing make-up from facial and other skin areas.
These and other objects of the present invention will be more readily evident from the following summary and detailed discussion.

Towelette pouches with outer container or saddle

Chesebrough-Pond's USA Co. Division of Conopco, Inc.


A method of thin film plasma processing which includes multiple power environments and circuitry is described so as to encompass a variety of configurations. The environments may establish an energy quantum which may be interactively adjusted such as for conditioning or processing when new targets or materials are inserted. The energy quantum can be increased from the traditionally low energy storage of a switch-mode power supply to a higher energy to allow more intense arc occurrences and, thus, the more rapid conditioning of a target. Switching between environments can be achieved manually or automatically through timing or through arc or plasma electrical characteristics sensing. Energy quantum may be adjusted through the inclusion of energy storage elements, hardwired elements, or through software configurations such as are possible with the utilization of a programmable processor. Applications for DC switch-mode thin film processing systems are specifically shown.

This invention relates generally to the field of thin film processing through the use of a plasma. Specifically, the invention relates to the occurrence of arcs and the reaction to these arcs such as exist in the initial conditioning of a target material for such processing. It discloses designs which are particularly suited to direct current (DC) operations especially those which involve the application of a switch-mode power supply.
The field of thin film plasma processing is well known. In this field, a power supply creates an AC or DC electric potential which causes the existence of a distributed plasma. The plasma then acts upon some area of material so as to cause processing of an item or substrate. This processing may be deposition, etching, or some other type of processing. Depending on the particular application being pursued, the materials, substrates and even the nature of the processing can vary greatly.
One of the challenges that exists for precise processing is the need to establish a target material in a relatively homogeneous state. This is important because when anomalies exist, areas of low impedance can be created and the plasma may begin to discharge or arc into such areas. Unlike situations in which a cathodic arc is desirable (an undistributed plasma), in such plasma processing applications (defined here as "non arc-based" plasma processing), the existence of arcs can be undesirable. The arcs can negatively impact the desired processing; they can create areas where precise control is not possible. For these and other reasons it has become customary--and often preferred--to use power supplies having very rapid process control capabilities and having very precise energy control. In DC applications this is often achieved through the utilization of switch-mode power supplies. These power supplies act to create DC power which is derived from a high frequency source. This not only affords the opportunity for rapid reaction to plasma conditions but it also allows for very low energy storage so as to minimize the effects caused by arc occurrences within the plasma.
An important aspect in many plasma processing applications is that of conditioning the target or material so that it may be used to achieve more precise processing. Not only are solid targets periodically replaced as they wear down but also they can be removed to allow different processing to occur. In each of these instances, the replaced target can tend to exhibit a tendency to arc as surface anomalies are eliminated. These anomalies may consist of unclean areas (such as fingerprints and the like) or topographic anomalies (such as scratches and the like). Regardless of their source it is not uncommon that target materials need to be conditioned before production line processing can occur.
In applications where not particularly precise processing is required, this conditioning is merely a nuisance. For instance, in the manufacture of products utilizing high energy storage power supplies, it is not atypical to merely throw away the first few products until a new target is properly conditioned. This can take a few seconds and may not be that expensive. Unfortunately in applications where precise plasma processing is desired such as through the utilization of low energy storage power supplies, this conditioning can take thousands of times longer and can result in the disposal of thousands of times more products due to imperfect processing. For instance in the coating of compact disks, rather than merely disposing of a few disks taking a few seconds, when low energy supplies are used, it can be necessary to dispose of many disks over the course of half an hour's run just to condition the target material. Obviously this is undesirable. Other applications can be more extreme as even a single semiconductor wafer may cost almost one hundred thousand dollars. Conditioning in these applications can also take a full day.
Unfortunately, until the present invention no system existed which both achieved quick and efficient conditioning of a target while also achieving the enhanced processing accuracies possible with a low energy storage power supply. Perhaps surprising in this regard is the fact that although there has been a recognized need to achieve both these criteria, this need has remained unsatisfied until the present invention even though the implementing arts and elements had long been available.
This is perhaps due to the fact that those skilled in the art of thin film and non arc-based plasma processing did not fully appreciate the nature of the problem and so were not able to achieve the solutions of the present invention. This also may have been due to the fact that those skilled in the art actually accepted directions which were away from the teaching of the present invention. One of these accepted directions was fueled by the perception that particularly delicate target handling and/or the a need to dispose of a large number of initial product runs was merely a requirement for accurate processing. Although discussed earlier in reference to low energy storage power supplies, even this realization was not fully appreciated. Perhaps also showing the degree to which those skilled in the art accepted and were directed toward handling solutions is also evidenced by the fact that until the present invention it appears that no efforts were made to achieve proper conditioning through a variation of the application of power to the plasma. Thus, until the present invention it simply was not possible to achieve both practical conditioning of a target as well as precise processing through the utilization of a low energy storage power supply such as a switch-mode power supply.

Adjustable energy quantum thin film plasma processing system


A highly puncture resistant, biocompatible medical material is provided. The medical material may be used for a dialysis graft or an artificial blood vessel. The medical material has a puncture resistant layer comprising a resin prepared by mixing 100 parts by weight of a styrene elastomer and/or an olefin elastomer, and at least 20 parts by weight of an isoprene derivative.

This invention relates a medical material having excellent puncture resistance and biocompatibility which is adapted for use at a site of repeated puncture with a medical needle. More specifically, this invention relates to a puncture resistant, biocompatible tubular structure such as an artificial medical material.
Some medical materials are repeatedly punctured by a medical needle, and kept in contact with a body tissue. A sheet of polyurethane or silicone rubber; a knitted or woven fabric or a felt of Dacron.RTM.; a stretched sheet or a felt of Teflon.RTM.; and the like have been used for such medical materials.
Such medical materials, however, suffered from insufficient puncture resistance as well as biocompatibility, and as a consequence, various unfavorable problems occurred by the use of such medical material at a site where the material was kept in a prolonged contact with a body tissue.
In hemodialysis, an interior shunt is usually formed by anastomosing an artery with a vein. Such a shunt, however, can not be formed when the patient has a damaged artery or vein. In such case, an artificial blood vessel prepared from Teflon.RTM. has been implanted at the corresponding site. Such an artificial blood vessel, however, suffered from various problems after prolonged use and repeated puncture with a medical needle. The insufficient puncture resistance of such an artificial blood vessel resulted in blood leakage upon anastomosis and after repeated puncture with the medical needle, and such blood leakage resulted in bacterial infection, formation of ulcer, chronic inflammation, formation or bump and hematoma, calcification, and the like. The conventional artificial blood vessel also suffered from difference in physical properties with the host blood vessel to which it is anastomosed, and such difference often resulted in the thickening of the blood vessel at the site of the anastomosis.


A method of adsorption allows separation of a first fluid component from a fluid mixture comprising at least the first fluid component in an adsorptive separation system having a parallel passage adsorbent contactor with parallel flow passages having cell walls which include an adsorbent material. The method provides for transferring heat from the heat of adsorption in a countercurrent direction along at least a portion of the contactor during adsorption and transferring heat in either axial direction along the contactor to provide at least a portion of the heat of desorption during a desorption step. A carbon dioxide separation process to separate carbon dioxide from flue gas also includes steps transferring heat from adsorption or for desorption along the parallel passage adsorbent contactor.

Temperature swing adsorption methods are known in the art for use in adsorptive separation of multi-component fluid mixtures, and gas mixtures in particular. Many conventional temperature swing adsorption processes are used for preferentially adsorbing one component of a feed gas mixture on an adsorbent material to separate it from the remaining feed gas components, and then subsequently to regenerate the adsorbent material to desorb the adsorbed component and allow for cyclic reuse of the adsorbent material. However, conventional temperature swing adsorption methods are typically limited in their efficiency due in part to limitations in heat and/or mass transport phenomena in the desorption or regeneration of the adsorbent material used in an adsorptive separation system, and also to limitations in the adsorption phase of the temperature swing adsorption process.
One shortcoming of typical conventional temperature adsorption processes is the inefficient adsorption of a feed gas component on the adsorbent material, which may result from the rapid increase in temperature of the adsorption front when moving through the adsorbent material due to the heat of adsorption released as the gas component is adsorbed. In many conventional temperature swing adsorption methods, such increases in the temperature of the adsorbent material during adsorption may result in decreased adsorbent capacity associated with "hot spots" in the adsorbent material and a corresponding decrease in efficiency of the temperature swing adsorption process. Another shortcoming of typically conventional temperatures swing adsorption methods is the inefficient desorption or regeneration of the adsorbent material, which may result from the difficulty in uniformly heating the adsorbent material as thermal energy is required to meet the heat of desorption of the adsorbed compound during desorption or regeneration. Such non-uniformities in the heating of the adsorbent material may typically result in retained adsorption of a gas component associated with "cold spots" in the adsorbent material, or may require the application of an unnecessarily large thermal flux to sufficiently desorb the gas component, which may lead to undesirably high heating costs and leave the adsorbent material unnecessarily overheated following desorption.
Further, conventional temperature swing adsorption methods typically employ adsorbent contactor structures such as adsorbent beds for contacting gas components with the adsorbent material. Exemplary known adsorbent contactors include packed bead or parallel plate adsorbent structures for adsorptive gas separation processes such as thermal and/or pressure swing adsorption processes, for example. However, some shortcomings of certain of the adsorbent contactors of the prior art relate to poor hydrodynamic, mass transport, and thermal characteristics of the contactor structure. In such cases, the poor thermal characteristics may undesirably result in either high thermal mass, which may require an undesirably large thermal energy flux to effect a given temperature change in the structure, and/or lower than desired thermal conductivity, which may result in undesirably large temperature differences within the structure, for example. Such undesirable thermal characteristics of certain adsorbent contactors of the prior art may contribute to some of the shortcomings of conventional temperature swing adsorption methods as described above. Aside from heat transport limitations, the poor hydrodynamics of certain conventional temperature swing adsorption structures may undesirably limit fluid throughput due to fluidization limitations, as in the case of beaded adsorbent beds. Further, in certain conventional systems, undesirably low mass transfer rates may limit the permissible cycle speed and also lower the dynamic selectivity of the cyclic adsorption-desorption process by limiting the adsorption selectivity of the system to only the adsorbent's inherent equilibrium selectivity, which may be undesirably low for separation of a given fluid mixture.

Method of adsorptive gas separation using thermally conductive contactor structure