A scale having first and second optical gratings on both surfaces of a transparent parallel portion or a scale having a common optical grating with first and second optical gratings on one of the surfaces of the transparent parallel portion is prepared. A beam is radiated on the first optical grating of the scale to cause it to pass through the first optical grating, thereby two-dimensionally inverting an image of the first optical grating. The inverted image is projected on the second optical grating. The inverted image of the image of the first optical grating and the second optical grating are displaced in opposite directions upon movement of the scale. Relative displacement between the inverted image and the second optical grating is larger than the movement amount of the scale, thereby performing displacement detection with high resolution.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a field of displacement measurement for optically measuring displacement information such as a displacement amount and a displacement velocity of an object.
2. Related Background Art
Encoders have been conventionally used to optically measure displacement amounts and displacement velocities of objects. FIG. 11 shows a typical arrangement of a conventional optical encoder. This encoder includes a light source 11 for generating a light beam, a lens 12 for collimating the light beam, a movable scale 13 having grating slits and a stationary scale 14 having grating slits having the same pitch as that of the slits of the movable scale 13. Note that these grating slits have a pitch which does not substantially induce a diffraction effect. The encoder also includes a photodetector 15 for detecting amounts of light passing through the movable and stationary scales 13 and 14, and a signal processing circuit 16. With this arrangement, when the scale 13 moves, the light amount detected by the photodetector 15 is periodically changed in correspondence to scale movement. More specifically, when the phases of the two slits coincide with each other, viewing them from the light source side, a maximum light amount is detected. Also, when the phases of the two slits of the scales 13 and 14 are shifted by 180.degree., a minimum light amount is detected. When the movable scale 13 is moved by one pitch of the slits, a period signal having one period is obtained. In the signal processing circuit 16, this period signal is converted into signal pulses, and these pulses are counted to measure a displacement of the movable scale.
In the conventional encoder of the type using these two scales, i.e., the movable and stationary scales, the positions of the two scales must be aligned with each other, and the position of each scale must be aligned with the detection system. In order to increase the detection resolution, high assembly precision is required to result in high cost. To increase the detection resolution is to decrease the pitch of the slits. However, when the pitch is excessively decreased, diffracted light components are produced to degrade displacement measurement. For this reason, the increase in detection resolution in this encoder is limited.

Method and apparatus for measuring displacement by using a diffracted inverted image projected on a diffraction grating


An apparatus and method for measuring a plantar contour having a foam impression block and a carrier. The apparatus has a foam impression block including a front portion and a rear portion and a carrier including a height adjuster. The block is associated with the carrier such that the rear portion and the height adjuster are adjacent one another.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and method of use for measuring the geometry of a foot in the position the foot will be in when inside of a shoe. More particularly, the present invention relates to an apparatus having a foam impression block specially formed into the shape the target foot wear will have. Moreover, the present invention relates to methods of using such an apparatus for measuring the plantar contour and instep of a foot in the position the foot will be in when inside of a shoe.
2. Description of the Related Art
A number of methods currently exist to measure the geometry of the plantar contour of a foot. The accurate measurement of the plantar contour is used in the manufacture of custom insoles. The prior art methods include plaster casting, optical scanning, contact sensor measurement, as well as foam impression measurement. These methods require the foot to be in a planar position. However, some shoes, such as high heels or other shoes with a slope, distort the plantar contour and instep due to the shifting of the user""s body weight. Accordingly, the insoles made using these prior art methods do not account for such distortions. Moreover, these prior art methods are not well suited for home use.
The optical scanning methods and contact sensor measurement methods utilize expensive equipment. These methods provide an accurate and complete measurement of the foot. But, the size, expense and complexity of the equipment necessary for these methods makes them not suitable for use in all locations. Moreover, these methods do not permit accurate measurement of the geometry of the foot in the position it will be in when inside of a shoe.
Plaster casting methods require the measurement to be performed by a person other then the one being measured. This method provides an accurate and complete measurement of the foot but can be very messy and time consuming. Thus, plaster casting methods are not suitable for use in a person""s home or by one""s self. Moreover, these methods do not permit accurate measurement of the geometry of the foot in the position it will be in when inside of a shoe.
Foam impression measurement methods and apparatus utilize an easily deformable foam block. A person steps onto the block, thus crushing the foam in the locations of higher pressure. In this manner, the foam block deforms in the approximate shape of the persons"" plantar contour. While this prior art method may be suitable for home use, it produces a sub-optimal characterization of the foot for a number of reasons. First, the foam block is uniform in thickness from heel to toe. This causes the toes to be forced upward as the foot is pressed into the foam because the toes of the foot have substantially less pressure on them than the region of the foot from the heel to the metatarsal heads. Forcing the toes upward can cause a number of problems including, hyper-extension of the plantar fascia, lowering of the correct arch height, and improper measurement of the forefoot and heel. Second, under full body weight, the foot expands allowing for a larger than normal foot impression. Additionally, the prior art does not provide for measurement of the instep. Moreover, the current foam materials and methods do not permit accurate measurement of the geometry of the foot in the position it will be in when inside of a shoe.
In the manufacture of custom insoles, the use of the plaster casting and foam impression methods also require the use of a scanning system. The scanning system may act directly on the negative impression within the foam or plaster. Scanning systems that act directly on negative impressions are known in the art. These laser scanning systems consist of a laser with a line generating optic. The laser projects a line at a know incident angle onto the negative impression. A camera is used to read the position of the laser line on the negative impression. Alternatively, the scanning system may act on a positive plaster model made from the negative impression within the plaster or foam. Scanning systems that act directly on the positive impressions are also known in the art. One such scanning system, provided by U.S. Pat. No. 4,876,758, specially constructed array of pin-like sensors. In either circumstance, the scanning system is used to digitize the measured contour. The digitized contour is provided to a computer controlled milling machine. The milling machine uses the digitized information to manufacturing a custom insole matching the digitized contour. Accordingly, the apparatus and methods of the present invention provide for cheaper and easier means to provide custom manufactured insoles to a customer.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide foot measurement apparatus and methods, which overcome the limitations set forth above.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an apparatus for measuring a plantar contour. The apparatus has a foam impression block, and a carrier having a heel. The block has a toe thickness, a length and a heel thickness. The toe thickness is less than the heel thickness. The block is disposed upon the carrier such that the heel thickness and the heel are adjacent one another.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide an apparatus for measuring a plantar contour and an instep. The apparatus has a foam impression block and a carrier. The carrier has a heel and a plurality of straps. The block has a toe thickness, a length and a heel thickness wherein the toe thickness is less than the heel thickness. The block is disposed upon the carrier such that the heel thickness and the heel are adjacent one another. The plurality of straps are disposed upon the carrier and are adapted to wrap around the instep such that a plurality of sizing graduations disposed upon each of the straps are readable.
It is also an object of the present invention to provide a method for measuring the plantar contour of a foot. The method having the steps of: (1) placing the plantar contour over a foam impression block disposed upon a carrier having a heel wherein the block has a toe thickness, a length and a heel thickness, the toe thickness is less than the heel thickness, and the block is disposed upon the carrier such that the heel thickness and heel are adjacent one another; (2) aligning the toes with the toe thickness; and (3) urging the plantar contour into the block to deform the block.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a method for measuring the plantar contour and instep of a foot. The method having the steps of: (1) placing the plantar contour over a foam impression block disposed upon a carrier having a heel and a plurality of straps, wherein the block has a toe thickness, a length and a heel thickness, the toe thickness is less than the heel thickness, the block is disposed upon the carrier such that the heel thickness and the heel are adjacent one another, and the plurality of straps are disposed upon the carrier are adapted to wrap around the foot; (2) aligning the toes of the foot with the toe thickness; (3) urging the plantar contour into the block to deform the block; (4) wrapping the straps around the instep such that a plurality of sizing graduations disposed upon each of the straps are readable; and (5) noting the sizing graduation indicated by each of the straps.

Method and apparatus for measuring foot geometry


A trailer unloading system anchors one or more trailers to a deck, with, or without tractor attached. The sides of the trailers are free to pivot from a top, longitudinal, pivot axis once unlatched from the edge of the trailer floor. The deck tilts the trailers sideways, the doors swing free, and the load discharges. The deck returns to level, the sides latch to support the floor and the trailers are ready to be reloaded.

1. The Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to the field of trailer dumping systems. More particularly this invention relates to an apparatus that tips or rotates trailers to unload their contents.
2. The Background Art
Trucks frequently carry cargo comprising comparatively small loose particles such as coal, gravel, or hog fuel (large sections of tree bark burned for heating purposes). Various mechanisms exist to unload such cargo. For example the underside of a vehicle may have a trapdoor that is opened to release the cargo. Such a system requires either that a receiving structure be positioned directly beneath the trapdoor or that the cargo be released while the vehicle is in motion to avoid dragging the wheel assembly through large mounds of material.
Such systems have significant disadvantages for cargo that is not comparatively dense. For such cargos, a unitary or trailing vehicle's volume must be maximized in order to approach the weight bearing capacity of the frame and engine or of a towing vehicle. Providing a trapdoor and an actuator to open and close a trapdoor on the underside of a vehicle takes clear, unsupported space and necessitates larger structural members to compensate for the weakness created by the opening. Furthermore, the size of a trapdoor must necessarily be limited to avoid structural weakness. Therefore, bulky and irregular cargos will be likely to jam when unloading.
Other systems provide an opening on top of a vehicle and unload cargo by rotating the entire vehicle such that the cargo falls out the top. However, such systems require a great deal of time and energy to lift and rotate the vehicle through an angle of 140 degrees or more.
Still other systems provide doors at the rear of a vehicle and unload the vehicle by raising the front of the vehicle relative to the rear so that the cargo flows out the rear doors. Such systems have the disadvantage of requiring a great deal of space, energy, and power to lift the center of gravity of the vehicle to a sufficient height for the contents of the vehicle to flow out. Furthermore, the size of the opening at the rear of the vehicle is typically limited to the width of the vehicle. Where the cargo is bulky and irregularly shaped, such an opening may cause the cargo to bridge or otherwise jam during unloading.
Thus it would be an advancement in the art to provide a system that allows for unloading of bulky, irregularly shaped cargos, such as debris, long objects, and so forth. Such a system would provide a large, clear, unobstructed opening that would not require excessive lifting or tilting of the vehicle to unload the cargo. It would be a further advancement in the art to provide a large opening of substantially the dimension of the cargo hold, facilitating unloading while preserving the structural integrity of the vehicle.

Trailer-tilting, load-discharge apparatus and method


A robust decoder generates an output state from input signals related to the line-voltage signals of a three-phase power system, using a segment identification method based on zero-crossings derived from line-voltage difference signals. The robust decoder includes a basic decoder that provides a current output state based on the input signals, a state table that provides a presumed previous state based on the current output state of the basic decoder, a binary feed back loop including a state element for storing a previous output state, and a selector for providing the output state based on the stored previous output state and the presumed previous state. The robust decoder may be implemented as hardware or software in a digital power converter. Such a digital power converter may include boost inductors each receiving an input line voltage signal from the three-phase power system to provide phase voltage signals, switches receiving the phase voltage signals to provide an intermediate voltage signal, the plurality of switches each being control by a driving signal, an output circuit coupled to the intermediate voltage signal to provide a rectified output voltage signal for digital power converter, and a digital control circuit receiving the input line voltages and the output voltage signal, the digital control circuit generating the driving signals to control the switches. The switches may be configured according to a state machine.

1. Field of Invention
This present invention relates to digital control of three-phase power converters. Specifically, the present invention relates to digital control of three-phase boost power-factor-corrected (PFC) rectifier.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
The six-step, three-phase boost PFC rectifier is widely used in high-power AC-to-DC conversions. Such a PFC rectifier achieves both low total harmonic distortion (THD) in its currents and unity power factor. The six-step operation is based on dividing a line cycle into six segments, with each segment being one of six switch states generated from either line or phase input voltages. In each segment, a specific pair of switches (i.e., two switches affiliated with two corresponding enabled phase voltages) are controlled by pulse width modulation (PWM) to implement single-switch, single-phase boost PFC rectification for each of the two phase voltages. At any given time, a switch state signal determines which pair of switches is modulated. The switch state signal is generated by a decoder which decodes binary signals derived from the input voltages. Thus, the three-phase boost PFC rectifier operates as two parallel single-phase boost PFC rectifiers. The currents in these two enabled phase voltages can be shaped according to the switch state signal, while the output voltage is maintained at a desired level. The current in the third phase voltage (i.e., the disabled phase voltage) is not directly controlled, but it is determined by the currents in the other two enabled phase voltages.
One problem associated with the six-step PFC rectifier relates to segment identification for both balanced and unbalanced input voltages. For balanced input voltages, two techniques for segment identification are used in the industry. One technique, which is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,329,439, entitled "Zero-Voltage-Switched Three Phase Pulse Width Modulating Switching Rectifier with Power Factor Correction," to Dusan Borojevic, Fred C. Lee, and Vlatko Vlatkovic, detects zero-crossings of the three-phase voltages. In a balanced three-phase power system, the phase angle between any two phase voltages is 120°, and segment transitions occur at the phase voltage zero-crossing times. By decoding the zero-crossing signals of the input phase voltages, which are represented at logic high levels during the positive half-line cycle (i.e., 180°) and at logic low levels during the negative half-line cycle (i.e., 180°), six 60° segments may be obtained. However, this technique requires a neutral line, which may not be available in many practical applications. As a result, while this zero-crossing detection technique is applicable to a three-phase rectifier with a four-wire connection (e.g. a Wayne connection), it is not applicable to a three-phase rectifier with only a three-wire connection (e.g. a Delta connection).
Because most conventional three-phase rectifiers are used in three-wire systems (i.e., systems in which the neutral line is not available and in which phase-voltages are not accessible), a second segment identification technique detects line-voltage zero-crossing signals. Generally, the zero-crossing signals (ZRS, ZST, and ZTR) associated with the three unbalanced input-line voltages (VRS, VST, and VTR) cannot be directly used for segment identification. For balanced three-phase input voltages, however, phase-voltage zero-crossing signals can be indirectly derived from the known line-voltage zero-crossing signals by 30° phase shifting, using the fact that the phase shift between a line voltage and a corresponding phase voltage in a balanced system is 30° (e.g., the phase shift between line voltage VST and phase voltage VS is 30°). This technique, however, leads to rather complex implementations, because detecting the line frequency and its variations require a phase-locked loop (PLL) circuit. Furthermore, this technique is generally not applicable to unbalanced input voltages, for which the phase angle between line and phase voltages is not necessarily 30°. Because a six-step, three-phase converter which properly identifies segments in both balanced and unbalanced input voltages is especially important to current-shaping and output voltage regulation, a simple and robust segment signal identification scheme is desired.
A decoder which properly identifies segments may be implemented in either hardware or software. A basic decoder, which is typically employed in a conventional six-step, three-phase converter, uses combinational logic to convert its binary input signals (e.g., zero-crossing signals of the input voltages) into one of the six output codes. However, because the output codes of this basic decoder are determined using only its contemporaneous input signals, the basic decoder essentially operates open-loop. Since the binary input signals are usually obtained by voltage comparators from input voltages that are susceptible to disturbance, the decoder may generate a false switching state as its output. A false switching state increases switching losses, component stresses and distortions of line current waveforms. The effect of disturbance on the binary input signals may be reduced when a hysteresis band is incorporated into the voltage comparators that sense zero-crossings of input voltages. However, it is difficult to design an optimal hysteresis band, because the amplitude of an unexpected input-voltage disturbance is almost impossible to estimate. Moreover, an excessive hysteresis band may cause an unacceptable phase delay, which causes the line currents to be significantly out of phase with the corresponding input voltages. Therefore, a robust segment-signal decoder in a six-step, three-phase converter with disturbance rejection is desired.
Yet another problem relates to current glitches during segment transitions. Such glitches result from one phase abruptly changing its switching state from "disabled" to "enabled" (i.e., from an uncontrollable phase current state to a controllable phase current state), while another phase changes its switching state from enabled to disabled. During these switching state changes, the corresponding duty cycles must change from one local steady state value to another local steady state value under current loop regulation. However, due to the current loop's limited bandwidth, the duty cycle changes may not be fast enough, thereby creating current transients that are seen as current glitches in the line current waveforms at the instants of segment transitions. To reduce these current glitches, the disabled phase current feedback path may be suspended by keeping the integrator output of the current-loop controller at the same value as before it is disabled. This technique is described in the article, entitled "A Three-Phase ZVT Boost Rectifier with Improved Analog Controller" by Richard Zhang, Silva Hiti, Fred C. Lee, and Dusan Boroyevic, and published in the IEEE Power Electronics Specialists' Conference (PESC) Record, pp 469-474, 1996. However, the implementation described in the article requires two extra analog electronic switches and a synchronization signal for each of the three current loops, adding extra complexity to an already complex analog controller circuit. Thus, a simpler and more robust solution than that described in the Zhang article is desired.

Digitally controlled three-phase PFC rectifier


A method and apparatus for a certificate authority system providing authentication to a plurality of devices associated with an organization are described. The method may include receiving, at the certificate authority system, a request from a device to sign authentication information of the device, wherein the device is associated with the organization. The method may also include sending a challenge to the device to perform an action with a system other than the certificate authority system, and receiving the response to the challenge from the device. Furthermore, the method may include verifying that the response was generated correctly based on the challenge, and signing the authentication information of the device with one or more keys of the certificate authority system as an authentication of an identity of the device.

Modern organizations typically employ a plurality of different devices for use by their employees. More recently, as networking and infrastructure virtualization become more popular, productive, and cost-effective, the organization devices may also include virtual resources (e.g., virtual servers, virtual databases, machines running virtual operating systems, etc.). These different devices, virtual and real, interact with one another to conduct the business of the organization. Such devices need to confirm that another device is who it claims to be, such that the device can be identified and/or trusted.
When a new device is provisioned to an organization's networking infrastructure, it is generally authenticated by an information technology (IT) specialist of the organization who oversees the provisioning of the new resource. After authentication, other authenticated devices of the organization may then trust the new device when interacting with it, such as by exchanging/authenticating digital certificates, verifying cryptographic keys, etc. This process of authenticating new organization devices, however, can be time consuming or even impossible in cases where virtual resources are provisioned dynamically and the IT specialist does not have access to the server running the virtual resource. As networks grow in size, and complexity, the problems associated with authenticating devices within the organization become more and more pronounced.
The present disclosure is directed to a certificate authority system providing authentication to a plurality of devices, substantially as shown in and/or described in connection with at least one of the figures, as set forth more completely in the claims.
In an exemplary embodiment, a certificate authority system authenticates a plurality of devices associated with an organization. In embodiments, the authentication can include the certificate authority system signing one or more forms of authentication information for a new device of an organization. In embodiments, the authentication information can include one or more keys, certificates, passwords, serial numbers, etc. In such embodiments, the authentications can be bootstrapped to provide guarantees of trust, such that other devices of the organization can rely on the guarantees of trust (e.g., encryption keys and/or digital certificates signed by the certificate authority system) when interacting with the new device.
In embodiments, the certificate authority system receives a request from a new device of an organization to sign authentication information of the device. In response to this request, the certificate authority system sends a challenge to the new device to perform an action with a system other than the certificate authority system. In embodiments, the action will cause the new device to obtain a response to the challenge as a result of the action being performing by the system. In embodiments, the certificate authority system receives the response to the challenge from the new device, and verifies that the response was generated correctly based on the challenge. Authentication is facilitated by, for example, interacting with the device, a cloud services provider, a device manufacturer, a third party system, or any combination thereof. Then, in response to the verification, the certificate authority system signs the authentication information of the device with one or more keys of the certificate authority system to certify an identity of the device, and thereby a level of trust that is associated with the certified identity, when interacting with one or more other devices associated with the organization.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Systems and methods for providing authentication to a plurality of devices


In the embodiment shown, the body is formed of cast aluminum, and is devoid of clean-out holes in the upper and bottom ends thereof. Instead, the clean-out holes are formed in the outer, annular wall, through an annular recess formed in the outer wall, To close off the clean-out holes, a steel band is nested in the recess, in circumscription of the body. Further, the steel band has grooves formed therein in which to accommodate piston rings.

This invention pertains to pistons, such as are used in gas compressors, pumps, and like equipments, which are formed in foundries by casting methods, and in particular to a cast, substantially hollow piston body, for a piston, of novel construction.
The known method of forming cast piston bodies, particularly cored piston bodies, comprises the forming of clean-out holes in the upper and lower ends or top and bottom walls of the piston body. After the interior of the piston body is satisfactorily cleaned, then its clean-out holes are machined to receive closure plugs. However, during use of the pistons which have these clean-out hole plugs therein, it happens that the plugs work free. The plugs have a tendency to loosen and remove from the holes. As a consequence, the gas compressor or pump in which these pistons are employed suffers grevious damage.
In view of the aforesaid problem with plugged clean-out holes in piston bodies, there obtains a need for an improved piston body. The need is for means which close off the clean-out holes, following clean-out of the piston body interior, which are not susceptible to displacement. In addition, it is also desirable to have piston bodies with generously large clean-out holes.
It is an object of this invention, then, to meet the aforecited need and, in so doing, define a piston body which has a great plurality of large clean-out holes formed therein.
Particularly, it is an object of this invention to set forth a cast, substantially hollow, piston body, comprising an annular outer wall; an annular, imperforate, top wall integral with said outer wall; an annular, imperforate, bottom wall integral with said outer wall; and an axial, central, piston rod-receiving bore; wherein said outer wall has a plurality of clean-out holes formed therein.


This disclosure relates generally to a system and method for translating between virtual machines. A network adaptor can be configured to be communicatively coupled to a server, the server comprising a first virtual machine having a first format, the network adaptor to receive input from the server. A translator can be configured to identify, from the input from the server, the first format of the first virtual machine and generate an output, compatible with a second format of a second virtual machine, based on the input from the server, the second format being incompatible with the first format.

Virtual machines create a guest operating system that operates over, alongside, or within an operating system of a host electronic device, such as a computer. The use of a virtual machine can provide a user of the host electronic device the capacity to interact with files and systems that are compatible with the virtual machine, but that may be incompatible with the host operating system. The virtual machine can operate as a software emulator, where the virtual machine mimics the functionality of the virtual operating system and provides hardware abstraction, e.g., virtual hardware, to create a simulated hardware environment on the host device. In some configurations, the virtual hardware can simulate hardware of a device remote to the host electronic device.
Companies such as VMware®, Inc., Citrix® Systems, Inc., and Microsoft® Corporation sell virtual machines for use on host devices. The virtual machines of the various companies can operate according to different, incompatible formats with respect to one another. Different virtual machine formats can incorporate different architectures and hosting environments, and can utilize different instruction sets. In addition, companies such as Microsoft® Corporation, Amazon.com®, Inc., and Google® Inc. have created public cloud services that can be accessed through the use of a virtual machine on a host device. Because virtual machines can be incompatible with respect to one another, a user who does not possess a virtual machine corresponding to one virtual machine format or cloud service format may not be capable of accessing data corresponding to another virtual machine or cloud service that does not correspond to the user's virtual machine.

Method and apparatus for virtual machine interoperability


An ultrasound imaging system includes: a harmonic filter coupled to an ultrasound transmitter to reduce transmitted harmonic components; a fundamental filter coupled with an ultrasound receiver to reduce received fundamental components; and a fusion processor configured to generate multiple frames of fusion images for two subsequent frames of ultrasound transmissions to improve frame rate. The ultrasound receiver may optionally perform signal alignment and matching to improve image quality. To improve image quality, the ultrasound system may optionally use multiple amplitude-modulated transmit pulses with different delays, or multiple transmit pulses with different amplitudes to extract harmonic signals.

Medical ultrasound images have noises and artifacts. Various techniques have been developed and utilized to reduce noise and improve image quality.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,632,277 discloses an ultrasound imaging system employing phase inversion subtraction to enhance the image generated, in which first and second amplitude modulated harmonic ultrasound signals that differ by 180 degrees in phase are transmitted to generate echo signals that are measured and combined to form ultrasound images. U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,866,631, 7,226,416, and 7,699,781 disclose variations of phase inversion ultrasonic imaging using multiple sets of transmit pulses differing in amplitude, frequency, phase, and/or pulse width.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,740,128, 5,833,614, and 5,913,823 disclose ultrasonic harmonic imaging systems in which ultrasonic energy is transmitted at a fundamental frequency and reflected ultrasonic energy is received at a harmonic of the fundamental frequency. In U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,740,128 and 5,913,823, ultrasonic energy is transmitted in power bursts, each having a respective envelope shape rising gradually to a respective maximum value and fall gradually from the respective maximum value. In U.S. Pat. No. 5,833,614, pulses of different durations are used.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,980,459 disclosed a technology that utilizes phase-coded pulses and slow-time filtering to obtain harmonic signals.
In order to improve harmonic imaging performance, other ultrasound methods like compounding are added to the harmonic imaging mode. For example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,897,500 and 6,458,083 disclose combining both fundamental and harmonic signals to form a compounded image.
The entire disclosures of the above discussed U.S. patents related to harmonic imaging techniques are hereby incorporated herein by reference.
Although some of the methods are effective in improving image qualities, they may introduce drawbacks in other areas. For instance, most current Tissue Harmonic Imaging (THI) techniques have drawbacks in penetration loss and frame rate reduction.

Ultrasound fusion harmonic imaging systems and methods


The present invention describes the use of angiotensin-(1-7) peptide as an anti-cancer therapeutic. Thus, in one embodiment, the present invention comprises a composition to inhibit the growth of cancer cells in an individual comprising a pharmaceutically effective amount of an agonist for the angiotensin-(1-7) receptor to inhibit cancer cell growth or proliferation. Application of a pharmaceutically effective amount of angiotensin-(1-7) or angiotensin-(1-7) receptor agonist is associated with an increase in the expression of genes involved in tumor suppression, apoptosis, and/or cell cycle inhibition, and a decrease the expression of known oncogenes, protein kinases, and/or cell cycle progression genes. Cancers treated using the methods and compositions described herein include cancers having an angiotensin-(1-7) receptor, including, but not limited to, breast and lung cancer.

Angiotensin-(1-7) [Ang-(1-7)] is an endogenous peptide hormone which is normally present in the circulation at concentrations similar to angiotensin II (Ang II) and is primarily derived from angiotensin I (Ang I) by tissue peptidases, including neprilysin, thimet oligopeptidase and prolyl endopeptidase (Ferrario, C. M. et al., Hypertension, 1997, 30:535-541) and by angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) 2 from angiotensin II (Ang II) (Vickers, C., et al., J. Biol. Chem., 2002, 277:14836-14843). In addition, Ang-(1-7) is a substrate for ACE (Chappell, M. C. et al. Hypertension, 1998, 31:362-367). ACE catalyzes the conversion of angiotensin I (Ang I) to the biologically active peptide angiotensin II [Ang II]. Treatment of patients or animals with ACE inhibitors results in a significant elevation in the circulating and tissue levels of Ang II, as well as the N-terminal heptapeptide fragment of Ang II, angiotensin-(1-7) (Campbell, M. C. et al., Hypertension, 1993, 22:513-522; Kohara, K. et al., Hypertension, 1991, 17:131-138Lawrence, A. C. et al., J. Hypertens., 1990, 8:715-724;and Luque, M. et al., J. Hypertens., 1996, 14:799-805). It has been suggested that ACE inhibition not only elevates Ang-(1-7) by increasing Ang I, the substrate for Ang-(1-7) production, but also by preventing Ang-(1-7) conversion to the inactive fragment Ang-(1-5).
Although Ang-(1-7) was long-considered an inactive product of the degradation of Ang II, studies showed that the heptapeptide produces unique physiological responses which are often opposite to those of the well-recognized angiotensin peptide, Ang II (Ferrario, C. M. et al., Hypertension, 1997, 30:535-541). Thus, Ang-(1-7) has been shown to stimulate vasopressin release from neuropeptidergic neurons (Schiavone, M. T. et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 1988, 85:4095-4098), increase the release of certain neurotransmitters (Ambuhl, P. et al., Regul. Pept., 1992, 38:111-120), reduce blood pressure in hypertensive dogs and rats (Benter, I. F. et al., Am J. Physiol. Heart Circ. Physiol., 1995, 269:H313-H319;and Nakamoto, H. et al., Hypertension, 1995, 25:796-802), and have biphasic effects on renal fluid absorption (DelliPizzi, A. et al., Br. J. Pharmacol., 1994, 111:1-3; DelliPizzi, A. et al., Pharmacologist, 34, 1992; Garcia, N. H. and Garbin, J. L., J. Am. Soc. Nephrol., 1994, 5:1133-1138; Handa, R. K. et al., Am. J. Physiol., 1996, 270:F141-F147;and Hilchey, S. D. and Bell-Quilley, C. P., Hypertension, 1995, 25:1238-1244).
Besides its role in reducing blood pressure, Ang-(1-7) attenuates vascular growth both in vitro and in vivo (Freeman, E. J. et al., Hypertension, 1996, 28:104-108; Strawn, W. B. et al., Hypertension, 1999, 33:207-211;and Tallant, E. A. et al., Hypertension, 1999, 34:950-957). Also, hypertensive patients administered ACE inhibitors show a reduced risk of cancer, particularly lung and sex-specific cancers (Jick, H., et al., Lancet, 1997, 349:525-528; Lever, A. F. et al., Lancet, 1998, 352:179-184;and Pahor, M. et al., Am. J. Hypertens., 1996, 9:695-699).
What is needed in cancer prevention and therapeutics is a way to prevent tumors from forming, or to inhibit the growth of tumors once formed. Also, what is needed are agents that act specifically at the tumor cell, thus minimizing non-specific and/or toxic side effects. Preferably, the chemotherapeutic agents will comprise ligands that target the chemotherapeutic agent to cancer cells with high efficacy to either reduce cellular signals that promote cell growth, or to increase cellular signals that promote cell death.

Angiotensin-(1-7) and angiotensin-(1-7) agonists for inhibition of cancer cell growth


Virtual bus stubs, which can be distributed among constituent computers of a computer network, and a central resolver cooperate to simulate a bus which is connected between multiple circuit parts of a simulated circuit. With each simulated cycle of a clock of the bus, the resolver (i) collects data from the virtual bus stubs representing signals driven on the bus by one or more of the circuit parts, (ii) resolves the current simulated state of the bus from the collected data, and (iii) sends data representing the resolved current simulated state of the bus to the virtual bus stubs. As a result, the virtual bus stubs and the resolver collectively accurately simulate the bus connecting the circuit parts. Since each circuit part has access to the simulated state of the bus through a respective virtual bus stub, each circuit part has access to all information regarding the simulated state of simulated circuit which is necessary for the accurate simulation of each circuit part. Busses provide a convenient organization for division of parts of a model of the circuit. The bus protocol provides a convenient protocol for exchange of information between simulated circuit parts since the bus protocol is an inherent part of any simulation of each of the circuit parts. In addition, since the circuit parts communicate with one another exclusively through the bus, each circuit part requires no information regarding the state of the other circuit part beyond the state of the bus. Thus, the state of the bus includes all the information about each of the circuit parts and to which each other of the circuit parts requires access.

In designing complex circuitry such as application-specific integrated circuits ("ASICs"), the designed logic of such circuitry is typically simulated in a computer using data and computer programs to thereby test the viability and accurate performance of the designed logic. By doing so, design flaws can be detected prior to expending the time and engineering and financial resources required to physically build the circuitry. To simulate circuitry using data and computer programs, the circuitry is described in a hardware description language ("HDL") to form a model. One example of an HDL is the Verilog HDL processed by the Cadence Verilog hardware simulator available from Cadence Design Systems, Inc. of San Jose, Calif. The HDL model of a circuit typically includes a description of components of the state of the circuit and a description of the behavior of the circuit. The behavior of the circuit generally includes inter-relationships between various components of the state of the circuit.
A hardware simulator then uses the HDL model of the circuitry to simulate the circuitry. The hardware simulator is a computer process which accepts data defining signals to be placed on certain parts of the simulated circuit and then changes the state of the circuit in accordance with the signals. The certain parts of the circuit include, for example, terminals, lines, or registers of the simulated circuit.
Circuitry which is simulated in this manner is becoming increasingly complex reducing significantly the feasibility of simulation of such circuitry on a single computer processor. Factors which contribute significantly to such reduction in feasibility in simulations of particularly complex circuits include intolerable amounts of time and computer resources which are required for such complex simulations to execute. For example, simulating a particularly complex circuit in a single computer may require more memory than is available within the single computer. Distribution of circuit simulations over computer networks is one solution. Distributing over constituent computers of a computer network a model simulating a complex circuit generally involves partitioning the model into discrete model parts and distributing those parts among the constituent computers of the computer network.
Distributing a circuit simulation over multiple computers of a computer network increases the complexity of such a simulation significantly. For example, each of the distributed model parts must generally know something about other distributed model parts, at least to the extent that the distributed model parts interact. In addition, since each of the distributed model parts executes independently of other distributed model parts, some mechanism must generally be provided to synchronize interaction between the distributed model parts. For example, if a component of the state of a first model part is dependent upon other components of the state of the first model part and components of the state of a model simulation part, execution of the first and second model parts must generally be synchronized to ensure accuracy of the state simulated by the first model part.
To distribute parts of a complex simulation of a particularly complex circuit, special purpose software is sometimes constructed to process communication and interaction between the distributed parts of the simulation and to coordinate and synchronize execution of the distributed parts of the simulation. Such software can execute particularly efficiently since design verification engineers, when constructing the software, can customize and optimize the software according to the particular requirements of the complex simulation. However, such software suffers from a significant disadvantage. Such software generally requires a substantial amount of time and effort to construct and is generally a complex and difficult task. As a result, constructing such software represents a substantial portion of the time required to simulate a particularly complex circuit and to verify the design of the circuit. In addition, such software is typically non-extensible, i.e., cannot be readily adapted to simulate a different circuit. In other words, once such software is constructed to orchestrate execution of a complex, distributed simulation, small changes in the design of the circuit generally require that the software be substantially rewritten altogether to orchestrate execution of the changed, complex, distributed simulation.
An alternative to distributing execution of a simulation of a particularly complex circuit is to simplify the simulation to mimic the designed behavior of the circuit rather than requiring that the simulation to simulate each component of the particular design of the circuit. Since the simulation is simplified and does not simulate each component of the particular design of the circuit, execution of the simulation within a single computer may be feasible. This approach suffers from the disadvantage that care must be taken to ensure that the behavior mimicked by the simulation is, in fact, accurately representative of the behavior of the circuit as designed. Thus, in essence, the engineer who designs and implements the simulation must determine to an appreciable degree the precise behavior of the circuit as designed. In general, it is preferable that determining the precise behavior of the circuit is done by the simulation and not by the engineer designing and implementing the simulation. In addition, if the design of the circuit is changed, perhaps in response to design flaws discovered during the simulation of the circuit, the behavior of the circuit must again be determined and mimicked by a simplified simulation.
Thus, a satisfactory mechanism by which parts of a simulation of a circuit can be distributed among multiple computers of a computer network and by which such distributed model parts can be coordinated and synchronized persists as a need in the simulation and verification of circuit designs.

Virtual bus for distributed hardware simulation


Systems and methods are provided for administering a test using an electronic device. The electronic device is registered to a test-taker, where the registering includes receiving identifying information from the test-taker and associating the electronic device with the test-taker using the identifying information. The test is stored in encrypted form on the electronic device, and the test includes a test question. The test is decrypted prior to test administration. The test is administered to the test-taker via the electronic device, and the administering includes displaying the test question on the electronic device and receiving an answer to the test question on the electronic device. The administered test is removed from the electronic device after transferring the answer to a testing service.

As education pushes for more authentic measures of 21st century skills, limitations in the technology available in schools may hamper these pursuits. Many schools lack sufficient numbers of computers, and the goal of having a computer available for each student continues to be unachievable in most schools across the country. Due to the lack of computers, standardized tests (e.g., the SAT Reasoning Test) may be administered in schools at a volume that is higher than the number of computers available during the administration. Because of this, standardized tests have been held back from being able to deliver innovative, computer-based assessments that could provide a better measure of students' skills. Pilot programs that allow for students to bring their home laptops to schools may show promise, but these resources are not available to all students, and the operational needs of this model may be much higher than the traditional, paper-and-pencils-based assessment.

Systems and methods for computer-based testing


A method of selecting a site for one or more retail units uses a database of information on existing units in a chain, including store sales or profits, site characteristics available from various databases, and information on marketing expenditure in the relevant market. Sales of potential new units are forecast abstracting from advertising efforts. Thus, potential profit characteristics of a site can be evaluated without regard to existing advertising programs. This corrects a major problem with existing approaches; site decisions can be made simultaneously with marketing allocation decisions.

In the prior art, retail industry decision-making is becoming more sophisticated in nature, relying upon scientific methodologies and quantitative measures. Site selection is one of the most crucial decisions made in the retail chain (including especially restaurants) environment as it is capital intensive, has serious long term marketing implications, and is critical to corporate-franchisee relations. While there are a number of site selection tools in the prior art, the presently available tools forecast sales based on the sales of existing sites, and do not explicitly incorporate the effect of advertising into the site selection process. The problem with this approach is locating a new site in an area populated with other successful stores may not be solely related to site characteristics. A site selection finding that a geographic site has high predicted sales may be a result of high advertising expenditures at the similar sites used to generate the prediction. Consequently, putting a store at that site may only be successful if the same level of advertising is used. This flaw in prior art site selection tools is a result of the inability of the prior art tools to isolate the effects of advertising so that this effect can be removed from the site selection process.
Accordingly, a need exists to provide site selection tools that are capable of making site selection analyses without the effects of advertising skewing the site selection results. The present invention solves this need by providing a method which allows for site selection without the effects of advertising so that business owners have a more accurate picture of site characteristics without the effects of advertising.

Method for site selection for retail and restaurant chains


Apparatus and method for locating the neutral bending plane of an elongated flexible shaft, typically a golf club shaft, by mounting one end portion of the shaft in a clamping mechanism having a rotatable clamp member that permits the shaft to turn about its longitudinal axis while being driven through a motion simulating a golf swing, with sufficient speed to cause the inertial loading of the shaft by its own mass, enhanced by a head weight, to turn the clamp member and the shaft into alignment with the path of movement of the shaft during the simulated swing. A brake fixes the shaft in this position during the swinging motion. A first embodiment uses a rotary motor to rotate the shaft in a radially projecting position about a stationary axis, with a clamping mechanism and brake mechanism on a base plate mounted on the motor shaft. A second embodiment mounts the clamping and brake mechanisms on a robotic golf-strokes machine to move along an arcuate path, and a third embodiment mounts the clamping and brake mechanisms for movement along a linear path, and a fourth mounts the clamping and brake mechanisms in a hand held mechanism to move along the swing path of the intended user.

This invention relates to the design and manufacture of products having elongated flexible shafts, and more generally to the location of the so-called "neutral plane" in an elongated shaft taking into account irregular characteristics in the shaft geometry, including wall thickness, shaft roundness, longitudinal straightness, material variation, and welded seams. This invention has particular reference to golf club shafts, that typically are longitudinally tapered from a larger "butt" end to a smaller "tip" end and are composed of composite material such as carbon, fiberglass or other fibers embedded in epoxy and rolled or wrapped into an elongated tube and subsequently cured, but the invention may be applicable to shafts composed of other materials as well. The illustrative embodiment is described in reference to tubular composite shafts as the primary area of interest, but the invention is not limited to composite shafts and can be used for metal shafts as well.
It is known that composite shafts, whether used for golf clubs, as fishing rods or for other purposes, have irregularities in their structures that produce variations in bending and other properties in the shafts. These irregularities result in variations in swing properties in different planes that extend longitudinally of the shaft. For example, a greater degree of longitudinal stiffness may exist in one plane of bending, making that plane the plane of greatest resistance to bending, or lowest flexibility. In addition to stiffness, other characteristics may be affected as well, including torsional twisting, vibration and other properties that will affect the shaft's performance in service use.
The effects of such variations are matters of concern to manufacturers and assemblers of products that use the shafts. In golf clubs, in particular, in which normal use involves high-speed loading and bending of the shaft followed by impact of a club head on the shaft with a golf ball and subsequent follow through in completion of the golf stroke, balancing of the club with respect to lateral bending, torsional twisting, vibration and stiffness is of critical importance. For these reasons, manufacturers have developed a variety of methods and apparatus for finding what often is referred to as the "spine" or the "seam" of the shaft so each manufacturer can mount its club heads in the angular position on the tip ends of their shafts that they regard as the optimum orientation for their clubs.
Apparatus and methods that have been developed for these purposes include those disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,958,834, which also contains a lengthy background section referring to other early patents in this field. The '834 patent discloses in FIG. 7 a locator fixture in which the butt end of a shaft is held in a set of bearings while the shaft is manually deflected and rotated to detect the seam or spine by feel. This patent then recommends locating the seam at the rear or trailing side of the shaft for maximum driving distance, or alternatively at the front of the shaft.
More recent apparatus and methods are shown and described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,183,275, 6,543,125 and 6,250,168. In U.S. Pat. No. 6,183,275, relatively complex mechanisms are provided for claimed precision in locating the seam in either a composite shaft or butt-welded metal shaft. In one method (in FIG. 3), the user places the end of the shaft in rotatable bearing rings, attaches a weight near the midpoint and then rotates the shaft while observing gauge readings indicating the highest deflection. This patent recommends placing the club head so that the seam is on the front side of the shaft. In U.S. Pat. No. 6,543,125, a preferred orientation, or "preferred oscillation plane," is determined by measuring the oscillation of a shaft when a horizontal impulse is applied, and then analyzing the oscillation or vibration to select the preferred plane. In U.S. Pat. No. 6,250,168, a mechanism is proposed for simply applying a load to the tip end of a shaft while the butt is held stationary but freely rotatable about the longitudinal axis of the shaft. In a somewhat similar approach, U.S. Pat. No. 5,040,279 discloses a method and apparatus that finds a vertically oscillating plane using a cantilever beam frequency set up.
All of the foregoing apparatus and methods, and others of a similar nature, attempt to locate the most favorable attitude or orientation of the golf club shaft through a variety of different approaches, all of which are effective to some degree but are limited by the methodology they employ and the inability of that methodology to analyze the shaft under all of the conditions that actually are encountered during use of the golf club.
The general objective of this invention is to provide a method and apparatus that can be used quickly and effectively to locate the neutral plane of each shaft that will enable the golf club manufacturer to optimize the performance of the assembled club by reducing the negative effects that are imparted to the club head during the golf stroke. For purposes of this disclosure, this plane sometimes will be referred to as the "neutral plane" rather than the spine or seam of the shaft, and the process may be referred to as "neutralizing" the shaft.

Method and apparatus for dynamically locating neutral shaft plane


An agricultural combine having a supporting structure that is driven by ground engaging wheels at a harvesting speed by a propulsion assembly. The combine is also provided with a threshing assembly that is supplied harvested crop material by a feederhouse. The feederhouse is provided with a moisture sensor for sensing the moisture of harvested crop material as it passes through the feederhouse. The moisture sensor produces a moisture signal that is directed to an electronic combine controller. The electronic combine controller regulates the harvesting speed of the combine in response to the moisture signal.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed to a combine having a crop moisture sensor that is mounted in the feederhouse of a combine for directing a moisture signal to a controller for controlling the harvesting speed of the combine.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Agricultural combines are large machines that harvest, thresh, separate and clean an agricultural crop. The resulting clean grain is stored in a grain tank located on the combine. The clean grain can then be transported from the grain tank to a truck, grain cart or other receiving bin by an unloading auger.
A harvesting assembly located at the front of the combine harvests the crop. The harvested crop is directed to a feederhouse for delivering the harvested crop material to a threshing assembly. The threshing assembly may either be a conventional transverse threshing cylinder and concave, or a rotary threshing assembly.
Typically crop moisture sensors are used to detect the moisture of harvested grain. Capacitance crop moisture sensors have been located in the clean grain elevator, various clean grain augers or in the grain tank. In one proposed system a crop moisture sensor is mounted on a harvesting platform. Its moisture signal is used to control combine running speed, see Japanese Patent 5-20781 3A2. In another proposed embodiment the moisture sensor is mounted to the floor of a feederhouse, see U.S. Pat. No. 6,185,990.
It is an object of the present invention to locate a crop moisture sensor in the feederhouse that senses the moisture of the harvested crop for controlling the operations for an agricultural combine.
An agricultural combine is provided with a throughput control system which controls the harvesting speed of the combine in response to various inputs. One of the inputs to the throughput control system is a harvested crop moisture signal that is directed to the electronic controller of the throughput control system. The moisture signal is generated by a capacitance moisture sensor that is mounted on the feederhouse. The moisture sensor comes into operational contact with the harvested crop material as it passes through the feederhouse. The moisture signal reflects the moisture content of the harvested crop before it enters the threshing assembly. The moisture signal is directed to the electronic controller and can be used to modify the desired hydraulic pressure signal or the actual pressure signal, to thereby modify the harvesting speed of the combine.
Cumulatively or alternatively the moisture signal can be used to immediately change the speed of the combine if the moisture signal falls outside certain preset limits or the moisture is dramatically changed from previous moisture readings. For example, if the combine is entering a green weedy patch in the field, the moisture sensor would signal high moisture crop material, the controller in turn would immediately slow down the combine to better accommodate this heavy load. Similarly, as the combine passes out of this weedy patch the controller would automatically speed up the combine as the combine enters more normal crop conditions. As stated above, the moisture signal can be used to simply modify one of the hydraulic pressure signals and/or be used against moisture set points to override the normal throughput control using the actual hydraulic pressure of the variable torque sensing drive.

Crop moisture sensor for controlling harvesting speed


A navigation system provides a significant level of protection against all forms of interference or jamming to GPS in a cost-effective way. The system employs a network of ground reference stations and Low Earth Orbiting (LEO) satellites in conjunction with GPS. A common-view ranging geometry to a GPS satellite is established that links a reference station and a user. A second common-view geometry to a LEO satellite between the same reference station and user pair is also established. The ground stations synthesize real-time aiding signals by making carrier phase measurements of GPS the LEO satellite signals. This aiding information is transmitted via the LEO satellites to the user receiver at high power to penetrate ambient jamming. The user receiver locks onto the carrier phase of the LEO satellite, demodulates the aiding information, then applies the carrier phase measurements and the aiding information to enable extended coherent measurements of the GPS signals. The system thereby recovers the GPS signals that would otherwise be lost to the jamming.

In recent years, users of global positioning systems (GPS) have enjoyed real-time three-dimensional navigation capabilities at previously-unavailable performance levels. Except for their susceptibility to interference and jamming, such GPS systems have largely fulfilled the promise of accurate, worldwide satellite navigation. Nevertheless, users continue to demand increasingly high navigation performance, particularly with respect to accuracy and integrity—i.e., the ability of a navigation system to detect false navigation information.
Unfortunately, the presence of jamming and/or interference has prevented full reliance on GPS as means of navigation, especially in certain military or safety-of-life applications. In civil aviation, safety risk due to jamming is generally not an issue. Various contingency procedures have been developed to safely return aircraft to the ground at alternate airfields. However, a dependence on GPS as currently structured could result in a risk of large-scale disruption to air traffic and, therefore, commerce in general. Furthermore, the increasing extent to which GPS is embedded in day-to-day infrastructure, such as ground and marine transportation, and the timing of electrical power distribution, the Internet, cellular telephones, and financial transactions, serves to increase potential societal vulnerabilities due to intentional disruption of the GPS signal from jamming.
Because a GPS signal is relatively weak (a user receives roughly −160 dBW at the terminals of an omnidirectional antenna), it takes very little jamming to bring down navigational capability. A low-cost 5W jammer, for example, is sufficient to disrupt GPS use at a radius of several tens of miles—especially if there is line-of-sight contact with the user. Such sensitivity tends to work against the practicality of satellite navigation and, conversely, in favor of traditional higher-power navigation aids used for aviation, some of which predate GPS, including VOR, DME, ILS, TACAN, and LORAN-C.
Currently, aircraft can only use GPS for supplemental-means navigation. Traditional navigation aids are sufficient for ordinary operations and have power levels that are sufficient to resist jammers who might be tempted to disrupt commerce. Therefore, because of the signal vulnerability of GPS, there is little incentive to take advantage of the significant performance and cost advantages of satellite navigation. The FAA's Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) and Local Area Augmentation System (LAAS) offer the potential to bring low-cost aircraft landing capability to thousands of airports nationwide where it was never available before. Today, the United States is paying for two civil safety-of-life navigation systems: the traditional ground-based system, and the newer, more capable satellite-based system.
A number of prior art techniques are available to combat jamming. These methods focus on (i) specialized satellite design and (ii) receiver design. In the satellite, for example, it is always possible to simply increase the raw power broadcast to the ground. However, there is a price for raw power: each Watt of extra power scales up the satellite payload and launch costs accordingly, such that significant increases in broadcast power quickly become expensive. Another approach is to use wider bandwidth broadcasts that can enable additional processing gain. Here, too, there is a price to pay: efficient use of finite spectrum for multiple purposes requires significant global coordination. GPS has specific broadcast spectrum assigned to it, and it is unlikely that any new spectrum will be assigned any time in the foreseeable future.
Receiver approaches to the problem of jamming are generally divided into three categories: (i) antenna pattern shaping, (ii) signal excision, and (iii) averaging. Antenna pattern shaping uses adaptive multi-element arrays of antennas called a Controlled Radiation Pattern Antenna (CRPA) to electronically point a beam directly at a satellite and, therefore, exclude a jammer. A CRPA can also point a null at an estimated jammer direction. CRPAs can be quite effective in most circumstances, although they are generally expensive and bulky. They also have a drawback of becoming less effective when a jammer line-of-sight happens to be nearly coincident with a satellite or, worse yet, when several distributed jammers are used. In this case, the laws of physics place mathematical constraints on the number and quality of beams and nulls that can be applied to a set of jammers for a given CRPA design.
Excision refers to wide-band, pre-correlation signal processing carried out in a GPS receiver. Because the signal characteristics of GPS are well-known, any excess power due to jamming is directly observable by the receiver in real time and can be excised via notch filters, pulse blanking, or any number of other more elaborate techniques. Excision is an effective and inexpensive signal processing step and should generally be carried out as a matter of good practice. However, it is insufficient in and of itself to eliminate all the effects of interference or jamming. For example, if a jammer is broadband noise, the receiver would detect the presence of jamming, but would be unable to apply excision to selectively remove any part of it without a priori knowledge of its character. Current signal processing techniques known as Space Time Adaptive Processing (STAP) and Space Frequency Adaptive Processing (SFAP) combine the CRPA and excision into one processing stage.
Averaging techniques aim to filter out as much jamming as possible during the pre-detection interval (PDI) of the receiver. The most basic form of averaging is the processing gain provided by the ratio of the pre-correlation bandwidth (20.46 MHz) to the pre-detection bandwidth of the receiver (typically 50 Hz). For a P(Y) code receiver, averaging provides a basic level of 56 dB of jamming immunity, and here only for very low dynamics. Attempts to improve upon this level of protection have traditionally encountered several barriers to practical implementation. The first barrier comes from the 50 bps data modulation superimposed on the GPS carrier. This modulation effectively limits the PDI to 20 ms.
Data stripping is one method used to try to get around the 20 ms PDI limitation. Since the GPS broadcast message changes infrequently or in a predictable way, it is often possible to apply pre-recorded frames to remove most of the data modulation. Unfortunately, for military or safety-of-life applications, the method cannot always be counted on because the pre-recorded data message does not always track the actual broadcast message. Consistency between the two data streams can be thrown off by any number of factors, including new ephemeris uploads, operational errors, and system failures. Any inconsistency does not contribute to graceful degradation. A key improvement to the data stripping approach teaches how Low Earth Orbiting (LEO) satellites can provide a global feed forward of the GPS data bits so as to eliminate any gaps in operation. See, e.g., U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/873,581, entitled "Real Time Data Aiding for Enhanced GPS Performance," filed Jun. 22, 2004.
Unfortunately, regardless of whether data is removed from the GPS carrier, significant obstacles remain in attempting to narrow the pre-detection bandwidth or making use of low signal level measurements. GPS signals are made up of multiple components, including a PRN code modulation and a carrier frequency. In the absence of interference or jamming, receivers typically track both the code and the carrier. In the event of jamming, most military receivers drop out of carrier track and revert to a form of code-only tracking, wherein the raw 20 ms pre-detection samples are multiplied together using variations of a dot-product discriminator. The dot product discriminator is generally considered to be among the most effective of the squaring-type discriminators. These samples are averaged together over an extended interval—sometimes several tens of seconds—to resolve a code tracking error. The commonly-applied benefit of dot-product-type code tracking is that it has somewhat higher jam resistance than carrier tracking alone. The idea is to use an Inertial Navigation System (INS) to subtract out user dynamics, thereby permitting the noisy post-detection samples to be averaged over a long interval. The most integrated version of code-based anti-jam tracking is called "Ultra-Tight Coupling" (UTC).
Unfortunately, ultra-tightly-coupled inertials have only been effective to a certain level of protection. The physics of such systems quickly limits their ability to withstand significant jamming. First, due to squaring losses stemming from the discriminator, long integration times are required. The integration time is proportional to the square of J/S. This means that for every doubling of jamming power, the required integration interval must quadruple. Second, inertial instruments exhibit errors that grow with time. Although some inertial instruments can provide better performance at increased cost, there are practical physical limits as to how long an inertial can remove the platform dynamics without an update from GPS. This limit is usually set by the time the inertial noise takes to reach a large fraction of a code chip—usually about 5 m. For a given quality of inertial, the dependence on GPS code modulation yields a certain jamming level at which the ranging error exceeds a threshold during integration and the system is no longer useful.
Assuming that the GPS data modulation can be removed from the carrier in a dependable way, coherent tracking of the carrier has sometimes been considered but summarily dismissed as an option for increased jam immunity. Such an approach has traditionally been seen as impractical because the receiver must integrate the carrier over a sustained interval to a stability of less than 30 picoseconds (the amount of time it takes light to traverse 1 cm). The challenge is to maintain this required stability over an interval that is much longer than 20 ms. A typical low-cost Temperature Compensated quartz Crystal Oscillator (TCXO) is the basis for the vast majority of GPS receivers today. The part cost generally ranges between $10 and $20. With a TCXO, the pre-detection interval may be safely extended to a large fraction of a second. Beyond this, a TCXO is not sufficiently stable.
Other more stable exotic clocks such as ovenized quartz or atomic clocks based on rubidium or cesium frequency standards are candidates, but even these highly stable clocks have practical issues that do not render them practical. For 30 dB of additional GPS jam protection, a user needs to integrate in the neighborhood 20 seconds. At this level, even many atomic clocks are not capable of providing the needed stability. Vibration, bulk, and cost can become prohibitive. A promising new Chip Scale Atomic Clock (CSOC) approach offers potential to reduce cost, size, weight, and power some years from now, but even the most optimistic projections of performance do not achieve sufficient frequency stability to yield the required phase stability over the needed interval. Some Oven-Controlled Crystal Oscillators (OCXO) possess the required phase stability over the needed interval. However, an OCXO is typically bulky, expensive, and power consuming. A solution depending on such highly stable clocks is not readily accessible without the cost, size, weight, and power consumption associated with precise temperature control. Such a solution with high premium on component performance sensitivity is a significant technical challenge. Power, vibration, and cost become major obstacles. What is needed is a solution that could provide significantly enhanced performance using a standard, low-cost TCXO.
The Military, Civil, and Commercial sectors each have their own issues and work-arounds to jamming. The Military is perhaps best prepared to combat jamming because it is generally less cost constrained and has access to more advanced technology. Unfortunately, even relatively low-power jammers are capable of bringing down user equipment within line of sight of the jammer. In the user equipment, a broad spectrum of anti-jam capabilities are employed, often as a combination of techniques, including CRPAs and ultra-tight inertial coupling. The Military also proposes to implement a new higher-power M-code signal that is intended to boost signal power by approximately 20 dB. Large-aperture spot beam antennas would focus a tighter beam on specific regions of the Earth to concentrate more signal power there. However, even if the cost of deploying such a high-power system were not an object, it will still be many years before such a system will be available for use. What is needed is a low-cost, immediately-available navigation solution.
These military solutions, taken in the aggregate, appear to provide reasonable protection against many jamming threats predicted in the near future. However, these solutions may also fall short under future jamming scenarios—especially as mentioned previously with respect to large numbers of low-power, distributed jammers. Perhaps most important, the set of current solutions described above all tend to be expensive.
Civil vulnerability is a significant challenge. As mentioned previously, GPS already has means to counteract unintentional interference with the addition of the second civil frequency. Because only one frequency is required for many operations, if one frequency is down due to unintentional interference, the other stands a high probability of being operational. For either unintentional or intentional interference, as a last resort, an aircraft can divert to an alternate airport.
The problem of intentional jamming is much worse. Again, the objective is to deny jammers a systematic means of disrupting air travel that would interfere with the daily flow of commerce. The commercial nature of civil aviation requires that any solution to the problem of intentional jamming be cost-effective. Installing expensive user equipment adapted from the Military, such as CRPA antennas, to the civil aircraft fleet has been viewed negatively. So far, the only viable solution has been to maintain the existing navigation aids in service, such as VOR, DME, and ILS, which operate at higher power. Because satellite solutions such as the WAAS do not provide any additional value to aviation users because the existing ground aids are also in operation, there is little incentive for the airlines to transition onto satellite navigation.
Commercial users also have a stake in a non-jammed signal. In addition to the growing dependence on GPS for a variety of commercial functions in society, including timing of the Internet, the power grid, cellular telephone networks, and financial transaction timing, there is also a potential regulatory threat to GPS signal strength that could originate from Ultra-Wide Band (UWB) technology. While UWB has significant promise, there is a distinct possibility of interference if the GPS band is not carefully protected from a regulatory standpoint. Given that regulations can sometimes take time to arrive at a satisfactory balance, it would be desirable to have access to an economical technical "safety net" that would allow users to protect their investment in critical GPS-based infrastructure during this critical transition to coexistence with UWB devices.
In summary, existing systems and methods for providing jam-immunity are unsatisfactory. What is needed is a navigation system that provides high accuracy and integrity for navigation in the presence of interference and/or jamming, thereby ensuring significant and effective anti-jam protection in the near-term for a wide variety of GPS and satellite navigation applications, including military, civil, and commercial.

Methods and apparatus for a navigation system with reduced susceptibility to interference and jamming


A method for forming a hollow structure having a predetermined shape from a sheet of superplastic material. The sheet is initially formed into a preform configuration. A reusable fluid inlet tube is placed in the preform configuration to define a port in fluid communication with the interior portion of the preform configuration. The preform configuration is disposed in a containment die, which defines a cavity having the predetermined desired shape. Force is applied to the containment die to temporarily seal the edges of the preform configuration without the use of welding or diffusion bonding. Once its edges are sealed, the preform configuration becomes a gas-tight envelope capable of holding fluid that is introduced through the fluid inlet tube. Fluid (e.g., argon) is fed through the tube to apply internal pressure to the gas-tight preform configuration under superplastic conditions (including appropriate heating) while it is still being held in the containment die so that it superplastically expands in the die cavity (deforms) into a hollow structure having the predetermined shape. The hollow structure may be an aeronautical member, e.g., an airfoil, or a member used in automobiles, furniture, boats, buildings, railroad cars, hospital equipment, architectural panels, or any other application requiring a closed metal shape.

It has long been desired to fabricate various airframe components, such as canards, winglets, or wings, as hollow bodies. The benefits of using hollow bodies for these airframe components include a substantial reduction in weight, which results in improved fuel efficiency and increased performance.
In a number of applications, an airframe component, such as the leading edge or wing tip of an aircraft's wing, is required to have a shape that would, if made using conventional fabrication techniques, require multiple part fabrication and assembly procedures. For example, one such airfoil structure typically used as a component in the manufacture of aircraft wings is a hollow airfoil shell having a complex, curved leading edge and an open trailing section. This airfoil structure is conventionally fabricated from several parts, which are assembled, joined together with a wing tip section and a trailing edge section, and then partially inserted into and attached to the aircraft fuselage to form the aircraft wing.
Conventionally, these hollow airfoil structures have been constructed using a systematic build-up of multiple subcomponent assemblies. The individual sheet assemblies have comprised a mixture of product forms. These forms included, for example, extruded, forged, cast, or formed sheet, which were then mechanically fastened and tied to the other subcomponent assemblies to fabricate the airfoil structure. At the part level, individual parts required processing through the fabrication stage, then fastened with mating structures during the assembly stage of the manufacturing operation.
With the introduction of new material systems in airframe design, efficient methods to fabricate and integrate subassemblies made from different materials, such as metallic, non-metallic, and matrix elements, have become increasingly important, for example, for improving the weight, cost, and life expectancy of the resultant aircraft structure. A continuing desire of those skilled in the art is to develop structures and methods for forming such structures to significantly reduce the total number of structures and steps required for the final assembly.
Many of the methods developed to manufacture hollow airfoil structures utilize superplastic forming ("SPF") techniques, which techniques rely on the capability of certain materials, such as titanium alloys, to develop unusually high tensile elongation with a minimal tendency towards necking when subjected to coordinated time-temperature-strain conditions within a limited range. This characteristic has been known in the art and used in producing of a wide variety of strong, lightweight metallic structures.
One prior art method involves forming a closed cellular structure from two or more separate layers of sheet material. The two or more layers are joined along respective edge portions (e.g., by welding or diffusion bonding) to form an inflatable envelope assembly. This inflatable assembly is then superplastically formed to produce an integral structural part having a predetermined shape.
It is known to insert one or more inlet tubes between the sheets that comprise an envelope assembly to supply gas under pressure to the interior of the envelope assembly to form the assembly into the desired shape using superplastic forming. The gas supply tube is first positioned and the envelope assembly is then sealed around its periphery to form a gas-tight structure. This sealing typically requires labor intensive and expensive methods, such as seam welding, partial penetration welding, or diffusion bonding using heat and pressure.
It is also known to form an airfoil using a single sheet. The single sheet is formed into a folded over sandwich structure and sealed along its periphery by a continuous weld to form an expandable envelope. This envelope structure is placed in a limiting structure, such as a containment die, and a gas is injected into the interior portion of the envelope structure under superplastic conditions to form or expand the single sheet. Such expansion may occur in two opposing directions. Thus, by applying appropriate internal pressure and temperature to the envelope structure, the envelope may be expanded into the surrounding die configuration, thereby producing the desired structural part.
These prior art techniques suffer from significant disadvantages in addition to those previously mentioned. For example, they require welding or diffusion bonding the periphery of the sheet assembly prior to superplastic forming and then cutting off the welded areas around the periphery of the expanded assembly to form the shell structure. Such removal is labor intensive and inefficient. The welded seam must be removed so that one or more internal members (e.g., internal reinforcing members) can be easily put into position. For example, if the welded seam is not removed from, e.g., the trailing edge, it will be impossible to spread the two major faces of the expanded assembly apart sufficiently to allow an internal member to be positioned.
Additionally, with prior art techniques there is a risk that the one or more inlet tubes that are positioned to supply the gas to the interior of the expandable envelope or sheet assembly will be pinched closed and rendered inoperable while welding the sandwich assembly. The inlet tubes are typically discarded after each use, which increases costs.
Accordingly, there is a continuing need for a method that can be used to create large structural components with reduced manufacturing and assembly costs, reduced part count (i.e., fewer parts), and reduced fasteners, which method results in a structural component having a less complex overall structure. Such a method could desirably use a single sheet that is superplastically formed in two opposing directions, without the need to weld or diffusion bond the edges of the sheet together. Desirably, in making an airfoil structure, such a method would eliminate the need to weld leading and/or trailing edge structures or on aerodynamic centerlines, thus resulting in an airfoil structure having a continuous leading edge. The elimination of welding or diffusion bonding would also enable the method to work with a wider variety of materials, such as aluminum. It would also be desirable to be able to form structures from a sheet without the special preparation of the sheet that is now needed to allow the sheet to accept and hold the gas inlet tubes.

Method for superplastically forming a structural article


A threshing assembly is provided for a combine having a frame mounted on wheels and a longitudinal axis. The threshing assembly is formed from a threshing rotor disposed within a perforated threshing cage. At least one helical vane, formed of high strength plastic, mounts to the interior of the threshing cage and extends along the length of the threshing cage. The radial height of the vane is graduated along the length of the threshing cage from the forward end to the rearward end for threshing of different size grain crop. Rasp bars of the threshing rotor also have heights that increase along the length of the threshing rotor, from the forward end to the rearward end, to correspond to the decrease in height of the vanes.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to grain combines, and in particular, to an improved threshing assembly for a combine.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A grain combine threshing section has two primary parts. These are the threshing rotor and cage. The threshing rotor rotates within the threshing cage and has rasp bars mounted on its outer surface. The threshing cage is perforated and may rotate along with the threshing rotor, but at slower speed. Steel vanes are mounted to the interior surface of the threshing cage. Crop is introduced into the space between the threshing rotor and the threshing cage. As material passes between the threshing rotor and cage, the rasp bars provide agitation and shear to separate the grain from the remainder of the crop. The threshed grain passes through the perforations of the threshing cage so that it can be collected.
For effective threshing, the clearance between the rasp bars of the threshing rotor and the interior of the threshing cage are set according to the type of crop being threshed. Decreasing the clearance between the rasp bars and threshing cage can improve threshing. Yet if this clearance is too small, grain damage can occur. Therefore, larger grains require greater clearances between the rasp bars and the threshing concave, where the crop is threshed. Because of this, the threshing assembly or its components has to be adjusted to provide the necessary clearances for the type of crop being harvested. This is undesireable due to the labor and time required to modify the threshing assembly.
What is therefore needed is a threshing assembly that can accommodate crops of different grain sizes without the necessity of adjusting of the threshing assembly.


An optical component has a plurality of parallel noncontiguous optical conduits of at least one protrusive phase material embedded in a recessive phase material that acts as a support structure. The optical conduits extend from a proximal surface to a distal surface of the optical component. The distal surface has a plurality of spaced apart surface features of the protrusive phase material. Each independent optical conduits act as waveguides for a wavelength or range of wavelengths. The optical component can be formed such that the protruding surface features at the distal end of the component form an ordered array. An optical instrument can include the optical component in conjunction with a light source for illuminating a sample and a detector in optical communication optical component via the optical conduits.

Tapering an optical waveguide (also known in many instances as an optical fiber) below its transmission cutoff diameter causes the propagating light to form an evanescent field at the waveguide tip. If nothing couples to this evanescent field, the propagating light undergoes total internal reflection (TIR) and returns to the light source. If any evanescent field coupling occurs the amount of reflected light is proportionally reduced. Near-field scanning optical microscopy (NSOM) uses this phenomenon to achieve spatial resolution performance beyond the classical diffraction limit by employing a sub-wavelength light source or detector positioned in close proximity to a specimen.
Individual optical waveguides have been drawn down to approximately 100 nm and addressed optically as microscopy or sensor probes. In certain applications, it is desirable to scan a large area. In other applications it is desirable to probe many regions over an area simultaneously. Unfortunately, scanning a large area using a single probe is time consuming because of the small size of the probes. In addition, individual probes cannot simultaneously probe many regions over a given area. What is needed is a microscope or sensor probe design which provides a large number of sharp tips oriented in parallel that is operable for scanning a large area quickly, permitting simultaneous probing of many regions over a given area.


A cytology sampling system includes a catheter tube and a cytology tool. The catheter tube has open proximal and distal ends. The cytology tool is insertable through the catheter tube and includes a flexible shaft, a brush, and a position sensor. The flexible shaft defines proximal and distal ends thereof. The brush is coupled to the distal end of the flexible shaft. The brush includes a plurality of brush shafts. Each brush shaft has bristles disposed along a portion of a length thereof. The bristles are coupled to and extend radially away from an outer surface of each of the brush shafts. The bristles are configured to collect cell samples from targeted tissue of a patient. The position sensor provides an indication of the location of the position sensor within a luminal structure. The system may include a positioning assembly for placing the distal end of the catheter tube adjacent the target tissue.

Cancer can be prevented, treated, and possibly cured if it is detected early enough, preferably in its precancerous or precursor stages. Accordingly, much effort has been directed to developing improvements in early detection devices and of the presence of cancer in its early stages.
Samples that contain more cells provide a greater accuracy and greater likelihood of early detection of the presence of cancer. A continuing need exists for devices capable of collecting larger cell samples form tissue of a patient.
Endobronchial navigation uses CT image data to create a navigation plan to facilitate advancing a navigation catheter (or other suitable device) through a bronchoscope and a branch of the bronchus of a patient to the nodule. Electromagnetic tracking may also may be utilized in conjunction with the CT data to facilitate guiding the navigation catheter through the branch of the bronchus to the nodule. In certain instances, the navigation catheter may be positioned within one of the airways of the branched luminal networks adjacent to or within the nodule or point of interest to provide access for one or more tools. Once the navigation catheter is in position, fluoroscopy may be used to visualize cytology tools, such as, for example, biopsy brushes, needle brushes and biopsy forceps as they are passed through the navigation catheter and into the lung and to the nodule or point of interest.

Cytology sampling system and method of utilizing the same


An exchange-traded financial instrument having a price that tracks an underlying benchmark, the underlying benchmark being a security or commodity that is itself traded. A contract for the financial instrument between a buyer and seller is not contingent upon the delivery of the underlying benchmark. A net carrying charge (credit or debit), defined as the difference between the investment yield of the underlying benchmark and a cost of financing ownership of the underlying benchmark using the generally accepted industry standard financing rate for that benchmark, is credited or debited, accrued, or built into the price of the derivative for both buyer and seller of the financial instrument, typically nightly. In one embodiment, the underlying benchmark is a U.S. Treasury security, and preferably a specific U.S. Treasury security such as the on the run (OTR) 10 Year Treasury note. Other single contract spread and ratio instruments are also disclosed.

Financial markets are continually evolving and investors continually seek improved vehicles via which they can generate increased income or obtain better return on capital. Investors also generally desire the availability of a diverse "menu" of vehicles via which money may be invested. It is generally within this context that embodiments of the present invention were developed.

Systems and methods for implementing the structuring, pricing, quotation, and trading of financial instruments