The present invention relates to a radio transceiver having a plurality of switchable antennas. The radio transceiver comprises (1) a housing, (2) a dipole antenna installed on the housing for transmitting and receiving radio signals, (3) at least one patch antenna installed on the housing for transmitting and receiving radio signals, each patch antenna being connected to an antenna switch, (4) an impedance matching circuit connected to the dipole antenna and each said antenna switch, (5) a transceiver circuit connected to the impedance matching circuit for converting radio signals received by the antennas into base band signals and converting base band signals to be transmitted into radio signals, (6) and mode control means for controlling each said antenna switch and the impedance matching circuit to match the impedance of the impedance matching circuit with the connected antennas.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a radio transceiver, and more particularly, to a radio transceiver having a plurality of switchable antennas.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Dipole antenna is commonly used in various radio transceivers such as mobile phones (GSM, DCS, DECT, etc.) for transmitting and receiving radio signals. Such dipole antenna can receive radio signals from all directions and thus is widely used in radio transceivers. The disadvantage of such dipole antenna is its low efficiency. In most circumstances, the radio signals are strong in certain directions and weak in others. But the dipole antenna can not enhance its efficiency according to this situation. In the meanwhile, a patch antenna is very direction-oriented. Only radio signals from the direction facing the patch antenna can be efficiently received. However, patch antennas are seldom used in radio transceivers, especially mobile phones. Because radio transceivers must be able to receive radio signals from all directions.

Radio transceiver having switchable antennas


The present invention discloses a method for delivering short messages in an IMS. The method includes: The sender encapsulates multiple concatenated short message segments into an IMS message, and sends the IMS message to the receiver. The present invention also discloses a system and apparatus for delivering short messages in an IMS. Through the embodiments of the present invention, the receiver can obtain a complete short message upon receiving the message.

The Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) is one of the framework agreements for multimedia communication systems formulated by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). The SIP is a text-based application-layer control protocol, which is independent of the lower-layer protocols and is designed to create, modify and terminate two-party or multi-party multimedia sessions on an IP network. The SIP technology provides a forking mechanism so that a SIP message can be received by multiple user equipments (UEs) correlated with a user ID. Forking comes in two types: parallel forking and serial forking. Parallel forking means that a proxy sends a SIP message to multiple UEs concurrently. Serial forking means the proxy sends a SIP message to each of multiple UEs one by one; if a UE returns a success response, the proxy stops sending SIP messages to other UEs; otherwise, the proxy continues sending SIP messages to other UEs until the SIP message is sent to all UEs.
The IMS is a subsystem proposed in the 3rd Generation Project Partnership (3GPP) Release 5 standard to support IP multimedia services. The IMS is based on SIP, and uses a SIP call control mechanism to create, manage and terminate various multimedia services. The IMS adopts the SIP-based forking mechanism, which is implemented by the Serving Call Session Control Function (S-CSCF) of the IMS. The S-CSCF receives registration information of the UE, and correlates the public user ID with the UE address. When a public user ID is correlated with multiple UE addresses, the SIP message sent to the public user ID is forked at the S-CSCF. The user configures whether the S-CSCF performs parallel forking or serial forking for the received messages. Namely, the user who correlates multiple UEs with the same public user ID can configure user data to decide whether the received SIP message undergoes parallel forking or serial forking.
The short message service (SMS) is maturely developed and widely applied in the traditional circuit switched (CS) domain. In order to continue developing the SMS and enable the SMS in the future IP network, the 3GPP organization sets up a topic to study how to use the SMS over IP. Currently, the 3GPP solves the SMS over IP by introducing an IP short message gateway (IP-SM-GW) as an SMS gateway between the IMS domain and the CS domain. When an IMS domain user sends a short message to a CS domain user, the short message is encapsulated in a SIP message body, and sent to the IP-SM-GW. The IP-SM-GW extracts the short message from the SIP message body, and sends the short message to the CS domain. The short message is sent by the CS domain user to the IMS domain user, and then transferred to the IP-SM-GW. The IP-SM-GW constructs a SIP message, encapsulates the short message into the SIP message body, and sends the SIP message body to the IMS domain user. The 3GPP TS 23.040 is a standard about SMS, and stipulates that a short message can carry a maximum data input of 140 bytes; if the data input is more than 140 bytes, the UE can send the short message through multiple correlated short messages, and the message receiver can assemble the multiple correlated short messages into a complete message.
When a CS domain user sends multiple message segments to an IMS domain user, because the IMS domain user owns multiple UEs, the short message undergoes forking at the S-CSCF. When the UE receives the message, the wireless network may be instable, so that some message segments fail to be received and the short message received by the UE is incomplete. Moreover, when a short message interworks with a SIP message, upon receiving multiple message segments, the IP-SM-GW converts them into multiple SIP messages directly, and sends them to the IMS terminal, without embodying the relationships between them. However, the IMS terminal is unable to assemble the SIP messages into a complete message. Namely, the IMS terminal is unable to obtain a complete short message. Further, the message segmentation in the IMS domain brings multiple SIP messages, which increases the load on the network.

Method, system and apparatus for transferring short messages in an IMS


The invention relates to an optical printer head 12 provided with one or a plurality of light emitting element array units 3. The light emitting element array unit 3 is provided with a circuit board 30, a base member 33 supporting the circuit board 30, and a plurality of light emitting elements mounted onto the base member 33 and arranged in a row in main scanning directions M1 and M2. The base member 33 has a lower hygroscopic rate than the circuit board 30. The plurality of light emitting element array units 3 are arranged along the main scanning directions M1 and M2, for example, so that end portions 34 in adjacent light emitting element array units 3 are overlapped with each other in vertical-scanning directions S1 and S2.

Some of image forming apparatuses such as electrophotographic printers employ an optical printer head in which a plurality of light emitting elements are arranged as exposure means.
The image forming apparatuses equipped with the optical printer head are adapted to cause the light emitting elements to selectively emit light based on image data, and the light is irradiated through a lens array of the optical printer head to a photoreceptor. An electrostatic latent image is formed onto the surface of the photoreceptor by the light irradiation. The electrostatic latent image formed onto the photoreceptor is changed into a toner image through the process of development using toner, and the like. Then, an image is recorded by transferring and fixing the toner image onto a recording paper.
As the above optical printer head, those in which a plurality of light emitting element array units mounting a plurality of light emitting elements on a circuit board are arranged along a main scanning direction, and the adjacent light emitting element array units are arranged in a zigzag pattern by shifting them in a vertical-scanning direction have been proposed (for example, refer to patent documents 1 and 2).
Patent document 1: Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 7-61035
Patent document 2: Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2001-328292

Optical printer head and image forming apparatus equipped with the same


A contact-state obtaining apparatus for obtaining a contact state in which a tire of a wheel of a vehicle contacts a road surface, the apparatus including a deformation detecting device which is supported by the wheel and which detects a deformation of the tire that is caused by a force exerted to the tire in a direction parallel to the road surface; and a contact-state obtaining portion which obtains, as the contact state, (a) a slipping state of the tire relative to the road surface and/or (b) the force exerted to the tire in the direction parallel to the road surface, based on the deformation of the tire detected by the deformation detecting device.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a contact-state obtaining apparatus that obtains a contact state in which a tire contacts a road surface, and a tire-deformation detecting apparatus that detects a deformation of a tire.
2. Related Art Statement
Japanese Patent Application Publication 6-341822A discloses, as an example of a contact-state obtaining device, a side slip angle obtaining device including a first velocity detecting portion that is provided on the side of a body of a vehicle and detects a first velocity at which a contact point of a tire with a road surface moves on a straight axis line about which the tire is rotated; a second velocity detecting portion that detects a second velocity at which the contact point of the tire moves on a straight centerline of the tire; and a side slip angle calculating portion that calculates a side slip angle of the tire based on the first and second velocities.
The side slip angle obtaining device obtains, as the side slip angle, an angle relative to the centerline of the tire, of a displacement-direction vector representing a direction in which the tire displaces, i.e., a composite vector obtained by addition of a vector obtained by translating a velocity of a gravity center of the vehicle's body from the gravity center to the contact point of the tire and a tangential vector on the contact point about a vertical axis (i.e., a yaw axis) passing through the gravity center. The first velocity detecting portion detects, as a first component of the displacement-direction vector, the first velocity at which the contact point of the tire moves on the straight axis line about which the tire is rotated, the second velocity detecting portion detects, as a second component of the displacement-direction vector, the second velocity at which the contact point of the tire moves on the straight centerline of the tire, and the side slip angle calculating portion calculates the side slip angle of the tire based on the first and second velocities.

Contact-state obtaining apparatus and tire-deformation detecting apparatus


A semiconductor memory device of present invention has a memory cell, a sense amplifier which amplifies data of the memory cell, first IO line connected to the sense amplifier, and second IO line which is connected to first IO line through a switch, wherein the second IO line is arranged on the memory cell.

1. Field of the Invention
Present invention relates to a semiconductor memory device and, more particularly, to a configuration of sense amplifier and an IO line wiring pattern of the semiconductor memory device.
2. Description of Related Art
FIG. 10 is an enlarged view of a part of an array portion among conventional semiconductor memory device.
In FIG. 10, LIO is first IO line connected to the sense amplifier which amplifies a data of a memory cell, and is arranged in a SAMP row region formed the sense amplifier. On the other hand, GIO is second IO line for connecting with LIO and supplying data to the data amplifier (DAMP). Here, GIO is formed on a sub WORD driver (SWD) formation region and on a crossing portion.
The memory cells are arranged with 8xc3x978 sets. Between each memory cell, the SAMP row are arranged in a lateral direction in paper of FIG. 10, and the SWD row are arranged in a vertical direction in paper of FIG. 10. The crossing portions are arranged between each SAMP row and the SWD row respectively.
FIG. 8 is an enlarged view of a portion L of FIG. 10, and FIG. 9 is a simplified cross-sectional view which cut a drawing of FIG. 8 with a broken line X.
In FIG. 8, input/output wiring group T and eight lines of GIO are wired on the SWD, and it""s cross-sectional view is shown in FIG. 9.
FIG. 11 is an enlarged view of the crossing portion circumference where LIO and GIO intersect, and FIG. 12 is an enlarged view of a switch element arrangement portion circumference A which connects LIO and GIO. As shown in FIG. 11, LIO and GIO are connected through SW1. The SW1 serves as a transfer gate, as shown in FIG. 12.
In FIG. 11, there are eight lines of GIO to four lines of LIO. It is because, in the vertical direction of the paper of the FIG. 10, addresses differ in odd steps and even steps of a sense amplifier row.
In the conventional array portion, eight lines of GIO are wired on SWD and on the crossing portion. For this reason, the wiring groups T and GIO on the SWD occupy an area larger than the SWD. Therefore, it is not easy to downsize the SWD.
The semiconductor memory device of present invention has a memory cell, a sense amplifier for amplifying a data of the memory cell, first IO line connected to the sense amplifier, and second IO line which connected through a switch to first IO line, wherein the second IO line is arranged on the memory cell.
The above-mentioned switch is formed in the region in which the sense amplifier is formed.
Second IO line is connected to data amplifier.
Furthermore, the semiconductor memory device of present invention has the sense amplifier for amplifying the data of a memory cell. And the semiconductor memory device also has an IO line for supplying the data from the sense amplifier to data amplifier. As for the semiconductor memory device, the IO line is arranged on the memory cell.
The IO line consists of the first and second wiring portions, and it has the switch element which connects the first and second wiring portions.
The switch element is in the sense amplifier formation region.


Embodiments of the present application include a gas turbine system. The system may include a rotor wheel and one or more impeller vanes radially disposed on the rotor wheel. The system may also include one or more fluid passages defined by adjacent impeller vanes. The one or more fluid passages may be radially disposed across the rotor wheel. Moreover, the system may include one or more shape memory alloy valves disposed within each of the fluid passages. The one or more shape memory alloy valves may be configured to change shape to control a flow of fluid through the fluid passages.

Gas turbines are widely used in industrial and commercial operations. A typical gas turbine includes a compressor at the front, one or more combustors around the middle, and a turbine at the rear. The compressor imparts kinetic energy to the working fluid (e.g., air) to produce a compressed working fluid at a highly energized state. The compressed working fluid exits the compressor and flows to the combustors where it mixes with fuel and ignites to generate combustion gases having a high temperature and pressure. The combustion gases flow to the turbine where they expand to produce work. For example, expansion of the combustion gases in the turbine may rotate a shaft connected to a generator to produce electricity.
The compressor and the turbine typically share a common rotor which extends from near the front of the compressor, through the combustor section, to near the rear of the turbine. The rotor typically is configured to direct a portion of the working fluid through one or more cooling flow passages to cool various components of the gas turbine. The cooling flow passages, however, are configured for base load conditions.

Systems and methods to control flow in a rotor wheel


The present invention provides a valve assembly, comprising a multiway valve (9) with a fitting surface (10) and a fluid manifold (7) with a mounting surface (8), wherein an opening of at least one branch channel lies opposite an opening of a respective channel of the multiway valve (9) in order to provide a fluid connection between the fluid manifold (7) and the multiway valve (9), and with an elastic sealing plate (1) with a plate-like body and through holes (2a-2e, 3a-3d) for the openings disposed between the mounting surface (8) and the fitting surface (10) and covering approximately completely the fitting surface (10) of the assigned multiway valve (9), wherein each through hole (2a-2e, 3a-3d) is surrounded by an annular sealing lip (4) formed on the elastic sealing plate (1), wherein the elastic sealing plate (1) is provided with an outer hygienic sealing profile (5) formed along the edge (6) on both sides of the sealing plate (1) in order to avoid a capillary entry of dirt and bacteria into the area between the multiway valve (9) and the fluid manifold (7).

The present invention relates to a valve assembly for controlling the fluid flow of a pressure medium. More particularly, the present invention relates to a sealing plate disposed between a multiway valve and a fluid manifold of said valve assembly. Especially, the invention-relates to a sealing solution in environments where a high hygienic standard is required.
A valve assembly is known from document EP 0 688 958 A1. The disclosed valve assembly comprises a fluid manifold which is provided with a mounting surface. The mounting surface corresponds with a fitting surface of a neighbouring multiway valve in order to connect the fluid ports of both parts for supplying and ejecting the valve assembly. For that reason the fluid manifold comprises a supply channel and one or more ejecting channels, wherein transverse branch channels run form these channels to the mounting surface. On the mounting surface an opening of each branch channel lies opposite an opening of a valve channel.
Furthermore, the valve assembly comprises a sealing element disposed between the mounting surface of the fluid manifold and the fitting surface of the multiway valve. The sealing element surrounds the respective opposite openings of the branch channels and the valve channels. The sealing element is shaped as an elastic sealing plate with a plate-like body covering approximately completely the fitting surface of the fitted multiway valve The sealing element has through holes which correspond with the openings of the branch channels and the valve channels. Each of these trough holes is surrounded by an annular sealing lip formed on the plate-like body of the sealing plate.
As shown in FIG. 3 of the above-mentioned prior art document the valve arrangement has in its mounted state a small outer gap between the multiway valve and a fluid manifold. Said gap allows dirt and bacteria to get into the area between both mounting parts where the sealing plate is disposed. This is undesirable in environments where a high hygienic standard is required. Because of the gaps it is very difficult to keep the valve arrangement clean enough.
It is the aim of the present invention to provide a valve arrangement which in contrast to the prior art provides a hygienic connection between a multiway valve and a fluid manifold.
This aim is obtained in a valve assembly of the above-mentioned kind by including an elastic sealing plate with a special hygienic outer sealing profile formed along the edge on both sides of the sealing plate.
So the present invention avoids an undesired capillary entry of dirt and bacteria into the area between the multiway valve and the fluid manifold. The sealing plate of the invention provides a functional integration through sealing openings of corresponding channels on the one hand and seal the outer gap between said two mounting parts on the other hand without using separate sealing elements.
In one preferred embodiment of the invention the side surface of the fluid manifold is disposed on the same plane as the side surface of the multiway valve. In this case the sealing profile is substantially shaped like a rectangle in the normal state and takes a convex shape in the mounted state in order to avoid sharp edges between the mounting parts.
In another preferred embodiment of the invention the side surface of the fluid manifold is disposed approximately rectangular to the side surface of the multiway valve. In this case the sealing profile is substantially shaped like a concave lip in the mounted state in order to avoid sharp edges between the mounting parts. It can be useful that the concave lip of the sealing profile comprises on its tip a slanting contour for pressing the tip of the lip on the respective surface of one mounting part.
As a further advantageous development of the invention two concave lips of neighbouring multiway valves form a u-shaped groove between the two multiway valves. The u-shaped groove provides an easy water-run-off when cleaning the valve assembly.
It is an additional favourable effect of the invention that along the edge of the mounting surface or the fitting surface of the fluid manifold and the multiway valve a fixing section for holding the sealing plate in the desired position is formed respectively. Furthermore, the elastic sealing plate could contain a reinforcing element made by metal or plastics material or another suitable material in order to stabilise the sealing plate.
The foregoing and other aspects will become apparent from the following detailed description of the invention when considered in conjunction with the enclosed drawings.

Hygienic sealing plate for valve assembly


A solid state drive (SSD) having a first memory portion comprising SLC flash memory and a second memory portion comprising MLC flash memory. The first memory portion may store read/write data, and the second memory portion may store read-only or read-mostly data. In some instances, the second memory portion may store historical data. The present disclosure also relates to a method of data progression in a hybrid solid state drive having both single-level cell (SLC) flash memory and multi-level cell (MLC) flash memory. The method may include monitoring write operations to the SLC memory, determining whether the frequency of write operations to a particular portion of the SLC memory is below a determined threshold, and moving the data stored in the particular portion of the SLC memory to the MLC memory.

The use of solid state drives (SSDs) in data storage systems is increasing. SSDs are advantageous over hard disk drives (HDD), for example, for a variety of reasons, including but not limited to: SSDs have faster random access time; SSDs have lower read latency time; SSDs have more consistent read performance; defragmentation is not necessary for SSDs; SSDs have no moving parts and thus, make no noise; SSDs do not require special cooling system and can tolerate higher temperatures; SSDs are smaller and lighter; SSDs generally are more reliable and have longer lifetimes; and SSDs consume less power. A significant drawback of SSDs, however, is their relatively high cost compared to HDDs.
SSDs can be based on either volatile (RAM-based) or non-volatile (flash) memory. Non-volatile memory can maintain information even when there is no power, whereas volatile memory requires continual power to maintain stored information. SSDs having non-volatile flash memory store information in memory cells that are made from floating-gate transistors. Memory cells can be either NOR gate flash or NAND gate flash. NOR allows for random-access reading and NAND allows only page access.
SSDs having non-volatile flash memory traditionally are either single-level cell (SLC) devices or multi-level cell (MLC) devices. SLC devices store only one bit of information per cell, and thus each cell can have one of two states (i.e., 0 or 1). MLC devices can store more than one bit of information per cell, with most traditional MLC devices storing two bits of information per cell, and thus each cell having four possible states (i.e., 00, 01, 10, or 11). SLC devices can have advantages over MLC devices in faster write speeds, lower power consumption, and higher cell endurance. However, SLC devices generally cost more per megabyte of storage than MLC devices.
In view of the foregoing, there is a need for an improved SSD having the beneficial features of both SLC and MLC technology. More particularly, there is a need for hybrid solid state drives having both single-level cells and multi-level cells and data storage systems including such solid state drives.

Single-level cell and multi-level cell hybrid solid state drive


A high capacity micro-Winchester disk drive is capable of storing approximately 120 megabytes of user data on each storage disk. A digital bus interface connects to data, control and status lines from a host computer, and a cache memory defines a plurality of programmable memory segments for disk data, host data and microcontroller data. The cache memory controller enables read-ahead, write-ahead, and automatic multiple block read and write operations to occur between the disk drive and the host without intervention of the disk drive's embedded microcontroller.

Low profile micro-Winchester disk drives are known. In addition to the related patents listed above, a representative low profile disk design is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,965,684 to Stefansky, entitled "Low Height Disk Drive". The architecture employed in the Stefansky patent employed "embedded servo" head positioning techniques wherein a multiplicity of embedded servo sectors provided, inter alia, head positioning information to the head positioner structure. The obvious drawback of the embedded sector approach is the overhead associated with the multiple servo sectors, an overhead which limits the overall data storage capacity of the disk drive.
One known way of avoiding the overhead associated with embedded servo sectors is to include an optical encoder for providing coarse head positioning information to the head positioner structure. This technique is followed in the teachings of the referenced U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,772,974 and 5,005,089, noted above. Improvements described in the referenced U.S. patent application Ser. No. 07/556,945 of Thanos et al, filed on Jul. 20, 1990, entitled "Head Position Recalibration for Disk Drive", now U.S. Pat. No. 5,227,930, enabled a low profile (one inch high) micro-Winchester disk drive employing an optical encoder to achieve a data storage capacity of approximately 52 megabytes of user data per data storage disk.
While the approach set forth in related U.S. Pat. No. 5,227,930 worked well, and has been very successful commercially, a hitherto need has remained to improve the capacity and performance of the disk drive described therein, so that as much as 120 megabytes of data may be stored on both sides of a micro-Winchester data storage disk, and so that practical access times to the vastly expanded data capacity are reduced.

Micro-winchester disk drive having on-board segmented cache memory


An improved shopping cart wheel which includes a hub which has bearing supporting cavities. The outer bearing is fabricated from a polymer, and the inner bearing is likewise fabricated from a polymer and has a cylindrical portion which extends into the center of the hub. This construction avoids the corrosion heretofore caused by cleaning solutions on the metal races.

The field of the invention is casters and the invention relates more specifically to shopping cart wheels.
For more than twenty years, most high quality shopping cart wheels have utilized bearings which include a pair of all steel races and steel ball bearings. Such bearings are satisfactory for many uses but several trends exist which cause such bearings to be unsatisfactory. First, shopping carts are getting larger and are being used for heavier loads. Large hardware and wholesale outlets tend to lead to shoppers placing far more and far heavier goods in the shopping cart than was the case for the typical grocery shopper.
Another tendency is the use of high-pressure washing systems to clean shopping carts. The carts are periodically placed in the parking lot of the supermarket and high-pressure detergent streams are used to clean the carts but, unfortunately, such streams often wash grease from within the steel wheel bearings. This often results in a very noisy bearing which makes the cart totally unacceptable to the store customers and employees.

Shopping cart wheels with polymeric bearing races


Microstructured hybrid actuator assemblies in which microactuators carrying designed surface properties to be revealed upon actuation are embedded in a layer of responsive materials. The microactuators in a microactuator array reversibly change their configuration in response to a change in the environment without requiring an external power source to switch their optical properties.

There is a need in the art for materials that can change their optical properties reversibly in response to the change in the environment, especially without requiring an external power source. Such change in the environment can be, for example, moisture change, temperature change, magnetic field change, electrical field change, pH change, illumination change, light intensity change, ion concentration change, and combinations thereof.

Environmentally responsive optical microstructured hybrid actuator assemblies and applications thereof

President and Fellows of Harvard College


A new and distinct Heuchera plant characterized by leaves which are multicolored changing from peach to gold to champagne-gold with a strong white veil overall, medium large leaves, light salmon pink flowers on short flowering stems, a medium mounding habit, and excellent vigor.

The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Heuchera and given the cultivar name of 'TNHEUCHA'. Heuchera is in the family Saxifragaceae. Heuchera 'TNHEUCHA' originated as a controlled cross using Heuchera 'K760-1', a proprietary, unpatented, unnamed plant as the seed parent, and Heuchera 'K626-2', a proprietary, unpatented, unnamed plant as the pollen parent.
Compared to the seed parent, Heuchera 'K760-1', the new cultivar is a much larger plant and more free-flowering.
Compared to the pollen parent, Heuchera 'K626-2', the new cultivar has larger leaves, is multicolored to gold rather than amber, and is veiled rather than not veiled.
Compared to Heuchera 'Ginger Ale', U.S. Plant Pat. No. 18,173, the new cultivar has a larger habit and leaves and more foliage colors.
Compared to Heuchera 'Peach Melba', U.S. Plant Pat. No. 17,131, the new cultivar has a larger habit and leaves, greater vigor, and has foliage that turns to gold shades.
This new Heuchera is uniquely distinguished by:                1. leaves which are multicolored changing from peach to gold to champagne-gold with a strong white veil overall,        2. medium large leaves,        3. light salmon pink flowers on short flowering stems,        4. a medium mounding habit, and        5. excellent vigor.
This new cultivar has been reproduced only by asexual propagation (tip cuttings and tissue culture). Each of the progeny exhibits identical characteristics to the original plant. Asexual propagation in 2013 by cuttings and tissue culture using standard micropropagation techniques with terminal and lateral shoots, as done in Canby, Oreg., shows that the foregoing characteristics and distinctions come true to form and are established and transmitted through succeeding propagations. The present invention has not been evaluated under all possible environmental conditions. The phenotype may change with variations in environment without a change in the genotype of the plant.


In a method of folding a pallet support integrally formed by folding a board material, both sides of the board material are pressed and folded inwardly for at least two times; a centerline of the board material is used as a reference to fold the whole piece of the board material in half; the board material is pressed flatly; an upper end of the board material is bent towards both sides of the board material to a predetermined length to form the pallet support with a cross-section having a thickness of a plurality of layers of the board material; and an upper end of the board material is folded towards both sides to form the pallet support of a T-shape cross-sectional structure with a thickened bottom and a cross-section with a thickness of a plurality of layers of the board material.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of folding pallet supports, and more particularly to the method of forming pallet supports of a pallet with the features of a simple structure, a low cost, an easy assembling process, a strong strength and a large bearing capacity.
2. Description of Related Art
In general, pallets are made of wood, plastic or metal, but wooden pallets deteriorate naturally after a long time of use and have the issue of quarantine pests and diseases, and plastic pallets manufactured by injection molding require a mold and incur a higher manufacturing cost. In addition, the plastic pallets may be cracked or broken easily when carrying heavy loads and create an environmental protection problem since plastic cannot be degenerated easily. Although metal pallets have a secured solid structure capable of carrying goods of a heavy load, the metal pallets are expensive, heavy, and inconvenient for both storage and transportation. Therefore, paper pallets become a popular trend for carrying and transporting goods, and related designers and manufacturers design and develop various different paper pallet structures.
In general, a paper pallet support is made of a cardboard material and formed by folding a cardboard integrally. In the method of folding the paper pallet support, both sides of the cardboard material are folded toward the center of the cardboard material, and the centerline of the cardboard material is used as a reference to fold the whole piece of cardboard material in half. Now, an end of the cardboard is bent towards both sides to form a T-shape cross-sectional structure with a thickened top, so as to provide a stable supporting structure.
Although the conventional method of folding paper pallet supports can fold a paper pallet support by using a single cardboard to save the adhesion process, the folding method simply folds the single cardboard into a support 5 of a T-shape cross-sectional structure with a thickened top as shown in FIG. 2, and cannot be folded into an I-shape cross-sectional structure with thickened top and bottom. Obviously, the strength at the thickened portion of the top 51 of the T-shape cross-sectional structure is sufficient, but the strength at the bottom 52 is insufficient. Therefore, the height of insert slots 521 formed at the bottom 52 and provided for inserting forklift arms of a forklift into the insert slots 521 respectively cannot be designed to meet the requirement due to the insufficient strength of the bottom 52. If the pallet is assembled into a meshed paper pallet, the two forklift arms may collide with sidewalls 522 of the bottom 52 easily since the height of the insert slots 521 at the bottom 52 is insufficient for passing the forklift arms. As a result, the sidewalls 522 are damaged and the whole pallet cannot be used anymore. In the conventional method of folding paper pallet supports, both sides of the cardboard material are folded towards the center of the cardboard material, so that the center of the bottom of the cardboard only has the downwardly folded portion with a single-side support to the cardboard, and the support is insufficient to carry a heaver load, and the pallet support may be deformed easily by heavy loads. Obviously, the prior art has the aforementioned drawbacks and requires improvements.


A truss shoe for a mine roof truss comprises a base having a pair of ends, a curved side extending between the ends, a top side, and a bearing surface. The shoe includes an angled stanchion having a bore and a housing having a tapered bore, with a recess between the housing and stanchion. A retainer is sized to fit in the recess, with the retainer having an aperture disposed adjacent an end such that the blocks a portion of the opening of the bore in the housing to retain a wedge assembly in the tapered bore.

In mining operations, bolts are often used to support the roof of the mine. In some applications, a pair of spaced apart inclined bar bolts are anchored into the roof of the mine. Each inclined bar bolt is connected to a truss shoe, which is often called a truss bracket. The truss shoes, which also are spaced apart due to their connection to the inclined bar bolts, are joined together by a pair of horizontally extending members which in turn are joined by a coupler. Typically, the horizontal member consists of a pair of generally horizontally threaded rods, with each of the threaded rods being connected to a corresponding one of the truss shoes.
Certain considerations may be faced when installing a mine roof truss. For example, the inclined bar bolts are typically installed using a bolting machine, and the truss shoes typically are already attached to the inclined bar bolts. The installer than installs the horizontal rods and the coupler that extend between the truss shoes. The horizontal rods may be connected to one another using a variety of couplers, such as a spacer tube or a dog bone coupler. One end of each of the threaded rods must be secured to a corresponding one of the truss shoes. After the assembly is complete, the horizontal rods are tensioned using a tensioning machine.
Each truss shoe has a tapered bore or barrel sized to receive an end of one of the horizontal rods, and a set of wedge pieces are placed in the bore on each one of the truss shoes. These wedge pieces grip the horizontal rod such that tension on the pair of horizontal members tends to draw the wedge pieces deeper into the tapered barrel, thus tightening the grip on the horizontal member.
The installer typically must ensure that the wedge pieces in each of the truss shoes are in place and have not been knocked loose or lost during any of the assembly steps. Many times, the wedge pieces must be manually placed in the tapered portion of the bore in the truss shoe. Unfortunately, these loose wedge pieces can easily fall to the ground during installation, where these small wedge pieces may be lost in the darkness of a mine passage. Of course, valuable time and effort may be expended looking for and recovering any missing wedge pieces. Even if the installer has a ready supply of replacement wedges, the installer often must expend extra time and effort inserting new wedges, which must be accomplished in the often cold and/or dark setting of a mine.

Roof truss shoe having wedge retention device and method of using the same

Dywidag-Systems International, U.S.A., Inc.


A vehicle interface is contemplated to be operable with an Electronic Vehicle Supply Equipment (EVSE) system and a vehicle charging system to facilitate vehicle charging related operations. The vehicle interface may include a noise compensation configured to facilitate compensating for noise within the reference signal resulting from the reference circuit. The vehicle interface may be configured to adapted to common mode interference and other influences resulting from connections between the vehicle interface and EVSE being referenced to earth ground and connections between the vehicle interface and other vehicle electronics being reference to a vehicle chassis ground.

An operation amplifier, buffer, or other device may be configured to receive a signal at first input and to tie a second input to ground in order to generate an output signal representative of a voltage at the signal received at the first input. The tying of the second input to ground can be problematic to the generation of the output signal in the event the ground connection floats or experiences other electrical disturbances. One non-limiting aspect of the present invention contemplates the use of a vehicle interface where the vehicle interface has a non-local ground relative to other components of the vehicle interface, and in particular, ameliorating the affects of the non-local ground on the generations of a output signal.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Vehicle interface with non-local return to ground


A pistol with a frame, a barrel and a firing mechanism. The firing mechanism includes a pivotably mounted hammer having a first hammer member and a second hammer member stationarily interlocked in a pocket of the first hammer member. The firing mechanism also includes a trigger assembly with a trigger member and a spacer pivotably mounted to the frame in a slot of the frame. The barrel has a lug on its bottom rear end that is movably mounted to the frame by a lug pin. A rear end of the lug has a contoured shape to accommodate the top of the trigger and a front of a pull bar being moved under the barrel. A handgrip panel is mounted to a handgrip section of the frame by a single fastener. The panel and handgrip section have cooperating angled surfaces to also mount the panel to the frame.

1. Field of The Invention
The present invention relates to firearms and, more particularly, to a compact pistol.
2. Prior Art
U.S. Pat. No. 4,555,861 discloses a pistol with a lever mounted on a pin with a hammer. U.S. Pat. No. 4,021,955 discloses a pivotably mounted trigger and a push bar. U.S. Pat. No. 3,682,040 discloses a pistol with a pivotably mounted trigger and a pulled trigger bar. U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,672,084 and 4,132,024 disclose pistol grips.


A multilayer electrode includes a current collector, a first electrode mixture layer disposed on at least one surface of the current collector, and a second electrode mixture layer disposed on the first electrode mixture layer. The first and second electrode mixture layers include one or more types of conductive materials. A porosity of the conductive material contained in the second electrode mixture layer is greater than that of the conductive material contained in the first electrode mixture layer. Ion mobility to the inside of an electrode may be improved while maintaining electrical conductivity, by including a conductive material having a relatively great average particle diameter and pores in the conductive material itself. Output characteristics of a lithium secondary battery and charging and discharging performance may be improved.

The present disclosure relates to a multilayer electrode and a lithium secondary battery including the same, and more particularly, to a multilayer electrode comprised of a plurality of electrode mixture layers including a conductive material having different average particle diameters and porosity, and a lithium secondary battery including the same.
As technological development and demand for mobile devices have increased, there has been a rapid increase in demand for secondary batteries as energy sources. Among such secondary batteries, lithium secondary batteries, exhibiting high energy density and operating potential and which have a long cycle life and a low self-discharge rate, have been commercialized and widely used.
As interest in environmental issues has increased in recent years, research into electric vehicles (EVs) and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs), which may replace fossil-fueled vehicles such as gasoline vehicles, diesel vehicles and the like, significant causes of air pollution, has been conducted. Lithium secondary batteries having high energy density, high discharge voltage and output stability have mainly been researched and used as power sources for electric vehicles (EVs) and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs).
Such a lithium secondary battery is under development as a model capable of implementing a high voltage and a high capacity in line with consumer demand. To implement a high capacity thereof, a lithium secondary battery is required to have an optimization process of an cathode material, a anode material, a separator, and an electrolyte, four elements of the lithium secondary battery, within a limited space.
Generally, an electrode for a secondary battery is produced by preparing a slurry in which an active material and a binder, and as required, a conductive material, are mixed, and then applying the slurry to a collector, such as a copper foil, as a single layer, followed by drying. In this case, at the time of applying the slurry, an active material powder is pressed onto a current collector and a pressing process is performed to uniformize the thickness of an electrode.
However, in the calendeing process of the related art, the surface pressing of an active material is increased as compared with the inside of the active material, and a pore ratio of the surface is reduced. This phenomenon becomes more severe as the thickness of an electrode increases or the calendeing density increases. Thus, in this case, it becomes difficult to impregnate an electrolyte into the inside of the electrode, and an ion movement path cannot thus be secured, such that ion transfer cannot be smooth. Therefore, there is a problem in that battery performance and lifespan characteristics are deteriorated.

Multilayer electrode and lithium secondary battery including the same


A drive control device and a drive control method for a stepping motor are provided to reduce the number of parts and generation of vibration and noise by a stepping motor. The drive control device controls a drive frequency of the stepping motor according to a measurement value inputted. The drive control device includes storage means for storing the resonance frequency of the stepping motor based on its resonance characteristic as an output-inhibited drive frequency and control means for calculating an instruction angle for operating a needle according to the measurement value, acquiring a first drive frequency of the stepping motor, judging whether the first drive frequency is the output-inhibited drive frequency, and deciding the drive frequency by replacing the first drive frequency with the second drive frequency which is lower than the output-inhibited drive frequency if the first drive frequency is the output-inhibited drive frequency.

A drive control system of a stepping motor controls drive frequency of the stepping motor based on a measurement value inputted in a certain period. The stepping motor may generate vibration due to a resonance characteristic (drive frequency versus vibration acceleration characteristic) inherent in the stepping motor, and the vibration is transferred to a component being driven by the stepping motor, inducing resonance of the component, and consequently noise has been a problem. A system is given for solving the problem, which detects vibration of the component, and changes frequency depending on the detected vibration so as to prevent the resonance and the noise (for example, referring to patent document 1).
However, such a prior drive control system of a stepping motor has a problem that the detection means of detecting vibration of the component is necessary, leading to increase in number of components, and increase in cost associated with such increase in number of components. Therefore, a system is given for preventing the resonance and the noise without using the detection means of detecting vibration of a component, in which when drive frequency is within a resonance frequency range, drive current of a stepping motor is controlled to decrease drive force of the stepping motor, so that generation of the resonance and the noise is prevented (for example, referring to patent document 2).    Patent document 1: JP-A-7-298691    Patent document 2: JP-A-9-140193

Drive control system of stepping motor and drive control method


Disclosed herein are system, method, and computer program product embodiments for determining an object of interest in an augmented reality environment, displaying an augmented reality selector containing pertinent actions in a reachable area, and causing a selected action to be executed. The augmented reality application may determine an augmented reality object of interest in an augmented reality experience and determine a reachable area of screen from the determined object to a reachable area. The augmented reality application may then display an augmented reality selector in the reachable area that includes interaction options determined based on the augmented reality object being focused on. In a mobile embodiment, this enhancement allows users to interact with the object without repositioning their hands or losing site of the object in the augmented reality experience. For an AR headset, by displaying the augmented reality selector in a reachable area, a user's field of vision remains unimpeded, and the user may interact with the object via simple gestures such as clicks.

Augmented reality systems provide users with an immersive user experience centered around augmented reality spaces. An augmented reality space may be a blended experience, with a physical, real-world environment enhanced with additional virtual perceptual information. An augmented reality system may provide an interaction methodology that allows users to interact with the augmented reality space and both virtual and real-world objects therein in a variety of fashions. Users may interact with the augmented reality space using an AR headset, AR glasses, or other suitable device devoted to interactions with an augmented reality space. Users may also interact with augmented reality spaces using a mobile device with an AR toolkit installed on it.
In the drawings, like reference numbers generally indicate identical or similar elements. Additionally, generally, the left-most digit(s) of a reference number identifies the drawing in which the reference number first appears.


An optical traffic signal column including stacked levels fixed to one another by rotation. The base of each level includes, distributed along its periphery, oblong passages and fixed connectors. The conductors include rods each having two ends angularly offset from one another, and including a common conducting rod and a stage-specific conducting rod. The connector rods are identical and respectively fix the bottom of a conducting rod of the relevant level and the top of the respective conducting rod of an adjacent level, the angular offset between the two fixing points corresponding to that of ends of the conducting rods. The conducting rods are mutually arranged and mounted to effect, from one level to the next level, an essentially identical angular position of the common conducting rods and an angular offset of the stage-specific conducting rods.

Signal columns of this type are known from document FR 2 128 998. The supply conductors described in this document consist of blades comprising a first male connection end and a second female connection end. Homologous conductors situated in stacked stages are placed in series by introducing the male end of one into the female end of the other. The manufacture of such conductors entirely assuming the interconnection function is complicated. Furthermore, in these old columns each stage is supplied electrically by means of two specific conductors, this considerably multiplying the number of conductors at the base of the column.
Document EP 755 494 discloses a signal column in which the supply conductors are folded to form a U-shaped bridge at one end and an elbow at their other end. In this way homologous conductors situated in stacked stages are placed in series by elastic application of the elbow of the one with the U-shaped bridge of the homologous conductor of the other. However, this arrangement may result in contact faults because the connection quality is entirely assumed by the shape and elasticity of the conductors. Furthermore, as in the preceding document, each stage of the column is supplied by two conductors, yet the number of these conductors must be limited.
In order to limit the number of conductors, there is provided in each stage of the column a common conductor which, by connecting from stage to stage, extends from the lowermost stage to the uppermost stage, and, for each stage, an allocated conductor which originates from the lowermost stage and which does not have to be continued toward the immediately upper stage. The stage-to-stage connection is to this end brought about by means of an angular offset of the connecting points for the conductors, as is described in document FR 2 517 021. The disadvantage is that, if it is desired to give the various stages the same angular assembly position, use must be made of common conductors whose shape differs from that of the allocated conductors.
Document DE 100 41 202 describes a signal column having a number of stackable signaling elements. Each element is provided with a light source supplied from electrical conductors extending along its side wall. One conductor is common to all the signaling elements and supplies each of them. Another conductor is specific to the supply of each stage. Each conductor has a first end forming a junction bridge for an adjacent signaling element. The common conductor has the specific feature that it extends vertically along the column, whereas the conductors specific to each signaling element are offset angularly from one stage to the other. The junction bridge of the common conductor takes the form of a knot so that it can extend along this vertical axis. As in document FR 2 517 021, this document proposes using a conductor common to all the stages and specific conductors allocated to each of the stages. The proposed solution therefore makes it possible to limit the number of conductors. However, this solution requires the use of specific conductors whose shape differs from that of the specific conductors, this complicating the manufacturing method and increasing its cost.


A method for producing a liquid crystal device, the method including: assembling two substrates to form at least one liquid crystal cell; and removing material from a first one of the assembled substrates to produce a first region of the first substrate that is thinner than a second region of the first substrate.

The invention relates to liquid crystal devices and methods of making liquid crystal devices. Liquid crystal technology has many applications. For example, liquid crystal devices can be used to selectably vary the retardance, intensity, and/or polarization of an incident beam. Such devices may include a single liquid crystal component or multiple liquid crystal components in optical series. Each liquid crystal component includes two substrates sandwiching a layer of liquid crystals, and the substrates each support an electrode. An electric field can be applied across the liquid crystal layer via the electrodes to cause a change in the orientation of the liquid crystals, which in turn causes an incident beam to see a change in the retardance of the liquid crystal layer. The component(s) can be combined with additional optical elements (e.g., polarizers, waveplates, fixed retarders, etc.) for modifying the output of an incident beam. As is common in the art, such liquid crystal devices can be configured in both reflective and transmissive arrangements.
One problem that can occur when using liquid crystal devices is that undesired reflections from one or more interfaces in the device can interfere with the main output beam and degrade the optical performance of the device. Such interference effects can be especially significant for a coherent input beam. Sometimes a wedge is introduced into the device to reduce the overlap between the main output beam and one or more of the reflected beams.
A second problem that can occur is thermal expansion of the liquid crystals within the device. Such expansion can degrade the optical performance of the device and ultimately lead to mechanical failure (e.g., failure of the perimeter seal).
Another consideration relates to the manufacturability of such liquid crystal devices. For many applications (e.g., telecom applications), the liquid crystal device should be small and compact. Unfortunately, it can be difficult to achieve robust and economical manufacture when handling and assembling such small components.

Liquid crystal assembly and method of making

Cambridge Research and Instrumentation, Inc.


A system for monitoring a bit condition in a drilling operation comprises a processor unit and a non-transitory computer-readable memory communicatively coupled to the processing unit and comprising computer-readable program instructions executable by the processing unit for: obtaining signals representative of at least vibrations of a drilling mast having at least one bit during a drilling operation; interpreting the signals into vibration values; continuously monitoring the vibration values in real time; and assessing and outputting a condition of the bit as a function of the continuous monitoring of the vibration values.

For the majority of open-pit mining operations, the first stage of comminution involves the drilling and blasting of an intact rock mass. In order to maximize the efficiency and placement of explosive energy, vertical or inclined blast holes are created using large hydraulically or electrically-controlled drill rigs. The applied weight and rotational forces produced by these machines are then transferred to a drill bit which advances through the rock mass by a process of induced compressive and shearing failure mechanisms. In addition to having high initial capital costs, factors such as maintenance, manpower, and energy requirements act to increase the total cost of operating this machinery. Also, since drilling and blasting represents the start of the mining production process, mine operators require these machines to be highly productive and constantly available.
Wear happens as a result of bit-rock interaction and major failure modes of tricone bits could be defined in three categories, namely gradual wear, teeth breakage and bearing failure. Gradual wear is a type of wear which can happen on the teeth, cones as well as shirttail structure. Teeth breakage may occur as a result of repeated impacts and fatigue in the harsh drilling environment. Teeth breakage is one of the major problems in drilling with a drill bit known as tricone. Bearing failure results from the effects of wear on the bearing elements as well as the cones and cutting structure will result in progressive wear in the cones rotary structure and bearing failure eventually.
To avoid downtime, some approaches have been developed to evaluate bit wear. One such approach is a performance-based method. The current state of bit wear is determined by monitoring penetration rate and torque. Assuming a constant rock type, and therefore a uniform rock strength, and constant operating conditions, the penetration rate will decrease over time as bit wear increases. Once the penetration rate has fallen below a pre-determined value, the bit should be replaced. This procedure is applicable for gradual tooth wear. For cone bearing failures, the torque could be a criterion. Any observation of a rapid rise in torque while under constant operating conditions is a sign of bearing failure. A bearing failure requires immediate bit replacement.
Unfortunately, the requirement of constant operating conditions and rock type is not the case in the open pit mining environment. Typically, several rock layers are encountered during the drilling of a single hole. Some layers may even be composed of entirely broken and non-homogenous rock material. At some particularly dynamic mine sites, rock layers can be encountered in differing orders from one hole to the next within the same drill pattern. This dynamic, and often unknown, in-situ geology makes it difficult to determine if penetration rate is decreasing or torque is spiking because of bit wear/failure or because a new rock layer is being encountered. This problem results in an essential limitation on performance-based drill bit wear monitoring and is a motivation to explore new approaches and models for bit wear monitoring.

Bit condition monitoring system and method

THE ROYAL INSTITUTION FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF LEARNING/MCGILL UNIVERSITY


A half-tone liquid crystal display panel having half-tone pixels, each comprising a plurality of sub-pixels including first and second sub-pixels. Activation voltage is supplied to the first sub-pixel from a TFT switch and to the second sub-pixel from the TFT switch through a coupling capacitor. The second sub-pixel includes a storage capacitor. Sensitivity of the activation voltage applied to the second sub-pixel resulting from capacitance non-uniformity across the panel is reduced by forming the coupling capacitor and the storage capacitor of the second sub-pixel with the same depositions utilizing a common dielectric layer. The capacitance of the storage capacitor of the second sub-pixel is designed large compared to the capacitance of the second sub-pixel.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to displays particularly with respect to liquid crystal, half-tone displays. Such displays typically are of active matrix configuration.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Backlighted liquid crystal displays (LCD) utilizing twisted-nematic (TN) liquid crystal have been developed to provide flat panel displays for applications such as aircraft instrumentation, laptop and notebook computers, and the like. Such LCDs typically utilize a rear electrode structure in the form of a matrix of transparent metal pixels or dot electrodes and a continuous transparent metal front electrode with the liquid crystal material sandwiched therebetween. The front electrode is often denoted as the common or counter electrode. Each pixel electrode is activated through a switch, usually implemented as a thin film transistor (TFT), which is deposited as a field effect transistor (FET). The drain electrode of each TFT is connected to, or actually forms, the pixel electrode with which it is associated. The gate electrodes of the TFTs in each row of the matrix are commonly connected to a gate bus-line for the row and the source electrodes of the TFTs in each column of the matrix are commonly connected to a source bus-line for the column. An image is created in raster fashion by sequentially scanning the gate bus rows while applying information signals to the source bus columns.
Color capability is imparted to the LCD in a well known manner by providing suitable color filters at the front surface of the LCD to intercept the light transmitted through the respective pixels and appropriately addressing the pixels to display the desired colors. For example, delta shaped triads with primary color RED, GREEN and BLUE filters are often utilized. By appropriate video control of the gate and source buses, various colors are generated. In the conventional design, each pixel electrode has a storage capacitor connected thereto for supplementing the charge holding capacity of the pixel so as to retain the voltage on the pixel between refresh pulses.
As an improvement to the conventional display pixel described above, half-tone pixels are utilized to impart gray scale capability to the LCD. A particularly desirable half-tone panel arrangement is described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,840,460 and 5,126,865. Said U.S. Pat. No. 4,840,460, issued Jun. 20, 1989, is entitled "Apparatus And Method For Providing A Gray Scale Capability In A Liquid Crystal Display Unit". Said U.S. Pat. No. 5,126,865, issued Jun. 30, 1992, is entitled "Liquid Crystal Display With Sub-pixels". Said U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,840,460 and 5,126,865 are assigned to the Assignee of the present invention and are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.
Briefly, a half-tone pixel is comprised of multiple sub-pixels with the activating TFT connected to a first one of the sub-pixels and with the remaining sub-pixels deriving their activation voltage from the TFT through respective coupling capacitors. As described in said U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,840,460 and 5,126,865, sub-pixels are selectively activated by controlling the activation voltage from the TFT to provide the gray scale capability. Conventionally, one or more of the half-tone sub-pixels has a storage capacitor associated therewith for the reasons described above with respect to the conventional pixel.
Although a half-tone pixel is often comprised of a first or primary sub-pixel with plural secondary sub-pixels, the following descriptions will be provided in terms of a liquid crystal display dot with two sub-pixels. The TFT activating voltage is applied directly to the primary sub-pixel and the second sub-pixel derives its activation voltage through its associated coupling capacitor. It is appreciated that the concepts and structures described herein with respect to the second sub-pixel also apply to the other secondary sub-pixels.
In the half-tone panel technology, the second sub-pixel voltage is derived from the first sub-pixel voltage as: EQU V.sub.2 =V.sub.1 [C.sub.c /(C.sub.c +C.sub.s2 +C.sub.lc2)] (1)
where:
V.sub.1 =the first sub-pixel voltage PA1 V.sub.2 =the second sub-pixel voltage PA1 C.sub.s2 =capacitance of second sub-pixel storage capacitor PA1 C.sub.c =capacitance of coupling capacitor PA1 C.sub.lc2 =capacitance of second sub-pixel.
A problem prevalent in the LCD half-tone display panel technology is achieving uniformity of gray levels across the panel. In order to provide acceptable gray level uniformity, the voltage relationship between the sub-pixels of a pixel should be independent of position on the panel. Quantitatively, V.sub.2 /V.sub.1 should be position independent. It is appreciated from the above, that V.sub.2 /V.sub.1 depends on C.sub.c, C.sub.lc2, and C.sub.s2. V.sub.1 is the primary voltage applied by the switches to the pixels and is substantially position independent over the panel. C.sub.lc2 is also reasonably well controlled and position independent over the panel so as to obtain uniformity of background. Thus, it is seen that the secondary voltage V.sub.2 is sensitive to variations in C.sub.c and C.sub.s2.
It is desirable to make the sub-pixel voltages V.sub.2 uniform over the panel. In the half-tone panel technology, however, the depositions that form C.sub.c and C.sub.s2 are not uniform and capacitances formed can vary as much as .+-.20% across the panel. The non-uniformity across the panel is exacerbated when, for example, either C.sub.c or C.sub.s2 is 20% larger and the other is 20% smaller. The variation is primarily caused by differences in dielectric thicknesses for the different depositions and the non-uniformity is exacerbated if C.sub.c is controlled by one deposition while C.sub.s2 is controlled by another deposition permitting the tolerances to accumulate.

Liquid crystal half-tone display with gray level uniformity


An article handling apparatus embodied, for example, as a vending machine, includes a controllably positioned hose-type dispenser for retrieving articles from an article storage area. A first end of the hose receives article securing energy (e.g., suction), and a second end is adapted to secure to and extract a selected article from the storage area. A hose positioning mechanism controllably positions the second end of the hose for retrieving articles from the article storage area. In order to maximize the height of the article storage volume, as well as provide other advantages, the following aspects of the invention are provided:

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to improvements in the design and operation of article handling apparatus and in particular to article handling mechanisms of the type that utilize computer-controlled electromechanical technology, and in the illustrated embodiment a robotically positioned gripper, which uses suction, for example, for grasping and moving a selected article from one area to another, such as from a storage area to a dispensing area.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Most prior art article handling mechanisms, more specifically referred to in the description of the present invention as being in the environment of a point-of-sale (POS) article dispenser, rely on a multitude of motors, switches and solenoids for moving various portions of the handling mechanism, and handling of the articles themselves, such as packaged products. Most such machines require one motor, switch and/or solenoid dedicated for each row, column or type of article or package to be handled or dispensed therefrom. Such machines generally suffer from numerous disadvantages, such as poor reliability due to mechanical failures, as well known by those skilled in this art.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,240,139 represents a significant improvement in article handling devices. It describes the use of a negative air pressure lifter (i.e., article pickup or handling mechanism), which uses suction, i.e., a reduced or so-called "negative" air pressure created by a partial vacuum, for making a secure contact to an article to be retrieved by entering the open top of an article storage bin located in a refrigerated storage area of a vending machine. Although robotic, and specifically suction-type lifting mechanisms are in common use in factory settings, where space limitations are generally relaxed, their use in tight confines, such as an article vending machine, has not gained wide acceptance. Due to the greater reliability and versatility of vending machines of the type which utilizes suction technology for grasping and moving selected articles, it would be desirable to develop new techniques and methods for the operation and control of such machines, as well as for other more generalized article handling mechanisms.
Hose storage is provided in the forenoted U.S. Pat. No. 5,240,139 by use of a longitudinally compressible air hose having about a 3:1 compression ratio. One end of the hose is connected to a source of negative air pressure which is provided to a support beam which is moved laterally over the top of the freezer. The other end of the air hose is connected to an article pickup head. Lateral positioning of a compressible hose is satisfactory in the environment of U.S. Pat. No. 5,240,139 since the freezer compartment only occupies the lower half of the interior of the vending machine, leaving the upper half available for the hose and its positioning mechanism. However, since the significant part of the expense of operating a vending machine business comprises servicing (i.e. filling) of the vending machine with products, it would be desirable to be able to provide taller article storage bins, with or without a freezer compartment, in order to maximize utilization of the article storage volume within the interior of the vending machine cabinet. Prior art article dispensers typically use between 50 and 60 percent of their available height for article storage.
Due to the above noted disadvantage, it would be desirable to decrease the height requirement for the hose positioning mechanism. One such way would be to consider the use of a non compressible hose. A non compressible hose has the advantage that it can be driven and/or guided by direct engagement with the walls of the hose, a much simpler technique as compared to the indirect hose positioning technique of the forenoted U.S. Pat. No. 5,240,139. Additionally, a non compressible hose has the advantage of maintaining a constant length in spite of being subjected to changes in vacuum. Even furthermore, a non compressible hose has greater structural integrity and reduced leakage, as compared with, for example telescopic tubing. However, two serious problems are presented by the use of a non compressible hose: where can a sufficient length of the hose be stored in order that it's free end can travel the distance from the bottom of the hose positioning mechanism (a position aligned with the top of an article storage bin) to the bottom of the article storage bin; and how can it be simply and reliably be withdrawn and retracted to and from the storage area as needed?
PCT patent publication WO 99/12132 entitled VENDING MACHINE discloses a vending machine having a folded articulated arm for positioning an article gripping suction hose into a freezer for retrieving articles to be dispensed. The hose is non-compressible, and continuous from a base area located beneath the articulated arm to its free end, where it is coupled to an article pickup head. A linear actuator and arm mechanism located in the base area is used to drive the hose into and out of the base area, through the articulated arm and into the freezer compartment. The hose positioning arrangement of this PCT patent publication has a similar disadvantage as the forenoted U.S. Pat. No. 5,240,139, in that a significant volume within the vending machine cabinet is required for the mechanism which positions the hose over and into the storage bins during a package dispensing cycle (i.e., a height almost equal to the height of the article storage bins themselves). Additionally, it is noted that only a relatively small length of hose is required to be stored, corresponding to the amount of hose required to move the article pickup head in the Z direction (i.e., into and out of the freezer), since a significant length of the hose is already stored in the folded articulated arm. Even furthermore, it is noted that this patent publication teaches a relatively complex mechanism for hose positioning, storage and drive.
German patent DE 2455673 by G. Lucas, published May 26, 1976 and entitled VENDING MACHINE FOR ICE CREAM-USING SUCTION HEAD TO PICKUP WRAPPED BLOCKS OF ICE CREAM FROM STACK IN REFRIGERATOR discloses an ice cream vending machine wherein a movable carriage is mounted inside a freezer and laterally positionable over the article storage bins. The carriage includes a drive mechanism for lowering an electric cord having a suction motor at its free end into the article storage bins for retrieving the ice cream packages. This type of positioning mechanism for an article handling device avoids the problem of hose storage by actually lowering the suction motor into the bin. It's is particularly disadvantageous since the repeated bending and flexing of the electric cord can lead to reliability/failure problems. Additionally, the diameter of the suction motor places severe limitations upon the dimensions of the article storage bins.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,957,326 entitled APPARATUS FOR RETRIEVING RANDOMLY ORGANIZED ARTICLES, describes a vending apparatus including carriage mounted for being laterally positionable over an article storage bin, and includes a drive mechanism for lowering into the storage bin a pickup head having a plurality of suction cups mounted thereon. Each suction cup is individually connected to a substantial length of hose which leads back to a manifold which supplies suction thereto. This type of positioning mechanism for an article handling device is particularly disadvantageous since the plurality of suction hoses connected to the pickup head are not provided in a hose storage area, and instead are coiled/dragged beneath the carriage during its repositioning thereby protruding significantly into a space which could more advantageously being used for the storage of articles to be vended/dispensed.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,557,659 the entitled DEVICE FOR SUPPORTING AND HANDLING LOADS BY MEANS OF VACUUM OPERATED SUCTION PADS, describes an article lifting and transport device wherein an electric motor slidably mounted along a raised and rotatable I beam, is used to lower an electrical cord towards an article to be handled. The electrical cord has at its free end a pickup head including a plurality of suction cups mounted thereon. A suction providing hose, which is continuous from a suction generator to the pickup head, is loosely supported between its ends by a series of slides connected to the rotatable I beam. This type of positioning mechanism for an article handling device is disadvantageous for substantially the same reason as the forenoted U.S. Pat. No. 5,957,326, due to the fact that the suction hose is dragged alongside and behind the carriage during its repositioning, thereby protruding significantly into a space which could more advantageously being used for the storage of articles to be vended/dispensed.

Method and apparatus for positioning an article handling device

Abstract: 1. the hose positioning mechanism maintains a constant height during hose positioning,

Abstract: 2. a hose drive means drives the hose in the article extraction direction by passing “THROUGH” the hose positioning mechanism,

Abstract: 3. the hose is constrained for movement between a hose storage area and the hose positioning mechanism so as to move in the same space in which the hose positioning mechanism moves,

Abstract: 4. the hose positioning mechanism carries therein the hose drive means, and

Abstract: 5. the hose positioning mechanism may comprise an X-Y, R-Theta, or Scissors arrangement.


A circuit and method for excitation of electric discharge gas lasers is provided. The circuit includes a pair of electrodes, a main energy storage means for storing electrical energy for the operation of the laser, energy transfer means in the form of saturable inductive elements which are connected in series coupling a terminal of the main energy storage means with one of the electrodes, and for transferring the electrical energy thereto in the form of a discharge voltage pulse. A switching means in series with a secondary energy storage means is connected between the saturable inductive elements and connected in parallel with the main energy storage means and the electrodes. The switching means is operable in one mode to allow the passage of current and operable in another mode to prevent the passage of current across the switching means. The circuit also includes a first preionizer for producing ionizing radiation; and, a second preionizer for producing ionizing radiation. The ionizing radiation from the first preionizer is available to the second preionizer for producing electrons within the second preionizer.

High power electric discharge gas lasers can be operated to provide high pulsed output energy. To produce such energy, the gas within the laser is usually excited by means of an intense source of electron excitation, either from a high voltage self sustained electric discharge, or, an electron beam sustained discharge. The excitation of the gas or gases within the laser results in the emission of light energy of the appropriate wave length that can then be collimated as is well known in the art. In practice, the self-sustained electric discharge method is the popular alternative.
To provide a self-sustained discharge in a gas laser, one must first preionize the gas by means of generating a low level of electrons in the discharge gap, then avalanching the low-level ionization to the final level required for breakdown of the gas, and finally excite the gas using sufficient energy to sustain the discharge.
In the past, single, high voltage pulses having fast rise times and a discharge pulse duration in the order of tens to hundreds of nanoseconds or more have been used to avalanche ionize the gas and then to provide the required sustained discharge. Low inductance rail-gap, thyratron and magnetic switches together with pulse forming networks (PFN) have been used to provide such high energy, rapid rise times and long duration pulses. However, in terms of switches, magnetic switching using saturable inductors are preferable as these switches offer long life, reliability, low cost, less complexity, and high repetition rate capability.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,698,518 entitled Magnetically Switched Power Supply System for Lasers in the name of Pacala teaches the use of saturable inductors as switches for compressing the width and sharpening the rise time of pulses from high voltage, high impedance pulse generators to provide the necessary excitation to EDGLs. Taylor (the applicant) et al. in U.S. Pat. No. 4,679,203 teach saturation of a pulse transformer core inductance to efficiently switch a main energy store into the discharge after the breakdown of the laser gas mix has occurred.
The use of magnetic-spiker sustainer excitation circuits in rare gas halide lasers such as XeCl lasers has resulted in more efficient lasers having longer optical pulse duration, and a higher beam quality compared to lasers with conventional electrical discharge excitation circuits. Magnetic-spiker sustainer circuits are currently being investigated for the generation of very high average power (1 kW) XeCl lasers for use in materials processing applications. As well, these circuits are capable of producing microsecond duration optical pulses. Long optical pulse duration provides for an increased number of laser cavity round trips, thereby providing conditions that allow for more direct control on the laser divergence, line width, polarization and level of amplified spontaneous emission. The low peak power associated with long optical pulse operation is advantageous for applications where non linear effects such as material damage must be avoided. One such example is in the medical field of XeCl laser coronary angioplasty, where long optical pulses are used to avoid surface damage to the fiber optic delivery system.
Spiker-sustainer circuits are comprised of two electrical circuits; a spiker circuit generates a fast high voltage pulse to initiate gas breakdown; a main energy storage circuit that is generally charged to a low voltage can be adjusted to ensure good energy transfer into the discharge. In magnetic-spiker circuits, the saturable magnetic material or core provides electrical isolation between the spiker circuit and the main energy storage circuit.
There are three basic modes of operation of magnetic-spiker circuits depending on the magnitude and polarity of the spiker voltage relative to the voltage on the main energy storage. When the polarity of the switched spiker voltage and the main energy storage are the same, the circuits operate in the diode mode. When the polarity of the switched spiker voltage and the main energy storage are opposite, the circuit operates in the switch mode. The overshoot mode is an adaptation of the switch mode. Although fine tuning of circuit parameters is required to obtain optimum laser performance in any of the modes, in some respects, operating in the overshoot has been found to be advantageous. Furthermore, operating in a modified overshoot mode (MOM) which will be described hereafter provides even greater advantages.

Magnetic spiker gas laser excitation circuit


A method for detecting anomalies in traffic patterns and a traffic anomalies detector are presented. The method and the detector are based on estimating the fan-in of a node, i.e. the number of distinct sources sending traffic to a node, based on infrequent, periodic sampling. Destinations with an abnormally large fan-in are likely to be the target of an attack, or to be downloading large amounts of material with a P2P application. The method and the anomalies detector are extremely simple to implement and exhibit excellent performance on real network traces.

Detailed visibility into individual users and business applications using the global network is essential for optimizing performance and delivering network services to business users. In general, current network monitoring tools are able to collect a large amount of data from various information sources distributed throughout the network. For example, Snort Intrusion System for TCP (SIFT), uses an information dissemination server which accepts long-term user queries, collects new documents from information sources, matches the documents against the queries, and continuously updates the users with relevant information. SIFT is able to process over 40,000 worldwide subscriptions and over 80,000 daily documents.
Also, tracking and monitoring traffic in communication networks is particularly relevant for network vendors who wish to provide access to information on their high-end routers; they must therefore devise scalable and efficient algorithms to deal with the limited per-packet processing time available. Traffic monitoring tools are also useful to network providers, as it allows them to filter information relevant to implementing cost saving measures by optimizing network resources utilization, detecting high-cost network traffic, or tracking down anomalous activity in a network, etc. For example, in order to protect their network and systems today, network providers deploy a layered defense model, which includes firewalls, anti-virus systems, access management and intrusion detections systems (IDS). The capacity to detect as fast as possible the propagation of malware and to react efficiently to on-going attacks inside the network in order to protect the network infrastructure is becoming a real challenge for network operators.
Network performance monitoring mechanisms need to perform traffic analysis in a non-invasive way with respect to the observed networking environment. Detecting attacks and point-to-point traffic is a huge problem for network managers in order to better utilize and protect their networks. Providing information that may help them to do this with minimal cost may be a key differentiator between the services a network may offer to users.
From security point of view, a relevant metric to detect malware is to determine the number of distinct sources sending traffic to a monitored destination, referred to as "node fan-in". Destinations with an abnormally large fan-in are likely to be the target of an attack, or to be downloading large amounts of material with a point-to-point application (e.g. BitTorrent). This is equivalent to determining the sources with the highest fan-out (number of distinct destinations from the source), by interchanging the roles of source and destination; this is known as "node fan-out". Sources with an abnormally large fan-out may be attempting to spread a worm or virus.
Some of the tools used today for establishing the node fan-in or fan-out perform monitoring of all packets arriving at a node. These tools require that the respective node be equipped with sophisticated hardware/software for packet inspection at high speed. In addition, these tools require a large amount of memory for maintaining the tables with destination/source information for each packet. Evidently, looking at every packet arriving at a node is not practical for large traffic volumes and nodes that are not equipped with sophisticated, expensive hardware component.
Other current methods of traffic monitoring are for example "linear counting" (described by Whang, K.-Y., Zanden, B. T. V., and Taylor, H. M. in "A linear-time probabilistic counting algorithm for database applications"), or "loglog counting" (see details at http://algo.inria.fr/flajolet/Publications/DuFI03-LNCS.pdf), or "Superspreader algorithms" (see details at http://reports-archive.adm.cs.cmu.edu/anon/2004/CMU-CS-04-142.pdf), to list the most relevant. However, all these tools and algorithms have a number of drawbacks that dissuade their use on a large scale: they do not necessarily work with sampled data, are complicated, and require extensive additional programming.
A need has arisen for both the users and network operators to have better mechanisms to monitor network performance, filter network traffic, and troubleshoot network congestion, without introducing any additional traffic on the communication network. This is especially relevant to Internet providers that must comply with SLAs (Service Level Agreements) provided to customers. As Internet architecture evolves, the SLAs now include requirements on the quality of service such as jitter, throughput, one-way packet delay, and packet loss ratio. Additionally, the need to monitor network traffic is prevalent for the underlying Internet protocol enabling the World Wide Web.
In particular, there is a need to provide a tool for estimating the destinations with the highest fan-in and/or sources with the highest fan-out that operate with high accuracy and provide instant feedback. Such tools need also to operate in high-speed routers at line speed, without the need of additional complex HW/SW at the network nodes. There is also a need to provide a solution that is extremely simple to implement and exhibits excellent performance on real network traces.

Method for estimating the fan-in and/or fan-out of a node


Elastic insight to Information Technology (“IT”) performance data is provided. Local performance data is continuously pushed from a front-end component to a back-end component. Global performance data is continuously pushed from the back-end component to the front-end component. The local performance data and the global performance data are aggregated at the front-end component by product, product family, and product solution. The aggregated data is monitored at the front-end component to identify a performance bottleneck.

Large scale and cloud datacenters are becoming increasingly popular. Small, medium, and large businesses alike are turning to these datacenters for their data storage and Information Technology ("IT") needs. A given business may have its own IT infrastructure and one or more datacenters integrated across different geographical areas to handle all of its tasks. The datacenters and the IT infrastructure may be typically architected with numerous storage devices and servers that may be shared across multiple users and run multiple IT products both in their front-end and back-end. Each one of these storage devices and servers may be responsible for storing, managing and keeping a history of large amounts of data in many levels of detail. Managing all of the IT devices and products at all times is one of the key challenges faced by businesses today.
A common challenge affecting datacenters and IT infrastructures is the monitoring of their IT devices and products. Typically IT monitoring solutions collect extensive information from the front-end and store it on the back-end. The information collected may be in the form of performance data that is aged over time and possibly reduced to smaller levels of detail. However, past information is not usually available to IT personnel at the front-end at the time of degraded performance or failure. The result is that it takes time to recognize problems and users may become increasingly frustrated with their IT infrastructure. The IT devices and products may not always meet their expected performance and user requirements despite the extensive data maintained in the back-end.

Providing elastic insight to information technology performance data

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Development LP


Redistributing parts includes defining locations. An actual inventory of parts is established among the locations, and a desired allocation of the parts is established among the locations. A demand for the parts at each location is determined using the actual inventory and the desired allocation. Paths are determined, where a path transfers an excess part from one location to another location. A transfer function describing a cost of transferring the excess part along the paths is generated. The transfer function is optimized to achieve the desired allocation of the excess parts at a minimum cost.

Distribution networks may include one or more locations that receive parts from a vendor and distribute the parts within the distribution network in order to provide a customer with a product. The parts may be, for example, manufactured into a product within the distribution network. Distribution networks may include locations that both supply parts to and receive parts from other locations. Performance at each location is thus affected by the performance at its suppliers. As a result, maintaining an optimal inventory of parts at each location that best serves the customer while minimizing inventory costs poses a challenge for inventory managers.

Redistribution of parts in a distribution network


A system for cooling an electronic module in a computer system. In one embodiment of the invention, predetermined areas of the module, such as those exposed parts that carry electrical currents are covered with an conformable, electrically insulating layer. Thereafter, a second conformable, thermally conductive layer is formed on the first layer. In addition, surface expanding elements may be arranged on the first layer near devices particularly sensitive to heat before the application of the second layer.

A very significant limitation on the operation and reliability of electronic devices is the efficient extraction of heat. Unless the devices are provided with an efficient heat transfer mechanism to maintain them within a predetermined operating temperature range, the speed, power, and useful life of the devices are severely limited. Excessive over-heating of electronic devices may cause their destruction.
The problem of heat removal from electronic circuit devices is increased when the devices are mounted on a thermally non-conductive substrate, such as an epoxy-glass printed circuit board. In a typical electronic module, the electronic devices are densely populated on the printed circuit board presenting a surface topology of varying heights, areas, and profiles.
It is a common approach in the cooling of heat generating electronic devices to provide each device requiring cooling with a poli-directional, or mono-directional localized heatsink. Thus, as shown in FIG. 1, an electronic module 10, includes a substrate 15 and heat generating devices 20 mounted on a surface 21 of the substrate 15. Heatsinks 30 are individually attached to the tops of the devices 20 for the purpose of dissipating heat. The drawbacks of such an approach is that the heatsinks 30 are of necessity limited in their footprints, must each be sized to conform to the geometry of the devices being cooled, must be aligned carefully with the device and are otherwise limited by the overall size of the system into which the module 10 is incorporated. It is tedious and expensive to adapt individually heatsinks to discrete heat generating devices which are diverse in placement and shape.
Alternatively, as shown in FIG. 2, heatsinks 30 have been provided for groups of localized devices 20 having similar dimensions. The main drawback of this approach is that it is a complex task to thermally mate the rigid heatsinks 30 with the devices 20. Generally, elastomeric compression pads, not shown, are required to ensure a good thermal contact between the heatsinks 30 and the devices 20. In addition, this method is not readily adaptable to multiple odd-shaped devices, and severely restricts the optimal layout of the devices 20 on the surface 21 of the substrate 15. Also, the relatively large weight of the assembled module 10 and the multiple screwholes required in the substrate 15 for attaching the heatsinks make this approach unattractive for mass-produced low-cost modules 10.
Yet another approach that has been used for cooling an electronic module 10 is shown in FIG. 3. In this arrangement a single heatsink 30 is in thermal contact with the opposite side of the substrate from the surface 15 on which the devices 20 are located. Although this scheme is fairly simple to assemble, it is less efficient in drawing heat from the devices 20 through the substrate 15, particularly if the devices 20 are surface mounted lacking leads protruding through the substrate 15 for conducting heat, or if the substrate 15 is made of a relative inexpensive material, for example, epoxy-glass, which has poor thermal conductive characteristics.
Accordingly, the known solutions for cooling an electronic module having varied heat generating devices mounted thereon increase the cost of assembly, and do not always provide for effective cooling of discrete and odd-shaped components.
Therefore, it is desirable to provide an apparatus and method for reliably cooling electronic modules with varied heat generating devices mounted thereon, which is simply to assemble, uses readily available inexpensive materials, and is easily adaptable to mass production methods.

Conformal heat sink for electronic module