Footwear which is adaptable for athletic events requiring different sole configurations for different playing surfaces, for example artificial turf and natural turf, by providing the soles of shoes with a prescribed pattern of protuberances which are suitable for one type of event, and altering the pattern to adapt the shoes for another and different type of event. In particular the sole of each shoe can have removable conical cleats for playing on natural turf, and removable stud or square cleats for playing on artificial turf.

This invention relates to foot wear, and more particularly, to special purpose footwear for athletic events.
Special purpose footwear for athletic events is designed taking into account, the particular circumstances associated with the event. For example, a football shoe for artificial turf of the kind commonly employed at indoor arenas has a different configuration than a football shoe for natural turf where blades of grass extend from sod and similar base materials. Artificial turf is formed by matting with projecting plastic blades which simulate grass.
Football shoes for artificial turf have soles with stubby projections positioned along interior contours with respect to the outer edge contour of the sole. In the typical shoe for artificial turf, the edge contour of the sole has positioned near it an interiorly a set of approximately 70 rectangular projections which are equally spaced from one another. On the further interior of the sole are larger, similar projections that constitute approximately three partial contours, each of which has a contour line similar to that of the sole edge but is interrupted at the position of the arch. The heel portion of the sole also includes two partial contours.
While this type of sole pattern has been found to suitable for artificial turf, it is unsuitable for natural turf.
Consequently, an entirely different shoe with a different sole pattern has been required. In particular, the typical football shoe for natural turf includes a sole with five conical projections, known as "cleats" that extend from the sole portion of the shoe near the edge contour for the sole and two conical projections or cleats extending from near the heel.
In addition, the nature and type of cleat can depend upon climatic conditions at the time of the event and sometimes upon the personal preference of the player. Some players believe that a particular type of cleat will bring them good fortune.
The result is that a player on different kinds of turf, such as natural and artificial turf, often requires many different pairs of shoes.
Accordingly, it is an object of the invention to simplify the different kinds of footwear that are required for special purpose events, such as football contests.
Another object of the invention is to provide footwear that can easily be adapted to a wide variety of contests, such as those on natural and artificial turf. A related object is to eliminate the need for alternative kinds of footwear in order to achieve satisfactory performance on a wide variety of playing surfaces.


Disclosed is a collapsible and extendable modular CD case of which each module forming the CD case includes a base member and two side members all having a plurality of parallel partitions on their inner surfaces to provide many open compartments for each receiving a CD therein. The base member has joint arms projecting from four corners and complementary engaging means formed on a front and a rear edge. Each of the joint arms is provided on an inner surface at predetermined positions with a pivotal hole and a retaining hole to respectively receive a stud and a retaining boss correspondingly formed on an outer end surface of each side member, so that each side member is pivotally connected to and between two of the joint arms at the same side of the base member by engagement of the pivotal holes with the studs. The side member each has a length about one half of the base member, so that the side members can be pivotally turned downward to completely lie flat on the base member when the modular CD case is not in use. And, the modular CD case is extendable by freely connecting it to a further module by associating the engaging means on the modular CD case with the complementary engaging means on the further module.

The present invention relates to an improved CD case, and more particularly to a modular CD case which can be collapsed to occupy as small room as possible when it is not in use, or be extended in length to provide more room for CDs.
Since CDs can store large quantity of information in the form of digital data, they are widely employed in musical production to replace the old fashion records and in many other fields for convenient storage and access of various kinds of information products and `software. Following the increasing growth in the quantity of CDs used in our daily life, various types of CD cases, racks, and other storage structures are developed and available in the market. Most conventional CD racks or storages include a support with a plurality of parallel compartments for each accommodating one single piece of CD therein. These conventional CD racks or storages usually have a fixed volume and are not collapsible, and therefore occupy considerable space when they are not in use or are to be moved. Some of these CD racks or storages are so designed that they have an appearance matching with other furniture. Under this condition, the CD racks or storages are largely limited in their functions of displaying and storing CDs without the possibility of freely changing or expanding the storing capacity thereof. There are also many knockdown CD racks available in the market to provide different appearances, functions, and effectiveness. Other types of CD racks are developed and introduced to the market, but all of them have some kinds of disadvantages and need improvements.

Collapsible and extendable modular CD case


An optical component according to the present invention comprises a substrate, and at least one optical element obtained by processing at least one thick optical film provided on the substrate. The optical component has a plurality of surfaces substantially not parallel to a surface of the substrate.

There has been a demand for development of small-size, light-weight and high-performance optical devices as portable electronic apparatuses are becoming practical. Conventionally, as representative optical devices, bulk type optical devices and light waveguide type optical devices have been known. The bulk type optical devices are optical devices into which a variety of optical components are incorporated. The light waveguide type optical devices are optical devices which are used for communication, and the like, and are formed on a substrate.
A bulk type optical device is described in Japanese Laid-Open Publication No. 6-20297. An optical pickup 52 which is such a bulk type optical device is shown in FIG. 15. In the optical pickup 52, a plurality of optical system members, which constitute the optical system of the optical pickup 52, are fixed at a housing 51 whose upper side is open. A semiconductor laser 53 as a light source and a collimator lens 54 for causing laser light (light beam) to be parallel light are provided at a predetermined position outside the housing 51. A spot lens 58 for detecting a signal and an attachment substrate 59 are provided inside the housing 51. On the attachment substrate 59, a Wollaston prism 55 which is a type of polarizing prism, a composite prism 56 for refracting laser light emitted from the above-described semiconductor laser 53, and a mirror 57 are mounted. Note that the above-described optical system members 55 through 57 are made of optical glass, for example. The Wollaston prism 55, the composite prism 56, and the mirror 57 are adhered and fixed at predetermined positions on the upper side of the attachment substrate 59, which is made of the same composition as that of the optical system members, using an adhesive for optical glass. The above-described optical system members 55 through 57 can be fixed with high precision to the attachment substrate 59 by adjusting their mount positions and angles using amounting jig (not shown). The upper and lower surfaces of the above-described attachment substrate 59 are flat planes parallel to each other. The spot lens 58 is housed in a lens holder 58a which is fixed at the inside surface of a side of the housing 51.
Optical components (a lens, a mirror, a prism, a diffraction grating, etc.) in a bulk type optical device are produced by a process such as polishing or molding. The size of the optical components is usually of the order of several millimeters. Therefore, there is a limit on the miniaturization of an optical device comprising these components.
If the size of each optical component is further reduced, the cost of the component is increased and the mount precision is made stringent. A bulk type optical device is produced by arranging and assembling optical components which have been separately produced. In this case, the greater the number of optical components, the greater the number of steps. Further, it is difficult to perform positioning with high precision.
To solve the above-described problem with bulk type optical devices, light waveguide type optical devices have been proposed.
The following stringent conditions are required for light waveguide type optical devices: (1) a small loss of light; (2) ease of production; (3) controllability of the difference in refractive index between a core layer and a cladding layer; (4) excellent heat resistance; and (5) a small difference in birefringence.
A quartz-based light waveguide requires a process at a high temperature of 1000° C. or more in the production thereof. For this reason, there are some problems, such as a substrate on which a light waveguide is formed is limited, a light waveguide cannot be formed after optical components have been mounted on the substrate, and the like.
In contrast, a plastic light waveguide, which can be formed at a low temperature, has been recently proposed. However, the plastic light waveguide has drawbacks, such as poor heat resistance and the like. A low birefringent polyimide, which is the most heat resistant plastic and which is clear and colorless, has been proposed as an exemplary material for light waveguide type optical components in Japanese Laid-Open Publication No. 8-134211. Such a polyimide light waveguide is generally produced by the following method. A polyimide precursor solution is applied to a semiconductor substrate made of silicon, gallium arsenide, or the like, or an optical substrate made of quartz, glass, or the like by spin coating or printing, followed by heating to evaporate a solvent, and curing, thereby preparing a polyimide thin film. Further, a polyimide waveguide is obtained via optional processes, such as wet etching, dry etching, laser ablation, and the like. With the above-described steps, a polyimide thin film having a thickness of several μm or so can be advantageously produced.
Generally, in a light waveguide, light is confined within a core having a size as small as several μm, thereby various optical functions are achieved. A light waveguide contributes to integration and miniaturization of an optical system. A plurality of light waveguide type optical components can be simultaneously produced by a process, such as photolithography, etching, and the like, and positioning precision for the light waveguide type optical components is high.
However, the core size of a light waveguide type optical component is as small as several μm. Therefore, a technique for aligning the light waveguide with other optical components on the order of micro meters is required for coupling light with the core. Thus, a reduction in assembling cost is required. For this reason, current light waveguide type optical components are mainly limited to applications in which a single mode optical fiber.
Moreover, in light waveguide type optical devices, nonuniformity in core size and/or light loss due to scattering at core interface is great and it is therefore difficult to mass-produce optical devices having low loss and consistent performance.
Further, in light waveguide type optical devices, even if a core and cladding are made of isotropic materials, birefringence easily develops due to distortion in the shape of the waveguide core or variations in the refractive index of the cladding. As a result, difference in propagation time between polarized light beams occurs, which creates distortion in a signal. It is therefore difficult to use light waveguide type optical devices as light transmission devices.
The present invention is provided to solve the above-described problems by means of technical philosophy which is absolutely different from the above-described bulk type and waveguide type optical devices. The objective of the present invention is to provide a small-sized and light-weight bulk type optical component.

Optical component and method for producing thick polyimide film


A system that provides responses to requests obtains a key that is used to digitally sign the request. The key is derived from information that is shared with a requestor to which the response is sent. The requestor derives, using the shared information, derives a key usable to verify the digital signature of the response, thereby enabling the requestor to operate in accordance with whether the digital signature of the response matches the response.

The security of computing resources and associated data is of high importance in many contexts. As an example, organizations often utilize networks of computing devices to provide a robust set of services to their users. Networks often span multiple geographic boundaries and often connect with other networks. An organization, for example, may support its operations using both internal networks of computing resources and computing resources managed by others. Computers of the organization, for instance, may communicate with computers of other organizations to access and/or provide data while using services of another organization. In many instances, organizations configure and operate remote networks using hardware managed by other organizations, thereby reducing infrastructure costs and achieving other advantages. With such configurations of computing resources, ensuring that access to the resources and the data they hold is secure can be challenging, especially as the size and complexity of such configurations grow.
Many systems utilize various methods of authentication to ensure that requests made to the system should be fulfilled. Such techniques enable systems to verify that a requestor corresponds to an identity authorized to cause a request to be fulfilled. Conventional techniques, however, often focus on authentication of requests to a system without much regard to responses provided by the system. Some secure communication protocols, such as transport layer security (TSL) and secure sockets layer (SSL) allow for bidirectional authentication of communications, providing some assurances with respect to the validity of responses received from a system. However, the assurances provided by use of such protocols, to some, may be inadequate. Further, conventional techniques often do not provide the ability to prove that certain responses were received.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Dynamic response signing capability in a distributed system


Disclosed are systems and methods for analyzing a flow of a fluid at two or more discrete locations to determine the concentration of a substance therein. One method of determining a characteristic of a fluid may include containing a fluid within a flow path that provides at least a first monitoring location and a second monitoring location, generating a first output signal corresponding to the characteristic of the fluid at the first monitoring location with a first optical computing device, generating a second output signal corresponding to the characteristic of the fluid at the second monitoring location with a second optical computing device, receiving first and second output signals from the first and second optical computing devices, respectively, with a signal processor, and determining a difference between the first and second output signals with the signal processor.

The present invention relates to optical analysis systems and methods for analyzing fluids and, in particular, systems and methods for analyzing a flow of a fluid at two or more discrete locations to determine a characteristic of a substance in the fluid.
In the oil and gas industry, several flow assurance techniques are employed to monitor the formation of both organic and inorganic deposits in flowlines and pipelines. These deposits can seriously impede the productivity of wells by reducing the near wellbore permeability of producing formations and progressively restrict the diameter of the connected flow conduits, flowlines and pipelines. Problems relating to flow assurances cost the oil industry billions of dollars worldwide for prevention and remediation.
Flow assurance problems are most often related to paraffin waxes and asphaltenes, which are typically caused by changes in the pressure and temperature of the produced fluids at or near the wellbore or in surface flow conduits. As the waxes and asphaltenes precipitate out of the fluid, the precipitates can accumulate and tend to restrict or clog flowlines and pipelines. Removing the precipitates can be done using solvent washes, although, in some cases, the disposal of certain solvents after cleaning presents increasing environmental concerns. In other applications, the precipitates are removed by pipeline grinding, scraping or pigging operations undertaken by an inline tool/device/robot. In extreme cases, this may require that the flowline or pipeline be shut down for a period of time and, in the case of a total blockage, can even require removal of the entire pipeline altogether.
Calcium carbonate scale is usually formed by changes in the pressure and temperature of produced water at or near the wellbore and within the production tubing/flow conduits. Barium, strontium and calcium sulfate scales are usually formed by the mixing of different formation water and also the mixing of formation water and seawater that is injected into producing wells. Scale formation may be partly prevented by water shut-off treatments and the use of scale inhibitors. Once formed, scale can be removed only with some difficulty, such as by dissolving the scale, where applicable, using mineral acids and specially-designed dissolvers. In extreme cases, the scale must be removed by either inline milling operations or removing and replacing the affected flowline or pipeline altogether.
Hydrates lattice compounds of methane and water are crystals which, if formed, may also foul or block flowlines and pipelines. Aromatics and naphthanates when combined with water can cause the formation of foam and/or emulsions that may also cause flow restriction or pipeline interruption. Reservoir erosion can also adversely affect production by adding particulates to the stream and altering subsurface flow characteristics.
Those skilled in the art will readily recognize the importance in accurately determining the effectiveness of treatments designed to counteract asphaltenes, wax, scale, corrosion, as well as monitoring sand/chalk loss, all of which can adversely affect hydrocarbon production. In some cases, production of a well from a particular reservoir can be permanently damaged by flow problems making prevention essential to proper reservoir management. Accordingly, identifying flow assurance issues before they occur will mitigate costly corrective action.

Systems and methods for monitoring a flow path


A method of forming a core-shell composite material includes depositing a polysiloxane shell to wrap a ceramic core via chemical vapor deposition for forming a core-shell composite material, wherein the ceramic core is an oxide of metal and silicon, which includes 100 parts by weight of calcium, 50 to 95 parts by weight of iron, 15 to 40 parts by weight of silicon, 2 to 15 parts by weight of magnesium, 2 to 20 parts by weight of aluminum, and 2 to 10 parts by weight of manganese.

Ceramic powder is usually added to a building material to increase the strength or to adjust the color (e.g. to black or brown) of the building material, in which the ceramic powder containing spinels of calcium or magnesium may form strong bonds with cement to greatly enhance the cement's strength. Simultaneously, spinels such as CaFe2O4, CaMn2O4, or MgFe2O4 are inherently dark brown or black, which are added to cement to change its color, thereby increasing the color variability of the building material. However, synthesized ceramic powder that contains calcium spinels usually also contains cement phase of dicalcium silicate (C2S) or tricalcium silicate (C3S), which usually expands after being dipped in water. As such, the ceramic powder is often hydrated and cementated during grinding, and this may result in difficulties with dispersing the ceramic powder. In addition, the ceramic powder can be expanded by water, and so it may absorb a lot of water. After absorbing water, the ceramic powder will generate too many pores while drying and sintering, and these pores will influence the structural strength and limit the applications of the ceramic powder. Moreover, when the ceramic powder is added to cement, the ceramic powder will continuously react with water and expand its volume, even expanding and breaking the cement, weakening the building material.
Accordingly, a novel ceramic powder composition and structure is called for to address the above issues.

Core-shell composite material and method for manufacturing the same

INDUSTRIAL TECHNOLOGY RESEARCH INSTITUTE


Detection of a profile drift of a polysilicon line is enhanced by a test structure that (1) measures a bottom width and an average width of a cross sectional area of the same polysilicon line (2) correlates the two measurements, and (3) compares such correlation with a previous correlation of bottom width to average width of cross sectional area of the same polysilicon line.

A semiconductor wafer typically comprises a plurality of polysilicon ("PC") lines, which transport electrical signals. A cross sectional view taken from the top down of the PC line is known as the profile of the PC line. PC lines have a specific profile in a stable production line. An ideal PC profile is rectangular. Over time, however, the ideal, rectangular profile may drift or, in other words, change. For instance, a PC profile which began as rectangular may drift to trapezoidal in shape. Such drift is known as profile drift. Profile drift may be caused by any number of factors. For example, a machine failure in the wafer fabrication plant or a change in process conditions, such as a change in the Reactive Ion Etching ("RIE") of the PC line, may cause profile drift.
There is one known technique for identification of profile drift in a PC line, namely visual detection. First, a semiconductor wafer comprising a plurality of PC lines is cut. In so doing, the cross sectional area of the PC line is revealed. Second, a photograph of the revealed cross sectional area of the PC line is taken. With the aid of a scanning electron microscope, a technician studies the photograph of the cross sectional area of the PC line. The photograph depicts the PC profile in the production line on a particular date. The technician notes the shape of the PC profile. A technician completes the same exercise on a later date. If the shape changes, the technician identifies a profile drift.
Visual detection has its drawbacks. Visual detection is a destructive technique. Once the wafer has been cut for visual inspection, the wafer cannot be further processed. Accordingly, visual detection wastes the resource of the wafer as well as needlessly consumes the time of the machines that created the destroyed wafer. In addition, visual inspection is time consuming for the technician. Accordingly, the technician does not visually detect each lot or even each bunch of lots. A technician randomly selects one wafer from one lot. Such lot is one lot out of hundreds of wafers and tens of lots. Because visual detection occurs with so few wafers, statistics cannot accurately be gathered regarding the profile drift of a given lot or even a given bunch of lots. Finally, visual detection is only as accurate as the visual faculties of the technician conducting the visual detection.
Therefore, there remains a need in the art for a structure and method of identifying profile drift of a PC line. Specifically, there is a need in the art for a standardized, nondestructive, statistically significant method for identifying profile drift.
These and other deficiencies in the prior art are overcome through the method of this invention.

Structure for monitoring semiconductor polysilicon gate profile

International Business Machines Corporation


For quicker estimation of physiological parameters than using a numerical solution, a machine-learned network is applied. The PV loop may be estimated for a specific patient in real-time without invasive pressure measurements. Synthetic data instead of or in addition to actual patient examples may be used to machine train the network, providing a broader and/or controlled range of examples for more accurate estimation even in rarely occurring pathologies. The synthetic data may be generated by a generative adversarial network.

The present embodiments relate to medical imaging, such as medical imaging of the cardiac system of a patent. The left ventricular (LV) pressure-volume (PV) loop represents an efficient tool for understanding and characterizing cardiac function. The PV loop contains information regarding stroke volume, cardiac output, ejection fraction, myocardial contractility, cardiac oxygen consumption, and other important measures of the heart and the systemic circulation. For example, the PV loop indicates the extent of ventricular remodeling, the degree of ventricular-arterial mismatching, and the left ventricular end-diastolic pressure-volume relationship, which represent strong predictors of congestive heart failure. Pathologies such as left ventricular hypertrophy, dilated cardiomyopathy, aortic and mitral valve stenosis, and regurgitation are manifested in the PV-loop. Other quantities may predict other conditions.
Medical imaging modalities such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), computed tomography (CT), and echocardiography can be used to estimate the time-varying LV volume through the heart cycle in a non-invasive manner, which can then be combined with an invasive measurement of LV pressure to obtain the PV loop. This invasive approach is expensive and associated with increased patient risks. Alternatively, model-based approaches may be employed for the non-invasive estimation of left ventricular, patient-specific PV loops. A lumped parameter circulation model, personalized using a two-step parameter estimation framework may be used to estimate the PV loop. The input data required for the model personalization is acquired through routine non-invasive clinical measurements and echocardiography. Other physiological models combine geometrical information extracted from medical imaging with background knowledge on the physiology of the system encoded in a complex mathematical model of ordinary or partial differential equations, which can be solved only numerically. This approach leads to a large number of algebraic equations, making it computationally very demanding. It may take minutes or hours to determine the PV loop using these models. Minutes or hours is not desired during diagnosis and may not be sufficient during a procedure. The computationally demanding aspect of these models and associated image segmentation process prevents adoption of this technology for real-time applications, such as intra-operative guidance of interventions.

Artificial intelligence for physiological quantification in medical imaging


A shaft sealing mechanism of an annular shape having at least one divided portion, which is installed in an annular space between a rotor and a stator, includes a group of thin plates. Outer peripheral ends of the thin plates are joined, and inner peripheral free ends come in contact with the rotor in a sliding manner so that a surface of the rotor and the thin plates form an acute angle to partition the annular space into a high-pressure region and a low-pressure region without being joined. At least a low-pressure gap near the divided portion is set to be larger than a low-pressure gap in a circumferential direction other than near the divided portion.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a shaft sealing mechanism, a structure for mounting the shaft sealing mechanism on a stator, and a turbine including the shaft sealing mechanism and the structure for mounting the shaft sealing mechanism on a stator.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a turbine is provided around a rotor thereof with static blades and dynamic blades, and has a shaft sealing mechanism around the rotor in order to reduce a leakage amount of working fluid flowing from a high pressure side to a low pressure side. As one example of such a shaft sealing mechanism, there are leaf seals disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Nos. 2002-013647, 2003-113945, and the like.
The turbine includes a gas turbine and a steam turbine, and an entire structure of the gas turbine is shown, as one example, in FIG. 8. Air compressed by a compressor 1 is mixed with fuel to be combusted in a combustor 2. Combustion gas, as working fluid, generated in the combustor 2 expands so that thermal energy of the combustion gas is converted to rotational energy in the courses of passing through static blades 6 and dynamic blades 7, which are provided alternatively around a rotor 4. The thus converted rotational energy is taken out as electric power. A shaft sealing mechanism 11 is provided between each static blade 6 and the rotor 4 in order to reduce a leakage amount of the combustion gas from a high pressure side to a low pressure side, and a leaf seal is used as an example of the shaft sealing mechanism.
One example of a conventional shaft sealing mechanism including the leaf seals is shown in FIG. 9. The shaft sealing mechanism 11 has a structure in which many thin plates 121, having a fixed width in an axial line direction of the rotor 4, are arranged in a multi-layered manner. The shaft sealing mechanism 11 includes a thin plate group 12 where the thin plates are arranged annularly in a circumferential direction of the rotor 4 and are disposed with fine spacing along the circumferential direction thereof. The thin plate group 12 is joined at an outer peripheral proximal end 122 thereof, and an inner peripheral free end 123 thereof comes in sliding contact with a rotor outer peripheral face 4a to form an acute angle to the rotor 4 without being joined. Thus, an annular space 8, which is provided between the rotor 4 and a stator 5 to allow working fluid to flow, is partitioned into a high-pressure region and a low-pressure region.
The thin plate group 12 is fixed to a leaf seal ring 14 obtained by combining a pair of divided seal rings 14a and 14b, and each thin plate 121 has a T-shape cross section, including a rotor axial line. The leaf seal ring 14 also includes a high-pressure-side plate 15 provided on a side adjacent to the high-pressure region through the thin plate group 12, and a low-pressure-side plate 16 provided on a side adjacent to the low-pressure region as guide plates for working fluid. A length of the low-pressure-side plate 16 is shorter than that of the high-pressure-side plate 15 in a sectional view including the rotor axial line, in order to generate a floating force by a gas pressure distribution acting on upper and lower faces of the thin plates 121. Therefore, a gap defined between a stator inner wall 5a adjacent to the low-pressure region and a thin plate edge 125 (hereinafter, "low-pressure gap Y1") is larger than a gap defined between the high-pressure-side plate 15 provided adjacent to the high-pressure region and a thin plate edge 124 (hereinafter, "high-pressure gap X") (X<Y1).
The shaft sealing mechanism 11 with the above configuration is fittingly inserted into a recessed groove 31 provided on the stator 5. The inner peripheral free end 123 of each thin plate 121 is floated from the outer peripheral face 4a of the rotor 4 by a floating force due to working fluid acting on the thin plate 121 and a dynamic pressure effect of working fluid due to rotation of the rotor 4 to achieve a non-contacting state between the inner peripheral free end 123 and the outer peripheral face 4a. Thus, each thin plate is prevented from wearing and generating heat.
Conventionally, the shaft sealing mechanism with such a leaf seal has a divided portion in a radial direction to the rotor axial center in order to facilitate assembling. A plurality of pieces of the divided leaf seal are sequentially assembled to the stator to integrally exhibit a sealing function. However, even if the assembled and integrated annular seal is formed, since it has at least one (usually, plural) divided portion in a radial direction to the rotor axial center, high pressure working fluid eventually flows into the leaf seal via a gap formed by the divided portions. FIG. 10 schematically depicts a flow of working fluid around the divided portion of the leaf seal. An actual leaf seal has a head of the thin plate 121 formed in a wide T-shape in cross section, including the rotor axial center, but it is schematically simplified as a rectangular shape in FIG. 10. Working fluid that has flowed in the shaft sealing mechanism 11 from a divided portion 19 flows into the inside from a gap (a high-pressure gap) between the high-pressure-side plate 15 and the thin plate edge 124 of the thin plate 121 along the high-pressure-side plate 16 in a circumferential direction, to flow down on a surface of the thin plate 121 along upper and lower faces of the thin plate 121. As disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2002-013647, the working fluid passes through a gap between the lower end of the high-pressure-side plate 15 and the rotor outer peripheral face 4a at any point in the circumferential direction on the leaf seal, except for around the divided portion of the leaf seal, to flow on the upper and the lower faces of the thin plate 121 from the side of the inner peripheral free end 123 of the thin plate 121 toward the side of the outer peripheral proximal end 122.
Around the divided portion, however, the working fluid flows from the divided portion 19 into the shaft sealing mechanism 11 while maintaining the same pressure over the entire length of the high-pressure-side plate 15 in a sectional view including the rotor axial line. Therefore, the same pressure acts on the side of the outer peripheral proximal end 122 and the side of the inner peripheral free end 123 around the thin plate edge 124 of the thin plate 121. This technique is different from the conventional example in this point. However, a pressing force acts on the thin plate due to fluctuation over a gas pressure distribution, and the inner peripheral free end 123 comes in contact with the rotor outer-surface 4a so that wearing and heat generation of the thin plate occurs.

Shaft sealing mechanism, structure for mounting shaft sealing mechanism on stator, and turbine


A photothermographic element comprising a substrate having on at least one side thereof a photothermographic system comprising silver halide spectrally sensitized to the infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum, a light insensitive silver source, a reducing agent for silver ion, and a binder, said element further comprising at least one layer which contains an infrared-absorbing dye having a central nucleus of the formula ##STR1## wherein n is an integer of 1 to 12,. Q is an ionic acidic moiety, PA1 and M is a cation, in an amount sufficient as to provide a transmission optical density of at least 0.1 at the wavelength of maximum sensitivity of said sensitized silver halide.

Light sensitive recording materials may suffer from a phenomenon known as halation which causes degradation in the quality of the recorded image. Such degradation may occur when a fraction of the imaging light which strikes the photosensitive layer is not absorbed but passes through to the film base on which the photosensitive layer is coated. A portion of the light reaching the base may be reflected back to strike the photosensitive layer from the underside. Light thus reflected may, in some cases, contribute significantly to the total exposure of the photosensitive layer. Any particulate matter in the photosensitive element, including silver salts, may cause light passing through the element to be scattered. Scattered light which is reflected from the film base will, on its second passage through the photosensitive layers cause exposure over an area adjacent to the point of intended exposure. It is this adjacent exposure effect which leads to image degradation. Silver halide based photographic materials (including photothermographic materials) are particularly prone to this form of image degradation since the photosensitive layers contain light scattering particles. The effect of light scatter on image quality is well documented and is described, for example, in T. H. James "The Theory of the Photographic Process", 4th Edition, Chapter 20, Macmillan 1977.
It is common practice to minimize the effects of light scatter by including a light absorbing layer within the photographic element. To be effective, the absorption of this layer must be at the same wavelengths as the sensitivity of the photosensitive layer. In the case of imaging materials coated on transparent base, a light absorbing layer is frequently coated on the reverse side of the base from the photosensitive layer. Such a coating, known as an "antihalation layer", effectively prevents reflection of any light which has passed through the photosensitive layer.
A similar effect may be achieved by a light absorbing layer interposed between the photosensitive layer and the base. This construction, described as an "antihalation underlayer" is applicable to photosensitive coatings on transparent or non-transparent bases. It is also possible to improve image quality by coating a light absorbing layer above the photosensitive layer of a photographic or photothermographic element. Coatings of this kind, described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,581,323 and 4,312,941, prevent multiple reflections of scattered light between the internal surfaces of a photosensitive element.
Photothermographic antihalation systems for infrared materials have been described previously. However, these usually had some disadvantages. A strippable antihalation coating of infrared absorbing pigment such as carbon black is described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,477,562 and 4,409,316. A strippable layer would generally have adhesion difficulties in processes such as coating, converting and packaging and also generates a sheet of pigmented waste material. For these reasons, it is not a desirable solution to the problem.
European Patent Application 0 377 961 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,581,325 describe infrared antihalation systems for photographic and photothermographic materials incorporating polymethine and holopolar dyes respectively. However, these dyes although having good infrared absorbance, have visible absorbance that is too high for use in subsequent exposures or viewing an image.
An antihalation system that has a high infrared absorbance before processing and a low visible absorbance after processing is the thermal-dye-bleach construction described in European Patent Application 0 403 157. The bleaching, infrared antihalation system uses a polymethine dye which is converted to a colorless derivative on heat processing. However, the system is not heat stable and as the dye decomposes,the infrared absorbance decreases with time.
Indolenine dyes have been described as infrared antihalation dyes in silver halide, photographic materials in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,895,955; 4,882,265; 4,876,181; 4,839,265 and 4,871,656 and Japanese Patent Application J63 195656. Infrared absorbing indolenine dyes have been described for electrophotography in U.S. Pat. No. 4,362,800 and for optical laser recording material in Japanese Patent Applications J6 2082-082A and J6 3033-477.
Water insoluble indolenine dyes have been used in photothermographic systems as weak sensitizing dyes in U.S. patent application No. U.S. Ser. No. 07/846,919 filed Apr. 13, 1992 and as a combined supersensitizer-antihalation system in Japanese Patent Application J4 182640.
However, the combination of infrared absorbing, water soluble indolenine dyes in a hydrophilic binder for photothermographic antihalation systems has not been described.

Photothermographic elements incorporating antihalation dyes


A semiconductor device includes a semiconductor layer formed over a semiconductor substrate. A well region is disposed in a portion of the semiconductor layer, and a plurality of first doped regions is disposed in various portions of the well region. A second doped region is disposed in a portion of the well region. An isolation element is disposed in a portion of the top-most one of the first doped regions, and a third doped region is disposed in a portion of the top-most one of the first doped regions. A fourth doped region is disposed in a portion of the second doped region. An insulating layer overlies the third doped region, the isolation element, the second doped region, and the fourth doped region, and a conductive layer overlies the insulating layer.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to integrated circuit (IC) devices, and in particular to a semiconductor device and a method for fabricating the same.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, as demand increases for high-voltage devices, such as power semiconductor devices, there has been an increasing interest in research for high-voltage metal-oxide-semiconductor field effect transistors (HV MOSFETs) applied in high-voltage devices.
Among the various types of high voltage metal-oxide-semiconductor field effect transistors (HV MOSFETs), semiconductor devices such as lateral double diffused metal-oxide-semiconductor (LDMOS) devices are often used.
However, with the trend of size reduction in semiconductor fabrication, the critical size of high-voltage MOSFETs for high-voltage devices needs to be reduced further. Thus, a reliable high-voltage MOSFET for high-voltage devices having a reduced size is needed to meet device performance requirements such as driving currents, on-resistances, and breakdown voltages, as the needs and trends in size reduction of high-voltage devices continue.

Semiconductor device and method for fabricating the same

Vanguard International Semiconductor Corporation


Disclosed is process for producing polyethylene using a slurry loop reactor. The process includes using a mathematical model to predict a plurality of process control parameters based on the desired product properties and reactor characteristics and controlling the process using the predicted process control parameters. Also disclosed is a process controller programmed with the model and a method for optimizing the configuration of a loop reactor using the model.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a process for preparing polyethylene. The present invention particularly relates to preparing high density polyethylene using a slurry loop reactor.
2. Background of the Art
It is well known in the art of manufacturing chemicals in general and polymers in particular to use a reactor consisting of a pipe containing a flowing stream of reactants. One such pipe reactor is known as the slurry loop reactor. In a slurry loop reactor, reactants are feed into a pipe containing a solvent and a catalyst. The admixture of solvent, reactants, and catalyst are continuously recycled through the pipe, hence the term "loop," with the reaction product being continuously removed.
In the manufacture of high density polyethylene, particles of polyethylene can be removed from the reactor by means of a settling leg. U.S. Pat. No. 3,293,000 to Marwil discloses the use of settling legs in a loop reactor for manufacturing an ethylene butane copolymer. In this reference, the settling leg functions to allow a portion of the polymer slurry to escape from the loop into outlets that allow the particles to be gravimetrically removed.
While technology for preparing polymers has changed with respect to catalysts and reactants, the same general loop reactor technology employed in the 1960s is still in use. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,613,484 to Ayres, et al., discloses an improvement to settling legs, also referred to as accumulator legs, is disclosed. This technology is still generally current and in present use, particularly for the production high density polyethylene.
Despite loop reactors having been used for a long time, the process of starting a running a loop reactor is not without problems. U.S. Pat. No. 6,303,825 to Gerlich, et al. discloses a method of starting up a loop reactor system. This reference suggests using a microprocessor to automate starting up and running a loop reactor. One suggested algorithm recognizes the end of the startup of the reactor and then controls the reactor at steady state.


Disclosed is an improved method of making hydrophobic and hydrophilic graft polymers, which method comprises the steps of (a) reacting copolymerizable monomers to form an organic polymeric backbone having a weight average molecular weight of from about 15,000 grams/mole to about 200,000 grams/mole and a plurality of organic halide moieties covalently bonded to the polymeric backbone and pendant from the polymeric backbone and then, without a separate purification or isolation step; (b) reacting copolymerizable monomers with the organic halide moieties of the polymeric backbone by atom transfer free radical polymerization in the presence of a catalytic amount of a Cu(I) salt or other transition metal species complexed to a ligand suitable for solubilizing the salt in the reaction mixture to form a plurality of polymeric side chains covalently bonded to the polymeric backbone and pendant from the polymeric backbone and having a weight average molecular weight of from about 500 grams/mole to about 200,000 grams/mole, wherein the polymeric back bone and the plurality of polymeric side chains form hydrophilic and hydrophobic graft polymers having a weight average molecular weight of from about 16,000 grams/mole to about 10,000,000 grams/mole.

Personal care compositions such as hair sprays, styling shampoos, cosmetics, skin care products, and the like, often contain film-forming polymers for various reasons. These film-forming polymers are especially useful in hair care compositions to provide hair styling performance to the composition. Film-forming polymers for use in such compositions include organic or silicone-containing, linear or graft, copolymers which contain various monomers in an alternating, random, block or homopolymer configuration.
Graft copolymers are well known for use as film-forming polymers in hair care and other personal care compositions. These graft copolymers typically comprise a polymeric backbone and one or more macromonomers grafted to the backbone, wherein the physical and chemical attributes such as glass transition temperature values (Tg), water solubility, and so forth are selected for the polymeric backbone and macromonomer grafts so as to provide the desired film-forming properties and other chemical or physical properties of the copolymers in a personal care composition. The graft copolymers are especially versatile in that the polymeric backbone and the attached macromonomer grafts can have select or different chemical or physical properties which collectively provide the optimal formulation or performance profile for the intended personal care composition in which it will be used.
Synthesis of graft copolymers, however, is typically more difficult than synthesis of many copolymers, especially linear polymers. Unlike linear polymer synthesis, the synthesis of graft copolymers typically involves a separate polymerization step involving the making of a macromonomer containing a reactive end group, copolymerization of the macromonomer with a copolymerizable, ethylenically unsaturated monomer, and then termination of this last copolymerization step to obtain the desired graft polymers.
It has now been found that hydrophobic and hydrophilic graft polymers can now be made by simpler, more effective synthesis methods, and that these new synthesis methods result in the formation graft polymers which when applied to the hair or other surface form a polymeric film or weld having improved adhesive and cohesive strength. These polymers are very useful when used as film-forming polymers in personal care compositions, especially when used as film-forming or styling polymers in hair styling compositions. The graft polymers in these hair styling compositions provide improved styling and/or conditioning performance, and are especially effective in providing improved durability of hair style and improved hair feel.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide an improved method for making graft polymers, and further to provide such a method for making graft polymers for use in personal care compositions, and yet further to provide such a method which involves fewer synthesis steps than other conventional methods of making graft polymers.


A pull or push rod or locking nut for a molding machine has an undercut, and the undercut has an undercut cross-section, a side wall, and an undercut ramp. The side wall transitions via a first transition curvature into an undercut base, and the undercut base transitions via a second transition curvature into the undercut ramp. The undercut base, viewed in the undercut cross-section, is at least partially curved, and the curvature of the undercut base differs from the first transition curvature and/or the second transition curvature.

The invention concerns a pull or push rod or a locking nut for a molding machine with at least one groove, a clamping unit of a molding machine or a molding machine with a clamping unit, and a method of producing a pull or push rod or a locking nut for a molding machine.
Molding machines can be understood as injection molding machines, transfer molding machines, presses or the like.
In the following, the prior art is explained using an example of an injection molding machine.
An injection process typically begins with the closing of the clamping unit, and the movable mold mounting plate is brought to the fixed mold mounting plate by a rapid stroke movement. The movable mold mounting plate is then locked with the pressure-exerting piston part of a clamping mechanism, and the clamping mechanism builds up the clamping force required for the injection process.
In the case of an injection molding machine with a tie bar, the clamping mechanism is often a hydraulic cylinder whose piston exerts a force via the tie bar on the movable mold mounting plate. Also common is the case of an injection molding machine with four tie bars. Here, the clamping mechanism is often designed as a pressure pad between the mold mounting plates or at the ends of the tie bars. These pressure pads are also often designed hydraulically, as high pressures have to be built up in a relatively short time.
So these tie bars are pull rods or push rods. These pull or push rods are fastened, for example, to the fixed mold mounting plate. On the opposite side of the pull or push rod, they are provided with grooves, and the grooves serve to form a positive-locking, releasable connection with a locking nut. Via this locking nut, the grooves apply pulling or compressive forces into the pull or push rod, in order to be able to move the movable mold mounting plate with respect to the fixed mold mounting plate, or to press the two against each other. Such locking nuts are mostly designed as half-shells, which can be brought into a locking position by bringing them together. This serves to enable a rapid stroke drive in the unlocked state of the locking nut to move the movable mold mounting plate with respect to the fixed mold mounting plate at a higher speed. If mold halves mounted on the mold mounting plates (almost) contact each other, the locking nut/s can again be moved into a locking position in order to apply the clamping force by the clamping force mechanism, which has a smaller range of motion and a lower speed, but can apply higher forces.
By applying the clamping force to the movable mold mounting plate, the movable mold mounting plate is pressed to the fixed mold mounting plate by a force in the range of 15 000 kN, for example. With such high clamping forces, the pull or push rod/s must accordingly be solid under high material expenditure. Here the grooves in the pull or push rods represent a notch, and thus form a cross-section with the highest load in the groove cross-section, the related undercuts before or after the grooves, however, are also increased sources of danger. In the case of an unprofessional design, they may form a notch which additionally stress the cross-section of the undercut (the undercut cross-section), and thus forms the cross-section with the highest stress when viewed via the pull or push rod or the locking nut.

Pull or push rod or a locking nut for a molding machine


A pressure sensor for sensing a pressure level of a medium. The pressure sensor includes a rigid substrate having a medium contacting side and a pressure sensitive resistor mounted on the medium contacting side. The resistor exhibits a change in resistance in response to pressure changes on the resistor above a predetermined threshold. Other embodiments of the invention are shown using a wheatstone bridge with pressure sensitive resistors and resistors that are insensitive to pressure changes.

The present invention relates to pressure sensors in general and in particular to a pressure sensor that eliminates the use of a diaphragm between the sensor and pressure to be measured.
Conventional devices for high pressure measurement in severe environments rely on a diaphragm in conjunction with a pressure sensing element. Various pressure sensing elements have been used such as strain gages, piezoresistive devices and semiconductor based sensing elements. These devices are constructed such that the diaphragm is positioned between the pressurized process media and the pressure sensing element. The diaphragms are subject to mechanical fatigue and therefore limit the service life of conventional high pressure sensors. A diaphragm free high pressure sensor as presented herein is therefore desirable.


The coating formation method of the present invention is a method for forming a coating on a surface of a coating formation target. The formation method of the present invention includes an electrostatic spraying step of electrostatically spraying a composition directly onto the coating formation target, thereby forming a coating composed of a deposit containing fibers. The composition contains a component (a), a component (b), and a component (c) below. (a) One or more volatile substances selected from water, alcohols, and ketones. (b) A polymer having coating formability. (c) A liquid agent containing one or more selected from oils and polyols that are in a liquid form at 20° C.

A cosmetic sheet containing cosmetics or cosmetic components in order to enable cosmetics, cosmetic components, or medicinal products for external wounds to effectively act on skin is described, for example, in Patent Literature 1. Furthermore, for example, Patent Literatures 2 and 3 describe methods for forming a coating through electrostatic spraying.

Method for manufacturing coating film by electrostatic spraying


An electronic appliance remote controller which includes a display screen (which may be part of the appliance, e.g. a TV screen) for displaying icons representing possible operations of the electronic appliance, and a motion detector circuit for detecting a motion within a field of view of the motion detector circuit. The motion detector circuit detects a predetermined motion of a moving object within the field of view as an indication that a remote control operation is to be started and, thereafter, tracks the movement of the object. The motion detector circuit outputs a cursor control signal representative of the motion of the object. A control circuit, connected to the display screen, the electronic appliance, and the motion detector circuit and supplied with the cursor control signal, controls the display screen to display a movable visual indicator, e.g. a cursor, whose own motion tracks the movement of the moving object and the electronic appliance to perform operations corresponding to the icons selected by the user using the visual indicator.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a remote control commander for an electronic appliance, such as a television set, and more particularly to an optical motion sensing remote control system for an electronic appliance.
2. Related Art
An IR (Infra Red) remote controller is a common means to control a TV from a distance. However, existing remote controllers have some drawbacks. They are easy to lose. The user often mistakes a VCR controller for the TV controller. In fact, a lot of people have a great xe2x80x9cremote controller collectionxe2x80x9d. Also one has to learn which button is where on the controller. Remote controllers require batteries which have to be replaced periodically. If a TV could have a camera vision and read the user""s gestures, no remote controller would be necessary. However, it is not easy for a TV to distinguish gestures from other moves in its camera view. One would not want the channel to change each time the user got up to fetch a snack from the kitchen, for example.
The above and other problems of prior art remote control system for electronic device are overcome by an remote control system for electronic device according to the present invention which includes a display screen (which may be part of the device, e.g. a TV screen) for displaying icons representing possible operations of the electronic device, and a motion detector circuit for detecting a motion within a field of view of the motion detector circuit. The motion detector circuit detects a predetermined motion of a moving object within the field of view as an indication that a remote control operation is to be started and, thereafter, tracks the movement of the object. The motion detector circuit outputs a cursor control signal representative of the motion of the object. A control circuit, connected to the display screen, the electronic device, and the motion detector circuit and supplied with the cursor control signal, controls the display screen to display a movable visual indicator, e.g. a cursor, whose own motion tracks the movement of the moving object and the electronic device to perform operations corresponding to the icons selected by the user using the visual indicator.
In a preferred embodiment, the motion detector circuit detects the selection of an icon by the user by detecting a predetermined motion pattern of the object when the visual indicator is coincident on the display screen with a particular icon. For example, the motion detector circuit detects the selection of an icon by the user by detecting a cessation of movement of the object for a predetermined period of time after the visual indicator is coincident on the display screen with a particular icon. The detected object can be, for example, the user""s hand. The predetermined motion can be a circular hand movement.
In the preferred embodiment, the motion detector circuit includes a video camera and calculates a motion vector of each macro block between two adjacent video frames in a video output signal from the video camera. Each video frame includes a plurality of blocks, each containing vectors representative of detected motion of the object. Neighbor vectors with almost the same direction are grouped as one region. For each frame, the motion detector circuit, in determining whether to track an object, checks each region to determine if that region satisfies the conditions (a) that the vector made one rotation clockwise or counterclockwise and (b) the region returned to the start position where it used to be and locks onto that region if conditions (a) and (b) are both satisfied.
In order that the same general length of hand movement will control the visual indicator to move a consistent corresponding length of movement, the control circuit includes an automatic cursor sensitivity adjustment feature which automatically scales the extremes of the movement of the visual indicator to the extremes of the predetermined hand motion so that, for example, the same diagonal motion of the user""s hand will cause the visual indicator to move just across the diagonal of the display screen regardless of whether the user is close to the motion detector circuit or far away.
A remote controlling method for an electronic device according to the invention includes the steps of visually displaying on a display screen such as a TV screen, icons representing possible operations of the electronic device (e.g. a TV), detecting a motion within a field of view, including detecting a first predetermined motion of a moving object within the field of view as an indication that a remote control operation is to be started and, thereafter, tracking the movement of the object an outputting a cursor control signal representative of the motion of the object. In response to the control signal, controlling the display screen to display a movable visual indicator, e.g. a cursor, whose movement tracks the movement of the moving object and further controlling the electronic device to perform operations corresponding to the icons selected by the user using the visual indicator. The first predetermined motion can be any hand movement, such as a circular movement or a diagonal hand movement, for example.
The step of detecting the selection of an icon by the user includes detecting a second predetermined motion pattern of the object when the visual indicator is coincident on the display screen with a particular icon. For example, the predetermined motion pattern could be a cessation of movement of the object for a predetermined period of time after the visual indicator is coincident on the display screen with the particular icon.
The motion detecting step uses a video camera in the preferred embodiment and includes calculating a motion vector of each macro block between two adjacent video frames in a video output signal from the video camera. Each video frame includes a plurality of blocks each containing vectors representative of detected motion of the object, wherein neighbor vectors with almost the same direction are grouped as one region. For each frame, the determination of whether to track an object is made by checking each region to determine if that region satisfies the conditions (a) that the vector made one rotation clockwise or counterclockwise and (b) the region returned to the start position where it used to be. That region is locked onto if conditions (a) and (b) are both satisfied.
In order that the same general length of hand movement will control the visual indicator to move a consistent corresponding length of movement, the remote controlling method according to the invention further includes a step of automatically adjusting the sensitivity of the visual indicator by the steps of automatically scaling the extremes of the movement of the visual indicator to the extremes of the predetermined hand motion so that, for example, the same diagonal motion of the user""s hand will cause the visual indicator to move just across the diagonal of the display screen regardless of whether the user is close to the motion detector circuit or far away.
The foregoing and other objectives, features and advantages of the invention will be more readily understood upon consideration of the following detailed description of certain preferred embodiments of the invention, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.


A method and system are described for controlling the flight pattern of a remote controlled aircraft. The system includes a microcontroller that is linked to an accelerometer for determining the attitude of the aircraft and modifying signals to the aircraft's flight control system in order to prevent a crash. In addition, several preset flight patterns are stored in a memory so that upon activation, the aircraft will enter a preset flight pattern.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to control systems for radio-controlled aircraft. More specifically, this invention relates to methods and systems for modifying the flight path of a radio-controlled aircraft.
2. Description of the Related Art
The sport of flying radio-controlled aircraft has increased in popularity over the past several years. Many hobbyists spend a tremendous amount of time building and flying these radio-controlled aircraft. As is known, these aircraft are flown by a pilot that sends control signals from a transmitter to a receiver in the aircraft.
A remote controlled airplane changes direction by movement around one or more of its three axes of rotation: lateral axis, vertical axis, and longitudinal axis. These axes are imaginary lines that run perpendicularly to each other through the exact weight center of the airplane. The airplane's rotation around them is termed pitch, roll, and yaw. The pilot guides the airplane by sending control signals to servos within the airplane that change the pitch, roll, and yaw by moving the elevators, ailerons, and rudder of the airplane.
Conventional remote controlled aircraft use radio frequency signals that are sent from the pilot's transmitter to a receiver in the airplane, which in turn generate a sequence of frequency modulated signals. Each control surface in the airplane is moved by a servo that receives these frequency modulated signals. By, for example, increasing the frequency of the signal that controls the elevator servo, the pilot can cause the airplane to ascend or descend. In the same manner, changing the pulse-width of the signals to the aileron servo will cause the airplane to turn.
Unfortunately, the chance that a beginner will successfully complete their first flight can be less than 1 in 10. This fact not only deters potential hobbyists from joining the sport, but also adds to the cost of taking up this sport since so many aircraft are destroyed during the learning stages.
One reason that so many aircraft are destroyed during the learning stage of flying remote-controlled aircraft is that no inexpensive and convenient system exists for assisting a novice pilot to maneuver the plane or recover from unstable flight situations. Some systems do exist for pilotless military aircraft, such as one described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,964,598 ('598) to Berejik et al. The system described in the '598 patent relies on feedback signals from gyroscopes in the airplane to control the bank-angle and actual rate of climb of the aircraft. While such a system might be appropriate for military drones, such a system is complex and would not provide a cost effective solution for radio-controlled airplane hobbyists.
What is needed in the art is a simple and inexpensive system that can be incorporated into radio-controlled aircraft systems in order to give novice pilots the ability to fly radio controlled aircraft without risking a crash. The present invention fulfills such a need.

Guidance system for radio-controlled aircraft


A current sensor includes: a current bar through which a current flows; a first cover that covers the current bar and includes a cutout portion formed in at least a part thereof; a magnetic substance core that covers at least parts of the current bar and the first cover and includes a gap; a magnetic field measuring element located in the gap; and a second cover that covers the magnetic substance core and the magnetic field measuring element and at least parts of the current bar and the first cover, and is located so that a side surface thereof engages with the cutout portion of the first cover.

There has been known a power sensor including a bus bar through which a current flows and a Hall element for measuring a magnetic field, a part of the bus bar being covered with ferrite, and the Hall element being located in a gap of the ferrite as disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2011-017618. Such a current sensor requires the bus bar, the ferrite, and the Hall element to have a fixed (stable) positional relationship. For example, the positional relationship may be fixed by a ferrite cover including a slit corresponding to a width of the bus bar.
Conventional current sensors have a difficulty in reducing a space because a device to which the current sensor is installed needs to have a structure for preventing a fall of the bus bar and a structure for screwing the ferrite cover.


An acceleration information detecting unit of an acceleration detecting apparatus having an acceleration sensor with at least one axis that measures acceleration in a back and forth direction (or a right and left direction) of a walking person. Acceleration data indicating the acceleration is sent to a wireless communication control unit. The wireless communication control unit sends the acceleration data to a physical movement analyzer using a short-distance wireless communication method. On the other hand, the wireless communication control unit of the physical movement analyzer receives the acceleration data that is sent from the acceleration detecting apparatus using a short-distance wireless communication method and sends it to a walking speed detecting unit. The walking speed detecting unit estimates strides and walking period based on the received acceleration data and calculates the walking speed based on the strides and the walking period.

(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a physical movement analyzer for performing analysis on postures and movements based on physical feature amounts that are extracted at the time when a human moves. More specifically, the present invention relates to a physical movement analyzer or the like that is used for a walking ability test in a rehabilitation system or a sport training system.
(2) Description of the Related Art
In view of the status of a recently aging society, apparatuses and medical treatments for rehabilitating elderly people or people with a leg disorder have drawn attention. Especially, quantitatively grasping the degree of recovery from a leg disorder (or deterioration of a leg disorder) of a patient with an artificial joint, a patient with a degenerative joint disease or the like is an important problem, and thus apparatuses or the like for solving this problem have been proposed conventionally. For example, refer to Japanese Laid-Open Patent application No. 1998-111940 (related art 1), Japanese Laid-Open Patent application No. 1993-180861 (related art 2) and Japanese Laid-Open Patent application No. 1993-274434 (related art 3).
The "body feature point detecting apparatus and physical movement analyzer" of the related art 1 performs movement analysis based on collected characteristics of physical movements for every human body part by shooting physical movements. Also, the "movement analyzer" of the related art 2 includes magnetic sensors corresponding to respective human body parts that detect the magnetic parts that are formed on a magnetic recording medium so as to measure movement amount quantitatively. Further, in addition, in the "movement analyzing method and its apparatus" of the related art 3, a bright gage mark is attached to a part of a human body so that the moving object can be recorded and a movement analysis is performed based on the trajectory of the gage mark.
Also, in general, deteriorated posture retention of the elderly people is the fundamental cause that makes them topple over to be a bedbound person. This deteriorated posture retention is remarkably observable in walking. In the case of elderly people, for example, deterioration in posture retention reduces walking speed and narrows walking strides. As a compensation for this, they enlarge the distance between the right leg and the left leg (called "stance" from here) so as to secure stability.
Therefore, there is a need to measure stances at the time of walking. In general, Gravicorders are used as a tool for performing human movement analysis. The feature of this technique is to perform movement analysis of the center of gravity at the time when a person gets on the load detection board which is previously set on a straight floor. For example, refer to Patent No. 2760472, related art 4.
However, in a technique using an image analyzing method and the like shown in the above-mentioned related art 1 to 3, it takes a lot of labor to collect and analyze data because the handling of the data is huge and redundant, and thus there emerges a problem that it is rarely used at sites of rehabilitation or sports training which have restrictions on time, cost and so on.
Also, in the case of the technique shown in the above-mentioned related art 4, areas where a person makes movements, kinds of movements, postures and the like are limited because measurement of human physical movements (trajectory) should be done by making a person get on the load detection board, which is troublesome for a person and a measurer (for example, a medical staff member and a caregiver). Also, in this case, there is a problem that measuring a walking state is impossible.

Physical movement analyzer and physical movement analyzing method

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.


A battery pack in accordance with an exemplary embodiment, which is booted when coupled to an external apparatus, includes: a connector which is a member configured to connect the external apparatus and the battery pack; and a booting circuit configured to start operation of the battery pack when the battery pack and the external apparatus are coupled. The connector includes: a (+) output terminal connected to a (+) output terminal of the battery pack; a coupling check terminal configured to check whether the external apparatus and the battery pack are coupled; a data transceiving terminal configured to tranceive data between the external apparatus and the battery pack; and a (−) output terminal connected to a (−) output terminal of the battery pack.

Recently, high output secondary batteries using a high-energy density nonaqueous electrolyte have been developed. A large-capacity secondary battery is provided by connecting a plurality of high-output secondary batteries in series so as to be usable for an apparatus, such as an electric vehicle, requiring strong power for driving a motor.
As such, a single large-capacity secondary battery (hereinafter referred to as "battery") is composed of a plurality of batteries generally connected in series. To this end, there is provided a control unit that monitors and controls a state of the battery on the whole. The control unit monitors the voltage, current, temperature, etc., of a battery, estimates the state of charge (SOC) of the battery by calculation, and controls the battery.
Meanwhile, such a control unit operates in a discharging or charging state, but when the battery is not a discharging or charging state, since the control unit consumes power, it is necessary to turn off the control unit to reduce power consumption.
As such, when the battery was not in a discharging or charging state, in related arts, in order to reduce power consumption of the control part, the control unit was allowed to operate in a sleep mode and the battery was continuously checked whether to be coupled to an external apparatus.
However, when the control unit operating in the sleep mode is left for a long period of time, battery discharge may occur.
Thus, the present disclosure proposes a battery pack which allows the battery to enter into a shutdown mode or a power-down mode when the battery is not coupled to an external apparatus, and release the shutdown mode or the power-down mode when the battery is coupled to an external apparatus.

Battery pack having fastening recognition function


In remote control systems (as in many other circumstances) the color representation of a bitmap is one of the heaviest factor in term of storage occupation and speed of transmission. Often, only a limited number of colors is actually used by a bitmap, so that the bit pattern of the single pixels is bigger than what is really needed to represent all the possible different colors. With the present invention, in case the number of colors does not exceed a predetermined thresholds, a palette table containing all the colors used in the bitmap is created. The pixel representations in the bitmap are then replaced by a pointer to the corresponding entry in the palette table. This allows to reduce the total size of the bitmap. The reduced bitmap is then transmitted together with the associated palette table. The receiving computer (the controller in a remote control system) is able to rebuild the original bitmap with the help of the palette table.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a method and system for reducing the storage occupation of a color bitmap, particularly for use in those systems where a bitmap must be stored or transmitted through a network.
2. Description of Related Art
Bitmap size is a critical parameter, particularly when the bitmap is to be stored or transmitted over a network. The storage occupation in the first case and the speed of transmission in the latter can be heavily affected. For this reason many techniques have been developed for reducing the size of bitmaps and consequently their storage occupation and speed of transmission. One kind of application, even if not the only one, where this need is extremely important is "remote control". Remote control programs are a special category of communication applications; they go beyond just connecting a computer with another computer to actually taking control of it. By connecting through phone lines and modems or through LAN connections, these programs can put all the resources of one data processing system (e.g. a personal computer or a workstation), usually called the target, under the complete control of another data processing system (e.g. a personal computer or a workstation, connected with a LAN), usually called the controller. The controller screen duplicates the target one. The keyboard of the controller can enter characters directly on the target data processing system; the mouse of the controller can move the mouse pointer on the target screen. The controller screen constantly receives data from the target data processing system screen. Likewise, the keyboard of the controller sends data to the target data processing system every time a key is hit. For all practical purposes, the controller user may as well be sitting in front of the target data processing system.
This kind of remote control software can be useful in a number of circumstances. Just as an example an office personal computer system can be controlled and operated from home personal computers. If the office PC is left connected (e.g. to a modem), the control can be taken from the home PC and all the resources of the target PC can be controlled and used remotely. A more specific use is to dial in (e.g. via modem) to a network—connected PC at the office, log in, and run network applications or update shared files on the network.
The bottleneck caused by transmission lines can have a significant effect on the speed of remote control operations. To boost performances, remote control programs try to reduce and minimize the amount of data that needs to be transmitted over the communication lines (e.g. LAN or telephone cables). The refresh of the video image on the display screen of the target PC, which should be duplicated on the controller PC, constitutes the main factor in the transmission speed, due to the large quantity of information which has to be transferred. In the past, remote control programs worked by sending and refreshing the entire image of the target PC screen to the remote PC every fraction of a second. The constant rate at which the screen images were sent to the controller PC was called the screen refresh rate. The controller PC screen accurately reflected the target PC screen as changes at the target PC would be included in the next screen refresh. This approach was, of course, not very satisfactory in terms of speed, because of the enormous amount of data to be transmitted at each refresh.
Often, a change of the image is limited to a small section of the screen (e.g. pulling down a menu, highlighting an object) and only the changed data need to be refreshed. The controller system can use the screen data previously received and just refresh the modified part of the screen. By cutting out redundant screen refresh data, a remote control program can improve the response time. Cache memories speed the performance of hard drives and memory chips, and can also be useful for remote control programs. The idea behind a cache is to keep recently used data in a temporary storage area that is quickly accessible. If the data are soon needed again, it is much quicker to access them from a fast-access temporary storage area than to retrieve from the original source. According to this technique, elements of a recently displayed screen are saved as a cache in extended memory. The entire age redraws from the controller PC screen cache, eliminating the need to transfer large amounts of information over the modem from the target to the controller PC. Screen elements that are often redrawn from a screen cache include bitmaps, text and fonts.
In the transmission of a bitmap image, one of the heaviest information to send is the color of each pixel. In the well known RGB format, the color of each pixel is represented by three octets (i.e. three bytes having 8 bits each), one for the Red, one for the Green and one for the Blue. The maximum possible number of differnt colors is 16,777,216, i.e. 2**24. This representation with all the possible colors is called "true color".
In remote control systems (as in many other circumstances) this detailed color representation is not always needed and the transmission of all this information frequently constitutes an unwanted burden. Usually for the scope of the controller system, a poorer color image would be enough. For this reason, many remote control systems use color reduction algorithms to reduce the color representation from 24 (or 16) bits to 8 bits or even 4 bits. An example of a function implementing these algorithms is GetDIBits from Microsoft. A drawback of prior art color reduction functions is that they require a relatively long computation time to perform this color reduction, mostly due to the effort of creating a reduced image as close as possible to the original one. In remote control system, where these operations must be performed very often at a very high speed rate, the color reduction delay is unacceptable. An alternative reduction mechanism is the one implemented by Tivoli Remote Control by International Business Machines Corp and described in GB Patent Application 9917455.9. This mechanism has the advantage of a faster processing, balanced by a reduced precision in the correspondance between the resulting "reduced" colors and the original ones. This reduced precision is normally acceptable, particularly in remote control systems, and preferrable to a delay in computation. A method combining the speed and easiness of processing with the precision of the results would therefore be highly welcome.


The present disclosure provides a supplemental load circuit configured to provide a supplemental power consumption to enable a lamp unit operating at a low power consumption to operate with a traffic controller configured to test for a higher power consumption. The supplemental load circuit includes a load, power input circuitry configured to receive a DC power signal from the lamp unit, and a control switch configured to receive a control signal having a duty cycle from the lamp unit. The control switch is configured to control application of the DC power signal to the load by the power input circuitry based on the duty cycle of the control signal. The present disclosure also provides a method for enabling a lamp unit to operate with a traffic controller designed for higher power lamp units.

Generally, traffic light control systems have been specifically designed to operate with incandescent or halogen lamps. Both of these lamp types are relatively high power consumption devices. More recently, the use of LED traffic lamps has found favor for many reasons; including longer life expectancies than previously used lamps, as well as their operation at significantly lower energy consumption rates.
An issue has arisen, however, in that some specific street traffic light controllers expect a load power consumption greatly exceeding that of an LED traffic lamp. In these cases, simply replacing the normally used incandescent or halogen lamp with an LED lamp unit can cause the controller to malfunction or otherwise decide that the lamp unit is burned out and, thus, stop sending AC power signals to the traffic lamp or operate the traffic lamp in a mode in which the "red" lamp unit flashes repeatedly. These situations can cause dangerous conditions for motorists and pedestrians.
In view of these known issues, it would be advantageous, therefore, to provide a circuit for use with LED traffic lamps that will allow existing street traffic light controllers to continue normal operations using LED or other types of low power consumption lamp units.

Supplemental load circuit for low power traffic lamps


Method and apparatus for performing centralized cyclic redundancy checks (CRC). For one embodiment a current thread of execution compares a connection index with that of a previous thread of execution. If they share the same connection index, a CRC calculation may be performed without providing a CRC residue to a centralized CRC unit since the most recently produced CRC residue by would be associated with a preceding sequential cell of the same packet. For an alternative embodiment a current thread of execution requests a CRC calculation and provides a connection index to the centralized CRC unit, which is used to access a content addressable memory (CAM). A hit in the CAM indicates that the CRC unit may use the CRC residue associated with the connection index in the CAM since it would have resulted from a preceding sequential cell.

A cyclic redundancy check (CRC) is a widely used technique wherein a particular polynomial is used to assure data reliability. The CRC may be used to protect blocks of data called frames or cells wherein, the transmitter appends an extra n-bit sequence called a frame check sequence (FCS). The FCS holds redundant information about the frame that helps the receiver detect errors.
For example, some commonly used polynomials for CRC calculations are:                CRC-12: X12+X11+X3+X2+X+1,        CRC-16: X16+X15+X2+1,        CRC-CCITT: X16+X12+X5+1,        CRC-32: X32+X26+X23+X22+X16+X12+X11+X10+X8+X7+X5+X4+X2+X1.
CRC-32, for example, generates a 32-bit FCS, which is used by the local network standards committee (IEEE-802) and some Department of Defense (DOD) applications. The same algorithm or hardware may be used to compute the FCS or to check the data using the FCS. By appending an extra n-bit sequence of zeroes to the data as input, an FCS will be produced as output. By appending the n-bit FCS sequence to the data as input, an n-bit sequence of zeroes will be produced as output if there are no transmission errors.
A network processor may perform CRC calculations as a transmitter and/or as a receiver for multiple frames or cells of one data packet or of multiple data packets. These packets may be of various different internetworking protocols or of one particular internetworking protocol. For example, Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) is a set of protocols that use the concept of a connection and require ATM specific signaling protocols and addressing structures, as well as protocols to route ATM connection requests across an ATM network. A virtual circuit is set up across the ATM network prior to transferring data. ATM circuits can be virtual paths, identified by a virtual path identifier (VPI) or virtual channels, identified by the combination of a VPI and a virtual channel identifier (VCI). A virtual path is a bundle of virtual channels with a common VPI.
A typical network processor while operating as an ATM switch receives a cell of a specific VCI/VPI value; looks up the connection value in a local connection table to retrieve an associated CRC residue, identify an outgoing port and optionally get a new VPI/VCI value for that particular connection; calculates a new CRC residue for the connection to update the local connection table, and retransmits the cell on that outgoing link with appropriate connection identifiers. For example, one of the more common ATM Adaptation Layers (AAL) used to transmit data across ATM networks is called AAL5. AAL5 requires packets transmitted using a particular connection to be received in sequence, without interleaving cells of different packets on the same connection so that the receiver will be able to reconstruct the packet. Updating the CRC residue for the connection, permits sequential CRC calculations for the packet. Unfortunately, as the network processor may be handling a large number of connections, the local table may become rather large, and latencies for repeated accesses to retrieve and to update CRC residues may represent a significant fraction of time in processing the packet.
Some network processors have provided for switching between multiple software threads of execution to permit access latencies to overlap with useful computations. Commonly though, cases may arise in which adjacent software threads may be processing sequential cells of the same connection as shown with reference to adjacent threads 301 and 302 of FIG. 3. In such cases, an access 315 to retrieve an updated CRC residue must necessarily be performed sequentially with respect to the access 314 that updates the CRC residue. Therefore, potential throughput of the network processor may be limited by the frequency of occurrence of these cases. Unfortunately, the frequency may be rather high for some commonly used AALs (like AAL5 for example).

Method and apparatus for performing cyclic redundancy checks