A resonant power source apparatus has a series circuit of switching elements QL and QH connected to ends of a DC power source, a series circuit of a current-resonant capacitor, a resonant reactor, and a primary winding of a transformer connected to ends of the switching element QL or QH, a rectifying/smoothing circuit to rectify and smooth a voltage of a secondary winding, a pulse ratio controller to alternately turn on/off the switching elements QL and QH according to an output voltage from the rectifying/smoothing circuit, and a resonant period detector to detect a period during which energy is transmitted from the primary side to the secondary side of the transformer. The pulse ratio controller determines an ON period of the switching element according to a signal from the resonant period detector and an ON period of the switching element QH according to a signal from the rectifying/smoothing circuit.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a resonant power source apparatus that is highly efficient, low noise, and inexpensive.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIG. 1 shows a current-resonant power source apparatus according to a related art. In FIG. 1, ends of a DC power source 1 are connected to a series circuit consisting of a MOSFET as a switching element QH and a MOSFET as a switching element QL. An end of the switching element QH is connected to a positive electrode of the DC power source 1. An end of the switching element QL is connected to a negative electrode of the DC power source 1.
The switching element QH is connected in parallel with a diode D2. The switching element QL is connected in parallel with a diode D1. The switching element QH is connected in parallel with a voltage-resonant capacitor Crv.
The voltage-resonant capacitor Crv is connected in parallel with a current-resonant circuit consisting of a current-resonant capacitor Cri, a resonant reactor Lr, and a primary winding P1 of a transformer T. The voltage-resonant capacitor Crv, current-resonant capacitor Cri, resonant reactor Lr, and the primary winding P1 of the transformer T form a resonant circuit.
The resonant reactor Lr may be a leakage inductance of the transformer T. The voltage-resonant capacitor Crv may be a parasitic capacitance of the switching element QH. The diode D2 connected in parallel with the switching element QH may be a parasitic diode of the switching element QH. The diode D1 connected in parallel with the switching element QL may be a parasitic diode of the switching element QL.
The primary winding P1 and a secondary winding S of the transformer T are wound so as to generate in-phase voltages. The secondary winding S of the transformer T is connected to a rectifying/smoothing circuit consisting of a rectifier D0 and a smoothing capacitor Co. The rectifying/smoothing circuit rectifies and smoothes a voltage (on/off-controlled pulse voltage) induced by the secondary winding S of the transformer T, to provide a DC output for a load 4.
Both ends of the smoothing capacitor Co are connected to an output voltage detector 5. The output voltage detector 5 detects an output voltage of the smoothing capacitor Co, generates an error voltage signal indicative of a difference between the detected voltage and a reference voltage, and supplies the error voltage signal through a photocoupler PC to a pulse ratio controller (PRC) 2. Based on the error voltage signal, the pulse ratio controller 2 generates a pulse ratio control signal to control the ON duty ratio of a pulse. The pulse ratio control signal is used by a high-side driver 3 to alternately turn on/off the switching elements QH and QL in such a way as to maintain a constant voltage for the load 4. To alternately turn on/off the switching elements QH and QL, voltage is applied to gates of the switching elements QH and QL.
Operation of the resonant power source apparatus of the above-mentioned configuration will be explained with reference to a timing chart of FIG. 2.
The ON period of the switching element QL is set to a given time width that involves a proper margin with respect to a half period of the resonance frequency of the resonant circuit consisting of the current-resonant capacitor Cri and resonant reactor Lr. The ON period of the switching element QH is determined according to the error voltage signal from the output voltage detector 5.
In FIG. 2, VQL is a terminal voltage of the switching element QL, IQL is a current passing through the switching element QL, IP1 is a current passing through the primary winding P1, VS is a terminal voltage of the secondary winding S, and ID0 is a current passing through the rectifier D0. The resonant reactor Lr is sufficiently smaller than the exciting inductance Lp of the primary winding P1, and the voltage-resonant capacitor Crv is sufficiently smaller than the current-resonant capacitor Cri.
In a period T1, the switching element QH is OFF, and the switching element QL changes from ON to OFF. Energy accumulated in the resonant reactor Lr and the exciting inductance Lp of the transformer T produces the resonant current IP1 that is passed from the resonant reactor Lr and exciting inductance Lp to the voltage-resonant capacitor Crv, current-resonant capacitor Cri, and primary winding P1. The exciting inductance Lp of the transformer T, resonant reactor Lr, and voltage-resonant capacitor Crv resonate to discharge the voltage-resonant capacitor Crv. As a result, a voltage VQH decreases and the voltage VQL increases.
In a period T2, the switching elements QL and QH are OFF. The voltage-resonant capacitor Crv completes the discharging, the voltage VQH is zero, and the voltage VQL is equal to a terminal voltage of the DC power source 1. The resonant current IP1 continuously passes in a clockwise direction through a path passing along the resonant reactor Lr, diode D2, current-resonant capacitor Cri, and primary winding P1. When the switching element QH is turned on, a period T3 starts. In the period T3, the switching element QH is ON and the switching element QL is OFF. The current IP1 decreases and continuously passes in a clockwise direction through a path passing along the resonant reactor Lr, switching element QH, current-resonant capacitor Cri, and primary winding P1. When this current becomes zero, a period T4 starts.
In the period T4, the switching element QH is ON and the switching element QL is OFF. The direction of the current IP1 is reversed. Namely, the resonant current IP1 passes in a counterclockwise direction through the primary winding P1 current-resonant capacitor Cri, switching element QH, and resonant reactor Lr, to reset the magnetic flux of the transformer T.
In the periods T1 to T4, the exciting inductance Lp of the transformer, the resonant reactor Lr, and the current-resonant capacitor Cri resonate to pass the current IP1.
In a period T5, the switching element QH turns off and the switching element QL is OFF. The current IP1 of the primary winding P1 of the transformer T is a resonant current that passes in a counterclockwise direction through the path passing along the primary winding P1, current-resonant capacitor Cri, voltage-resonant capacitor Crv, reactor Lr, and primary winding P1. The exciting inductance Lp of the transformer T, the reactor Lr, and the voltage-resonant capacitor Crv resonate to charge the voltage-resonant capacitor Crv, increase the voltage VQH, and decrease the voltage VQL.
In a period T6, the switching elements QH and QL are OFF. The voltage-resonant capacitor Crv is charged to the voltage of the DC power source 1, the voltage VQH becomes equal to the voltage of the DC power source 1, and the voltage VQL becomes zero. As a result, the resonant current IP1 continuously passes in a counterclockwise direction through the primary winding P1, current-resonant capacitor Cri, DC power source 1, diode D1, and reactor Lr.
In a period T7, the switching element QL turns on and the switching element QH is OFF. The resonant current IP1 continuously passes in a counterclockwise direction through the path passing along the primary winding P1, current-resonant capacitor Cri, DC power source 1, switching element QL, and resonant reactor Lr. In the periods T5 to T7, the exciting inductance Lp of the transformer T, the resonant reactor Lr, and the current-resonant capacitor Cri resonate to pass the current IP1 (the current IQL of the switching element QL).
In a period T8, the switching element QL is ON and the switching element QH is OFF. The current IP1 continuously passes in the counterclockwise direction through a path passing along the primary winding P1, current-resonant capacitor Cri, DC power source 1, switching element QL, and resonant reactor Lr. The current ID0 starts to pass through the rectifier D0 on the secondary side.
In a period T9, the switching element QL is ON and the switching element QH is OFF. The current IP1 from the DC power source 1 passes through a path passing along the current-resonant capacitor Cri, primary winding P1, and switching element QL. The current ID0 continuously passes through the rectifier D0 on the secondary side.
In the periods T8 and T9, the resonant reactor Lr and current-resonant capacitor Cri resonate to pass the current IP1 (equal to the current IQL of the switching element QL). In the periods T8 and T9, energy is transmitted from the primary winding P1 to the secondary winding S of the transformer T. At this time, the current ID0 passed from the primary side to the secondary side increases along a curve as time passes. At a certain point, the current ID0 starts to decrease and becomes zero after a resonant period t1 (corresponding to the periods T6 to T9). The energy transferred to the secondary side is rectified and smoothed through the rectifier D0 and smoothing capacitor Co, so that DC power is supplied to the load 4.
In a period T10, the switching element QL is ON and the switching element QH is OFF. The current IP1 (equal to the current IQL of the switching element QL) provided by the DC power source 1 passes through the path passing through the current-resonant capacitor Cri, primary winding P1, resonant reactor Lr, and switching element QL. The current ID0 stops. In the period T10, the exciting inductance Lp of the transformer T, the resonant reactor Lr, and the current-resonant capacitor Cri resonate to pass the current IP1 (equal to the current IQL of the switching element QL). After the period T10 (corresponding to a period t2 determined by an oscillation frequency or a duty ratio), the switching element QL turns off and the switching element QH turns on to start a reset period t3 (corresponding to the periods T1 to T5).
If the switching element QL turns off in the period t1 for transferring energy to the secondary side, no zero-current switching is carried out, and therefore, the rectifier D0 causes recovery noise to increase the switching noise and switching loss of the switching element QL.
To avoid this problem, the ON period of the switching element QL must have a sufficient margin to cover a variation in the period t1 due to variations of the current-resonant capacitor Cri and resonant reactor Lr. Namely, the ON period of t1+t2 must be sufficiently long.
If the period t2 is too long, an effective value of the current IP1 increases to increase a loss. In addition, a period for applying voltage to the primary side of the transformer T is extended to increase a loss in the transformer T. The loss is irrelevant to an original purpose of supplying energy to the secondary side, and therefore, is undesirable. In addition, the loss deteriorates the efficacy of the power source apparatus.
To solve the problem, Japanese Examined Patent Application Publication No. JP7-63216 (Japanese Patent No. 2042563) discloses a series resonant converter. FIG. 3 shows the converter. The converter includes a series circuit of two switching elements 102 and 103, a series circuit of two rectifiers 104 and 105, and a series circuit of two capacitors 106 and 107. These series circuits are connected to a DC power source 101. A node between the rectifiers 104 and 105 is connected to a node between the capacitors 106 and 107. The node between the rectifiers 104 and 105 and a node between the switching elements 102 and 103 are connected to a series circuit of a primary winding of a transformer 108 and a reactor 109. A secondary winding of the transformer 108 is connected to a rectifier 110 and an output capacitor 111. A transformer voltage detector 130 detects a voltage on the secondary winding of the transformer 108. A logic circuit 150 compares the output of the transformer voltage detector 130 with drive signals for controlling the switching elements, turns on the switching elements 102 and 103 during a period in which the transformer 108 generates voltage, and turns off the switching elements 102 and 103 after a disappearance of the voltage of the transformer 108.
This series resonant converter zeroes voltage applied to the transformer when a period for supplying energy to the secondary side ends, thereby zeroing voltage induced by the secondary winding.


A printer contains a list of objects to be printed under control of a controller. Different resolutions for the objects are included in the list of objects to be printed. In one embodiment, each item has an associated resolution indicating a minimum resolution for printing the item, unless the item before it has the same resolution. In such a case, the previous resolution is used to render ensuing objects for printing until an object requires a different resolution. A rendering module renders the object for printing as a function of the listed resolutions and resolutions supported by the printer. If the desired resolution is lower than that supported by the printer, the lowest resolution of the printer is used to render the object.

Many printers, such as laser printers and ink jet printers, commonly receive data in page description language form before starting the printing process. With a page description language (PDL), a page is represented using graphics, text, and images that can be specified to be located anywhere on the page, and in any order, using successive commands of the language. The PDL commands reflect the way the page is composed. However, before printing, the received data must be rasterized so a page print mechanism ("print engine") in the printer can print the page while moving the print media (e.g, paper) uniformly in one direction, usually top to bottom.
Rasterization is the process of converting data that represent a page or portion of a page into a series of individual dots or pixels across the printed page to form a raster scanline, producing successive scanlines one after another down the page. The complete set of scanlines for a page is the raster data for the page. Rasterization is performed in the page printer by a rasterizer or other processor.
PDL commands for the page are converted to an intermediate representation called an "object display list" prior to rasterization. An object display list is a sequence of objects to be printed along with various print commands. The object display list is a compact representation of the page to be printed.
In many cases, a page to be printed is divided into several strips, such as horizontal strips of data. An object display list is created for each strip, which can be separately rasterized. By so dividing the page, the processing and memory requirements to provide rasterization are reduced. All the information for a particular band is contained in the display list commands for that band.
Strips contain many different types of objects to be printed, such as fonts, vectors, bit maps and others. Each strip is rendered and printed by a print engine. Rendering is normally performed to a resolution that is selected by a user. A user can enter the resolution for a page on a front panel of a printer. Higher resolutions require larger quantities of data to be rendered, which can require more time, storage and disk bandwidth. If a resolution of 1200 dpi is selected, that resolution is used for printing regardless of what is on the page. If an object having a resolution of 150 dpi raster is to be printed, it is scaled up to 1200 dpi and rendered. It is desired to minimize the amount of data that needs to be rendered.

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.


Camera compensation methods and systems that compensate for misalignment of sensors/camera in stereoscopic camera systems. The compensation includes identifying a pitch angle offset between a first camera and a second camera, determining misalignment of the first and second cameras from the identified pitch angle offset, determining a relative compensation delay responsive to the determined misalignment, introducing the relative compensation delay to image streams produced by the cameras, and producing a stereoscopic image on a display from the first and second image streams with the introduced delay.

Stereoscopic camera systems utilize a pair of sensors/cameras to capture images of a scene from two viewpoints. A conventional camera in such systems typically utilizes either a charge coupled device (CCD) sensor or a complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) sensor to capture an image frame of a scene. CCD sensors typically use a global shutter, which simultaneously captures the entire frame. CMOS sensors, on the other hand, typically use a rolling shutter, which sequentially exposes different parts of the frame at different points in time.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.


A fluid rotating apparatus of a positive displacement type pump includes a plurality of rotors accommodated in a housing, a bearing for rotatably supporting the rotors, a suction port and a discharge port formed in the housing, a plurality of motors for individually rotating the rotors, a detector for detecting rotating angles and rotating speeds of the motors, a synchronous controller for controlling rotation of the plurality of motors by a signal from the detector, and a transporting member coaxially provided on one of the rotors and on the upstream side thereof. The transporting member includes a rotary disk rotatable together with the rotor and a fixed disk opposed to the rotary disk fixed to the housing so as to maintain a gap between the rotary disk and the fixed disk. A spiral groove is formed on one of a surface of the rotary disk and an opposing surface of the fixed surface so as to transport one of fluid and gas molecules in a radial direction of the rotor between the rotary disk and the fixed disk. In this manner, fluid (i.e., liquid or gas) molecules are sucked and discharged due to a capacity change of a space defined by the rotors and the housing through synchronous control by the synchronous controller.

The present invention relates to a fluid rotating apparatus such as a vacuum pump, a compressor, or the like.
FIG. 13 shows an example of a conventional sliding vane vacuum pump provided with only one rotor. In the vacuum pump with one rotor, when the rotor 101 rotates, two blades 102 inserted in the rotor 101 in the diametrical direction of the rotor 101 are driven and rotated inside a cylindrical fixed wall 103 (stator). At this time, the leading ends of the blades 102 are kept in contact with the fixed wall since the blades 102 are always urged in the radical direction of the rotor 101 by the action of a spring 104. Subsequent to the rotation, the capacity of each of the spaces 105 partitioned by the blades 102 in the fixed wall is changed, and a gas entering from a suction port 106 formed at the fixed wall is eventually sucked and compressed and flows out through a discharge port 107 having a discharge valve In the vacuum pump of this type, in order to prevent internal leakage, it is necessary to seal the side surface and the leading ends of the blades 102, the side surface of the fixed wall 103, and the side surface of the rotor 101 with oil membranes, respectively. However, when this kind of vacuum pump is used in the manufacturing process of semiconductors, e.g., CVD or dry etching, etc. using a highly corrosive reactive gas such as chlorine gas, the gas reacts with the sealing oil to thereby generate a reaction product in the pump. In this situation, it becomes necessary to perform maintenance work frequently so as to remove the reaction product, and moreover, the pump should be cleaned and the oil should be exchanged every time maintenance work is performed, thus bringing the manufacturing process to a halt. The activity rate is hence decreased. So long as the sealing oil is used in the vacuum pump, the oil is scattered from the downstream side to the upstream side, polluting the vacuum chamber and deteriorating the manufacturing efficiency.
In view of the above-described inconveniences, a positive displacement type screw vacuum pump has been developed and put into practical use as a dry pump which does not require the sealing oil. FIG. 14 is a side sectional view of an example of such screw vacuum pump. Within a housing 111 are provided two rotors 112, the rotary shafts of which are made parallel to each other. Spiral grooves are formed on the peripheral surfaces of the rotors 112. A space is defined when a recess portion (groove) 113a of one rotor and a projection 113b of the other rotor are meshed with each other. Thus, as the rotors 112 rotate, the capacity of the space changes, to cause sucking and discharging of the fluid.
In addition to the positive displacement type vacuum pump, a turbo type vacuum pump as shown in FIG. 15 has been developed.
The turbo type vacuum pump comprises a rotary shaft 150, a motor 15, ball bearings 152a and 152b, and a housing 153. A plurality of rotary disks 154 arranged in multiple stages is provided on the rotary shaft 150 and a spiral groove is formed on each of the surfaces of the rotary disks 154. An opposed surface 155 is formed on the fixed side of the pump, with a small gap provided therebetween to cause suction and discharge of the gas due to molecular drag operation of the spiral groove caused by the high speed rotation of the rotary shaft 150.
The positive displacement type vacuum pump and the turbo type vacuum pump have the following disadvantages:
In the conventional positive displacement type screw vacuum pump referred to above and shown in FIG. 14, the synchronous rotation of the rotors 112 is achieved by timing gears. That is, the rotation of a motor 115 is transmitted from a driving gear 116a to an intermediate gear 116b and further to one of the meshed timing gears 116c of the rotors 112. The phase of the rotating angles of both rotors 112 is adjusted by the engagement between the two timing gears 116c. Therefore, since the screw vacuum pump uses the gears both for transmission of the motor power and for synchronous rotation of the rotors as described hereinabove, a lubricating oil filled in a machine chamber 117 which houses the gears must be supplied to the gears. Moreover, a mechanical seal 119 should be provided between the machine chamber 117 and a fluid chamber 118 so as to prevent the lubricating oil from entering the chamber 118 where the rotors are accommodated.
The vacuum pump with two rotors in the above-described construction has disadvantages yet to be solved, in that (1) many gears are required for the power transmission and the synchronous rotation, i.e., many parts are required, resulting in a complicated structure of the apparatus, (2) a high speed operation cannot be expected and the apparatus is bulky in size since the rotors are synchronously rotated due to the contact maintained between the gears, (3) a mechanical seal must be regularly exchanged due to the abrasion thereof, such that a completely maintenance-free pump is not realized, (4) a large sliding torque due to the mechanical seal induces large mechanical losses, and so on.
Unlike the screw vacuum pump having two rotors, the turbo type vacuum pump has one rotor, namely, one rotary shaft. Accordingly, the rotary shaft can be driven at a high speed because the turbo type vacuum pump has no sliding mechanism allowing the two shafts to synchronously rotate. A clean dry pump can constituted by supplying lubricating oil to only the bearing section and providing a sealing section for preventing the penetration of the oil into the pump section.
Since the drag operation of the spiral groove allows the discharge performance of the pump to range from a viscous flow region to a molecular flow region, a vacuum can be generated to a degree of 10.sup.-5 torr.
As apparent from the graph of FIG. 4 showing, by a conventional example (1), characteristic data of the relationship between discharge speed and inlet pressure, in this kind of pump, i.e., the pump in FIG. 14, utilizing the molecular drag operation, the discharge speed is reduced to a great extent when the inlet pressure is in the range between atmospheric pressure and an intermediate degree of vacuum (10-3 to 10.sup.0 torr).
The generation of heat which occurs in the pump section in the above-described range of the inlet pressure makes it difficult to achieve continuous operation of the pump. As a result, the discharge period of time is long, which deteriorates the operational efficiency of the pump used in a semiconductor plant.

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.


A cardiac arrhythmia monitor provides electrodes to allow daily ECG measurements of a patient without cumbersome electrode connection to the patient. ECG data may be diagnosed by the monitor to indicate likelihood of an arrhythmia and an indication provided to the patient ECG data based on that indication may be forwarded to a physician or other healthcare professional for a review.

The present invention relates to electronic devices for detecting a cardiac arrhythmia and in particular to a device providing improved patient mobility and reliable long-term monitoring.
The human heart normally beats anywhere from 60 to 80 beats per minute when a person is at rest. Diagnosis of cardiac arrhythmias normally requires that a qualified professional review an electrocardiograph (ECG) in which the electrical impulses from the heart are recorded and displayed in chart form. The electrical impulses are measured by electrodes attached at a number of locations to the patient's chest. Certain episodes of cardiac arrhythmias, although serious, can be unnoticed by the patient. For example, it is desirable that chronic atrial fibrillation be treated within 48 hours of its onset.
One possible solution is the use of a "cardiac event recorder", a portable ECG recording device carried by the patient and communicating with electrodes worn under the patient's clothing and adhesively attached to the patient's skin. Such recorders may provide algorithms for monitoring the ECG signal and may report to the users, for example, that atrial fibrillation has begun. Recorders of this type may also record a rolling "window" of ECG data using solid state computer memory. In this latter case, the recorded ECG data may be transmitted over phone lines or the like for review by a qualified physician.
Unfortunately, the cardiac event recorder is not a practical tool for providing a warning of the onset of certain cardiac arrhythmias that can occur unexpectedly at any time in later life. The need for the patient to carry the cardiac event monitor about during the day and the continuous attachment of electrodes is impractical for long term monitoring that may span decades.
What is therefore needed is a less cumbersome, and more patient-friendly, apparatus and method for detecting cardiac arrhythmias than currently achieved.


A system, method, and computer program product for benchmarking a stream processing system are disclosed. The method comprises generating a plurality of correlated test streams. A semantically related data set is embedded within each of the test streams in the plurality of correlated test streams. The plurality of correlated test streams is provided to at least one stream processing system. A summary is generated for each of the semantically related embedded data sets. A common identifier, which is transparent to the system being tested, is embedded within each stream in the plurality of correlated test streams. The common identifier is extracted from the output data set generated by the stream processing system. At least one of the stored copies of the summaries and the common identifier are compared to an output data set including a set of zero or more correlation results generated by the stream processing system.

Stream processing systems analyze various incoming streams to determine dependencies among the streams. For example, analytic modules may process multiple streams to detect common patterns, interdependent events, content generated by common sources or related users, and the like. One way of testing these systems is to transmit test streams with known parameters to the stream processing system. Therefore, stream generation is employed for performance characterization, testing, and benchmarking of stream processing systems dealing with processing, forwarding, storing and/or analysis of stream traffic. Stream generation typically aims to simulate or emulate streams generated by different types of applications, protocols and activities. For example, the activities might include email, chat, web browsing, message boards, newsgroups, cellular activity, and the like. Different approaches have been used for generating the streams, such as model driven simulations and client-server architectures.
Examples of currently available stream generation tools include commercial products such as LoadRunner, Netpressure, Http-Load, and MegaSIP; and academic prototypes such as SURGE, Wagon, Httperf, Harpoon, NetProbe, D-ITG, MGEN, and LARIAT.
The existing stream generation approaches focus primarily on matching predetermined volumetric and timing properties, and ignore statistical properties at the content level, such as content and contextual semantics. Most of the existing approaches for stream generation are application specific or lack scalability and/or modularity. Another problem with current stream generating systems is that they are domain/protocol specific. For example, current stream generating systems generate a single type of stream, e.g. web requests. Multiple streams can be generated but they are uncorrelated streams with little or no content richness. Current stream generating systems are not suitable for testing and benchmarking stream processing systems that make intelligent decisions based on analysis of content in correlated streams.
Therefore a need exists to overcome the problems with the prior art as discussed above.

System and method for benchmarking correlated stream processing systems

International Business Machines Corporation


An enclosure for an electrical device includes a first wall portion. The first wall portion has a first cable through passageway with an edge, a portion of the edge being rolled. A second wall portion is adjacent the first wall portion and has a removable knock-out portion at least partially covering a second cable through passageway.

The present invention relates to an enclosure for an electrical device that has a through passageway for routing cables. More particularly, the present invention relates to an enclosure for an electrical device including a wall portion having a through passageway with a rolled edge for routing cables. A movable tray overlies the wall portion and has a removable knock-out portion that substantially aligns with the through passageway.
Conventional enclosures for electrical devices are generally used to help transmit voice and data communications, which are transmitted through electric wires, fiber optic cables with a plurality of fiber optic strands, coaxial cables, or microwave systems. Fiber optic lines are becoming the most desirable transmission medium because they have a larger transmission capacity than other transmission media. Thus, to handle the large volume of voice and data communications in many applications, commercial carriers that operate wide area networks and businesses using internal networks often install fiber optic cables.
In a typical application, a telecommunication company or other commercial carrier connects one or more fiber optic cables to an enclosure unit or electrical box. Each fiber optic cable generally has a plurality of fiber optic strands; and each fiber optic strand is generally connected to a separate connector in the enclosure unit. The connectors of the enclosure units are also coupled to internal lines routed to adapters, jacks or other types of connectors at specific locations within a building. Enclosure units are usually wall or rack mounted. To maximize the number of enclosure units that can fit in the limited space of a typical communications room, a number of enclosure units are preferably mounted in a single rack.
With a typical rack-mount enclosure unit, a number of connection units are vertically mounted in the rack. The fiber optic cables or individual fiber optic strands typically pass from one enclosure unit to the next by being fed or threaded into cable passageways in the sides, tops and/or bottoms in the enclosure units.
Conventional rack-mount and wall-mount enclosure units have several limitations. Generally, when threading or passing cables through the cable passageways, the cables can be chafed, cut or damaged by the edge of the passageway in the metal enclosure unit. Additionally, when the conventional cable through passageways are not in use, dust, dirt or other debris may enter through the cable passageway into the enclosure unit damaging any electrical wiring, connectors or other electrical devices inside. Some conventional enclosure units may attempt to avoid this problem by passing the cables through grommets, gaskets or other rubber barriers. However, this makes the installation more difficult and time consuming, since it is usually necessary to cut holes in the gasket and then feed the cable through a relatively small hole in the gasket.
Examples of conventional through passageways for routing cable are disclosed in the following U.S. Pat. No.: 5,933,563 to Schaffer et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 5,922,997 to Lecinski; U.S. Pat. No. 5,559,922 to Arnett; U.S. Pat. No. 5,459,808 to Keith; U.S. Pat. No. 5,408,570 to Cook et al.; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,052,773 to Noon et al.
Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to provide an improved enclosure for an electrical device having a cable through passageway.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an enclosure for an electrical device that allows cables to be installed therein in an easy and time efficient manner.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide an enclosure for an electrical device with a cable through passageway that eliminates or reduces chafing, cutting or damaging of cables passed therethrough.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide an enclosure for an electrical device that has a cable through passageway that can be easily covered to protect the interior of the enclosure or uncovered to allow passage of a cable therethrough.
The foregoing objects are basically obtained by providing an enclosure for an electrical device including a first wall portion with a first cable through passageway having an edge, a portion of the edge being rolled. A second wall portion is adjacent the first portion and has a removable knock-out portion at least partially covering a second cable through passageway.
By forming an enclosure for an electrical device according to the present invention, a cable can be passed through the cable passageway easily, quickly and without chafing or damaging the cable. Additionally, the cable passageway can be easily covered to protect the interior of the enclosure unit from dust, dirt or other debris.
Other objects, advantages and salient features of the invention will become apparent from the following detailed description which, taken in conjunction with the annexed drawings, discloses a preferred embodiment of the invention.

Open ended, rolled edge through passageway for routing cable


A flexible pouch includes a flexible compartment with a bottom. A rim is formed around the bottom of the compartment and is spaced from and extends outwardly from this compartment bottom. At least three coplanar feet are provided on the rim for stabilizing the pouch when the pouch is resting on the rim. These coplanar feet can be generally flush with the rim when the pouch is in a flat, empty position. However, when the compartment of the pouch is filled, the coplanar feet will be formed as the lowermost portions of the rim. The pouch will rest on these coplanar feet when on a support to be stably held in position. This pouch design will avoid wobbling or tipping over of the pouch and therefore minimize or eliminate product spillage. Also, a method for making this pouch includes the steps of forming the pouch with the compartment, providing a rim around the bottom of the compartment, and spacing the rim from the bottom of the compartment. A portion of this rim is then removed at the outer edge to form the plurality of coplanar feet.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a stable flexible pouch with a flexible compartment and a method for making the pouch. This pouch has a rim encircling the bottom of the compartment with portions of the rim being removed in order to form stabilizing coplanar feet.
2. Description of the Background Art
Various flexible pouches are known in the prior art. These flexible pouches are often unstable when resting on a support. For example, flexible pouches can be made from two sheets sealed together, an extruded tube or other methods. When these pouches are filled, they are often unstable when resting on a support surface. This leads to unnecessary spills resulting in wasted product and a mess.
For example, known flexible pouches are used for as beverage containers. When resting on a table, for example, these pouches have a tendency to wobble and therefore be unstable. These prior art pouches can then easily tip over and the juice or other beverage spilled therefrom. This is especially a problem when children handle the pouches. Accordingly, a need in the art exists for a flexible pouch which can stably rest on a support.

Stable flexible pouch and method for making the pouch


The invention provides kappa receptor agonists of formula (I) and delta receptor antagonists of formula (II), wherein R1–R6 X and n have any of the meanings given in the specification, as well as compositions comprising them, methods for their use, and synthetic procedures and intermediates useful for their preparation.

Endogenous opioid peptides are known and are involved in the mediation or modulation of a variety of mammalian physiological processes, many of which are mimicked by opiates or other non-endogenous opioid ligands. Some of the effects that have been suggested include analgesia, tolerance and dependence, appetite, renal function, gastrointestinal motility, gastric secretion, learning and memory, mental illness, epileptic seizures and other neurological disorders, cardiovascular responses, and respiratory depression, see G. T. Shearman et al. J. Pharmacol. Exp. Ther., 243, 591–597, 1987.
The fact that the effects of endogenous and exogenous opioids are mediated by at least three different types of opioid receptors raises the possibility that highly selective exogenous opioid agonist or antagonist ligands might have therapeutic applications. Thus, if a ligand acts at a single opioid receptor type or subtype, the potential side effects mediated through other opioid receptor types can be minimized or eliminated.
The kappa opioid receptor is one of the three major opioid receptors that are found in the central nervous system and in the periphery, see Dhawan, B. N.; Cesselin, R.; Raghubir, R.; Reisine, T.; Bradley, P. B.; Portoghese, P. S.; Hamon, M. International Union of Pharmacology. XII. Classification of Opioid Receptors. Pharmacol. Rev. 1996, 48, 567–583. The precise roles of kappa receptors have not yet been established, but it appears that kappa-selective endogenous opioid peptides, such as dynorphin A, function both as neuro- and immuno-modulators.
A number of nonpeptide kappa agonists have been developed as promising potential analgesics, and some of them have found wide use as pharmacological tools in opioid research, see Jones, R. M.; Paterlini, M. G. κ-Opioid Receptors: recent advances and implications for drug design. Curr. Opin. Drug Discuss. Dev. 1998, 1, 175–182. Norbinaltorphimine (norBNI 1) a bivalent ligand shown in FIG. 3, which contains two naltrexone-derived pharmacophores, is a nonpeptide ligand that is highly selective and widely used as a kappa opioid receptor antagonist, see Portoghese, P. S.; Lipkowski, A. W.; Takemori, A. E. Bimorphinans as High Selective, Potent κ Opioid Antagonists. J. Med. Chem. 1987, 30, 238–239.
Additionally, International Patent Application PCT/US 99/18021, filed Jun. 8, 1999, reports certain kappa receptor antagonists. Data is provided for certain specific 5′-guanidinonaltrindole compounds demonstrating the compounds were found to have activity as kappa receptor antagonists.
Despite the above reports, there exists a need for kappa receptor agonists that can be used as therapeutic agents such as analgesics, or as pharmacological tools to further investigate kappa receptor binding, structure, and function. In particular, there is a need for potent and selective agonists that can be used to treat conditions associated with kappa receptor function.


The invention relates to a reverse centrifugal filter and a method of separating solids particles suspended in a liquid. The reverse centrifugal filter of the invention contains a rotatable filter screen in a filter vessel. As the filter screen rotates, solid particles in a liquid which may accumulate on the filter screen are thrown away from it, thus keeping the filter screen alway clean for efficient operation.

The continuous removal of fine solid particles of density similar to the carrying liquid is very difficult and expensive operation. The most effective method is based on applying very high centrifugal forces to the liquid with suspended solid particles in stacked conical disc centrifuges, which forces effectively cause the denser particles to settle on the disc surface and slide outward whereas the clarified liquid flows inward under an applied hydraulic pressure. These devices are very expensive and are impractical to use for low capital budget projects. A less capital intensive approach is to use two or more filter bags with appropriate mesh size cloth and remove them in sequence to empty them of collected solids. The filter bag approach is obviously labor intensive and therefore expensive in operation. Yet another method is to filter liquid through a screen under high centrifugal forces and periodically or continuously clean the deposits from the screen by some mechanical means or forces. The net forces on liquids and solids are in the same direction and as a result the filtration surface has a tendency to be only partially open for filtration at any time. A large filtration surface area is therefore required which makes the equipment quite expensive. Also, some particles are forced through the openings in the filtration surface. In yet another method, high hydraulic forces derived from a pump drive the liquid in a circular motion in a cylindrical-conical container, called hydro-cyclone, and the resulting centrifugal forces cause the solid and liquids of different densities to separate radially. However, unless the density difference between solid particles and carrying liquid is significant and/or the particles size is large, this method does not provide reasonable level of clarification.
A method for clarification of the invention disclosed here yields an equipment that is low in the initial cost as well as in operating cost. The method uses filtration to remove fine particles from the liquid while using centrifugal forces, in the reverse direction to the hydraulic forces derived from a pump, to drive the particles away from the screen in order to continuously maintain the filtration surface clean of any solid particles. An apparatus of the invention to carry out the method described above includes a centrifugal screen enclosure provided in a vessel. The clarified liquid comes out from a first outlet and a liquid/solid sludge from a second outlet.


The invention relates to a labyrinth of mirrors with elemental cells in the form of an equilateral triangle, each cell having at least one passage portal covered with opaque vinyl and at least one arch with a mirror forming a reflective obstacle. Each cell has a short-throw projector for projecting moving images with different designs or themes. The images are projected over the variable surface or contour of the passage portal which is covered with light opaque vinyl, the other two arches being covered with reflective vinyl or a mirror, as are the inner surfaces of the holding pillars or posts. The projection is defined by means of masks wherein the pixels outside the contour are covered in black or are rendered transparent, a technology called “projection mapping”. In each cell, there is at least one opaque arch and two reflectors.

The concept of a mirror maze dates back to 1649, when a wealthy Parisian citizen named Peter Stuyvesant visited the Hall of Mirrors in the palace of Versailles; he founded the House of Mirrors in Amsterdam in 1651.
The mirror maze is an attraction that creates repetitive images that confuse the spectator, where obstacles are created by combining support panels and mirrors embedded therein, and disorientation of the spectator is effected through repetition of the images in the arrangement of mirrors that are set up in cells at specific angles in order to form a basic cell comprised of three support panels and at least two mirrors. The frames or contours that hold the mirrors are imprinted with repetitive motifs in order to confuse the spectator even more, and in this manner to increase disorientation; this is the usual pattern of what is called a first-generation maze.
Second-generation mirror mazes utilize panels with imprinted arches and changes in lighting in the floor and ceiling of the basic cell with the purpose of creating a more intense experience by using a greater amount of visual stimuli.
United States patent application US 2011310310, published on Dec. 22, 2011, whose inventors are Lassila Neal et al., describes a system and method for multiple projection and framing of a lateral projection of a video on objects in a random fashion, wherein the data of the image are used to produce the framing of the projection on the object, and opaque projection surfaces and additional background surfaces are used to change the viewing angle.
Chinese patent CN 101923205, published on Dec. 22, 2010, whose inventor is Lai-Chang Lin, describes an optical system for wide-angle projection—in other words, the projection of lateral images or short throw images with very short effective focal length—which allows projection within narrow profiles with high image quality.
United States patent application US 2010277780, published on Nov. 4, 2010, whose inventor is Elias Darrin, describes an arrangement of mirrors disposed in a triangular prism shape on a revolving base supported on a vertical axis, wherein the mirror arrangement is used to increase the illusion created by the mirror maze per se; the arrangement has a zipping mechanism that facilitates the propulsion of the rotation axis, which in turn causes the mirror arrangement to revolve.
Taiwanese patent TW 200926840, published on Jun. 16, 2009, whose inventor is Wang Feng-Xing, describes an image-generating system in a maze, which projects a digital photograph and comprises an image-processing module that assigns flags to the photographs to be projected onto a platform.
Japanese patent JP 2009006022, published on Jan. 15, 2009, whose inventor is Nishi Nobuhiro, describes a mirror maze for amusement in which additional entertainment stations, such as slot machines, video game machines, and so on are integrated along the length of the tour. The entertainment stations are located in specific areas within the maze, and the spectator can decide if he would like to play an additional game during the tour.
United States patent application US 2008205046, published on Aug. 28, 2008, whose inventor is Elias Darrin, describes modifications to the lighting of a mirror maze with the traditional arrangement formed by support pillars and mirrors, wherein double lighting lines are positioned at the junction between two pillars that do not include a mirror, and a single lighting line is positioned in those that include a mirror in order to produce the appearance of a pair of lighting lines, that is, in the arch that allows the passage of the spectator and the one that constitutes an obstacle, respectively.
Slovak patent SK 322008, published on Aug. 5, 2008, whose inventor is Holy Peter, describes an inflatable maze for the entertainment of children at a party.
International patent application WO 2007121639, published on Nov. 1, 2007, whose inventor is Lai Ying-Kuang, describes a three-dimensional maze with an arrangement with several levels, in which the user can climb up or down in addition to circulate through each level. The maze is suitable for amusement during parties or in areas where large groups of people gather.
Chinese patent CN 2465755, published on Dec. 19, 2001, whose inventor is Shen Xingcun, describes a mirror maze that combines transparent glass panels that function as passages and as a generator of the image of the spectator through the additional mirrors located in the vicinity of the glass.

Mirror maze with dynamic animation for projection onto an arch


A continuous speech recognition system has the ability to correct errors in strings of words. The error correction method stores data in the system's internal state to update probability tables used in developing alternative lists for substitution in misrecognized text.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to continuous speech recognition systems and, more particularly, to methodologies for presenting the user with control over correction activity.
2. Background Description
In a continuous speech recognition system designed to decode speech without pauses between words, it is reasonable to expect that errors of decoding will take place and will have to be corrected by the user. The effort needed to correct errors may be affected by both the visual presentation of information supporting correction and by the actions the interface allows the user to perform on the presentation.
Speech recognition systems of the kind typified by the recognition engines developed at the International Business Machines (IBM) Thomas J. Watson Research Center are able to decode continuous utterances comprising many connected words. Unfortunately, even human listeners occasionally mistake one sequence of words for another. It is therefore a feature of such recognition engines that alternative strings of words for any given acoustic sequence are stored against the possibility that the choice presented by the recognizer is incorrect. Storing the alternative strings allows the user to be presented with alternative choices. Alternatively, the acoustic data can be stored in a certain form, and the portion corresponding to the incorrect words could be decoded again and a number of alternatives displayed for the user to choose from.
The presentation of choices from recognized alternatives is common practice in the human interfaces of discrete word recognition systems. In such systems the incorrect word can be indicated by the user, and the system user interface can, in response, present a list of alternative words. Such systems typically order the word list according to the probability associated with each word according the acoustic evidence and the language model scores.
In continuous speech recognition systems, word boundaries are not well fixed by the system since the user does not indicate word boundaries by pausing. For example, the sentences "Do you know how to recognize speech?" and "Do you know how to wreck a nice beach?" have fundamentally indistinguishable acoustics but very different content. A user faced with correcting this form of error is not given the means to address a sequence of words by the conventional discrete correction methods. Thus, the technique used in discrete error correction does not apply effectively to this problem.

Method and apparatus for error correction in a continuous dictation system

International Business Machines Corporation


A thermoplastic article can be injection molded in a mold (10) which includes a cavity (28) defining the shape of the article, at least one thermoplastic entry aperture (23) which is adapted to receive molten thermoplastic resin from a nozzle (22) of an injection molding machine (24), a thermoplastic flow path (21, 26, 30) communicating with the thermoplastic entry aperture and the cavity, and a fluid flow passageway (32, 34) extending into the mold. The fluid flow passageway extends from an exterior surface of the mold to the thermoplastic flow path. A low viscosity fluid such as a gas can be injected through the fluid flow passageway and into the thermoplastic flow path. An end portion (44) of the fluid is flow passageway adjacent the thermoplastic flow path has a porous me lug (50) disposed therein. The porous metal plug includes a porous metal core (64) which permits the low viscosity fluid to flow therethrough but prevents the passage of molten plastic therethrough. The porous metal core can be a sintered metal. Alternatively, the fluid flow passageway can extend from an exterior surface of the mold directly to the mold cavity, rather than the thermoplastic flow path.

Field of the Invention
This invention relates to gas-assisted injection molding of thermoplastic articles. In one of its aspects, the invention relates to a mold having an improved means for injecting a fluid such as a gas into an injected thermoplastic material. In another of its aspects, the invention relates to a process for injection molding a thermoplastic article wherein a fluid such as a gas is injected into the molten thermoplastic through an improved plug which permits passage of the fluid therethrough but which prohibits flow of thermoplastic material therethrough.

Gas-assisted injection molding apparatus


1-β-D-Arabinofuranosyluracil in 3′,5′-hydroxyl-protected form is reacted with a trifluoromethanesulfonylating agent in the presence of an organic base to convert it into a 2′-triflate form, and then it is reacted with a fluorinating agent containing “a salt or complex formed by an organic base and hydrofluoric acid” to produce 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine in 3′,5′-hydroxyl-protected form. A deprotecting agent is further caused to act thereon to obtain 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine. The 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine obtained can efficiently be purified by temporarily converting it into a 3′,5′-diacetyl form, recrystallizing the 3′,5′-diacetyl form, and then deacetylating it. Thus, high-purity 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine can be produced.

The present invention relates to a process for producing 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine, which is an important intermediate of medicines.
The target of the present invention, 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine, is an important intermediate of medicines. Conventional production processes can be divided into the following two, and representative publications are cited.
(1) A process of conducting a ring opening and fluorination of 2,2′-anhydrouridine with hydrofluoric acid (see Non-patent Publication 1 (J. Org. Chem. (USA), 1964, Vol. 29, No. 3, pp. 558-564)).
(2) 1-β-D-Arabinofuranosyluracil in 3′,5′-hydroxyl-protected form is dehydroxyfluorinated by DAST ((C2H5)2NSF3) (see Non-patent Publication 2 (Chem. Pharm. Bull. (Japan), 1994, Vol. 42, No. 3, pp. 595-598)).
As a technology related to the present invention, in syntheses of 2′-deoxy-2′-fluoroadenosine and 2′-deoxy-2′-fluoroguanosine, there are disclosed processes in which corresponding 9-β-D-arabinofuranosyladenine in 3′,5′-hydroxyl-protected form and N2-isobutyryl-9-β-D-arabinofuranosylguanine in 3′,5′-hydroxyl-protected form are reacted with trifluoromethanesulfonyl chloride in the presence of sodium hydroxide to respectively convert them to corresponding 2′-triflates, followed by reactions with tetrabutylammonium fluoride (TBAF) (see Non-patent Publication 3 (Tetrahedron Lett. (Great Britain), 1977, Vol. 18, No. 15, pp. 1291-1294), Non-patent Publication 4 (Chem. Pharm. Bull. (Japan), 1981, Vol. 29, No. 4, pp. 1034-1038), Non-patent Publication 5 (J. Carbohyd. Nucl. Nucl. (Great Britain), 1980, Vol. 7, No. 2, pp. 131-140), Non-patent Publication 6 (Chem. Pharm. Bull. (Japan), 1981, Vol. 29, No. 11, pp. 3281-3285)).
The process for producing 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine, which is disclosed in Non-patent Publication 1, was much limited in material of the reactor, since the reaction was conducted by using an excessive amount of hydrofluoric acid, which is highly corrosive, under high temperature. The productivity was inferior since the substrate was diluted with reaction solvent to high degree, and the reaction yield itself was low. From the industrial viewpoint, it was difficult to say that the process is an industrial production process, since it uses hydrofluoric acid that is difficult in handling in large amount, and since column chromatography is necessary for purifying the obtained product.
On the other hand, in the production process of non-patent publication 2, it is necessary to use a special fluorination agent that is industrially expensive and problematic in handling in large amount, and the reaction yield is also ordinary. Thus, it was difficult to say that the process is an industrial production process.
The processes for synthesizing 2′-deoxy-2′-fluoroadenosine or 2′-deoxy-2′-fluoroguanosine, which are disclosed in Non-patent Publications 3-6, gave the target with only very low yield.
The reaction of obtaining 2′-deoxy-2′-fluoroadenosine or 2′-deoxy-2′-fluoroguanosine by fluorinating a 2′-triflate form, which is disclosed in Non-patent Publications 3-6, is considered to be a nucleophilic SN2 substitution reaction by fluorine anion (F−). In this reaction, "an elimination reaction of a triflate group (CF3SO3− group)" occurs competitively as a side reaction, and there is produced as a by-product a compound in which 1′-position carbon and 2′-position carbon are bonded by a double bond. The cause of low yield in the Non-patent Publication 3 is also due to this side reaction. This is an essential problem inherent in the nucleophilic SN2 substitution reaction by fluorine anion (F−). A similar problem arises in the production of the present invention's target compound 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine, too.
Thus, there was a strong desire for a process of industrially advantageously producing 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine.
Furthermore, since 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine, the final target compound in the present invention, is a water-soluble and scarcely crystalline compound, it was necessary to conduct a purification by column chromatography to purify it as a high-purity, white-color, crystalline powder with high recovery (Non-patent Publication 1 and Non-patent Publication 2). Thus, it placed a burden in purification procedure. There has been no report yet of a process capable of purifying it in the form of a high-purity, white-color, crystalline powder with high recovery by a simple purification procedure like recrystallization purification. Thus, there was also a strong desire for an industrial purification process of 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine.

Processing for producing 2′-deoxy-2′-fluorouridine


In a general-purpose engine having a throttle valve installed in an air intake passage connected to a combustion chamber, sucked air mixing with fuel to generate an air-fuel mixture to be ignited to drive a piston to rotate a crankshaft connected to a load, a first warm-up time period during which the engine is warmed up and a second warm-up time period which is longer than the first time period are determined based on detected engine temperature and a fuel quantity is increased during the first time period. The operation of the motor is controlled such that a change rate of throttle valve opening is limited within a range until the measured time exceeds the second warm-up time period after it exceeded the first time period. With this, it becomes possible to complete warm-up operation in a short period of time, while improving rate of fuel consumption and emission performance.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a control apparatus for a general-purpose internal combustion engine, particularly to an apparatus for controlling warm-up operation of a general-purpose internal combustion engine.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, in general-purpose internal combustion engines used as prime movers in generators, agricultural machines and various other equipment conducting engine, warm-up operation is conducted since engine starting for making the engine speed stable to prevent engine stall due to abrupt opening and closing of a throttle valve as taught by Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. Hei 5(1993)-59992 (paragraphs 0035, 0036, 0042 to 0044, FIGS. 10, 15, etc.).
However, when a fuel quantity is kept increasing until the engine has been completely warmed up as described in the reference '992, although engine stall can be surely prevented, the rate of fuel consumption and also the emission performance degrades disadvantageously. Therefore, it is preferable to complete the warm-up operation with increased fuel in a short period of time.
It is also known to start the engine warm-up operation by closing a choke valve to a position corresponding to ambient temperature for increasing fuel quantity and to finish it by gradually opening the choke valve to a fully-opened position as taught by Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. Hei 7(1995)-77106 (paragraphs 0036, 0041 to 0044, FIGS. 3, 4, etc.).
However, since an appropriate or optimal time period of warm-up differs depending on ambient temperature or condition of the engine, if the warm-up operation is conducted by regulating the choke valve position based solely on the ambient temperature, i.e., by determining the warm-up time period based solely on the ambient temperature as disclosed in the reference '106, the warm-up time period could be inappropriate depending on the condition of the engine. This also leads to the degradation of the rate of fuel consumption and occurrence of engine stall.

Control apparatus for general-purpose engine


The cooling air introducing port 24 is open to a lower portion of an axial direction end portion of the motor housing member 11, 12, the water-proof cover 25 for covering the cooling air introducing port 24 is attached to the outside of the axial direction end portion of the housing member 11, 12, and the air introducing passage 26 having a labyrinth structure is composed of the bent portion 25d provided in a lower end portion of the water-proof cover 25, the first wall face 21d provided in the annular portion 21b of the shroud and the second wall face 21e.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electric fan used for moving air to a radiator of a vehicle. More particularly, the present invention relates to a structure for introducing cooling air into a motor for driving a fan.
2. Description of the Related Art
Concerning the device for introducing cooling air into a motor of an electric fan for vehicle use, the device described in the official gazette of JP-A-9-74718 is well-known.
According to the above patent document, cooling air introducing port, which is directed downward, is formed in an end portion of an end housing of a motor used for driving a fan. Further, first to the third labyrinth plates are provided in a passage from this cooling air introducing port to the inside of the motor.
The first labyrinth plate is contacted with and fixed to a cylindrical main body housing of the motor and directed in the direction substantially perpendicular to the horizontal direction when the motor is mounted on a vehicle. The second labyrinth plate is contacted with and fixed to the cylindrical main body housing on the inner side of the motor compared with the first labyrinth plate and extended in the substantially same direction as that of the first labyrinth plate. The third labyrinth plate is extended in the horizontal direction from the end housing to the inside of the motor.
According to the structure described in the above patent document, the labyrinth structure including the first to the third labyrinth plate is composed in a relatively short range in the neighborhood of the cooling air introducing port in the cylindrical main body housing of the motor. Therefore, water and dust flowing into the device together with cooling air cannot be sufficiently separated.
Therefore, in order to sufficiently separate water and dust from the cooling air, it is necessary to design a sectional area of a passage in the labyrinth structure to be small. As a result, the following problems may be encountered. The ventilating resistance of the labyrinth structure is increased, and a volume of the cooling air is decreased. Accordingly, the motor cooling performance is lowered.


A hybrid variety of (Texas bluegrass×Kentucky bluegrass)×Kentucky bluegrass is described, characterized by a moderately rapid establishment; dark green color; short plant height; semi-erect growth habit; short tiller culms; a moderately wide leaf blade; large seed; short flag leaf; moderately aggressive rhizome growth; high cold resistance; and high resistance to rust and dollarspot diseases.

Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a new and distinct hybrid variety Poa arachnifera Torr.×Poa pratensis L. that has been designated as 'HB 328' bluegrass.
Description of Related Art
A Texas Bluegrass×Kentucky Bluegrass hybrid designated 'Reveille' has been disclosed in PVP Certificate No. 9800337. Another Poa arachnifera Torr.×Poa pratensis L. hybrid designated as 'HB 129' has been disclosed in pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/197,945, filed Aug. 5, 2005, claiming the benefit of provisional application No. 60/599,539, filed Aug. 6, 2004. 'HB 129' is commercially available as 'Thermal Blue' and this commercial designation is used elsewhere herein.
U.S. Plant Pat. No. 18,439, filed Aug. 19, 2005, described another Poa arachnifera Torr.×Poa pratensis L. hybrid designated as 'HB 329' as the progeny formed by crossing an interspecific hybrid bluegrass (Texas Bluegrass×Kentucky Bluegrass) designated 'HB 47' (a female plant 7-23×cv. 'Geronimo' male plant ) as the female parent crossed with cv. 'Ascot' Kentucky bluegrass (Poa pratensis L.) as the pollen parent. 'HB 329' is commercially available as 'Dura Blue' and this commercial designation is used elsewhere herein.
U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/483,919, filed Jul. 10, 2006, described another Poa arachnifera Torr.×Poa pratensis L. hybrid designated as 'HB 130'. 'HB 130' bluegrass is the progeny of Texas bluegrass (Poa arachnifera Torr.) female plant 6-8 (seed parent), with cv. 'Geronimo' Kentucky bluegrass (pollen parent) (Poa pratensis L.). 'HB 130' is commercially available as 'Solar Green' and this commercial designation is used elsewhere herein.

Hybrid variety of bluegrass designated ‘HB 328’


A plug structure for connecting sockets comprises at least one jack formed at a side of a first socket; and a plug rod disposed on a second socket corresponding to the at least one jack and configured to plug in the at least one jack. The plug rod is electrically contacted with a spring piece in the jack so as to electrify the second socket. A slidable baffle plate is disposed on an inner side of the at least one jack and is configured to cover the jack. A through hole corresponding to the jack is formed in the baffle plate. A slope configured to push the baffle plate is disposed at a position on the baffle plate corresponding to the jack, and is disposed at an edge of the through hole and fitted with the plug rod to push the baffle plate to be inserted into the through hole. The plug structure for connecting sockets according to the present disclosure provides an improvement for a security protection of combined interfaces of the sockets, thus ensuring a security of the combined sockets.

Since a conventional socket has a fixed number and type of jacks, it is easy to cause a waste or a shortness of jacks due to different requirements for jacks and different numbers of electric appliances. For this, a socket device which can arbitrarily extend a number of jacks has been proposed, such as the socket device disclosed in Chinese Patent ZL201120198999.7, which realizes a plugging by providing a first socket having a plurality of jacks configured to plug with a second socket at one end side and a wire for connecting with the electric supply at the other end side and a second socket having a plurality of jacks at one side and a plug rod fitted with the plurality of jacks of the first socket at the other side. Thus, one first socket can be plugged with a plurality of second sockets sequentially.
However, in this conventional socket device, there is no security arrangement between the jack and the plug rod, and it is easy to cause accidents. Therefore, there is a need to improve and develop the conventional socket device.


An implantable medical device (IMD) comprising a controller adapted to execute instructions included in firmware, a programmable neural therapy source adapted to provide programmable electrical neural stimulation therapy to at least one neural stimulation electrode, and a state machine included in hardware circuitry coupled to the programmable neural therapy source. When neural therapy is initiated by a firmware instruction, the state machine is configured to automatically apply power to the neural therapy source when neural therapy is initiated by a firmware instruction and automatically remove power from the neural therapy source when neural therapy is terminated by a firmware instruction.

Implantable medical devices (IMDs) are devices designed to be implanted into a patient. Some examples of these devices include devices with neural stimulation (NS) capability. Other examples include cardiac function management (CFM) devices such as implantable pacemakers, implantable cardioverter defibrillators (ICDs), cardiac resynchronization devices, and devices that include a combination of such capabilities. Further examples of implantable medical devices include implantable diagnostic devices, or implantable drug delivery systems.
Neural stimulation can be useful to treat neurological impairment of physiological systems of a patient such as the bladder, the upper airway, and the heart. Vagus nerve stimulation has been proposed to treat breathing disorders, gastrointestinal motility, eating disorders, obesity, anorexia, gastrointestinal tract disorders, hypertension, coma, and epilepsy.
Most implantable devices are processor controlled. Typically, the processor executes instructions contained in firmware to flexibly implement functions required by the device. Implementing functions of an IMD in firmware can have some disadvantages. As the number of functions performable by an implantable device increases, the processor may have to be constantly executing instructions to respond to external events and device initiated events. This can result in a large amount of battery power being consumed by the device. Also, events may result in electrical stimulation circuits drawing a large amount of battery power.


A data processing apparatus is provided with an execute block instruction EMB which specifies a memory location of a block of program instructions to be executed as well as the length of that block of program instructions. When the end of that block of program instructions has been reached as tracked in response to the specified length value, a return to the main program flow is triggered. The instruction decoder can include a block counter register to keep track of the position within the block of program instructions being called. The block of program instructions are fetched by a prefetch unit into the instruction pipeline following the execute block instruction and are treated as having a program counter value corresponding to the execute block instruction whilst the block counter value keeps track of their separate positions within the block of program instructions.

This application claims priority to UK Application No. 0307821.9, filed 04 Apr. 2003. The entire contents of this application are incorporated herein by reference.
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the field of data processing systems. More particularly, this invention relates to the control of execution of a block of program instructions within a data processing system.
2. Description of the Prior Art
It is known that computer programs often contain sequences of program instructions that are frequently repeated within the computer program. In order to produce a computer program with a smaller code size, it is known to arrange such blocks of computer program instructions into functions or subroutines which can be called from various positions within the computer program.
It is normal for such subroutines to terminate with a return instruction which commands the data processing apparatus to return to the instruction immediately following the point in the computer program from where the call to the subroutine was made. When the subroutine or block of instructions is short in length, then the overhead of providing a return instruction at the end of the subroutine can form a significant proportion of the size of the subroutine itself. As an example, if the subroutine block of program instructions being called is only three instructions in length, then the necessary return instruction at the end of the block increases this length to four instructions and results in a significant increase in code size when this is repeated across a large number of such subroutines which may be included within a computer program as a whole.
It is also known to provide data processing systems including a dictionary function whereby an instruction in the program is a dictionary instruction which triggers a reference to be made to a stored dictionary table where there is a pointer to a memory location storing a sequence of program instructions to be executed in response to that dictionary function. The dictionary table may also include an indication of the length of that block of instructions. The dictionary table approach has the disadvantage that an additional memory construct, namely the dictionary table, needs to be provided within the data processing system as well as additional registers for keeping track of full length memory addresses for the dictionary instruction and the position within the block of program instructions called. In the context of blocks of program instructions which are very short in length, the storage requirements of the dictionary table entries relating to those small blocks of program instructions form a significant proportion of the storage requirements for those blocks of instructions in a manner which is disadvantageous.
A further disadvantage of the dictionary table approach is that it is a more radical change to an existing data processing system architecture if it is to be added to such an existing data processing system architecture. It is desirable that new functionality should be added to a data processing system architecture in a manner which minimises the degree of architectural change necessary.
It is also known within VAX architecture computers to provide an execute instruction which commands the system to execute an instruction found at a memory location specified by the execute instruction. This type of operation can be considered as a one-for-one replacement of the execute instruction within the program code by different instructions pointed to by those execute instructions. This type of functionality is particularly useful for debugging and diagnostic purposes but does not yield significant code density improvements.

Controlling execution of a block of program instructions within a computer processing system


A speakerphone system has a speaker and microphone in a common acoustic environment and electrically preceded and succeeded, respectively, by receive and transmit sections and adapted, respectively, to reproduce as sounds by such speaker signals passed through such receive section from a remote station, and to convert sounds sensed by such microphone into signals passed through such transmit section to such station. A computer derives from the signals from the microphone an electric quantity which is a measure of the average audible ambient noise level in such environment, and the computer uses such quantity as one factor among others in switching signal losses between such two sections so as to change the state of operation of the system between transmit and receive states. As an improvement, there is derived from such quantity a control signal which effects dynamic adjustment of the gain in the receive section so that the average level of the sounds reproduced by the speaker will increase as such noise level increases, and conversely (Automatic Level Control). Other improvements are to provide for the system(a) a plurality of individually selectable interface circuits for matching the system to differently designed two-way voice communication channels in the outside world, (b) an auxiliary microphone for picking up voice sounds in the environment to be reproduced by the speaker, (c) an additional speaker not subject to automatic level control, and (d) sound tones produced under manual control in the environment by the system either to aid an installer in adjusting the system or to provide a reminder that the system is "on."

U.S. Pat. No. 5,007,046 issued Apr. 9, 1991 in the name of Richard H. Erving et al for Computer Controlled Adaptive Speakerphone and assigned to the assignee hereof and incorporated herein by reference and made a part hereof (the "'046 patent") discloses a speakerphone adapted to be in an idle state, a transmit state or a receive state, and to switch from any one of such states to either of the other two states. The same speakerphone is also disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,959,857, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,901,346 and 4,887,288, each assigned to the assignee hereof, but it will be discussed herein with reference to its disclosure in the '046 patent.
The speakerphone disclosed in that patent, under the control of, for example, a computer, measures the energy of the incoming transmit and receive signals and also develops information about the signal and noise levels for self calibration and efficient operation. This information is obtained for the computer illustratively by pre-processing analog circuitry and an analog-to-digital converter. The analog circuitry converts the incoming transmit and receive signals into a signal that tracks the envelope of the audio. This envelope information is then amplified by a logarithmic amplifier which greatly expands the dynamic operating range of the speakerphone. The resulting analog signals are passed to the analog-to-digital converter which periodically presents the computer with digital information corresponding to the logarithm of the amplitude of the envelope of the signals.
This digital information is used by the computer to develop several different audio signal averages. A transmit signal average and a receive signal average are developed by averaging samples of these signals in a manner that recognizes peaks in the applied signals. Since speech tends to have many peaks rather than a constant level, this averaging technique favors detecting speech.
A transmit noise average and a receive noise average are also developed. The transmit noise average is representative of the noise level of the operating environment for the speakerphone. The receive noise average measures the noise level on the line from the far end party. The transmit noise average and the receive noise average are both developed by measuring the lowest level seen by the analog-to-digital converter. Since background noise is generally constant, the lowest level samples provide a reasonable estimate of the noise level.
The transmit noise average is used in various ways in the operation of the speakerphone of the '046 patent (the "'046 speakerphone"). When the speakerphone is in its idle state, an average of the audio informational signals picked up by the speakerphone microphone from its environment (the "transmit signal average") is compared to such noise average, and the exceeding by such signal average of such noise average by more than a certain threshold, is a factor which, among others, tends to induce switching from the idle to the transmit state. Similar exceeding by the transmit signal average of the transmit noise average by more than a threshold when the speakerphone is in, respectively, the transmit state and the receive state are factors which, among others, tend, respectively, to induce retaining of the speakerphone in the transmit state, and the switching of the speakerphone from the receive state to the transmit state.
In all of the above cases, however, the transmit noise average has no first order effect on the level of the voice sounds reproduced by the speaker element of the speakerphone. Consequently, with progressive increase in the average ambient noise level of the acoustic environment of that speaker element, the reproduced voice signals tend to become less and less intelligible.

Two-way voice communication methods and apparatus


In some arrangements, product packaging is digitally watermarked over most of its extent to facilitate high-throughput item identification at retail checkouts. Imagery captured by conventional or plenoptic cameras can be processed (e.g., by GPUs) to derive several different perspective-transformed views—further minimizing the need to manually reposition items for identification. Crinkles and other deformations in product packaging can be optically sensed, allowing such surfaces to be virtually flattened to aid identification. Piles of items can be 3D-modelled and virtually segmented into geometric primitives to aid identification, and to discover locations of obscured items. Other data (e.g., including data from sensors in aisles, shelves and carts, and gaze tracking for clues about visual saliency) can be used in assessing identification hypotheses about an item. Logos may be identified and used—or ignored—in product identification. A great variety of other features and arrangements are also detailed.

The widespread use of barcodes has greatly simplified supermarket checkout. However, many problems persist, causing both inconvenience for shoppers, and added costs for retailers.
One of the difficulties is finding a barcode on a package. While experienced supermarket clerks eventually learn barcode locations for popular products, even the best clerks sometimes have difficulty with less common products. For shoppers who use self-service checkout stations, any product can be confounding.
Another issue concerns re-orienting a package so that its barcode is in position for reading. Many items are straightforward. However, particularly with large items (e.g., a carton of diapers, or a heavy bag of dog food), it can be a physical challenge to manipulate the product so that the barcode is exposed to the reading device. Often in self-service checkout stations, the physical constraints of the checkout station compound the difficulty, as these stations commonly don't have the handheld scanning capability with which conventional checkouts are equipped—forcing the shopper to manipulate the product so that barcode faces a glass scanning platen on the counter. (When properly positioned, the shopper may be unable to view either the platen or the barcode—exacerbating the difficulty.) Moreover, it is not enough for the barcode to be visible to the scanner; it must also be presented so as to roughly face the scanner (i.e., its surface normal must generally be within about 40-50 degrees of facing the scanning device in order to be read).
Sometimes a product is flipped and turned in search of a barcode, only to find there is none. Bottles of wine, for example, commonly lack barcodes.
Yet another issue is occasional difficulty in getting the scanning equipment to successfully read the barcode, after the barcode has been found and correctly positioned. This is a particular problem with malleable items (e.g., a package of frozen peas), in which the barcoded surface is crinkled or otherwise physically irregular.
To redress such issues, some have proposed identifying products with passive tags that can be sensed by radio (e.g., RFID and NFC chips). However, the costs of these tags are an obstacle in the low-margin grocery business. And it can be difficult to distinguish the responses from several different items on a checkout counter. Moreover, certain materials in the check-out queue may be radio-opaque—preventing some identifiers from being read. Privacy issues raise yet further concerns.
Other checkout technologies have also been tried. For example, in patent publication 20040081799, Kodak describes how a marking can be applied to supermarket packaging by adding a polymer layer that defines scannable information in the form of matte and glossy areas. The matte/glossy areas can form indicia such as barcodes, or digital watermarks. However, this technology requires applying a polymer layer to the packaging—a further expense, and an additional processing step that packagers are not equipped to provide.
Other identification technologies have been proposed for use in conjunction with barcode-based product identification. For example, patent application 20040199427 proposes capturing 2D imagery of products, and checking their color histograms against histograms associated with products identified by sensed barcode data, to ensure correct product identification. The same publication similarly proposes weighing articles on the conveyor—again checking for consistency with the barcode-indicated product. Publications 20040223663 and 20090060259 teach related arrangements, in which imagery of products is used to check for possibly switched barcodes.
Applicant's U.S. Pat. No. 7,044,395 teaches that a watermark can replace a barcode, such as a UPC symbol or other standard product code, in a retail point of sale application. A reader unit at a checkout counter extracts a product identifier from the watermark, and uses it to look up the product and its price.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,654,872 describes a system employing two video cameras, which captures images of a 3D article, and uses the imagery to recognize the article. U.S. Pat. No. 7,398,927 teaches another two-camera system, this one to read product codes from articles despite specular reflections. U.S. Pat. No. 7,909,248 details a self-service checkout terminal in which captured imagery is compared against a database of reference imagery to try to identify a matching product.
In accordance with various embodiments of the present technology, certain drawbacks of the prior art are overcome, and new capabilities are provided.
For example, in one aspect, the present technology involves marking product packaging with a digital watermark that encodes related information (e.g., Universal Product Codes, such as UPC-A or UPC-E; Electronic Product Codes—EPC, European Article Number Codes—EAN, a URI or web address, etc.). The marking spans a substantial part of the packaging surface area, so that it can be sensed from one or more fixed cameras at a checkout station without repositioning of the item. The watermark indicia is applied to the packaging along with other printing—integrated in the other packaging artwork.
In one such embodiment, a variety of recognition technologies are used at a checkout station—looking for different indicia of product identification (watermark, barcode, color histogram, weight, temperature, etc.). The system applies a set of rules to the collected evidence, and outputs a product identification based on the available information.
In another aspect, crinkles and other deformations in malleable product packaging are optically sensed, and are used in decoding an identifier from the distorted surface (e.g., the crinkled surface can be virtually flattened prior to decoding the identifier). In one particular arrangement, the crinkled configuration is sensed by structure-from-motion techniques. In another, the product configuration is sensed by a structured light scanner (e.g., of the sort popularized by the Microsoft Kinect sensor).
In yet another aspect, a checkout station comprises a conveyor belt that includes markings that are optically sensed, and which are used to increase check-out speed and accuracy.
In still another aspect, imagery captured from an item that is being conveyor-transported at a checkout station is processed to compensate for motion blur, prior to applying a product recognition technology.
In yet another aspect, a plenoptic camera system senses information at a checkout station. The collected light field data is then processed to yield multiple different planes of focused imagery, to which product recognition technologies are applied. In some embodiments, these planes include a variety of non-parallel planes.
In still another aspect, 2D imagery that is acquired at a checkout station is applied to a GPU, which computes multiple perspective-transformed versions of the imagery. These different versions of the imagery are then analyzed for product recognition purposes. The GPU can process input imagery of several different focal lengths, e.g., captured by plural fixed-focus cameras, or by a camera that cyclically changes its focal plane, or by plenoptic sensing.
In yet another aspect, piled items presented for checkout are volumetrically modeled and segmented to identify component items in the pile.
In still another aspect, the location of an item that is too obscured to be identified within a pile, is determined, so that a clerk or a mechanical system can expose it for identification.
In yet a further aspect, a confidence score is computed that indicates the certainty of an identification hypothesis about an item. This hypothesis is tested against collected evidence, until the confidence score exceeds a threshold (or until the process concludes with an ambiguous determination).
In still another aspect, data acquired away from the checkout station (e.g., in a store aisle) is used in identifying items at checkout. This data can include, e.g., sensor data evidencing removal of a product from a shelf, location data indicating that the shopper paused near certain merchandise, etc. Such data may be accorded a weight that varies with a time elapsed between its sensing and item checkout.
In yet another aspect, a clerk's or shopper's interaction with an item is sensed to aid in identification of the item. For example, a clerk's gaze may be tracked to identify the location of a salient feature on the item, or a shopper's particular hand pose in grasping the item when putting it into a cart or onto a checkout conveyor may provide some clue about the item's identity.
In still another aspect, a system provides guidance to a clerk or shopper concerning a manner of packing items into bags, e.g., based on the shapes, weights and temperatures of the purchased items.
In yet a further aspect, different items at a checkout station are illuminated with light of different colors, e.g., to indicate items that have been successfully identified (or not), to indicate which items should be placed in which bags, etc.
The foregoing and a great number of other features and advantages of the present technology will be more readily apparent from the following detailed description, which proceeds with reference to the accompanying drawings.

Methods and arrangements for identifying objects


Compounds formed by reacting a protected amino acid with an alkali metal enolate of an alkyl acetate are reacted with a halogenating agent for halogenation of the 2-position, or a protected amino acid is reacted with an alkali metal enolate of an alkyl halogenoacetate, to form a 4-amino-3-oxo-2-halogenobutanoic acid ester derivative, and hydrolysis and decarboxylation are conducted to produce a 3-amino-2-oxo-1-halogenopropane derivative or its salt. The present method is a useful process for producing a 3-amino-2-oxo-1-halogenopropane derivatives which can easily be converted to a 3-amino-1,2-epoxypropane.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a process for producing 3-amino-2-oxo-1-halogenopropane derivatives which can easily be converted to optically active 3-substituted-3-amino-1,2-epoxypropane derivatives which are equivalents of .alpha.-aminoalcohol derivatives that are important as intermediates for HIV protease inhibitors or certain enzyme inhibitors.
2. Discussion of the Background
.alpha.-Aminoalcohol derivatives which can easily be converted from optically active 3-substituted-3-amino-1,2-epoxypropane derivatives are used as intermediates for synthesis of a large number of HIV protease inhibitors such as Ro3l-8959 (Parkes K. et al (Roche), J. Org. Chem., 1994, vol. 59, p.3656) SC-52151 (Getman D. P. et. al. (Monsanto), J. Med. Chem., 1993, vol. 36, p. 288) VX478 (Verte, WO9405639), and AG1343 (Lilly, WO9521164!.
Known examples of a method of producing 3-amino-1,2-epoxypropane derivatives include a method in which the 2-position of an N-protected-3-amino-2-oxo-1-halogenopropane is reduced stereoselectively to form the corresponding alcohol, and this alcohol is then epoxidized through dehydrohalogenation (Getman D. P. et al., J. Med. Chem., 1993, vol. 36, p. 288), a method in which N-protected-3-amino-1-propene is epoxidized oxidatively asymmetrically (Luly J. R. et al., J. Org. Chem., 1987, vol. 52, p. 1487), and a method in which methylene is inserted into N-protected-3-amino-1-propanal (Searle G. D., WO93/23388.).
In the first method, it is important how the key intermediate N-protected 3-amino-2-oxo-1-halogenopropane or its equivalent substance can be produced industrially at low cost. However, industrialization of this method is limited since it has to use diazomethane having quite a high explosiveness and a strong toxicity as a sub-starting material (see for example, Getman D. P. et al., J. Med. Chem., 1993, vol. 36, p. 288; Okada Y. et al., Chem. Pharm. Bull., 1988, vol. 36, p. 4794; EP 346867; and Raddatz P. et al., J. Med. Chem., 1991, vol. 34, p. 3267). Further, there is a method in which an N-substituted amino acid ester is reacted with a halomethyl anion. However, quite an unstable halomethyl anion is used, and a halogen to be introduced into the 1-position is presumably limited to chlorine or fluorine in view of a common chemical knowledge. For these reasons, industrialization of this method is limited (Barluenga et al., J. Chem. Soc., Chem. Commun., 1994).
Still further, a method in which, after a C-terminus of an N-substituted amino acid is activated, the resulting compound is reacted with fluoromalonic acid half ester for decarboxylation (EP 442754) can be mentioned as a known technology. In this method, however, the halogen is limited to a specific element, fluorine. Therefore, this method cannot be applied to a system containing chlorine or bromine for achieving the object of the present invention.
In the second method, the Wittig reaction of a costly aldehyde (3-amino-1-propanal) is utilized to produce the key intermediate, N-substituted-3-amino-1-propene. Consequently, this method involves quite a high cost. Further, in the third method, not only does the method of forming the intermediate N-substituted aldehyde entail a high cost, but also carbene has to be formed at a low temperature when inserting methylene. Accordingly, this method is not industrially appropriate.
Thus, there remains a need for a method of preparing compounds which can easily be converted to intermediates useful for preparing HIV proteases. There also remains a need for a need for processes for preparing amino-2-oxo-1-halogenopropane derivatives and 3-amino-1,2-epoxypropane derivatives.

Process for producing 3-amino-2-oxo-1-halogenopropane derivatives


A micro fuel cell comprises at least a substrate provided with front and rear faces. The front face of the substrate supports a successive stacking of a first electrode, a substantially flat electrolytic membrane and a second electrode. The electrolytic membrane comprises at least one anchoring element salient substantially perpendicularly to a main plane of said membrane. The anchoring element is arranged in a complementary part of an anchoring recess formed in the substrate. The substrate can also comprise a plurality of microchannels, substantially perpendicular to the main plane of the membrane. The anchoring recess can then be formed by one of the microchannels whereas the other microchannels enable supply of the first electrode with reactive fluid. Such a micro fuel cell is able to operate when a pressure difference exists between the two sides of the stacking.

The invention relates to a micro fuel cell comprising at least:                a substrate provided with front and rear faces        and a successive stacking of a first electrode, a substantially flat electrolytic membrane and a second electrode, said stacking being supported by the front face of the substrate.
The invention also relates to a method for production of a micro fuel cell.

Micro fuel cell with an electrolytic membrane reinforced by an anchoring element and method for production of a micro fuel cell