A windshield wiper frame for use in a windshield wiper assembly for motor vehicles includes a pair of primary yokes, and a bridge member pivotally connected to the pair of primary yokes and having at least one elongated vane which extends downwardly and at a slant from the front wall of the bridge member. This windshield wiper assembly can efficiently wipe the convex surface of the windshield glass and extend the operational life thereof.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the construction of a windshield wiper frame and more particularly, to an improved windshield wiper frame having at least one pair of horizontally elongated vanes extending downwardly and at a slant from the rear edge of the top portion of at least one horizontally elongated opening disposed on the top of the bridge of the wiper frame. These vanes direct the flow of air through the holes in the bridge, thereby increasing air pressure on the wiper blade and improving the performance of the windshield wiper assembly.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Various types of windshield wiper frames for a windshield assembly are well known. Such windshield wiper frames include a bridge, a pair of primary yokes pivotally connected to the bridge, a pair of secondary yokes pivotally connected to one end of each primary yoke, a mounting stay mounted on the other end of each primary yoke and mounting stays mounted on each end of the secondary yokes. However, such prior art wiper frames suffer from poor cleaning performance of the windshield wiper blade due to inadequate pressure on the windshield glass.
In order to improve cleaning performance, one known windshield wiper frame as shown in FIG. 1 , is equipped with a bridge having a pair of vanes extending up from the rear walls thereof. However, this wiper frame suffers from a number of problems. For example, as air flowing past the vehicle presses down on the pair of vanes, the entire upper portion of the wiper frame is also pressed down toward the glass, causing the entire frame to pivot slightly. Therefore, the lower portion of the wiper frame, and the wiper blade itself may be lifted slightly away from the glass, thereby preventing the wiper blade from effectively cleaning the convex surface of the windshield glass. This pivoting can result in decreased operational life of the wiper arm. In addition, the known bridge with vanes lacks openings disposed on the top of the bridge. These openings are needed to maintain the pressure balance on the two sides of the bendable lip of the blade so as to achieve an effective cleaning operation.


An exhaust gas purification unit for purifying the exhaust gas from an internal combustion engine which is preferably operated in lean burn mode, in particular a diesel engine used in motor vehicles, has a particulate filter and a SCR catalytic converter arranged in the exhaust pipe in succession in the direction of flow, and a reducing agent supply. Ammonia can be added to the exhaust gas from the internal combustion engine on the entry side of the SCR catalytic converter by the reducing agent supply. A hydrogen-generating unit enriches the exhaust gas from the internal combustion engine with generated hydrogen.

This application is a 371 of, PCT/EP02/04040, filed Apr. 11, 2002, which claims the priority of German Patent Application No. 101 28 414.4, filed Jun. 12, 2001, the disclosures of which are expressly incorporated by reference herein.
The present invention relates to an exhaust gas purification unit for purifying the exhaust gas from an internal combustion engine which is preferably operated in lean burn mode.
A known exhaust gas purification unit is described in DE 40 32 085 A1. The corresponding exhaust gas purification installation includes an arrangement of denox or SCR (SCR=selective catalytic reduction) catalytic converters. These SCR catalytic converters catalyze a selective reduction reaction, in which nitrogen oxides are reduced under oxidizing conditions to form harmless nitrogen with the aid of ammonia which is introduced into the exhaust pipe or a reducing agent which releases ammonia. Ammonia is used as reducing agent, and additionally the upstream connection of a particulate filter for removing condensed exhaust gas constituents is proposed. These and similar installations remove the nitrogen oxide gaseous pollutants from oxygen containing exhaust gases, with the catalytic activity typically being effective in a temperature range between 200° C. and 450° C.
As statutory exhaust gas limit values are reduced further, effective lowering of the levels of other harmful exhaust gas constituents, such as for example carbon monoxide, hydrocarbons, has to be achieved in addition to the reduction in the levels of nitrogen oxides, in particular at relatively low exhaust gas temperatures.

Exhaust gas purification unit with reducing agent supply


A method and system for processing negotiable economic credits (e.g., cash, credit card, enterprise incentives/award such as frequent flier miles, etc.) through a hand held device. Credits are storable in the form of credit data in a credit database associated with a point of sale and/or hand held device. Credit is retrievable from the credit database, in response to synchronizing a hand held device, such as a PDA, wireless PDA, paging device, cellular telephone, or other hand held computing device, with the point of sale. Credit data may be transferred to/from the hand held device, thereby permitting a user to maintain and manage enterprise credits based on the credit data, utilizing the hand held device. In one embodiment, when a particular number of enterprise credits have been earned, the user may utilize such credits to receive price discounts on enterprise products or services, or awards of such products or services. A user may also use credits earned for enterprise sponsored credit programs unrelated to transactions at unrelated enterprise having compatible points of sale for providing/receiving/processing credits, so long as credits are recognized at a point of sale.

1. Technical Field of the Invention
The present invention is generally related to electronic hand held devices (hereinafter referred to as "hand held devices") and electronic commerce ("E-commerce"). More particularly, the present invention is also related to hand held devices, such as a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA), wireless telephone, pager, or other mobile computing and storage device adapted for use in E-commerce. The present invention is also related to wireless and wireline computer networks. The present invention is also related to the fields of electronic cash, credit, and/or associated product management for retail establishments, organizations, and customers. The present invention is also related generally to merchandising systems and systems for generating and redeeming negotiable economic credits (e.g., electronic product discount coupons, cash and/or enterprise credits or awards).
2. Description of the Related Art
The recent shift in the consumer electronics industry from an emphasis on analog technology to a preference for digital technology is largely based on the fact that the former generally limits the user to a role of a passive recipient of information, while the latter is interactive and allows the user to control what, when, and how he or she receives and manipulates certain information.
This shift in focus has resulted in the development and increasingly widespread use of, for example, a hand held digital device generically referred to as a "personal digital assistant" (PDA). Such a PDA can be, for example, a "smart" phone, two-way pager, and so forth. These hand held devices are becoming increasingly popular for storing and maintaining information. Hand held devices, such as PDAs, may be connected to a desktop personal computer, networks or other PDAs via infrared, direct wire, or wireless communication links.
Unlike personal computers, which are general-purpose devices geared toward refining and processing information, PDAs are designed to capture, store and display information originating from various sources. Additionally, while a certain level of skill is required to use a personal computer effectively, hand held devices, such as PDAs, are designed with the novice and non-computer user in mind.
A typical PDA includes a microprocessor, a memory unit, a display, associated encoder circuitry, and selector buttons. It may optionally contain a clock and infrared emitter and receiver. A graphical user interface permits a user to store, retrieve and manipulate data via an interactive display. A PDA also typically includes a calendar, datebook, and one or more directories. The calendar shows a month of dates organized as rows and columns in the usual form. The datebook shows one day at a time and contains alphanumeric text entered in free format (typically, with a time of day and an event and/or name). Each directory contains entries consisting of a name field and a free form alphanumeric text field that can contain company names, addresses, telephone and fax numbers, email addresses, etc.
Entries may be organized alphabetically according to the name field and can be scanned or searched for by specifying a specific sequence of characters in the name field. A menu displayed via the graphical user interface permits a user to choose particular functions and directories. Most PDAs come equipped with a stylus, which is a plastic-tipped pen that a user utilizes to write in a "graffiti area" of the display and tap particular graphically displayed icons. Each icon is indicative of a particular activity or function.
PDAs are increasingly being utilized to access information from remote computer networks, such as the "World Wide Web" and the "Internet," both terms well known in the computer networking arts. PDA users can, for example, download e-mail from the Internet to the PDA. Web sites also exist that permit PDA users to access and download software that may be run on the PDA. For example, some web sites offer information to PDAs in the form of compressed news articles, stock quotes, and other data obtained from a wide variety of other electronic webbased sources.
Based on the foregoing, it can be appreciated that a large number of users of hand held devices, such as PDAs, pagers and mobile telephony are increasingly relying on such devices to maintain and transmit a variety of personal and business information.
Discount coupons have long been distributed by manufacturers to merchandise their products and by retail stores or establishments to attract consumers to their particular stores. Both coupon types are typically distributed to attract customers to engage in commercial transactions. Such coupons are effective if utilized by a sufficiently high percentage of customers. Utilizing this gauge, free-standing inserts are not very effective. Their redemption rate is presently approximately 2.8 percent and dropping.
Typically, coupons are physically collected at stores and credit is provided to the customer purchasing the corresponding product. The coupons are generally bundled and forwarded to a clearing house and then to a redemption center for sorting and counting. Reports are eventually forwarded to the manufacturers issuing the coupons in order to eventually generate a credit to the stores redeeming the coupons. It may unfortunately take several months before a store is reimbursed for coupons under present coupon redemption/processing methods.
Another problem with coupons is a significant misredemption rate of between 20 and 30 percent as a result of misidentification and outright fraud. The misredemption problem is exacerbated by the enormous amount of time, usually a number of months, that it takes to reimburse the retail stores for the discount given the customer.
Attempts have been made to address such problems. Such attempts, however, have resulted in additional problems, while not fully addressing the problems described above. For example, some companies have implemented a product specific micro-marketing system tied to a product point of selection and proprietary hardware in the form of an alerting platform attached to a grocery cart. A consumer within a retail establishment presses a button on the grocery cart alerting platform to select an electronic coupon when a coupon is graphically displayed at the exact product location within the retail establishment. The customer and the cart must be located at the point of selection to access the coupon. Such a system is proprietary in nature and requires a customer to retrieve a coupon only from the point of product selection within the store. Thus, because of the proprietary nature of the system, the coupons, the alerting platform and other proprietary hardware may not be utilized at other retail establishments. Furthermore, the enterprise associated with the retail establishment is burdened by the maintenance, replacement, and repair of the proprietary hardware attached to the retail establishment's shopping carts due to use, abuse, the weather and so forth.
Other systems known in the art utilize smart cards and smart card readers/writers at a point of product selection for obtaining coupon data. Furthermore, smart cards are primarily memory devices and do not allow user to manage or manipulate data contained in the smart card without a microprocessor enabled user interface adapted to read and write on the smart card. Also, a more limited card may currently be swiped at a point of sale for the purpose of obtaining discount on items tied to the enterprise/proprietary system. Again, user management or utility of credits are severally limited in the prior art.
Accordingly, alternatives are needed to traditional mass marketing and credit redeeming techniques, and proprietary, point of selection type systems. A need exists for non-proprietary based systems that are flexible, efficient and consumer friendly. Further a need exists for couponing devices that are not owned by the enterprise or retail establishment, but owned by the customers themselves and which can be utilized at other retail establishments and enterprises. Such a device and associated systems and methods, should be ubiquitous in nature to avoid the problems inherently associated with prior proprietary-based systems.
It has become apparent to the present inventors that the ability to acquire, use and/or electronically store negotiable economic credits (e.g., frequent flier miles, e-cash, buyer awards and other electronic commerce-related incentives) on or through hand held devices would free users of the time consuming tasks of clipping, organizing and redeeming traditional paper coupons or credits (e.g., filling out paper-based requests for the redemption of frequent flier miles), and problems that may be associated with proprietary micro-marketing systems. It has also become apparent to the present inventors that for merchandisers and manufacturers, such hand held devices could be utilized to effectively market, compile and negotiate coupon and/or credit exchanges much more efficiently than the traditional paper coupon/credit processing methods or proprietary-based micro-marketing systems and methods.
It is believed that aspects of the invention presently described herein solve the traditional problems associated with paper credit redemption and the growing use of negotiable economic credits, and the problems associated with proprietary-based marketing systems, while addressing an area of user control that has not yet been considered, anticipated, or utilized by negotiable economic credit promoters, merchandisers and/or manufacturers, and the increasing number of individuals who rely on hand held devices, such as PDAs to maintain and store personal and business information.


A protection system is provided that mitigates damage caused by slug flow in oil and gas production systems. The protection system opens or closes a choke valve based upon flow parameters such as the separator pressure and level, and the riser pressure. The choke valve position is calculated based upon a number of factors of the production system in order to maintain efficiency while providing safety.

1. Field of the Invention
This disclosure relates generally to protection systems for mitigation of damage caused by slug flow and more particularly, to a method and apparatus for protecting against slug flow.
2. Description of the Related Art
In multi-phase flow systems used in the oil and gas industry, crude oil, water and gas are transported from a well through a pipeline system to a process facility. In offshore oil production, the crude oil, water, and gas are generally simultaneously transported through a sub-sea pipeline to gas/liquid separating equipment, such as a separator, which is located on an offshore platform or onshore. This type of multiphase fluid flow results in different types of flow regimes occurring, including slug flow.
Slug flow can be problematic because it consists of alternating liquid and gas surges, which results in an unwanted flow pattern of alternating lack of flow or production starvation, large liquid slugs, and strong gas surges. Alternating patterns of liquid slugs and gas surges being supplied to a separator reduces its efficiency, since the separator is operated with acceptable pressure fluctuations and delivers a lower liquid content in the gas outlet and a lower gas content in the liquid outlet in order to accommodate for the pressure fluctuations.
The liquid slugs can also grow under certain flow conditions, which leads to severe slugging with the above-described unwanted flow patterns and inefficiency. Liquid slugs can also be generated by operational changes, such as with the increase of the fluid production during the start-up of a pipeline.
Monitoring for slug flow can be difficult due to the number of variables involved in the slug flow formation. Measurement of the flow rate in the sub-sea pipeline is difficult due to the multiphase flow therein and can require costly equipment to do so.
Accordingly, there is a need for mitigation of slug flow, which maintains the efficiency of the separator, while maintaining the efficiency of the oil and gas production system. There is a further need for a slug protection and mitigation system that is easily and cost effectively incorporated into the oil and gas production system, while reliably mitigating against damage caused by slug flow. The method and apparatus of the present invention provides for slug flow mitigation and protection.


The invention relates to the compounds or its pharmaceutical acceptable polymorphs, solvates, enantiomers, stereoisomers and hydrates thereof. The pharmaceutical compositions comprising an effective amount of compounds of formula I, formula II and formula III and the methods for the treatment of neurological diseases may be formulated for oral, buccal, rectal, topical, transdermal, transmucosal, lozenge, spray, intravenous, oral solution, nasal spray, oral solution, suspension, oral spray, buccal mucosal layer tablet, parenteral administration, syrup, or injection. Such compositions may be used to treatment of neurological diseases.

Depression is one of the most devastating human conditions. In the Unites States alone, the economic burden attributed to major depressive disorder (MDD) increased by over 21% from 2005 to 2010; this cost is representative of the combination of direct effects, suicide-related expenditures and workplace costs. Several reasons may explain this sharp uptick in costs in a short period of time: an increase in both the population of the United States as well as in the prevalence of MDD; an increase in the costs of treatments; changes in the composition and quality of treatment services; and changes in the rates of employment and treatment-seeking behaviors. Without a doubt, the discovery of treatments to combat depression is essential.
Major depressive disorder (MDD) is a disabling illness that is associated with frequent relapses, incomplete recovery between episodes, and persistent psychosocial and functional impairment. MDD is considered one of the ten leading causes of disability worldwide and is also associated with an increased risk of suicidal behaviours. Although many psychopharmacological agents are currently available for the treatment of MDD, approximately 10-20% of patients treated with the common antidepressant medications do not achieve complete recovery and meet the criteria of treatment-resistance
Good Rapid antidepressant effects of ketamine in MDD have been recognized for more than 15 years; in 2000, Berman et al conducted the first randomized, double-blind crossover study of intravenous ketamine (0.5 mg/kg) versus saline solution, in unipolar or bipolar patients in a major depressive episode. All 8 patients who were treated with ketamine had significant improvement in depressive symptoms, and 1 patient maintained mood improvement for 2-week postinfusion
Managing acute pathology of often relies on the addressing underlying pathology and symptoms of the disease. There is currently a need in the art for new compositions to treatment or delay of the onset of neurological diseases and its associated complications progression.

Compositions and methods for the treatment of neurological diseases


A high voltage power supply and a high voltage power control method thereof. The high voltage power supply includes a high voltage generation part to generate a high voltage, and a pulse width modulation (PWM) generation part to generate a pulse width modulation signal according to an output control value and to control the high voltage generation part to generate the high voltage using the generated pulse width modulation signal, when a high voltage output setting signal having the output control value is received by the PWM generation part to indicate the high voltage to be generated. Therefore, it is possible to automatically output a high voltage as desired without requiring an offline setting. In addition, although a voltage set and/or an output load are changed, the changed voltage set and/or the output load are automatically compensated so that a constant high voltage output can be output with a variety of different devices having different loads and power requirements.

1. Field of the Invention
The present general inventive concept relates to a high voltage power supply and a high voltage power control method thereof. More particularly, the present general inventive concept relates to a high voltage power supply, which generates a high voltage power independent of an output load according to a high voltage output setting signal, and a high voltage control method thereof.
2. Description of the Related Art
Generally, a high voltage power supply is used to power an electric device requiring a number of kilo volts (KV) of a high voltage direct current source such as a laser printer and/or a facsimile. The high voltage power supply converts a direct current into a high voltage alternating current (AC), and rectifies the high voltage alternating current to convert the high voltage alternating current into a high voltage direct current (DC). Generally, the high voltage power supply comprises a transformer for converting a direct current into an alternating current.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating an image forming apparatus including a conventional high voltage power supply 100.
Referring to FIG. 1, the image forming apparatus includes an engine controller 10, a development device 50, and the conventional high voltage power supply 100.
The engine controller 10 controls the high voltage power supply 100 to generate a high voltage power for supplying to the development device 50. Particularly, the engine controller 10 supplies a logic level high signal as a "High/Low" signal and a high voltage power supply (HVPS) control signal to the high voltage power supply 100 only if the high voltage power needs to be output. The engine controller 10 outputs a pulse width modulation signal (PWM 1, PWM 2, . . . , PWM n) with a certain duty ratio according to a preset value to the high voltage power supply 100.
A plurality of the pulse width modulation signals (PWM 1, PWM 2, . . . , PWM n) are used according to the high voltage power that the development device 50 requires, and a plurality of high voltage power supplies of the high voltage power supply 100 are also required according to the plurality of pulse width modulation signals (PWM 1, PWM 2, . . . , PWM n). Accordingly, a plurality of high voltage outputs (HV output 1, HV output 2, . . . , HV output n) are output from the plurality of high voltage power supplies of the high voltage power supply 100.
The high voltage power supply 100 can generate a high voltage power of hundreds to thousands of volts by switching on/off due to the pulse width modulation signals (PWM 1, PWM 2, . . . , PWM n) applied from the engine controller 10. The high voltage power supply 100 outputs the generated high voltage outputs (HV output 1, HV output 2, . . . , HV output n) to the development device 50.
To output the plurality of high voltage outputs (HV output 1, HV output 2, . . . , HV output n), the engine controller 10 generates the plurality of the pulse width modulation signals (PWM 1, PWM 2, . . . , PWM n). As a result of having to generate the plurality of pulse modulation signals (PWM 1, PWM 2, . . . , PWM n), the engine controller 10 is greatly burdened.
Additionally, if the image forming apparatus connected to the conventional high voltage power supply 100 or another output load such as the development device 50 is changed, the high voltage output(s) is also changed. Therefore, a re-tuning of a high voltage outputs (HV output 1, HV output 2, . . . , HV output n) is required to output constant high voltage output(s). The high voltage output(s) change according to the output load.
The high voltage output(s) of the conventional high voltage power supply 100 should be set by using a variable resistance in an offline setting, and then be mounted to the image forming apparatus so that it is determined whether the high voltage output(s) having the set value is output. Once this process is completed, the conventional high voltage power supply 100 can be manufactured. Therefore, time and complication for manufacturing the conventional high voltage power supply 100 are costly.

High voltage power supply and a high voltage power control method thereof


There are provided a first optical waveguide having a first curved portion, a second optical waveguide having a second curved portion that extends along and is disposed inside the first curved portion, a third optical waveguide having a third curved portion, an end portion of the third curved portion being connected to both end portions of the first and second curved portions. Further provided are light output means disposed at an end portion of the first optical waveguide which is opposite the end portion of the first curved portion, for receiving light outputted from the first optical waveguide, light input means disposed at an end portion of the second optical waveguide which is opposite the end portion of the second curved portion, for introducing light into the second optical waveguide, light input/output means disposed at an end portion of the third optical waveguide which is opposite to the end portion of the third curved portion, for introducing light into the third optical waveguide and for receiving light outputted from the third optical waveguide. This optical waveguide circulator is suitable for miniaturization and is also suitable for mass production because it does not require any expensive individual parts.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an optical circulator used for optical communication and, more particularly, to an optical waveguide circulator.
2. Description of the Related Art
The optical circulator is an optical device having at least three optical input/output ports A, B, and C and provided with a function that, for instance, light incident on port A is allowed to exit from port B and light incident on port B is allowed to exit from port C, but light is prohibited from passing through the device in the opposite direction.
Conventionally, as shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, an optical circulator is generally constructed by bulk components such as polarizing beam splitters 12, Faraday rotators 10, wave plates 11, and prisms 13.
As shown in FIG. 1, light inputted to port 14 (port B) is separated by the polarizing beam splitter 12, and resulting beams are rotated in polarization plane by 45.degree. in passing through the Faraday rotators 10. Resulting 45.degree.-rotated beams are rotated by 45.degree. in the opposite direction by the wave plates 11, then combined by the other polarizing beam splitter 12, and outputted from port 15 (port C).
On the other hand, as shown in FIG. 2, light inputted to port 16 (port A) is separated by the polarizing beam splitter 12, and separated beams are rotated in polarization plane by 45.degree. in passing through the wave plates 11. Resulting 45.degree.-rotated beams are further rotated by 45.degree. in the same direction by the Faraday rotators 10, then combined by the other polarizing beam splitter 12, and outputted from port 14 (port B).
In the above bulk-type optical circulator, each of the polarizing beam splitters 12, the Faraday rotators 10, and the wave plates 11 is made of quartz glass or a magnet, for instance. In assembling those optical elements, to efficiently guide incident light to an output end, care should be taken not to cause deviations from the optical axis.
FIG. 3 shows another optical circulator which is configured differently from the above one. That is, the optical circulator is configured by two optical isolators and one Y branching device connected to the former.
Constructed as an assembly of a plurality of optical elements, the conventional bulk-type optical circulator necessarily has a limit in its miniaturization. In addition to limitations due to sizes of the optical elements themselves, there are other factors of preventing the miniaturization as exemplified by the facts that such operations as polishing and bonding of glass members are needed to produce a polarizing beam splitter, and that optical elements need to be assembled with each other.
The optical circulator of FIG. 3 also has a limit in miniaturization because the individual parts, i.e., the isolators and the Y branching deice, are large and a certain space is needed for reinforcement after the parts are connected together.
The conventional optical circulators have another problem that the individual optical elements are expensive. For example, each of such optical elements as a polarizing beam splitter, a wave plate, and a Faraday rotator is expensive and hence prevents price reduction. Also in the configuration with fusion splice of the parts, the parts, i.e., the isolators and the Y branching device, are expensive and the cost of fusion splice is high.
Further, requiring assembly of optical parts with high accuracy, the conventional optical circulators has a limit in mass productivity even with automated assembly using robots or the like. Also in the configuration with fusion splice of the parts, the parts are connected together such that optical fibers are fusion-spliced manually one by one and hence there is no likelihood of substantial improvement in mass productivity.
Still further, when a conventional circulator is used in combination with a passive device, it is unavoidable to manually fusion-splice optical fibers of the optical circulator and the passive device one by one and hence the manufacture takes long time.


A method and an access unit for accessing an industrial communication network are provided. An access unit has first ports connected to the communication network and at least one second port. The access unit is configured to pass data traffic between nodes of the communication network through the access unit in a first operational state of the access unit. The access unit is configured to pass data traffic to a test node via the at least one second port and/or allow test data to be injected into the communication network via the at least one second port in a second operational state of the access unit.

Industrial communication networks are widely used. Such communication networks may have the topology of a High-availability Seamless Redundancy (HSR) ring in accordance with IEC 62439-3.
Substations in high and medium voltage power networks are an exemplary field in which such communication networks may be used. Such substations include primary devices such as electrical cables, lines, bus bars, switches, power transformers and instrument transformers, which are generally arranged in switch yards and/or bays. These primary devices are operated in an automated way via a Substation Automation (SA) system. The SA system comprises secondary devices, which may include Intelligent Electronic Devices (IED), responsible for the protection, control and monitoring of the primary devices. Protection devices, such as protection relays, bay controllers or revenue meters are exemplary for secondary devices.
A SA system is operative to process currents, voltages, and binary information, e.g., the position indication of circuit breakers and disconnectors. In a conventional SA system, this information has been provided via copper wires from the primary process interfaces to the control and protection IEDs. Especially for protection IEDs, a test switch may be installed to interrupt the connection of the IED to the instrument transformers, directly located on the primary equipment, and to allow a test equipment to be connected to inject simulated currents and voltages to the device under test.
For a digital substation, I/O units that collect the currents, voltages and other information, such as binary information indicating the state of circuit breakers and disconnectors, are located on process level and the relevant information is provided by communication links to the SA system. The communication links may be based on Ethernet and may be implemented as point-to-point connections, switched networks, or High-availability Seamless Redundancy (HSR) rings. The physical layer may be based on fiber optic connections or electrical connections.
WO 2009/053488 A1 discloses a method of operating a SA system with a standardized configuration description. During maintenance, commissioning and fault situations when one or several IEDs are inoperable, the data that these IEDs would have produced is substituted to ensure availability of the substation. To this effect, a dedicated substitute device is permanently installed that can take the role of any IED. The dedicated substitute device is an active device. The provision of the active substitute device that remains permanently installed may add to the costs of the testing infrastructure.
US 2015/0180760 A1 discloses a network test system that improves visibility into the real-time operation of a network system or subsystem of a spacecraft through the use of a port from each relevant network to a spacecraft test interface.
US 2008/0247416 A1 discloses a network diagnostic component and related circuit for tapping a line in the network diagnostic component.
FIG. 18 and FIG. 19 schematically illustrate a prior art technique of testing a SA system that has HSR ring topology. Plural HSR nodes 41-44 are connected to an HSR process bus. A first HSR node 41 and a fourth HSR node 44 are connected by a connection 111 which may be a fiber optic connection or an electrical connection. The HSR ring is a closed ring network. A test node 112 must be inserted to analyse the network traffic and/or to inject simulated test data. Conventionally, this requires the connection 111 on at least one of the nodes 41-44 to be removed. FIG. 19 schematically illustrates the SA system when a test node 112 has been inserted into the HSR ring. The connection 111 needs to be disconnected from the HSR node 41 and must be connected to the test node 112, as schematically illustrated by the broken arrow 113. A new connection 114 must be inserted. Various shortcomings are associated with such a procedure. For illustration, access to the installed HSR nodes 41, 44 may be limited due to installation space, making it challenging to access HSR nodes 41-44. This may apply in particular in case the nodes 41-44 are installed in an area with limited access, like on process level. Insertion of the test node 112 can modify the behaviour of the SA system. After completion of the test, the test node 112 is removed again from the SA system. There is a risk that the connection 111 will not be re-installed correctly. As a consequence of the complexity of these processes, the HSR ring may be open for several seconds up to minutes also for the normal operation, leading to higher probability of failure.

Method and access unit for accessing industrial communication networks


Patterns are processed minimizing resources such as memory and/or processing power. According to one aspect, when a pattern object is received with the same identifier as that of an earlier received pattern, a count is maintained reflecting a number of times the earlier pattern is to be used in rendering. When the earlier pattern is used as many times as the count in the rendering operations, the earlier pattern is deleted from the memory. According to another aspect, when two patterns are defined based on the same pattern data, the pattern is stored in a common storage area, and a pointer is maintained to the storage area from both the patterns. According to another aspect, even if a pattern is to be used only in the expanded form while rendering, the pattern is stored in non-expanded form until the time of rendering to minimize memory consumption.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to raster image processing in printers, and more specifically to a method and apparatus for efficiently rendering and storing of pattern objects in a page.
2. Related Art
Printers are often used to print a specified content (received from an external system such as personal computers) on medium such as paper. The content to be printed ("page content") is typically specified by page description languages (PDL) such as Postscript (PS) and Printer Control Language (PCL), as is well known in the relevant arts. Printing generally entails converting a page content specified by a PDL to a corresponding bit map. The bit map may then be used to print the content on the desired medium.
Bit maps are often generated by performing logical operations on data representing source, destination and paint. As is well known, a destination generally refers to a bit-map formed by rendering the display-list elements up to that point of time. A source refers to a current display list element being rendered, and paint refers to the shade of color or a pattern that the source may be filled with in the destination.
Patterns are often used in many instances while generating a page. For example, a pattern representing a map may be replicated onto several places of a printed page. In general, the manner in which a pattern is used while generating page content impacts the performance throughput and/or required resources (e.g., memory, processing power, etc). Accordingly, it may be necessary to process a pattern while meeting various requirements.

Efficient storage and rendering of patterns in a printer


An analog front-end circuit includes an analog processing circuit, an A/D converter, a target register in which a lower limit target value of an input image signal is set, and a calculation circuit. The analog processing circuit includes an offset control circuit which performs offset control based on an offset control value set in an offset control register. The calculation circuit monitors the A/D-converted value in a lower limit value output period when the A/D-converted value corresponding to a lower limit value of an input range is output from the A/D converter, and sets the offset control value that causes the A/D-converted value to become closer to the lower limit target value set in the target register in the offset control register.

The present invention relates to an analog front-end circuit, an electronic instrument, and the like.
In an image sensor such as a CCD or CMOS sensor used for electronic instruments such as an image reader, an analog image signal relating to a document or the like read by the image sensor is converted into a digital image data using an A/D converter. JP-A-2004-297146 discloses technology relating to an analog front-end circuit (image processor) having such an A/D converter.
As a method which controls the offset or the gain of such an analog front-end circuit, an external CPU (firmware which operates on a CPU) may set an offset control value or a gain control value in a register before scanning a document to implement offset control or gain control.
According to this method, since a closed-loop feedback occurs within the image sensor (line sensor), the analog front-end circuit, and the CPU, it takes time to prepare to read a document. Moreover, since firmware which operates on the CPU is required, it is necessary to construct an analysis algorithm or analysis means.

Analog front-end circuit and electronic instrument


A bio-sensing device includes a first platform, a second platform, at least one first magnetic element, and at least one second magnetic element. The first platform is configured to support a microplate. The microplate has a plurality of wells, each of which stores a reagent and a plurality of microbeads. The second platform is movably placed below the first platform. The first and the second magnetic elements are respectively located on the second platform. The first magnetic element moves along with the second platform to magnetically attract the microbeads in the wells, the second magnetic element moves along with the second platform to demagnetize the microbeads in the wells, and magnetism of the first magnetic element is opposite to magnetism of the second magnetic element.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a bio-sensing device; more particularly, the invention relates to a bio-sensing device equipped with a demagnetization structure.
2. Description of Related Art
There are a number of existing cell separation technologies, such as a fluorescence activated cell separation (FACS) technology, a dielectrophoresis (DEP) cell separation technology, a micro-fabricated sieving separation technology, a magnetically activated cell separation (MACS) technology, and some optics-related and acoustics-related technologies.
Among these cell separation technologies, flow cytometry and the MACS technology are applied in most cases. Nevertheless, the frequently applied flow cytometry not only requires significant costs and a great number of samples but also has low bacterial disinfectant efficacy.
Different from flow cytometry, the MACS technology ensures that most target cells may be acquired within a relatively short period of time, and the separation principle of microbeads is based on the magnetic properties of the microbeads, i.e., the microbeads are magnetically attracted to the magnetic field and freely moved in a non-magnetic environment. Particularly, the microbeads are coated with specific antibodies which are attached to antigens of some desired cells via the antibody-antigen interaction. Thereby, the desired cells may be attached to the surfaces of the microbeads, such that the desired cells may be separated. Owing to the antibody-antigen interaction, the MACS technology is highly specific, simple, and cost-effective, and the sampling requirements for separation are low.
However, in the existing MACS technology, the microbeads with the weakened magnetic force may be gradually magnetized after being constantly controlled by the magnetic field. In the course of time, the microbeads in the wells tend to be gathered and attracted to one another even though the microbeads are not subject to any magnetic field; as a result, even in a non-magnetic environment, the microbeads can no longer move in a free manner.


This invention relates to new soft-switching techniques for minimizing switching losses and stress in power electronic circuits using inverter legs. By choosing the switching frequency with specific relationships with the resonant frequency of the power electronic circuits, the proposed switching technique enables the power electronic circuits to achieve soft switching under full load and short-circuit conditions at the defined frequencies for both capacitive and inductive loads. This technique can be applied to an electronic circuit with two switches connected in totem pole configuration between two dc voltage rails or commonly known as a power inverter leg or inverter arm. Examples of these circuits are class-D power converter, half-bridge power converters and full-bridge power converters or inverters. The proposed techniques allow inverter circuits with resistive, capacitive and inductive loads to achieve soft switching.

Many power electronic circuits consist of inverter legs or arms. An inverter leg is shown in FIG. 1. Each inverter leg consists of two power switches (SI and S2) connected across a dc voltage rail. This switch arrangement across a dc voltage rail is also known as a totem-pole configuration. Each switch has an anti-parallel diode (D1 or D2), which can be part of the switch structure in a power mosfet or an externally connected diode. In addition, there is also capacitance across the switch and diode. This o capacitance (C) arises from the inherent capacitance of the switch and diode. In some applications, however, an additional capacitor may be connected across the switch to increase the capacitance if more capacitance is needed for achieving soft switching.
Usually, the node between S1 and S2 is connected to the load circuit (Fig. 1). The two switches are turned on and off in a complimentary manner with a dead time in between. This means that only one switch is turned on at any time. Between the change of switching states, both switches are not turned on for a short period of time that is known as the dead time. Usually, this dead time is a small portion of the switching period. Two inverter legs can be used to form a single-phase full-bridge inverter (FIG. 2). The inverter leg can be used to form a half-bridge inverter as shown in FIG. 3(a) and FIG. 3(b). Capacitor Cb is simply a dc voltage blocking capacitor (FIG. 3(b)). The function of the inverter circuits are to generate an ac voltage from the do votlage supply and apply this ac voltage across the load which may be an energy-consuming component (ie a resistive load) or an energy-storing component such as a capacitor and inductor forming a resonant tank.
Examples of typical loads are shown in FIG. 4 and FIG. 5. In FIG. 4, the overall load consists of a dc voltage blocking capacitor, a resonant inductor, a resonant capacitor and an equivalent resistive load. This is a commonly used circuit for an electronic ballast for a lamp and the resistive load represents the energy consuming lamp. The equivalent resistive load can also be a transformer coupled circuit with the energy-consuming load connected on the secondary transformer circuit via a rectifier (such as the system for a switched mode power supply). FIG. 5 shows multi-resonant circuit with an energy-consuming load. This multi-resonant circuit is an alternative electronic ballast circuit for a high-intensity-discharge (HID) lamp, in which Lr2 and Cr form a relatively low-frequency (e.g. 50 kHz) resonant tank to create a high voltage to ignite the HID lamp and Lrl and Cr form a relatively high-frequency (e.g. 400 kHz) resonant tank for operating the lamp under steady-state conditions. Here Lr2>Lrl.
To understand the problems faced by existing technology, existing soft-switching techniques for power electronic circuits with inverter leg or legs will be described, using the half-bridge circuit in FIG. 4 as an example. The directions of the load current Iinput and load voltage Vinput as indicated in FIG. 4 are assigned as positive for the following description.
In the example of FIG. 4, the dc blocking capacitor Cb eliminates the dc component of the ac voltage generated by the inverter leg. The resonant tank consists of Lr and Cr and the dominant resonant frequency is fr=½πsqrt(LrCr). If the switching frequency (fs) of the AC rectangular voltage generated by the inverter circuit is higher than fr, the overall load including the resonant tank and resistive load is more inductive than capacitive. In this case (fs>fr), the overall load is considered as inductive and the current Iz is lagging behind the applied ac voltage Vz as shown in FIG. 6(a). On the other hand, if fs<fr, the overall load is capacitive and the current Iinput is leading the applied voltage Vinput as shown in FIG. 6(b).
FIG. 7 shows three typical switching trajectories of a power switch. The y-axis is the current through the switch and the x-axis is the voltage across the switch. During the transition periods of the turn-on or turn-off processes, a power switch will withstand high transitional voltage (across the switch) and current (through the switch). This is called hard switching. Hard switching not only leads to switching loss and stress, but more importantly causes switching transients or spikes that are major source of electromagnetic interference (EMI). Such EMI problems may induce noise in the gating signals of the power switches, causing reliability problems. For example, if noise is induced in the gate of a nominally-off power switch and triggers the switch to turn on, the inverter leg may have a shoot-through or short-circuit situation. As one solution to this problem it is known to connect a snubber circuit consisting of resistor and capacitor to reduce the high di/dt and dv/dt of the switch so as to reduce the switching loss and stress. However, traditional snubber circuits are lossy because part of the switching loss is transferred from the switch to the snubber resistor. In order to achieve soft switching, it is necessary to create a zero voltage and/or zero current condition for the switch to turn on or off. If either the switch voltage or switch current is zero, the instantaneous product of switch voltage and current is zero. Thus, the switching loss becomes zero. In practice, it may not be possible to achieve absolute zero switch voltage and/or current. Instead, the switch voltage and/or current can be clamped to near-zero value. Such near-zero voltage and/or current zero-voltage and/or current switching may still be considered to be zero voltage or zero current. The general term for zero-voltage or zero-current switching is soft switching.
The following conditions have to be met in order to achieve soft switching in circuits including an inverter leg.
(A) For zero-voltage 'turn off' of power electronic switches S1 and S2
Condition (1)—Parallel capacitance is needed across the power switches S1 and S2 in order to limit the dv/dt of the switch so as to achieve zero-voltage turn off.
Parallel capacitance across the switch can come from the power switches' device capacitance such as the drain-source capacitance of the power mosfet. External capacitor can be added across the switch if necessary. This is a well known technique for zero-voltage turn off of power electronic devices.
(B) For zero-voltage 'turn-on' of power electronic switches S1 and S2
Condition (1*)—The tank current Iinput should be in the correct direction as follows:
For the inverter circuit example (FIG. 4), soft switching can be achieved if the overall load (including the resonant tank and resistive load) is inductive. The normal understanding in the prior art is that the frequency (fs) of the inverter's ac voltage Vinput must be higher that the dominant resonant frequency (fr) of the overall load so that the overall load is inductive. The actual soft-switching condition is that the current input is positive just before S2 (bottom switch) is turned on and negative just before S1 (top switch) is turned on (1*) (FIG. 6(a)). This is a necessary condition for zero-voltage switching
When S1 is turned off, it is soft-switched off because the parallel capacitor across S1 limits dv/dt of the switch voltage. The initial voltage across S1 is near zero during the turn-off process of S1. Therefore, S1 is zero-voltage (soft) turned off. The next important process is to ensure that S2 is soft-switched on. If fs>fr, the overall load is inductive. The existing method is to add a small dead time between the turn-off of S1 and turn-on of S2. During this dead time, both gating signals for S1 and S2 are off. However, this does not mean that the current Iinput is not continuous. When S1 is turned off, the capacitor voltage across S1 will rise to the dc rail voltage whilst the capacitor voltage across S2 will discharge to zero. Because the load is inductive, Iinput must be continuous. So the anti-parallel diode across S2 will be turned on so as to allow Iinput to flow continuously during this dead time. This means that the voltage across S2 will be clamped by its parallel diode's on-state voltage which is typically 0.7V (this is a near-zero-voltage when compared with the dc rail voltage of tens or hundreds of volts). Therefore, a soft-switching condition is created for S2 to be turned on at zero voltage condition.
Similar arguments apply to the soft-turn-off process of S2 and soft-turn-on process of S1. At the end of the on-time of S2, Iinput is negative. S2 can be soft turned off because of its parallel capacitor which limits the dv/dt of the voltage across S2. So S2 can be zero voltage (soft) turned off. S1 is not turned on immediately after S2 is turned off because of the dead time. The inductive load current Iinput has to flow into the anti-parallel diode of S1 during this dead time, thus clamping the voltage across S1 to zero. So S1 can be turned on under zero voltage condition.
The main problem of the above soft-switching method for the inverter circuit is that fs must be greater than fr so that the overall load is inductive. If fs<fr, the overall load becomes capacitive and the soft-switching condition that "the current Iinput is positive just before S2 is turned on and negative just before S1 is turned on" (1*) cannot be met (FIG. 6(b)). If Iinput is negative just before S2 is turned on, the anti-parallel diode of S2 is not conducting. Thus, the voltage across S2 is not clamped to zero for S2 to turn on and soft-switching condition is lost.
Condition (2*): Tank current Iinput must exceed a minimum magnitude in order to fully discharge total equivalent capacitance across the power switch for zero-voltage switching—Equation (3).
It is necessary to find the current threshold for soft switching in the operating frequency region. When the current is above the current threshold, soft switching can be achieved. The current iinput should be large enough to remove the charge on (discharge) the total equivalent capacitance across the power switch (such as the drain and source of the power mosfet). The requirement can be expressed by below equation:
                    Qs        =                                            ∫                                                -                                      t                    d                                                  /                2                                                              t                  d                                /                2                                                                                i                  input                                                                  (                  t                  )                                                                                ⅆ                t                                              ≥                      2                                                                                C              s                                                  V              g                                                          (        1        )
where Qs is the charge and Cs is the total equivalent capacitance across the power switch (e.g. drain and source of the power switch), Vg is the dc inverter voltage and td is the dead time between the gating signals of S1 and S2.
If a resonant tank is used in the load circuit, the input circuit can be approximated as a sinusoidal current because of the filtering effect of the resonant tank.iinput(t)=Iinputsin (ωst−φ)  (2)
where Iinput is the peak magnitude of iinput(t), ωs=2πfs is the angular frequency of the inverter, t is the time variable and φ is the phase angle between the voltage generated by the inverter leg (Vinput) across the load circuit.
Based on (1) and (2), the input current must obey the following equation in order to create a zero-voltage condition for the power switch to achieve soft switching:Iinput≧CsVgωs/sin (ωs·td/2)  (3)
Therefore, equation (3) must be met as a necessary condition for soft switching. This equation provides a guideline to choose the appropriate td, Cs and fs.

Soft-switching techniques for power inverter legs


A method for generating an exam is disclosed. The method includes setting initial conditions for the exam, wherein the initial conditions comprises a number of true propositions p, a number of false propositions q, and a number of random propositions r, and determining numbers of different propositions in the exam according to the initial conditions. The method further includes selecting the p number of true propositions, and numbering each of the p number of true propositions with a running number, selecting q number of false propositions, grouping the q number of false propositions, numbering each of the groups with a group number, selecting the r number of propositions, grouping the r number of propositions, numbering each of the groups with a group number. The method further includes generating an exam according to the p number of true propositions, the q number of false propositions, and the r number of propositions.

1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the present disclosure relate to generating exams, and more particularly to a system and method for generating an exam.
2. Description of Related Art
An examination is often given to a person in order to determine a qualification or a grade for the person. The examination may be given on paper or be given electronically and may include true/false questions and/or multiple-choice questions. In order to generate the examination, a test creator often has to list out test questions and answers to the test questions manually.
However, this method is inefficient because listing out the test questions and the answers to the test questions is often redundant and exhausting. Additionally, the method often involves errors and accordingly extra resources may be employed to reduce the errors.
What is needed, therefore, is a system and method which can generate an exam automatically in order to reduce inefficiency and inaccuracy.

System and method for generating an exam

Hong Fu Jin Precision Industry (ShenZhen) Co., Ltd.


Compositions, methods, and kits useful for treating hyperlipidemic conditions are provided herein. Such compositions can contain synergizing amounts of nicotinic acid, nicotinamide riboside and/or nicotinic acid metabolites in combination with leucine and/or a leucine metabolite, with or without resveratrol.

Metabolic disorders, such as hyperlipidemia and obesity, and the related impact on health and mortality presents a significant burden to public health. For instance, obesity, clinically defined as a body mass index of over 30 kg/m2, is estimated to affect 35.7% of the U.S. adult population. In the U.S., obesity is estimated to cause roughly 110,000-365,000 deaths per year. Obesity can result in hyperlipidemia, characterized by an excess of lipids, including cholesterol, cholesterol esters, phospholipids, and triglycerides, in the bloodstream, and can further result in diabetes, vascular disease, cancer, renal disease, infectious diseases, external causes, intentional self-harm, nervous system disorders, and chronic pulmonary disease (N Engl J Med 2011; 364:829-841). Metabolic syndrome, in which subjects present with central obesity and at least two other metabolic disorders (such as high cholesterol, high blood pressure, or diabetes), is estimated to affect 25% of the U.S. population.
Hyperlipidemia, one of the symptoms of obesity and other conditions, can be treated with various medications, including nicotinic acid. Nicotinic acid is a form of vitamin B3 (niacin). When taken in high doses (1-3 g/day), nicotinic acid can treat hyperlipidemia, as it can lower total lipid, LDL, cholesterol, triglycerides, and lipoprotein, or raise HDL lipoprotein in the bloodstream. It can also reduce atherosclerotic plaque progression and coronary heart disease morbidity and mortality.
However, nicotinic acid can have a significant side-effect and hence can be generally poorly tolerated. One significant side-effect can be severe cutaneous vasodilation and flushing responses, and is consequently infrequently prescribed despite well documented safety and efficacy (Carlson L A. Nicotinic acid: the broad-spectrum lipid drug. A 50th anniversary review. J Int Med 2005; 258:94-114). While side effects are somewhat attenuated in sustained (SR) and extended (ER) release preparations, the side effects persist sufficiently to limit drug use. Therefore, there exists a pressing need to decrease the side-effects of the nicotinic acid without decreasing its therapeutic effects.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Leucine and nicotinic acid reduces lipid levels


Terminal groups (2a), (2b), (2c) and (2d) extending in respective directions, of an IC (1 ) disposed on a stage (11 ) are reflected by first mirrors (31a), (31b), (31c) and (31d) down toward second mirrors (32a), (32b), (32c) and (32d). The terminal groups are reflected by the second mirrors toward the center and are further reflected by third mirrors (33a), (33b), (33c) and (33d) downward. The reflected terminal groups are received by a lens unit (35 ) and image taking means to be displayed in a display screen so that front images of the terminal groups of the IC (1 ) in the respective directions as viewed from the sides thereof can be displayed in the same display screen. Accordingly, the terminal groups in the respective directions can be inspected at one time.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an inspection apparatus of terminal groups (portions to be inspected) extending from an outer periphery of an electronic component such as an integrated circuit (IC), and more particularly to an inspection apparatus of an electronic component capable of displaying the portions to be inspected such as the terminal groups disposed in a plurality of directions onto the same plane.
2. Prior Art
FIG. 5 shows an integrated circuit (IC) as an example of an electronic component. A plurality of terminal groups (2a), (2b), (2c) and (2d) are disposed on four sides of the IC (1). The terminal groups (2a), (2b), (2c) and (2d) are protruded in the directions of (A), (B), (C) and (D), respectively. In FIG. 5, only the terminal groups (2a) and (2c) are shown.
The terminal groups (2a), (2b), (2c) and (2d) each include a large number of terminals. When the IC (1) is mounted on a circuit board, the terminals constituting the terminal groups (2a), (2b), (2c) and (2d) are joined to land portions formed on the circuit board by means of solder paste. The solder paste is melted by a heating furnace and cooled to thereby be hardened, so that the terminals are soldered to the land portions.
In order to mount the IC (1) on the circuit board exactly, it is necessary that all of the terminals of the terminal groups (2a), (2b), (2c) and (2d) protruded in the respective directions can be brought into contact with the land portions on the circuit board stably. For example, when any terminal is deformed to be separated from the land portion, the deformed terminal fails to come into contact with the land portion and cannot be electrically connected to the land portion exactly. Further, when any terminal is deformed to be protruded downward, a plurality of terminals positioned on both sides thereof are separated from the land portions to form space therebetween, so that soldering therebetween is failed. Accordingly, before the IC (1) is mounted on the circuit board, it is necessary to inspect whether all tips of the terminals of the terminal groups protruded in the respective directions (A), (B), (C) and (D) are aligned on the same plane or not.
Heretofore, the inspection is made by means of eyes or an image taking apparatus, while the inspection is made separately in the respective directions of (A), (B), (C) and (D).
However, the inspection using eyes is difficult to examine delicate unalignment or ununiformity of the terminal groups including the numerous terminals one by one.
Further, in the conventional inspection using the image taking apparatus, it is necessary to rotate or move the IC (1) or the image taking apparatus in order to take images of the terminal groups in the respective directions and the inspection process requires much labor and time. In addition, ununiformity of the separate terminals in the terminal group in each direction can be examined, while it is impossible to compare and examine uniformity of the tips of the terminals between the terminal groups protruded in different directions. Accordingly, even when the tips of the terminals of the terminal group protruded in each direction are aligned or uniformed, there is a case where the tips of the terminals of the terminal groups protruded in different directions are not necessarily aligned with one another when the tips are compared with one another. In such a case, it is impossible to bring all the terminals into contact with the land portions stably.
Accordingly, it is desired to develop the inspection apparatus of an electronic component which can compare the terminal groups in all the directions.

Inspection apparatus of electronic component


Interpolation processing of digital map imagery data is carried out by prefetching full and half resolution data stored in half-resolution addresses of scene memory into a cache and accessing the cache as virtual addresses associated with the interlaced scan of the display are generated. Both full and half-resolution data is controllably weighted and summed bi-linearly to obtain interpolated data values for spatial locations corresponding to the virtual addresses. For a respective half-resolution storage location, stored imagery data includes both half-resolution data, (such as that representative of color characteristics, elevation, cultural features, linear and area features) of its associated half-resolution spatial location in a terrain map and a plurality of full-resolution data for a plurality of full-resolution spatial locations of the terrain map that are located in a adjacent neighborhood surrounding the half-resolution spatial location.

Co-pending U.S. Pat. No. 4,970,682, issued Nov. 13, 1990, derived from parent application Ser. No. 168,437, filed Mar. 15, 1988, (the original `continuation chain` parent application of which, Ser. No. 224,742, now abandoned was filed Jan. 13, 1981), by Paul B. Beckwith et al, entitled Digital Map Generator and Display System, assigned to the assignee of the present application and the disclosure of which is incorporated herein, describes a digital map generation and display system which is capable of accessing and displaying a digital terrain map image to an observer (e.g. the pilot of a fixed or rotary wing aircraft) effectively in real time with the travel of the aircraft over that terrain. A principal factor in the ability of the system to effect a real time display is the combination of a scene memory, which stores a portion of digital map imagery data that has been decompressed from a mass storage device in a prescribed orientation (North-up), and a controlled addressing scheme for reading out data from the scene memory for display in accordance with heading information supplied by the aircraft's on-board navigation equipment. Because the scene memory address signals (which are navigation-dependent) can be expected to be associated with spatial locations in the (terrain map) image that do not necessarily coincide with spatial locations in the map from which the data stored in memory was originally derived, it is necessary to interpolate the data which is used to drive the pixels of the display.
Previously, such interpolation has been accomplished by techniques which include choosing a stored data value associated with that image spatial location closest to the spatial location for the pixel address, or by `truncating` the pixel address to that memory address which is associated with a prescribed one of a set of geometrically dispersed spatial locations adjacent to the spatial location of the pixel of interest. Because such approximations do not take into account variations across the terrain map, such as abrupt color changes, and are limited by the resolution of the database, they may introduce anomalies (e.g. flickering lines) in the displayed image, especially during image rotation, thereby degrading image quality.


A piston structure for an engine is provided. The piston structure includes a piston for reciprocating within a cylinder, a connecting rod having a smaller-end part and a larger-end part in both ends, respectively, the smaller-end part coupled to the piston, the larger-end part coupled to a crankshaft, a cross-sectionally hollow piston pin coupling the piston to the smaller-end part, and a dynamic absorber provided inside the piston pin, including a fixed part fixed to the piston pin and a movable part pivotally supported by the fixed part, and for suppressing the piston, the piston pin, and the smaller-end part from integrally resonating with respect to the larger-end part of the connecting rod on combustion stroke. The dynamic absorber includes an assemblable dynamic absorber in which the movable part is formed by attaching a mass adjusting part to the fixed part.

The present invention relates to a piston structure for an engine, in which the piston is coupled to a smaller end part of a connecting rod by a piston pin.
Generally, in engines installed in vehicles (e.g., automobiles), a piston is coupled to a smaller end part of a connecting rod by a piston pin. Specifically, the piston pin is inserted through a pin insertion hole formed in the smaller end part of the connecting rod, and the smaller end part of the connecting rod is located in a central area of the piston pin in its axial directions. Two boss parts are formed in a bottom face of the piston (the face opposite to a top face), at positions corresponding to both end portions of the piston pin in the axial directions so as to sandwich the smaller end part of the connecting rod therebetween. The two boss parts are formed with pin supporting holes into which both the end portions of the piston pin in the axial directions are inserted and for supporting both the end portions, respectively (e.g., see JP2004-353500A).
Such engines having the above configuration are known to cause combustion noises due to resonance caused depending on a basic structure of the engine (e.g., see Masaya Otsuka, "How to Minimize Diesel Combustion Noise by Improving Engine Structure," Proceedings of Society of Automotive Engineers Convention, No. 36-05, Society of Automotive Engineers of Japan, Inc. May 2005, P. 7-10). In "How to Minimize Diesel Combustion Noise by Improving Engine Structure," it is described that the engine sound has three peaks at 1.7 kHz, 3.3 kHz, and 6 kHz. One of these peaks (3.3 kHz) is caused by stretching resonance of the connecting rod, and the amplitude of this resonance can hardly be reduced.
Note that the present invention has a related earlier application (JP2012-189134).
The present inventors have studied for spring mass models for pistons and connecting rods, and as a result, they have found out the followings.
In spring mass models for pistons and connecting rods, a piston, a piston pin, and a smaller end part of a connecting rod correspond to a mass point (wherein the mass is M (unit: kg)) as a whole, and a coupling part of the connecting rod coupling the smaller end part and a larger end part thereof corresponds to a spring (wherein the spring constant is K (unit: N/m)) supporting the mass point at the larger end part. Thus, if the piston, the piston pin, and the smaller end part of the connecting rod act integrally, these components integrally resonate with respect to the larger end part of the connecting rod at a resonance frequency of (½π)×(K/M)1/2 Hz (e.g., 3 kHz-4 kHz). This resonance corresponds to the stretching resonance of the connecting rod described above.
Meanwhile, a lubricant film is formed between the piston pin and the pin insertion hole of the connecting rod. The lubricant film corresponds to the spring coupling the piston pin to the smaller end part of the connecting rod. Moreover, in a case where a full floating type assembly, in which the piston pin is turnable with respect to all the boss parts and the smaller end part of the connecting rod, is adopted, in addition to between the piston pin and the pin insertion hole of the connecting rod, lubricant films are also formed between the piston pin and each of the pin supporting holes of the boss parts of the piston. The lubricant films correspond to the springs coupling the piston pin to the piston.
With the lubricant film between the piston pin and the pin insertion hole of the connecting rod (in the full floating type, this lubricant film and the lubricant films between the piston pin and the pin supporting holes of the boss parts of the piston), the piston is supported by the smaller end part of the connecting rod via the spring, and the piston, the piston pin, and the smaller end part of the connecting rod do not integrally resonate with respect to the larger end part of the connecting rod. Since the piston is not pushed with a strong force except for on combustion stroke (expansion stroke), the lubricant film remains, and thereby, the resonance does not occur.
On the other hand, on the combustion stroke, since the piston is pushed with a strong force, the lubricant film is eliminated, and as a result, the piston, the piston pin, and the smaller end part of the connecting rod integrally resonate with respect to the larger end part of the connecting rod.
From these point of views, since the piston, the piston pin, and the smaller end part of the connecting rod become integral on the combustion stroke, it can be considered to utilize a dynamic absorber in order to suppress the resonance (reduce vibration at the resonance frequency). However, by simply providing the dynamic absorber, although the noises due to the resonance can be reduced on the combustion stroke, the noises increase due to the vibration of the dynamic absorber on other strokes where the piston, the piston pin, and the smaller end part of the connecting rod do not become integral.


Among N-glycoside-linked sugar chains which are bound to the Fc region of an antibody, sugar chains which are bound to Asn at position 297 relates to the activity and stability of the antibody in blood, but there is a possibility that extra sugar chains bound to the amino acid residues at positions other than 297 have influences upon the antibody constant region-mediated activity and a possibility of causing a problem of uniformity as a therapeutic antibody preparation. Accordingly, among N-glycoside-linked sugar chains which bind to the Fc region of the antibody, a method for controlling extra sugar chains which are bound to Asn residues at positions other than position 297 according to the EU index is required. The present invention provides an antibody variant composition, comprising amino acid residues of an Asn-X-Ser/Thr (X represents an amino acid residue other than Pro) sequence at positions other than positions 297 to 299 according to the EU index in an Fc region of a human IgG antibody, in which at least one amino acid substitution selected from an amino acid substitution of Asn to other amino acid residue, an amino acid substitution of X to Pro and an amino acid substitution of Ser/Thr to other amino acid residue is carried out, and a fragment of the antibody variant composition.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an antibody variant composition in which, among N-glycoside-linked sugar chains which are bound to the Fc region of an antibody, sugar chains which are bound to Asn residues at position other than position 297 according to the EU index are decreased or deleted; an antibody variant composition in which, among N-glycoside-linked sugar chains which are bound to the Fc region of an antibody, extra sugar chains which are bound to Asn residues at positions other than position 297 according to the EU index are decreased or deleted and effector activity of the antibody is maintained; a DNA encoding the antibody variant molecules; a cell capable of producing the antibody variant composition, a process for producing the antibody variant composition; and a method for reducing extra sugar chains which are bound to Asn residues at position other than position 297 according to the EU index among the N-glycoside-linked sugar chains which bind to the Fc region of the antibody.
2. Brief Description of the Background Art
Since antibodies have high binding activity and binding specificity and high stability in blood, their applications to the diagnostic, preventive and therapeutic agents of various human diseases have been attempted (Non-patent Document 1). In addition, human chimeric antibodies or humanized antibodies were prepared from non-human animal antibodies making use of recombinant techniques (Non-patent Documents 2 to 5).
A human chimeric antibody comprises an antibody variable region of a non-human animal antibody and a constant region of a human antibody. A humanized antibody is an antibody in which complementarity determining regions (hereinafter referred to as CDR) of a non-human animal antibody is substituted with CDRs of a human antibody.
The human chimeric antibodies and humanized antibodies resolved problems possessed by non-human animal antibodies such as mouse antibodies, such as the high immunogenicity, low effector function and short blood half-life, and applications of monoclonal antibodies to pharmaceutical preparations were made possible by using them (Non-patent Documents 6 to 9). In the Unites States, for example, a plural of humanized antibodies have already been approved as an antibody for cancer treatment, and are on the market (Non-patent Document 10).
These human chimeric antibodies and humanized antibodies actually show effects to a certain degree at clinical level, but therapeutic antibodies having higher effects are required.
For example, in the case of single administration of Rituxan (registered tradename) (Non-patent Document 11) (manufactured by IDEC/Roche/Genentech) which is a human chimeric antibody to CD20, it was reported that its response rate for recurrent low malignancy non-Hodgkin lymphoma patients in the phase III clinical test is no more than 48% (complete remission 6%, partial remission 42%), and its average duration of response is 12 months (Non-patent Document 12).
In the case of combination use of Rituxan (registered tradename) and chemotherapy (CHOP: Cyclophosphamide, Doxorubicin, Vincristine), it was reported that its response ratio for recurrent low malignancy and follicular non-Hodgkin lymphoma patients by the phase II clinical test is 95% (complete remission 55%, partial remission 45%), but side effects due to CHOP were found (Non-patent Document 13).
In the case of single administration of Herceptin (registered tradename) (manufactured by Genentech) which is a humanized antibody to HER2, it was reported that its response ratio for metastatic breast cancer patients in the phase III clinical test is only 15%, and its average duration of response is 9.1 months (Non-patent Document 14).
The human antibody molecule is also called immunoglobulin (hereinafter referred to as Ig) and classified into isotypes of IgA, IgD, IgE, IgG, and IgM based on its molecular structure.
An antibody molecule of human IgG (hereinafter referred to as IgG) type which is mainly used as a therapeutic antibody is an antibody molecule comprises two heavy chains (hereinafter referred to as H chain) and two light chains (hereinafter referred to as L chain).
An H chain comprises individual domain structures which are respectively called an H chain variable region (hereinafter referred to as VH), CH1, hinge, CH2 and CH3 domains from the N-terminal. Also, the CH2 domain and CH3 domain in combination are called Fc region.
An L chain comprises individual domain structures which are respectively called an L chain variable region (hereinafter referred to as VL) and an L chain constant region (hereinafter referred to as CL) from the N-terminal.
The H chain of the IgG type antibody includes four subclasses consisting of IgG1, IgG2, IgG3 and IgG4. The H chains of the individual IgG subclasses are homologous with each other at almost 95% amino acid sequence identity in the constant region, except for highly-variable hinges.
Although individual IgG subclasses have highly homologous with each other in the amino acid sequence, they have different biological activity in strength (Non-patent Document 15). Examples of the biological activities include an effector function such as a complement-dependent cytotoxicity (hereinafter referred to as CDC activity), an antibody-dependent cellular cytotoxicity (hereinafter referred to as ADCC activity) and a phagocytic activity. These activities play an important role in eliminating foreign substances and pathogens in the living body.
A family of Fey receptor (hereinafter referred to as FcγR) is expressed on the surface of various leukocytes such as natural killer cells (hereinafter referred to as NK cell), monocytes, macrophages, granulocytes and the like.
FcγR is classified into active type FcγR such as FcγRI, FcγRIIa, FcγRIIIa and FcγRIIIb and inhibitory type FcγR such as FcγRIIb. IgG antibodies, particularly IgG1 and IgG3 in human, strongly bind to these receptors so that they induce ADCC activity and phagocytosis by leucocytes.
ADCC activity means a cell lysis reaction which is generated by cytotoxic molecules released from NK cell, such as perforin and granzyme, as a result that an antibody bound to an antigen mainly binds to FcγRIIIa on the NK cell surface via the Fc moiety (Non-patent Documents 16 and 17). In general, ADCC activity shows an order of IgG1>IgG3>>IgG4≧IgG2 (Non-patent Documents 18 and 19). A binding site to FcγRIIIa on the Fc of the antibody is present in CH2 domain, and a crystal structure analysis shows that one molecule of FcγRIIIa binds to the space between two CH2 domains (Non-patent Document 20).
CDC activity means a reaction in which an antibody bound to its antigen activates reaction cascade of a group of serum proteins called complement system and finally lyses the target cell. CDC activity is high in human IgG1 and IgG3 and generally shows an order of IgG3≧IgG1>>IgG2≈IgG4. The complement system is classified into respective components of C1 to C9, and most of them are enzyme precursors which express the enzyme activity by partial degradation.
CDC activity induces the cell lysis reaction by starting from the binding of C1q as one component of C1 to the Fc region of an antibody on the target cell, advancing activation cascade by partial degradation of respective component by the components of the previous step, and finally forming a pore forming unit which is called membrane attack complex formed by C5 to C9 on the cell membrane of target cell (Non-patent Documents 16 and 17). An Fc region amino acid substitution study suggests that the binding site of C1q on the Fc region is present in the CH2 domain (Non-patent Document 21)
Importance of the above-mentioned effector function is recognized also in the drug effect mechanism of a therapeutic antibody to be used in clinical practice. The above-mentioned Rituxan (registered trademark) is a human chimeric antibody of IgG1 subclass and exhibits ADCC activity and CDC activity in vitro (Non-patent Document 22).
Further, regarding its clinical effect, Rituxan (registered trademark) is suggested to actually exhibit the effector function in the human body of patients, since Rituxan (registered trademark) exhibits high therapeutic effect in patients having FcγRIIIa genotype which shows strong ADCC activity (Non-patent Document 23), the complement components in blood are quickly consumed after administration (Non-patent Document 24), expression of CD59 which is a factor to inhibit CDC activity is increased in the cancer cells of patients who recurred after administration (Non-patent Document 25), and the like.
Herceptin (registered trademark) is also an IgG1 subclass humanized antibody, and it was reported to exhibit high therapeutic effects in patients having FcγRIIIa genotype which shows strong ADCC activity (Non-patent Document 26).
In addition, since human IgG escaped from degradation by lysosome by binding to a neonatal Fc receptor (neonatal Fc receptor for IgG; FcRn, hereinafter referred to as FcRn) which is expressed on such as vascular endothelial cell, under low pH conditions in endosome, it has a long blood half-life for 7 days (IgG3) to 21 days (IgG1, IgG2 and IgG4). Based on study on the Fc amino acid residue substitution it is suggested that the binding site of the antibody Fc and FcRn is present in the interface of CH2 domain and CH3 domain (Non-patent Document 27).
Based on the above, the human IgG1 antibody is most suitable as a therapeutic antibody since it has higher ADCC activity and CDC activity and further has longer half-life in human blood than other subclasses.
C1q is known to bind to the Fc region of the antibody molecule. The binding constants (Ka) in the binding of C1q to a monomeric antibody molecule in human IgG1, IgG2, IgG3 and IgG4 are 1.2×104, 0.64×104, 2.9×104 and 0.44×104 respectively (Non-patent Document 28). As discussed the above, especially CH2 domain among the Fc region is important (Non-patent Document 29).
Further in detail, regarding EU index (Non-patent Document 30), it is known that Len 235 (Non-patent Document 31), Asp 270, Lys 322, Pro 329 and Pro 331 (Non-patent Document 32) in the CH2 are important in human IgG1, and Glu 233, Leu 234, Leu 235, Gly 236 (Non-patent Document 33), and Lys 322 (Non-patent Document 34) are important for human IgG3.
Attempts to enhance CDC activity by preparing a IgG variant by introducing amino acid substitutions in human IgG heavy chain constant region, and thereby increasing its binding activity to C1q.
Idusogie et al. reported that CDC activity is enhanced about 2-fold at the maximum when Lys at position 326 or Glu at position 333 according to the EU index in the CH2 domain of the heavy chain constant region of an anti-CD20 chimeric antibody Rituxan (registered trademark) comprising a human IgG1 type constant region and a mouse-derived variable region is substituted with other amino acid (Non-patent Document 35, Patent Document 2).
Idusogie et al. further showed that the CDC activity of IgG2 which was about one per several hundreds of the CDC activity of IgG1 increases to about 1/25 of the CDC activity of IgG1 when Lys at position 326 or Glu at position 333 according to the EU index in the human IgG2 type antibody is substituted with other amino acid (Patent Documents 3 to 5).
In addition, Dall'Acqua et al. reported that by applying various amino acid substitutions to the hinge region of a human IgG1 type anti-EphA2 antibody, plural of variants are exhibit higher C1q binding activity and higher CDC activity than those of the antibody before the substitutions (Non-patent Document 35).
Different from the techniques for introducing amino acid substitutions, an example in which CDC activity is enhanced by a combination of naturally existing sequences is also known. Shitara et al. found that when the full CH2 domain of human IgG1 and the full CH3 domain or a part of its N terminal side of human IgG1 are substituted with the sequence of human IgG3, the C1q binding activity and the CDC activity are greatly increased than those of IgG1 and IgG3 (Patent Document 6, Non-patent Document 36).
Two types are existed in the sugar chains bound to a protein, that is, N-glycoside-linked sugar chain and O-glycoside-linked sugar chain. The sugar chain which is linked to the N atom of amide group in the side chain of Asn in the protein is N-glycoside-linked sugar chain, and the sugar chain which is linked to the O atom of a hydroxyl group in the side chain of Ser and Thr in the protein is O-glycoside-linked sugar chain.
The N-glycoside-linked sugar chain includes three types, that is, a high mannose type sugar chain, a complex type sugar chain and a hybrid type sugar chain.
The process of biosynthesis of N-glycoside-linked sugar chain starts in the rough-surfaced endoplasmic reticulum from the attachment of dolichol-pyrophosphoric acid-oligosaccharide containing 9 molecules of mannose (Man) [(Glc)3(Man)9(GlcNAc)2] to the Asn residue of a consensus sequence Asn-X-Ser/Thr (X is any amino acid other than proline) of the N-glycoside-linked sugar chain. Thereafter, the sugar chain intermediate is converted into high mannose types such as Man8 type, Man7 type, Man6 type and Man5 type by various enzymes to synthesize complex type sugar chains to which N-acetylglucosamine, galactose, sialic acid, fucose and the like, instead of mannose, is linked (Non-patent Document 37).
However, it is known that the N-glycoside-linked sugar chain is not linked to all of the Asn-X-Ser/Thr sequences in a protein and is not linked further depending on the peripheral amino acid sequences and three-dimensional structure. Particularly, it is known that the addition of sugar chain hardly occurs to the Asn residue of Asn-X-Ser/Thr when the amino acid next to the C-terminal side of Asn-X-Ser/Thr is Pro (Non-patent Documents 38 and 39).
It is known that a complex-type N-glycoside-linked sugar chain binds to only Asn at position 297 of the CH2 domain in the constant region of the human IgG (Non-patent Document 40), however it is not known that the sugar chain binds to other position. It is known only that extra N-glycoside-linked sugar chain is linked to Asn at position 471 of constant region of mouse IgG3 (Non-patent Document 41).
On the other hand, a sequence of Asn-Thr-Thr is present at positions 392 to 394 of the CH3 domain in the human IgG3 type constant region, but the amino acid at position 395 is Pro (Non-patent Document 42), and actually, addition of sugar chain to Asn at position 392 of IgG3 is not known.
It is known that ADCC activity of human IgG is changed depending on the structure of the complex-type N-glycoside-linked sugar chain to be added to the Asn at position 297 (a typical schematic illustration of complex-type sugar chain is shown in FIG. 1) (Patent Document 7).
Although there are reports stating that the ADCC activity of antibodies changes depending on the containing amounts of galactose and N-acetylglucosamine in the sugar chains to be linked to the antibodies (Non-patent Documents 43 to 46), a substance which exerts most influence upon ADCC activity is the fucose that performs α1,6 bond to the reducing terminal of N-acetylglucosamine (hereinafter referred to as a core fucose in some cases).
An IgG antibody comprising a complex-type N-glycoside-linked sugar chain having no core fucose shows markedly higher ADCC activity than that of an IgG antibody comprising complex-type N-glycoside-linked sugar chain having core fucose (Non-patent Documents 47 and 48, Patent Document 7).
As the cells which produce an antibody composition comprising complex-type N-glycoside-linked sugar chains having no core fucose, cells in which α1,6-fucosyltransferase gene was knocked out are known (Patent Documents 8 and 9).
All of FcγR-dependent activities such as ADCC activity, phagocytosis, CDC activity and FcRn binding activity are important for the therapeutic effect of a therapeutic antibody.
However, since all of the C1q binding which is the initial stage of inducing CDC activity, binding to FcγR which is the initial stage of inducing ADCC activity and binding to FcRn which contributes to the long blood half life are effected via the antibody Fc region of the antibody, there is a possibility that these activities are decreased when an amino acid substitution is introduced into the Fc region of the antibody.
Idusogie et al. reported that ADCC activity is greatly decreased in the case of introducing an amino acid point mutation into the CH2 domain of CDC activity-enhanced IgG1 (Non-patent Document 49).
Also, Dall'Acqua et al. reports a phenomenon that introduction of amino acid mutation into the CH2 domain of IgG1 for increasing binding activity to FcRn decreases ADCC activity at the same time (Non-patent Document 50).
Interestingly, these reports show that although the binding sites to FcγRIIIa, C1q and FcRn in the Fc are positioned at slightly different site, the amino acid substitution for changing each binding activity has unexpected influences upon other binding sites.
The amino acid at position 392 of the IgG heavy chain constant region is positioned at the interface of two CH3 domains in the antibody molecule (Non-patent Document 51). Since the amino acid positioned at the interface plays an important role in the association of two heavy chain molecules (Non-patent Document 52), for example, when the amino acid at position 392 is modified, there is a possibility that it has unexpected influences upon the three-dimensional structure and various biological activities of the antibody molecule.


A pelletizing press for producing pellets from material to be pressed, preferably from biomass, for use as fuel in fire places, wherein the biomass consists of cellulosic and/or lignocellulosic fibers, chips or shreds. In the pelletizing press, a dispersion chamber is formed by at least one die having a plurality of bores for pressing the biomass and at least by a lateral wall, and at least one roller rolling on a rolling surface of the die is arranged in the dispersion chamber. A pelletizing press of this method for producing pellets enables the formation of a dispersion chamber that, by means of at least one lateral wall, is as compact and sealed as possible relative to the prior art. At least two lateral wall parts are arranged to form a lateral wall; at least the first lateral wall part is arranged to be movable in relation to the second lateral wall part for carrying out a relative movement.

The production of pellets, also referred to as granules, from fine material or compacted and/or molten material is already known. The production of pellets, or wood pellets from preferably chopped biomass, such as wood chips, sawdust, or the like, is also already sufficiently known and is propagated in the field of renewable energy sources as a pioneering technology for climate protection, in particular in Europe. Typically, chip material from the wood-processing industry is used as the raw material, however, freshly cut timber or types of wood which are not usable in the wood-processing industry or waste materials can also be used. Pollutant-free base material is preferably to be used for the market for wood pellets for supplying small furnace facilities in single-family or multifamily houses. Block power plants or special high-temperature furnace facilities for generating heat and/or obtaining electrical energy (combination power plants) can also cleanly combust pollutant-charged material (pellets made of particle hoard or medium-density fiberboard with or without a coating or lacquering) in small amounts, however.
The wood pellets are typically produced in so-called pelletizing presses, in which the material to be compressed is pressed through boreholes of a matrix by moving and/or actively rolling rollers, also referred to as pan grinder rollers. The material (biomass) is shaped by the boreholes and discharged as strands from the boreholes. Boreholes are understood as all openings which are preferably implemented as essentially cylindrical, and are arranged in a matrix to feedthrough and shape the material. The boreholes can also have larger intake areas (depressions) to improve the compression procedure and can be hardened or can have hardened sleeves in the boreholes. A differentiation is made between flat and ring matrices in the field of matrices. Rollers revolve externally or internally around on ring matrices for the compression, on flat matrices, the pan grinder rollers roll circularly (mill construction) or linearly reversing. The invention is preferably concerned with flat matrices of the latter construction, but can optionally also be used with ring matrices. The possibilities for preparing and scattering the biomass, or the post-processing (chopping of the strands, cooling, storage, transport) of the pellets do not have to be discussed in greater detail. Reference is made in this regard to the prior art.
Due to the warming of the climate, which has been acknowledged worldwide in the meantime, the industry has been forced to accelerate and cheapen the large-scale industrial production of wood pellets. However, in particular in large production facilities, which are partially to be assigned to specialized mechanical engineering or heavy mechanical engineering, large and heavy machine parts are used. In particular the bearings or other sensitive machine elements or control devices required for this purpose must be protected from fine dust which occurs during the production or already exists. The efforts of development are directed toward sealing off the pressing or scattering chamber of the material to be compressed or the biomass to the least possible extent. The problem in this case is the movable parts (matrices and/or rollers) in the pelletizing press, which execute a relative movement to one another inside the pressing chamber or the scattering chamber. A large-scale encapsulation of the pressing chamber or the scattering chamber is typically performed, which has the result that an excessively large area of the pelletizing press is contaminated, with corresponding effects on moving or operationally-relevant facility parts. Reference is made hereafter to the scattering chamber, which therefore describes the contaminated area inside the pelletizing press.

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