A method for transmitting and receiving data over a shared access carrier network with a plurality of user devices is provided. The user devices each have a modem associated therewith and a network interface for communicating over a local network. The method begins by transmitting a query from each one of the user devices over the local network requesting remaining ones of the plurality of user devices to specify available resources pertaining to shared access carrier network connectivity capabilities of the modem associated therewith. A reply is received over the local network in response to the query from each of the remaining user devices. Based on the replies from each of the remaining user devices, at least one of the user devices is selected to serve as a master device that provides connectivity to the shared access carrier system through which the other of the plurality of user devices transmit and receive data.

A carrier network generally refers to a computer network through which users communicate with various service providers (e.g. Internet web servers). Carrier networks include "Shared Access Carrier Networks," in which data of multiple users are conveyed together over a shared communications medium between the users and an intermediate network. One of the most prevalent Shared Access Carrier Networks today is found in the Data-Over-Cable (DOC) Network, which includes traditional networks constructed from coaxial cable and hybrid fiber coaxial (HFC) networks constructed with both fiber optical cabling and coaxial cable. Other Shared Access Carrier Networks include wireless and digital subscriber line (xDSL) networks (the xDSL lines typically being aggregated onto an oversubscribed backhaul trunk into the Intermediate Network, with the trunk defining the shared communications medium).
In conventional shared access carrier networks such as a hybrid fiber coaxial (HFC) network, a bidirectional communication path is maintained between a network headend and each remote point in the network. The communication path simultaneously carries broadband radio frequency (RF) signals in two directions on the same medium by dividing the frequency spectrum of the bidirectional communication path. Frequency division multiplexing (FDM) allows two or more simultaneous and continuous channels to be derived from a shared access transmission medium. FDM assigns separate portions of the available frequency spectrum to the "downstream" or "forward path" direction from a headend signal source to a plurality of remote points, and a second frequency range for carrying signals in the "upstream" or "return path" direction from each remote point to the headend.
For example, a conventional cable modem system provides a point-to-multipoint topology for supporting data communication between a cable modem termination system (CMTS) at a cable headend and multiple cable modems (CMs) at the customer premises. In such systems, information is broadcast on downstream channels from the CMTS to the cable modems as defined in DOCSIS in accordance with a time division multiplexing (TDM) technique. In contrast, information is transmitted upstream from each of the cable modems to the CMTS on the upstream channels as short burst signals in accordance with a time domain multiple access (TDMA) technique. The upstream transmission of data from the cable modems is managed by the CMTS, which allots to each cable modem specific slots of time within which to transfer data.
Network carriers and their equipment providers have adopted industry standards in order to increase interchangeability and reduce manufacturing costs for network hardware. For example, DOC carriers have adopted industry standards such as the Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification (DOCSIS). DOCSIS version 1.0 was issued in 1997 with hardware devices being certified starting in 1999. DOCSIS version 1.1 replaced version 1.0 in 1999-2001 and now accounts for the bulk of installed DOC network equipment. Although released, DOCSIS version 2.0 is not yet widely available. As a result, networks conforming to DOCSIS (i.e. DOCSIS-compliant) use DOCSIS version 1.1 hardware in most cases. In part, DOCSIS sets forth requirements and objectives for various aspects of cable modem systems including operations support systems, management, data interfaces, as well as network layer, data link layer, and physical layer transport for data over cable systems.
Since the number of upstream time slots available in a DOCSIS compliant shared access carrier system is limited, the number of cable modems that can register and communicate over the system is also limited. In part as a result of the continuing rapid growth of the Internet and the need for broadband access to it, the number of cable modems seeking access to the shared access carrier system can readily exceed the available resources of the system.

Method and apparatus for transmitting and receiving data over a shared access carrier network


A networked storage system includes network-attached file system (FS) nodes implementing a distributed global file system. Each FS node includes a file system server and at least one storage system including storage resources (such as disk drives) representing portions of a global file system storage space. The FS nodes are organized according to respective cost-performance characteristics of the storage systems, generally ranging from a high-cost, high-performance characteristic to a low-cost, low-performance characteristic. A storage management system performs information lifecycle management (ILM) which includes allocating the FS nodes for storing data according to a mapping between an ILM-based data classification scheme and the cost-performance characteristics of the storage devices, as well as dynamically managing the placement of data among the storage devices according to the ILM-based classification of the data. The storage management system also performs global file system management including allocating a set of identifiers (e.g. segment identifiers) of the distributed global file system among the FS nodes, and dynamically adjusting the allocation of the identifiers among the FS nodes in response to the addition and removal of whole storage systems and/or storage resources within each of the storage systems.

The invention pertains to the field of data storage.
In the field of data storage, so-called "distributed" file systems are known in which storage resources on file servers are made available to remote hosts computers via a communications network such as a TCP/IP network. Well known examples of such file systems include Distributed File System (DFS) and Network File System (NFS). Storage resources in the form of volumes or directories are made available to host computers by a "mount" operation that creates an association between a local identifier (such as the well known letter identifiers of Windows® operating systems) and a network identifier (typically a pairing of a host name and a volume or directory name). Host references to the local identifier are forwarded to a local client component of the distributed file system, which engages in a specialized protocol with the file server to perform the requested storage operation on the remote storage resource.
More recently, "global" distributed file systems have been created which are characterized by a single "namespace" for all storage resources in a network. In traditional distributed file systems, it is necessary to identify the host computer on which the storage resource resides, and thus the namespace includes both host identifiers as well as volume/directory/file identifiers. From the perspective of many applications programs that utilize network storage, the need to identify a physical host computer as part of accessing data may be undesirable. Global file systems address this drawback of traditional distributed file systems by creating a single namespace for all resources in a given network, so that it is unnecessary to explicitly identify host computers as part of accessing storage data.
Global file systems have suffered performance issues arising from centralized management of so-called "metadata", which is the data that identifies where all the user data is stored in the network and the mapping of the single namespace to identifiers of host computers and storage devices on which the user data is stored. Thus a further recent development in the field has been a "segmented" distributed file system in which the metadata itself is managed in a distributed rather than a centralized fashion. In one commercially available segmented file system, the totality of a single virtual storage space is divided into numbered segments, in a manner somewhat akin to the use of area codes in the telephone system. Also like the telephone system, storage requests are routed among servers based on locally stored subsets of the metadata. Thus if a request is directed to segment 205, for example, and first encounters a server that is responsible for segments 100-199, that server consults its local metadata to identify another server to which the request should be routed. The other server may be the server responsible for the requested segment, or it may be a server that is along a path to the responsible server.
Distributed file systems in general provide relatively good scaling as demand for storage resources in a network grows. However, the management of the namespace and access to the metadata can become difficult in larger networks. Segmented file systems provide even better scaling by their use of a single namespace and distributed metadata management. Storage resources can easily be added to a system in any of various forms, such as high-end integrated cached disk arrays (ICDAs) to mid-range systems to low-end systems having only a few disk drives and fitting within a single shelf of an equipment rack, by relatively simple configuration operations.
There is also a movement within the field of data storage toward so-called information lifecycle management or ILM, which involves classifying data according to its use and then assigning the data to one of different types of storage devices to achieve a desired cost/performance objective. As an example, an ILM system may classify data according to how frequently it is accessed, how delay-sensitive the associated application is, the need for protection in form of redundancy, etc. The classification of data can change over its lifetime, and as its classification changes the ILM should automatically move the data to a more appropriate form of storage. Data that has been recently created and that is in high demand, for example, may be deployed on a relatively expensive high-performance storage system, whereas the same data at a later time experiencing much less frequent access may be moved to a mid-range or even low-end storage system. Archival storage can be employed to store data that has reached the end of its production lifetime. ILM systems allow system users to create various policies for how data is to be treated based on its classification.

Networked storage system employing information lifecycle management in conjunction with a distributed global file system


A cover for a key is disclosed. The cover includes: a first wall; a second wall opposite to the first wall; and an outer wall extending between the first wall and the second wall, the outer wall defining a pair of slots extending therethrough, the slots being positioned opposite to each other on the outer wall, wherein the first wall, the second wall, and the outer wall define a closed chamber for receiving a bow of the key and an opening to the chamber.

A key cap provides a protective cover for the bow, or head, of a key. When the bow of a key is inserted into a key cap, the key cap covers the outer surface of the bow and retains the bow (for example, by friction fit), leaving the blade of the key to be exposed outside of the key cap. Keys can be differentiated by fitting their bows with key caps of varying shapes, colours and/or designs. Key caps can also provide improved grip of the covered key and display information for identifying the key.
The shape of a key's bow can be useful in identifying the type of the key. Various different bow shapes for common key types are known. A popular type of key is the "SC1" key, which is compatible with, for example, a Schlage® five-pin, "C" keyway. An SC1 key has a bow that is generally wider than the bows of other common key types, such as "KW1" (Kwikset) and "WR5" (Weiser). As a consequence, a key cap for covering a KW1 key or a WR5 key may not be suitable for use with an SC1 key. For example, the bow of an SC1 key may not fit in a smaller key cap for other common key types. Even if the SC1 bow can be fitted in the smaller key cap, the wider SC1 bow may cause the key cap material to experience an unusual amount of stretching, with the resulting stress eventually causing the key cap to tear. Conversely, a key cap which is appropriately sized to cover an SC1 bow may not provide a secure friction fit for keys that have narrower bows.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,928,845 ('845) discloses a universal key cap that fits around different edged bows of various common house keys. The key cap in '845 includes a hollow chamber for receiving the bow of a key and edged segments molded on an inner surface of the chamber that register with at least one of the edges of the key bow. The edged segments of the key cap are designed to accommodate the varied geometry of the key bows of a plurality of common key types. As a result, the key cap of '845 includes a chamber having a complex internal make-up defined by multiple edges and edged corners. In particular, the chamber of the key cap is designed to be wide enough to house the bow of SC1 keys and, accordingly, the key cap has a large width, which may result in undesirable bulk.
Like reference numerals are used in the drawings to denote like elements and features.


The present invention is a bed loft comprising a pair of end assemblies and at least one support beam for receiving a support beam prong. Each end assembly comprises a first post and a second post. The first post comprises at least one support beam prong for insertion into the support beam, at least one end assembly prong for insertion into an end assembly support beam, and a receiver for holding a foot of a bedpost. The second post comprises at least one end assembly support beam for receiving an end assembly prong and a receiver for holding a foot of a bedpost.

There are many advantages to lofting a bed in circumstances where floor space is scarce, such as in a dormitory situation. It is advantageous to use the same floor space for the bed and for other furniture such as a desk, couch or dresser. It is not possible, however, to loft every bed without making permanent modifications that can blemish the bedframe. Also, not every bed frame is of the exact same dimensions. Therefore, there is a need for a system for lofting a bed that can accept a broad range of existing bed styles and designs without making modifications to the bedframe.


A granulating device, and a granulating method for thermoplastic resin material, in which a screw type kneading and extruding machine for kneading, extruding and melting the thermoplastic resin material, a die holder connected to a front end portion of the screw type kneading and extruding machine, the die holder including a passage through which the melted resin material folws, a change-over valve and at least two outlets, the passage selectively connected to the outlets with the change-over valve, a first and a second dies, for forming the melted resin material into a plurality of pieces of string, connected respectively to the outlets to adapt to different ranges of viscosity of the melted resin material, and a first and a second cutter units including cutters moved respectively along extruding planes of the first and second dies to cut the string-shaped resin material into small pieces, and cooling and solidifying sections for cooling and solidifying the small pieces of thermoplastic resin material.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for continuously granulating thermoplastic resin material with a screw type kneading and extruding machine and a granulating device.
2. Background
In order to granulate a large quantity of thermoplastic resin (not less than 1000 kg/Hr) that has been polymerized by a polymerizing apparatus, in general, one set of screw type kneading and extruding machine and one set of granulating device are used being combined into one unit. In the screw type kneading and extruding machine, a single shaft screw or two shaft screws are rotated in a cylinder, and when necessary, a gear pump is attached to a front end portion of the screw type kneading and extruding machine so as to intensify the extruding function. The granulating device is formed into a substantial disk-shape. On the disk-shaped component of the granulating device, there are formed a large number of nozzles penetrating the disk-shaped component in the thickness direction, and these nozzles are annularly distributed on the disk-shaped component. The granulating device includes: a die attached onto a front end plane of the screw type kneading and extruding machine; and a cutter unit driven and moved along an outer surface of the die (an extruding plane). The granulating device is composed as described above, and there are two types of granulating devices. One is a submerged type granulating device, and the other is an aerial type granulating device.
By the screw type kneading and extruding machine and the granulating device constructed as described above, pellets of thermoplastic resin are made as follows. Powdered thermoplastic resin material is continuously fed from a polymerizing apparatus. Then the thermoplastic resin material is kneaded and melted by the screw type kneading and extruding machine. After that, the thermoplastic resin material is extruded from the nozzles of the die being formed into the shape of pieces of string.
In the granulation of thermoplastic resin, in order to simplify the arrangement of the apparatus and also in order to enhance the efficiency of the operation of the apparatus, one set of polymerizing apparatus is directly connected with one set of screw type kneading and extruding machine. In this case, after the resin material has been polymerized by the polymerizing apparatus, it is directly fed to the screw type kneading and extruding machine and pelletized by the granulating device.
Since the conventional granulating device is constructed as described above, the following problems may be encountered. When the physical property, that is, the viscosity of thermoplastic resin material fed from the polymerizing apparatus is greatly changed, or alternatively when a quantity of thermoplastic resin material fed from the polymerizing apparatus is greatly changed, it is impossible to normally conduct granulation with one type die. When granulation is conducted with one type die, the following problems may be caused. It is impossible to produce spherical pellets, and comma-shaped pellets are produced; plate-shaped pellets are produced; pellets are curled; thread-shaped objects are attached to pellets; and pellets are not separated from each other but they are connected to each other. In this way, defective pellets are produced.
In general, the granulating device including a die and cutter unit is designed so that the processing capacity of the granulating device is equal to the processing capacity of the screw type kneading and extruding machine. That is, when the viscosity of resin material fed from the polymerizing apparatus changes in a wide range, the specification of the granulating device is determined so that the resin material of high viscosity, which requires much energy when it is processed in the screw type kneading and extruding machine, can be normally granulated. In the case of processing resin material of high viscosity, the pressure loss is relatively large when it is fluidized and extruded from the nozzles of the die. Accordingly, in order to reduce the pressure loss, the number of the nozzles is increased, so that the flow velocity is decreased. In the case of processing resin material of low viscosity, the pressure loss is relatively small when it is fluidized and extruded from the nozzles of the die. Accordingly, the resin pressure in the die is low. Therefore, the resin material is extruded from the die as a soft and weak string-shaped resin. For this reason, it is difficult to smoothly cut the resin material with a cutter, and defective pellets are produced. In order to take countermeasure against the above problem, the number of nozzles is reduced, so that the flow velocity of resin in the nozzle can be increased. In accordance with the difference of the die and also in accordance with the difference of the flow velocity of resin material, the number of cutters of the cutter unit or the rotating speed (the moving speed) of the cutters is differently determined. That is, in the case of processing resin material of high viscosity, the number of cutters is reduced and the rotating speed is increased, because resin material extruded from a large number of nozzles at a low flow velocity is cut. In the case of processing resin material of low viscosity, the number of cutters is increased and the rotating speed is decreased, because resin material extruded from a small number of nozzles at a high flow velocity is cut.
Thermoplastic resin is produced by a series of polymerizing apparatus while the polymerizing condition is changed so as to produce resin materials of different viscosity. That is, several types of resin materials, the viscosity ranges of which are different, are successively or alternately produced. In some cases, due to a decrease in the demand, a reduction of output is forced. However, in any cases, the polymerizing apparatus is not stopped even in a short period of time, but it is continuously operated by changing the polymerizing condition in accordance with the change in the production. It is necessary for the screw type kneading and extruding apparatus directly connected with the polymerizing apparatus and also it is necessary for the granulating device attached to the screw type kneading and extruding apparatus, to be operated for conducting granulation normally in accordance with a change in the viscosity of resin material fed from the polymerizing apparatus and a change in the quantity of resin material fed from the polymerizing apparatus. That is, it is necessary for the screw type kneading and extruding apparatus and the granulating device to produce pellets, the shapes of which are not defective. When the resin material feeding condition is changed, the screw type kneading and extruding machine can be adopted to the change by changing the number of revolutions of the screw or the temperature condition of the cylinder. Although the granulating device can be adopted to a narrow range of change by changing the rotating speed of cutters, however, it is impossible for the granulating device to be adopted to a wide range of change. Consequently, it is possible to consider preparing several granulating devices, the applicable viscosity ranges of which are different, and replacing the granulating device in accordance with the condition. However, in order to replace the granulating device, it is necessary to temporarily stop the operation of the screw type kneading and extruding machine. However, in the case of a screw type kneading and extruding machine directly connected with a polymerizing apparatus, the screw type kneading and extruding machine can be stopped only for a short period of time since the polymerizing apparatus is continuously operated. In such a short period of time, it is impossible to replace the granulating device. When the granulating device is replaced if necessary, operation of the polymerizing apparatus is reduced, and resin material polymerized in the process of the reduced operation is discharged. In some cases, the discharged resin material is wasted.

Granulating device for thermoplastic resin


Embodiments of the invention provide a parallax barrier and a display device. The parallax barrier comprises: first and second substrates; liquid crystal, filled between the two substrates; a plurality of strip-like electrode units, disposed parallel to each other and at an interval on a side of the first substrate close to the liquid crystal; a first alignment layer, disposed above the strip-like electrode units; a second alignment layer, disposed on a surface of the second substrate opposed to the first substrate, wherein, a aligning direction of the first alignment layer is perpendicular to an extending direction of the strip-like electrode units, and aligning directions of the first and second alignment layer are opposite, wherein, after the strip-like electrode units are energized, the liquid crystal directly above the strip-like electrode units are rotated by an angle ranged from 85° to 95° in a plane parallel to the substrates.

The hypostasis of the 3D display is to produce stereoscopy with a parallax, namely, to make a left-eye image be seen by the left eye of a person, and a right-eye image be seen by his right eye. Where, the left-eye and right-eye images are a pair of stereoscopic images having a parallax. Current 3D display technologies can be mainly classified into a glasses mode and a naked-eye mode. As regards the glasses mode 3D display technology, it is inevitable that a user has to wear glasses, and long-time watching will fatigue eye and will degrade the comfort level of watching. The naked-eye mode 3D technology does not require a user to wear glasses, and will become a mainstream of the 3D display technology in the future.
A parallax barrier method is a naked-eye 3D display technology that is commonly used, and as shown in FIG. 1, a naked-eye 3D display device with a parallax barrier includes a display unit 1 and a parallax barrier 2 disposed in correspondence with the display unit 1. The parallax barrier 2 is an optical device with periodically arranged light transmitting and light shielding stripes.
The display principle of the parallax barrier 2 is shown in FIG. 2. The display unit 1 is classified into two portions, i.e., pixels denoted by left-oblique lines, with which a right-eye image is displayed, and pixels denoted by right-oblique lines, with which a left-eye image is displayed, and one parallax barrier 2 is placed between the display unit 1 and a viewer. Light shielding regions of the parallax barrier 2 will be used to shield the right-eye image for the left eye of the viewer, and to shield the left-eye image for his right eye, so that the viewer sees merely the left-eye image with the left eye and sees merely the right-eye image with the right eye through light transmitting regions. Thereby, a 3D effect is attained.
In order to realize the 2D/3D switch, a liquid crystal slit grating is usually employed as the parallax barrier. The liquid crystal slit grating generally adopts a liquid crystal panel of a TN mode (namely, a liquid crystal mode for nematic liquid crystals in which the twisted angle of liquid crystal molecules is 90 degrees). When being energized, the liquid crystal slit grating turns to be a slit grating with alternating light transmitting and light shielding stripes, so that the 3D display can be achieved; and when being not energized, the liquid crystal slit grating is pervious to light as a whole, so that the 2D display can be conducted.
FIG. 3 is a structurally schematic view showing a liquid crystal slit grating in prior art. The liquid crystal slit grating includes two substrates (upper and lower substrates) and liquid crystal filled between the two substrates. On a lower surface of its upper substrate, a plurality of transparent electrodes 2-1, which are arranged separately with a certain distance therebetween, are provided, and on an upper surface of the lower substrate, a whole layer of transparent electrode 2-2 is provided in correspondence with the transparent electrodes 2-1. As shown in FIG. 4, provided that a width of a light shielding region of the liquid crystal slit grating is c, and a width of a light transmitting region is d, then a width of each of the transparent electrodes 2-1 on the lower surface of the upper substrate is usually c, and an interval between adjacent transparent electrodes 2-1 is d.
In the course of fabricating such a parallax barrier, it is necessary that on each of the two substrates, a transparent electrode be deposited one time, and exposure, development and etching be conducted at least one time, so as to form a pattern shown in FIG. 4. Thus, the fabrication cost is relatively high. Furthermore, because two transparent electrodes are formed on two substrates, respectively, a anisotropic conductive adhesive is required to electrically communicate the transparent electrode formed on one of the two substrates with a leading wire on the other of the two substrates, and thus, the fabrication cost is further increased.


Herein disclosed is a system and method for record linkage that uses machine learning to link records, so that many users can contribute their training data to a shared repository and employ the accumulated training data without any user having to share their actual data. The system includes a record linkage server, which further includes a record linkage repository, a domain classifier, and a domain classification trainer. The record linkage server is connected with a record linkage client, which includes a field comparator and a manual label prompter. Further disclosed is a method for record linkage, describing how two structured data sets can be matched, including searching domains, loading data sets, loading domain, matching fields, iterating record linking for all record pairs, including: selecting record pair, calculating comparison vector, calculating label probabilities, determining label, optionally setting label manually, updating prior probabilities, optionally confirming selected label, and updating training data.

Record linking is the task of finding records that refer to the same object across data sets. It is also known as data matching. This is a common data management problem faced whenever two data sets need to be combined or joined. The objects are the real-world artifacts the records refer to and the fields of the record are the attributes of the object. It is often the case that there is no common identifier between the two data sets. In this case, the fields need to be matched between the two data sets, and then for each combination of records between the two data sets, the data in each field are compared to determine whether any two records refer to the same object or entity.
It is understood that the objects, which are being matched have common, generally accepted attributes. It is common in data management to refer to an area of objects and their attributes as a domain. There are a number of domains that people apply record linking to. For instance, people is a very common domain for record linking. For the people domain, the data sets are comprised of records that have name and address information. These records can for example refer to customers at a financial institution or patients at a hospital. Another common domain for record linking is product information. In this domain, the data sets can contain the name, manufacturer, and descriptions of products.
There are a number of systems that have been created, which use machine learning, including statistics, probability, and other methods, to determine when two records match each other in a pair of data sets. There are generally accepted ways to compare data that are then used by the machine-learning algorithm. These systems require a set of training data where a human user has specified pairs of records as matching or not matching. The training data is used to train a machine learning algorithm so that it can determine whether the rest of the pairs of data under consideration are matches or not automatically.
The biggest problem that these systems face is the creation of training data. It is time consuming for a person to review pairs of records from two data sets to determine whether they match or not. It is a generally held belief in the machine learning community that the larger the set of training data the better the system will work. More training data means that the machine learning algorithm, no matter which one is used, will be better trained and better able to automatically match records.
It is almost always the case that the data being matched in record linking systems is either private or sensitive information. For each domain, there is usually a requirement to keep the information in the data sets private, whether for regulatory and legal reasons, or for competitive reasons.
Thus, when a company performs record linking on their data in a domain, there is no way to utilize the training data that another company has created in the same domain. There is no way to share training data with other companies in a way that adheres to regulatory, legal, and competitive requirements.
As such, considering the foregoing, it may be appreciated that there continues to be a need for novel and improved devices and methods for performing record linking, while allowing users to share training data in a secure manner.

Record linkage sharing using labeled comparison vectors and a machine learning domain classification trainer


An ordered structured organic film comprising a plurality of segments and a plurality of linkers arranged as a covalent organic framework, wherein the structured organic film may be a multi-segment thick structured organic film.

Materials whose chemical structures are comprised of molecules linked by covalent bonds into extended structures may be placed into two classes: (1) polymers and cross-linked polymers, and (2) covalent organic frameworks (also known as covalently linked organic networks).
The first class, polymers and cross-linked polymers, is typically embodied by polymerization of molecular monomers to form long linear chains of covalently-bonded molecules. Polymer chemistry processes can allow for polymerized chains to, in turn, or concomitantly, become 'cross-linked.' The nature of polymer chemistry offers poor control over the molecular-level structure of the formed material, i.e. the organization of polymer chains and the patterning of molecular monomers between chains is mostly random. Nearly all polymers are amorphous, save for some linear polymers that efficiently pack as ordered rods. Some polymer materials, notably block co-polymers, can possess regions of order within their bulk. In the two preceding cases the patterning of polymer chains is not by design, any ordering at the molecular-level is a consequence of the natural intermolecular packing tendencies.
The second class, covalent organic frameworks (COFs), differ from the first class (polymers/cross-linked polymers) in that COFs are intended to be highly patterned. In COF chemistry molecular components are called molecular building blocks rather than monomers. During COF synthesis molecular building blocks react to form two- or three-dimensional networks. Consequently, molecular building blocks are patterned throughout COF materials and molecular building blocks are linked to each other through strong covalent bonds.
COFs developed thus far are typically powders with high porosity and are materials with exceptionally low density. COFs can store near-record amounts of argon and nitrogen. While these conventional COFs are useful, there is a need, addressed by embodiments of the present invention, for new materials that offer advantages over conventional COFs in terms of enhanced characteristics.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.


A method for manufacturing a circuit board including the following steps: providing a flexible double-sided metal-clad laminate including a first metal foil, a flexible dielectric layer, and a second metal foil. A carrier is attached to the second metal foil. A first wiring layer including a first wiring region and a second wiring region is formed by the first metal foil. The first wiring region includes a first connecting pad, and the second wiring region includes a connecting pad. A plurality of rigid dielectric blocks surrounded to form an interval and a first groove exposing the first connecting pad is pressed on the flexible dielectric layer to form a rigid dielectric layer. An electronic component is fixed the first groove. The carrier is removed. The intermediate structure is bent along the interval and pressed. A second wiring layer is formed by the second metal foil.

Circuit board embedded component technology mainly embeds electronic components inside the circuit board, so that the circuit board module has the advantages of miniaturization, shortening the connection path between components, and reducing transmission loss. It can realize portable electronic equipment A technological approach that is smaller and lighter, multi-functional and high-performance. In the prior art, a groove is usually formed on the substrate first, the components are embedded in the groove, and then the outer substrate is laminated for packaging. However, the above-mentioned process load, and the multi-layer circuit needs to be produced by partial pressure and then laminated, which takes a long time.
Therefore, there is room for improvement within the art.

Circuit board with at least one embedded electronic component and method for manufacturing the same

QING DING PRECISION ELECTRONICS (HUAIAN) CO., LTD


An optical device for determining at least one signal light component being characteristic for an optical near-field interaction of a probe with an object to be investigated, wherein the near-field interaction is subjected to a fundamental modulation at a fundamental frequency Ω, comprises an interferometer device with an illumination light path (I) being directed to the probe, a reference light path (II) being directed to a detector device for obtaining detector output signals including signal light components, and a signal light path (III) being directed from the probe to the detector device, wherein the reference and signal light paths (II, III) are superimposed at the detector device, and a demodulation device for determining the signal light components by demodulating the detector output signals, wherein the reference light path (II) does not contain the probe, an interferometer phase modulator is arranged in the reference light path (II) or signal light path (III) for changing an interferometer phase comprising the optical phase difference between the reference light and the signal light, and the demodulation device is adapted for determining the signal light components from the detector output signals obtained at three or more different interferometer states, which represent three or more different interferometer phases or at least two different interferometer phases with at least one state wherein the reference light path (II) is blocked.

There exist a wide variety of materials displaying interesting optical properties on a scale ranging from hundreds down to single nanometres. Some examples include viruses, cells, polymer blends, polycrystalline and nanocomposite materials, quantum dots, electronic components such as transistors and memory cells. None of these structures can be directly resolved by conventional optical microscopy due to the resolution limit imposed by the diffraction of light. This limit is formally expressed by Abbe's law (d≈0.5λ/NA) where d is the lateral resolution, λ is the light wavelength and NA numerical aperture of the microscope objective. Similarly, the light cannot be focused to a disk of radius smaller then roughly half the wavelength.
A first way around the diffraction limit was obtained with a spatial confinement of the light source with aperture-type near-field optical microscopes (a-SNOM). This could be realised by opening a small (subwavelength-sized) aperture in an otherwise opaque screen. To avoid the diffraction effects, the sample has to be placed in the immediate vicinity of the aperture. Usually, the intensity of light transmitted through or reflected from the sample is recorded. Phase sensitivity can also be achieved e.g. by sinusoidal phase modulation of the measurement wave (see M. Vaez-Iravani et al. in "Applied Physics Letters" vol. 62, 1993, p. 1044).
The resolution of an a-SNOM is limited by the size of the aperture. The transmission efficiency of a small aperture rapidly decreases with decreasing size to wavelength ratio. This limits the smallest practical aperture sizes to roughly 50 nm for the visible light and to hundreds of nanometres or more for infrared radiation.
To improve the resolution even further, the apertureless or scattering-type near-field microscope (s-SNOM) was developed. In s-SNOM, a sharp, usually metallic tip is dithered in the proximity of the sample and illuminated by the focused light. The light scattered by the tip is collected since it conveys the information on the local optical properties of the sample. The presence of the sample modifies the scattered light amplitude and phase because the scattering depends not only on the tip alone, but on the polarizability of the entire coupled tip-sample system. The optical resolution of s-SNOM is essentially limited only by the tip radius. However, the largest part of the collected light does not originate from the tip apex. Instead, it is mostly produced by reflections and scatterings from the tip shaft and the entire illuminated area of the sample. This undesirable part of the signal, commonly referred to as background light, has to be separated from the measured quantities. Furthermore, to obtain the complex-valued dielectric constant of the sample both the amplitude and phase of the scattered light have to be determined.
The background signal can be avoided by taking advantage of the continuous tip oscillation. The tip dithering induces a periodic change in the coupled tip-sample system polarizability thus a modulation of the scattered wave S representing the signal light. However, the s-SNOM background B is also strongly modulated at the same frequency Ω. The contrasts can be enhanced and scattering source S better distinguished from the background B if the signal is demodulated at a higher harmonic, nΩ, n>1 (see G. Wurtz et al. in "The European Physical Journal —Applied Physics" vol. 5, 1999, 269).
The light intensity In detected by the detector at frequency nΩ, n>0 is in general a complicated sum of all possible signal and background interference products:In=ES,nEB,0 cos(φS,n−φB,0)+ES,0EB,n cos(φS,0−φB,n)+¼Σi≠0,nES,iES,n±i cos(φS,i−φS,n±i)+¼Σi≠0,nEB,i+EB,n±i cos(φB,i−φB,n±i))+½Σi≠0,nEB,iES,n±i cos(φB,i−φS,n±i)where the ES,i and EB,i are the i-th harmonic components of the signal and background amplitudes and the φS,i and φB,0 their corresponding phases. In practice it can be assumed EB,0>>ES,i and also EB,0>>EB,i for every i≧1. For a sufficiently high harmonic n, usually n≧2, we also have EB,n≈0. The detected intensity is then simplyIn=ES,nEB,0 cos(φS,n−φB,0)
However, this method provides no phase information and the measured quantity In is dependent on the amplitudes of the background and the signal and the exact phase relation between them.
By combining the higher harmonic demodulation with an interferometric detection, the contribution of the background can be significantly reduced as the signal in this case contains one additional term, representing the interference product between the source S and the reference wave R:In=ES,n(EB,0 cos(φS,n−φB,0)+ER cos(φS,n−φR))
Usually the reference (ER) term is dominant. By effectively neglecting the background contribution (EB,0<<ER) it was proposed by Taubner et al. ("Journal of Microscopy" vol. 210, 2003, p. 311) to reconstruct the amplitude and phase by measuring the signal twice (yielding signal amplitudes s1 and s2), with 90° reference phase shift between the measurements. With the known detector sensitivity a, the n-th harmonic amplitude ES,n and phase φS,n of the scattered waves are then reconstructed as:ES,n=sqrt(s12+s22)/(aER)φS,n=arctan(s1,s2)
In a typical s-SNOM experiment of the above type using infrared light with wavelength around 10 μm, the reference to background amplitude ratio ER:EB ranging from 3 to 10 is observed. In an average case of ER:EB=5 the above expressions lead to an error of up to 28% in the calculated amplitude ES,n and up to 17° in the phase φS,n compared to the exact values. Further, EB,0 is unknown and generally not constant thus introducing artificial optical contrasts.
Finally, the adjustment of the interferometer is usually performed with a fixed reference phase. This often results in suboptimal alignment since the maximum in the detected intensity doesn't necessarily maximize the real signal amplitude, but only its projection on the reference wave (cosine component). It is therefore advantageous to measure the amplitude and phase simultaneously.
Phase sensitivity can also be achieved through an interferometric method proposed by Zenhausern et al. (EP 757 271). There it is also assumed that interferometric detection will enhance the detected signal intensity by several orders of magnitude by detecting a signal proportional to (k r)3 instead of (k r)6 in the Rayleigh scattering limit k r<<1, where k is the wave vector of the illuminating light and r is the radius of the scatterer. However, this assumption would only be correct in the absence of the background signal, which in reality amplifies the measured scattering signal the same way an interferometric reference does. As explained above, the additional amplification due to the interferometric detection is usually only a factor 10 or less over the background. In EP 757 271, this effect was not considered and consequently no way to eliminate the background contribution was proposed.
The first and so far the only method capable of both the background interference elimination and simultaneous amplitude and phase measurement was introduced by Hillenbrand et al. (DE 100 35 134). This method is based on the detection of scattering at higher harmonics nΩ of the tip dithering frequency, heterodyned with the reference wave shifted by a frequency Δ in respect to light used for tip and sample illumination. However, this heterodyne method can have the following shortcomings in practice: the frequency shift required for heterodyning is produced by an acousto-optic modulator (AOM) which separates the shifted beam by less than 100 mrad from the unshifted beam at its output. In such circumstances the Mach-Zender interferometer required by the method may be difficult to set up and align and the alignment of the frequency-shifted beam changes with the light wavelength. Furthermore, the AOM-s are commercially available for operation in only a few relatively narrow spectral regions, thus making the heterodyne method rather unsuitable for spectroscopic applications. Finally, the optical signal might be affected by the mechanical tip-sample interaction since the expression for the measured complex value of the signalzn˜ES,nERei(φR−φS,n+nψ) explicitly depends on the variable phase ψ of the mechanical tip oscillation.

Optical device for measuring modulated signal light

Max-Planck-Gesellschaft zur Forderung der Wissenschaften e.V.


In a device for showing a first image in a second image which is visible through a transparent sheet at which light proceeding from the first image is reflected and which is so arranged that the first image and the second image are detectable by an observer at the same viewing angle, at least one light source is provided for substantially parallel light, by which the light proceeding from the first image as light bundle can be generated with little expansion.

a) Field of the Invention
The invention is directed to a device for showing a first image in a second image which is visible through a transparent pane or sheet at which light proceeding from the first image is reflected and which is so arranged that the first image and the second image are detectable by the observer at the same viewing angle.
b) Description of the Prior Art
Devices of this kind can be used in aircraft and automobiles, for example. For this purpose, the second image represents, for example, the surroundings that are visible through the windshield. The first image, e.g., for flight operation, can be symbols which are displayed in the visual range or viewing area of the pilot via the windshield as virtual images serving as orientation aids for take-off and landing. The use of such devices also provides substantial advantages for other vehicles such as automobiles. For instance, by means of the first image, a symbol can be made visible representing the safe distance by which the driver of the vehicle can gage whether he is too close to a vehicle traveling in front of him. In so doing, it is possible to couple the apparent distance of this symbol with speed so that the vehicle operator can monitor whether or not an adequate safety distance is being maintained between him and the vehicle traveling in front of him.
Further, essential information from the display instruments can also be faded into the viewing area of the driver so that the driver has substantially better control over the vehicle than if he had to constantly glance back and forth between the environment and the dashboard, so that operating safety and driving safety are substantially improved.
There are a great many suggested systems for such devices which are also known as "Head-Up Displays" (HUD). From these suggested systems there arises the important fact that, in order to reduce fatigue, the information of the first image, as virtual image, is formed so that no accommodation of the eye is required while the eye is adjusted to distant vision. In order to form an image as a virtual image at a great distance, the object representing the first image, e.g., a liquid crystal display (LCD), is brought between the focal point and the first lens vertex of an imaging system.
Over the past twenty years, a large number of protective rights have been claimed worldwide for HUDs for motor vehicles. In Europe, however, these systems are still in the developmental and testing stage. In this connection, a distinction is drawn between systems with holographic optics and those without holographic optics. An overview of the former systems can be found, e.g., in the article "Holographic Applications in Avionic HUDs", Woodcock and Kirkham, Military Technology Miltech (1985), page 6.
In systems without holographic presentation such as those known from EP-A-0 202 460 or U.S. Pat. No. 4,740,780, imaging optics are either dispensed with entirely or conventional glass optics, e.g., according to GB 2 203 855 A, are used to generate a virtual image by means of an image generator. In the most elementary systems, the information which is displayed as a first image on a hidden LCD is simply projected on the windshield of a vehicle. An advantage in these HUDs consists in that the driver need not change his viewing direction to detect the displayed information; however, in order to read, the driver must adjust his eyes to the short distance to the windshield. The changing accommodation of the eye to distance vision for viewing the surroundings and to the windshield leads to fatigue and accordingly to lowered response time especially in older drivers.
In systems with virtual image display several meters in front of the windshield, the relaxed eye can read the information at any time; unnecessary fatigue is thus avoided. However, due to the reflection of light on the aspherically curved windshield, especially with virtual image display, imaging aberrations occur which must be corrected by specially computed optics. As can be gathered from DE 26 33 067C2, the production and computation of these compensatory optics is very involved and difficult with respect to manufacturing tolerances. Because of the large space requirement of conventional optical systems, integration problems also occur.
The following questions in particular must be answered as regards the use of HUDs in vehicles:
How great is the space requirement for a system and can this system be integrated in a vehicle? PA1 Can the vehicle supply sufficient output to power the light source and image generator? PA1 How high are production costs?
These questions must be taken into account already in the design stage. Two HUDs of very different design will now be described:
The first system, developed by Holtronic GmbH Ottersberg in association with BMW, Munich, dispenses with a separate combiner, as it is called, in the windshield to combine the first and second images so as not to impair the driver's clear view of the outside environment. This system is described, e.g., in DE 37 12 663A1. The imaging element can be a holographic optical element (HOE) in transmission operation (transmission HOE or T-HOE) which is integrated in the dashboard or instrument panel of the motor vehicle.
The essential structural component parts in this solution are a light source, an image generator and the T-HOE which carries out several functions. It directs the light beam in the desired direction on the windshield, generates an enlarged virtual image of the object at a distance of several meters in front of the windshield, and compensates for errors occurring as a result of the reflection of light on the windshield.
In this connection, there exist various possibilities for optical presentation of information. For virtual display of instruments or symbols intended to alert the driver of a defect in the electronics, for example, a stationary imaging plane is sufficient. With other information displays, e.g., the display of a position-dependent object, as in the safety distance indicator mentioned above, a variable distance display is useful. This can be realized in different ways.
With the use of holographic methods, stationary symbols can be displayed as three-dimensional images at various distances by means of a multihologram, as it is called. Such a hologram comprises a plurality of individual holograms which reconstruct the same object at different distances. However, an adjusting device is required for specifically illuminating each individual hologram. Imaging with a stereoscopic beam path, on the other hand, is a more elegant solution, since the image generation can be changed optionally. This method has been realized with the HUD mentioned above.
The spatial or three-dimensional image impression is created in the stereoscopic process by the binocular parallax when the left eye and right eye are presented with the respective slightly different aspect of an object. The spatial shift is achieved by generating two images of the display object from the respective visual angle of the eyes while taking into account convergence and the magnitude of the object. In so doing, the imaging plane (focal plane) remains stationary. Thus, the HUD is formed of two optical channels, each with an image generator. The information of each individual image enters the respective eye. The brain then allows the two partial images to melt together in an overall picture.
In principle, because of the possibility of variable display of information, there is demand for displays in which the symbols shown in the first image can be generated electronically. Picture tubes and LCDs are suitable for this purpose. However, picture tubes are not practical in automobiles due to high price and because of the voltage supply unit for generating high voltage. LCDs, on the other hand, are compact and relatively easy to drive or control and their voltage supply also does not pose a problem. Disadvantages are insufficient brightness, low contrast which is dependent on the wavelength and polarization of the scatter light, sensitivity to temperature, and low resolution capability.
The latter represents a major problem for use in a motor vehicle. At present, suitable LCDs have a pixel size of more than 0.3 mm. At a magnification factor of 50, the driver sees the pixel at a size of 15 mm. The spacing between the pixels is around 10% greater than the pixel itself. Therefore, the unwanted image of the pixel matrix is still clearly visible from a distance of 10 to 15 m. Only relatively large jumps in distance can be exactly displayed with this pixel size because, while the size of the symbols can be correctly generated, the jumps in distance of the symbols to be generated (lateral disparity) are particularly large because of the pixel size, especially at great distances. A compromise must be made, wherein the image has the correct magnitude at any apparent image distance, but the lateral disparity can be correctly adjusted only for specified distances because of the low resolution. As regards the use of LCDs for this system in the automotive field, it may be concluded that resolution power, contrast and temperature stability would have to be improved.
The T-HOEs mentioned above have the characteristic of dividing white light into its spectral components. Imaging via a T-HOE with irradiation by white light would lead to blurring of the image due to such chromatic aberrations. These chromatic aberrations can be compensated in a wavelength region of around 100 nm by combining a plurality of HOEs; but if only one HOE is used, this results in the requirement for a narrow-band light source with an unrealistic requirement of .DELTA..lambda.<10 nm. Further, the light source would have to possess the highest possible brightness or luminance to allow the observer still to detect the display against a bright real background. The required luminance of the light source can be determined from the luminance at the position of the observer and from the efficiency of the optical system.
Another factor determining the suitability of a light source is its size and optical output. Light sources consuming 100 W or more are impractical not only because of the high output, but also because of high heat generation. Moreover, a light source may not have a long delay time (t <10 s) between the controlling or triggering phase and operating phase so that warning symbols can be displayed in the most direct manner possible.
The article "Windshield with Holographic Mirror for Head-Up Displays", W. Windeln and M. A. Beeck, Automobiltechnische Zeitschrift 91 (1989), pages 538-342, mentions another system which was developed by Volkswagen AG, Wolfsburg, in association with Vereinigten Glaswerke GmbH, Aachen. This system uses a holographic combiner which is integrated in the windshield. The desired information is generated on an LCD and appears with the help of an imaging lens with a stationary display plane. A high degree of efficiency is achieved in the overall system through the use of a combiner. As was described above, the requirements imposed on a combiner (high transmission, high efficiency, high reflection factor, low spectral bandwidth and good imaging quality) can only be met by a holographic combiner. At present, the only suitable holographic storage medium is dichromate gelatin (DCG) which has also been used in aircraft for many years. Photopolymers represent another material which might also be useful for this purpose. The photopolymers offered by Polaroid, Offenbach (with wet development) and Du Pont, Wilmington, U.S.A., are particularly notable. The latter do not require an involved wet development process with toxic chemicals. After a simple diffuse post-exposure and subsequent heat treatment, the hologram is fully developed and fixed. However, photopolymers are still in the developmental phase, i.e., are not yet commercially available.
A majority of development efforts is focussed on the industrial manufacture of the combiner and its integration into the windshield.
In principle, the distortion of the virtual light image can also be corrected by the combiner. A narrow-band green phosphor serves as a light source for the display and, in combination with the combiner, suppresses chromatic imaging errors.
The solutions known from the prior art have the following fundamental drawbacks: the required luminance in the viewing field of the vehicle operator is not achieved by LCD displays or rear-illumination displays or even cathode-ray tubes because the arrangement must also be operable under glaring sunlight. Further, the holograms used to mirror the display element in particular possess the very unpleasant quality that they appear when illuminated with broadband light in the visible spectrum and in rainbow colors.
For the purpose of increasing the light intensity, it is proposed in DE 38 22 222 A1 to arrange polarizing filters on the inside of the windshield and to reflect the first image directly via an optical system as a virtual image on the windshield. In this way, glaring sunlight, for example, can be damped so that the first image is more visible. Further, these polarizing filters have the advantage that double images and distracting reflections on the windshield are prevented or at least reduced. However, experience has shown that this solution also does not provide sufficiently high light intensity for the first image with simultaneous visibility of the bright second image.

Device for showing a first image in a second image which is visible through a transparent sheet

LDT GmbH Co. Laser-Dispaly-Technologie KG


An electronic input/output apparatus for a computer system which includes a computer and a computer screen, includes a mechanical mouse and a printhead integral with the mouse, both being attached to the computer through an electrical interconnection means. The mouse is represented by a cursor on the computer screen based on movement of the mouse. The electrical interconnection means provides data signals between the computer and the electronic input/output apparatus for the mouse and additionally for the printhead which is capable of printing data displayed on the computer screen which has been passed over by the cursor. The printhead, upon activation by a print button or the like, prints onto a substrate as the I/O apparatus is moved across the substrate. Control of the printing operation is done by monitoring and controlling the data sent to the printhead based on positional and velocity values obtainable by a tracking mechanism within the mouse.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a computer mouse which includes a printer and more specifically, a mechanical mouse which includes an ink jet printer which receives signals representing data displayed in a region selected on a computer screen by the mouse. As the mouse moves, the printer will eject drops of ink which correspond to the data in the selected region.
2. Description of Related Art
U.S. Pat. No. 4,412,232 to Weber et al. discloses an ink jet printer which is hand held and includes a printhead and a sensing device. The sensing device generates timing pulses which are sent to a computer and used for controlling the printhead. The printhead uses piezoelectric elements to print data onto a sheet of paper. The printhead and the sensing device are connected to a computer by an electrical connection.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,999,016 to Suzuki et al. discloses a hand recording apparatus wherein data is printed onto a recording medium by a thermal printhead. The printhead is driven based on signals from an encoder plate and a photosensor which detect movement of the entire apparatus. Data is recorded from a keyboard of a word-processor into a RAM and then read out of to the recording apparatus whenever the recording apparatus is activated.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,750,049 to Murakami et al. discloses a hand held copying apparatus which includes an encoder, a reading device, a controller, a storage device, a recording device and a monitoring device. The monitoring device is an LCD and the recording device is a thermal head. Data is read into the apparatus, stored for a variable amount of time and outputted to a piece of paper by the thermal head. A button on the apparatus is depressed to switch between the recording and the reading functions. The encoder generates timing pulses which are used to synchronize the reading device and the recording device.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,901,164 to Kurosawa discloses a hand scanner image input/output apparatus wherein an object is scanned by a scanning element within the input/output device and then printed onto a piece of paper using a thermal printhead. The thermal printhead is moved into an active region prior to printing and an inactive position during scanning.
None of the known existing printing systems combine a mouse with a thermal ink jet printer to form a device capable of both designating data on a computer screen and printing the data.
Thus, the need exists for a computer mouse which can perform routine pointing/designating functions associated with a computer mouse, while additionally providing the capability of printing selected information from a computer screen by depressing of a print button on the mouse and translationally moving the mouse across a recording surface to print thereon.


A plasma generator assembly for treatment of an item to be soldered in a vacuum chamber. The generator includes a chamber having a first opening for placement of a microwave source, formed so that plasma generated from a gas is spread out over a wide area; a second chamber for containing generated plasma effluent; and a partial barrier such as a perforated plate and/or an optical baffle attached to the second chamber. On the opposite side of the partial barrier from the second chamber is the area of the vacuum chamber for treatment of the item.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to plasma generation, and in particular, relates to a method of plasma generation utilizing microwave energy.
2. Description of the Related Art
Plasma generation, the generation of glow-discharge (a gas consisting of a stream of high velocity ions, electrons and neutral particles), is used to treat areas to be soldered in plasma-assisted dry soldering (PADS). See for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,921,157 on a fluxless soldering process. Generation of plasma with microwaves is now done utilizing a low-pressure, rarified gas and generating plasma only in a small area. For example, a quartz insulator having dimensions of about 3-4 inches on a side is used to generate plasma with a small aperture of about 2 inches. In one type of plasma generation, using SF.sub.6 as a source gas, atomic fluorine F, is readily formed. It is a free radical and therefore has a short lifetime. Because there is only a small area of treatment which may be remote from some of the areas to be treated with the plasma, some areas may not be treated because the F does not survive until it reaches that treatment area. Thus, in the prior method, only a small portion of the active species, for example, F, actually gets to the treatment site. By the time the F reaches the treatment site, it has generally recombined with other radicals which have diffused out of the plasma region, often with about a 100-fold decrease in effectiveness at the outer regions of, for example, a 12-cm treatment area.
Plasma may also be generated with electron cyclotron resonance systems (ECR), inductively coupled (or capacitively coupled) radio frequency (RF) plasma, DC-coupled plasma systems and helicon waves (waves of plasma formed in a magnetic field which interact with the field in such a way as to heat the plasma). In addition, the AFTERFLOW.TM. hollow quartz tube (Machine Technologies, Inc., Parsippany, N.J.) within a microwave guide assembly may be used to generate plasma in a confined area.
It is therefore an object of this invention to provide a method and apparatus which allow plasma generation over an expanded area, for use, for example, in treatment with short-lived species, such as in plasma-assisted dry soldering.
Other objects and advantages will be more fully apparent from the following disclosure and appended claims.


A method, system, and computer program product are provided for virtualizing specific values in a guest configuration based on the underlying host symbol substitution values. A symbolic link located in a traditional file system in a virtual guest is opened. Each symbol is extracted from a symbol-based file located in a symbol-based file system. The symbol-based file is accessed through a symbolic link from the traditional file system. The virtual guest issues a privileged instruction to a hypervisor for each symbol in the symbol-based file to retrieve a substitution value from a symbol table that is stored in hypervisor storage. The substitution value for each symbol is returned to the virtual guest, and it replaces the symbol in the symbol-based file. In response to a file read request for the traditional file, the substitution value is retrieved from the symbol-based file using the symbolic link from the traditional file.

Embodiments of the invention generally relate to computer systems, and more specifically to virtualization of files.
In a virtual guest environment, configuration information that is unique to the specific guest instance is saved in files at various locations inside the guest file system. These files are accessed and managed locally by the system and applications running inside the virtual guest instance. In an environment having a large number of virtual guest instances, these unique configuration files are managed individually for each of the virtual guest instances.
Remote file system capabilities can be leveraged to share file system contents across multiple systems via a network share. However, the sharing occurs on a directory or file system basis and is not available for an individual file, or at a field level. Network shares are also subject to the reliability and speed of the underlying network.

Virtualizing specific values in a guest configuration based on the underlying host symbol repository

International Business Machines Corporation


A multiprocessor system having shared memory uses guarded pointers to identify protected segments of memory and permitted access to a location specified by the guarded pointer. Modification of pointers is restricted by the hardware system to limit access to memory segments and to limit operations which can be performed within the memory segments. Global address translation is based on grouping of pages which may be stored across multiple nodes. The page groups are identified in the global translation of each node and, with the virtual address, identify a node in which data is stored. Pages are subdivided into blocks and block status flags are stored for each page. The block status flags indicate whether a memory location may be read or written into at a particular node and indicate to a home node whether a remote node has written new data into a location.

In most computer systems, individual programs access code and data by addressing memory through a virtual address space. That virtual address space for each program must then be translated into the physical address space in which the code and data is actually stored in memory. Thus, distinct programs may use identical virtual addresses which translate to different locations in physical memory. The physical address space utilized by several programs may be completely distinct or they may overlap. Some level of security must be provided in order to permit common access to certain memory locations while protecting against unauthorized access to other locations.
Memory system designers must provide security without sacrificing efficiency and flexibility. One process' objects must be protected from modification by other, unauthorized processes, and user programs must not be allowed to affect the execution of trusted system programs. It must be possible to share data between processes in a manner that restricts data access to authorized processes; merely providing the ability to have data be private to a process or accessible to all processes is insufficient. An efficient mechanism must also be provided to change protection domains (the set of objects that can be referenced) when entering a subsystem.
The current trend towards the use of multithreading as a method of increasing the utilization of execution units make traditional security schemes undesirable, particularly if context switches may occur on a cycle-by-cycle basis. Traditional security systems have a non-zero context switch time as loading the protection domain for the new context may require installing new address translations or protection table entries.
A number of multithreaded systems such as Alewife (Agarwal, A., et al., "The MIT Alewife machine: A large-scale distributed-memory mutiprocessor," Scalable Shared Memory Multiprocessors, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1991.), and Tera (Alverson, R., et al., "The tera computer system," Proceedings of the 1990 International Conference on Supercomputing, September, 1990, ACM SIGPLAN Computer Architecture News, pp 1-6) have avoided this problem by requiring that all threads which are simultaneously loaded share the same address space and protection domain. This may be sufficient for execution of threads from a single user program, but disallows interleaving threads from different protection domains, which may restrict the performance of the machine.

Memory system with global address translation


The invention is related to phosphorus substituted anti-viral inhibitory compounds, compositions containing such compounds, and therapeutic methods that include the administration of such compounds, as well as to processes and intermediates useful for preparing such compounds.

AIDS is a major public health problem worldwide. Although drugs targeting HIV viruses are in wide use and have shown effectiveness, toxicity and development of resistant strains have limited their usefulness. Assay methods capable of determining the presence, absence or amounts of HIV viruses are of practical utility in the search for inhibitors as well as for diagnosing the presence of HIV.
Human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection and related disease is a major public health problem worldwide. The retrovirus human immunodeficiency virus type 1 (HIV-1), a member of the primate lentivirus family (DeClercq E (1994) Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 724:438-456; Barre-Sinoussi F (1996) Lancet, 348:31-35), is generally accepted to be the causative agent of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) Tarrago et al. FASEB Journal 1994, 8:497-503). AIDS is the result of repeated replication of HIV-1 and a decrease in immune capacity, most prominently a fall in the number of CD4+ lymphocytes. The mature virus has a single stranded RNA genome that encodes 15 proteins (Frankel et al. (1998) Annual Review of Biochemistry, 67:1-25; Katz et al. (1994) Annual Review of Biochemistry, 63:133-173), including three key enzymes: (i) protease (Prt) (von der Helm K (1996) Biological Chemistry, 377:765-774); (ii) reverse transcriptase (RT) (Hottiger et al. (1996) Biological Chemistry Hoppe-Seyler, 377:97-120), an enzyme unique to retroviruses; and (iii) integrase (Asante et al. (1999) Advances in Virus Research 52:351-369; Wlodawer A (1999) Advances in Virus Research 52:335-350; Esposito et al. (1999) Advances in Virus Research 52:319-333). Protease is responsible for processing the viral precursor polyproteins, integrase is responsible for the integration of the double stranded DNA form of the viral genome into host DNA and RT is the key enzyme in the replication of the viral genome. In viral replication, RT acts as both an RNA- and a DNA-dependent DNA polymerase, to convert the single stranded RNA genome into double stranded DNA. Since virally encoded Reverse Transcriptase (RT) mediates specific reactions during the natural reproduction of the virus, inhibition of HIV RT is an important therapeutic target for treatment of HIV infection and related disease.
Sequence analysis of the complete genomes from several infective and non-infective HIV-isolates has shed considerable light on the make-up of the virus and the types of molecules that are essential for its replication and maturation to an infective species. The HIV protease is essential for the processing of the viral gag and gag-pol polypeptides into mature virion proteins. L. Ratner, et al., Nature, 313:277-284 (1985); L. H. Pearl and W. R. Taylor, Nature, 329:351 (1987). HIV exhibits the same gag/pol/env organization seen in other retroviruses. L. Ratner, et al., above; S. Wain-Hobson, et al., Cell, 40:9-17 (1985); R. Sanchez-Pescador, et al., Science, 227:484-492 (1985); and M. A. Muesing, et al., Nature, 313:450-458 (1985).
Drugs approved in the United States for AIDS therapy include nucleoside inhibitors of RT (Smith et al (1994) Clinical Investigator, 17:226-243), protease inhibitors and non-nucleoside RT inhibitors (NNRTI), (Johnson et al (2000) Advances in Internal Medicine, 45 (1-40; Porche D J (1999) Nursing Clinics of North America, 34:95-112).
Inhibitors of HIV protease are useful to limit the establishment and progression of infection by therapeutic administration as well as in diagnostic assays for HIV. Protease inhibitor drugs approved by the FDA include:                saquinavir (Invirase®, Fortovase®, Hoffman-La Roche, EP-00432695 and EP-00432694)        ritonavir (Norvir®, Abbott Laboratories)        indinavir (Crixivan®, Merck & Co.)        nelfinavir (Viracept®, Pfizer)        amprenavir (Agenerase®, GlaxoSmithKline, Vertex Pharmaceuticals)        lopinavir/ritonavir (Kaletra®, Abbott Laboratories)
Experimental protease inhibitor drugs include:                fosamprenavir (Glaxo SmithKline, Vertex Pharmaceuticals)        tipranavir (Boehringer Ingelheim)        atazanavir (Bristol-Myers Squibb).
There is a need for anti-HIV therapeutic agents, i.e. drugs having improved antiviral and pharmacokinetic properties with enhanced activity against development of HIV resistance, improved oral bioavailability, greater potency and extended effective half-life in vivo. New HIV antivirals should be active against mutant HIV strains, have distinct resistance profiles, fewer side effects, less complicated dosing schedules, and orally active. In particular, there is a need for a less onerous dosage regimen, such as one pill, once per day. Although drugs targeting HIV RT are in wide use and have shown effectiveness, particularly when employed in combination, toxicity and development of resistant strains have limited their usefulness.
Combination therapy of HIV antivirals has proven to be highly effective in suppressing viral replication to unquantifiable levels for a sustained period of time. Also, combination therapy with RT and other HIV inhibitors have shown synergistic effects in suppressing HIV replication. Unfortunately, many patients currently fail combination therapy due to the development of drug resistance, non-compliance with complicated dosing regimens, pharmacokinetic interactions, toxicity, and lack of potency. Therefore, there is a need for new HIV RT inhibitors that are synergistic in combination with other HIV inhibitors.
Improving the delivery of drugs and other agents to target cells and tissues has been the focus of considerable research for many years. Though many attempts have been made to develop effective methods for importing biologically active molecules into cells, both in vivo and in vitro, none has proved to be entirely satisfactory. Optimizing the association of the inhibitory drug with its intracellular target, while minimizing intercellular redistribution of the drug, e.g. to neighboring cells, is often difficult or inefficient.
Most agents currently administered to a patient parenterally are not targeted, resulting in systemic delivery of the agent to cells and tissues of the body where it is unnecessary, and often undesirable. This may result in adverse drug side effects, and often limits the dose of a drug (e.g., cytotoxic agents and other anti-cancer or anti-viral drugs) that can be administered. By comparison, although oral administration of drugs is generally recognized as a convenient and economical method of administration, oral administration can result in either (a) uptake of the drug through the cellular and tissue barriers, e.g. blood/brain, epithelial, cell membrane, resulting in undesirable systemic distribution, or (b) temporary residence of the drug within the gastrointestinal tract. Accordingly, a major goal has been to develop methods for specifically targeting agents to cells and tissues. Benefits of such treatment includes avoiding the general physiological effects of inappropriate delivery of such agents to other cells and tissues, such as uninfected cells. Intracellular targeting may be achieved by methods and compositions which allow accumulation or retention of biologically active agents inside cells.

Phosphonate analogs of HIV inhibitor compounds


There is provided a charging device which can rapidly charge, with a single charger, portable devices of a plurality of charging specifications.

The present invention relates to a charging device, for example, a charging device which charges a portable device via a universal serial bus.
In recent years, charging of portable devices via a USB has been becoming common. With USB2.0, the maximum current that can be taken out from a port is defined as 500 mA, and there is a problem in which it takes a while to charge a high-capacity secondary battery.
To address such problems, there is proposed a mechanism which can determine the power supply ability of the USB charger (host) side and obtain a current exceeding 500 mA from a charger having sufficient power supply ability (Japanese Patent No. 4695220 (Patent Document 1), Japanese Patent No. 4664362 (Patent Document 2), U.S. Pat. No. 7,581,119 B2 (Patent Document 3), Japanese Patent No. 3811704 (Patent Document 4), U.S. Pat. No. 7,170,259 B2 (Patent Document 5), Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2005-6497 (Patent Document 6), and Battery Charging v1.2 Specification, Internet <URL: http://www.usb.org/developers/devclass_docs> (Non-Patent Document 1), for example).

Abstract: A plurality of available power indicating circuits included in a USB module 10 notify, through a data line, a portable device coupled to the charging device of a signal indicating suppliable amount of current. A CPU 4 obtains, from a portable device coupled thereto, information identifying the portable device, at the time of adjustment. A memory 6 has a table stored therein, for a plurality of portable devices, defining a correspondence between information identifying a portable device and an available power indicating circuit. Referring to the table based on the obtained information, the CPU 4 selects an available power indicating circuit and, at the time of actual operation, activates only the selected available power indicating circuit.


A housing for at least one removable memory package includes a connector section having a contact array for connecting to the package and an enclosure coupled to and extending from the connector section for supporting the package for connection to the connector section. The housing further includes an ejection mechanism for ejecting the package outwardly from the enclosure and an ejection release button, which is connected to the ejection mechanism for initiating ejection of the package and supported for movement in a direction that is approximately perpendicular to the ejecting package. By locating the ejection release button at the front surface of the eject mechanism, and sliding the eject button in a direction perpendicular to the direction of the ejecting package, the eject mechanism can be of narrow width.

Memory cards are used in a variety of electronic equipment. Typically, these cards contain a number of integrated circuits connected to an edge connector, which is interconnected to corresponding circuits of a digital device by means of a header connector mounted in the device. The memory cards are typically supported in some type of housing so that the contacts at the mating edge of the memory card will be aligned with the contacts of the header upon inserting the card into the housing. Since the card may need to be removed from electrical engagement with the header connector, it is desirable that there be some means to readily eject the card from electrical engagement with the connector.
Eject mechanisms shown in the prior art (e.g., see U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,401,176; 5,389,001; and 5,149,276) provide an eject linkage that allows a user to eject a memory card by pressing a button located on the side of the card housing. A typical design for such a memory card housing 10 is shown in FIG. 1. A side-actuated eject mechanism 12 includes an eject button 14 that is connected to one end of a linkage 16 that is pivoted about a fulcrum 18. The other end of the linkage 16 is connected to a sliding eject plate assembly 20 which has hooks (not shown) that forcibly eject a memory card(s) from the card housing 10 when the button 14 is depressed. The direction of button travel is parallel to but opposite that of the ejecting card. A similar second eject mechanism is located on the opposite side of the card housing to separately eject a second memory card. This second eject mechanism includes a second plate assembly (not shown), a second linkage 16', and a second button 14' for separately actuating the second eject mechanism.
The problem with incorporating an eject button on the side is that it results in a wider eject mechanism than would be desired in some applications. For instance, a bulky design is detrimental to compactness in an electronic camera. In some desirable locations on the camera body for the memory card housing, there is simply not enough width-wise dimension to accommodate much more than the memory card itself. A more compact design is obtained in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,440,448; 5,432,673; and 5,234,351 by constructing an ejector with a sliding button accessible from either the top or the bottom of the eject mechanism. The direction of movement of the button is both parallel to and in the same direction as the ejecting memory card. However, this design increases the overall thickness of the memory card housing and requires finger access into the top and/or bottom of the housing in order to reach the eject button and to actuate the mechanism. In many applications, such as an electronic camera, such an eject access is either impractical or esthetically unappealing.

Memory card housing with a center-actuated ejector