A method for producing cast-in-place flexible joined-together constructional structures and buildings comprises applying to precleaned mating surfaces of the constructional structures and buildings involved a thiokol-containing compound incorporating the following components, wt %.. ______________________________________ liquid thiokol 80-120 inorganic pigment 20-45 vulcanizer of aerobic rubber hardening 6.5-10.0 adhesive additive 5.5-7.5 rubber hardener 0.05-0.15 cross-linking agent 2.6-4.1 modifier 0.3-0.4 coal tar 14.5-31.2, ______________________________________. followed by filling a space confined between the mating surfaces with a mortar based on a cement having a maximum expansion ratio of 0.3%. Then the joined-together constructional structures or buildings are held for a period of time long enough for vulcanization of the thiokol-containing compound and cement hardening so as to impart elastomonolithic properties to the joined-together constructional structures or buildings involved.

More attention is drawn nowadays in worldwide practice to various techniques for reliably joining a diversity of structural elements made of concrete, reinforced concrete, metal, or glass.
Currently, there are quite a number of methods and techniques for joining together a variety of constructions in industrial, civil, and hydraulic construction engineering, as well as in road building.
A particular concern in these methods is the joint between the surfaces being joined together for which strict requirements are imposed for adhesive bond and water-tightness. Such joints may behave differently during operation and, are therefore, classified as flexible and rigid joints. Rigid joints are usually made by welding, e.g., steel inserts, or connecting reinforcement bars, or some other joinable elements of parts to be joined together, followed by tightening the joints are usually made by welding, concrete, or by bonding together the concrete surfaces being joined using polymer solutions. Flexible joints are usually made with the use of a metal or rubber stress compensator with its ends embedded into the construction members to be joined together and by a variety of polymer and bituminous sealing compounds.
However, joints made in such a way are too complicated in construction, hard-to-make, and may be water-permeable and liable to fail when exposed to impact loads.
Joined construction structures for use in underground transport construction engineering for water- and corrosion-proofing of industrial wastewater treatment facilities and in hydraulic construction engineering should possess, apart from mechanical strength, reliable water-tightness.
Constructional structures that leak water at their joints are liable to rapidly destruct, which involves enormous expenditures afterwards for repair-and-restoration work. When corrosive fluids are involved, which is the case for treatment facilities, environmental pollution is liable to occur as a result of failure of such facilities.
Known in current practice is the use of solutions for water-tighting of reinforced concrete structures. Such solutions incorporate standard portland cement, a self-stressing or self-expanding cement, an aggregate, and water. However, use of cements featuring high expansion- and self-stressing ratio has demonstrated that a considerable amount of stresses are liable to arise in the joint during the curing process, resulting in spalling and splitting of the material of the construction structures being joined together.
A similar joining practice is performed by a known quick-to-set sealing mixture, consisting of gypsum-aluminous expanding cement, aluminous cement, portland cement, chrysotile asbestos, and water. However, the fact that chrysotile asbestos, which is known to be a carcinogen, is used as a reinforcing material renders such mixture instable and impracticable.
Use of diverse superplasticiers is known to improve the features of diverse concrete mixes.
As it has previously been stated, flexibility of joints between constructions and structures is attained due to the use of a variety of sealing compounds applied to the joining surfaces of the structural elements. In particular, such sealing compounds are based on various rubbers, such as polyisobutylene rubber, butyl- and thickol rubbers.
For a combination of the features, a special concern in sealing compounds is whether compositions is based on liquid thiokols or liquid polysulfide rubbers. These are essentially oligomers which, after having been exposed to vulcanization, turn out to be cross-linked polymers, thus forming elastic products featuring good physico-mechanical, adhesive, and dielectric characteristics as well as high elasticity in a temperature range minus 60 to plus 90.degree.-110.degree. C.
Known in the art is a method for producing cast-in-place flexible joined-together constructional structures comprising a 0.5-2.0 mm thick layer of a mixture applied to the surfaces of the elements of the constructional structures to be joined together. Such mixture incorporates liquid thiokol (in combination with epoxy resin and pigments) (54-65.2 wt. %), a curing agent taken in an amount of 0.12-7.90 wt. % and appearing as a mixture of sodium bichromate, kaolin, diphenylquanidine, and water, coal tar (0.2-43.3 wt. %), and solvents. A space between the joining surfaces is immediately filled with a cement mortar having the following components (wt. %):
______________________________________ cement based on aluminous slags and having a 29.9-30.7 maximum expansion ration of 0.3% mortar sand 59.80-60-03 water 7.7-9.6 plasticizer (optional) 0.1-0.2 hardener (SU A, 1,765,434, optional) 0.75 ______________________________________
After having been cured for a seven-day period sufficient for concrete hardening, the joined-together constructional structures acquire monolithic-and-elastic properties, and their joints retain strength and water-tightness after repeated exposure to transverse tensile and compression loads (5000 cycles on the average) as well as heating and cooling procedures.
However, such a method for producing cast-in-place flexible joints of constructional structures is too complicated for practical applications. This is because even an insignificant deviation from the formulation of the compound based on liquid thiokol and failure to observe the strict requirement as to the immediate and thorough homogenization of all components of the compound can result in disturbing the vulcanization process. The result of such a disturbance of the thiokol vulcanization process makes it impossible for a reliable adhesion of the surfaces being joined together under conditions of variable loads acting upon the joint material, more specifically, the cement stone. The resultant joint possesses neither strength nor flexibility. Apart from what has been discussed above, the known method under discussion involves an immediate application of the thiokol-based composition just after its preparation and thorough agitation. Thus, the fact that the vulcanization process occurs immediately after intermixing of the components prevents preliminary preparation of the composition.
The present invention has as its primary and essential object to provide a method for producing cast-in-place flexible joined-together constructional structures and buildings suitable for successful use in industrial construction engineering and reconditioning of constructions and buildings by providing a stable and reliable adhesion of the material of the structures being joined together to the joining material under conditions of variable loads and corrosive media.

Method for producing cast-in-place flexible joined-together constructional structures and buildings


A system and method for enabling wireless traffic message passing. The method includes initializing a vehicle wireless subsystem and a highway wireless subsystem, enabling a vehicle transponder to broadcast a query to request real-time traffic pattern data, and if a response to the query has been received, incorporating the real-time traffic pattern data into a runtime database and creating a human-readable display for displaying the runtime database on a navigation system. The human-readable display of the traffic pattern data includes the display of free-flowing traffic, slow moving traffic, and stopped traffic on a map to allow the driver to change a planned travel route if slow and stopped traffic pattern conditions exit on the planned travel route.

1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the present invention are generally related to the field of intelligent highway systems. More particularly, embodiments of the present invention are related to a system and method for the dissemination of traffic conditions on the highway.
2. Description
Currently many vehicles are being manufactured to include navigation systems. The current state of navigation systems in vehicles is based on fixed maps using a GPS (Global Positioning System) to determine where the vehicle is located. The navigation system provides a user, while in the vehicle, with directions to be able to traverse streets, roads, and highways to get from point A to point B without much hassle. Some of the things that are not available today with navigation systems are (1) whether there is going to be congested traffic up ahead, (2) whether there are any road closures involved, (3) whether there are any detours ahead, or (4) any other obstacles that would prevent a driver from getting to his/her destination in a timely manner.
Currently, drivers cannot determine whether there is upcoming traffic congestion or some other type of road condition without having to listen to an appropriate traffic report on a radio station. Often times, even if the driver is able to hear the traffic report on the radio, it is at random whether the driver will be able to obtain the traffic information that the driver needs at the time the driver needs it (i.e., prior to already being in the location of the traffic jam).
On Dec. 17, 2003, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approved an Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) initiative that provides for a new signal frequency of 5.9 GHz (Giga Hertz) to be used for Intelligent Highways. See, http://hraunfoss=fcc=gov/edocs public/attachmatch/DOC-242309A1 =pdf. (It should be noted that periods have been replaced with equal signs in URLs within this document to avoid inadvertent hyperlinks.) The Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) initiative is intended for interstate highways as well as vehicles to have wireless transponders with an effective radius of roughly 100 yards that will enable the ability of a vehicle to know when to put brakes on to avoid a crash or when another vehicle is approaching. Thus, this initiative is basically a public safety measure where vehicles will be aware of what's going on immediately around them and highways, or at least interstates, will have transponders that will interact with all of the vehicles that pass by the transponders. This will allow a vehicle to have knowledge such as whether some other vehicle is coming up very quickly behind it, whether it is safe to change lanes, etc. The installation of the equipment for Intelligent Highways is expected to occur within the next five (5) years.
Although Intelligent Highways will provide public safety measures and alerts, such as collision avoidance, work zone warnings, or other road condition warnings, Intelligent Highways will not be able to provide traffic pattern data regarding highway congestion issues.
Thus, what is needed is a system and method for disseminating upcoming traffic conditions on highways to drivers. What is also needed is a system and method for disseminating real-time traffic pattern information regarding highway traffic conditions by augmenting a pre-existing short-range communication environment and vehicle navigation systems. What is further needed is a system and method that provides real-time traffic pattern information regarding highway traffic conditions to enable a driver to make appropriate choices in the selection of optimal travel routes.

System and method for enabling wireless traffic message passing


A steerable lift axle/suspension system for a heavy-duty vehicle such as a semi-trailer or a straight truck, includes a pair of steering dampers and a backup lock. The steering dampers minimize shimmy of the steerable wheels during over-the-road operation of the vehicle, and straighten the wheels on such steerable axle/suspension systems having a lift feature when the system is raised. The backup lock secures the wheels in a straightened position when such liftable systems are raised and the vehicle is backing up, to minimize vehicle handling problems. The steering dampers and backup lock are mounted at a location off the axle tube of the axle and on the axle/suspension system beams, to eliminate stress on the axle that would otherwise be caused by welded attachment of such components to the axle tube, thereby enabling use of a less robust, more lightweight axle tube.

1. Technical Field
The invention relates to semi-trailers, and in particular to the steerable lift axle/suspension systems of the trailer of a semi-trailer. More particularly, the invention relates to the mounting of steering dampers and a backup lock on the suspension assembly beams rather than on the axle.
2. Background Art
Prior art steerable lift axle/suspension systems of semi-trailers or tractor-trailers typically have the steering dampers and the backup lock of the system mounted directly on the axle and, specifically, on the central axle tube portion of the axle which generally is located inboard from each of the suspension assembly beams. Manufacturers of steerable lift axles typically supply and assemble special brackets for mounting these components directly on their axle, then mount suspension assemblies on the axle or, alternatively, sell the axle to trailer builders who then mount the suspension assemblies on the axle. This practice either causes the steerable axle manufacturer or the trailer builder to become heavily involved in suspension assembly geometry layout work. Many problems and/or limitations often result from this manufacturing arrangement because axle manufacturers and trailer builders typically have less then complete familiarity with the complexities of suspension assembly design.
The present invention solves the noted problems by mounting the steering dampers and the backup lock on the suspension assembly beams via support brackets rather than on the axle tube. By locating these components on the suspension beams rather than on the axle, stresses to the axle caused by mounting components or brackets thereon also are eliminated. Eliminating such stresses, in turn, eliminates the possibility of axle tube failures caused by those stresses. To compensate for such stresses, axle manufacturers heretofore have made the walls of steerable suspension axle tubes thicker, with the undesirable result of adding weight to the vehicle.
The present invention also enables the suspension manufacturer to be more completely involved in the design of the overall axle/suspension system, Which results in improved performance characteristics, more compact design, ease of installation, and reduced weight. It also benefits the end user because the user can turn to one supplier, that is, the suspension manufacturer, rather than many suppliers, including axle and trailer manufacturers, to service the system.
In addition, the location of the component mounting brackets on the inboard side of the, suspension beams by bolt attachment is advantageous because, if a problem occurs with the components or brackets, new parts can be obtained and the defective parts easily replaced or repaired. In the past, problems with the brackets or the mounted components also could cause damage to the axle tube, resulting in the need to replace the entire axle. Such repairs are expensive and time-consuming because they involve much cutting, welding, and fixturing.

Steering damper and backup lock beam attachment


A radio communication system comprises: a radio base station, a terminal device, and a plurality of relay devices that relay radio communication between the radio base station and the terminal device. The plurality of relay devices create communication quality information in radio communication between the relay devices and the radio base station. The terminal device preferentially connects to the relay device having the best communication quality based on each of the communication quality information.

A mobile router (MR) (see Patent Literature 1, for example) relays radio communication between the radio base station and the terminal device. Specifically, the mobile router functions as an access point of a radio LAN scheme for the terminal device, and functions as a radio terminal for the radio base station. The mobile router normally is in one-to-one correspondence with the terminal device. For example, even if passengers in a bus respectively carry mobile routers, that is, if a large number of mobile routers exist in a bus, the terminal device carried by a passenger is capable of connecting only to a mobile user carried by the passenger.
As described above, as the mobile router is in one-to-one correspondence with the terminal device, the terminal device is not capable of selecting one mobile router in a good communication state with the radio base station, even if the plurality of mobile routers exist around the terminal device. Furthermore, the plurality of mobile routers respectively perform radio communication with the radio base station, so that the mobile routers scramble for a radio resource between the mobile routers and the radio base station. Therefore, there has been a case where the terminal device connecting to a part of the mobile routers is not capable of performing radio communication with the radio base station, so that it has not always been possible to efficiently perform radio communication.

Radio communication system and communication control method


The invention relates to analog integrated electronic circuits using differential pairs. The proposal is for a method of automatic correction of offset voltage. The inputs (V1, V2) of the differential circuit are short circuited during a calibration phase distinct from the normal usage phase. A capacitor is charged through the difference of the output currents of the branches of the differential pair in this phase. The voltage at the terminals of the capacitor is compared with at least one threshold. During the normal usage phase following the calibration phase, the result of the comparison is kept in memory. In the normal usage phase, a correction is applied depending on the result kept in memory to a current source of a follower stage upstream of the differential pair.

In a differential pair, the difference of output currents depends on the difference of input voltages, and if a null potential difference is applied between the inputs, for example by short circuiting the inputs, the difference of the output currents should be null.
The defects of matching the components that constitute the pair mean that the pair has an offset input voltage, more commonly called the offset voltage, that is not null; this offset voltage represents the intrinsic imbalance of the pair and is reflected by a difference of non-null output currents in the presence of a null input differential voltage. In practice, the offset voltage is the compensation voltage that needs to be applied between the inputs so that the difference of output currents is null.
A differential pair conventionally comprises two branches supplied by one and the same reference current source Io, each branch comprising a transistor and a charge. The input voltages are applied to the bases of the transistors, the emitters are connected to the common current source, and the collectors are connected to the charges. The current of the source is shared between the two branches depending on the difference of input voltages applied to the bases.
The differential pairs may be used individually or grouped into associations of pairs when the installations are more complex. For example, two pairs may share one and the same charge, the collector of a transistor of one pair being connected to the collector of a transistor of another pair. The pairs may be mounted in cascade, a current output of one pair being connected to a current output of another pair which itself has another current output connected to a third pair, and so on. Depending on the use of the differential pairs, it is possible to find different associations of pairs. The invention applies in general to all these uses.
Such differential pairs are used notably in analog-digital converters. They are used for example to constitute comparators, each comparator comprising a differential pair receiving as an input, on the one hand, a voltage to be converted, on the other hand a reference voltage; they are also used, still for converters, in folding circuits; a folding circuit comprises several folding cells each constituted of at least one differential pair, the current outputs of the cells being connected in cascade to one another in order to establish a voltage or an analog output current that varies in a bell or in a sinusoid depending on the input voltage to be converted; the different cells each receive the input voltage and a respective reference voltage.
In precision analog circuits using several differential pairs, it is realized that the lack of precision of operation (notably lack of precision of conversion in the converters) may result from the presence of non-null offset voltages; from a physical point of view, these offset voltages result above all from the fact that the emitter-base voltages of the various transistors of the pairs are not exactly identical even when identical currents pass through them.
Specifically, the technologies are not perfect and two transistors manufactured simultaneously, having at least theoretically the same emitter surfaces, and even placed side by side in an integrated circuit therefore having every chance of being identical, do not have strictly identical features. This results from an inevitable dispersion of manufacturing. In addition, not only do the two transistors of a pair generate an offset voltage in this pair, but, due to this very dispersion, the various differential pairs of an integrated circuit inevitably have offset voltages that are different from one another.
It has already been proposed to reduce this disadvantage by using differential pairs having larger transistors. They have less dispersion because their size is better controlled. But then, the capacitors are bigger and the circuits are therefore slower, which is not desirable in applications such as fast analog-digital converters. For the latter, it would be better to have smaller transistors in the differential pairs. In addition, the circuits are more bulky if the transistors are bigger, and they consume more current.
Individual calibration solutions have also been proposed a posteriori: a manufactured converter is tested and the conversion errors are stored in an EPROM memory of the integrated circuit to be used for the compensation of the errors during use. Laser adjustment solutions also exist, notably for individually adjusting the resistances present in the differential branches. This technique requires an individual test and an individual correction of each integrated circuit depending on the conversion errors noted. The method is therefore extremely costly industrially, each circuit having to be tested and corrected individually.

Electronic circuit with compensation of intrinsic offset of differential pairs


A renal hilum surgical simulation system is provided. The renal hilum surgical simulation system includes simulated tissue layers and simulated renal organs and/or vasculatures. The renal hilum surgical simulation system is adapted for but not limited to laparoscopic donor nephrectomy surgical procedures.

This application relates to surgical training, and in particular, to simulated tissue structures and organ models for teaching and practicing various surgical techniques and procedures related but not limited to laparoscopic, endoscopic and minimally invasive surgery.
Laparoscopic surgery requires several small incisions in the abdomen for the insertion of trocars or small cylindrical tubes approximately 5 to 10 millimeters in diameter through which surgical instruments and a laparoscope are placed into the abdominal cavity. The laparoscope illuminates the surgical field and sends a magnified image from inside the body to a video monitor giving the surgeon a close-up view of the organs and tissues. The surgeon watches the live video feed and performs the operation by manipulating the surgical instruments placed through the trocars.
Kidney transplantation is the treatment of choice for patients with end-stage renal disease, which has rapidly increased in the last 10 years. There are currently 100,000 patients on the kidney transplant list, with many waiting 5-10 years for a kidney from a deceased donor. This has led to an increase in live donor nephrectomies, and in turn become a vital procedure for transplant surgeons to be proficient in to both minimize morbidity and mortality for the healthy donor, and to harvest the kidney in an optimal condition for transplantation. Laparoscopic donor nephrectomy (LDN) has since become the preferred surgical approach, as there are many advantages over open surgery, including decreased hospital stay, postoperative pain and morbidity, and increased donor satisfaction. However, while there are benefits to laparoscopic surgery, the complex surgical tasks involved place higher demands on the skills of the surgeon.
Simulation-based education has greatly enhanced laparoscopic surgical training by providing a safe and effective means for acquiring technical skills. However, despite the increased need for training on the LDN procedure, simulation training surgical simulation systems, simulators or models are lacking. As a result, trainees are limited to practicing the procedure in costly animal and cadaver labs or rely on experience gained through practice on patients in the operating room, which reduces operating room efficiency. To increase the safe conduct of the operation, increase the number of practitioners learning LDN, improve the skills of practitioners, reduce training costs and make training LDN easier, a LDN simulation model that focuses and isolates one or more of the most technically challenging steps in the operation, renal hilum dissection, is desirable and beneficial for reducing the learning curve of transplant trainees allowing them to achieve proficiency faster. In addition, a LDN-focused model or surgical simulation system would enable trainees to practice in a low-risk environment and potentially reduce the need, and associated costs, for animal and cadaver labs.


A transmission for a motor vehicle with an engine includes a transmission housing and a dual clutch assembly with a clutch housing connectable to an engine output member. The clutch housing is rotationally supported within the transmission housing. The selective engagement of the dual clutch assembly interconnects the dual clutch housing with at least one of a first input member and a second input member. The transmission also includes a plurality of gear sets associated with various forward and reverse gear ratios, a controller implemented with an algorithm that provides a lock-up profile for the dual clutch assembly, and a plurality of synchronizer assemblies that couple at least one of the gear sets with at least one of a first countershaft and a second countershaft. The selective engagement of at least one of the synchronizer assemblies establishes at least one of the forward speed ratios.

The statements in this section merely provide background information related to the present disclosure and may or may not constitute prior art.
Some motor vehicles include a dual clutch transmission with a pair of operating clutches which drive a pair of input shafts. The input shafts may be located on opposite sides of an output shaft or may be located concentrically between spaced-apart output shafts. A plurality of synchronizers selectively couple rotatable gears associated with the shafts to achieve forward and reverse gear ratios. Typically, the dual clutch transmission is under the direction of a controller that provides a lock-up profile for launching the motor vehicle. The lock-up profile, however, sets the engine speed targets as a function of the accelerator pedal position.
Accordingly, there is a need for a dual clutch transmission with an improved lock-up profile.


A method for regulating a compressor of a pressure supplying system. The compressor is switched on and off dependent on a threshold temperature of one or more components of the pressure supplying system, the threshold temperature being ascertained using a temperature calculating method. The respective threshold temperature is ascertained by correlating the reciprocal temperature dependence that exists as a result of heat transfer between adjacent components.

Such methods for controlling compressors in motor vehicles are known and are intended essentially to avoid overheating of the equipment resulting from overloading. In the case of a compressor for a vehicle with an air suspension system, for example, increased heat generation is less to be feared during normal driving, since fewer level changes normally occur in this state. However, in the case of level changes at standstill, or constant level regulation resulting from manual operation or changing load, or for fast all-terrain vehicles in off-road use or when the compressor or compressor drive is heavily encapsulated with insulation materials (sound damping), relatively severe heating is not uncommon.
In this connection DE 196 21 946 C1, which is incorporated by reference, discloses an air suspension which has a compressor working according to demand and intermittently in normal operation, which compressor is switched on and off by a control unit in dependence on an estimated temperature, the estimated temperature being calculated as the instantaneously present operating temperature. If the calculated "estimated temperature" exceeds a threshold value, the compressor is switched off. As a result, no temperature sensors for monitoring the compressor are needed and therefore no additional signal inputs for the control unit. It is disadvantageous in this case that, also and especially in the case of the abrupt increase in the "estimated value" of the compressor provided each time the compressor is switched on again, which abrupt increase is also disclosed, with rising temperature the compressor is switched on and off more and more frequently and within shorter time intervals, without reaching the desired pressure increase in the system.
In addition, the temperature limit values for switching the compressor on and off in vehicle level control systems are usually designed in such a way that, when the compressor is switched on again, a predefined level change can be carried out with a fully loaded vehicle. However, in most cases a full load is not present, whereby the availability of the compressor is unnecessarily limited.

Compressor temperature control by indirect temperature measurement


A switchable inductance that can be formed in an integrated circuit, including a spiral interrupted between two first points connected to two terminals via two metallizations running one above the other, one of the two metallizations being deformable; a hollowing between the two metallizations; and a switching device capable of deforming the deformable metallization to separate or to put in contact said two metallizations.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of inductances and more specifically of inductances of variable value, the inductances being formed from conductive tracks formed, for example, in metallization levels of integrated circuits.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
FIG. 1 is a diagram of an inductance comprising a spiral coil with intermediary taps. Such a coil is conventionally formed on a metal level of an integrated circuit. The coil comprises four spirals between an external terminal E and an internal terminal S. Terminal S is connected to a switch I1 via a line l1 shown in dotted lines and performed on a metal level different from the metal level used to form the coil. Intermediary points P1 and P2, located in this example at the level of the second and third coil spiral, are respectively connected to switches I2 and I3 via lines l2 and l3 formed on a level different from that of the coil. Terminal E of the coil and the terminals of switches I1 to I3 non-connected to the coil are connected to connection terminals and possibly to elements of the integrated circuit on which is formed the coil.
A disadvantage of this inductance is that the presence of lines l1 to l3 between the coil and the switches causes parasitic effects in the coil.
Another disadvantage of this inductance is that when switch I2 or I3 is activated, the unused end of the coil located beyond point P1 or point P2 causes parasitic effects in the "useful" portion of the coil located between point E and point P1 or point P2.
Accordingly, such an inductance is not adapted to the provision of several inductance values due to parasitic phenomena.


Disclosed herein is an applicator device for applying a protective covering for an electronic device, comprising: a plate, a back piece and an opening on a top surface of the plate; wherein the opening is sized to fit around a raised section of an electronic device; wherein the opening and the back piece forms a chamber to allow the protective covering for a raised section of the electronic device to fit inside; wherein a depth of the chamber is greater than a depth of the protective covering. Disclosed herein is a method of using the applicator device, comprising removing a top sheet from the applicator device, aligning a perimeter of the opening to a perimeter of the raised section for allowing the protective covering to align and cover the raised section, exerting a pressure to release the protective covering from the back piece so that the protective covering is adherent to the raised section.

With the increasing demand for better photo quality, camera bumps that house one or more cameras have become a staple part of many smartphone. Camera bump is often a more preferred design than a thicker phone. In some smartphone models, a camera bump on a phone may house three rear camera lenses and a flash. Camera bump is raised above the flat surface of an electronic device, and this raised section presents a challenge. Because putting the electronic device on a surface such as a desk may result in the device resting on the camera bump, and this may scratch the lens in the rear cameras. Therefore, the use of camera bump requires additional protective covering for protecting rear camera lens from scratches in daily use.

Applicator device for a protector covering and its application


An edge ring for use in batch thermal processing of wafers supported on a vertical tower within a furnace. The edge rings are have a width approximately overlapping the periphery of the wafers and are detachably supported on the towers equally spaced between the wafer to reduce thermal edge effects. The edge rings have may have internal or external recesses to interlock with structures on or adjacent the fingers of the tower legs supporting the wafers or one or more steps formed on the lateral sides of the edge ring may slide over and then fall below a locking ledge associated with the support fingers. Preferably, the tower and edge ring and other parts of the furnace adjacent the hot zone are composed of silicon.

Batch thermal processing, in which multiple wafers are simultaneously processed in a furnace, continues to be widely practiced in the semiconductor industry. Most modern batch thermal processing is based on vertical furnaces in which a vertically arranged support tower holds a large number of wafers in a horizontal orientation. The towers are conventionally composed of quartz, especially for processing temperatures under 1000° C. or of silicon carbide, especially for higher processing temperatures, but silicon towers are entering service in commercial use for all temperature ranges.
One process that utilizes such thermal processing is high temperature oxidation (HTO), in which very thin oxide layers are grown by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) using SiH4 and N2O or NO as precursor gases. Typical CVD temperatures are in the neighborhood of 750° C. The thin oxide may have a thickness in the vicinity of 2.5 nm or less and be used for a tunneling barrier, for example, in flash memories. Other processes are available for growing thin films, such as using O2 as an oxidizing agent.
Thickness uniformity of the grown film has, however, been a problem. A thickness profile 12A is schematically illustrated in the graph of FIG. 1. Two peaks 14A, 16A in the thickness have been observed near the wafer periphery. The peaks 14A, 16A may represent 16% and 33% variation on opposed sides, and, since tunnel current varies exponentially with thickness, a modest thickness variation can produce a large variation in tunneling current and hence the recording performance of flash memories.
The specific origin of the peaks is not completely understood, but possible causes are believed to include thermal edge effects such as thermal shadowing by the tower legs or proximity to the furnace wall, and by gas flow discontinuities at the wafer periphery. Some have attempted to solve this problem by attaching auxiliary rings to the tower which extend over the edge of the wafer a small distance toward the center. Optimally, the wafer is spaced between the two neighboring edge rings facing its upper and lower faces. Edge rings have been shown to be effective at reducing if not eliminating the peaks.
The typical design includes a quartz tower and quartz edge rings which are fused with the three or four legs of the tower. This design suffers several problems. Although the quartz is relatively inexpensive, the fusing at so many locations is laborious. If one of the edge rings is broken in service, repair is almost impossible. Either the tower and welded edge rings are discarded or the wafer locations around the broken edge ring are not thereafter used for production wafers. Although quartz is generally accepted for use in thermal support fixtures, advancing technology calls into question whether it has an adequate purity level.
Accordingly, a better design is desired for edge rings and their support towers.

Detachable edge ring for thermal processing support towers


A tablet filling device to convey a vial to a tablet cassette for receiving tablets easily and reliably. The tablet filling device includes: a detachable tablet feeding unit including a plurality of tablet feeders capable of discharging tablets one by one and arranged horizontally and vertically; and an arm unit that carries an empty vial, fills the vial with tablets discharged from a tablet feeder of the tablet feeding unit, and carries the vial filled with the tablets. The arm unit includes: a perpendicularly moving base movable horizontally and vertically along a horizontal rail and a vertical rail, respectively, the rails provided in directions in which the tablet feeders of the tablet feeding unit are arranged; an arm base on the perpendicularly moving base to be slidable in a horizontal direction perpendicular to the horizontal rail and horizontally rotatable; and an arm, on the arm base, capable of holding the vial.

As disclosed in Patent Document 1, a conventional tablet filling device is composed of a tablet supply portion having a plurality of motor bases for attachment of tablet cassettes containing classified tablets, a tablet filling portion for filling vials with tablets, and a tablet container supply portion for supplying vials to the filling portion. The tablet supply portion rotates a rotor in each tablet supply container by a container driving motor built in each motor base to count and discharge a requisite amount of tablets, and the discharged tablets are conveyed to a filling position of the tablet filling portion by a hopper and a movable carrying container.
Patent Document 1: JP 11-70901 A
In the above conventional tablet filling device, it is necessary to provide all the respective motor bases with driving motors for discharging tablets and sensors for counting tablets. Further, when tablet clogging occurs in the rotor of a tablet cassette, overload of the driving motor is detected and an error is displayed, and the filling operation must be suspended until a restoring operation is performed by the operator.


A straw bale wall vent box is provided in a wall joinery system comprising a lower member, a substantially planar top member, and a plurality of rebar disposed through the top member and a bottom side of the lower member. The lower member can further include insulation, a drainage floor sloping downwardly from an exterior side, and a trim piece extending from the bottom side towards the plaster screed. In some embodiments the trim piece joins the plaster screed. In those embodiments in which the trim piece joins the plaster screed, both sides of the lower member can each include at least one aperture. Additional embodiments are directed to a straw bale wall vent system comprising a plurality of wall vent boxes placed side by side so that the first and second sides of adjacent vent boxes are substantially in contact.

This invention relates generally to the field of straw bale construction and more specifically to a vent that is incorporated into the wall joinery system between the bottom of a straw bale wall and the top of its"" foundation to allow condensation from within the wall to be removed.
Straw bale construction is a technique for building structures that greatly reduces and in some instances can even eliminate the use of lumber by forming walls out of stacked straw bales. The resurgence of straw bale construction has introduced current knowledge about modern materials and construction analysis to create structures that are especially durable and energy efficient when compared to both traditional lumber and non-lumber built structures. For example, modem straw bale construction features steel rebar that is driven through the straw bales that form the walls in order to provide strength, rather than more traditional materials such as bamboo or lumber. In addition, cables can be wrapped from the foundation to the roof-plate to form an exoskeleton. Modern straw bale construction also takes advantage of computer simulation and other techniques presently adapted to building construction to optimize designs for improved energy efficiency, for example.
The greatest strengths of straw bale construction are the fact that it is using a waste product as a building material and that wall structures having insulation values from r50-r60 are possible. These two factors make this construction medium an extremely promising component for addressing the global energy situation. However, there are several places where this technique needs refinements.
One involves the most vulnerable point of straw bale construction, namely moisture that tends. to collect in the lower outside corner of the wall. Therefore, the need exists for a vent system incorporated into the wall joinery system between the bales and the foundation in order to increase the longevity of straw bale wall systems. When kept dry, bales have been shown to last in excess of 100 years.
Straw bale construction combines well with other building technologies like greenhouses and cob for thermal mass. As a result, structures that combine the advantages of several natural building techniques are facilitated by straw balexe2x80x94allowing designs of maximum diversity, efficiency, and comfort.
These four advantages make straw bale special with respect to the following environmental considerations: 1) Reduced lumber consumption, 2) Increased thermal efficiency, 3) Use of a waste product as a building material, and 4) Adaptability to other building technologies. Clearly, a system that would increase the longevity of straw bale wall systems would further advance these environmental factors.
As shown in FIG. 1, straw bale structures typically include a cement foundation 10 and a wall 12 disposed thereon. The wall 12 is built of a plurality of straw bales 14 held in place by a plurality of steel rebar 16. The rebar 16 between a first row 18 of straw bales 14 and the foundation 10 is set in the foundation 10 while the cement is still wet. Thereafter, the first row 18 of straw bales 14 is set in place such that each bale 14 is impaled onto rebar 16 protruding from the foundation 10. FIG. 1 includes a partial cut-away section to show several rebar 16 set into the foundation 10 and protruding up into a straw bale 14. A new set of rebar 16 is then driven into the first row 18 of bales 14 such that approximately half of the length of each rebar 16 protrudes out of the bales 14. A next row of bales 14 is then impaled on the rebar 16 and the process is repeated. It will be apparent to one skilled in the art that this technique can be varied in many ways including the offset of the bales 14 from one row to the next as well as in terms of the number of rebar 16 used per bale 14, the particular arrangement of rebar 16, and how that arrangement is offset between adjacent rows of bales 14.
As shown in FIG. 2 a typical straw bale wall 12 includes both an interior siding 20 and an exterior siding 22. The interior siding 20 is commonly formed of plaster and is provided to prevent straw and straw dust from contaminating the interior of the structure, to provide a preferred surface for painting and anchoring fixtures, and to improve the insulation value of the wall 12. The exterior siding 22 is commonly formed of stucco and is provided to prevent the bales 14 from degrading due to sun, rain, and wind, to provide a preferred surface for painting and anchoring fixtures, and to improve the insulation value of the wall 12. An interfacial layer (not shown) is provided on both sides of the wall 12 to improve the adherence of sidings 20, 22. Interfacial layer 24 is commonly chicken wire.
Straw bale walls 12 have proven to be strong and durable, and have excellent insulating properties. However, it has also been found that warm, moist air from within the structure can penetrate the plaster of the interior siding 20. This can cause condensation 23 to form on an interior surface 24 of the exterior siding 22. The condensation 23 then tends to drip down the interior surface 24 and pool at the bottom along the foundation 10, as shown in FIG. 2, and can cause the straw to rot.
Accordingly, what is desired is a venting system that can be interposed between the wall 12 and the foundation 10 to collect moisture and to vent it back into the interior of the structure without significantly increasing building costs and without significantly diminishing the insulation value of the wall 12.
According to an embodiment of the present invention, a straw bale wall vent box comprises a lower member, a substantially planar top member, and a plurality of rebar disposed through the top member and the bottom side of the lower member. The lower member includes substantially parallel first and second sides, an exterior side, and an optional bottom side. The top member is substantially planar and includes a plurality of apertures, and can further include a stucco screed on an exterior end and a plaster screed on an interior end. The top member is disposed above and substantially parallel to the bottom side of the lower member, and is joined to a top edge of the exterior side of the lower member. The plurality of rebar is disposed through the top member and the bottom side of the lower member. This structure is advantageous as the apertures allow moisture from the straw bales to enter the vent box from which it can then vent into the air space above the foundation. The rebar serves to transfer the load from the top member to the foundation.
It will be appreciated that although the embodiments described herein and shown in the drawings all include stucco and plaster screeds, these are not critical elements to the invention and in some simple embodiments they are excluded. One of skill in the art will readily see how the invention can be constructed and used without screeds, or with only an exterior or interior screed.
The lower member can further include a drainage floor sloping downwardly from the exterior side, the rebar being disposed through the drainage floor. In those embodiments that include a drainage floor the bottom side is optional. The lower member can also include a trim piece substantially parallel to the exterior side and extending from the bottom side towards the plaster screed. The trim piece in some embodiments joins the plaster screed. In some embodiments the drainage floor joins the trim piece along its top edge, and in other embodiments along a line beneath and substantially parallel to the top edge. The drainage floor is advantageous to guide moisture towards the interior side of the vent box. In those embodiments in which the drainage floor joins the trim piece along its top edge, moisture can drain out of the vent box. In those embodiments in which the drainage floor joins the trim piece beneath the top edge, the moisture will tend to evaporate and vent out of the box through the opening between the top edge of the trim piece and the plaster screed.
In those embodiments in which the trim piece joins the plaster screed, the first and second sides of the lower member each can include at least one aperture. In those embodiments that include a drainage floor, the apertures in the first and second sides are disposed above the line along which the drainage floor joins the two sides. In other embodiments in which the trim piece joins the plaster screed, the first and second sides of the lower member are each bounded by the bottom side, the exterior side, and the drainage floor. In each of these embodiments the advantage of either apertures or first and second sides that do not extend beyond the drainage floor is to provide for air circulation between adjoining vent boxes when configured as a straw bale wall vent system as will be described in greater detail below.
Some embodiments include insulation within the bottom portion of the lower member. The insulation is advantageous to insulate against the cold of the foundation. In some of these embodiments a space within the lower member is defined by the bottom side, the drainage floor, the exterior side, and the first and second sides, and this space includes an insulation. However, in those embodiments that do not include a drainage floor the insulation can simply form a layer on the bottom side of the lower member.
Additional embodiments of the present invention are directed to a straw bale wall vent system comprising a plurality of wall vent boxes, as previously described, wherein the plurality of wall vent boxes are placed side by side so that the first and second sides of adjacent vent boxes are substantially in contact. In those embodiments in which each vent box includes a trim piece that extends upwardly to join the plaster screed, the plurality of adjoining vent boxes essentially forms a tube. Therefore, to provide air circulation necessary to remove excess moisture, the system further includes an air blower configured to force air into one of the vent boxes, and an outlet in one of the vent boxes through which the air may escape.
These and other advantages of the present invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon a reading of the following descriptions of the invention and a study of the several figures of the drawings.

Straw bale wall vent box and venting system


A tank holds a pool of liquid coolant in which spaced, rotatable disks are partially submerged. An air flow is established over exposed portions of the disks, preferably parallel thereto, whereby coolant adhering to the disks upon rotating out of the coolant pool is partially evaporated and the disks and remaining adhering coolant have their temperature lowered and serve to cool the coolant pool upon reentry into the pool from the air space above. A fluid to be cooled is passed through tubes mounted in the tank, below the surface of the liquid coolant, parallel to the surfaces of the disks. Adjacent rows of tubes define spaces therebetween, each of which receives the submerged portion of at least one disk. The evaporative cooler may be used in a refrigeration apparatus in combination with a compressor and an evaporator.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention is a new type of evaporative cooler for air-conditioning and refrigeration.
2. The Prior Art
There are three basic kinds of condensers in air-conditioning and refrigeration: air-cooled, water-cooled, and evaporatively cooled.
The most common kind of condenser is air-cooled which residential and smaller commercial equipment use almost exclusively. These condensers typically consist of a coil of copper tubing with refrigerant inside and aluminum fins on the outside of the tubes. A fan blows air over the coil to reject heat to the atmosphere. This type of condenser is simple and requires little maintenance, but is relatively inefficient.
Water-cooled condensers are the second most common type. Water-cooled condensers are typically used with centrifugal and screw chillers found in large commercial and industrial locations. The normal arrangement is a shell-tube heat exchanger with cooling water circulating inside tubes and condensing refrigerant on the outside. The water for this type of condenser is normally cooled by a separate cooling tower. A cooling tower consists of a water spray system that distributes water over a fill material. A fan moves air over the wet fill to cool the water. This system is normally more energy-efficient, with condensing temperatures 20 to 30 degrees Fahrenheit lower than a comparable air-cooled condenser. On the other hand water-cooled condensers and associated cooling towers normally require much more maintenance, are more complicated, and must be assembled in the field rather than shipped as single package.
The third type of condenser is evaporatively cooled. An evaporative condenser combines a water-cooled condenser and a cooling tower into a single package. Existing evaporative condensers are typically found in large commercial or industrial refrigeration systems and are only rarely used in air-conditioning applications.
FIG. 1 shows a typical arrangement for the third type, i.e. an evaporative condenser. A pump 10 draws water from a sump 12 and delivers it to a spray header 15 from which it is sprayed over tubes 14 containing condensing refrigerant. A fan 16 moves air entering at C through the water spray and wet tubes 14 to remove heat therefrom by evaporation. The air exiting the condenser at D goes through a mist eliminator 18 that removes most of the water droplets. While FIG. 1 illustrates a blow through type evaporative condenser, a draw-through type evaporative condenser, wherein the fan is located downstream of the tubes and draws the through the tubes and spray, is also known in the art.
The water pump and spray piping of a system such as shown in FIG. 1 create two major maintenance problems. First they are vulnerable to freezing damage. A partial solution to this problem is to place the sump and pump inside a heated building, but this arrangement makes installation more difficult. The second problem is that the pump and piping can easily clog with dirt. Water strainers are used to reduce this problem, but they too can clog and require frequent maintenance.
Current evaporative condensers and cooling towers have also had significant problems as sources of Legionnaire's disease, a potentially fatal type of pneumonia. Without regular water treatment, the warm, wet conditions in the condenser can support growth of legionella, the bacteria that cause Legionnaire's disease. While legionella are common in freshwater ponds and other surface waters, they do not cause pneumonia unless they are inhaled into the lung. A real problem with conventional evaporative condensers and cooling towers is that the water spray creates a mist of water droplets that can be easily inhaled. Evaporative condensers have been implicated in several outbreaks of Legionnaire's disease.
Evaporative condensers and cooling towers have inherent efficiency advantages compared with air-cooled equipment. For air-cooled equipment the limiting air temperature is the outdoor dry-bulb temperature. For evaporative systems, on the other hand, the limit is the wet-bulb temperature which can be 20 to 40 F. cooler. In addition, heat transfer between air and a wet surface is several times higher than that for a dry surface. The air flow requirements are also smaller with evaporative heat exchange, since the water vapor greatly increases the enthalpy (energy content) of the air. These factors mean that an evaporative condenser or cooling tower can give much lower condensing temperatures while reducing size and fan-energy requirements compared with air-cooled systems.
Despite the better efficiency of evaporative heat exchange, there has been a gradual movement away from water-cooled condensers and evaporative condensers. Early residential air-conditioning systems in the 1930's were normally water-cooled, whereas since the 1950's they have been almost exclusively air-cooled. Cooling loads of 150 tons were normally handled with a water-cooled chiller in the 1960's are now usually serviced with air-cooled equipment. These changes are driven by concerns about maintenance costs associated with water-cooled equipment.
Theoretical analysis and simulation of evaporative condensers, cooling towers, and fluid coolers have been performed by Webb and Villacres, "Performance Simulation of Evaporative Heat Exchangers--(Cooling Towers, Fluid Coolers and Condensers)." AIChE Heat Transfer Symposium, vol. 80, 1984. The theoretical basis is well-established, and their simulation predicted heat load within .+-.3% for a wide variety of air inlet conditions. Moreover, several papers exist which attempt to determine the energy saving potential of evaporatively-cooled condensers. Guinn and Novell "Operating Performance of A Water Spray on an Air-Type Condensing Unit," ASHRAE Transactions, vol. 87, part 2, 1981, reported tests on a commercially available water spraying device on the air-cooled condensing unit of a three ton split system air conditioner. They found that the compressor power input decreased by 5% to 9%, the cooling capacity increased by 4.4% to 8.8%, and that the energy efficiency ratio (EER) of the system was improved by 12% to 19% depending upon the thermodynamic state of the inlet air. The sprayer used 51.5 liters of water per hour. Problems encountered were water runoff from the tubes and fouling and corrosion of the tubes. Markoski, M. J. "Exergetic Analysis of Water Spray Augmentation of Air Cooled Condensers," Proceedings of 19th Intl. Congress of Refrigeration, IIIa, 1995, provides a brief exergetic analysis of this method of heat transfer augmentation. Leidenfrost, W., and B. Korenic, "Evaporative Cooling and Heat Transfer Augmentation Related to Reduced Condenser Temperature", Heat Transfer Engineenng, vol. 3, 1982, tested evaporative cooling for reducing condenser temperatures. Their analytical model was shown to be in agreement with the experimental data. One interesting test showed that, with the condenser heat rate held constant at 300 W (1024 Btu/h), the condensing temperature could be lowered from 44.6.degree. C. (112.3.degree. F.) with dry surfaces to 24.4.degree. C. (75.9.degree. F.) with wet surfaces. Also, the same data set showed that for a constant condensing temperature, the condenser heat could be increased from 300 W (1024 Btu/h) to 2280 W (7780 Btu/h) when applying the water spray. Although the increase in heat removal rate is partially offset by increased air pressure drop, the net effect is still very positive, with a stated possible decrease in air conditioner power consumption of 50%.


A method, apparatus, and computer instructions for sending content from a first application to a second application. In response to a user input indicating a selection of content for transfer to the second application, the selection of the content is copied to form copied content. The copied content is then automatically sent to the second application without requiring additional user manipulation of the copy content. Additionally, the destination may be another user. In this case, the second application is employed to automatically transfer the copied content to that second user.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates generally to an improved data processing system and in particular to a method and apparatus for processing data. Still more particularly, the present invention relates to a method, apparatus, and computer instructions for transferring data from an application to a destination.
2. Description of Related Art
The use of data processing systems is pervasive in the workplace. Users generate documents, spreadsheets, and visual presentations on a daily basis. Further, users communicate with each other through email and instant messages over networks, such as wide-area networks and the Internet. This widespread use of computers and the interconnectivity provided through networks allows for different users to collaborate or work with each other in different locations. Collaborating users may be as close as in an office down the hall or on another floor, or as far away as in another city or country. Regardless of the distance, users are able to communicate with each other and collaborate on different projects.
Often times, a user might find a need for sending a portion of a document to another user for review or use by the remote user. For example, two people may work on a document and one individual may decide that the other should inspect a particular paragraph that is being drafted. In the current process, the user selects and copies the text for the paragraph. Thereafter, the user opens an email client or similar application. The text is then pasted by the user into the application. The user then identifies the recipient and sends the content to him/her for inspection. Such a process is time-consuming and requires many steps. In some cases, this tedious process may result in less collaboration if a user does not feel that the need for another user to review a portion of a document or a spreadsheet is great enough to justify the effort required to send the content to another user for review.
Therefore, it would be advantageous to have an improved method, apparatus, and computer instructions for sending data from one user to another user.

Method and apparatus for transferring data from an application to a destination

International Business Machines Corporation


A cleaning device for cleaning the back side of a panel with a control member and a cleaning member, which is separate from the control member and which has a base member and two blades disposed thereon. The control member and the cleaning member interact magnetically through the panel, so that the cleaning member disposed on the back side of the panel can be guided along the panel while pressing the cleaning edges of both blades on the back side of the panel by means of the control member disposed in a manner corresponding to it on the front side of the panel. The two blades may be of different lengths and, by suitable geometry and arrangement of the blades or of magnetic elements, the shorter of the two blades exerts a greater pressing force on the panel with its cleaning edge than does the longer.

The invention relates to a cleaning device for cleaning the back side of a panel, especially an aquarium panel, with a control member and a cleaning member, which is separate from the control member and which has a base member and two blades disposed at opposite ends of the base member, wherein the control member and the cleaning member can be made to interact magnetically through the panel by means of appropriately disposed magnetic elements, so that the cleaning member disposed on the back side of the panel can be guided along the panel while pressing the cleaning edges of both blades on the back side of the panel by means of the control member disposed in a manner corresponding to it on the front side of the panel.
Such cleaning devices are already sufficiently known from the prior art. Thus DE 9105938 U1, for example, discloses a cleaning device of the class in question for cleaning poorly accessible or inaccessible back sides of panels, especially aquarium panels, wherein at least two blades are mounted in the manner of knife edges on the cleaning member therein ("secondary part"), which by virtue of magnetic attraction is jointly moved with a control member ("primary part"), which can be guided manually on the front side of the panel. As regards the cleaning result achievable therewith, however, this cleaning device is not optimally adapted to the elimination of various kinds of panel soiling.
Against this background, the object of the present invention is to improve a cleaning device of the type mentioned in the introduction to the effect that panels can be cleaned as simply and quickly as possible with an improved cleaning result therewith even in the presence of different kinds of soiling of the back side of the panel, such as occurs in particular in aquariums.


An apparatus for distributing a pulp flow, said apparatus including: a valve body connected to an inlet conduit and an outlet conduit for the pulp flow and provided with a closing member for opening and closing the valve to regulate the pulp flow; a distribution member arranged in a direction the pulp flow and downstream of the closing member, said distribution member distributing the pulp flow into at least two partial flows, and at least two channels wherein each channel receives a respective one of the two partial flows, wherein said channels are connected to the valve body or to the outlet conduit from the valve.

The present invention relates to an apparatus for dividing pulp flows in a pulp or paper production process.
The flow of medium-consistency pulp is regulated mainly by means of a flow meter and a pulp flow valve. The flow meter is located in a pipeline prior to or after the pulp flow valve and the flow is regulated by changing the opening angle of the valve. This kind of pulp flow regulation is usually reliable and ensures the exact desired flow rate in all situations.
If pulp is to be splitted into two separate flow channels, it is typical that the splitting is effected by arranging two flow measurements and two regulation valves in parallel so that the desired flow may be set in both pipe lines, either independently of each other or by connecting the regulators to each other so that the regulators distribute the pulp into the desired pipe lines. With this arrangement, all process solutions relating to pulp distribution may be realized reliably and the regulators may be separated from each other and controlled independently.
However, there are several mill applications where absolutely exact distribution between the pipelines is not needed. The distribution may be considered successful, if the pulp is divided with an accuracy of at least 40/60% between the pipelines and there is no need to change the distribution ratio of the pulp in the process, but it is typical for the process in its continuous operation. This kind of situation prevails in several pulp washing apparatuses, e.g. in the DrumDis-placer®-drum washer, wherein the pulp is fed onto the washer drum through a feed box extending to the whole length of the drum. The pulp entering the washer is distributed into two or more pipelines, via which the pulp is led to various locations in the pulp feed box, but finally the pulp enters one and the same hydraulic space. Thus, the final equalizing of the pulp takes place only after the distribution and in view of the process this equalizing of the distribution is adequate.
At low consistency, less than 6%, the properties of pulp are similar to those of liquid, whereby regulation for distributing the pulp into different pipelines may be carried out by means of suitable pipeline design using e.g. hydraulic elbows, T-branches, reductions and other suitable pipe fittings. In these, the flow resistances are designed so that after the distribution the pulp encounters an equal flow resistance in both branches, whereby the flow resistances do not guide the distribution of the pulp. Pipe fittings, in which mixing is effected by means of reduction/enlargement of the pipe can be used only, if the amount of material flowing into each pulp line is the same, but absolutely exact distribution between the lines is not required. This kind of distribution systems have been used e.g. in feed pipings for vacuum drum filters and feed pipings for low-consistency-fed drum washers, e.g. DrumDisplacer®-washers. Additionally, the same system has been applied in feed pipings for pulp screening plants, where the pulp to be distributed is to be made to mix in the distribution point and thus fed to two different devices in as similar form as possible.
Distribution of medium-consistency (6-16%, especially 8-14%) pulp has mainly been carried out using piping provided with flow measuring and a valve, and automation. In some systems, the distribution of the pulp has been boosted e.g. by means of turbulence-generating members or piping design, but the main regulation has been effected by means of a valve and flow control. This has been a typical constructional solution, because medium-consistency pulp flow causes such a flow resistance that turbulence generated by the distribution of the pulp by means of piping is as such not adequate for maintaining the mixing required for the distribution, but as a rule, flow resistances after the distribution point effect the distribution. If the pulp flow stops in a flow channel or pipe after the distribution point, the force required for compensating for the static friction is even in a short piping so great that it is not possible to enforce the flow, but the pulp keeps flowing via the other channel only, despite the greater flow resistances. Flow properties of medium-consistency pulp have been described by e.g. Gullichsen et al., Tappi, 64 (1981) No. 6, p. 69-72.
In order to enable uniform feeding of medium-consistency pulp into an apparatus, e.g. into said washer feed box, the feeding is to be effected via more than one feed pipe, into which pipes the pulp is distributed from the main line. In such a case, each feed pipe typically has to be provided with a regulation valve and a flow meter, as described in the above. The flow meters dose the same amount of pulp into each feed pipe, and the desired flow volume is ensured by a proper position of the valves. This kind of arrangement is needed, because none of the feed pipes may get clogged, but continuous operation of all the pipes is inevitable. As the apparatus size increases, this results in a large number of regulation valves and flow meters, which thus involves an increase in costs.
Our new studies have revealed that an exactly equal flow volume in every feed pipe is not absolutely inevitable. This is true especially when the pulp is ultimately led from the feed pipes into one and the same undivided space, wherein the pulp flow will equalize anyway. Thus, the distribution of the pulp into the feed pipes does not have to be so uniform that it would require regulation by flow meters, but a resulting problem is the clogging risk of the feed pipes without flow control.


An apparatus and method for rendering infectious and medical waste safe through heating and the disposal of said waste includes a body portion with a chamber to receive a container of medical waste. The chamber is connected with a filter for biological materials which escape from the waste container during heating. The contaminants are directed toward the filter by flowing out gas from the container in a predetermined direction as the waste container is heated to a temperature of preferably not less than 350.degree. F. and preferably not more than 385.degree. F. to render the waste biologically safe and unreusable.

The safe handling and disposal of regulated medical waste from various medical and health care facilities is a well-known problem. Of particular concern is the safe processing of contaminated needles, scalpels, and sharp metal or glass objects which have come into contact with the human body or bodily fluids. These items often include thermoplastic materials such as those found in syringes and tubing, vials of glass and other objects which have contacted bodily fluids.
Numerous environmental regulations have been enacted which prevent the use of conventional methods of waste disposal. On-site methods to render the infectious and medical waste safe have not proven to be practical or cost-efficient. Although the prior art discloses numerous examples of sterilization through the use of electronic beam radiation, gamma rays, heat, and even microwave energy, numerous problems still exist.
Sterilization by autoclaving, for example, does not solve the potential problems since sterilization is labor intensive and subject to human error. This sterilization method also does not change the dangerous nature of "sharps" materials such as needles and scalpels, and further does not render syringe tubes and parts unrecognizable or unusable.
The problems associated with used thermoplastic hypodermic needles and syringes are well known. These contaminated and dangerous handling materials resist decay and are often sought by illegal drug users. Past disposal techniques involve the requirement of medical facilities to cut the needle from the syringe body immediately after injection. This procedure, however, was discovered to spread disease through airborne aerosols caused by the mechanical sheering action. The contaminated needle tip and syringe would then still need to be handled and disposed of as a regulated waste item. More recent developments have lead to depositing the syringe and needle into a "sharps" container. The sharps container would then be delivered to an authorized facility in a costly "tracking" process.
A prior art device is capable of destroying the needle at the point of use through low voltage electric current. The needle is reduced along with all associated contaminants, at temperatures of incandescence by passing the current through the needle. This process leaves a sterile and incinerated residue, but suffers the drawback of not having the capability to render safe other commonly used materials, such as scalpels, glass, or leftover syringe parts. Other prior techniques handle sharp items by encasing the needles and scalpels in gels, resins, or thermoplastics. U.S. Pat. No. 4,662,516 to Baker Sr. et al., discloses such a technique. In Baker, et al., a thermoplastic bag with waste is melted at an autoclave temperature and is capable of encapsulating the medical waste. The product of this system, however, remains a hazardous material for handling purposes. The treated waste is recognizable and can be unsterile. The needles project from the solid mass, making them exposed and extremely dangerous. Further, autoclave sterilization depends on "wet heat" destroying microbial life by having the heat contact the life forms for a defined period of time. The autoclave sterilization process is not efficient when the waste is shielded by plastic bags or immersed in a liquefied or melted plastic.
An additional problem which these devices have not addressed, is the fact that infectious and hazardous fumes are discharged from the waste material as it is heated. These fumes contain chemicals from the thermoplastic syringes, various medications, body fluids, and other chemicals in addition to biological contaminants. U.S. Pat. No. 5,240,656 issued to Scheeres discloses a method and apparatus for treating contaminated plastic waste and discloses the use of a carbon filter for the purpose of removing any odors. The Scheeres system, however, does not handle the problem of filtering biological and viral contaminants within the fumes and does not disclose a method of directing air towards the filter.
The heating of several different waste materials at one time also creates the problem of non-uniform heating throughout the container. This leads to unpredictability with gas discharge. Several of the prior methods are also not capable of handling all types of medical waste. That is, many of the prior art systems are capable of handling syringes, but not capable of handling soft wastes such as gauze, tape and fabrics for sterilization purposes in a single on-site system.

Method and apparatus for disposal of infectious and medical waste


Refrigeration-shelf-stable ready-to-drink complete nutritional products such as nutritional supplements, foods for special dietary use, and medical foods can be prepared through an ultra-pasteurization and/or pasteurization process. By varying the choice and quantity of nutritional and functional ingredients, and by varying processing conditions, various such products can be obtained that specifically target the nutritional and health needs of different health conditions and diseases in both healthy individuals and patient populations. Daily values for calories, carbohydrates, fat, protein, minerals and vitamins are calculated to provide a complete nutritional product which when consumed within the refrigeration shelf-life will have substantially maintained its completeness.

Nutrition is one of the cornerstones of health, well-being, and the prevention and treatment of numerous chronic diseases. Nutritional products play an important role in these areas and attempts to provide cost-efficient, readily available and convenient nutritional products to the general public and those with special dietary needs has been a major focus in recent years. Complete nutritional products, i.e. those which contain all the essential macro and micro nutrients, have heretofore been available only in sterilized products or frozen products. Sterilized products are generally sold in hermetically sealed containers such as cans and are intended to have a long room temperature shelf-life. Table 2 lists many commercially available sterilized nutritional products. Such products require expensive processing steps which must be carefully controlled to properly remove microorganisms and bacterial enzymes. As will be discussed further herein, sterilization processes, due to the severity of the heat treatment can cause undesirable physical, chemical, enzymatic and microbial changes which deleteriously affect the final product. Moreover, although such sterilized products are often marketed as "ready-to-drink", they are typically stored at room temperature and therefore require refrigeration for maximum taste. Moreover, enzymatic reactions still occur, albeit slower, during room temperature storage of sterilized products. Such reactions can result in a host of undesirable defects, such as the destruction of vitamins which are necessary to the integrity of the overall product. Since sterilized products are designed to have up to one and a half year of room temperature shelf-life, such a product will have a different actual content of degradable micro nutrients (vitamins) in the early part of its shelf-life as compared to the latter part. Thus, a consumer will obtain a different and unknown amount of vitamins depending on when the sterilized product is consumed. To account for this slow degradative process during long-term shelf-life, manufacturers of sterilized complete nutritional products often include up to 50% more of a given vitamin than would normally be included to account for the inherent degradation loss and to ensure the product is likely to contain at least the labeled amount of nutrients at the end of its shelf-life. Such large overdosing results in an imbalance in the taste of the product, particularly if consumed in the early stages of its shelf-life. Moreover, the cost factor of including such large overdoses is enormous. In addition to the high cost of sterilization, and increased overdosing of vitamins, sterilization processes require high cost packaging, such as in metal cans and room-temperature self-stable laminated packages such as TetraBric.RTM. & Combibloc.RTM..
In addition to sterilized complete nutritional products, there are several frozen ultra-pasteurized or pasteurized complete nutritional products which are commercially available. These are set forth in Table 3. Frozen products cannot truly be considered ready-to-drink at the point of purchase because they require thawing before consumption.
More importantly, however, the freezing and thawing process has a number of known deleterious affects on complex compositions which have a variety of sensitive components contained therein. For example, upon freezing and thawing of a complex nutritional composition such as those of the present invention, a series of physical-chemical reactions can occur in the product. Phase separation, and the resultant unpleasant appearance is a common problem. Additionally, proteins can become denatured and precipitate out during the thawing process. Such precipitate is not only undesirable from an appearance point of view to the consumer, but also has unwanted texture and mouthfeel characteristics. Flavors, vitamins and minerals can become physically entrapped in the precipitate complex. It is common for consumers to drink only the liquid phase of a beverage and ignore the undesired solid phase which precipitates out. As a result, the consumer is effectively deprived of the very nutrients for which the composition is designed to deliver. The result is a product which is ineffective at meeting its intended function and the needs of the consumer or patient.
Moreover, frozen products require the extra steps of freezing during processing, require special handling during distribution and special storage systems as well. Frozen products generally need to be thawed in a refrigerator for 24 hours prior to use. Other products which are not frozen, such as modified milks and milk substitutes, are commercially available but are nutritionally incomplete from the vitamin and mineral point of view.
Like milk, liquid nutritional products (usually containing milk proteins) are heated for a variety of reasons, the main reasons being: to remove potential pathogenic organisms and to increase shelf-life. The major concerns about the resulting products of thermal process are safety and quality. Like milk, heat-treated nutritional products should not be a public heath risk. They should have a good keeping quality, provide an intended balance of nutrients, and be of desirable sensory characteristics, i.e., appearance, color, flavor, and mouth feel. When milk or nutritional products are heated at a constant temperature, all their constituents and components will be affected, but to different extents. Increasing the temperature will accelerate reaction rates. But different reactions will be affected to different extents. Physical, chemical, enzymatic and microbial changes will depend principally upon the time-temperature conditions, but will also be influenced by other factors, such as composition, pH, and oxygen content. The wide range of reactions taking place when nutritional products are heated will influence the safety and quality of the product. Upon heating of products at higher temperatures for longer times, some undesirable changes can also take place (e.g., decrease in pH, Maillard browning, cooked caramel flavor, denaturation of whey proteins and interaction with casein). The changes that take place during heating and subsequent storage, can affect the nutritional value and sensory characteristics.
In thermal processing, the most important parameter is the level of microbial inactivation achieved. For safety reasons, the minimum holding time (residence time) should be considered for microbial inactivation, although this will give an underestimate of the true level of microbial inactivation.
In terms of microbial quality and reducing spoilage rates, the emphasis is toward that of prevention. One approach, now widely used, is that of Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points (HACCP). Here the philosophy is to identify where hazard may occur from raw materials, different processing stages, packaging, or subsequent handling and storage. Critical control points are then established. These are points in the production process where the hazard can be effectively controlled. Loss of control permits the realization of the potential hazard as an unacceptable food safety or spoilage risk.
The quality of raw materials (ingredients) also has a pronounced effect on the quality of the final product. From the microbial point of view, the ingredients must be free of serious pathogens, and have initial total bacterial counts not more than 104 per gram. This reflects good hygiene in production of the ingredients. It is also useful to monitor psychotropic bacteria in raw ingredients (via direct assay of proteolytic enzymes) as they are usually predominant among the microorganisms found in pasteurized products.

Refrigeration-shelf-stable ready-to-drink complete nutritional compositions and products


A control method executed by an information processing device including a first processor and a second processor includes specifying a plurality of processes which issued orders for causing the first processor to execute a drawing process for drawing a frame, the plurality of processes being executed by the second processor, first determining whether the drawing process is completed, based on a comparison between the specified plurality of processes and specific processes, and controlling, based on a result of the first determining, a state regarding a power consumption of the first processor until the first processor starts another drawing process for drawing another frame.

There are smart devices which include a graphics processing unit (GPU) which executes drawing process and a central processing unit (CPU) that issues a drawing command to GPU. Smart devices are also referred to as smart terminals. In such a smart terminal, in order to reduce power consumption, in GPU, while drawing process is not performed, clock gating in which input of a clock signal to GPU is stopped is performed. For example, related art is disclosed in International Publication Pamphlet No. WO 2008/126192, Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2008-271118, Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2007-41143, and Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2011-60193.

Control method and information processing device


A terminal synchronization method and a terminal relate to the communications field, where the terminal sends synchronization signals in a distributed manner by controlling a sequence for sending the synchronization signals such that terminals in a vehicle to vehicle communications system can have uniform timing. The method includes obtaining, by a terminal, a configurable transmission period for sending a first synchronization signal, and sending, by the terminal, the first synchronization signal based on the configurable transmission period.

An Internet of Vehicles technology based on a Long Term Evolution (English full name: Long Term Evolution, English abbreviation: LTE) technology includes vehicle to vehicle (English full name: Vehicle to Vehicle, English abbreviation: V2V) communications, vehicle to pedestrian (English full name: Vehicle to Pedestrian, English abbreviation: V2P) communications, and vehicle to infrastructure (English full name: Vehicle to Infrastructure,
English abbreviation: V2I) communications, which are collectively referred to as V2X (Vehicle to X). The V2V communications technology is an evolution of a Long Term Evolution-device to device (English full name: Long Term Evolution Device to Device, English abbreviation: LTE-D2D) communications technology. Vehicle to vehicle communications has higher requirements such as a fast moving speed, a small delay, and high communication reliability. Then synchronization between terminals is a precondition for meeting the requirements.
In an existing LTE-D2D system, it is assumed that a first terminal needs to simultaneously receive signals from a plurality of other terminals, but a terminal, such as a second terminal shown in FIG. 1, of the plurality of terminals may be located out of a coverage area of a cellular network to which the first terminal is connected. To ensure synchronization between a terminal out of the coverage area of the cellular network and the first terminal and prevent signals of the terminals from interfering with each other, the first terminal usually uses a sidelink synchronization signal (English full name: SideLink Synchronization Signal, English abbreviation: SLSS) to periodically forward a synchronization source with a high priority to the terminal out of the coverage area of the cellular network, so that the terminal out of the coverage area of the cellular network can be synchronized with a terminal in the coverage area of the cellular network.
Further, the terminal located out of the coverage area of the cellular network, or a terminal in an overlapping coverage area of two cellular networks may receive a plurality of SLSSs. For example, a second terminal shown in FIG. 2 is located in an overlapping area of a cellular network coverage area of a first base station and a cellular network coverage area of a second base station. Because a terminal in the LTE-D2D system does not have a high requirement for a delay and communication reliability, the terminal in the overlapping area may select, based on a priority and signal strength of a synchronization source, timing of a synchronization source of a terminal that communicates with the terminal in the overlapping area, to perform synchronization; and ignore received timing of a synchronization source of another terminal. As a result, no terminal in a specific range can be synchronized. However, in a vehicle to vehicle communications system, all terminals in a specific range need to be synchronized, and perform communication with uniform timing.

Terminal synchronization method and terminal


Packaging for accommodating a food item comprising a lower panel (12) and an upper panel (14) which are supported to be in spaced apart relationship to provide a space which is intended to accommodate the food item, a wall element (13) provided between the upper (12) and lower panel (14) to substantially surround the space and having at least a portion (20) capable of being moved across the space from one side of the space to an opposite side of the space, said side wall (13) at the opposite side being open or capable of being opened to permit access to the food item from the opposite side with movement of said portion (20) of the side wall, said upper panel (14) being removable from above the space to provide access to the space.

In the past, various forms of packaging have been proposed for use with food items of the form referred to above and examples of such packaging are disclosed in British patent specification 979302, U.S. Pat. No. 4,189,054 and Australian patent specifications AU-A-39049/89, AU-A-89900/91 and AU-A-89269/91.
A common difficulty with food items of the form described above relates to spillage that occurs while they are being consumed. It is a common occurrence that as one eats the item from one side, the contents and/or sauces or condiments within the food item spill from the other sides. This creates provides a significant disadvantage in the marketing of such products where the customers are concerned about the state of their clothing after they have consumed such a food item. It is highly desirable property of packaging which is utilised with food items of the type referred to above, that the packaging be capable of accommodating the spillage of any materials from the food item, such as sauce or condiments, and that the packaging limits the loss of contents from the food item during its consumption whereby on completion of the food item, the packaging can be disposed of together with any spillage that has occurred.
A further difficulty with food items of the form referred to above relates to the production of those items and after their production, the transferral to the packaging in which they are to be delivered to the customer. It is usual practice that the food item is assembled on a bench and on its completion is then transferred to the packaging either immediately or at the time of delivery to the customer. This method of assembly creates significant difficulties particularly where the contents between the two outer layers is bulky. It is common that during the assembly of the food item, considerable spillage can occur onto the bench surrounding the area in which it is being assembled and that on transferral of the completed food item into the packaging or to the point of delivery, further loss of contents can occur. This detracts from the need to maintain a clean environment in food preparation areas. In addition, there is the overriding requirement that during the assembly of the food items, there be minimal contact by the personnel involved to reduce the likelihood of contamination of the contents. It is highly desirable that the amount of contact with the contents being introduced into the food item and that the food item itself, be minimised.


Disclosed herein is a variable-gain amplification circuit, wherein the sources of first and second MOSFETs (Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field Effect Transistors) are tied to a common connection point connected to a current source. An input signal is supplied to the gates of the first and second MOSFETs. The drains of the first and second MOSFETs are connected to the sources of third and fourth MOSFETs respectively whereas the drains of the third and fourth MOSFETs are connected to two output terminals respectively, a gain control voltage is supplied to the gates of both the third and fourth MOSFETs. When control is executed in order to lower the gain control voltage supplied to the gates of both the third and fourth MOSFETs, other control is also executed in order to raise a bias voltage applied to the gates of both the first and second MOSFETs.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a variable-gain amplification circuit, a receiver, which makes use of the variable-gain amplification circuit as a high-frequency amplification circuit having an AGC (automatic gain control) function, and a receiver IC.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is known a variable-gain amplification circuit with few small distortions as disclosed in documents such as Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 2005-312016 referred to as Patent Document 1 hereinafter. The variable-gain amplification circuit employs transistors and/or MOSFETs (Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field Effect Transistors). The transistors and/or MOSFETs employed in the variable-gain amplification circuit are connected to each other by use of cascade coupling.
The variable-gain amplification circuit has a configuration like one shown in FIG. 21. For example, the variable-gain amplification circuit shown in FIG. 21 is employed as a high-frequency amplifier in a TV tuner. The high-frequency amplifier has an AGC (automatic gain control) function to make the output signal level fixed for an input signal level higher than a level determined in advance.
In the typical configuration shown in FIG. 21, MOSFETs 1 and 2 are connected to each other by use of cascode coupling. To put it in detail, the drain of the MOSFET 1 is connected to the source of MOSFET 2 and the source of the MOSFET 1 is connected to a ground terminal. The drain of the MOSFET 2 is connected to a power-supply line of a voltage power supply +Vcc through a coil L1 and connected to the terminal of the ground through a variable-capacitance capacitor Cv2. The drain of the MOSFET 2 is also connected to an output terminal.
An input signal is supplied to the gate of the MOSFET 1 by way of a transformer T1, a variable-capacitance capacitor Cv1 and a capacitor C1. The secondary coil of the transformer T1 and the variable-capacitance capacitor Cv1 form a tuning circuit.
An AGC voltage Vagc is supplied to the gate of the MOSFET 2. The gate of the MOSFET 2 is connected to the terminal of the ground through a capacitor Co.
In addition, in this typical configuration, between the power-supply line of the voltage power supply +Vcc and the terminal of the ground, a resistor R1 and MOSFETs 3 and 4 are connected to each other to form a series circuit. To be more specific, the source of the MOSFET 3 is connected to the drain of the MOSFET 4. The gate of the MOSFET 3 is connected to the gate of the MOSFET 2 whereas the gate of the MOSFET 4 is connected to the gate of the MOSFET 1.
In the typical configuration shown in FIG. 21, the AGC voltage Vagc supplied to the gate of the MOSFET 2 is generated by a circuit provided at a stage following this variable-gain amplification circuit. For an input signal level higher than a level determined in advance, the AGC voltage Vagc is reduced. With the AGC voltage Vagc reduced, the voltage appearing between the drain and source of the MOSFET 1 is also reduced, driving the MOSFET 1 to a three-pole tube region. In this region, the gain of the variable-gain amplification circuit starts to decrease and the variable-gain amplification circuit works as a variable-gain amplifier. The variable-gain amplification circuit having a configuration shown in FIG. 21 is known as a variable-gain amplifier having small distortions.

Variable-gain amplification circuit, receiver and receiver IC