A receptacle which is defined in a given interface standard, performs data transfer by using differential signals, and is connected to a plug when transmitting a signal between devices. The receptacle includes: a power supply terminal; a ground terminal; a first differential signal terminal used for transmitting a first differential signal; a second differential signal terminal used for transmitting a second differential signal, the second differential signal terminal making a pair with the first differential signal terminal; and at least one protection element provided between the power supply terminal and the ground terminal.

The present invention relates to a receptacle.
As an interface standard for transmitting differential signals, the Universal Serial Bus (USB) standard, IEEE1394, and the like have been known. An interface conforming to such a standard is provided in various electronic instruments. In recent years, the size of an electronic instrument has been reduced accompanying an increase in demand for a portable instrument. In the electronic instrument equipped with the above-mentioned interface, a reduction of the size of the electronic instrument results in a decrease in the interconnect distance between a precision circuit such as an internal logic circuit and the interface (receptacle, for example). This may cause a problem to occur in the electronic instrument due to overvoltage and static electricity from the outside.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 6-261449 discloses a method for protecting an electronic instrument against overvoltage. However, since a receptacle provided in a small electronic instrument may have small dimensions, it is difficult to apply the method disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 6-261449 to a receptacle provided in a small electronic instrument. Moreover, when applying the method disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 6-261449 to a receptacle of which the dimensions are defined in the interface standard, the receptacle may not conform to the definition of the standard. Therefore, it is difficult to apply the method disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 6-261449 to the above-mentioned interface.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2001-85118 discloses a cable in which a common mode choke coil is provided to a connector. In the case where a protection element which protects an electronic instrument against overvoltage is provided to the connector inside the cable, the electronic instrument can be protected against overvoltage by connecting the cable with the receptacle. However, when the cable is removed from the electronic instrument, terminals inside the receptacle of the electronic instrument are not provided with protective measures. In this case, an internal circuit of the electronic instrument may be destroyed due to static electricity from the outside.


An illumination device for backlighting an image reproduction device containing light valves, the illumination device including a plurality of luminous spots arranged in grid format on a flat thermally conductive carrier. Each luminous spot having a plurality of light emitting diodes electrically insulated from one another, and a submount exhibiting good thermal conductivity and being connected to the carrier.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to an illumination device for backlighting an image reproduction device containing light valves, wherein luminous spots formed by a plurality of light emitting diodes are in each case arranged in grid form.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Image reproduction devices having light valves, in particular liquid crystal displays, require sufficiently bright and uniform backlighting. This is achieved by means of fluorescent tubes in the case of relatively large displays, such as computer screens for example. The known illumination devices do not suffice, however, in applications requiring a very high luminance. Thus, a very high luminance is required for so-called head-up displays in motor vehicles, by way of example, since the reflected image of the display must still be visible even when there is high ambient brightness.
GB 2 361 581 shows an arrangement having a light emitting diode which is arranged in a depression of a heat-dissipating substrate. A plurality of such substrates may be arranged in grid form, a printed circuit connecting all light emitting diodes and substrates to one another. However, this arrangement is difficult to produce; in particular, connecting individual light emitting diodes in series is very difficult.

Illumination device having luminous spots formed by light emitting diodes


A knob for a lock includes a knob body and a reinforcing member. The knob body has a side, and a neck extends outward from the side of the knob body and has a slot. The reinforcing member is mounted around the neck and has a stop that is engaged in the slot of the neck. An escutcheon is mounted around the reinforcing member. The knob has increased strength for withstanding larger force intended to destroy the lock through either jimmying the connection area between the side of the knob body and an end wall of the escutcheon or hammering an outer face of the knob body.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a reinforcing member for a knob of a lock to improve the strength of the knob for preventing destruction of the knob by an unauthorized user.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIG. 1 of the drawings illustrates a conventional knob and FIG. 2 illustrates a lock having the conventional knob in FIG. 1. The knob includes a knob body 90 and a neck 91 extending from a side of the knob body 90. An escutcheon 92 is mounted around the neck 91. When mounted to a door, an unauthorized user may use a sharp-pointed member 93 to jimmy the connection area between the knob body 90 and the escutcheon 92. Alternatively, the unauthorized user may directly hammer an outer surface of the knob body 90, which, in turn, presses against the escutcheon 92 and thus causes deformation of the escutcheon 92. As a result, the lock core can be removed.

Reinforcing member for a knob for a lock


An ion mobility spectrometer includes a protective housing. A drift tube having at least one inlet and at least one outlet confines a drift gas. An ion gate is positioned in the drift tube. The ion gate defines a reaction region and a drift region in the drift tube. An ion detector is positioned in the drift tube downstream of the ion gate at an end of the drift region. A helical resistive wire coil is positioned around the drift tube. A power supply generates an electric field in the helical resistive wire coil that rapidly controls the temperature of the drift gas.

The basic components of a typical ion mobility spectrometer (IMS) include an ionization source, a drift tube that includes a reaction region, an ion shutter grid, a drift region, and an ion detector. In gas phase analysis, the sample to be analyzed is introduced into the reaction region by an inert carrier gas, ionization of the sample is often accomplished by passing the sample through a reaction region and/or an ionization region. The generated ions are directed toward the drift region by an electric field that is applied to drift rings (sometime referred as guard rings or ion guide) that establish the drift region. A narrow pulse of ions is then injected into, and/or allowed to enter, the drift region via an ion shutter grid. Once in the drift region, ions of the sample are separated based upon their ion mobilities. The arrival time of the ions at a detector is an indication of ion mobility, which can be related to ion mass. However, one skilled in the art appreciates that ion mobility is not only related to ion mass, but rather is fundamentally related to the ion-drift gas interaction potential, which is not solely dependent on ion mass.
State-of-the art ion mobility spectrometers include drift tubes with complicated mechanic parts. Each component in the drift tube typically requires the assembly of multiple parts. Such complex mechanical designs significantly increase the cost of ion mobility spectrometer and can also limit the performance of the ion mobility spectrometer. In general, the more parts in the drift tube design, then the higher probability that the drift tube will have technical problems, such as gas leakage, inadequate temperature control, inadequate pressure control, thermal and/or electrical insulation leakage.
For many applications, such as explosive detection in highly contaminated field environments, normal operation of the spectrometer is frequently prevented by overloading the system with large samples or contaminants. Rapid self cleaning mechanisms are highly desired for these applications. Conventional ion mobility spectrometer drift tube constructions are described by Ching Wu, et al., "Construction and Characterization of a High-Flow, High-Resolution Ion Mobility Spectrometer for Detection of Explosives after Personnel Portal Sampling" Talanta, 57, 2002, 123-134. The large thermal mass of the tube structure prevents the system from flash heating and rapid cooling of the ion mobility spectrometric components for cleaning purpose. Spectrometric components can be cleaned by "baking out" the components. However, "baking out" typically takes hours to complete.
Previous publications have indicted that a uniform electric field in the drift region of an ion mobility spectrometer is imperative to achieve high mobility resolution in such devices. See, for example, Ching Wu, et al., "Electrospray Ionization High Resolution Ion Mobility Spectrometry/Mass Spectrometry," Analytical Chemistry, 70, 1998, 4929-4938. A uniform electric field can be created by reducing the size of each voltage drop step and increasing the number of drift rings. Narrow drift rings are utilized to generate the desired field distribution. However, the more drift rings that are used in a drift tube, the more lead wires are needed to be sealed at the wall to complete the drift tube structure. Structure complication greatly limits the possibility of creating highly uniform electric fields in the drift tube. U.S. Pat. No. 4,712,080 and U.S. Patent Publication No. 2005/0211894 A1 describe layers of conductive coating that are commonly proposed to build the drift tube. However, coatings that are exactly the same thickness along the drift tube are a very challenging to make. Conductive layers with uneven coating thickness will cause distorted electric field distributions and unpredictable system performance.

Ion mobility spectrometer apparatus and methods


Provided is a blade maintenance device for a wind turbine. The blade maintenance device for the wind turbine includes: a body that travels along a leading edge of a blade; support units that extend from the body to both sides of the blade and support the sides of the blade; and a maintenance unit installed at at least one of the body and the support units so as to perform maintenance of an outer side of the blade.

A wind turbine is a device that produces electricity by converting wind energy into mechanical energy and comes into the spotlight as a clean energy source for reducing a greenhouse gas. A conventional wind turbine includes a tower, a nacelle mounted on an upper part of the tower, and a rotor connected to the nacelle and having a plurality of blades.
In the wind turbine, periodic maintenance, such as cleaning, inspection, and deicing (to remove ice formed on a blade), is required even after installation so as to prevent a trouble or an accident and to improve operating efficiency. However, since the wind turbine is a large structure having a height of the tower of about 100 meters and a length of the blade of 40 to 70 meters or more, there are many difficulties in performing maintenance. In particular, since the blade is placed at a high altitude, a working environment is poor and dangerous, as a worker needs to stay in the midair for maintenance.
Since a maintenance condition of the blade is poor in this way, a device that is capable of performing maintenance without the worker's direct access to the blade has been suggested.
Japanese Patent Laid-open Publication No. 2002-115646 discloses a cleaning device that performs cleaning of a leading edge while moving along the leading edge of a blade. The device is equipped with a brush that moves along the leading edge of the blade and a driving instrument installed in the blade so that the brush can be moved, and including a motor, a gear, and a car wheel.
However, since, in the device, the driving instrument needs to be installed in the blade, a movement space of the driving instrument needs to be formed within the blade. Also, since slits need to be formed in the leading edge of the blade so as to connect the driving instrument inside the blade and the brush disposed at an outer side of the leading edge, rigidity of the blade may be degraded. A cleaning area is limited to the leading edge of the blade, and it is difficult to remove ice formed on the leading edge of the blade.
U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2010/0132137 discloses a device that is capable of performing inspection and cleaning of a blade while travelling along an outer side of a leading edge of the blade. The device is equipped with a travelling body having a plurality of wheels for travelling along the leading edge, a driving unit for rotating the plurality of wheels, units for cleaning and inspection, and wing parts that extend to both lower sides of the travelling body so as to travel along the leading edge while keeping balance.
However, since the device keeps balance only by the wing parts that extend to both sides of the travelling body, it is difficult for the travelling body to stably travel along the leading edge. Areas to be cleaned and inspected are limited to the leading edge of the blade.

Blade maintenance device for wind turbine


A voice log-in system is based on a person's spoken name input only, using speaker-dependent acoustic name recognition models in a performing speaker-independent name recognition. In an enrollment phase, a dual pass endpointing procedure defines both the person's full name (broad endpoints), and the component names separated by pauses (precise endpoints). An HMM (Hidden Markov Model) recognition model generator generates a corresponding HMM name recognition model modified by the insertion of additional skip transitions for the pauses between component names. In a recognition/update phase, a spoken-name speech signal is input to an HMM name recognition engine which performs speaker-independent name recognition--the modified HMM name recognition model permits the name recognition operation to accommodate pauses between component names of variable duration.

Speaker recognition generally includes the tasks of speaker identification and speaker verification: speaker identification involves labeling an unknown voice as one from a set of known voices, while speaker verification involves determining whether an unknown voice matches the known voice of a speaker whose identity is being claimed. In particular, speaker identity verification based on a person's voice is of considerable interest for providing telephone access to such services as banking transactions, credit card verification, remote access to dial-up computer databases.
The specific problem for which the invention has application is providing verified access to medical records databases for health care providers. For example, a voice log-in system would be used by doctors to obtain verified access to a number of medical databases at different health care institutions.
Two approaches to voice verification technology have been used: voice/mechanical and total voice. In a voice/mechanical system, a user manually enters a digit code and then speaks a voice password--the voice password is compared with a reference acoustic recognition model retrieved based on the secret code. In a total voice system, a user speaks a digit code--speaker-independent digit recognition is used to recognize the digits, and then a reference acoustic recognition model is loaded based on the recognized digit string, and voice verification is performed.
The total voice system can be described as a template-based, fixed-text speaker verification task. It includes the subtasks: (a) enrollment--creating a reference template composed of a set of speech features, as a function of time, associated with the fixed-text digit code for each valid user; (b) verification--selecting an appropriate reference template based on speaker-independent recognition of the digit code, and comparing input speech with reference templates at equivalent points in time, with a decision being based on similarity between input and reference, integrated over time; and (c) reference update--adapting the reference templates to accommodate changes in a valid user's speech after successful verification.
The enrollment procedure builds an initial reference template for a speaker by capturing the digit code, typically by examining the speech energy profile and determining the end points in time. For each successful verification, the dynamic reference updating procedure averages the feature sets associated with the reference template and the input speech, and the reference template is updated accordingly, thereby accommodating changes in a persons speech input as familiarity with the system is achieved.
Both the voice/mechanical and the total voice speaker verification systems are disadvantageous in that each requires the use of a specific digit code (either entered or spoken). In the medical records database application, such a requirement is problematic to the point of impracticality. Doctors and other health care providers typically see patients at a number of hospitals, each of which has its own medical records database system. These systems typically assign each user a unique identification code, requiring each health care provider to remember a different identification code for each institution and database system.
Accordingly, a need exists for a speaker verification system that is not based on the spoken input of an identification code.


A radiating spacer consisting essentially of a silicone solidified product containing a heat conductive filler, said spacer having a thermal conductivity of at least 0.8 W/m.multidot.K and a compressibility of at least 10% under a load of 30 g/cm.sup.2.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a radiating spacer which has high flexibility and which, when incorporated in an electronic equipment, reduces a load to a heat-generating element, a heat sink employing such a spacer, a radiating spacer part material, an electronic equipment, and a silicone composition.
2. Description of the Background
A heat-generating electronic part such as a transistor or a thyristor generates a heat during its use, and it is important to remove such heat. Heretofore, as a method for removing the generated heat, it has been common to remove the heat by attaching the heat-generating electronic part to a radiating fin or a metal plate with an electrically insulating heat conductive sheet interposed therebetween. As such a heat conductive sheet, a radiation sheet having a heat conductive filler loaded to silicone rubber has been mainly employed.
On the other hand, along with recent high densification of electronic equipments, a system of conducting the heat generated from a heat-generating electronic part directly to a casing of the electronic equipment, may be employed in a case where no space for attaching a radiating fin or the like is available or in a case where an electronic equipment is sealed in so that heat dissipation from the radiating fin located inside to the exterior, is difficult. To carry out such heat conduction, a highly flexible radiating spacer may be employed which has a thickness to fill out the space between the heat-generating electronic part and the casing.
Further, a highly flexible radiating spacer may also be employed between a printed board and a radiating fin for heat dissipation in a case where IC or LSI heat-generating electronic part is mounted on the printed board.
However, conventional radiating sheets commonly employed, are hard with a Shore hardness of at least 90 and accordingly poor in the shape-trailing property. Accordingly, there has been a problem that when such a radiating sheet is pressed against a heat-generating electronic part for close contact, the heat-generating electronic part which is weak against stress is likely to break.
Therefore, a radiating spacer more flexible than a radiating sheet has been developed. However, even then, in a case where the heat-generating electronic part to be contacted with the radiating spacer, is extremely weak against stress, the heat-generating electronic part is likely to break when the radiating spacer is brought in close contact therewith and a load is exerted thereto. Thus, a problem of breakage has not yet been solved.
Along with high densification of electronic equipments, the shape-trailing property has been required more than ever, and a radiating spacer having higher flexibility has now been desired. However, if the material for a radiating spacer is designed to meet such requirement, its surface usually tends to have high adhesiveness. This adhesiveness not only impairs the operation efficiency but also causes deterioration of the thermal conductivity due to adhesion of dust from the atmosphere on the surface of the material, although it may be effective for temporal tacking of the material itself.

Radiating spacer, its use and silicone composition


Briefly, descriptions of embodiments for, at least practically, reducing the power consumption of a mass storage device are provided. The present disclosure relates to at least partially reducing the power consumption of a mass storage device and, more particularly, to a method and device for at least partially reducing the power consumption of a mass storage device. One embodiment may include a power supply coupled with at least one mass storage device, and a control circuit. The control circuit may be capable of at least partially dynamically adjusting the amount of electrical power supplied to the mass storage device based, at least in part, upon at least one signal provided to the control circuit.

1. Field
The present disclosure relates to at least partially reducing the power consumption of a mass storage device and, more particularly, to a method and device for at least partially reducing the power consumption of a mass storage device.
2. Background Information
In this context, a mass storage device may be characterized as any device used to provide relatively inexpensive storage, such as, for example, a couple hundred dollars, of relatively large amounts of data, such as, for example, a hundred megabytes or more, in either digital or analog form; however, the disclosed subject matter is not limited to any price or storage capacity. While a mass storage device may comprise may forms, some, but not all, examples of a mass storage device may include: flash memory, cassette storage, tape storage, optical storage, or a hard disk drive.
As a specific example of a mass storage device, a hard disk drive (also referred to as a "hard drive" or "hard disk") typically comprises a device that reads and writes digital data typical upon at least one rigid disk of magnetic or magnetically coated material, rotating in a sealed housing. In this context, the terms "digital data" and "digital format" refer to data represented in discrete, discontinuous form, as contrasted with analog data, which is represented in a continuous form. Digital data usually implies the use of binary digits; however, the term digital data is not limited to binary digits and may utilize any radix.
Typically, mass storage devices are used in information handling platforms. In this context, an information handling platform includes a system, which is capable of accepting and at least possibly manipulating information, possibly in a variety of formats and modes, and in part stores digital data using a mass storage device. A few, but not all, examples of an information handling platform include computers, digital video recorders, or digital audio devices which may receive audio information via, for example, removable media or possibly a network connection, and store the audio information on the mass storage device.
A mass storage device is often one of the components of an information storage platform that consumes a large amount of power, such as, for example, about 2 Watts (W); however, the disclosed subject matter is not limited to any particular wattage. As an example, an information handling platform, such as, for example, a notebook computer, may utilize a mass storage device, such as, for example, a hard disk drive. The power consumption of the notebook's hard disk drive will typically reduce the amount of time the notebook computer may operate from battery power. A need, therefore, exists for an improved device or technique for at least partially reducing the power consumption of a mass storage device.


A processing box, comprising a housing, the housing comprising two end plates located at two opposite ends; and deflectable deflection sliders, being provided at the bottom of the housing, the deflection sliders being provided on the housing by means of a rotating shaft, and being able to rotate on the surface of the bottom wall of the housing. When the processing box is mounted in an image forming device by means of a mounting bracket on the image forming device, the deflection sliders cooperate with a guide portion of the mounting bracket and deflect in accordance with the guide portion of the mounting bracket, so that the processing box can be deflected firstly relative to the image forming device and then be placed properly, thereby facilitating the mounting of the processing box.

The processing box is a box which is detachably mounted in the host of the image forming device. As an integral unit, the processing box includes a housing, a toner cartridge, a developing roller, and the like. The processing box is detachable with respect to the host of the device, which facilitates the maintenance of the device. When the processing box is being installed in the image forming device, the traditional installation method is vertical or parallel installation, but now processing boxes installed in an inclined manner are also present, such as the processing box disclosed in the Chinese invention patent application No. CN105785739A. By providing an installation guide portion on an end plate of the processing box, the processing box can be installed into the image forming device in an inclined manner.
However, some of the existing image forming devices are provided with an installation frame for guiding the installation of the processing box, and a guide portion is arranged on the installation frame, so that the processing box needs to be installed along the guide portion of the installation frame during installation, which results in that the existing processing box installed in an inclined manner cannot be normally installed in the image forming device, and brings inconvenience to the user.


Embodiments disclosed herein provide systems and methods for orchestrating application updates over a wireless communication network. In a particular embodiment, a method provides registering a first application with an update controller and, in response to registering the first application, determining first network data update parameters for the first application and determining network constraints on application data updates over a wireless communication network. The method further provides determining when the first application is allowed to request data updates based on the first network data update parameters and the network constraints and notifying the first application of when the first application is allowed to request data updates over the wireless communication network.

Wireless communication devices are now able to install and run numerous applications. Many of the applications can instruct wireless devices to request and receive data updates over a wireless communication network. These data updates may include messages, news items, current weather information, documents, or any other type of data that may be used by an application. These data updates may occur at any time, including times when an application is executing in the background or when a device is otherwise dormant.
As more applications that request such data updates execute on a wireless device, more resources of both the device and the wireless network are used in order to provide each application with a data channel necessary to request and receive updates. Since each application on a device updates on its own accord, the device may be constantly requesting data resources from the wireless network in order to provide each individual application with a channel to request updates.
Overview
Embodiments disclosed herein provide systems and methods for orchestrating application updates over a wireless communication network. In a particular embodiment, a method provides registering a first application with an update controller and, in response to registering the first application, determining first network data update parameters for the first application and determining network constraints on application data updates over a wireless communication network. The method further provides determining when the first application is allowed to request data updates based on the first network data update parameters and the network constraints and notifying the first application of when the first application is allowed to request data updates over the wireless communication network.

Orchestration of application updates over a wireless communication network


An autoconfiguring data router is connected to a communications network subnet having a second network data router. The autoconfiguring data router includes a configuration determination module that determines configuration attributes for operably connecting the autoconfiguring data router to the subnet, and an autoconfiguration module that configures the autoconfiguring data router according to the configuration attributes so that the autoconfiguring data router is operably connected to the subnet.

Configuring network devices is a significant burden for computer administrative staffs. As individual networks grow, the complexity of their configuration and management increases. Moreover, with the addition of new networks, new protocols, and new services, the already difficult task of configuring and managing a network can become overwhelming.
The difficulties of network management arise from many sources. First, configuring a network device is a labor intensive process that requires special training. Current configuration methods require an administrator to initiate and perform the actual configuration before the network device can become a functional part of the network. In addition, when a network device must be reconfigured due to network growth or change, an administrator again must be personally involved to execute the reconfiguration process.
Second, configuration is more complicated in the current multi-vendor network environment where there is no single standard configuration method for every network device. There are many possible ways to configure network devices, such as by using SNMP, command line interfaces, and configuration files using FTP. In fact, the preferred method of configuring a single type of network device frequently varies from vendor to vendor. Recently, this problem has become worse with an increased number of acquisitions in the network industry. An acquired company's products often are configured differently than its acquiring company's existing products. Thus, even within a single vendor's product line, it often is necessary to support multiple configuration methods.
Finally, configuring a network device is error-prone and the process is difficult to debug. While some configuration tools are beginning to become available, most currently available tools do little or no semantic and/or consistency checking between related configuration options.

Methods for auto-configuring a router on an IP subnet


A positioning device (12), especially for a vehicle seat belt feeder, comprises a flexible load-bearing element (16) and a molded part (18) comprising a plurality of molded elements (20) each of which annularly surrounds the elastic load-bearing element (16) and includes axial bearing surfaces. The axial bearing surfaces of the molded elements (20) include a surface structure which is configured so that two neighboring molded elements (20) loaded against each other contact each other with their axial bearing surfaces, are in positive engagement and are orientated in the radial direction at a defined position relative to each other, A belt buckle device (10) comprises an afore-described positioning device (12) as well as a belt buckle (14) that is fastened to the load-bearing element (16).

The invention relates to a positioning device, especially for a vehicle seat belt feeder, comprising a flexible load-bearing element and a molded part including a plurality of molded elements each annularly surrounding the deformable load-bearing element and having axial bearing surfaces. The invention furthermore relates to a belt buckle device including such positioning device.
An afore-mentioned positioning device is known, for example, from DE 10 2008 026 872 A1. When in such positioning device the molded part is provided at least partially outside a holder, it is possible that not all molded elements are arranged in a way optimally centered relative to the load-bearing element. If said molded elements are pulled into the holder, they can abut against the holder due to the radial offset. In order to avoid wear on the positioning device and increased friction, the holder must have a funnel, for example, that permits centered orientation of the molded elements. Irrespective thereof, when the radially offset molded elements abut against the holder, an undesired noise may be caused.

Position device, particularly for a belt feeder, and belt lock device


A piezoelectric power generator including a resonator having a first weight member supported on a base member by a spring; a second weight member; and a generating device having a vibrating plate with a piezoelectric element attached to a surface thereof. Further, the vibrating plate has one end secured to the first weight member and the other end being a free end attached to the second weight member. The generating device is capable of bending and vibrating in an up-and-down direction, such that the first weight member can swing at a predetermined frequency about an axis perpendicular to a bending vibration plane of the generating device.

Conventionally, various piezoelectric power generators have been proposed which generate electric power using a piezoelectric effect. Patent Document 1 discloses a piezoelectric power generator having a cantilever structure such as that illustrated in FIG. 12. This piezoelectric power generator includes a generating device 52 and a weight 53. One end of the generating device 52 is secured to a frame-like supporting member 51, and the other end of the generating device 52 is a free end. The weight 53 is provided for excitation and is attached to the free end of the generating device 52. The generating device 52 has a unimorph structure in which a piezoelectric element 52b is bonded to one principal surface of a metal plate 52a. The entire generating device 52 is in the shape of a rectangular parallelepiped. When an external vibration acts on the piezoelectric power generator, a free vibration is excited in the generating device 52 by the action of the weight 53, and an electric charge can be generated by a piezoelectric effect of the piezoelectric element 52b. The generated electric charge is extracted from charge collecting electrodes formed on the front and back surfaces of the piezoelectric element 52b.
For example, like power generators that use vibration of human walk or vibration of bicycles or cars, there are power generators used in a relatively low-frequency vibration region. By bringing the natural frequency of a generating device close to the frequency of such a low-frequency external vibration, it is possible to significantly vibrate the generating device and increase the amount of power generation. The amount of power generation of a piezoelectric element is determined by a value obtained by dividing the product of the square of a piezoelectric constant of a piezoelectric body forming the piezoelectric element, the square of stress applied to the piezoelectric body, and a volume of the piezoelectric body by a dielectric constant of the piezoelectric body. If the material of the piezoelectric body is the same, the amount of power generation W is proportional to the product of the square of stress σ applied to the piezoelectric body and a volume V of the piezoelectric body as given by the expression W∝σ2×V.
Therefore, to increase the amount of power generation W, it is effective to increase both the stress σ applied to the piezoelectric body and the volume V of the piezoelectric body. In particular, the stress σ has a greater influence on the amount of power generation W than the volume V does. To increase the stress σ applied to the piezoelectric body, it is effective to increase the amount of displacement of the generating device. However, the amount of displacement of the generating device cannot be significantly increased simply by supporting the generating device 52 with the supporting member 51 in a cantilever manner.
Patent Document 2 discloses a piezoelectric power generator in which a plurality of generating devices having different resonance frequencies are supported in a cantilever manner. As illustrated in FIG. 13, this piezoelectric power generator includes a plurality of generating devices 61 to 63 each having one end secured to a base 60 and the other end being a free end, and weights 64 to 66 provided for excitation and attached to the respective free ends of the generating devices 61 to 63. The generating devices 61 to 63 have different lengths. This piezoelectric power generator is designed to generate electric power in a wide frequency range even when the frequency of external vibration varies. However, it is not possible to increase the amount of power generation at a specific frequency.
Patent Document 3 discloses another piezoelectric power generator. As illustrated in FIG. 14, this piezoelectric power generator includes a lever 71 having a cantilever structure in which one end thereof is secured to a metal angle 70 and the other end thereof is a free end, a weight 72 attached to the free end of the lever 71, and a multilayer piezoelectric element 73 connected to a midpoint (point of action) of the lever 71. This piezoelectric power generator amplifies an external force using the principle of leverage to increase the force applied to the multilayer piezoelectric element 73. However, since only a compressive load in the thickness direction acts on the multilayer piezoelectric element 73, the amount of distortion of the piezoelectric element is not large enough to significantly increase the amount of power generation.
Patent Document 1: Japanese Patent No. 3170965
Patent Document 2: Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 7-245970
Patent Document 3: Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 11-146663


A loop feature for propelled toy vehicles includes a generally vertically oriented single loop having a movable ingress portion and a movable egress portion. A propelled toy vehicle enters the loop upon engaging one surface of the ingress portion. Player-operable controls effect movement of the egress portion to permit the propelled toy vehicle to exit the loop. Both movable portions have a free end and a connected end. The connected end of each movable portion is hingedly connected to each end of a fixed arcuate portion. Within the loop there is provision for propelling the toy vehicle as it continues to go around the loop.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to features for enhancing the enjoyment and play value of propelled toy vehicles and more particularly to a generally vertically oriented loop feature for propelled toy vehicles.
2. Background Art
Toy vehicles, and in particular propelled toy vehicles, have long been popular playthings; their enjoyment and play value has been enhanced by various features such as obstacles over which propelled toy vehicles clamber and track layouts around which propelled toy vehicles race. A feature that is particularly entertaining and exciting is a generally vertically oriented loop around which a propelled toy vehicle proceeds in apparent defiance of gravity. Generally such loop features are part of a track layout such as for electrically powered slot car racers or track layouts for freewheeling vehicles that are propelled by gravity or mechanical launching devices. However, a vertical loop feature could as well be used in association with a propelled toy vehicle in the absence of a track layout.
Generally, vertically oriented loops have utilized non-aligned entrances and exits such that the loop is not a complete loop but is instead a portion or turn of a spiral. One disadvantage of such spiral turns is that the number of revolutions that the propelled toy vehicle can make is limited to the number of turns of the spiral that have been provided. Aside from the cost and space requirements for such additional turns of the spiral, there is the additional disadvantage that the player does not have any control over the number of revolutions that will be made with the propelled toy vehicle.
In Rasmussen U.S. Pat. No. 4,969,851 issued Nov. 13, 1990, a trackway segment is disclosed for facilitating flipping over of a propelled toy vehicle. The trackway segment includes an arc forming a curved ramp and a lower curved section mounted for pivotal movement relative to the curved ramp. The lower curved section is manually movable between a lower position where it permits the toy vehicle to enter the curved ramp and an upward position in which the toy vehicle will pass beneath it and bypass entering the curved ramp. However, the curved ramp of Rasmussen is specifically designed to flip the toy vehicle over by terminating the curved ramp far short of completing a loop. There remains a need for a generally vertically oriented single loop around which a propelled toy may complete a selected number of loops and then exit the loop.

Breslow, Morrison, Terzian & Associates, Inc.


Various approaches for performing a fast-Fourier transform (FFT) of N input data elements using a radix K decomposition of the FFT are disclosed (K>=2, and N>=8). In one approach, N/K input data elements are written to respective ones of K addressable memories, and N/K*logK N passes are performed on the input data. Each pass includes reading K data elements in parallel from the K addressable memories using the respectively generated addresses, the K data elements being in a first order corresponding to the respective memories; permuting the first order of K data elements into a second order of K data elements; performing a radix K calculation on the second order of K data elements, resulting in corresponding result data elements in the second order; permuting the second order of K result data elements into the first order; and writing the K result data elements in parallel to the corresponding K addressable memories using the respective addresses.

The fast Fourier transform (FFT) allows discrete samples of a signal to be transformed from the time domain to the frequency domain. The similar inverse fast Fourier transform (IFFT) transforms from the frequency domain to the time domain. FFT and IFFT are indispensable algorithms for digital signal processing in applications such as certain modems.
The calculation of an FFT is a complicated operation. An application may devote a significant portion of resources such as chip area and power consumption to calculation of an FFT. There is a general need for improvements to the FFT calculation that reduce resource consumption.
The present invention may address one or more of the above issues.

Memory segmentation for fast fourier transform


A motor vehicle has an electric propulsion motor which is cooled in an air radiator by air forced through the latter by a blower. The blower and air radiator are arranged in an air circuit in series with each other. The air circuit is a closed loop which includes the cabin, so that all the air passing through the air radiator comes from the cabin and can be adjustably recycled back into the cabin or exhausted to the outside. The circuit includes two parallel branches, with an auxiliary electric radiator placed in one of these branches downstream of the blower and the air radiator. A mixing valve enables the proportion of the total air flow passing through the branch containing the auxiliary radiator to be adjusted according to the heating requirements in the cabin.

Cooling apparatus is conventionally associated with the internal combustion engines by which most motor vehicles are propelled. When weather conditions necessitate heating of the cabin of the vehicle, the heat which is removed from the engine by the cooling apparatus is sufficient to provide this heating of the cabin once the engine has reached its normal operating temperature. By contrast, if the vehicle is propelled by an engine or motor which does not generate much heat --and in particular, an electric motor--the heat which is recovered by cooling this motor is not always enough to ensure satisfactory heating of the cabin. Accordingly, under these circumstances an auxiliary heat source has to be provided, for example an electric radiator, in order to ensure that sufficient heat is available.

Heating and cooling apparatus for an electric vehicle


A standby feed circuit for a subscriber line comprising a constant current power feeding circuit for a subscriber line for supplying a voltage to a subscriber line at a voltage less than a standard central office power feeding circuit, a voltage source for providing the standard voltage, apparatus for applying the standard voltage when a station apparatus connected to the subscriber line is in an on-hook condition, and apparatus for applying said voltage less than the standard voltage in place of the standard voltage when the station apparatus is in an off-hook condition.

Central offices supply typically 48 volts to subscriber lines; when a substantially increased current (as distinguished from leakage current) flows down the subscriber line, the central office considers that a station apparatus connected to the line has gone off-hook. Since subscriber lines are of various lengths (some lines being very long), and thus of various resistances, the central office power supplies typically provides full 48 volts to the lines in order to ensure that sufficient current flows in an off-hook condition which will be detected at the central office.
PBXs on the other hand typically operate with much shorter subscriber lines, and therefore do not expect high resistance in the lines. Thus to save cost, their power supplies often supply voltage much lower than central offices (e.g. 27 volts), with the expectation that the lower voltage is what would often be found at the end of a long subscriber line connected to a central office, off-hook current at this lower voltage would be able to be detected, and the system would operate satisfactorily.
Many telephone sets which provide PBX types of features are designed to work with central offices. They are thus designed to operate using the line voltage supplied from a PBX, i.e. in the 48 volt range. If there are two telephone sets connected to one line and one of them goes off-hook, the other one will sense the lower voltage across the line when the first one is busy and will indicate to the user of the other set that the line is busy. This is illustrated in FIG. 1, in which two telephone sets 1A and 1B are connected to a line 3 which is connected to central office 5. Set 1A is shown off-hook and set 1B indicates BUSY on its display.
However, in the case in which the voltage at the telephone sets is lower in the first place, e.g. 27 volts as supplied from a PBX, both sets could detect the lower voltage even if none is are off-hook, and as a result both indicate that the line is busy, prohibiting their use.
Thus station apparatus such as feature telephone sets, fax machines, modems, etc., which sense voltage levels across the telephone line in order to determine if the line is busy, may not operate correctly if operating from a low voltage power supply circuit, such as that supplied from many PBXs.
There has been no way of knowing, other than by trial and error, which station apparatus would be compatible with the lower voltage lines. Those that worked in a connected up and tested state would be accepted, and those that did not were not used for this purpose. There are a large number of different types and suppliers of such station apparatus, and operability has been typically determined in the field, by set-up on the line to be used. Returning apparatus that does not work, and determining apparatus that does work by trial and error, wastes time, is costly, and is annoying, both to the purchaser and to the supplier.


The system and method of the present invention enable the effective and efficient determination of the misalignment between openings located in the contact layer and the interconnect layer, respectively. In this way, defective semiconductors produced in semiconductor wafer fabrication can be readily identified and segregated for shipment to customers. A single multifunctional structure formed in the contact layer can be used to determine the alignment accuracy of the contact layer and the interconnect layer by (a) inline visual inspection and (b) determination of the end of line electrical resistance properties of the semiconductor wafer. Hence the use of the multi-functional aspects of this invention eliminates the correlation issues with the structure.

This invention relates to methods for processing semiconductor materials, and in particular to methods for measuring the amount of alignment offset problems in the fabrication of a semiconductor which exist between an interconnect layer and a layer having opening therein such as vias or the like, and provides for effective and efficient electrical and visual alignment confirmation of the location of the openings.
Today's semiconductor technology has been advancing in a direction that requires ever increasing numbers of interconnections with integrated circuits. Typically a large number of integrated circuits are formed on a silicon wafer. Then, they are sliced into individual integrated circuit dies (or chips). Each die is then packaged and used. Electrical connections to the dies are made in one of a few ways. In one type of package, a die receiving area (or die receiving cavity) is provided in the package to receive an integrated circuit die. A number of conductive lines (traces or leads) whose outer ends are electrically connected to pins or leads on the package extend inward towards the die receiving area, usually in a radial pattern, stopping just short of the periphery of the die. The die has a number of "bond pads" for the purpose of making electrical connections with the inner ends of the conductive lines, and is mounted such that the bond pads are exposed. The inner ends of these conductive traces or leads are positioned such that they form an array of connection points surrounding the die. Very thin "bond wires", usually formed of a metal such as aluminum or gold, are then used to connect the connections points on a one for one basis with the bond pads on the integrated circuit die. After mounting, the area or cavity containing the die and the bond wires is usually sealed with a cover or an encapsulant to protect the die and the bond wires from ambient moisture or physical damage.
Semiconductor integrated circuits undergo a variety of processing steps during manufacture, such as masking, resist coat, etching, and deposition. In many of these steps, material is overlayed or removed from the existing layer at specific locations in order to form the desired elements of the integrated circuit. Proper alignment of the various process layers is therefore critical. The shrinking dimensions of modern integrated circuits require increasingly stringent overlay alignment accuracy. If the proper alignment tolerance is not achieved, a device can result which is defective or has reliability problems. More specifically, semiconductor processes such as described above employ fabrication steps in which aligned openings are formed in contact layers and multiple interconnect layers to complete an electrical connection. The interconnect layer is typically a metal layer and the contact layer or via layer is typically an insulating/dielectric layer Registration is typically used to measure the accuracy of a process layer alignment performed using an alignment mark. Registration involves comparing the position of a subsequent layer to that of an existing layer by overlaying a distinct pattern on a matching pattern previously formed on the existing layer. The deviation in position of the overlay from the original provides a measure of accuracy of the alignment. Currently available registration structures include box-in-box visual verniers to determine the extent of registration, i.e., the amount of alignment offset. Automatic Measurement Systems ("AMS") and Canomap, each of which uses a different type of structure or pattern for comparison.
Under current practice using alignment marks, optimization of alignment of respective openings involves testing mark sizes and shapes. Subsequent registration of respective test wafers are used to verify the alignment using the alignment mark. One existing method to optimize an alignment mark uses a waferstepper test reticle with a single type of alignment mark to generate a first process layer, followed by printing the second layer resist pattern, and then performing registration on an overlay in both X and Y directions. The mark which results in the "best registration" reading is chosen as the optimal mark.
However, this and other similar techniques have a number of disadvantages. For example, the measurement results do not provide information regarding the position of the alignment marks within acceptable process performance specifications. Another problem is that a full array of alignment marks and registration overlays are not available to test. Furthermore, layer process variations which may effect the overlay are not taken into account in the measurements. Thus, none of the currently available registrability measurement techniques determine whether a particular alignment mark is indeed optimal. In order to get overlay registration measurements from different alignment mark sizes, the test wafers must be stripped, re-spun and re-exposed several times. This could potentially alter the film surface and thereby affect alignment measurement results. In order to optimize other types of alignment marks, a different set of test wafers would have to be generated using a different test reticle. Furthermore, the test reticles do not include the capability for orthogonal measurements, which means that measurement results are considerably more difficult to model mathematically. These drawbacks limit the achievable alignment accuracy, and result in significantly increased manufacturing costs and greater likelihood of device defects.
As previously described above, visual alignment targets with box in box method are generally used to visually determine the alignment accuracy of contact layer openings to the underlying layers (See FIG. 1A).
A separate electrical structure with contact chains layout in both X and Y direction to detect the alignment accuracy (see FIGS. 1B & 1C).
Thus, the discontinuous structural patterns, such as the box in box design described above, are used for separately performing the functions of (a) visual inline alignment confirmation and (b) electrical measurement with scribeline structure at end of line to determine the accuracy of the alignment during manufacturing. This has made it very difficult to correlate the alignment accuracy of the openings to the underlining layer due to the sensitivity and difference in the structures.
There is thus a need that exists for a system and method for reducing alignment offset problems between an interconnect layer and/or contact layer and the layer containing the openings.

Method and system for alignment of openings in semiconductor fabrication


Systems and methods for determining a position of an object are provided by the present invention. Light is captured by at least one collector. Each collector has a first opening through which light enters that is larger than a second opening through which light exits. The exiting light is used by at least one light detector to generate signals. The position of the object is determined based upon the generated signals.

Optical position devices are well known. They are utilized in a variety of applications, including common automatic toilet flushers, video games, and sophisticated laser guided munitions. FIG. 1 is a simplified depiction of a laser guided munitions application. As shown, a laser beam 110 is aimed at a building 115 from an airplane 105. A missile 100 includes a seeker 120 that senses laser light 125 reflected from the building 115. The seeker 120 tracks the reflected laser light 125, guiding the missile to the building 115.
There are two primary methods of optical position detection. One utilizes a Position Sensitive Detector (PSD), and the other utilizes a Quad Detector. Both a PSD and a Quad Detector include a lens to focus light onto a detector surface.
FIG. 2A is a first depiction of a PSD showing a lens 201 focusing light 205 onto a detector surface 210. Processing electronics 215 convert angular displacement into linear displacement. A PSD gives lateral position of a focused image of a light source by generating a differential current. As shown in FIG. 2B, one cathode (C) and at least two anodes (A) are in contact with a detector surface 210. Current through an anode is proportional to the position of the light imaged onto the detector surface 210 due to resistance of the detector surface 210. In the example of FIG. 2B, focused light 205 strikes the detector surface 210 two-thirds of the width of the detector surface 210 away from anode A2, and one-third the width of the detector surface 210 away from anode A1. As a result of the resistance, one-third of the produced current flows through anode A2, and two-thirds of the produced current flows through anode A1. The current from the two anodes is then processed by the processing electronics 215 to determine where on the detector surface 210 the focused light 205 is imaged to determine an angular position of the light source.
The advantage of utilizing a PSD is that continuous angular position can be determined throughout the PSD's angular field of view. However, disadvantages associated with PSD's include a slow response time, typically in the range of milliseconds, which is too slow for many applications, and a high noise floor, resulting in low sensitivity. Thus, PSD's cannot be used in certain applications, such as laser guided munitions. PSD's are typically relegated to more common applications, such as automatic toilet flushers and automatic sinks.
FIG. 2C is a simplified depiction of a Quad Detector. A Quad Detector includes four detector surfaces 220A–D constructed on a single piece of silicon. Similar to a PSD, a lens 201 focuses light 205. The light 205 is focused on the junction where the four detectors 220A–D converge, and, when properly aligned, falls equally on all four detectors 220A–D. If the junction is not properly aligned, the light 205 will fall disproportionally onto the four detectors 220A–D, causing unequal signal strength from the four detectors 220A–D. The lens 201 must be mechanically realigned to properly position the light 205 on the junction of the four detectors 220A–D. This mechanical realignment is achieved utilizing a gimbal (not shown in the Figures). Detected light 205 is then sent to processing electronics 215 to determine the angular position of the light source. An advantage of utilizing a Quad Detector is that Quad Detectors have a fast response time. Thus, they are utilized in sophisticated applications, such as laser guided munitions. A disadvantage is that an expensive gimbal must be utilized for continuous angular position tracking within the Quad Detector's field of view.
Accordingly, a need exists for an optical position device that has a fast response time and does not require the use of a gimbal.
Both PSD's and Quad Detectors also suffer from a waste of detector sensitivity. While a good lens may have a F# of F2, and an excellent lens may have a F# of F1, most of the sensitivity provided by lenses in optical position devices is wasted. FIG. 3 is a simplified depiction the wasted sensitivity. The angular sensitivity subtended by a typical optical detector such as a PSD or Quad Detector is pi. However, a lens uses only a small fraction of this subtended sensitivity. For example, an excellent F1 lens only subtends 0.58 pi. This excellent F1 lens wastes greater than 70% of the available pi sensitivity of the detector.
Accordingly, a need exits for an optical position device which does not utilize a lens.

Technique for lensless optical positioning with a plurality of light collectors


The purpose of this invention is a process and a device operating in real time for identifying and localizing an area in relative movement in a scene and determining the speed and oriented direction of this relative movement in real time.

The purpose of this invention is a process and device for identifying and localizing an area in relative movement in a scene and for determining the speed and oriented direction of this relative movement, in real time.
Relative movement means a movement of said area (which may be composed of an xe2x80x9cobjectxe2x80x9d in the broadest sense of the term including a living being or a portion of a living being, for example a hand) in an approximately motionless environment, or more or less complete immobility of said area (or xe2x80x9cobjectxe2x80x9d) in an environment that is at least partially in movement.
The invention relates to the processing of a digital video output signal from an observation system composed of an optical imput system or objective capable of forming an image of the observed scene, and by an optoelectronic conversion system or sensor capable of converting said image that it receives into a digital output signal.
In general, the observation system is composed of a video camera or camescope that observes the scene to be monitored (said digital output signal then being composed of the digital video signal output by a camera with a digital output or of the output of an analog/digital converter, the input of which is connected to the output of a camera outputting an analog video signal.
The observation system may also be composed of the objective of an optical instrument (binoculars, sighting refracting instrument, view-finder), from which at least a portion of the outgoing light beam is sampled and by a photoelectronic sensor, for example of the CCD or CMOS type, with the normal associated electronic system, sensor receiving the image formed by said portion of the light beam and converting it through the associated electronic system into a digital video output signal.
The invention consists mainly of processing the digital video output signal from an observation system, particularly a video camera, with a digital output to determine signals signaling the existence and localization of an area in relative movement in said scene, and the speed and oriented direction of the displacement if said area is actually moving in said scene relatively to an approximately motionless environment, in real time.
The best system yet developed for identifying and localizing an object in relative movement and for determining its speed and oriented direction of displacement is animal or human sight, for example a hunter in his hide localizing the displacement of an animal, and the direction and speed of this displacement.
Prior art surveillance devices like artificial retinas, either analog (Giocomo Indiveri et al, in Proceedings of MicroNeuro""96 pp 15 to 22), or digital (Pierre-Franxc3xa7ois Rxc3xcedi in Proceedings of MicroNeuro""96 pp 23 to 29), have been proposed, but the first article deals with detectors and analog units with complex structures, and the second article deals with means of identifying the edges of an object; furthermore, very fast and high capacity memories are used in the devices described in order to operate in real time, and limited information is obtained about moving areas or objects.
Thus the suggestion was made of memorizing a frame output signal from a video camera, or similar instrument, composed of a sequence of data relative to pixels representative of the scene observed by the camera at time t0 in a first two-dimensional memory, and then the video signal for the next corresponding frame representing said scene at time t1, in a second two-dimensional memory. If an object has moved between t0 and t1, on the one hand, the distance d by which the object has moved in the scene between t1 and t0 and, on the other hand, the time T=t1xe2x88x92t0 between the beginnings of two successive corresponding frames relative to the same pixels are determined. The displacement speed is then equal to d/T. This type of system requires a very large total memory capacity if it is required to obtain precise speed and oriented direction indications characterizing the displacement. Furthermore, there is some delay in obtaining the speed and displacement direction indications; this information is not available until time t1+R, where R is the time necessary for the calculations for the period t0xe2x88x92ti.These two disadvantages (the need for a large memory capacity and the delay in obtaining the required information) limit applications of this type of system.
Furthermore, French patent No. 2.611.063, of which one of the inventors (Mr. Patrick Pirim) is the inventor of the present invention, describes a process and a device for real time processing of a sequenced data flow, composed in particular of the output signal from a camescope, in order to perform data compression. According to this prior patent, the histogram of signal levels is formed using a classification law for a first sequence, the representative Gauss function associated with this histogram is memorized and the maximum and minimum levels are extracted from it, the levels of the next sequence or second sequence are compared with said signal levels for the first sequence memorized with a constant time constant identical for each pixel, a binary classification signal is generated that characterizes the next said sequence with reference to the classification law, an auxiliary signal is generated from this binary signal representative of the duration and position of a range of significant values, and finally said auxiliary signal is used to generate a signal localizing the range with the longest duration, called the dominant range, and these operations are repeated for subsequent sequences of the sequenced signal. This process and this device of classification enable data compression, keeping only interesting parameters in the processed flow of sequenced data. In particular, this process is capable of processing a digital video signal representative of a video image in order to extract and localize at least one characteristic of at least one area in said image. It is thus possible to classify brightness and/or chrominance levels of the signal and to characterize and localize an object in the image.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,488,430 detects and estimates a displacement by determining horizontal and vertical changes in the image of the observed area separately. Difference signals are used to detect movements from right to left or from left to right, or from top to bottom or bottom to top, in the horizontal and vertical directions respectively, firstly by carrying out the EXCLUSIVE OR logical function on horizontal/vertical difference signals and frame difference signals, and secondly by using a ratio of the sums of horizontal/vertical signals and the sums of frame difference signals with respect to a Kxc3x973 window. In this U.S. Pat. No. 5,488,430, calculated values of the image along two orthogonal horizontal and vertical directions are used with an identical repetitive difference K in these two orthogonal directions, this difference K being defined as a function of the displacement speeds that are to be determined. The device according to this US patent determines the direction of movements along each of the two orthogonal directions by applying a set of calculation operations indicated in columns 12 (at the beginning and end) and 13 (at the beginning) to the difference signals, which requires very complex (and therefore difficult to execute) electronic computing units performing particularly division, multiplication and summation; furthermore, additional complex computing units are necessary to obtain the speed and oriented direction of displacement (extraction of square root to obtain the amplitude of the speed and calculation of the arc tan function to obtain the oriented direction), starting from projections on the two horizontal and vertical axes. Finally U.S. Pat. No. 5,488,430 does not include any means of smoothing pixel values by means of a time constant, variable for each pixel, in order to compensate for excessively fast variations of these values.
On the contrary, the process according to the invention is embodied by using a digital type of device, object of the invention, which has a relatively simple structure and a relatively small memory capacity, and by which the required information can be obtained quickly with a wide variety of results and applications (corresponding to a complete half-image for interlaced frames or a complete image, depending on the application).
An article by Alberto Tomita Sr. and Rokuya Ishii, entitled xe2x80x9cHand Shape Extraction from a Sequence of Digitized Gray-Scale Imagesxe2x80x9d in Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, vol. 3, 1994, p 1925-1930, implements a movement detection by subtraction between successive images followed by the formation of histograms based on the shape of a human hand in order to extract the shape of a human hand in a digitized scene. The histogram analysis is based on a gray scale inherent to the human hand. It does not include any means of forming histograms of the plane coordinates. The sole purpose of the authors of this article is to detect the displacements of a human hand, for example in order to replace the normal mouse by a hand, the displacements of which are identified, for inputting data into a computer.
On the contrary, the present invention is not limited to detecting the displacement of a hand, but is capable of detecting the relative displacement of any object (in the widest sense of the term) in a scene, and does not use histograms based on the gray values of a hand, but rather the histograms of some particular digital variables representative of the displacement (if any) and histograms of plane coordinates.
According to this invention:
a digital video output signal from an observation system is processed, this signal being composed of a sequence of frames (corresponding to a half-image in the case of two interlaced frames per image or to a complete image in the case of a single frame per image) in the known manner, each consisting of a given number of successive lines, and a given number of pixels or image points in each of these lines,
in order to obtain, using a relatively small memory capacity, signals capable of indicating if there is an area in relative movement in the observed scene and, if so, to specify the localization, and speed and oriented direction of said area if it is actually moving with respect to its environment,
by generating two digital signals, one characteristic of the significant variation or non-variation of the pixel signal, for the same pixel location, between two successive corresponding frames, and the other characteristic of the amplitude of this variation, if any, and performing a matrix distribution of these two signals for the pixels in a portion of a frame at a same instant.
It is a first object of the invention to provide a process operating in real time for identifying and localizing an area in relative movement in a scene observed by an observation system with an output constituted by a digital video signal of the type comprising a succession of corresponding frames, each composed of a succession of lines, each composed of a succession of pixels, and for determining the speed and oriented direction of the displacement, said process being characterized in that it consists in carrying out the following sequence of operations on the digital video output signal:
a smoothing processing on said digital video output signal using a digital time constant, the numerical value of which may be modified independently for each pixel of said output signal,
a memorization, on the one hand, of a frame of said output signal after smoothing and, on the other hand, of the smoothing time constant associated with said frame,
a temporal processing for each pixel position, consisting in determining firstly the existence, and secondly the amplitude of a significant variation in the amplitude of the pixel signal between the current frame and the immediately preceding smoothed and memorized frame, and generating two digital signals, the first signal being a binary, or single bit, signal with two possible values, one of which represents the presence and the other represents the absence of a significant variation between two successive frames, the value of said binary signal modifying the memorized value of said time constant in order to reduce it if said signal represents a significant variation and in order to increase it if said signal does not represent such a variation, the reduction or increase being done in a quantified manner, whereas the second digital signal, i.e. the amplitude signal, is a multibit signal with a limited number of bits quantifying the amplitude of this variation; and
a spatial processing consisting of the following steps for each frame of the digital video input signal:
distributing only the values of a fraction of the pixels in a frame at a given observation instant (a fraction which is scanned across said matrix throughout the duration of the frame) firstly of said binary signal and secondly of said digital amplitude signal, into a matrix with a number of rows and columns that is small compared with the number of lines and the number of pixels per line in the video signal, respectively, in order to characterize the values of the pixels,
determining in this double instantaneous matrix representation, a particular area in which said binary signal has the value sought for, representing the presence or absence of a significant variation, and said digital amplitude signal varies, or does not vary, by a significant value for adjacent pixels in the matrix along an oriented direction starting from an origin pixel, within the same portion of the frame and therefore at the same observation instant, and
generating signals representing the existence and localization of the area in relative displacement and the relative inter-frame speed and the oriented direction of this displacement, if any, relative to its environment, inferred from the instantaneous matrix distribution of these two binary and amplitude digital signals.
Preferably, the process according to the invention is characterized in that it also consists of:
forming firstly histograms of the signal values distributed in matrices, and secondly histograms of the inclinations of two coordinate axes, with variable slope, in a plane,
identifying a domain in which there is a significant variation of the processed values in each histogram formed, and
for each identified domain, deducing whether or not there is an area in relative movement, and if so its localization, speed and oriented direction.
In specific embodiments:
said matrix is a square matrix with the same odd number of rows and columns (2l+1), and nested matrices containing 3xc3x973, 5xc3x975, 7xc3x977, . . . (2l+1)xc3x97(2l+1) elements, centered on the center of this square matrix, are considered in order to determine the smallest nested matrix in which said digital signal varies along an oriented direction starting from said center, the value of said binary signal showing that the threshold limit along this direction has been exceeded,
said matrix is a hexagonal matrix, and nested hexagonal matrices of increasing size, centered on the center of this hexagonal matrix, are considered, in order to determine the smallest nested matrix in which said digital signal varies along an oriented direction,
said matrix is an inverted L matrix with a single row and a single column, and nested matrices containing 3xc3x973 pixels, 5xc3x975 pixels, 7xc3x977 pixels, . . . (2l+1)xc3x97(2l+1) pixels are considered for the single row and the single column, in order to determine the smallest matrix in which the signal varies along an oriented direction, namely the line with the steepest slope and constant quantification.
Advantageously, said time constant is of the form 2p, where p is a number less than 16, and which can then be expressed in not more than 4 bits, the time constant being reduced or increased by subtracting or adding one unit to p.
In this case, if it is required, successive decreasing portions of complete frames are considered using the Mallat time-scale algorithm and the largest of these portions, which gives displacement, speed and orientation indications compatible with the value of p, is selected.
Another object of the invention is a device operating in real time for identifying and localizing an area in relative movement in a scene observed by an observation system with an output constituted by a digital video signal of the type comprising a succession of corresponding frames, successive lines in each corresponding frame and successive pixels in each line, and for determining the speed and oriented direction of the displacement, by using the process described above, said device receiving said video output signal as input and being characterized in that it comprises in combination:
means for smoothing said digital video output signal making use of a digital time constant, the numerical value of which may be modified independently for each of said output signal pixels;
means for memorizing firstly a frame of said output signal after smoothing and secondly the smoothing time constant associated with said frame,
a temporal processing unit to analyze the variations with time of the amplitude of the pixel signal, for the same pixel position, between the current frame and the immediately preceding smoothed and memorized frame of said digital signal, said unit comprising a memory capable of receiving, storing and retrieving information about the corresponding previous smoothed frame, together with means of comparison to determine if the absolute value of the difference, between the current pixel signal and a representative value of the pixel signal for the same pixel position in the previous frame stored in said memory, exceeds or does not exceed a threshold, for each position of the pixel in the input video signal frame, by generating a binary, or single bit, signal with two values, one of these two values showing that the threshold is exceeded and the other showing that it is not exceeded, and computing means capable of determining a multibit digital amplitude signal with a small number of bits, the value of which depends on the amplitude of the variation in the value of the same pixel between the current frame and the immediately preceding, smoothed and memorized, frame of the digital video signal; and
a spatial processing unit, into which the outputs from said successive binary and digital amplitude signals for the pixels in a given frame produced by the temporal processing unit are input, said spatial processing unit comprising means for characterizing the amplitude values of the pixels, these means distributing only said binary and digital amplitude signals relative to the same instant, i.e. to a single frame, into a matrix with fewer rows and columns than the number of lines and the number of pixels per line respectively in a frame of said digital video signal, the frame being scanned across said matrix throughout the duration of a frame, spotting means for determining an area of pixels within said matrix in which, at this instant, the binary signal has the searched value, and means of determining an area of pixels in said matrix, into which, at the same instant, the digital amplitude signal for adjacent pixels varies by a significant quantity, and means which, in response to the indications from the two preceding means, generate signals representing this area of pixels and therefore the existence and localization of an area in relative movement within the observed scene and the relative inter-frame speed and oriented direction of this area when it actually moves relative to its environment.
Preferably, the spatial processing unit will also include an output delivering a delayed digital video signal consisting of the input digital video signal with a delay equal to the duration of the rows of a matrix minus the duration of a row, in order to supply an output signal contemporary with the analysis of the matrix in said temporal processing unit.
Preferably, the spatial processing unit of the device according to the invention, includes delay means in cascade, each of which imposes a delay equal to the time difference between the beginning of two successive lines, and delay means in cascade for each line, each importing a delay equal to the time difference between two successive pixels in a line, the outputs from all registers and the input to the first registers on each line delivering at a given instant the values of said binary signal and said digital amplitude signal at the same instant, to said identification means.
Advantageously, the device according to the invention also comprises means for forming histograms of the output values from said spatial processing unit, and histograms of the inclinations of two, variable slope, coordinate axes within a plane, means for identifying a domain, in each histogram, in which there is a significant variation in the processed value, in order to validate this domain at their output, and to deduce, for all histograms, output signals that identify and localize an area of relative movement in the observed scene, if any, and the speed and oriented direction of this movement if said area is effectively moving with respect to its environment.
If it is required to detect the movement of an object in an approximately motionless environment, it is necessary to determine the part of the matrix in which the value of the binary signal shows that the limit has been exceeded and at the same time the digital amplitude signal varies by a significant value between adjacent pixels in a frame.
On the contrary, if it is required to detect a motionless object in an environment that is effectively in motion, it is necessary to determine the part of the matrix in which the value of the binary signal shows that the limit has not been exceeded and at the same time the digital amplitude signal does not vary between adjacent pixels in a frame.
Preferably in the device for identifying, localizing and determining the speed and oriented direction of displacement of an area in relative movement
in a scene, embodying the above mentioned process: said smoothing means include an input receiving said digital video signal and derive, for each successive pixel in a frame of said video signal, a smoothed signal in which the temporal variations of the input digital video signal are reduced by using a threshold signal received on another input and a time constant related to each pixel position in a frame, the value of which is modified successively so that the smoothing maintains, although reduced, the trend in the variations of the incoming digital video signal, said smoothing means working in cooperation with said memory unit that receives, stores and retrieves the updated values of the smoothed signal and of said time constant, for each portion of pixels in a frame, and output, for each pixel position, at least the succession of values of the updated time constant and of the values of the binary signal that shows whether or not said threshold is exceeded by the absolute value of the difference between the value of the pixel and its smoothed value; said spatial processing assembly carrying out the matrix distribution along lines and columns in a reduced number, of the outputs from said smoothing means, namely the successive values of the time constant and of said binary signal;
means are provided for identifying, in said matrix distribution, an area of pixels in which simultaneously:
either the value of said binary signal corresponds to a threshold being exceeded and said time constant varies between adjacent pixels by a significant value in one direction and for producing output signals indicating the localization of said area and the speed and oriented direction of displacement in this area
or the value of said binary signal corresponds to a limit not being exceeded and said time constant does not vary between adjacent pixels and for producing output signals indicating the localization of said area.
In the preferred embodiments:
said smoothing means include, in combination with a video memory or field memory that stores successive values, for each pixel in the frame, of said time constant and the smoothed digital video signal, means for calculating, for each pixel, the absolute value of the difference between the value of the digital video signal output from the camera and the value of the previously smoothed digital video signal, means for comparing said difference with a threshold, and for generating a binary signal, one of the two values of which indicates that said limit has been exceeded and the other value indicates that it has not been exceeded; means for updating the time constant receiving the immediately preceding value of the time constant from said memory and reducing it if it receives a binary signal with a value showing that the limit has been exceeded, or increase it if the value of the binary signal indicates that it has not been exceeded, the reduction or increase being however not performed if it would lead respectively to a negative value or to a value exceeding a threshold value, and means for updating the smoothed value of the digital video signal that algebraically add, to the prior value of this smoothed signal received from said memory, the quotient of the difference between the digital video signal output from the camera and the previous smoothed digital video signal from said memory by a factor equal to value of the previous time constant retrieved by from said memory;
said time constant is in the form 2p, where p is an integer less than 16, and which can therefore be represented by not more than 4 bits, the reduction or increase in the time constant being done by subtracting or adding one unit to p;
said matrix distribution means include in combination with delay means applying successive delays, equal to the duration of one line of the video signal, to the digital video signal originating from the camera so as to deliver on successive outputs this video signal delayed by one delay period, two delay periods and so on, up to a number of delay periods equal to the number of lines in the spatial distribution matrix minus one, means for performing a matrix distribution along successive rows of the matrix receiving firstly, the digital video signal from the camera without a delay and this progressively delayed signal output from the delaying means outputs and secondly, values of the time constant and said binary signal received from said smoothing means in order for producing a matrix distribution, in rows and columns, of said values, at a given instant, of the time constant and binary signal for pixels in a portion of the frame of the digital video signal with the same size as the matrix;
the matrix distribution means comprise a series of digital signal conductors, i.e. one for each row in the distribution matrix, each with series-connected shift registers, each imposing a delay equal to the time difference between two successive pixels in a line of the digital video signal, the position of a pixel distributed in the matrix being determined by a point in the matrix located before a delay register, the number per line thereof being equal to the number of columns in the matrix minus one, and by a point downstream the furthest downstream register;
said means of detecting a moving area in said matrix, by detecting the simultaneous presence of a value of the binary signal indicating that a limit was exceeded and a variation in the value of the time constant, include means for determining, along discrete digitized oriented directions, the slope of the variation in the value of the time constant close to a pixel at the center of said matrix, forming the origin for said directions, and means for selecting the steepest slope of this variation close to this center-origin and determining the oriented direction, taking account of a selection criterion for selecting the direction if there is more than one direction with same maximum slope of this variation, these latter means outputting signals representative of the speed and oriented direction of the displacement in the moving area, with a validation signal indicating that these speed and direction signals are validated, together with the value of the time constant.
Preferably, if included in the device according to the invention, the means for creating the histograms each include:
inputs receiving the signal from which the histogram is formed and a validation signal originating from the matrix distribution means; and
means for establishing two linear unidimensional histograms for the two plane coordinates and for combining these two linear histograms into a surface histogram representing the area in which there is a significant variation in the input signal, and
an output delivering a signal representative of said area.
Furthermore, the means for forming the histograms preferably include:
means for calculating a reference change, the inputs of which receive a line sequence signal, a column sequence signal and a pixel clock signal and the output of which is representative of the reference change;
two means for forming histograms for two axes, receiving the two reference signals and forming histograms of these axes; and
area means into which the outputs from the two histogram formation means for the two axes are input, and which output a signal containing global slope information for the two axes.
In some applications, said time constant may be composed of the order number of the intervals, in limited number and with a gradually increasing magnitude, into which the absolute value of the difference between the value of the current pixel and the immediately preceding value of the same pixel after smoothing is divided, for each pixel position.
Advantageously, for determining the binary signal of overshooting, or not overshooting, of the threshold the absolute value of the difference between the value of the current input pixel and the immediately preceding smoothed value of the same pixel originating from the memory in compared with a threshold value, for each pixel position.
As concerns the digital amplitude signal, it is preferably generated as an integer representing the tendency of the value of the current pixel to approach the immediately preceding smoothed value of this pixel, for each pixel position.
One of the characteristics of the invention consists of the fact that, for determining both the binary signal and the digital amplitude signal, use is made, as value of the immediately preceeding pixel, of a stored smoothed value thereof, in order to reduce any excessive variations of this pixel signal with time that may exist in the digital video input signal originating from the video camera or any other observation device with a digital output.
It is known that the effect of a smoothing operation is to gradually substitute, for a digital signal with large amplitude variations with time, a signal with smaller variations and therefore more easily quantifiable with a small number of steps, and therefore bits, in the smoothed digital amplitude signal.
We will now describe a preferred embodiment, given for illustrative purposes and in no way limitative, of a device according to the invention embodying the process according to the invention, with reference to the appended drawings.

Abstract: The process carries out temporal processing of the digital video input signal S(PI) that consists in deducing, from the variations between the value of each pixel in a frame and in the immediately preceding frame, a binary signal DP identifying whether or not there was a significant variation and a digital signal CO representing the magnitude of this variation, and a spatial processing consisting in distributing in a matrix these two signals successively for a single frame that is scanned through the matrix, and deducing the required relative movement and its parameters from this matrix distribution. The device achieves this by including a temporal processing unit 15 associated with a memory 16 and a spatial processing unit 17 associated with a delay unit 18; the clock unit 20 and the control unit 19 control the rate of operation of units 15 and 17.