A seasoning apparatus includes: a table on which a stack of paper sheets is loaded, each of the paper sheets having at least one face on which active light curable aqueous ink has been deposited; an air blowing device which blows air in an air blowing direction to a side of the stack loaded on the table; an active light emission device which emits the active light in an active light emitting direction to a side of the stack loaded on the table; and a control device which causes the air blowing device to blow the air to the stack to create gaps between faces of the paper sheets, and causes the active light emission device to emit the active light to the stack to cause the active light to enter the gaps.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a seasoning apparatus and a seasoning method, and more particularly to technology for seasoning a stack of sheets of paper on which printing has been performed using ultraviolet-curable water-based ink.
2. Description of the Related Art
When ink is deposited on a sheet of paper in a printing apparatus, expansion and contraction of the paper sheet occurs immediately after the ink deposition due to differences in the amount of water within the paper sheet resulting from light and dark tones (i.e., difference in deposited volumes) of the ink in the image region in the paper sheet. This problem is especially pronounced in a system that prints onto general printing paper using water-based ink. Moreover, when carrying out double-side printing, normally, after completing printing on one side (a front face) of a paper sheet, printing is subsequently carried out on the reverse side (a rear face) of the paper sheet; however, since there is significant expansion of the paper sheet immediately after the printing on the front face, then a problem arises in that deviation occurs in the sizes and positions of the images printed respectively on the front face and the rear face (i.e., there is mismatch between the front and rear positional registration).
Furthermore, in the case of single-side printing also, and not only double-side printing, there is a problem that the occurrence of cackling (undulation) of the printed paper sheet as a result of the above-described deformation of the paper sheet causes deterioration of printing quality and also causes adverse effects on subsequent processing steps, such as a binding process, which are carried out after the printing step.
In order to prevent these problems, it is necessary to season the paper sheet immediately after printing so as to adapt the paper sheet to the ambient temperature and humidity.
Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 10-297813 discloses technology in which the periphery of a stack of paper sheets is enclosed by side plates and air is blown through at least one air blowing port arranged in the side plate, whereby dispersion of the air blown through the air blowing port to the exterior of the paper stack is prevented, and the air can be caused to flow efficiently in amongst the paper sheets. Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 10-297813 further discloses technology for sucking air between the paper sheets when the air blowing has ended, so as to press down the disordered paper sheets to be stacked in order.
In addition, with conventional thermoplastic ink, image strength is poor and scratches occur during subsequent processing, and the like, and therefore ink that is curable with active light (e.g., ultraviolet (UV)) is desirable. In order to reduce organic solvent in the ink due to environmental considerations, UV-curable water-based ink containing water as a solvent has been developed; however, this entail a problem in that curing of the UV-curable water-based ink does not progress efficiently, due to the presence of water in the ink.
Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2007-245653 discloses an image forming method in which an image formed from UV-curable water-based ink on a recording medium is irradiated with UV light by a UV light irradiation device, and the method includes a step of blowing a warm air flow onto the image by a warm air flow blowing device, and a subsequent step of curing the ink forming the image by irradiation of UV light of maximum intensity by the UV light irradiation device. In this method, however, if the printing speed is fast, a problem arises in that there is insufficient time to cure the ink forming the image and, although the surface of the printed item is cured, the interior portion thereof cannot be cured adequately.


A conversion circuit for converting a differential signal into a single-phase signal 1 has a source-follower amplifier 10 and a source-grounded amplifier 20. The source-follower amplifier 10 outputs a non-inverted signal IN of the differential signal the phase of which is not inverted. The source-grounded amplifier 20 inverts an inverted signal INX of the differential signal and adjusts its phase to that of the non-inverted signal IN. At point A, differential signals IN, INX are added and output as a single-phase signal OUT.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a conversion circuit for converting differential signal into single-phase signal. More specifically, the present invention relates to a conversion circuit for converting differential signal into single-phase signal, which has a reduced chip area and improved power efficiency.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the prior art, there is a conversion circuit which convert differential signal with different phase into single-phase signal. For example, the conversion circuit is used in portable telephones, wireless LANs, and other applications in which, after conversion, the single-phase signal is output to a single antenna to perform communication.
As the conversion circuits of the prior art, for example a circuit which uses transformer 101 (or Balun), which is passive element (see FIG. 8A), and a circuit which uses transistors 104, 105 (see FIG. 8B), are widely used. In either case, differential signals are input from two input terminals IN and INX, and single-phase signal is output from an output terminal OUT.
Further, a conversion circuit for converting differential signal into single-ended signal, have also been disclosed which combine a plurality of current mirror circuits configured from transistors, so as to obtain single-ended signals without distortion (see for example the Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 8-288762).
However, in the case of the conversion circuit employing a transformer shown in FIG. 8A, the chip area is increased by the amount of the transformer 101. And in the case of the conversion circuit employing transistors shown in FIG. 8B, the single-phase signal OUT is obtained using only the output side of the inverted signals INX of the input differential signals, so that power loss is considerable.
Further, because in the above Patent Reference 1 a plurality of current mirror circuits are combined, the number of components is large, and the chip area similarly is increased.

Conversion circuit for converting differential signal into signal-phase signal


To support a non-display setting for each piece of data corresponding to a display item, and to easily allow the user to recognize the existence of data set to a secret setting, the input device (101) according to the present invention includes a touch sensor (104) that detects contact, a display unit (103), a tactile sensation providing unit (107) that provides a tactile sensation to a contacting object in contact with the touch sensor (104), and a control unit (108) that controls the tactile sensation providing unit (107) to provide the tactile sensation to the contacting object in contact with the touch sensor (104) when, for a display item being displayed on the display unit (103), data set to the non-display setting exists in correspondence with the display item.

An input device, such as a mobile phone terminal, often includes an address book application that manages the name, telephone number, email address, and the like of acquaintances (phone book application), a schedule application that manages the user's schedule, and the like. The information used by these applications includes personal information. Therefore, the user may not want some of the data registered in applications such as the address book application to be seen by a third-party (other person).
Out of consideration for such circumstances, some conventional mobile phone terminals support a non-display setting (secret setting) that does not display registered data (for example, see Patent Literature 1). In the mobile phone terminal disclosed in Patent Literature 1, a secret setting can be set for each piece of data in the address book, and an item set to the secret setting is not displayed in the address book. In order to cancel the secret setting, the user inputs a security code on the standby screen. When the security code is correct, the secret setting is temporarily canceled, and the user can visually confirm data set to the secret setting in the address book.


A method and apparatus for dynamically storing objects of an object-oriented programming application in a LDAP repository so that useful information from the objects may be read by other applications are disclosed. Embodiments of the method preferably comprise dynamically determining persistent attributes, which are a subset of each object's attributes, for each object being stored and mapping the persistent attributes to LDAP attributes in the LDAP repository. Embodiments of the invention preferably comprise a persistent data manager that is a component of the object-oriented programming application and that acts as an interface to the LDAP repository, storing objects in the LDAP repository when requested. The objects may be Java objects.

Object-oriented programming is a method of programming that pairs programming tasks and data into re-usable chunks known as objects. Each object comprises attributes (i.e., data) that define and describe the object. Java classes are meta-definitions that define the structure and characteristics for groups of objects in object-oriented parlance. Java classes when instantiated create instances of the Java classes and are then considered Java objects. Methods within Java objects are used to get or set attributes of the Java object and to change the state of the Java object. Associated with each method is code that is executed when the method is invoked.
Java objects of an application, when instantiated, are resident within a computer's memory (e.g., ROM). However, when the computer is turned off or restarted, the objects are flushed from the memory. As such, the objects need to be loaded back into the computer's memory in order to be accessed. Consequently, there is a need for the objects and, particularly, the object attributes to be stored in persistent repository.
The Java objects may be stored as basic system files with a flat file structure. Basic systems files are a simple way of storing the Java objects that would be easily accessible to the application from which the Java objects originated. Unfortunately, other applications would need to learn the application's application programming interfaces ("APIs") in order to be able to access the object data from the basic system files. Having to learn these APIs is generally a deterrent that would effectively prevent the basic systems files from being usable outside of the originating application.
Storing the Java objects according to a standard protocol would seem to be a necessary improvement. Indeed, there are known methods for serializing Java objects and their attributes and storing them in a Lightweight Directory Access Protocol ("LDAP") repository. LDAP is an industry standard for storing information into a quickly accessible database. Serializing a Java object comprises converting the Java object's physical memory representation into a string of characters and storing the string of characters in the LDAP repository.
Unfortunately, simply serializing the Java objects and storing them in a LDAP repository does not make the stored Java objects readable or useable by other applications that do not have the same Java object structures. The string of characters has to be converted into the Java object from which it originated in order to be readable. Moreover, serializing the whole Java object necessarily stores attributes that are unimportant to other applications (e.g., attributes that represent internal operations of the Java object).
LDAP does include a plurality of data objects including different types of attributes (e.g., commonName, description, ipHostNumber, host, uidNumber). These LDAP data objects and their attributes, unfortunately, may not directly correspond to an application's Java objects and their attributes. In order to be usable, the LDAP data objects need to be mapped to Java objects. New LDAP data objects and attributes need to be created. If the Java objects are mapped to LDAP data objects, then the Java objects may be stored in a LDAP repository in a manner that is readable and useable by other applications.

Mechanism for mapping Java objects onto an LDAP repository

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.


Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for a blockchain-based image processing are provided. One of the methods comprises: displaying, by a terminal device, a target image; obtaining, by the terminal device, information of a copyright owner of the target image and a current display environment of the target image; sending, by the terminal device, the obtained information to one or more blockchain nodes configured to obtain ciphertext information by encrypting the obtained information and to store the ciphertext information in a blockchain; obtaining, by the terminal device, the ciphertext information from the blockchain; and updating, by the terminal device, historical information in a pixel matrix of the target image based on the ciphertext information.

With the rapid development of computer and Internet technologies, it becomes more convenient for people to obtain various information. As a result, however, it also becomes extremely convenient for people to freely plagiarize and disseminate other people's creation without consent of authors. For example, people freely plagiarize an original image by a user on a website, take a screenshot of an image on a website, or take a photo of an image being displayed on a website, which leads to infringement of the image copyright of the user.
Therefore, there is a need for a reliable solution to protect the copyright of images created by a user.

Blockchain-based image processing method and apparatus


This invention discloses a set of internal signaling (i.e., management primitives) to support a clock-synchronization protocol for wirelessly synchronizing clock registers of wired or wireless nodes via a wireless local area network (i.e., 802.11 network). The clock synchronization is performed between two higher-layer protocol entities residing within two different wireless stations (STAs).

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to clock synchronization and, more particularly, to an internal signaling method to support stringent clock synchronization at a higher-layer protocol.
2. Description of the Related Art
High-precision clock synchronization is one of the most basic requirements in distributed real-time systems. Due to the unavoidable drift of local clocks, a global time base can be achieved only by means of a clock-synchronization protocol. Co-pending U.S. application Ser. No. 60/362,518, filed on Mar. 7, 2002, incorporated by reference herein in its entirety, is directed to a clock-synchronization protocol for wirelessly synchronizing clock registers of wired or wireless nodes via a wireless local area network (i.e., 802.11 network). To support the clock-synchronization protocol disclosed therein, there is a need for a set of management primitives (i.e., internal signaling) which will provide information about the synchronization frames from the medium access control (MAC) to a higher-layer protocol.

Internal signaling method to support clock synchronization of nodes connected via a wireless local area network


A drinking trough having a drinking valve assigned to a water-supply line, the drinking valve having a valve pin that moves in order to discharge water; a water-collecting bowl assigned to the respective drinking valve; an actuating means or elongated actuating end of the valve pin extending from the valve pin to a water-accommodating hollow of the water-collecting bowl, the actuating means being movable between an actuated position to an unactuated position; and a starter body assigned to the respective water-collecting bowl, in which the starter body actuates the actuating means by moving the actuating means to the actuated position when water in the water-collecting bowl reaches a certain lower level, whereby the moving of the actuating means to the actuated position actuates the valve pin so as to allow water to flow from the drinking valve into the water-collecting bowl, and when the water in the water-collecting bowl reaches a certain higher level, the actuating means moves to the unactuated position, whereby the moving of the actuating means unactuates the valve pin so as to cease the flow of water from the drinking valve.

1. Technical Field
The invention relates to a drinking trough for, in particular, poultry, such as turkeys, chickens, chicks or the like, having at least one drinking valve that is assigned to a water-supply line, the drinking valve having a valve pin that can be moved in order to discharge water, and additionally having at least one water-collecting bowl and a starter body, both being assigned to a respective drinking valve, and also to a method of dispensing or regulating water flow from a drinking valve into a water-collecting bowl.
2. Prior Art
Drinking troughs of the type mentioned here allow animals, in particular poultry such as, for example, turkeys, hens, geese, ducks and also the young of the aforementioned animals, to obtain automatically the water they require. For this purpose, the drinking trough has an elongate water-supply line, to which a plurality of drinking valves are preferably connected at regular intervals. Each drinking valve is assigned a water-collecting bowl. Water discharged by the drinking valve, to be precise in particular water that is not drunk directly by the animals, accumulates in the water-collecting bowl. As soon as most or all of the water supply in the water-collecting bowl has been used up (drunk by the animals, evaporated, splashed out of the water-collecting bowl, etcetera), the animals preferably can open a respective drinking valve for a short period of time directly, by means of their beaks or bills, and drink the water discharged from the supply line through the drinking valve either directly or from the collecting bowl.
The known drinking troughs of the type described above have proven successful for the most part for chickens, chicks and broilers. The known drinking troughs, however, have not proven successful for breeding and fattening turkeys. In particular young turkeys and turkey chicks are often not capable of actuating the drinking valves directly and it is problematic for young turkeys and turkey chicks to obtain the water they require via drinking valves. Moreover, the problems concerning the soiling of the water-collecting bowls and the splashing of water are more pronounced in the case of turkeys than in the case of other animals.
A recently developed drinking trough disclosed in U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 20030084854 to Schumacher addressed some of the difficulties experienced by young turkeys in using traditional drinking troughs. More particularly, that invention employs an elongated tubular structure, an elongated rod structure, or an elongated valve pin within an elongated tubular structure as an actuator lever to allow the bird to more easily actuate the drinking valve and receive a fresh supply of water. That invention further points out the utility of the elongated actuator levers in avoiding the problems of soiling and water splashing by permitting the water from the drinking valve to travel down the lever into a water-collecting bowl.
Accordingly, there is always a need for an improved drinking trough. More particularly, there is a need for a drinking trough, and a method for dispensing water therefrom, in which the problems concerning soiling and water splashing may be avoided in a relatively reliable manner and in which turkeys in particular, to be precise also turkey chicks, can automatically obtain the water they require to a sufficient extent, preferably throughout the breeding and fattening processes. Further, there is a need for such a drinking trough to be able to fill and refill automatically as water is removed from the drinking trough so as to allow even those birds incapable of activating the drinking valve to obtain water. It is to these needs among others that this invention is related.

Drinking trough with elongated actuator and method of dispensing water therefrom


A lamp includes a light source, a cover configured to block the transmission of light from the light source, and a cover interface portion configured to interface with the cover such that the cover is disposed for upward and downward movement with respect to the light source between a first position configured to fully block the transmission of light from the light source and at least one second position configured to allow light from the light source to illuminate an area around the lamp. A track system, operatively associated with the cover, includes at least one track and at least one tracking element. The track system is configured for retaining the at least one tracking element for sliding movement along the at least one track to enable the cover to be held at various heights.

The present disclosure relates to lamps which are powered by a source of current, for example an electrical socket or a battery.
Jewish law prohibits turning lamps on or off for at least approximately a 24 hour period, for example, on the Jewish Sabbath, and on certain Jewish holidays. This period may be as long as 72 hours if the Sabbath precedes or follows certain Jewish festival days. This proscription generally prevents a person from turning a source of current or lamp switch on and off, or varying the current, for example using a dimmer switch to dim or brighten the light. However, blocking and unblocking the light mechanically is generally not proscribed. Using light timers is also not proscribed, and these devices enjoy a significant role in addressing the proscription; however their utility is limited in situations in which one cannot predict when the light is needed to be on and off.
Moving a lamp on the Sabbath is also generally proscribed.
Accordingly, there is a market among Sabbath-observant Jewish people for a lamp in which the light source can be mechanically blocked and unblocked, in the place where it has been left for use on the Sabbath. Such a lamp is particularly in demand in a bedroom so that the room can be darkened at will.
U.S. Patent Publication No. 2003/0026099 describes a lamp comprising a set of partially opaque light enveloping covers for enveloping a light source. A lamp embodying the invention described in this application is currently on the market. The lamp comprises a base configured to sit on a flat horizontal surface, a bulb operatively mounted over the base, a cylindrical light source encasement element, which is partially translucent and partially opaque, and a cover which is opaque, except for an oval aperture which allows the light to be transmitted. The cover is rotatably mounted on the light source encasement for rotation about an axis perpendicular the base. By rotating the cover about its own axis, the user can align the oval aperture with the portion of the light source encasement element which is translucent to allow the light to be transmitted through the oval aperture. Perfect alignment of the oval aperture and translucent portion of the underlying light source encasement element will transmit the maximum amount of light in the direction to which the aperture is open, whereas partial alignments transmit variable amounts of light. Rotation in at least one direction can causes complete misalignment of the oval aperture with the translucent portion of the light source encasement element to substantially block the light, for example, to darken a room for sleeping. The base and cover are provided with heat dissipating slots that are positioned to avoid transmission of light.
One of the limitations of the above lamp design is that increasingly misaligning the light encasement elements (i.e. to reduce the amount of light) also causes the light to be increasingly directionally transmitted. This limitation can be most disadvantageous when the ideal amount of transmitted light (for example to promote sleep of one individual and continued activity of other individuals) is intended to be shared by family members and the otherwise ideal locations of the respective family members in the room for whom darkness is ideal are not compatible with the direction in which transmission of light from the lamp is blocked.
For example, when bringing the lamp on a trip, if the transmitted light is meant to be substantially reduced to permit a family member (e.g. a child) to sleep while others read by its light, its placement on a night table between two hotel beds or on a breakfast table, diminishes the amount of the light for reading on one side of the table because the light is directionally transmitted via the slot. For example, if the lamp is positioned so that the direction of light transmission benefits both sides of the table equally, the alignment of the slot needs to be adjusted so that more light is transmitted into the room (contrary to what is indicated for sleeping), because this orientation of the lamp is now sub-optimal for both users.
U.S. Patent Publication No. 2005/0213330 describes a lamp adapted for Sabbath observance which comprises an opaque cover configured to be placed over an incandescent bulb. The cover is configured to be placed on (or lifted off) a cover support platform. The cover support platform and the cover together envelop the bulb to block light transmission from the light bulb. The cover must be completely removed and replaced, to alternately reveal and block the light source and therefore cannot be adjusted to vary transmission of light. Furthermore, removal of the cover may cause the cover to become separated and misplaced.


The present invention relates to the field of quantitative microspectroscopy, and in particular to an apparatus for determining the exact thickness of an optical microscopic sample at the time an absorbance measurement or other spectroscopic measurements are performed on this sample. This apparatus can be an optical microscope comprising a means for containing a sample wherein said means has first and second optical markers; a means for holding said means for containing a sample; a means for illuminating the sample in said means for containing a sample; a means for automatically focusing on first and second optical markers in said means for containing a sample; and a means for performing a pattern recognition procedure for said optical samples, wherein said means comprises an imaging receiver which is connected to an image processor and a computer.

In many areas of science and technology, there exists a need to determine the concentration of chemical substances in small samples. One method for determining the concentration of a substance is quantitative microspectroscopy. In this case one measures the optical absorbance, A(.lambda.,c), which is related to the concentration, c, via the simple equation (1): EQU A(.lambda.,c)=a(.lambda.)cz (1)
where .lambda. is the optical wavelength, a(.lambda.) is the wavelength-dependent absorption coefficient, and z is the sample thickness.
The error in determining the concentration is given by equation (2): ##EQU1##
The error in the absorbance measurement can be kept extremely low, using modern optoelectronics and electronics equipment. For a given substance, the absorption coefficient, a(.lambda.), can be determined precisely in advance by using large samples with a thickness in the range 1 mm to 10 mm. Consequently, the error in determining the concentration, c, in small samples having a thickness in the sub-mm range is dominated by the error in measuring the sample thickness, and is given by equation (3): ##EQU2##
From equation (3) it follows that determining the concentration of a chemical substance within a 10 .mu.m thick microsample with an accuracy of 1% would require knowledge of the sample thickness with an accuracy of 1%, i.e. with an accuracy of 100 nm.
Producing microsample containers with a precision in the sample thickness of 100 nm might be possible, but is expected to be cost-intensive. Moreover, such microsample containers are likely to deform over their shelf life during storage, or to deform due to sample loading. It is apparent that it is practical to determine the exact sample thickness at the time of usage, after loading the sample into the container. Consequently, there exists a need for a method and apparatus for precisely determining the thickness of thin optical samples.

Apparatus for determining the thickness of an optical sample


The invention relates to a humidity sensor comprising a sensor element, a molding, which preferably consists of a thermoplastic material or a two-component polyurethane, epoxy or silicone casting and which is adapted to adhere to the sensor element, a dead-space volume, which is arranged in connection with the sensor element and which is covered by a membrane. The membrane is attached to an external surface of the molding and is adapted to protect the sensor element from exposure to ambient moisture and dirt and allowing diffusion of ambient air gas molecules, like water vapor, into the dead-space volume. The dead-space volume is less than 100 mm3.

Known humidity sensors of the type that detects the relative humidity of air, by absorbing water from the ambient into a polymer, where the principle of measuring is, to detect the change of the dielectric constant or conductivity of this polymer as a function of the relative humidity, has the implicit weakness, that they deteriorate over time, if they frequently are exposed to condensing conditions, moisture and dirt. As a consequence of this, most humidity sensors are equipped with some kind of protective encapsulation.
Humidity sensors of this type are nevertheless unsuited for use under conditions with condensation and moisture. The reason for this is, that the dead-space volume may be several thousand mm3, allowing the amount of water condensing inside the encapsulation dead-space volume to accumulate and get so large, that it becomes a significant problem because of the irreversible damage it may cause on the sensing element.
The large amount of condensed water takes very long time to evaporate and diffuse out of the encapsulation. This is a major disadvantage for using this kind of humidity sensor in wet and condensing environment.

Humidity sensor and a method for manufacturing the same


In a gas turbine engine, fuel is supplied to a fuel metering valve which is connected to a shutoff valve. The shutoff valve supplies fuel to a manifold. Fuel flow between the manifold and main fuel nozzles is controlled by fuel staging valves while the pilot nozzle is connected directly to the manifold by a fuel line which may include an orifice. The orifice is designed to match the flow in the pilot nozzle with the flow in main nozzles when the fuel staging valve is on.

In a gas turbine engine, air is compressed and combined with a fuel (liquid or gaseous) in a combustion chamber. The air fuel mixture is ignited and the energy from the resulting expansion is used to turn a turbine. In such engines, the output power is proportional to fuel flow and, more particularly, is proportional to the sum of the fuel mass flow rate and the air mass flow rate through the combustor.
As a byproduct of the combustion process, gas turbine engines, such as those used to power electrical generators may emit certain pollutants, such as nitrous oxides (NO.sub.x). NO.sub.x may be limited by controlling the flame temperature of the burners in the combustor. As the flame temperature is increased, the NO.sub.x produced by the engine also increases. Further, if the average flame temperature becomes too high, it may damage the combustor or other parts of the engine. In contrast, if the average flame temperature becomes too low, the burners may be extinguished, resulting in a "lean blow out". It would, therefore, be advantageous to maintain the flame temperature within a predetermined range to ensure that the NO.sub.x output is limited and that the combustor does not "blow out" or damage the engine.
Combustor flame temperature in a gas turbine engine is proportional to the fuel to air ratio in the combustor. Flame temperature, being proportional to the fuel to air ratio, increases as the fuel to air ratio increases. Therefore, an increase in fuel flow or decrease in airflow through the combustor will normally result in an increase in flame temperature.
In contrast, any decrease in fuel flow or increase in airflow will reduce the flame temperature.
It would, therefore, be advantageous to maintain a substantially constant flame temperature by adjusting the fuel to air ratio within the combustor. For example, the airflow to the combustor might be increased as the fuel flow increases to meet increased output power demands. Alternatively the airflow may be decreased as the fuel flow is decreased for reduced output power demand. However, in many gas turbine engines, the airflow is not adjustable over a sufficient range to maintain a substantially constant flame temperature.
In gas turbine engines, of the type described herein, the fuel to air ratio in the combustor may be adjusted by changing a number of variables. For example, the local fuel to air ratio may be adjusted by selectively controlling the flow of fuel to individual nozzles in the combustor.

Fuel supply system for a gas turbine engine


A display device includes a pixel unit including scan lines, data lines crossing the scan lines, and pixels connected to the scan lines and the data lines; a timing control unit configured to receive first data from an outside; a conversion unit configured to receive the first data from the timing control unit, to extract luminance components of the first data corresponding to the pixels to determine luminance distribution of the first data, to divide the luminance distribution into a plurality of luminance distribution ranges, and to convert the first data into second data by regulating an input gray level of the first data based on a conversion equation corresponding to a variation between data of the luminance distribution ranges; and a data drive unit configured to receive the second data from the conversion unit and to provide the second data to the data lines.

1. Field
Exemplary embodiments of the invention relate to a display device with improved visibility and a method of driving the display device.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, there have been developed various types of flat-panel display devices having light weight and thin thickness without using a cathode ray tube, e.g., a liquid crystal display ("LCD") device, a plasma display panel ("PDP"), an organic light emitting display ("OLED") device, etc.
The flat-panel display device is typically applied to a display of a television and a personal portable terminal such as a smartphone, a laptop computer or a digital camera. When such a display device is used in the personal portable terminal having limited battery capacity, power consumption of the personal portable terminal depends on power consumption of the display device.
For example, among the flat-panel display devices, the OLED device emits light depending on a change in current amount, and current consumption is high at the time of emitting bright light.

Display device and driving method thereof


A method of imaging described herein comprises (a) disposing ultrasound-switchable fluorophores within an environment; (b) exposing the environment to ultrasound to create a first activation region within the environment; (c) disposing the fluorophores within the first activation region to switch the fluorophores from an off state to an on state; (d) irradiating the environment to excite the fluorophores within the first activation region; (e) detecting photoluminescence from the excited fluorophores at a first optical spot on an exterior surface of the environment; (f) subsequently creating a second activation region within the environment; (g) switching fluorophores within the second activation region to an on state; (h) exciting the fluorophores in the on state within the second activation region; and (i) detecting photoluminescence from the excited fluorophores within the second activation region at a second optical spot on the exterior surface, wherein the first and second optical spots are optically resolvable.

Fluorescence imaging has been widely used in many biomedical applications. Such imaging provides high sensitivity and specificity, with the additional benefits of low cost, use of non-ionizing radiation, and the ability to use multicolor imaging. However, fluorescence imaging suffers from various limitations, including limitations caused by the high optical scattering of biological tissue. For example, fluorescence microscopy has high spatial resolution (sub-microns) but is limited in imaging depth (<1 mm). Fluorescence diffuse optical tomography can image tissue as deep as several centimeters but is limited by poor spatial resolution (a few millimeters).
To achieve high resolution fluorescence imaging in centimeter-deep tissue, various techniques based on ultrasound mediated fluorescence emission have been developed. In general, spatial resolution is improved in these approaches by confining the fluorescence emission to a relatively small volume, which is dependent on ultrasound frequency. However, because this limited volume (where the desired signal comes from) is relatively small compared to the total fluorophore distribution, detection sensitivity can be lower than ideally desired. Fluorophores (or contrast agents) with high fluorescence emission efficiency and/or imaging systems with high sensitivity are thus generally desired to compensate for the small emission volume. High detection specificity and reduced noise are also often desired or needed to differentiate signal photons from other background photons.
Previously, fiber optic bundles have been used to collect emitted fluorescence photons, and various improved ultrasound-switchable fluorophores/contrast agents have been developed to improve detection sensitivity. While these developments have improved the utility of ultrasound-based fluorescence imaging, many of these previously developed systems still suffer from low photon-collection efficiency. Moreover, many previous techniques suffer from slow imaging speed, which has previously been limited by the time required for cooling imaged tissue to minimize thermal diffusion effects between two adjacent locations in the scanning/imaging sequence.
Therefore, there is a need for improved methods and systems of ultrasound-based fluorescence imaging.

Ultrasound-switchable fluorescence imaging having improved imaging speed

Board of Regents, The University of Texas System


Method and laser oscillator for the generation of a laser beam—According to the invention with a view to adjusting, inside said laser oscillator (1), the phase of each of the N elementary laser beams (FLE.1, FLE.2, FLE.N) generated on the basis of said laser oscillator (1) in such a way that said elementary laser beams are in phase, the deviation between the phase of an individual elementary laser beam (FLE.1) and the phases of the N−1 other elementary laser beams (FLE.2, FLE.N) is converted into a level of luminous intensity by means of at least one optical filtering element to which at least a part of each elementary laser beam is directed.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and a laser oscillator for the generation of a laser beam.
Although not exclusively so, this method is particularly suitable for autonomous generation of a laser beam (that is to say without an initiation beam being injected in advance).
2. Description of the Related Art
As is known, for generating a high-power laser beam it is known initially to generate a plurality of elementary laser beams, and subsequently to aggregate the beams thus generated so hat they combine coherently at a single focus point and thus form a single laser beam, which has a higher power the higher the number of elementary beams.
However, for the power of the resulting laser beam to be optimal, it is important for the elementary laser beams all to be of the same emission frequency and the same phase.
A known solution for achieving this is disclosed for example in document U.S. Pat. No. 6,366,356. It involves initially generating a "master" laser beam from a laser oscillator, and subsequently space-division multiplexing the master beam into a plurality of elementary laser beams at the output of this oscillator. These elementary beams are amplified separately, in parallel, by the same number of optical amplifiers, and subsequently the phases thereof are adjusted. These elementary beams which are thus placed in phase are finally combined to form a single laser beam having a higher power than the master laser beam. During this combining, since all of the elementary laser beams come from the same master beam, they actually have the same emission frequency and the same power. Further, as a result of adjusting the phase of each elementary laser beam, they are also in phase.
However, this solution has the drawback of requiring two optical modules in succession: first a "master" laser oscillator and then a set of amplifiers in paralleI. Finally, the device is completed by a phase analysis system for the elementary beams, a feedback loop, and a set of phase modulators located between the master oscillator and the amplifiers. It goes without saying that a device of this type proves to be particularly complex and expensive to implement, while taking up a significant amount of space.
For all of these reasons, it is desirable only to have a laser oscillator, which can itself generate the elementary laser beams autonomously for the subsequent aggregation thereof.
A known solution for achieving this is disclosed in document U.S. Pat. No. 7,130,113. Specifically, it involves arranging, within a single laser oscillator, a plurality of elementary laser cavities which can respectively generate a plurality of elementary laser beams having identical emission frequencies. For this purpose, each elementary laser cavity comprises an amplification medium which, when it is pumped or excited by introducing energy, generates an intrinsic noise in all spatial directions. The light which propagates the direction corresponding to the axis of the elementary laser cavity is amplified every successive time it passes through the amplification medium of each laser cavity, so that each elementary laser beam converges to a stationary state in which it reaches the nominal power thereof at the output of the laser oscillator. Subsequently, the elementary laser beams thus generated in the different elementary laser cavities are placed in phase in an all-optical manner, using a diaphragm which limits the emitted elementary laser beams to portions dose to the optical axis. Finally, the elementary laser beams thus placed in phase are combined so as to form a single high-power laser beam. Placing the elementary laser beams in phase is thus made simpler.
However, although this known solution is effective for combining a limited number of elementary beams (typically fewer than ten), it is not satisfactory when the number of elementary beams is larger. Specifically, as is known, the resonant frequencies (or modal coincidences) of the set of elementary laser cavities are the degrees of freedom of the laser oscillator, and make it possible to adjust the laser emission spectrum so as to maximise the effectiveness of combination. It is also important to have the largest possible number thereof, so as to combine the elementary laser beams effectively. However, when the number of elementary beams increases, these resonant frequencies are found to become scarcer, and this actually reduces the effectiveness of combination. Therefore, when it is attempted to place elementary laser beams in phase passively, and therefore by self-adjusting the emission spectrum, as is the case in document U.S. Pat. No. 7,130,113, the modal coincidences become scarcer and the effectiveness of combination is reduced.


Roughly described, an AWG has a waveguide array and a region of vertical-only confinement that is shared for both input and output beams of the waveguide array. The AWG layout is such that the input and output beams to and from the waveguide array cross each other within the region of vertical-only confinement.

The present invention relates to arrayed waveguide gratings (AWGs), and more particularly to a novel architecture for an AWG.
AWGs, sometimes also known as "phasars" or "phased arrays", are well known components in the optical communications network industry. An AWG is a planar structure comprising an array of waveguides arranged side-by-side which together act like a diffraction grating. AWGs can be used as multiplexers and as demultiplexers, and a single AWG design can commonly be used both as a multiplexer and demultiplexer. The construction and operation of such AWGs is well known in the art. See for example, "PHASAR-based WDM-Devices: Principles, Design and Applications", M K Smit, IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Quantum Electronics Vol. 2, No. 2, 20 June 1996, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,002,350 and WO97123969.
FIG. 1 illustrates the layout of a conventional AWG. It comprises a substrate ("die", "chip") 100 supporting one or more input optical waveguides 110 delivering optical energy into an "input slab" region 112. The slab region is a planar waveguide which confines the input optical energy in only the vertical dimension; the energy is permitted to spread transversely without restriction. The input slab is sometimes referred to herein as an "input free space region", or an "input free propagation region".
An image of the input optical energy (or an interference pattern, if there is more than one input optical waveguide) is developed on the far border 114 of the input slab region 112. At this border the light enters the input end 116 of a waveguide array 118 which consists of tens or hundreds of individual waveguides. The array waveguides (not visible individually in FIG. 1) are of lengths which increase linearly across the array, each waveguide having a length which differs from its nearest adjacent waveguide by a value ΔL.
Optical energy exits the waveguide array 116 at an output end 120 thereof, and delivers the light into an "output slab" region 122. Like the input slab, the output slab region is a planar waveguide which confines the input optical energy in only the vertical dimension. The energy is permitted to spread transversely without restriction, and for that reason the output slab is sometimes referred to herein as an "output free space region", or an "output free propagation region".
A diffraction pattern is developed on the far border 124 of the output slab region 122, where the light enters a set of one or more output optical waveguides 126. The structure can be used as a demultiplexer if there is only one input waveguide 110 and more than one output waveguide 126; in this case information can be carried on multiple channels (wavelengths) in the single input waveguide and the channels are separated out by the AWG for delivery into the different output waveguides. The structure can also be used as a multiplexer if operated in reverse. It can furthermore be used as a router if there are multiple input waveguides 110 and multiple output waveguide 126.
It is frequently desirable to be able to reduce the physical size of an AWG, either to be able to fit more functions on a chip or to fabricate smaller chips. There are physical limits on how small an AWG can be made, however, since waveguide curves must be made gentle enough to maintain their guiding properties. A significant amount of space is also consumed usually by the input and output waveguides which must fan-in or fan-out to direct the light to or from the edges of the chip. There are also additional minimum-size restrictions imposed by the waveguide-to-waveguide length differential ΔL in the array and the desired number of waveguides in the array, as well as the focal lengths required in the input and output slabs. Other factors may also play a role in thwarting attempts to shrink AWG device designs. It would be desirable if some of these factors could be overcome to enable smaller AWGs.


The amplitude of the hysteresis of the circuit is determined principally by the intensity of the current produced by a generator by means of a "band gap" reference voltage, an internal resistance of the circuit, and the resistances connected to the emitters of the input-stage transistors, enabling a high degree of precision to be achieved. The inputs of the circuit are defined by the bases of the input-stage transistors and therefore have high impedance. The preferred application is for forming interface circuits for sensors to be fitted in motor vehicles.

The present invention relates in general to electronic circuits and particularly concerns the comparator circuits commonly used in electronic circuits. It has been developed with particular attention to its possible use for producing monolithic comparator circuits with precision hysteresis and high input impedance.
There is a particular need for comparators with these characteristics in order to produce interfaces between sensors with variable reluctance (for example, sensors used to detect the speed and position of the shaft of an internal combustion engine in a motor vehicle) and the corresponding processing circuits (for example, in the case of the sensors mentioned above, the electronic control unit of the engine).
For use in such a situation, the comparator must detect a signal the level of which (for example 100 mV), in some situations, is little greater than a lower limit level (for example, 50 mV) below which no detection should take place. There is therefore a need for a comparator which has the broadest possible hysteresis so that it is substantially insensitive to noise (which is present to a considerable extent in an automotive environment) but which, at the same, can ensure operation in the limit condition indicated above, taking account of the spread of the hysteresis value, both as regards its absolute value and in relation to temperature. Moreover, a further input impedance is also required to prevent errors due to the high resistances of the sources which drive the comparator.

Comparator circuit with precision hysteresis and high input impedance


Although conventional antennas have characteristics suitable for mobile radio base stations, their vertical dimension is large, and locations of their installation are limited. A radiator for an first upper antenna 32 is arranged in a hollow nonconductive radome 2, using an internal conductor 7a and a metal pipe 10. A radiator for a second lower antenna 34 is arranged in the radome 2, using metal pipes 14 and 15. Two parasitic elements 31 are installed substantially in parallel with the first antenna 32 below a feeding point 9. Two parasitic elements 33 are installed substantially in parallel with the second antenna 34 above a feeding point 13. These allow the tilt angle to be freely set between -10.degree. and +10.degree. by adjusting the parasitic element length and the antenna to be reduced in size.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an antenna mainly used for a mobile radio, and more particularly, to a mobile radio antenna preferably used for a base station.
2.Related art of the Invention
In recent years, mobile radios, such as cellular phones and personal handyphone systems (hereinafter called PHSs), have been widely used. Many small base stations, especially for PHSs must be built, since its base stations and mobile stations have low power. Thus such base stations are required to be reduced in space.
Preferably, antennas for mobile radio base stations are as horizontally omnidirectional as possible because their mobile stations cannot be located. It is also preferable that their beam tilt angle can be set between zero and a few degrees in a vertical plane except for special antennas including indoor antennas and that their gain be high. FIG. 24 shows an example of such a conventional antenna for mobile radio base stations, a two-element co-linear array antenna. As shown in FIG. 24, a radome 115, which is nonconductive and housing an antenna consists of a radome top 115a, a radome bottom 115b, and a radome wall 115c, with a coaxial feeder 112 installed between radome top 115a and radome bottom 115b. A first dipole antenna 109 is formed with an internal conductor 112a above the coaxial feeder 112 and with a metal pipe 113, held by a spacer 114 made of an insulating material, such as Fluoride resin, and powered through an external conductor of the coaxial feeder 112. A second dipole antenna 110 is formed by symmetrically positioning metal pipes 113, held by spacers 114, above and below a circular slit 112X, provided around the external conductor of the coaxial feeder 112. The second antenna is powered through the circular slit 112X.
In the above arrangement, the first and second dipole antennas 109 and 110 are vertical, and the diagram representing its directivity in a horizontal plane is virtually round. The dipole antennas also have high directivity in a vertical plane and provides a desired gain because they are stacked vertically. For the arrangement, the beam tilt angle depends on the distance between the feeding points of the first and second dipole antennas 109 and 110. To tilt radiation beams from the arrangement down (or toward the -Z direction), the distance is reduced. To tilt the radio beams up (or toward the +Z direction), the distance is increased.
Although such conventional antennas have characteristics necessary for antennas for mobile radio base stations, their vertical dimension will be inevitably large. A conventional antenna must have a vertical dimension of about 177 mm for 1.9 GHz, for example. A vertical diversity antenna is as long as about 572 mm, assuming that the distance between its upper and lower antennas is 2.5.lambda. (395 mm). Tilting beams from the antenna up causes it to become longer (its length increases from 177 to 191 mm when the tilt angle is set to +10.degree.), thus limiting the location of its installation.

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.


Provided is an air compressor which helps to attain a proper discharge air temperature and which is superior in energy saving property. There are provided an air line connecting an air compressor, an oil separator, and an after cooler; an oil circulation line connecting the air compressor, the oil separator, and an oil cooler; a bearing oil supply line connecting one end of an intermediate branching portion disposed at an intermediate point of the oil circulation line between the oil cooler and the air compressor to a bearing oil supply portion of the air compressor; an intermediate portion oil supply line connecting the other end of the intermediate branching portion to an intermediate oil supply portion of the air compressor; a branching line supplying oil to the bearing oil supply portion and the intermediate oil supply portion; a blower sending air to the oil cooler and the after cooler; a bypass line connecting one end of a bypass branching portion disposed at an intermediate point of the oil circulation line between the oil separator and the oil cooler to the downstream side of the oil cooler of the bearing oil supply line; and a control valve controlling the inflow amount of the lubricating oil to the bypass line.

A prior-art technique regarding an oil-cooled air compressor is disclosed, for example, in JP-2014-88876-A (Patent Document 1). The abstract of Patent Document 1 discloses "a cooling of a liquid injection type compressor element section in which a liquid is injected into a compression chamber of the compressor element section via an injection valve, the cooling including a step of controlling the amount of the liquid injected into the compression chamber of the compressor element section in accordance with a specific control parameter independently of any other possible adjustment device."


A method and apparatus for detecting structural anomalies in the body of rotating members of an engine involves establishing an electric circuit in the body of the rotating members by embedding a network of electrically conductive fibers. Upon rotation of the members in the presence of a magnetic field, an electric current flows in the electrically conductive fibers of the rotating members. Detection of a structural anomaly in any of the rotating members results from detecting a break of the electric circuit.

Rotating components in large machines such as gas turbines, steam turbines, or aircraft engines, operate under large centrifugal stresses and may suffer breaks or cracks located at various points in the body of the rotating component. For example, engines have rotating compressor units that move and compress air. The compressor has blades around the periphery of a rotating disk, and the high speeds that the blades rotate induce high levels of stresses that tend to pull the components apart and cause cracks. In addition, through problems of excessive wear, the rotating assembly components may become unbalanced, which imposes unacceptable loads on the unit, possibly resulting in the creation of cracks. Once a crack is formed, it may grow in size until the rotating component is separated from the main assembly, thus resulting in a catastrophic failure. The problem is of gravest importance with passenger-carrying jet airliner engines, where upon such failure, separated blade components penetrate the engine compartment and/or the aircraft itself, thus impairing the air worthiness of the aircraft.
The most common method of detecting anomalies, such as cracks, in a rotating component of an engine, is to electronically monitor vibrations emanating from the rotating component. The idea is that a rotating assembly that lacks any cracks or similar imperfections is optimally balanced during the manufacturing and testing process, therefore vibrations due to asymmetrical rotational forces are minimal. Monitoring of dangerously high vibration amplitudes, or at least, large incremental changes over otherwise normal patterns of vibration, provides a good indication of a break or excessive wear present anywhere in the rotating unit.
Sonnichsen and Milatovic (U.S. Pat. No. 6,456,945) discloses a method of detecting cracks in a rotor, by measuring the rotational speed and vibration of the rotor. A processor subtracts a baseline vibration signal from the detected vibration measurement to produce a vibration difference signal. Subsequently, the amplitude and the phase of the vibration difference signal is measured to determine if anomaly, such as a crack, has occurred. Similarly, Gasch and Mingfu (U.S. Pat. No. 5,533,400), discloses a method for sensing cracks formed in rotating shafts, wherein the harmonic vibration components of flexural vibrations of the shaft are measured.
The vibration sensing method even though it offers the advantage of real time detection of anomalies in the body of the rotating unit, lacks sensitivity to the exact or even the approximate location of the crack. Since the method is based on sensing the vibration caused by unbalance during the operation of the unit, and said unbalance is created by the presence of cracks anywhere in the body of the unit, which produce an aggregate result, the method can not be tailored to sense small individual cracks in high-risk areas, such as the tip of the blade. Furthermore, the vibration sensing method is relatively complex, as it requires several peripheral electronic components, such as filters, speed sensors, etc.
In addition to the above real time monitoring of the occurrence of cracks in rotating units in engines, manual inspection may also be performed. More specifically, the engine is taken apart and the unit under inspection is immersed in a fluorescent solution. The fluorescent material will penetrate any cracks in the area and make them visible under ultraviolet light. Manual inspections are costly and time consuming, since the engine must be taken out of service and be disassembled.

Apparatus and related method for sensing cracks in rotating engine blades


A method for enhancing the fairness and performance in a multihop ad hoc network, the method usually including providing contention synchronization information regarding a transmission between nodes of the network, wherein the information is routinely provided to nodes in a range of two hops from the nodes participating at the transmission. The method also typically includes setting, after successfully finishing the transmission, a waiting time for the nodes participating at the transmission, in which these nodes backoff from accessing a transmission medium.

1. Field of the Invention
Certain embodiments of the present invention relate generally to a method for enhancing the fairness and/or performance in a multihop ad hoc network as well as to a corresponding system therefor, and/or to network nodes of the system executing steps of the method.
2. Description of the Related Art
A wireless ad hoc network is commonly a network where nodes may not communicate with each other directly as in Wireless Local Area Networks (WLAN) and usually may use multihop wireless links. Each node in an ad hoc network generally not only sends packets from itself, but also typically forwards packets for other nodes, thus normally acting as a router. Generally, an ad hoc network is self-organized and includes nodes that support an ad hoc routing protocol, such as, for example, Dynamic Source Routing (DSR), Dynamic Sequence Distance Vector (DSDV), etc.
Contrary to an ad hoc network, Wireless Local Area Networks are typically developed to provide high bandwidth access for users in a limited geographical area, where nodes may usually communicate with each other directly. The IEEE Project 802 recommends an international standard 802.11 for Wireless Local Area Networks (see "IEEE standard for Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) specifications", ISO/IEC 8802-11:1999(E), Aug. 1999; and B. P. Crow, J. G. Kim: "IEEE 802.11 Wireless Local Area Networks", IEEE Communications magazine, Sept. 1997). With the Distributed Coordination Function (DCF) according to the 802.11 standard, a four-way handshaking mechanism, which uses request-to-send/clear-to-send (RTS/CTS) technique to reserve the channel before data transmission, is proposed to solve the problem of hidden terminals. Although the collision probability for hidden terminals is thus commonly reduced, it generally does not solve the problem completely.
Specifically, the details of the distributed Coordination Function are as follows. The DCF is the fundamental access method used to support asynchronous data transfer on a best effort basis. That is, all stations must support the DCF. The DCF operates solely in the ad hoc network, and either operates solely or coexists with a point coordination function (PCF) in an infrastructure network. According to the MAC architecture, the DCF sits directly on top of the physical layer and supports contention services. Contention services imply that each station with a frame body queued for transmission must contend for access to the channel and, once the frame body is transmitted, must recontend for access to the channel for all subsequent frames. Contention services promote fair access to the channel for all stations.
The DCF is based on carrier sense multiple access with collision avoidance (CSMA/CA). CSMA/CD (collision detection) is not used because a station is unable to listen to the channel for collisions while transmitting. In IEEE 802.11, carrier sensing is performed at both the air interface, referred to as physical carrier sensing, and at the MAC sublayer, referred to as virtual carrier sensing. Physical carrier sensing detects the presence of other IEEE 802.11 WLAN users by analyzing all detected packets, and also detects activity in the channel via relative signal strength from other sources.
A source station performs virtual carrier sensing by sending MPDU (MAC protocol data unit) duration information in the header of request to send (RTS), clear to send (CTS), and data frames. An MPDU is a complete data unit that is passed from the MAC sublayer to the physical layer. The MPDU contains header information, payload, and a 32-bit CRC. The duration field indicates the amount of time (in microseconds) after the end of the present frame the channel will be utilized to complete the successful transmission of the data or management frame. Stations in the BSS use the information in the duration field to adjust their network allocation vector (NAV), which indicates the amount of time that must elapse until the current transmission session is complete and the channel can be sampled again for idle status. The channel is marked busy if either the physical or virtual carrier sensing mechanisms indicate the channel is busy.
Priority access to the wireless medium is controlled through the use of interframe space (IFS) time intervals between the transmission of frames. The IFS intervals are mandatory periods of idle time on the transmission medium. Three IFS intervals are specified in the standard: short IFS (SIFS), point coordination function IFS (PIFS), and DCF-IFS (DIFS). The SIFS interval is the smallest IFS, followed by PIFS and DIFS, respectively. Stations only required to wait a SIFS have priority access over those stations required to wait a PIFS or DIFS before transmitting; therefore, SIFS has the highest-priority access to the communications medium. For the basic access method, when a station senses the channel is idle, the station waits for a DIFS period and samples the channel again. If the channel is still idle, the station transmits an MPDU. The receiving station calculates the checksum and determines whether the packet was received correctly. Upon receipt of a correct packet, the receiving station waits a SIFS interval and transmits a positive acknowledgment frame (ACK) back to the source station, indicating that the transmission was successful. When the data frame is transmitted, the duration field of the frame is used to let all stations in the BSS know how long the medium will be busy. All stations hearing the data frame adjust their NAV based on the duration field value, which includes the SIFS interval and the ACK following the data frame.
Since a source station in a BSS cannot hear its own transmissions, when a collision occurs, the source continues transmitting the complete MPDU. If the MPDU is large (e.g., 2300 octets), a lot of channel bandwidth is wasted due to a corrupt MPDU. RTS and CTS control frames can be used by a station to reserve channel bandwidth prior to the transmission of an MPDU and to minimize the amount of bandwidth wasted when collisions occur. RTS and CTS control frames are relatively small (RTS is 20 octets and CTS is 14 octets) when compared to the maximum data frame size (2346 octets). The RTS control frame is first transmitted by the source station (after successfully contending for the channel) with a data or management frame queued for transmission to a specified destination station. All stations in the BSS, hearing the RTS packet, read the duration field and set their NAVs accordingly. The destination station responds to the RTS packet with a CTS packet after an SIFS idle period has elapsed. Stations hearing the CTS packet look at the duration field and again update their NAV. Upon successful reception of the CTS, the source station is virtually assured that the medium is stable and reserved for successful transmission of the MPDU. Note that stations are capable of updating their NAVs based on the RTS from the source station and CTS from the destination station, which helps to combat the "hidden terminal" problem. In the transmission of an MPDU using the RTS/CTS mechanism, stations can choose to never use RTS/CTS, use RTS/CTS whenever the MSDU exceeds the value of RTS_Threshold (manageable parameter), or always use RTS/CTS. If a collision occurs with an RTS or CTS MPDU, far less bandwidth is wasted when compared to a large data MPDU. However, for a lightly loaded medium, additional delay is imposed by the overhead of the RTS/CTS frames.
Large MSDUs handed down from the LLC to the MAC may require fragmentation to increase transmission reliability. To determine whether to perform fragmentation, MPDUs are compared to the manageable parameter Fragmentation_Threshold. If the MPDU size exceeds the value of Fragmentation_Threshold, the MSDU is broken into multiple fragments. The resulting MPDUs are of size Fragmentation_Threshold, with exception of the last MPDU, which is of variable size not to exceed Fragmentation_Threshold. When an MSDU is fragmented, all fragments are transmitted sequentially. The channel is not released until the complete MSDU has been transmitted successfully, or the source station fails to receive an acknowledgment for a transmitted fragment. The destination station positively acknowledges each successfully received fragment by sending a DCF ACK back to the source station. The source station maintains control of the channel throughout the transmission of the MSDU by waiting only an SIFS period after receiving an ACK and transmitting the next fragment. When an ACK is not received for a previously transmitted frame, the source station halts transmission and recontends for the channel. Upon gaining access to the channel, the source starts transmitting with the last unacknowledged fragment.
If RTS and CTS are used, only the first fragment is sent using the handshaking mechanism. The duration value of RTS and CTS only accounts for the transmission of the first fragment through the receipt of its ACK. Stations in the BSS thereafter maintain their NAV by extracting the duration information from all subsequent fragments.
The collision avoidance portion of CSMA/CA is performed through a random backoff procedure. If a station with a frame to transmit initially senses the channel to be busy; then the station waits until the channel becomes idle for a DIFS period, and then computes a random backoff time. For IEEE 802.11, time is slotted in time periods that correspond to a Slot_Time. Unlike slotted Aloha, where the slot time is equal to the transmission time of one packet, the Slot_Time used in IEEE 802.11 is much smaller than an MPDU and is used to define the IFS intervals and determine the backoff time for stations in the CP. The Slot_Time is different for each physical layer implementation. The random backoff time is an integer value that corresponds to a number of time slots. Initially, the station computes a backoff time in the range 0-7. After the medium becomes idle after a DIFS period, stations decrement their backoff timer until the medium becomes busy again or the timer reaches zero. If the timer has not reached zero and the medium becomes busy, the station freezes its timer. When the timer is finally decremented to zero, the station transmits its frame. If two or more stations decrement to zero at the same time, a collision will occur, and each station will have to generate a new backoff time in the range 0-15. For each retransmission attempt, the backoff time grows as └22+i·ranf( )┘·Slot_Time, where i is the number of consecutive times a station attempts to send an MPDU, ranf( ) is a uniform random variate in (0,1), and └x┘ represents the largest integer less than or equal to x. The idle period after a DIFS period is referred to as the contention window (CW). The advantage of this channel access method is that it promotes fairness among stations, but its weakness is that it probably could not support DTBS. Fairness is maintained because each station must recontend for the channel after every transmission of an MSDU. All stations have equal probability of gaining access to the channel after each DIFS interval. Time-bounded services typically support applications such as packetized voice or video that must be maintained with a specified minimum delay. With DCF, there is no mechanism to guarantee minimum delay to stations supporting time-bounded services.
However, since the Distributed Coordination Function (DCF) is typically designed to work in the Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) situation with hidden terminals, it usually does not work well in multihop ad hoc networks. Further, since the Distributed Coordination Function is normally based on Carrier Sense Multiple Access with Collision Avoidance (CSMA/CA), the sender will generally sense whether the channel is busy before a transmission is initiated. Typically, only when the channel is idle, the sender will transmit the packet, otherwise it will usually backoff a random time, which is commonly determined by the contention window (CW) value. This mechanism generally works well in the Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN) scenario. However, in a multihop ad hoc network, packet collisions may occur at the receiver. Therefore, sensing the channel at the transmitter before any attempt to access the channel typically cannot eliminate such collisions. Hence, in multihop scenario, the sender usually does not know the situation of the receiver and/or risks for collisions at the receiver.
The hidden terminal problem may often be reduced by at least two ways: Firstly, using a slotted based synchronization mechanism with proper collision avoidance, and secondly, using another channel (see Z. J. Hass, J. Deng: "Dual Busy Tone Multiple Access (DBTMA)—A Multiple Access Control Scheme for Ad Hoc Networks", IEEE Trans. On Comm. V50, N6, June 2002, pp.975-985) to acknowledge the data packet and/or prevent a possible access attempt in the receiver range, and the sender must generally make sure that the acknowledgment channel is idle before transmission.
However, an ad hoc network is typically supposed to be self-organized. Currently, however, there is no known standard to synchronize all the packet transmitting times. Meanwhile, the hardware implementation cost of a two or more channel protocol is usually unknown, although most of them use only narrow-bandwidth, out-of-band busy tone. Therefore, a distributed Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol for one channel without specific synchronization slot mechanism is normally preferred. However, it is generally a challenging undertaking to design such a distributed single channel Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol for a multihop network.
On the other hand, there is no known scheme in the Distributed Coordination Function (DCF) to deal with the problem of exposed terminals. According to the Distributed Coordination Function (DCF), the Medium Access Control (MAC) layer ACK is typically used to improve the performance of the Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol in transmission errors. Therefore, the sender usually becomes the receiver of the Medium Access Control (MAC) acknowledgment (ACK) after it has transmitted the data packet. With a single channel, the exposed terminal problem is normally difficult to solve.
From the viewpoint of customers or users, the performance of the transport layer is commonly the most important consideration, regardless of whether it runs over a Local Area Network (LAN), a Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), or a mobile ad hoc network (MANET). The Transport Control Protocol (TCP) is the most widely used reliable transport layer protocol and is often expected to work well in ad hoc networks (see, for example, K. Chandran, S. Raghunathan, et al.: "A Feedback-Based Scheme for Improving TCP Performance in Ad Hoc Wireless Networks", IEEE Personal Comm., Feb. 2001, pp.34-39; F. Wang, Y. Zhang: "Improving TCP Performance over Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks with Out-of-Order Detection and Response", MOBIHOC'02, June 2002; C. Barakat, E. Altman, W. Dabbous: "On TCP Performance in a Heterogeneous Network: A Survey", IEEE Commun. Mag., Jan. 2000; and S. Xu, T. Saadawi: "Does the IEEE 802.11 MAC Protocol Work Well in Multihop Wireless Ad hoc Network", IEEE Commun. Mag., June 2001). How to improve the TCP performance in multihop ad hoc networks (MANET) with frequent link failures and route changes due to node mobility is the focus of recent work. Most of them require a feedback from the network layer or lower layer to change the status of TCP. According to K. Chandran, S. Raghunathan, et al.: "A Feedback-Based Scheme for Improving TCP Performance in Ad Hoc Wireless Networks", IEEE Personal Comm., Feb. 2001, pp.34-39, TCP is typically adapted to frequent route changes by detecting and/or responding an out-of-order packet delivery at the TCP layer. However, the recent study of S. Xu, T. Saadawi: "Does the IEEE 802.11 MAC Protocol Work Well in Multihop Wireless Ad hoc Network", IEEE Commun. Mag., June 2001, shows that the TCP over 802.11 DCF usually works poorly, even if there is no mobile node. The problem often lies in the Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol 802.11 DCF, where the hidden terminal problem generally still exists in a multihop ad hoc network, and where the binary exponential backoff (BEB) scheme of the Distributed Coordintaion Function (DCF) almost always favors the latest successful node.
The Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol with which stations may share a common broadcast channel is, however, typically essential in a Wireless Local Area (WLAN) and/or an ad hoc network. Thus, in order to address the above problems, the following proposals have been made during the past years.
The fairness problem was first pointed out by V. Bharghavan, A. Demers, S. Shenker, L. Zhang: "MACAW: A Media Access Protocol for Wireless WLAN's", ACM SIGCOMM, 1994, pp.212-225. That is, usually, based on a Request-to-Send/Clear-to-Send (RTS/CTS) exchange to reserve the channel before the data transmission for addressing the hidden terminals problem in single channel networks, a new protocol named MACAW generally using an RTS-CTS-DS-DATA-ACK message exchange and typically including multiple increase and linear decrease backoff strategies, has been proposed therein. The data sending (DS) packet was added, generally to notify all nodes in the sender's range of its following use of the shared channel. Although the RTS/CTS exchange usually cannot eliminate the hidden terminal problem, it commonly can alleviate it to some extent. Therefore, the IEEE 802.11 committee proposed the "IEEE standard for Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) specifications", ISO/IEC 8802-11:1999(E), Aug. 1999, which includes a RTS/CTS exchange as an optional access method. However, MACAW often uses packet sensing (PS), while the 802.11 DCF is routinely based on CSMA/CA.
Further, it has been proposed by C. L. Fullmer, J. J. Garcia-Lura-Aceves: "Floor Acquisition Multiple Access (FAMA) for Packet-Radio Networks", ACM SIGCOMM 1995, that a station that has data to send generally must acquire control of the channel before sending, and, typically, that it ensures that no data packets collide with any other packets. It was also shown that carrier sensing is usually necessary in FAMA protocols to eliminate the hidden terminal problem efficiently in single-channel networks (see C. L. Fullmer, J. J. Garcia-Lura-Aceves: "Solutions to Hidden Terminal Problems in Wireless Networks", ACM SIGCOMM 1997). However, the absence of data packet collisions normally does not mean fairness. In fact, all of these protocols generally favor the station whose corresponding receiver has no collision.
A contention resolution algorithm that combines persistence and backoff has been proposed by T. Czugur, M. Naghshineh, P. Kermani, J. A. Copeland: "Fair Media Access for Wireless LANs", IEEE Globecom'99, pp.570-579, 1999, with two variants, connection-based and time-based. It also often uses a backoff strategy and/or a copying scheme similar to MACAW. However, the results have typically shown that none of the algorithm always provides the best fair access in every scenario. Besides, there is usually no formal fairness objective in this scheme.
Still further, a measurement-based algorithm has been proposed by Z. Fang, B. Bensaou, Y. Wang: "Performance Evaluation of a Fair Backoff Algorithm for IEEE 802.11 DFWMAC", MOBIHOC'02, June 2002, to achieve fairness in ad hoc networks, generally by replacing the binary exponential backoff (BEB) in the Distributed Control Function (DCF) with another backoff scheme where the contention windows are typically adjusted according to what the stations hears. Since it usually adjusts the contention window (CW) directly, the traffic load normally fluctuates greatly, especially on a short time scale. Although it commonly achieves at least some degree of fairness, the performance routinely degrades when the density of traffic and stations increases.
A distributed Max-Min fairness framework for wireless ad hoc network has been proposed by X. L. Huang, B. Bensaou,: "On Max-Min Fairness and Scheduling in Wireless Ad-Hoc Networks: Analytical Framework and Implementation", MOBIHOC'01, Long Beach, Calif., 2001. The Max-Min fairly shared assignment is generally achieved in a distributed way, where nodes often obtain contention tree information from all their neighbor's neighbors. The backoff window is typically adjusted according to a fairness reference, similar to the way described by Z. Fang, B. Bensaou, Y. Wang: "Performance Evaluation of a Fair Backoff Algorithm for IEEE 802.11 DFWMAC", MOBIHOC'02, June 2002. However, without synchronization information, stations usually cannot compete efficiently in a distributed way. Thus, the whole performance may degrade.
Furthermore, T. Nandagopal, T. Kim, X. Gao, V. Bharghavan: "Achieving MAC Layer Fairness in Wireless Packet Networks", ACM Mobicom 2000, proposed a general analytical framework that generally captures the unique characteristics of shared wireless channels and/or typically allows the modeling of a large class of system-wide fairness models, usually via the specification of per-flow utility functions. By combining persistence and backoff, a slotted local mechanism for proportional fair contention resolution is presented. However, how to implement such framework in a distributed way without synchronization is unknown.
A distributed priority scheduling technique that normally piggybacks the priority tag of a node's head-of-line packet onto the handshake (RTS/CTS) frames and data frame has been proposed by V. Kanodia, C. Li, A. Sabharwal, B. Sadeghi, E. Knightly: "Distributed Multi-Hop Scheduling and Medium Access with Delay and Throughput Constraints", ACM SIGMOBILE, 2001, pp.200-209. Each node locally usually constructs a scheduling table based on overhead information, and commonly incorporates its estimate of its relative priority into the Medium Access Control (MAC). The scheme is typically further enhanced by receiver participation and/or stale entry elimination, as described by V. Kanodia, C. Li, A. Sabharwal, B. Sadeghi, E. Knightly: "Ordered Packet Scheduling in Wireless Ad Hoc Networks: Mechanisms and Performance Analysis", MOBIHOC'02, June 2002.
Accordingly, the above generally emphasizes why the performance of TCP over ad hoc network has usually been the research focus recently. Specifically, since a node in MANET is likely in motion, the communication links between nodes will likely be broken frequently, which often leads to mass packet losses and/or usually degrades TCP performance greatly. As described above, a general feedback-based scheme for improving the TCP performance in ad hoc wireless network has been proposed by K. Chandran, S. Raghunathan, et al.: "A Feedback-Based Scheme for Improving TCP Performance in Ad Hoc Wireless Networks", IEEE Personal Comm., Feb. 2001, pp.34-39. The TCP source typically enters a snooze state after it receives a router failure notification packet and normally freezes its sending window at least until it receives the route reestablishment notification packet.
Another proposal, according to F. Wang, Y. Zhang: "Improving TCP Performance over Mobile Ad-Hoc Networks with Out-of-Order Detection and Response", MOBIHOC'02, June 2002, is to make TCP adapt to frequent route changes, usually by detecting and/or responding to out-of-order packet delivery at the TCP layer. In fact, most of the work deals with the link failure and route change problems typically caused by node mobility.
However, recently studies according to S. Xu, T. Saadawi, "Does the IEEE 802.11 MAC Protocol Work Well in Multihop Wireless Ad hoc Network", IEEE Commun. Mag., June 2001, shows that the performance and fairness of the Medium Control Access (MAC) protocol in ad hoc network normally affects the network layer (routing) and/or transport layer greatly. A conclusion of this document is that the current WLAN IEEE 802.11 DCF does not typically function well in a multihop ad hoc network.
However, as is described below with respect to FIGS. 1(a) and 1(b), all the Medium Access Control (MAC) protocols mentioned above tend to have the same problem.
Namely, the fairness problem was first pointed out by V. Bharghavan, A. Demers, S. Shenker, L. Zhang: "MACAW: A Media Access Protocol for Wireless WLAN's", ACM SIGCOMM, 1994. pp.212-225. This problem occurs mainly because of hidden terminal problems, as well as because of the binary exponential backoff (BEB) scheme used in the Medium Access Control (MAC) protocol.
The general scenario will be described with respect to FIG. 1(a) and (b). There are typically two flows in the illustrated configuration, flow 1 is normally from node N1 to node N2, and flow 2 is usually from node N4 to node N3 in case (a) and in the opposite direction in case (b). The carrier sensing range (and interfering range) is commonly supposed to be the same as the communication range according to V. Bharghavan, A. Demers, S. Shenker, L. Zhang: "MACAW: A Media Access Protocol for Wireless WLAN's", ACM SIGCOMM, 1994. pp.212-225, which is typically different from the supposition according to S. Xu, T. Saadawi, "Does the IEEE 802.11 MAC Protocol Work Well in Multihop Wireless Ad hoc Network", IEEE Commun. Mag., June 2001. A larger sensing range and/or interfering ranges will usually degrade the network performance severely. Therefore, a term range is frequently used to refer both the communication range and sensing/interfering range of a node. The range of a node transmitting data is normally covered by a solid line, while the range of a node receiving data is commonly covered by a dashed line. Since the Request-to-Send/Clear-to-Send (RTS/CTS) handshaking mechanism routinely alleviates the hidden terminal problem, it is generally assumed that Request-to-Send/Clear-to-Send (RTS/CTS) is always used, except for a broadcast frame. In addition, it is typically supposed that both flows have enough traffic, in other words, the transmitting node almost always has data to send.
The configuration according to FIG. 1(a) is commonly symmetric, in other words, the competition between flow 1 and flow 2 is normally fair, at least on a large time scale. However, there typically exists an extreme unfairness on the time scale of seconds. It shall generally be supposed that flow 1 reserves the channel successfully by Request-to-Send/Clear-to-Send (RTS/CTS), then node N3 usually cannot reply the RTS from node N4 because it is normally deferred. Node N4 will generally retransmit the RTS frame again and again until it reaches the retransmission limit, which is usually seven for 802.11 DCF. Since flow 1 typically finishes the packet exchange successfully, it will routinely reduce its contention window (CW) to CWmin, which is normally 31 according to 802.11 DCF. However, the contention window (CW) of node N2 will generally double every time after a failed access, at least until it reaches the retransmission limit and the contention window (CW) will commonly be reset to CWmin again. Usually, the only chance that flow 2 can successfully initiate a transfer is when its RTS happens to arrive during those very short gaps in between a completed data transmission and the next RTS from node N1. The opposite scenario may happen where flow 2 seizes the channel and flow 1 cannot get the channel.
The following observations may be obtained in simulations: If the User Datagram Protocol (UDP) is used as the transport layer protocol, in other words, if there is no congestion control and flow control at the transport layer, then flow 1 usually grabs the channel from one to ten seconds (flow 2 generally cannot send any packet in this period) and, after that, flow 2 commonly grabs the channel and flow 1 cannot send any packet. If the Transport Control Protocol TCP is used as the transport layer protocol, then the results are typically different. When one flow grabs the channel, the other flow usually cannot get the channel, and the TCP agent of that node will normally time-out and/or retransmit at the transport layer, typically causing it to be unlikely to grab the channel again. However, which flow will grab the channel and starve the other flow is often somewhat random.
Similar to the issues as analyzed by V. Bharghavan, A. Demers, S. Shenker, L. Zhang: "MACAW: A Media Access Protocol for Wireless WLAN's", ACM SIGCOMM, 1994. pp.212-225, a key problem is usually the lack of synchronizing information. When one flow (for example, flow 1) grabs the channel, the other flow access will normally be successful only in the short period after the transmission of flow 1 and its next access attempt. However, node N4 commonly has no way of knowing whether node N1 is transmitting. According to V. Bharghavan, A. Demers, S. Shenker, L. Zhang: "MACAW: A Media Access Protocol for Wireless WLAN's", ACM SIGCOMM, 1994. pp.212-225, the problem is often solved by having node N3 not contending on behalf of node N4. Node N3 generally uses a "Request for RTS" (RRTS) to trigger the RTS from node N4. Although a RRTS packet normally works well in the configuration according to FIG. 1(a), it generally cannot solve the contention problem according to FIG. 1(b).
By referring to the configuration according to FIG. 1(b), node N2 (the receiver of flow 1) is commonly in the range of node N3 (the sender of flow 2). The simulation results show that flow 2 grabs the channel while flow 1 is typically completely denied access most of the time, especially when TCP is used at the transport layer. A key problem is commonly not only the lack of synchronizing information. Node N1 is usually trying to contend with node N3 during a very short contention period, but node N1 normally has no way of knowing when this period starts or finishes. The RRTS commonly cannot solve the problem in this scenario at least because, most of the time, when node N1 initiates a data transfer by sending a RTS, node N2 cannot hear it, usually due to node N3's transmission. The situation often persists even when nodes N1 and N3 are synchronized well, in other words, node N1 and N3 start competing to access the channel at the same time using the same contention window (CW) counter. Typically, the only chance that node N1 has to access the channel is when node N3 tries to access the channel after the RTS/CTS exchange of flow 1 is finished. Then, node N3 will usually hear the CTS from node N2 and normally stop trying to access the channel.
The same problem often occurs not only for the 802.11 DCF, but also for all the Medium Access Control (MAC) protocols mentioned above. As may be seen from the previous example, the issue generally lies not only in the lacking of synchronization information, but also in the backoff scheme and/or in the contention window (CW) resetting scheme after a successful transfer of a stream.

Method for enhancing fairness and performance in a multihop ad hoc network and corresponding system


A method and apparatus for cleaning treatment composition containers are disclosed which are capable of taking out photographic treatment compositions in the form of powder, granules, tablets or slurry from the containers without adhesion of the components to the inner wall of the container and residue of the coagulated and solidified substances and as well as cleaning the inside portions of the containers. The method and apparatus for cleaning the containers for the photographic treatment compositions have the steps of mounting containers filled with treatment compositions in the form of powder, granules, tablets or slurry and comprising as a resin, only high-density polyethylene (HDPE) having a density of 0.941 to 0.969 g/cm3 and a melt index of 0.3 g/10 min to 5.0 g/10 min to a cleaning apparatus; opening an opening portion of the container to inject the treatment material into a dissolving tank, and spraying cleaning water into the empty container from a nozzle.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and an apparatus for taking out a photographic treatment composition from a container to clean the empty container when photographic treatment solution for use in an operation for processing silver-halide color photographic photosensitive material is prepared. More particularly, the present invention relates to a method and an apparatus for cleaning a container filled with a photographic treatment composition such that handling and transportation easiness can be realized, apprehension that contact of the photographic treatment composition with the hand occurring when the photographic treatment composition is dissolved can be eliminated and the state of filling is realized to be adaptable to an automatic developing machine.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, a process of a silver-halide photographic photosensitive material, for example, a process of a silver-halide color photographic photosensitive material consists of steps for stabilizing an image including a color developing step, a step for removing silver and a cleaning step using water. In each step, solution (called "processing solution") is used which contains one or more types of processing chemicals except for the cleaning step using water. Since each processing solution has a relatively low density, it is improper that manufacture of each solution in a state in which the solution can be used, transportation of the solutions to a processing laboratory and preservation of the same are performed. The reason for this lies in that reduction in the cost and preserving space cannot be realized and easy handling is not permitted. Therefore, so-called rich processing solution is usually delivered which is obtained by filling a container with rich solution arranged to be diluted with water so as to be used.
The process for raising the concentration of the photographic treatment solution in the uniform liquid phase encounters a limitation because of restraint of the solubility and reactions of components. Therefore, the volume and weight cannot satisfactorily be reduced. Hence it follows that a suggestion has been made that the photographic treatment composition is formed into powder, granules, tablets or slurry so as to reduce the volume and the weight.
Although the foregoing method is effective to reduce the volume and the weight, there arises a problem in that collapsed fine particles in the composition in the form of powder, granules, tablets or slurry and coagulated and solidified fine particles adhere to the inner surface of the container and remain on the foregoing surface. A portion of the components of a solid photographic treatment composition, such as the tablets or granules, firmly adheres to the inner surface of the container because of slight moisture adsorption. Thus, the portion cannot easily be removed. The foregoing portion raises a problem from viewpoints of environmental conservation, safety work and recycling of the containers.
It is preferable that the container for the photographic treatment composition is reused to effectively utilize the resources. To achieve the foregoing object, a method has been disclosed in, for example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 8-220722 and Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 6-82988, the method having the steps of discharging the components from the container; and cleaning the inside portion of the container with water.
When the foregoing method is applied to the components in the form of powder, granules, tablets or slurry such that cleaning water is poured to the solid or slurry particles, local coagulation and solidification occur. Thus, a portion of the component remains in the container and, therefore, the portion cannot easily be discharged from the container. When the components is in the form of the slurry, the particles of the components are introduced into the container. Thus, the slurry components cannot easily be removed by cleaning using water.
When the form of the photographic treatment composition is changed from the rich composition solution in a uniform phase to the components in the form of powder, granules, tablets or slurry, the volume and the weight can be reduced. Thus, easy transportation and handling and cost reduction can be realized. However, the foregoing problems must be overcome.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Cleaning container for photographic treatment composition