A communication scheme for supporting data transfer to a visited site of a mobile terminal which moves across a private network operated by a private address system and an Internet operated by a global address system is disclosed. When the mobile terminal has moved from the first network to the second network, packets destined to an original home address of the mobile terminal on the first subnet are transferred from the first router device in the first subnet by setting an address of the first interface of a packet relay device as a care-of address of the mobile terminal. Then, the packets received by the packet relay device from the first router device at the first interface are transferred to the second router device in the second subnet through the second interface of the packet relay device, and the packets received by the second router device from the packet relay device are transferred to a current location address of the mobile terminal.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a communication scheme for supporting data transfer to a visited site of a mobile terminal which moves across a private network operated by a private address system and an Internet operated by a global address system.
2. Description of the Background Art
A router device is used in connecting between LANs, and plays a role of transferring data packets (datagrams) from one LAN to the other LAN. Each data packet contains a description of its source and final destination network layer addresses (such as IP addresses in the case of IP, for example) in addition to communication data to be transferred, and the router device determines an output interface (port number) and a next transfer target node (a host that is either a router device or a communication terminal) of each data packet according to its address information.
Here, a routing by the router device will be described for an exemplary case of transmitting IP packets from a terminal A to a terminal B on a network.
An IP packet sent out from the terminal A is routed within the Internet according to an IP address written in its packet header, and transmitted up to a subnet to which the terminal B belongs. At that point, whenever a router device within the Internet is passed through, an IP forwarding processing in a sequence of: reception of a datalink layer packet→conversion into an IP packet→processing of an IP header Information, etc. and an output target determination→conversion into a datalink layer packet→transmission of a datalink layer packet, is carried out with respect to an IP packet transmitted from the terminal A. Once it reaches to a router device of the final subnet, a logical address to physical address conversion is carried out by ARP (Address Resolution Protocol) (by obtaining a MAC address from an IP address, for example), and an IP packet is converted into a datalink layer packet by attaching a datalink layer header information such as MAC address, and this datalink layer packet is transmitted to the terminal B.
On the other hand, a technique for accommodating mobile terminals into the Internet-like network has been studied and developed. As one such mobile access technique, a scheme utilizing Mobile IP is known.
Mobile IP deals with the case where a user carrying a mobile terminal communicates while moving over the IP network across a plurality of subnets. In the case of communicating while moving over the IP network where the network address of the mobile terminal changes as the location of the terminal changes, there is a need to provide a scheme for managing a location of the terminal and transferring communication contents properly, and Mobile IP is a scheme that is proposed in order to fulfill that need. Mobile IP is a technique which makes the mobile terminal to appear to the other terminals as if it is connected at a location where it is normally expected to be located (a home address of a home network), regardless of a location at which the mobile terminal is connected on the network. Mobile IP has been promoted to RFC level by IETF in October, 1996.
In the following, the basic operation of Mobile IP will be described with reference to FIG. 1, which shows an exemplary network configuration in which a first network 100-1 and a second network 100-2 are connected through Internet 100-3. Here, each of these networks is assumed to be operated using global addresses.
In Mobile IP, a network (home network) 100-1 to which a mobile terminal (mobile host: MH) 103 is normally connected has a router called home agent (HA) 105 located therein. The mobile terminal 103 is assigned with a home address at the home network, which is managed by the home agent 105. Here, for the sake of explanation, it is assumed that the home address of the mobile terminal 103 is "10.2" and the address of its home agent 105 is "10.1".
Next, suppose that the mobile terminal 103 moves and makes a connection at a visited site network 100-2. The visited site network 100-2 has a router called foreign agent (FA) 106 located therein. After moving, the mobile terminal 103 receives packets destined to the own node via this foreign agent 106. Here, for the sake of explanation, it is assumed that the IP address of the foreign agent 106 is "20.1". In this case, the address "20.1" of the foreign agent 106 will be used as the current location address (called care-of address) of the mobile terminal 103.
In order to notify the current location of the own node, the mobile terminal 103 notifies the IP address "20.1" of the current location from the visited site to the home agent 105. Upon receiving this notification, the home agent 105 manages a correspondence between the home address "10.2" and the current location address "20.1" of the mobile terminal 103.
Now, Mobile IP assumes that there exists a correspondent host who does not know that the mobile terminal 103 has moved. This correspondent host (CH) 109 that tries to communicate with the mobile terminal 103 does not know that the mobile terminal 103 has moved so that it transmits packets destined to the home address "10.2". However, the mobile terminal 103 is currently absent from the home network. Hence, the home agent 105 which manages this mobile terminal 103 intercepts (receives as a proxy) a packet destined to the home address "10.2", and transfers it by encapsulating it into an IP packet destined to the current location address "20.1" that is registered in advance. The foreign agent 106 that is located at the address "20.1" takes out this packet from the encapsulated packet that is transferred thereto, and delivers it to the visiting mobile terminal 103 at the datalink layer. By such a mechanism, the mobile terminal 103 can receive a packet that would have been received by the own node at its original home network 100-1, even at its visited site.
In the opposite case where the mobile terminal 103 returns a packet to the correspondent host 109 from its current location, an IP packet is sent to the correspondent host 109 directly without going through the home agent 105. At that point, the home address "10.2" is used as a source address to be attached to that packet, rather than the current location (care-of) address "20.1". In this way, it appears as if the mobile terminal 103 is continually connected to its home network, from the correspondent host 109, so that the influence of the moving can be eliminated entirely.
As described above, in Mobile IP, each node (correspondent host) on the network can access the mobile terminal 103 regardless of a location on the network at which the mobile terminal 103 is connected, by using the home address of the home network 103.
Now, in the Mobile IP scheme, a protocol is designed by assuming only a case where the mobile terminal moves within a single address space. That is, it has been assumed that the current location registration message (which is also referred to as the mobility registration message) from the visited site can reach the home agent of the home network without failure.
However, nowadays, in the case where a large organization makes Internet connections, it is rather rare to have global IP addresses allocated to all the nodes within the organization because of the shortage of IP addresses, and usually private addresses (see RFC 1597) are used for operation within the organization and the address conversion to global addresses are carried out at a time of communications with the external.
Thus, in such a case, Mobile IP can be utilized only within a range where the mobile terminal moves within a single address space. In other words, there has been a problem that Mobile IP cannot support those services in which the mobile terminal is allowed to move across networks operated by mutually different address systems.
FIG. 2 shows an exemplary case where Mobile IP cannot be utilized, which is a network model in which a communication service provider offers a service using mobile terminals that are capable of making Internet accesses. FIG. 2 shows an exemplary network configuration in which a private network 101 operated by a private address system and a global Internet 102-2 operated by a global address system are connected through Internet 102-1 operated by a global address system.
The number of global addresses that are allocated to one communication service provider is limited, so that communications using private addresses will be carried out within the private network 101 operated by the communication service provider. This service can possibly be required to support not only data transfer in the case where the mobile terminal 103 moved from the home network 101a to another subnet 101b and accesses to servers 201 and 202 of the private network 101 by the mobile terminal 103, but also accesses to a server 203 which is generally connected to the global Internet 102-1 from within the private network 101 by using a network address translation device 104 having a network address translation (NAT) function, and direct communications by the mobile terminal 103 that has moved to the global Internet 102-2 in a global region.
However, when the mobile terminal 103 which has its home network in a private region moves into a global region, Mobile IP cannot be used. On the contrary, when the mobile terminal which has its home network in a global region moves into a private region, Mobile IP also cannot be used.
In such a network model, it is not sufficient to realize a simple packet exchange between the private network and the global Internet, and it is also necessary to maintain currently carried out communications by utilizing the properties of Mobile IP even in a case where the mobile terminal that had been connected to the private network shortly before has now moved to the global Internet or vise versa.
In order to realize that, it is necessary to carry out the routing control of communication packets by recognizing the current location to which the mobile terminal has moved, comprehending a relative relationship with respect to a location to which the mobile terminal had been connected shortly before, and carrying out the necessary global to private address translation via the entrance of the private network.
As described above, in general, in order to support the mobile terminal which moves across the private network operated by the communication service provider and the global Internet by utilizing the Mobile IP scheme, it is necessary to provide a scheme for controlling a location to be regarded as the current home network according to the current location and the immediately previous location of the mobile terminal and a way of commanding transfer of packets to the current location with respect to the immediately previous home network, and for realizing the routing control up to the final destination by receiving the transmitted or transferred packet at the border between the private network and the global network and converting it into appropriate format.
Thus, in the case of supporting a service in which the mobile terminal can move across networks operated by mutually different address systems, the conventionally known mobile access technique for Internet-like network such as the usual mobile management by Mobile IP in a single address space is insufficient, and there is a need for a mechanism which can properly account for two types of address spaces such as the private network operated by the private address system managed by the communication service provider and the general global Internet, and realize not only the packet exchange across their border but also the proper routing control of packets up to the current location even when the mobile terminal moves across their border.

Mobile computer communication scheme supporting moving among networks of different address systems


A method and apparatus for relocating a storage such that a physical address area of the storage, which is allocated to an absolute address area, is replaced with a new physical address area. This relocation process is performed with a Floating Address Register for translating an absolute address into a physical address in a hierarchy storage system including a main storage and a store-in cache memory, thereby reducing a stopping time of the main storage during the relocation process. According to the method, data of the area of object physical addresses to be relocated is fetched into a block of the cache memory, and then the new physical addresses of the storage are allocated to the absolute address to which the old physical addresses have been allocated.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a storage for a computer, for example, and more particularly to the relocation of data stored in the storage.
2. Related Arts
Many existing large computers are equipped with a translation table called FAR (Floating Address Register) for translating an absolute address into a physical address and are able to allocate every predetermined split unit of an absolute address space to an arbitrary physical memory element. This feature is useful, for example, for maintenance of memory units. In general, the FAR can be modified only while a system is not operating.
Heretofore, when intending to modify a FAR while the system is operating, the following procedures would be necessary for preventing any misoperation. Firstly, access to a storage is temporarily stopped. Then physical addresses are modified and storage data is transferred from old physical addresses to new physical addresses, whereupon access to the storage is restarted.
Such prior technology is exemplified by Japanese Patent Publication No. 21222/1988. The operational principles of a store-in cache described above are conventional and is described in, for example, Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 290550/1986.
With the foregoing prior art, during moving of the stored data with modification of the physical addresses, it is necessary to stop access to the storage. During that time, therefore, the operation of an apparatus utilizing the storage would be stopped.
A problem with some kinds of apparatuses is that the response speed of the storage would be lowered due to this stopping.

Storage relocating method and hierarchy storage system utilizing a cache memory


A power generation system includes a converter configured for supplying power from a constrained power or energy source to a power network and a control system configured for balancing instantaneously available power from the constrained source against demanded load from the power network by dynamically adjusting power network voltage, power network frequency, or a combination of power network voltage and power network frequency.

The invention relates generally to power generation systems and more particularly to systems configured for supplying power from constrained power or energy sources.
Small and medium size generators are increasingly being considered for use in distribution networks because of the changing regulatory and market environment and because of the potential for energy savings and service improvements which may result from such use. A strong interest also exists in distributed generator (DG) systems that provide backup power capability and grid independent operation.
Grid independent operation occurs when a system of generators operates independently of the bulk power system to deliver power to loads at nominal voltage and frequency within an acceptable tolerance band. Grid independent operation can be extremely challenging for DG systems supplying dynamic loads such as motors, especially when non-conventional generators such as fuel cells, wind turbines, micro-turbines, or batteries, for example, are coupled with power electronic converters having limited current handling capability and no contribution to system inertia. In a traditional power system, when load demands are suddenly increased, the power required to support the load is instantly provided by the system inertia. The output of the power source is then increased to satisfy the load. For this reason, grid independent systems with limited or no physical inertia to support changing load conditions are difficult to operate successfully.
A mini-grid is a power system where a diverse set of local generation assets and controls are integrated to satisfy local loads. A mini-grid can be operated in a grid connected or islanded mode.
The voltage strength of a node in an AC power system where a mini-grid is connected can be estimated using the Short Circuit Ratio (SCR). SCR is defined as Ssc divided by SMG wherein, Ssc is the three-phase short circuit power at the node of connection when the mini-grid is disconnected (expressed in kVA), and SMG is the sum of the apparent power rating of the generation and energy storage equipment in the mini-grid (expressed in kVA). A node of a power system is defined to be weak if the SCR is less than 3.
The frequency strength of a power system can be estimated using the following ratio: Hsys divided by PMG, wherein Hsys is the rotational stored energy of the power system (expressed in kW·s); PMG is the sum of the active power rating of the generation and energy storage equipment in the mini-grid (Expressed in kW). A power system is defined to be weak if this ratio is less than 5 s.
It is desirable to have the capability to operate dynamic loads with constrained generation resources in weak or isolated grid networks and more specifically in low inertia mini-grid networks.


The present invention relates to the conversion of signals from RF to baseband using transition functions, or edge functions. These functions typically transition from positive to negative, or from negative to positive, synchronously with the transition of the received pulse signal, effecting detection essentially by synchronously rectifying a signal cycle of the received pulse, producing a net signal at baseband that can be further processed to detect modulation according to the modulation format. It is further disclosed how to configure these systems for optimal reception with a filter optimized for a given detect signal function. Generalizations of the matched filter embodiment lead to further embodiments employing alternative detection functions. Also disclosed is a two-stage version which applies a decode signal to the rectified signal. This step can be performed by a single correlator or by a plurality of correlators in parallel. Coding methods are disclosed to employ two-stage systems for enhanced channelization, and interference rejection.

In the field of ultra wideband transmission, there have been numerous methods devised to convert the radio frequency (RF) signal to baseband for further demodulation. One method uses a template pulse, a pulse similar to that of the received pulsed, generated within the receiver, correlated with, or simply multiplied with the received pulse and integrated to increase signal-to-noise ratio. Another example of this method is the transmit reference method which uses a delayed version of the received pulse as the template pulse. Another method correlates a sampling, or gating, pulse with the received. Impulse radios often use coherent detection methods, e.g., synchronous mixing of received pulses with gating pulses (also referred to as sampling pulses) or template pulses, along with integration of the output, to convert pulsed signals to base band. Gating pulses or template pulses are used as mixing pulses in order to increase pulse strength prior to integration. Typically, the mixing pulses are applied such that the template pulses substantially coincide with the peak of the received pulses.
A problem with these methods arises, however. The template and/or gating pulses are typically 150 picoseconds or less. For gigapulse transmission rates, the system must resample within 1 nanosecond. The template pulse generator, and correlator are iteratively powered and unpowered during this process resulting in two edges required for each conversion. These two edges must be carefully timed relative to one another and must have a rapid transition rate for high data rate systems. In addition, re-energizing the detection circuitry takes some appreciable amount of time and, thus creates inherent data latency. Current timing circuitry has difficulty responding to such a timing demand.
The time required to re-energize the detection circuitry at the sample rate places a limit on the achievable data rate. This is particularly relevant to high data rate systems, which tend to rely on high-chip rates to advance the data stream. High chipping rate systems are often preferred for very high data rate or high channel capacity systems. In these systems, events (pulses, clocks, samples, etc.) occur in rapid succession. Each event requires a settling time before a new event can occur without undue coupling from one to the next. Circuitry implementing these methods tends to be unduly complex and because of the amount of components involved, results in limits on the minimum size of devices employing this technology.
Thus, a new method for converting RF signals to baseband is required that requires less complex circuitry yet enables high chipping rates. In addition, an apparatus employing this method is needed.

Method and apparatus for converting RF signals to baseband


The present invention relates to a circuit (100) for breaking alternating current, the circuit (100) comprising: an input (102) arranged to receive an alternating current (AC); an output (104) arranged to provide the alternating current (AC) to at least one electrical load (200n); at least one controllable switch (106; 108) coupled between the input (102) and the output (104); an impedance network (Z) coupled between the input (102) and the output (104); a controller (110) coupled to a reference ground (112) common to the controller (110) and the at least one controllable switch (106; 108), wherein the controller (110) is arranged to measure at least one measuring voltage (V1; V2) between a node of the impedance network (Z) and the reference ground (112) and to control the at least one controllable switch (106; 108), so as to control the breaking of the alternating current (AC) provided to the at least one electrical load (200n), based on the value of the measured at least one measuring voltage (V1; V2).

Circuits for breaking alternating current (AC) is known in the art.
One solution is the well-known fuse which breaks the current if an applied current is larger than a nominal value, i.e. an overcurrent. The applied current is broken as the metal wire or strip of the fuse melts due to the overcurrent.
Another solution known in the art is a circuit breaker which is arranged to protect electrical circuits, including electrical loads, from damage caused by overcurrent. Unlike the fuse, the circuit breaker can be reset manually or automatically to resume normal operation.

Circuit for breaking alternating current


A thermographic device has a elongated handle, provided with a small fan (3), and a frame (6) and an image acquisition camera (9) provided at the respective ends of the handle. The frame is provided with a quick coupling (7) for a thermographic plate and the fan is suitable to blow air onto the surface of the organ to be examined before resting the thermographic plate.

1. Field of the invention
The present invention relates to a thermographic device for examining the blood circulation of particular organs, such as for example the breast, the thyroid or others.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The state of the art includes thermographic devices which are constituted by a frame for supporting a heat-sensitive plate (that is to say, a plate whose surface is slightly deformable and changes in color in certain points according to the temperature of the surface against which it is rested) and by a photographic camera with color film for taking photographs of the heat-sensitive plate.
The images that can be obtained with currently commercially available devices often have haloes which are difficult to read and interpret, due to the fact that it is not possible to discriminate whether the thermal situation detected by skin contact is due to superficial blood flow or to deep vessel flow.
In addition to this, the heat signal due to deep circulation diverges as it moves away from the vessel and toward the surface of the body: for example at the regions affected by the large deep vessels of the breasts, currently obtainable thermographic images have large haloes with blurred contours and dimensions which are significantly larger than the actual dimensions of the deep vessels.
It has been found experimentally that the less a thermographic examination is disturbed by the thermal situation due to surface blood flow, the more it improves in significance, reliability and unequivocally of interpretation.
In practice, it has been found that if the surface of the organ to be examined, for example the breasts, is cooled appropriately before resting the thermographic plate, the images that form on the plate are first of all less disturbed by the heat due to surface blood flow and secondly, over time, are affected by the heat that gradually arrives from the deep regions: essentially, it is possible to choose, among the images that appear sequentially, those that are most significant and indicative of the thermal and circulatory situation at the various depths of the organ.
An aim of the present invention is to obviate the above cited drawbacks of conventional devices.
An object of the invention is to provide a thermographic device which allows to produce images which are affected to a limited extent by surface blood circulation and allows to obtain a series of images from which it is possible to clearly detect the situation of functional blood circulation at various depths.
A further object of the present invention is to provided a device constituted by components which are easy to manufacture, procure and assemble, be intuitive and safe in use and effective in operation, and to require limited maintenance.

Thermographic device for examining the blood circulation


One implementation provides a method for acquiring knowledge from multiple knowledge bases in a knowledge repository. The method includes identifying first and second knowledge bases within the knowledge repository by analyzing a search request received from a client system. The first knowledge base contains knowledge of a first type and the second knowledge base contains knowledge of a second type. The method further includes generating instructions that, when executed, cause first and second requests to be sent to the knowledge repository in sequential fashion to acquire knowledge from the first and second knowledge bases, such that the second request is sent after the first request, and such that the second request includes knowledge of the first type from the first knowledge base acquired in response to the first request.

In today's technology age, information and information sources are plentiful. On the World Wide Web, for example, individuals are capable of obtaining information from all over the world. Database and web servers may provide users with information about fixing a car, buying products or services, and the like. By using search engines, an individual can quickly and easily search for information by entering a series of search terms.
Search engines often provide compilation and retrieval services. One example of a compilation service involves the use of "spiders" that crawl through the World Wide Web and search for web sites and web-site content. The information from these web sites is then compiled into search indexes. A master index may be used to store references to the various web sites and also to store information contained in the web-site content. Certain terms may be associated with the entries stored in the master index. Then, when an individual user enters one or more search terms during a search operation, the search engine references its master index to locate web-site references or web-site content associated with terms that match those from the user's search request.
Because of the growing amount of data contained within the World Wide Web and other information sources, it often may be difficult for users to obtain all of the information they need by using only a single search request. For example, if a user wants to obtain information from within a company's Intranet, the user may need to execute multiple searches and access multiple knowledge bases, or information sources, to retrieve all of the needed information. Alternatively, a service field agent may need to execute multiple searches and collect information from various different sources when interacting with customers.


A system for analyzing the impact of operating soot blowers in a heat transfer section of a power plant determines a steam temperature influencing sequence and calculates a feed-forward signal to be applied to a steam temperature control system of the heat transfer section. The system operates a group of soot blowers for a number of times and collects quantitative data related to the steam temperature during and after each soot blowing operation. A computer program used by the system analyzes the quantitative data, generates a number of statistical parameters for evaluating the impact of operating the soot blowers according to a given sequence on the steam temperature, and determines whether the given sequence is a steam temperature influencing sequence. Consequently, the system determines a feed-forward signal based on the steam temperature influencing sequence and applies the feed-forward signal to a steam temperature control system used by the heat transfer section to compensate for any adverse impact of soot blowing.

Electric power plants generate electricity using various types of power generators, which may be categorized, depending on the energy used to generate electricity, into thermal, nuclear, wind, hydroelectric, etc., generators. Each of these various types of generators operates under different sets of constraints. For example, an output of a thermal generator is a function of the amount of heat generated in a boiler, wherein the amount of heat is determined by the amount of fuel that can be burned per hour, etc. Additionally, the output of the thermal generator may also be dependent upon the heat transfer efficiency of the boiler used to burn the fuel. Similar types of constraints exist with other types of electric power plants. Moreover, for most power plants using boilers, the desired steam temperature set-points at final superheater and reheater outlets are constant and it is necessary to maintain steam temperature close to the set-points within a narrow range at all load levels.
Fuel burning electric power generators operate by burning fuel to generate steam from water traveling through a number of pipes and tubes in the boiler. The steam is used to generate electricity in one or more turbines. However, burning of certain types of fuel, such as coal, oil, waste material, etc., also generates a substantial amount of soot, slag, ash and other deposits ("soot") on various surfaces in the boilers, including the inner walls of the boiler as well as on the exterior walls of the tubes carrying the water through the boiler. The soot deposited in the boiler has various deleterious effects on the rate of heat transfer from the boiler to the water and thus on the efficiency of power generators using the boilers. Therefore, it is necessary to address the problem of soot in fuel burning power plants that burn coal, oil, and other such fuels that generate soot. It should be noted that while not all fuel burning power plants generate soot, for the remainder of this patent the term "fuel burning power plants" is used to refer to those power plants that generate soot.
Various solutions are used to address the problems caused by generation and presence of soot deposits in boilers of fuel burning power plants. For example, fuel burning power plants use soot removing devices or equipment known as soot blowers as part of operating boilers. Fuel burning power plants use various types of soot blowers to spray cleaning materials through nozzles, which are located on the gas side of the boiler walls and/or on other heat exchange surfaces. Such soot blowers use any of the various media such as saturated steam, superheated steam, compressed air, water, etc., for removing soot from the boilers.
However, soot blowing activity affects many aspects of boiler operations. For example, soot blowing affects heat transfer efficiency, steam temperature control, levels of NOX inside the boilers, etc. For example, soot blowing in a water wall section of a boiler increases heat absorption rate in the water wall section, which reduces the temperature of the flue gas leaving the furnace section of the boiler. As a result, the flue gases entering the convection section may have a lower temperature, resulting in lower heat absorption in a superheat section and a reheat section of the boiler, and therefore, reducing the steam temperature in these sections as well. On the other hand, soot blowing in the convection section of a boiler increases the heat absorption rate, resulting in increased steam temperature.
Various qualitative effects of soot blowing are well known. However, it is difficult to determine precise quantitative impact of soot blowing on the efficiency and steam temperature of fuel burning power plants. Compensation techniques used by existing control systems include using a feedback PID controller that modulates at least one of spray flow levels, burner tilts, and flue gas bypass dampers, to compensate for the effect of soot blowing. However, often such feedback compensation action is reactionary and it may cause significant steam temperature swings. Therefore, it is necessary to develop a systematic method of constructing a feed-forward signal to compensate for the impacts of soot blowing.
In today's competitive electrical utility industry where utilities use various sophisticated control systems to manage operating costs and increase efficiency of power generators, it is important to understand the effects of operating soot blowers so that operators and control systems may make informed decisions about how to compensate for the disturbances caused by soot blowing. Thus, there is a need to provide better quantitative information about the impact of soot blowing so that any adverse or negative impact of soot blowing can be compensated for more effectively.

Method and apparatus for improving steam temperature control

Emerson Process Management Power & Water Solutions, Inc.


A heat cycle system and a control method. The heat cycle system includes: driving devices, one or a plurality of outdoor units, and a plurality of indoor units, which are connected by pipelines; a bypass pipeline for the plurality of indoor units, a bypass valve being disposed in the bypass pipeline; a pressure sensor that senses a pressure difference ΔPo across the plurality of outdoor units; and a controller that is preset with a pressure difference set value ΔPset, wherein the controller calculates a pressure offset parameter ΔP=ΔPo−ΔPset and adjusts an opening degree of the bypass valve based on the pressure offset parameter ΔP so that the pressure offset parameter ΔP approaches zero, and wherein the controller is preset with a first pressure offset threshold P1, and the controller is configured such that closed indoor units enter a bypass mode one by one when ΔP>P1, until ΔP≤P1.

Common thermal cycle systems include a pump, a plurality of outdoor units and a plurality of indoor units, which are connected by pipelines. A cooling medium such as water passes through the outdoor units when driven by the pump, and in the outdoor units, it exchanges heat with a refrigerant in a cooling cycle of the outdoor units via a heat exchange device such as a plate heat exchanger. When a flow rate of the cooling medium passing through the outdoor units is lower than a set value, such as 70% of a rated flow rate, there is a risk that the cooling medium will freeze in the outdoor units. Therefore, a bypass pipeline may be provided so that a part of the cooling medium does not pass through the indoor units, thereby ensuring the flow rate of the cooling medium flowing through the outdoor units.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Thermal cycling system and control method of the thermal cycling system


A medical container comprising a body for containing a medicament, the body of the medical container being formed of a multilayered film comprising (i) a layer formed of a linear polyolefin and (ii) a layer formed of a cyclic polyolefin adjacent to the layer (i), and the layer (i) formed of the linear polyolefin satisfying the following conditions (a) and/or (b):                Condition (a): an amount of a liquid component, which remains after Soxhlet's extraction with organic solvents followed by evaporation of the solvents, is 0.2% by weight or less, and        Condition (b): a branching degree of a component, which remains after Soxhlet's extraction with n-hexane followed by evaporation of n-hexane, is 50 or less per 1,000 carbon atoms.

Heretofore, as a container containing a medicament, there has widely been used a container using a single-layered film formed of a linear polyolefin or a multilayered film comprising a linear polyolefin layer and a polymer layer having barrier properties against moisture or a gas. Also, the use of a multilayered film comprising these films bonded to each other using an adhesive has recently been approved by revision of the Pharmacopoeia in Japan and a medical container provided with various performances has been developed, and thus it becomes possible to contain various medicaments in such a container.
However, since it has become possible to contain various medicaments as a result of the improvement in the performances of the container, there may arise problems such as decrease in the content of an active ingredient of a medicament due to an interaction between a low molecular weight component eluted into the container from the linear polyolefin layer and/or the adhesive layer, increase in the content of related substances, increase in the content of insoluble fine particles in a liquid medicament and the like.
Under these circumstances, there is an apprehension that any adverse influence is exerted on the medicament to be packed. To dispel such an apprehension, there has been proposed, as a polyolefin packing material which is less likely to be adversely influence, a polyolefin packing material for packing a medicament, which contains 150 ppm or less of a substance having 12 or more and 26 or less carbon atoms, and is obtained by treating a linear low-density polyethylene resin at a resin temperature of 170 to 230° C. under reduced pressure of 10 Torr or less using a Vent-type extruder (see Japanese Patent No. 2,826,643 which is referred to below). Also, as a packing material for foods, beverages or drugs, which is less likely to cause elution of a low molecular weight substance, there hwe been proposed a low elution packing material obtained by laminating a sealant layer (for example, a linear low-density polyethylene or non-stretched polypropylene film) on a base material via a cyclic olefin copolymer layer or a blend polymer layer formed of a cyclic olefin copolymer and a polyolefin resin (see Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication (Kokai) No. 2001-162724 which is referred to below)[0005]
However, a medical container using these packing materials has a problem in that when a drug is a solid medicament (for example, a powdered medicament) which is mixed with a dissolving liquid to prepare a liquid medicament upon use, insoluble fine particles in the liquid medicament increase. Also, it is required for such a medical container to have suitability as to radiation exposure upon irradiation sterilization, in addition to the suitability as to high temperature sterilization such as high pressure steam sterilization, hot water sterilization or the like.    Patent Reference 1: Japanese Patent No. 2,826,643    Patent Reference 1: Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication (Kokai) No. 2001-162724

Medical container and medical duplex container


An impasto pattern representing a desired character or mark is formed on a stretchable support, typically sportswear fabric by extruding a high viscosity liquid silicone rubber composition to the support through a nozzle of a robotic applicator having a picture drawing function to form a predetermined pattern of impasto extrudate on the support, and curing the extrudate.

Casual wear becomes more fashionable. For example, T-shirts having colorful well-designed characters and marks printed thereon are popular. Sportswear also becomes colorful. For example, baseball uniforms bear numbers on the back. Clothing items for tennis, golf, swimming, aerobics and wind surfing bear attractive characters and marks thereon.
These characters and marks printed on such clothing items are generally planar. In order that such patterns be more fashionable or attractive, it is recently desired for marks and designs to have a thickness, that is, to provide an impasto or raised or three-dimensional pattern. A common practice is to attach a shaped piece of thick fabric to clothing fabric. Since most sportswear uses stretchable fabric, pieces to be attached thereto are also required to be stretchable. At present, pieces of rubber each cut to a shape are bonded to the fabric base with a hot-melt adhesive. This method, however, requires a step of cutting rubber to one or more pieces having a desired shape of character or symbol to collectively form a certain mark. The cutting step yields a quantity of waste rubber. This results in an increased cost.
It was proposed to print a room temperature vulcanizable silicone rubber to fabric as disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication (JP-B) No. 17715/1978. This method, however, requires a long time to cure and is thus unsuitable for commercial use.
Swimming caps of silicone rubber are made fashionable by printing marking ink to the cap surface by a screen printing technique. Few ink prints can be thick or impasto. One proposal for producing a sterographic feel is by engraving a mold to define a three-dimensional pattern of character or mark, pouring marking ink into the engraved mold, and transferring the ink molding to a swimming cap under pressure as disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Kokai (JP-A) No. 312110/1988. This method requires engraving of a mold for every pattern, resulting in an increased cost.


In a plug for an electrical plug connection, having a contact carrier joined together of an upper part and a lower part, the upper part and the lower part having plug chambers that are aligned with one another, and the plug chambers of the lower part having electrical contacts for contacting by electrical contacts of a mating connector that reach through the plug chambers of the upper part, having a matting seal for sealing the plug chambers and having a pressure plate pressing on the matting seal, it is provided that the matting seal is situated between the upper and lower parts of the contact carrier, and the pressure plate is integrated into the upper part.

In known plugs of this kind, a sealing mat, or rather matting seal (e.g. a rubber mat or a gel mat) is provided for the protection of the contacting locations of the plug. For this purpose, the contact pins, that preferably have a round cross section, of a mating connector are sealed by the sealing matting applied in the plug in response to the introduction of the mating connector. It is prevented thereby that, for example, water is able to reach the contacting locations from the mating connector via its contact pins, and trigger corrosion there. In order to obtain this sealing mat as a sound sealing element within the meaning of a complete sealing, in spite of contact pins having pierced through it, elastic material (such as rubber) or material that continues to flow (such as gel) is used for the sealing mat, and the sealing or the material that continues to flow is supported using a pressure plate. The sealing matting is clamped in place between the contact carrier's upper part of the plug and the pressure plate which is latched to the upper part of the contact carrier. The electrical contacts of the plug are provided on the contact carrier's lower part, which is connected to the upper part of the contact carrier. Therefore, the plug always has to be equipped with the pressure plate, in order for the sealing mat to be held to the upper part of the contact carrier, that is, in order to be present in the condition in which it can perform its function. From this, there follows an additional material and assembling expenditure in the production of such a plug. Additional tools and assembly steps are also required for the production of the pressure plate, which, together with the assembly, represents a considerable additional expenditure.


Apparatus and means for attaching the head-suspension assembly to the actuator arm in a disk drive. A head-suspension assembly in a first fabrication step is permanently fastened to a nut plate, for example, by laser welding. The nut plate is fastened to the suspension assembly on the suspension surface that faces away from the nearby recording disk when the disk drive is fully assembled. Another aspect of this invention is the use of heat-activated thermosetting adhesive. The head-suspension assembly with the affixed nut plate is fastened to an actuator arm with a heat-activated adhesive film. In one embodiment, the adhesive is applied to both sides of a thin plastic film for ease of handling and application. In another embodiment, the adhesive is made electrically conductive to provide an electrically-conductive path between the actuator arm and the head-suspension assembly. In one such embodiment, the plastic film separating the two layers of electrically-conductive adhesive is perforated to allow contact between the two layers of adhesive that forms an electrically-conductive path.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the field of disk drives, and more specifically to a method and apparatus for fastening a head-suspension assembly to a rigid actuator arm for a hard disk drive.
2. Description of the Related Art
The data storage capacity of a hard disk drive is determined by its volumetric recording bit density, i.e., the number of recording bits per unit volume that the disk drive can use. Using one or more recording disks in a hard disk drive, the total available bit storage capacity in a hard disk drive is a function of the following parameters: the number of recording bits per recording track on a surface of a recording disk, the number of recording tracks on the surface of the recording disk, the number of recording surfaces for each recording disk, and the number of recording disks contained in the hard disk drive. To increase the data storage capacity of a hard disk drive, one may increase any or all of the above parameters. There is, accordingly, a clearly felt need to more effectively use the space within a disk-drive enclosure as well as a need to increase the durability of the drive through increased shock protection. More efficient use of space can increase the number of recording disks within the hard disk drive (which greatly increases the amount of data that can be stored) and/or provide additional space for other internal components.
A head-suspension assembly for a disk drive typically includes a magnetic transducer, called the read/write head, capable of detecting and/or changing the magnetic transitions on the magnetic recording surface of a magnetic recording disk. The read/write head is typically fixed to a gimbal assembly that enables the read/write head to fly above, or be in full or partial contact with, a moving magnetic recording surface. The gimbal assembly is fastened to a load beam, and may be formed out of load beam material. The load beam is typically made of thin, somewhat flexible material, usually metal. The head-suspension assembly is typically fastened to an actuator arm. The actuator arm is moved by the control electronics of the disk drive to position the read/write head over different portions (tracks) of the magnetic recording surface. Moving the read/write head from one track on the magnetic recording surface to another track on the same magnetic recording surface, so that the read/write head can read the data on the new track requires a time interval called access time. Another factor affecting drive performance is rotational latency time, which is the time it takes the disk to rotate from the present location on the desired track to the location of the desired data on the same track.
One constraint on developers of hard disk drives is the "form factor" (the defined physical dimensions) imposed on a hard disk drive to be competitive within the market-place. In particular, each form factor defines a height that drives must match so that the drive fits correctly into standard openings in devices using the drives, such as personal computers and other electronic devices. Increasing the number of magnetic recording disks within a given form factor reduces the spacing between adjacent magnetic recording disks. The actuator arms and associated suspensions and magnetic read/write heads operate within the space between adjacent disks, and on the outfacing surfaces above and below the "top" and "bottom" disks respectively. The assembly and operation of the read/write heads is more difficult because the reduction of the space for the read/write headsuspensions places the head-suspension materials in close proximity to the moving disk surface.
The typical read/write head-suspension assembly includes a load beam that is welded to a nut plate. The nut plate provides a stiff weldment for the suspension and the means for attaching the suspension to the disk-drive actuator arm. One commonly used method for attaching the headsuspension assembly (also called the "Head-Gimbal Assembly" (HGA), particularly when a gimbal is included for the head assembly) to the disk drive actuator arm is by swaging. In the swaging process, a spherical swage ball is passed through a tube that provides the attachment feature of the nut plate. The material of the nut plate tube (also called the "ferrule" or "boss" of the nut plate) and the actuator arm is displaced to accommodate the swage ball being forced through the nut plate tube (the diameter of the swage ball is larger than the original inner diameter of the nut plate tube). It is important that the flange portion of the nut plate remain flat and stable during the swaging process so that the suspension performance is not compromised by undesirable deformations of the nut plate. Therefore, the nut plate flange has typically been manufactured so that the nut plate flange provides a stiff mounting for the suspension. This stiffness is provided by providing a relatively thick nut plate flange, typically three (3) to four (4) times the thickness of the suspension material. Prior-art FIG. 1 is a side view of the portion of a head-arm assembly 100 showing the head-suspension material 120 fastened between a nut plate 130 and an actuator arm 110. Portions of the complete actuator arm 110 and complete head-suspension 120 are not shown to simplify the drawing, but are well known to those skilled in the art. The attachment method is typically the conventional swaging process exemplified in FIG. 2. The swaging process necessitates a relatively thick nut plate flange 133, that reduces the nut plate-to-disk clearance 142 (shown in FIG. 1) to undesirably low values. FIG. 2 shows the nut plate slipped into a swaging hole 111 in arm 110 and shows the swage ball 150 immediately before it is forced through the nut plate tube 131. The interference fit of the swage ball 150 with the nut plate tube 131 forces the material of the nut plate tube 131 radially outward into the actuator arm 110, fixing the nut plate 130 solidly to the actuator arm 110 at surface 132.
The present practice is to place the nut plate flange material on the side of the suspension material that is closest to the disk surface. By doing so, the clearance to the disk surface is reduced still further. This is not desired because it requires tight tolerance control to assure no contact between the nut plate flange and the disk surface during the head merge operation wherein the actuator components are first introduced to the disk stack at manufacture, and later during operation of the disk drive. Tight tolerances require more intricate tooling and fixtures, as well as increased piece part cost. It is also important to avoid contact between the nut plate and suspension components and the disk surface during shock loading, both during disk operation and otherwise. Shock-induced contact may cause the localized loss of data at the location where a head, load beam, nut plate, or actuator arm hits the disk surface, or catastrophic failure of the drive in the form of a head crash.
Others have approached the shock-event situation a bit differently in the portable market. Some actually drive the actuator clear off of the disk 140 when parking the heads for shutdown. If the arms and suspensions are not over the disk, then they do not have to worry about disk-to-head or disk-to-suspension contacts during non-operational shock events. This approach has several significant disadvantages:
(1) A ramp tower is needed to keep the suspensions spaced apart when they are unloaded from the disk; PA1 (2) It requires more space in the drive: the ramp tower space as well as the additional rotation angle space for the actuator to unload the heads; PA1 (3) It uses energy to park and unpark the heads from the tower; PA1 (4) Loading and unloading heads can introduce instability in the flight of the heads, leading to greater risk of drive failure; and PA1 (5) Operational shock protection is not improved by this strategy.
Another approach is to thin the nutplate material. One embodiment initially used this approach by reducing the nutplate thickness to 0.0098" (0.25 mm) from 0.0118" (0.30 mm). This only gains 0.002" (0.05 mm). Suspension suppliers and head stack suppliers are reluctant to thin the nutplate further, because of concern for warpage of the nutplate during the standard swage-attaching operation. This warpage results when the swage ball is forced through the ferrule (or boss) on the nutplate. Swaging is a harsh event. Nutplate stiffness limits warpage only if the nutplate is thick enough. Practitioners believe that the 0.0098" (0.25 mm) is minimal but that substantial warpage would likely result with thinner nut plates. Warpage is a problem because it affects the bend area of the suspension. This area is carefully designed to achieve acceptable resonance characteristics and to achieve adequate loading of the slider against the disk. This loading (called the "gram load") must be well controlled to achieve consistent flight behavior of the slider of head suspension 320.
Adhesive fastening is believed to have been used on the suspension-to-load beam or flexureto-actuator arm assembly by Maxtor Corporation on a 5 1/4-inch (133 mm) drive, 8 disks, about a 640-800 MB drive made about 1988-89. The adhesive used was a two-part adhesive, where one side of one piece is coated with adhesive Part A, and the facing surface of the other piece is coated with adhesive Part B. When the two adhesive parts come in contact, they cure in a chemical reaction at room temperature (RT). To set the adhesive, the two pieces are placed in a tool that holds them in contact until the adhesive sets (about 30 minutes at RT). The type of adhesives used by Maxtor Corporation are now considered too unstable for use at the upper operating temperatures of modern disk drives, are also considered as having unacceptable out-gassing for modern disk drives, and also are not stable enough for applications in modern very small drives designed for extremely long lifetimes.
Another problem known in the art of fastening the head-suspension assembly to the actuator arm arises from vibrations. Consider that vibrations are passed from the actuator arm to the head-suspension assembly. The rigid metal-to-metal connection, for example, between the swaged nut-plate tube and the actuator arm, apparently passes vibrations from the actuator arm to the head, which then occasionally introduces head-tracking errors.
Another problem known in the art is the impracticality in reworking the actuator arm-suspension assembly when a problem is detected. Removing the head-suspension assembly from the actuator arm without damage to either the head-suspension assembly or the actuator arm is extremely difficult. Presently, removing a head-suspension assembly from an actuator arm damages the head-suspension, rendering it useless.
Other problems known in the art are the relatively long time needed to assemble the slider/head-to-suspension assembly, and the impracticality in reworking when a problem is detected. Currently the slider suspension and read/write head assembly (together often just called the "head") is bonded to the suspension with an electrically-conductive adhesive, such as a silver-filled two-part epoxy adhesive, and an anaerobic, UV and heat-curing adhesive, such as Loctite 366. The 366 adhesive is used as the fast-bonding material to hold the head and suspension in position, while the filled-epoxy adhesive requires longer heat-cure time to react. The process requires depositing small drops of each adhesive component, followed by UV and heat-cure cycles. A typical process would include a fast-UV cure to tack the assembly, followed by a heat-cure tunnel oven to react the conductive epoxy adhesive. This is a time-consuming process. In addition, if a problem is detected, removing a head from a suspension damages one or both, rendering them useless.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,943,875 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,853,811 disclose methods and means for attaching the head-suspension assembly to the actuator arm through the use of screws or welds. U.S. Pat. No. 4,943,875 disclose the use of a mounting band that encircles the end of the actuator arm and is secured thereto by one of a variety of means, including spring loading, adhesive, solder, or deformable metallic means.

Method and apparatus for a low-profile head-suspension attachment for a disk drive


Articles and methods for forming protected electrodes for use in electrochemical cells, including those for use in rechargeable lithium batteries, are provided. In some embodiments, the articles and methods involve an electrode that does not include an electroactive layer, but includes a current collector and a protective structure positioned directly adjacent the current collector, or separated from the current collector by one or more thin layers. Lithium ions may be transported across the protective structure to form an electroactive layer between the current collector and the protective structure. In some embodiments, an anisotropic force may be applied to the electrode to facilitate formation of the electroactive layer.

There has been considerable interest in recent years in developing high energy density batteries with lithium containing anodes. Lithium metal is particularly attractive as the anode of electrochemical cells because of its extremely light weight and high energy density compared to other anodes, such as lithium intercalated carbon anodes, where the presence of non-electroactive materials increases weight and volume of the anode, and thereby reduces the energy density of the cells. Moreover, lithium metal anodes, or those comprising mainly lithium metal, provide an opportunity to construct cells which are lighter in weight, and which have a higher energy density than cells such as lithium-ion, nickel metal hydride or nickel-cadmium cells. These features are highly desirable for batteries for portable electronic devices such as cellular phones and laptop computers where a premium is paid for low weight. Unfortunately, the reactivity of lithium and the associated cycle life, dendrite formation, electrolyte compatibility, and fabrication and safety problems have hindered the commercialization of lithium cells. Despite the various approaches proposed for forming lithium anodes and forming interfacial and/or protective layers, improvements are needed.


The invention provides a high strength steel sheet which exhibits excellent chemical convertibility and corrosion resistance after electrodeposition coating even in the case where the steel sheet has a high Si content, and a method for manufacturing such steel sheets. The method includes continuous annealing of a steel sheet which includes, in terms of mass %, C at 0.01 to 0.18%, Si at 0.4 to 2.0%, Mn at 1.0 to 3.0%, Al at 0.001 to 1.0%, P at 0.005 to 0.060% and S at ≦0.01%, the balance being represented by Fe and inevitable impurities, while controlling the dew-point temperature of the atmosphere to become not more than −40° C. when the annealing furnace inside temperature is in the range of not less than 750° C.

From the viewpoint of the improvements in automobile fuel efficiency and crash safety of the automobiles, there have recently been increasing demands for car body materials to be increased in strength for thickness reduction in order to reduce the weight and increase the strength of car bodies themselves. For this purpose, the use of high strength steel sheets in automobiles has been promoted.
In general, automotive steel sheets are painted before use. As a pretreatment before painting, a chemical conversion treatment called phosphatization is performed. The chemical conversion treatment for steel sheets is one of the important treatments for ensuring corrosion resistance after painting.
The addition of silicon is effective for increasing the strength and the ductility of steel sheets. During continuous annealing, however, silicon is oxidized even if the annealing is performed in a reductive N2+H2 gas atmosphere which does not induce the oxidation of Fe (which reduces Fe oxides). As a result, a silicon oxide (SiO2) is formed on the outermost surface of a steel sheet. This SiO2 inhibits a reaction for forming a chemical conversion film during a chemical conversion treatment, thereby resulting in formation of a microscopical region where any chemical conversion film is not generated. (Hereinafter, such a region will be sometimes referred to as "non-covered region".) That is, chemical convertibility is lowered.
Among conventional techniques directed to the improvement of chemical convertibility of high-Si containing steel sheets, patent document 1 discloses a method in which an iron coating layer is electroplated at 20 to 1500 mg/m2 onto a steel sheet. However, this method entails the provision of a separate electroplating facility and increases costs correspondingly to an increase in the number of steps.
Further, patent documents 2 and 3 provide an improvement in phosphatability by specifying the Mn/Si ratio and by adding nickel, respectively. However, the effects are dependent on the Si content in a steel sheet, and a further improvement will be necessary for steel sheets having a high Si content.
Patent document 4 discloses a method in which the dew-point temperature during annealing is controlled to be −25 to 0° C. so as to form an internal oxide layer which includes a Si-containing oxide within a depth of 1 μm from the surface of a steel sheet base as well as to control the proportion of the Si-containing oxide to be not more than 80% over a length of 10 μm of the surface of the steel sheet. However, the method described in patent document 4 is predicated on the idea that the dew-point temperature is controlled with respect to the entire area inside a furnace. Thus, difficulties are encountered in controlling the dew-point temperature and ensuring stable operation. If annealing is performed while the controlling of the dew-point temperature is unstable, the distribution of internal oxides formed in a steel sheet becomes nonuniform to cause a risk that chemical convertibility may be variable in a longitudinal direction or a width direction of the steel sheet (non-covered regions may be formed in the entirety or a portion of the steel sheet). Even though an improvement in chemical convertibility is attained, a problem still remains in that corrosion resistance after electrodeposition coating is poor because of the presence of the Si-containing oxide immediately under the chemical conversion coating.
Further, patent document 5 describes a method in which the steel sheet temperature is brought to 350 to 650° C. in an oxidative atmosphere so as to form an oxide film on the surface of the steel sheet, and thereafter the steel sheet is heated to a recrystallization temperature in a reductive atmosphere and subsequently cooled. With this method, however, it is often the case that the thickness of the oxide film formed on the surface of the steel sheet is variable depending on the oxidation method and that the oxidation does not take place sufficiently or the oxide film becomes excessively thick with the result that the oxide film leaves residue or is exfoliated during the subsequent annealing in a reductive atmosphere, thus resulting in a deterioration in surface quality. In EXAMPLES, this patent document describes an embodiment in which oxidation is carried out in air. However, oxidation in air causes a problem such as giving a thick oxide which is hardly reduced in subsequent reduction or requiring a reductive atmosphere with a high hydrogen concentration.
Furthermore, patent document 6 describes a method in which a cold rolled steel sheet containing, in terms of mass %, Si at not less than 0.1% and/or Mn at not less than 1.0% is heated at a steel sheet temperature of not less than 400° C. in an iron-oxidizing atmosphere to form an oxide film on the surface of the steel sheet, and thereafter the oxide film on the surface of the steel sheet is reduced in an iron-reducing atmosphere. In detail, iron on the surface of the steel sheet is oxidized at not less than 400° C. using a direct flame burner with an air ratio of not less than 0.93 and not more than 1.10, and thereafter the steel sheet is annealed in a N2+H2 gas atmosphere which reduces the iron oxide, thereby forming an iron oxide layer on the outermost surface while suppressing the oxidation of SiO2 which lowers chemical convertibility from occurring on the outermost surface. Patent document 6 does not specifically describe the heating temperature with the direct flame burner. However, in the case where Si is present at a high content (generally, 0.6% or more), the oxidation amount of silicon, which is more easily oxidized than iron, becomes large so as to suppress the oxidation of Fe or limit the oxidation of Fe itself to a too low level. As a result, the formation of a superficial reduced Fe layer by the reduction becomes insufficient and SiO2 comes to be present on the surface of the steel sheet after the reduction, thus possibly resulting in a region which may not be covered with a chemical conversion film.

High strength steel sheet and method for manufacturing the same


A FIFO circuit includes a memory such as a register array having a plurality of storage locations. One or more data inputs can be coupled to the memory for receiving data that is to be stored therein. A control circuit controls the storage of data received from the one or more data inputs into the memory. In one embodiment, a particular one (e.g., memory location 0) of the plurality of storage locations is used as the location from which all data from the memory is outputted from. A multiplexer is used to move the data from within the memory into this particular memory location. The control circuit includes circuitry which allows for data received from the one or more data inputs to be stored substantially at the same time into the memory. In another embodiment, the FIFO circuit includes one data input for receiving data from a write bus and a second data input for receiving data from a read bus. A counter is used to store the pointer to the storage location within the memory were the write bus data is to be stored and a FIFO is used to store the pointer information to the storage location within the memory were read data bus data is to be stored that is received by the FIFO circuit.

Referring to FIG. 1, there is shown a prior art FIFO circuit 100. FIFO circuit 100 includes a write data FIFO 102 coupled to a write data bus and a read data FIFO 104 coupled to a read data bus. An output multiplexer (MUX) 106 under the control of a data select signal 108 controls which data to present at the output (DATA_OUT) 110 of the MUX 106. FIFO circuit 100 is typically used for applications where data from both read and write data busses need to be captured, buffered and then presented to an output interface.
Considering an application where the data bus width is 64 bits wide and the buffering requirement is 16 data words in all, by using FIFO circuit 100 both the write data FIFO 102 and the read data FIFO 104 have to have a width of 64 bits and a depth of 16. Since both the write data FIFO 102 and the read data buffer 104 have to be the same size, this may lead to under utilization of memory in the FIFO's in situations were the amount of data coming into one of the FIFO's is less than that coming into the other FIFO. The FIFO circuit 100 also requires one or more multiplexers having a large fan-in (both the write 102 and read 104 both FIFOs each require a 16:1 mux), this large fan-in has the potential of taking away a big margin of timing. To solve the timing problem, often the outputs are registered, causing the design area to be increased and performance to be reduced by a latency of one extra clock cycle.

FIFO with multiple data inputs and method thereof


A connector alignment assembly comprises a support member having a surface from which an array of male connector pins extend outwardly, each male connector pin having a base region proximate the surface of the support member and a tip region proximate the end of each male connector pin. Guide posts extend from the surface in the direction of the array of male connector pins and compression mechanisms, one associated with each of the guide posts. The compression mechanisms are adapted to transition from the uncompressed position to a compressed position. An alignment plate has guide holes which engage with the guide posts to position the alignment plate in a spaced relationship from the surface of the support member. The alignment plate has an array of male connector pin holes which engage with the array of male connector pins.

Electrical connection pins are a popular means for connecting two electrical devices. For example, integrated circuit (IC) packages typically possess a number of male electrical connection pins for mounting the IC package to an electrical socket on a printed circuit board (PCB). Each of the male electrical connection pins of the IC package is inserted into corresponding female socket terminals in the electrical socket on the PCB.
As technology continues to advance, the size of electrical devices continues to decrease while the number of connections required between electrical devices continues to increase. Consequently, increasing the density of electrical connection terminals for electrically connecting two electrical devices is necessary. Since the male connection pins are relatively tall and thin, they are fragile and more susceptible to damage such as being bent or broken during handling, transport and mating.


The present disclosure provides a multicopper oxidase mutant with improved salt tolerance. Threonine at site 317 of wild-type multicopper oxidase WT was mutated to asparagine, leucine at site 386 was mutated to tyrosine, and serine at site 427 was mutated to glutamic acid by site-directed mutagenesis to obtain a mutant T317N-L386Y-S427E. Compared with WT, the tolerance of T317N-L386Y-S427E to 6%, 9%, 12%, 15% and 18% NaCl (W/V) is improved.

Biogenic amines are a general term for low molecular weight nitrogen-containing organic compounds, which are normal physiologically active substances in living organisms. The proper amount of biogenic amines synthesized by the human body help to maintain the normal physiological function of the body. However, when excessive biogenic amines are taken through food, they can cause allergic reactions such as headaches, nausea, palpitations, blood pressure changes and respiratory disorders, and they can threaten life in serious cases.
The biogenic amines are widely found in fermented foods rich in protein content such as aquatic products, meat products and seasonings, as well as alcoholic fermented beverages. Few biogenic amines in the fermented food are from the raw materials, and most of biogenic amines in the fermented food are formed by decarboxylation of amino acids. In addition to the biogenic amines contained in the food itself, most of the biogenic amines in the fermented food are formed by amino decarboxylation. The abundant protein in food is decomposed into amino acids under the co-action of endopeptidase and exopeptidase, and the amino acid is oxidized to produce the biogenic amines under the catalysis of the corresponding amino acid decarboxylase. The common biogenic amines in the food include putrescine, cadaverine, spermine, spermidine, tyramine, phenethylamine and histamine. The most toxic biogenic amine is histamine, followed by tyramine.
With the improvement of living standards, people's requirements for food safety are getting higher and higher, and the harm of potential toxic effects of the biogenic amines to human health should not be underestimated. Therefore, effective measures should be taken to control and reduce biogenic amines. At present, the control of biogenic amine content in food mainly starts from three aspects: (1) Control from the source: (1.1) most of the biogenic amines in food are formed by amino decarboxylation, therefore, the content of free amino acid can be controlled to reduce the content of biogenic amines. However, the free amino acid in food is mainly a hydrolysis product of protein in a raw material. Controlling the content of free amino acid means reducing the protein content, which will affect the flavor of some high-protein foods; (1.2) the strain with no amino acid decarboxylase activity is used to replace the original production strain and is added to a fermentation system at the beginning of fermentation. However, due to the great variety and complex relationship of the original production strains for mixed fermentation and open fermentation, replacing one kind of the strains may cause a change in the entire fermentation system, thereby ultimately resulting in fermentation failure, so this type of control is generally only applicable to a closed single-strain fermentation system. (2) Process control: (2.1) the growth of biogenic amine-producing bacteria is inhibited by rational selection of raw materials, temperature and salinity in the production process so as to achieve the purpose of inhibiting the production of biogenic amines; the limitation of this method lies in that the factors such as processing temperature and salinity are mostly determined by food characteristics, while low temperature storage will increase equipment and energy consumption costs, and some microorganisms can produce biogenic amines at a low temperature; (2.2) strains that degrade biogenic amines are added in the fermentation process to degrade the biogenic amines produced in the fermentation process without affecting dominant strains for production in the fermentation system, the limitation of this method lies in that there is concern about the safety of the added strains and the flavors of the food may be affected. (3) Terminal elimination: the biogenic amines already formed in the food are degraded by adding biogenic amine degrading enzymes to fermented foods, this method does not substantially affect the production process of the fermented foods, and has little effect on food nutrition and flavor, so the method is currently the most promising method.
Regarding the biogenic amine degrading enzymes, researchers have attempted to isolate and purify enzymes capable of degrading biogenic amines from screened strains capable of degrading biogenic amines, and to preliminarily analyze the action mechanism of the enzymes. Amine oxidase, amine dehydrogenase and multicopper oxidase are currently the three main types of enzymes capable of degrading biogenic amines. Amine oxidase and histamine dehydrogenase capable of degrading biogenic amines can only specifically act on certain biogenic amine or certain biogenic amines, and the activity is also inhibited by ethanol or carbonyl compounds, and the optimum pH of the enzyme is mostly neutral at the same time, therefore, it is difficult to achieve the desired results when using these two types of enzymes to degrade the biogenic amines in alcohol-containing fermented beverages and acidic fermented foods. The multicopper oxidase can catalyze various biogenic amines to oxidize to generate corresponding aldehydes, ammonia and water, the activity is less affected by an acidic environment and ethanol, but a high salt environment in high-salt fermented food (such as soy sauce containing 18% salt) will quickly inactivate the enzyme and affect the degradation effect of the enzyme on the biogenic amines. Therefore, the improvement on the salt tolerance of multicopper oxidase is of great significance for establishing an enzymatic reduction and control method for biogenic amines in the fermented food.

Multicopper oxidase mutant with improved salt tolerance


A mobile device and method for performing a function using a short-range communication tag are provided. In the method, the mobile device inputs function-related information into a short-range communication tag, and recognizes proximity to or contact with the short-range communication tag. Then the mobile device reads the function-related information from the short-range communication tag, and performs a function correlated with the function-related information. This allows performing various functions of the mobile device, only depending on a user's action to bring the mobile device in proximity to or contact with the Near Field Communication (NFC) tag.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mobile device technology based on a short-range communication. More particularly, the present invention relates to a mobile device and method for performing a function using a short-range communication tag.
2. Description of the Related Art
With the remarkable growth of related technologies, a great variety of mobile devices are increasingly popular and currently available. Mobile devices not only provide a voice call service, but also offer several data transmission services and various additional services, thus evolving into multimedia communication devices.
Some mobile devices introduced recently have a Near Field Communication (NFC) module to execute NFC-based services. Currently, these mobile devices perform a function to read information from an NFC tag or to transmit information to other mobile devices having an NFC module.
However, in view of user's convenience, NFC-based services still have plenty of room for further improvement.

Mobile device and method for performing function based on short-range communication


The disclosure relates to a thermostatic mixer, including a device for the dynamic regulation of the cold water flow which supplies the mixer. A resistance is generated to the flow of cold water supplied to the thermostatic mixer when small flows of mixed water are required, and said resistance is lifted or reduced when large flows of mixed water are required. Said operation is automatically carried out by devices for dynamic regulation of flow, whereby the flow cross-section provided for the incoming cold water is reduced when the drawn flow is reduced and a larger flow cross-section reestablished when a larger flow is required.

The statements in this section merely provide background information related to the present disclosure and may not constitute prior art.
Thermostatic mixers that are suited to handle a large flow rate generally do not function if the flow rate required from them is considerably smaller than the maximum flow rate they are designed for, as occurs, for example, when a thermostatic mixer suited to supply a fixture comprising a plurality of showers is used to supply a single shower. Under these circumstances, the thermostatic mixers lose their stability and start to vibrate so that the water flow drawn from them is subject to constant fluctuations in the ratio between cold water and warm water and therefore sustains temperature fluctuations, which are uncomfortable for the user and may become dangerous. This disadvantage may be corrected by opposing a resistance to the cold water flow fed into the thermostatic mixer when small flow rates of mixed water are supposed to be pumped and by suppressing or reducing this resistance when large flow rates of mixed water are supposed to be pumped. This operation is carried out automatically by devices for dynamic flow regulation, which are designed to reduce the passage cross-section provided to the arriving cold water when the accommodated flow rate is reduced and to restore a larger passage cross-section when an increased flow rate is required.
Nevertheless, the known devices for dynamic flow regulation are generally associated with various disadvantages. Above all, in light of their design and their dimensions, they must be elements that can be added to the fixture in series connection to the feed pipe of the cold water to the mixer and which cannot be installed in the mixer itself. Therefore, the load of the recuperating spring requires adjustment as a function of the inflow pressure of the cold water for the device to function properly. Consequently, during installation the device must be adapted to the pressure conditions prevailing in the system, and the function of the device is no longer appropriate when considerable fluctuations in the cold water inflow pressure occur.

Thermostatic mixer with device for dynamic regulation of a water flow


A lens array sheet having a plurality of pyramid-shaped projections or recesses on a surface of its transparent base material film, particularly suitable to be used as a light condensing plate of an organic electroluminescence element is provided.

There are demands for a surface lighting device used for a display device to have many characteristics, such as high luminance, low power consumption and thin shape. When improving one of these characteristics, it is liable that other performance has to be more or less sacrificed and it has been very difficult to improve all performances at a time.
To overcome the plurality of challenges, a sheet (lens array sheet) having a lens array formed with a fine concave and convex pattern, such as a prism shape and a Fresnel lens shape, on a surface of a thermoplastic resin mold, such as a transparent plastic, has been increasingly used as an optical part in recent years.
For example, a method of easily attaining high luminance by using a lens array sheet as a light condensing plate for a liquid crystal display device and condensing a display light in an approximately normal direction has become widely used. This method uses a light condensing effect of a prism and is capable of attaining high luminance without increasing an electric power and a thickness of the device, while it has a disadvantage that the luminance drastically declines when being out of the light condensing range.
To solve such a disadvantage, the Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 7-261006 proposes to change a refraction index between one surface and the other surface of the prism. Also, the Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2000-75102 proposes to use as a material of the light condensing plate an alicyclic structure containing thermoplastic resin having a norbornene structure.
Since an organic electroluminescence material can be used as a thin film, it is an effective material for making a surface lighting device and a display device thinner and lighter. However, light transmittance of a liquid crystal panel is too low to use it as a backlight of a liquid crystal display device, therefore, the light condensing efficiency has to be furthermore improved comparing with that in a conventional backlight using a cold-cathode tube, etc.
However, when using a prism lens having a line shaped surface, which has been conventionally used as a light condensing plate of a liquid crystal substrate, as a light condensing plate of an organic electroluminescence element, there is a disadvantage that the viewing angle becomes narrow.


An air flow meter has a body forming a main passage defining an intake air passage of an internal combustion engine. An auxiliary passage within the main passage has a longitudinal passage in the axial direction and at least one transverse passage in the radial direction of the main passage. The auxiliary passage is defined by a member having a radially directed portion connected to an internal wall of the main passage. A hollow space is provided in the radially directed portion to render the wall thickness of the radially directed portion substantially uniform. Additionally, the hollow space is separated from the longitudinal passage by an auxiliary member which, in a preferred embodiment, surrounds a heat sensitive resistor.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an air flow meter for metering the flow rate of intake air of an internal combustion engine and, more particularly, to an air flow meter having a flow metering heat-sensitive resistor located in an auxiliary passage which is in turn arranged in a main passage forming an intake air passage.
2. Description of the related art
A known hot-wire air flow meter for an internal combustion engine, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,887,577 has a body forming a main passage defining an intake air passage of an internal combustion engine; an auxiliary passage forming member arranged in the main passage and forming an auxiliary passage having a longitudinal passage in the axial direction of the main passage leading to transverse passages formed in the radial direction of the main passage; and a heat-sensitive resistor arranged in the longitudinal passage of the auxiliary passage for metering the flow rate of intake air. The resistor is located in a radial holder across the main passage which must necessarily be transversely thickened to accommodate the resistor across the air flow passage. So as to provide a symmetrical construction across the main passage the auxiliary passage forming member is thickened transversely across the longitudinal passage at the opposite side of the holder of the heat-sensitive resistor, as shown in FIG. 4 of the said U.S. patent, so as to provide support for the portion defining tile auxiliary passage.
JP-A-61-53518 (1986) and JP-A-64-10127 (1989) disclose the holder of the heat-sensitive resistor constructed such that a protecting member for the heat-sensitive resistor is disposed around the heat-sensitive resistor.
The member forming the auxiliary passage necessarily has its internal shape and size determined according to the air flow specification requirement of the auxiliary passage and since the outer wall forms part of the main passage, its external shape and size exert serious influences upon the air flow of the main passage. If this external shape is not correct, an increase in pressure loss occurs, and vortexes are established in the air flow. As a result, the hot-wire air flow meter output fluctuates (herein termed "output noise") which results in a decrease in accuracy of a fuel injection unit controlled thereby.
The prior art thus far described has failed to take into consideration the need for a uniform thickness and reduction in thickness of the auxiliary passage forming member but has determined tile internal and external shapes and sizes from the above-specified necessary specifications of the auxiliary passage and the main passage. As a result, the auxiliary passage forming member has tended to have a thick portion extending transversely to the main passage which causes a problem in that the product weight is increased. Even more importantly, because the body and the auxiliary passage forming member are integrally molded, if the auxiliary passage forming member is solid and relatively thick both axially and transversely of the main passage, and if it is made of a synthetic resin, a large shinkage normally occurs due to molding shrinkage, which then causes another problem in that the desired shape and size cannot be obtained resulting in decreased accuracy (see FIG. 5 described later herein). If the auxiliary passage forming member is made of a metal, such as aluminum, a similar but less serious problem arises than when synthetic resin is used.
If the thickness of the auxiliary passage forming member is to be made uniform, on the other hand (as shown in FIG. 6 described later herein), the external shape is incorrect to raise a further problem in that the aforementioned pressure loss and output noise occur due to the member having a flat leading surface. Also, such a construction is not symmetrical across the main passage since the axial length of the resistor holder is greater than that of the auxiliary passage forming member.
Moreover, the prior art technologies, as disclosed in JP-A-61-53518 (1986) and JP-A-64-10127 (1989), are directed to the protecting member for the heat-sensitive resistor, and neither has the object of improving the shape and size accuracies of the auxiliary passage forming member.
The present invention seeks to overcome the foregoing disadvantages.
A first specific object of the present invention is to provide an air flow meter in which the auxiliary passage forming member has reduced wall thickness without increasing the pressure loss and the output noise.
A second specific object of the present invention is to provide an air flow meter which can not only eliminate the aforementioned thick portion but also protect the heat-sensitive resistor arranged in the auxiliary passage.
A third specific object of the present invention is to provide an air flow meter which can not only eliminate the aforementioned thick portion but also reduce the output error caused by the intake pulsations of an internal combustion engine.
A fourth specific object of the present invention is to provide an air flow meter which can not only eliminate the aforementioned thick portion but also reduce the fluctuations of the air flow in the auxiliary passage and the meter output noise.

Hitachi Automotive Engineering Co., Ltd.


A fluorescent lamp includes a tubular glass bulb, an internal electrode provided substantially along the central axis of the tubular glass bulb, a fluorescent layer provided on the inner surface of the tubular glass bulb, and an external electrode provided on the outer surface of the tubular glass bulb, wherein the internal electrode, having a coiled shape, is laid in the tubular glass bulb with an appropriate tension. According to the present invention, it is possible to prevent a sag in the internal electrode from occurring due to a difference in coefficient of thermal expansion between the tubular glass bulb and a metallic member forming the internal electrode, and to prevent either the tubular glass bulb or the internal electrode from being broken because of an excessive stress, thereby overcoming the problem concerning such type of fluorescent lamp.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a fluorescent lamp and a method for manufacturing the same, more particularly to a fluorescent lamp and a method for manufacturing the same, which is constructed such that an electric discharge is performed through a tubular glass bulb or a dielectric between an internal electrode axially passing through the tubular glass bulb forming a discharge chamber and an external electrode provided on an outer surface of the tubular glass bulb.
2. Background Art
An example of a prior fluorescent lamp, such a type as described above, constructed such that a discharge is performed through a dielectric between an internal electrode and an external electrode is disclosed, for example, in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication Hei. 7-272694.
FIG. 10 shows an example of a constitution of a prior fluorescent lamp 80 such a type as described above. A tubular glass bulb 81 applied a fluorescent layer 82 on an inner surface thereof has been discharged the air, filled with gas and then sealed at both ends, thereby forming a discharge chamber 81a. An external electrode 83 is formed on an outer surface of the tubular glass bulb 81.
In the discharge chamber 81a, an internal electrode 84 made of a metal rod or a thin and long metal tube is laid substantially along the central axis of the tubular glass bulb 81.
FIG. 11 shows another example of a constitution of a prior fluorescent lamp 85 such a type as described above. A tubular glass bulb 87 applied a fluorescent layer 82 on an inner surface thereof has been sealed by flare stems 88a, 88b at both ends, thereby forming a discharge chamber 89. In the discharge chamber 89, a getter 90 and an internal electrode 91 are provided, and rare gas (not shown) is filled. An external electrode 92, made of a conductive coating or the like, is formed on an outer surface of the tubular glass bulb 87. A light emitting is accomplished by applying high-frequency power between the internal electrode 91 and the external electrode 92.
However, there are some problems with the above-described fluorescent lamp constructed such that a discharge is performed through a dielectric, compared to a conventional fluorescent lamp, which has been employed, constructed such that a pair of electrodes face each other and a discharge is performed only in a discharge chamber.
In the above-described fluorescent lamp, it has a constitution that an internal electrode axially passing through a tubular glass bulb. Therefore, it causes a first problem that the internal electrode or the tubular glass bulb is deformed or broken because of a change in the ambient temperature, a temperature rise in discharging or the like, since the coefficient of expansion of the internal electrode made of a metal differs from that of the tubular glass bulb.
Also, the discharge is performed between almost whole of the surface of the internal electrode and the external electrode. Therefore, for example, when a part where a discharge resistance is slightly lower than another part exists in the electrodes, the discharge tends to be concentrated on the part, which in turn causes a second problem that the concentrated part in the internal electrode or the external electrode is exhausted.
In addition, the discharge is performed through a tubular glass bulb as a dielectric. Therefore, the tubular glass bulb is also exhausted. Particularly when the discharge is concentrated as described above, the concentrated part of the tubular glass bulb is holed to lose functions as the discharge chamber, which in turn causes a third problem that the whole of the fluorescent lamp is broken.
Furthermore, the fluorescent lamp of this type causes a fourth problem that it shows a tendency to be a lower efficiency compared to the above-mentioned conventional fluorescent lamp constructed such that a discharge is performed only in a discharge chamber. Accordingly, with regard to a fluorescent lamp constructed such that a discharge is performed through a dielectric, unique problems, which will be overcome by the present invention, arising from such construction occurs.
A method for manufacturing the conventional fluorescent lamp 85 shown in FIG. 11 is next described in order of process in connection with FIGS. 12A to 12D. First, as shown in FIG. 12A, a mount is formed by connecting a flare stem 88a, to which a getter 90 is attached, to one end of the internal electrode 91 made of, for example, a tungsten wire by spot welding or the like.
Next, as shown in FIG. 12B, the mount is inserted into the tubular glass bulb 87 in a condition that the internal electrode 91 is hung downward. The flare stem 88a is deeply inserted so that the other end of the internal electrode 91 appears at the bottom of the tubular glass bulb 87. The other flare stem 88b is attached to the other end of the internal electrode 91 by spot welding or the like. Furthermore, a fluorescent layer 86 is formed on the inner surface of the tubular glass bulb 87 in advance.
Next, as shown in FIG. 12C, the flare stem 88a is pulled up so that the position thereof agrees with the upper end of the tubular glass bulb 87, and the flare stem 88a is welded. Thereafter, as shown in FIG. 12D, the other flare stem 88b is positioned so that the position thereof agrees with the lower end of the tubular glass bulb 87, and the other flare stem 88b is welded.
However, according to this conventional manufacturing method, the flare stem 88a is deeply inserted into the tubular glass bulb 87 in order to attach the other flare stem 88b, as shown in FIG. 12B. Therefore, the flare stem 88a attains the fluorescent layer 86, thereby causing a problem that the circumference of the flare stem 88a scratches the fluorescent layer 86.
Additionally, the above manufacturing method contains steps, for example, such that the flare stem 88a is made to have a round trip in the tubular glass bulb 87 so as to attach the flare stem 88b, which is troublesome and is not always necessary for the completed fluorescent lamp 85. Therefore, the above method causes problems that it shows a low manufacturing efficiency and a low productivity, which will be overcome by the present invention.

Fluorescent lamp with coil shaped internal electrode