A disk system has a disk as a recording medium, and a disk recording/reproducing apparatus for recording and reproducing data by a head radially movable provided on a disk by a head moving mechanism, and the disk has a first region formed with a servo sector having servo information along a data track for recording and reproducing data on a disk, second regions having servo sectors having servo information along a servo track and of the number of magnification of integer number of the servo sectors in the first region, and the disk recording/reproducing apparatus has, position detecting section placed on the moving portion of the head moving mechanism for detecting the moving position of a head to output a position signal representing the head position in the radial direction of the disk, memory section for storing "head follow-up information" for a servo track obtained from the position signal in the state that the head is positioned on the servo track, and section for controlling to follow up the head to the data track by using "first track follow-up error information" obtained by servo information read from the servo sector immediately after the head is passed over the servo sector in the first region when the head is positioned on the data track, and using "second track follow-up error information" of a difference between the follow-up information of the head to the data track obtained from the position signal and follow-up information stored in the memory section while the head is passed between servo sectors in the first region.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a disk system for recording and reproducing data by using a disk-like recording medium such as a magnetic disk and, more particularly, to a disk system for positioning a head on a data track in accordance with servo information formed on a portion of a sector on a data recording surface.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a conventional magnetic disk apparatus, "servo information" for "positioning" a magnetic head on a magnetic disk is previously formed so as to raise the density of tracks. In the magnetic disk apparatus, an accessing system for suitably positioning a magnetic head in accordance with the servo information is employed. "A sector servo system" is known as one type for positioning the magnetic head as described above. In the magnetic disk which employs the "sector servo system", servo information formed of a pattern repeated at a predetermined cycle is formed in advance on a portion of a sector (e.g., a servo sector) on the track. The servo information is read by the magnetic head, and a position error signal indicating a position error of a head with respect to a desired track is generated by sampling by using a sampling cycle to be determined in accordance with the number of sectors and the rotating speed of the disk. The position of the magnetic head is controlled so that the position error signal becomes minimum.
A small-sized hard disk apparatus or a floppy disk apparatus of magnetic disk apparatuses is frequently placed in a portable personal computer or the like. An external vibration of impact is easily applied to the apparatus. It is difficult to accurately follow a head to a mark track by holding a complete head positioning state against such a vibration or an impact. Therefore, the disk is heretofore constructed so as to obtain servo information in terms of data recording region (i.e., magnetic region) as many as possible thereby to widen the servo band, thereby improving "vibration-proof performance". The "positioning accuracy" is obtained by mounting the entire magnetic disk in a vibration removing mechanism.
In the above-described sector servo system, however, the position error signal of the magnetic head cannot be obtained between the sector and the sector. Thus, when the number of the servo sectors is suppressed so as to improve a format efficiency, a cycle in which the position error signal cannot be obtained is lengthened. Therefore, the follow-up performance of the magnetic head to a mark track (so-called track follow-up performance) against a disturbance such as an impact or a vibration or the responsivity of the magnetic head (i.e., disturbance suppressing characteristic) when the head is deviated from a mark track due to a disturbance, is deteriorated. As a result, there arises a problem that, since an accurate "positioning operation" cannot be maintained, positioning characteristic is lowered.
In a sample-data control system, a "phase lag" due to sample/hold generally occurs. In order to eliminate the influence of the phase lag to a control system, it is necessary to limit the servo band to approximately 1/7 or less of a sampling frequency. If the servo band is limited as described above, utility in a frequency band where "a disturbance" exists is lowered, and hence vibration-proof performance is deteriorated.
On the other hand, in order to position a head in a magnetic disk apparatus and particularly a hard disk apparatus, a "data surface servo system" represented by a "sector servo system" has been employed instead of a "servo surface servo system" heretofore frequently used. And the data surface servo system is also employed by a large capacity flexible magnetic disk apparatus in order to improve the track density. The data surface servo system does not used an exclusive use servo surface like the servo surface servo system, but writes (records) servo information on a data surface, and does not have a thermal offtrack which becomes a problem in the servo surface servo system but can obtain servo information (i.e, position information) directly from a data track. Therefore, the data surface servo system has an advantage that an accurate "head positioning" can be achieved.
In the conventional sector servo system, as shown in FIG. 4, a servo sector 33 is provided on a partial region of a sector on a data surface of a disk 1, i.e., between data sectors 32. A servo pattern 31 for applying head position information of radial direction of the disk is formed in advance on the servo sector 33. A head for recording and reproducing data intermittently read the servo pattern 31 at each servo sector 33. A position signal as shown in FIG. 5 is, for example, decoded from the information of the servo pattern 31 thus intermittently obtained, and the head is controlled to be positioned in accordance with the position signal dispersively obtained at each sector.
In a disk apparatus using such a sector servo system as a head positioning servo, or particularly in a large capacity flexible magnetic disk apparatus, it is necessary to obtain a sufficient servo band so as to follow up the head to "track radial runout" generated due to "eccentricity" generated upon elongation or contraction of a medium due to temperature and moisture changes or replacement of a disk (i.e., the track radial runout of a primary mode having a frequency equal to the rotating frequency of the disk or the track radial run-out of a secondary mode having twice the frequency) and to accurately position the head to a data track. Therefore, a wide servo band is realized to strengthen the head against a disturbance such as a vibration, an impact, etc., and to obtain faster "settling time".
The sector servo type disk apparatus has a "sampled-data control system". Therefore, in order to obtain a wide servo band, its sampling frequency may be set to a high value. As a method of obtaining a wide servo band by increasing the sampling frequency, there are generally the following methods:
(Method A): A method of accelerating the rotating speed of a disk
(Method B): A method of increasing the number of servo sectors (i.e., generally equal to the number of data sectors)
In the (method A) for accelerating the rotating speed of the disk, since the fluctuating frequency of the track is proportionally raised, the "follow-up performance of the head" against the fluctuation of the track is not improved. Therefore, in order to generally improve the performance of the disk system, it is most effectively to employ the (method B) to increase the number of servo sectors and to increase the quantity of the servo information. However, if the number of servo sectors is increased, better head positioning control is performed, but "format efficiency" (i.e., formatted capacity to unformatted capacity ratio) is reversely decreased. Thus, the storage capacity of the data to be actually recorded is reduced. Therefore, it is difficult to obtain sufficient storage capacity and to simultaneously attain the number of sectors to obtain a sufficient servo band only by the methods A and B.
In the conventional "sector servo system", as shown, for example, in FIG. 14, a servo pattern 31 repeated in a predetermined cycle radially of a disk is previously formed as "servo information" on a partial region of a sector on a disk, i.e., on a servo sector 33 provided intermittently between data sectors 32, the position signal of the head obtained by reading the servo pattern 31 is decoded to control to position a head 35. The servo pattern 31 has a position information portion 34, which has information bits A, B, C and D for obtaining two-phase position signals X and Y used to accurately follow up the head 35 to a data track, and information bits P, Q and R for enhancing the position detecting ability of the head 35 by using the position signals X and Y to detect the position even if the head 35 is moved faster.
FIG. 15 shows a position signal obtained by decoding the servo pattern 31. When the amplitude values of the signals obtained by reading the information bits A, B, C, D and P, Q, R by the head 35 as the head 35 passes over the servo pattern 31 are defined as SA, SB, SC, SC and SP, SQ, SR, respectively, X=SA-SB, Y=SC-SD are satisfied. The position signals X and Y are used as analog signals, while the SP, SQ and SR are binarized, and used as digital signals of "1" or "0". In the case of controlling to follow up a track, the position signals X and Y are used. The position where they become "0" is used as a data track center, a feedback control is performed so that X=0 or Y=0 is obtained, thereby following up the head to the data track. In the case of seeking the head to a target track, the position and the speed of the head are obtained from the signals X, Y, SP, SQ and SR, and the head is controlled at its speed in accordance with a desired speed previously set in response to the distance to a target track. A head position detecting method first determines the magnitude of the X and Y to determine the zone L0, L1, L2, L3 where the head exists. More specifically, it is determined in accordance with the criterion of the following formulae: EQU X.gtoreq.0, Y>0.fwdarw.L0 EQU X>0, Y.ltoreq.0.fwdarw.L1 EQU X.ltoreq.0, Y<0.fwdarw.L2 EQU X<0, Y.gtoreq.0.fwdarw.L3
Then, second position signal groups U=X+Y, V=X-Y are respectively obtained from the signals X and Y. Further, positions D0, D1, D2 and D3 in the zones L0, L1, L2 and L3 determined previously are obtained from the signals U and V as below, where .+-.a is the amplitude value of the signals X and Y shown in FIG. 15 EQU L0 : D0=V/(2a)+0.5 EQU L1 : D1=0.5-U/(2a) EQU L2 : D2=0.5-V/(2a) EQU L3 : D3=U/(2a)+0.5
In the above-described "head positioning method", the condition that the head is moved within four track zones including the zone where the head exists at present between samplings is set in advance, thereby detecting the head position without error.
For example, (a): in FIG. 15, the head is moved to the inside, and it is assumed that the head is not returned to the outside. At this time, if the head is in the zone Ln by sampling at an arbitrary servo sector, a range that the move can move up to the sampling in next servo sector is limited within four zones of the inside including the Ln (e.g., if Ln=L0, within the zones L0 to L3), and the position can be detected under the condition without error.
(b): It is assumed that the head is moved to the inside and the head might be returned at one track to the outside in the worst case. If the head is in the zone Ln by sampling at an arbitrary servo sector, a range that the head can move to the sampling in next servo sector is limited within three zones of the inside including one zone of the outside of the Ln and Ln (e.g., if Ln=L0, within the zones L13 to L0 to L2), and the position can be detected under the condition without error. Therefore, in the former case (a), the range that the head can move between continuous sampling points (i.e., time for detecting the two continuous servo sectors by the head, i.e., the time equal to the servo sector detecting cycle), i.e., an allowable maximum moving speed is limited to less than three track pitch per time equal to servo sector detecting cycle. In the latter case (b), the range becomes less than two track pitch.
When the signals of SP, SQ and SR having further longer repetition cycle are used together, sixteen track zones of L0 to L15 can be identified, and the position of the head within the sixteen tracks can be unitarily identified. In the case (a) of this case, the allowable maximum moving speed is limited to less than fifteen track pitch per time equal to the servo sector detecting cycle. In the case (b), the allowable maximum moving speed is limited to less than fourteen track pitch. Thus, the allowable value of the maximum speed of the head can be enhanced by adding information bits P, Q, and R to the position information portion 34 of the servo pattern 31. In order to obtain the position of the head, the "0" track is first detected, the present position of the head is determined from position information obtained by the previous sampling and the position information obtained by the present sampling by the restriction that the moving speed of the head is within the allowable maximum moving speed, the positions to be determined at each sampling from the "0" track position are accumulated and calculated to obtain the present position of the head.
As described above, the pattern repeated at a predetermined cycle is formed, and the position of the head can be unitarily identified within the cycle. Further, the present position of the head can be detected by the position obtained by the previous sampling and the servo information obtained by the present sampling by the restriction that the distance for moving the head between the two sampling points is within the cycle or less. This head position detecting method is known as so-called "a relative position detecting method".
On the other hand, as the other conventional head position detecting method, there is known an "absolute position detecting method" in which servo information such as a Gray code to be unitarily identified from servo information is formed when the servo information is detected irrespective of the information of the previous position where the present head is disposed at any track and at any position in the track.
However, according to the above-described relative position detecting method, the servo information may be less, but it has the restriction that the moving distance of the head between servo information sampling points must be within a range that the head can be unitarily identified, and hence the moving speed of the head is limited. In this case, if the repetition cycle of the servo pattern 31 is lengthened by adding position information bit having long cycle like P, Q and R of FIG. 14, the head position detecting ability is improved, and the head can be moved at faster speed, but since the maximum merit of this method i which the servo information amount may be less is lost, it has a limit. According to the above-described method, when the ranges where the head position can be unitarily identified from the servo pattern 31 are the same, the less the number of the sectors is, the more the allowable maximum moving speed is decelerated. Generally, since the number of sectors is determined by considering the other specifications such as data format, track follow-up performance, etc., the position and speed detecting ability, i.e., seeking performance depends upon the specifications, and it cannot be designed independent of them.
On the other hand, according to the absolute position detecting method, since it required the servo pattern having a number of bits such as Gray code, etc., the servo information amount is very increased as compared with the relative position detecting method. Therefore, it has a malfunction that data format efficiency is extremely wrong.
As described above, the sector servo system used to position the head in the disk apparatus such as the flexible magnetic disk apparatus (i.e., FD) lowers its data format efficiency if the number of servo sectors is increased so as to increase its servo band, and it is difficult to obtain sufficient storage capacity.
In the conventional sector servo type magnetic disk apparatus, for example, the following characteristics are provided:
(Characteristic 1): The position error signal of the magnetic head is not obtained between a sector and a sector.
(Characteristic 2): The number of servo sectors is limited in format efficiency.
(Characteristic 3): The open-loop gain of a servo system in a frequency band in which a disturbance exists is low.
The sector servo type magnetic disk apparatus is difficult by the above-described various characteristics to correctly follow u the magnetic head to a target
p track against a disturbance such as an external vibration or impact, and has a problem that its responsivity at the time of offtracking due to a disturbance is deteriorated.
Further, the "relative position detecting method" for detecting the present position of the head from the position obtained by the previous sampling and the servo information obtained by the present sampling of the head position detecting methods used in the conventional disk apparatuses may use less servo information, but has a restriction that the moving distance of the head between servo information sampling points must be within the range in which the position of the head can be unitarily identified. Thus, in order to accurately detect the position and moving speed of the head, the moving speed of the head is limited. Therefore, it has a problem that a high speed seeking is difficult to be realized. If the repetition cycle of the servo pattern is lengthened in this method, the head position detecting capacity is improved and the high speed seeking is performed, but the servo information amount is increased to lose its maximum merit.
In the "absolute position detecting method" for forming the servo information to be unitarily identified from the servo information irrespective of the previous position information of the present position of the head, it is necessary to use a servo pattern having a number of bits such as Gray code. Therefore, the servo information amount is very increased, and there is a problem that the data format efficiency is deteriorated.


An apparatus and method for picking up a single compact disc from a stack of compact discs wherein each disc has a hub. A plurality of members are inserted into a center bore of the disc stack, which is defined by the hubs of the discs. The top disc in the stack is separated from the stack when a sufficient number of members are in contact with the hub of the disc and a radial force is exerted on the hub.

This invention relates to a method and apparatus for repetitive handling of compact discs, and more particularly, to an apparatus suitable for picking a single compact disc from a stack of compact discs.
Existing equipment for picking a single compact disc is unnecessarily complex and expensive, and it remains desirable to find a low-cost, simple solution to this problem.


A slide fastener with a slider locking mechanism comprising a slider body, a tab attached to the slider body rotatably, and a slider having a locking pawl formed integrally with the tab, wherein the locking pawl has a pawl portion fitted into between the elements, and the pawl portion comprises: a first contact surface which, when the tab is rotated after sliding operation of the slider is ended, contacts with a first element of an element row attached to a fastener stringer to stop the tab's rotation temporarily; and a second contact surface which, when the slider starts a forced movement in an element separating direction with the tab's rotation stopped, contacts with a second element to stop the slider's forced movement in a state where the tab restarts to rotate and the pawl portion is fitted into between the elements.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a slide fastener with a slider locking mechanism capable of automatically locking a slider without use of any resilient member.
2. Description of the Related Art
As a conventional slide fastener for use in clothes, there has been known a type in which a slider having a locking mechanism is inserted through an element row in order to prevent right and left fastener stringers from being opened unintentionally when the slider is not operated. Generally, the slider having the locking mechanism has a locking pawl capable of advancing to and retracting from an element guide passage formed between upper and lower blades of the slider and a leaf spring for urging the locking pawl into the element guide passage. When the slider is not operated, the locking pawl is urged by the leaf spring so as to engage a part (pawl portion) of the locking pawl with the element row, thereby stopping movement of the slider.
By the way, as a measure to environmental problems in recent years, it has been demanded to form respective components which constitute a product of the same material in order to facilitate recycling of materials. However, in sliders having the above-described conventional locking mechanism, for example, often the slider and tab are molded of synthetic resin while the leaf spring having resilience is formed of a metallic member. That is, in many cases, the leaf spring is formed of a different material from the other members. For the reason, when recycling the materials of the slider, its components need to be separated, thereby taking time and labor, which is a problem of the prior art.
Although a resilient member such as the leaf spring is sometimes formed of synthetic resin in order to solve the problem about recycle, usually, the resilient member made of synthetic resin is likely to be deteriorated with a time passage so that the resilience is lost with a long term usage, which is another problem.
A slider with a locking mechanism configured of components made of the same material without use of any leaf spring considering the recycle of the slider has been disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2000-333710. Further, U.S. Pat. No. 2,972,793 has disclosed a slider with a locking mechanism without use of any leaf spring.
In the slider described in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2000-333710, all its components are formed of synthetic resin and more specifically, the slider is constituted of four synthetic resin components, a slider body, a tab, a locking pawl (pawl) and a cover body for attaching the tab to the slider body. The tab has a mounting shaft (pintle) for attaching the tab to the slider body rotatably and a cam having a thumb-shaped section provided projectingly at right angle with respect to the longitudinal direction of the tab from the mounting shaft.
In the slider of Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2000-333710 having such a structure, when the tab attached to the slider body is held at a non-operation position by rotating the tab to a rear mouth side, the locking pawl accommodated in the slider body is pressed by the cam. Consequently, the locking pawl presses right and left element rows and at the same time, a part of the locking pawl is fitted into between elements, thereby locking the slider.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,972,793 has described a slider 81 with a locking mechanism in which as shown in FIG. 13, a tab 82 includes a mountain-like locking pawl 83 and a hook-shaped retractable pawl 84 (see FIG. 2 of U.S. Pat. No. 2,972,793). According to U.S. Pat. No. 2,972,793, the retractable pawl 84 is a pawl which first engages an element row 85 when the tab 82 is pushed down, and if the fastener is moved, when the tab 82 is at a non-locked position, the retractable pawl 84 and the locking pawl 83 are retracted into a locked position. That is, in the slider 81 of U.S. Pat. No. 2,972,793-A1, when the retractable pawl 84 is retracted into an element row 85, the tab 82 is rotated so that the locking pawl 83 engages the element row 85 to thereby lock the slider 81.
In the slider made of synthetic resin described in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2000-333710, when the locking pawl presses the element row while a part of the locking pawl fits into between the elements, the slider is locked easily. However, to lock the slider in this way, a user needs to rotate the tab and press the locking pawl with a cam provided on the tab. That is, the slider cannot be automatically locked.
Further, according to Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2000-333710, because the cam and locking pawl of the tab receive a large load when the slider is locked, the cam and locking pawl are worn as a result of repeated usage in a long period. Consequently, a locking function of the slider is lowered or becomes inoperative. Additionally, while the slider of Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2000-333710 is constituted of four members, the reduction in the number of the components of the slider has been demanded in views of reduction of manufacturing cost and ease of assembly.
In the slider 81 described in U.S. Pat. No. 2,972,793, when the fastener is moved as described above, the retractable pawl 84 is retracted into the element row 85 so that the tab 82 is rotated. Thus, the slider can be locked without user's rotating the tab unlike the slider of Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2000-333710.
However, because in the slider 81 of U.S. Pat. No. 2,972,793, two small pawls different in shape, the locking pawl 83 and retractable pawl 84, need to be formed for the tab 82, the configuration of the tab 82 becomes complicated and the size of the slider 81 tends to be enlarged. Further, U.S. Pat. No. 2,972,793 has no description about the positions and the dimensions of the locking pawl 83 and the retractable pawl 84 which are formed in the tab 82. In the slider 81 of U.S. Pat. No. 2,972,793, it is important to set up positions and dimensions of the locking pawl 83 and the retractable pawl 84 appropriately. The locking pawl 83 is worn considerably or the slider 81 cannot be locked stably depending on the positions and dimensions of the locking pawl 83 and the retractable 84.


A space comfort system controls humidity in a space by applying heat to air recirculated to the space when the humidity is excessive and cooling of the air is not required. In a preferred embodiment, the call for heat occurs from the time the humidity increases to a level above a differential band within which is the humidity set point until humidity falls to below the differential band. Heat is applied to the air only when there is no demand for cooling of the air.

In the past, people have felt that temperature-based control provided adequate comfort in closed spaces such as residential dwellings. The majority of such systems have an air recirculating system to heat the recirculated air if the space temperature as sensed by a thermostat is below a comfort range and cool the recirculating air if above the comfort range. It is well known that the relative humidity of air increases as its temperature is decreased, say by contact with a cool surface, until the dew point is reached, at which time relative humidity is 100% and water vapor starts to condense from the air onto the cool surface. In most cases the air conditioning unit is designed and its capacity is selected so that while cooling the air, air temperature within the air conditioner plenum adjacent to the heat exchanger is also lowered to below its dew point thereby condensing a portion of the humidity in the air passing through the plenum as well. When this cooled air with a part of its water vapor condensed in the air conditioner mixes with the air in the controlled space, the humidity of the space is reduced as well.
In many situations, this is adequate to assure comfort within the closed space. Experience shows that relative humidity need not be controlled as accurately as temperature in order to achieve comfort. Typically, if relative humidity can be held between approximately 30% and 50%, people within the closed space will be comfortable. In the majority of conditions, where high humidity is accompanied with relatively high temperature, the conventional approach outlined above is sufficient to keep relative humidity within or close to its comfort range. There are many situations however, where ignoring actual relative humidity achieved by conventional cooling is not adequate. For example, in some climates temperature is not far above the normal comfort range, but relative humidity is very high. Cooling the air results in a closed space with relative humidity far above the comfort range. In other situations, it is advantageous to control relative humidity more closely than the hit or miss approach of simply cooling recirculating air and thereby removing an indeterminate amount of water vapor from the air in the closed space. For example, glued furniture joints may weaken because of frequent humidity swings. Musical instruments such as pianos, harpsichords, guitars, violins, etc. may be damaged or their tuning harmed by frequent humidity changes. Certain house plants do not thrive if the humidity is consistently outside a relatively small range. Persistently high humidity can cause mildew of walls and clothes.
In larger environmental control systems it is possible to provide both cooled and dehumidified air from the air conditioning and heated air from the heating plant to the controlled space. In these systems, the heating and air conditioning can operate simultaneously. By providing more cooling than is needed to achieve the desired temperature in the controlled space, additional water vapor can be condensed from the recirculating air. Simultaneously providing heated air raises the space air temperature to within the comfort level.
Residential and small commercial spaces using recirculating air temperature control are not so easy to control in this way, and are the focus of this invention. The temperature in these spaces is controlled by a system including a plenum, a return air duct connected to provide air from the space to the plenum, and a conditioned air duct connected to allow air flow from the plenum to the space. A fan within the plenum creates a pressure differential within the plenum which extracts air from the space through the return air duct and forces the extracted air through the conditioned air duct into the space after its temperature and humidity has been changed. A heating unit which is usually either a furnace or heat pump and which operates responsive to a first value of a heating active signal has a heat exchanger within the plenum. An air conditioning unit operating responsive to a first value of a cooling active signal has a heat exchanger within the plenum downstream from the heating unit heat exchanger. A temperature sensor within the space supplies a temperature signal encoding a value indicative of the internal air temperature of the space and a humidity sensor within the space provides a humidity signal encoding a value indicative of the humidity level in the air within the space. A set point generator providing a temperature set point signal and a humidity set point signal respectively encoding a temperature set point value and a humidity set point value. Of course, the set point generator forms a part of the thermostat in most installations.
Because the furnace heat exchanger is typically positioned upstream in the duct or plenum from the air conditioning heat exchanger, it is obvious that providing heat to recirculating air just prior to it being cooled will not allow humidity control. Accordingly, a different procedure is needed to allow humidity control in spaces having such temperature control units.

Reheat system for reducing excessive humidity in a controlled space


A new and distinct cultivar of Astilbe plant named ‘To Have and To Hold’, characterized by its upright and sturdy plant habit; strong and healthy foliage; freely and uniformly flowering habit; intense red purple-colored flowers; and good garden performance.

The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Astilbe, botanically known as Astilbe chinensis and hereinafter referred to by the name 'To Have and To Hold'.
The new Astilbe is a product of a planned breeding program conducted by the Inventor in Heemskerk, The Netherlands. The objective of the breeding program was to create new Astilbe cultivars with healthy foliage and attractive flower coloration.
The new Astilbe originated from a cross-pollination made by the Inventor in 1998 in Heemskerk, The Netherlands, of two unidentified selections of Astilbe chinensis, not patented. The new Astilbe was discovered and selected by the Inventor as a single flowering plant within the progeny of the stated cross-pollination in a controlled environment in Heemskerk, The Netherlands in July, 1999.
Asexual reproduction of the new Astilbe by divisions in a controlled environment in Heemskerk, The Netherlands since January, 2000, has shown that the unique features of this new Astilbe are stable and reproduced true to type in successive generations.


An additive for an electrolyte of a lithium battery including a disultone-based compound represented by Formula 1 below, an organic electrolyte solution including the additive, and a lithium battery including the organic electrolyte solution are provided:

1. Field
One or more embodiments of the present invention relate to an additive for an electrolyte of a lithium secondary battery, an organic electrolyte solution including the additive, and a lithium battery including the organic electrolyte solution.
2. Description of the Related Art
Lithium batteries are used as driving (energy) sources of portable electronic devices, such as camcorders, mobile phones, and laptop computers. Lithium secondary batteries are rechargeable at high rates and have a high energy density per unit weight (about three times higher than that of the conventional lead storage batteries, nickel-cadmium (Ni—Cd) batteries, nickel-hydrogen batteries, or nickel-zinc batteries).
A lithium battery operating at a high driving voltage is incompatible with an aqueous electrolyte solution highly reactive to lithium. For this reason, the lithium battery normally uses an organic electrolyte solution. The organic electrolyte solution may be prepared by dissolving a lithium salt in an organic solvent. An appropriate organic solvent may be stable at high voltages, may have a high ionic conductivity, a high dielectric constant, and a low viscosity.
Using a carbonate-based polar or non-aqueous solvent in a lithium battery may cause a side reaction between an anode (and/or a cathode) and an electrolyte solution during initial charging, and consequentially lead to an irreversible reaction using excess charges.
The irreversible reaction may result in a passivation layer such as a solid electrolyte interface (SEI) layer on a surface of the anode. The SEI layer may prevent decomposition of the electrolyte and also serve as an ion channel. The higher the stability of the SEI layer and the lower the resistance of the SEI layer, the longer the the lithium battery life may be.
The irreversible reaction may also form a protection layer on a surface of the cathode. The protection layer may prevent decomposition of the electrolyte solution and also serve as an ion channel. The higher the stability of the protection layer at high temperature, the longer the lithium battery life may be.
A variety of additives are used to stabilize the SEI layer and/or the protective layer. However, when a conventional additive is used, the SEI layer may be prone to deterioration at high temperatures. That is, the SEI layer and/or the protection layer may have poor stability at high temperatures.
Therefore, there is a demand for an organic electrolyte solution for forming an SEI layer and/or protective layer with improved stability at high temperatures.

Additive for electrolyte of lithium battery, organic electrolyte solution comprising the same, and lithium battery using the organic electrolyte solution

Abstract: wherein, in Formula 1, A1, A2, A3, and A4 are each independently a substituted or unsubstituted C1-C5 alkylene group; a carbonyl group; or a sulfinyl group.


Techniques for augmenting technical instruction sets with additional solutions from solution providers are described. A user query for technical instruction comprising a technical problem to solve is received and a current user state from data representing user knowledge and available physical resources is determined from the user. Additionally, a technical instruction set is identified and an augmented technical instruction set comprising additional technical instructions from a winner of a knowledge augmentation auction is generated and returned.

The present disclosure relates to providing enhanced or augmented technical instructions to a user, and more specifically, to providing technical instructions to a user incorporating solutions from a winner of a knowledge augmentation auction.
Current implementations to obtain technical solutions require a user to manually consult technical information. This can include users searching through physical copies of technical manuals and/or other's notes on how to implement solutions. Often users must consult directly with a coworker or other users to try and discern an appropriate solution to technical problems. With the advent of online forums and other networked databased users can utilize search functions to sort through solution databases. However, these searches only provide technical information based on keywords or other search parameters and can often leave the user reviewing large amounts of irrelevant or redundant material. Narrowing searches to specific solutions related to a user's problems consumes large amounts of time and resources.
In some cases, these methods provide a user general technical information about a problem the user may want to solve, but it does not provide specific solution related to the user and the resources the user has available to them. This can again lead to a user reviewing generic material and instructions multiple times without advancing in the solution. Current implementations also fail to allow a provider of solutions to target users who may benefit from implementing the provider's solution.

Enabling sponsored solutions for technical instruction augmentation

International Business Machines Corporation


A method of making a microelectronic package, and a microelectronic package made according to the method. The method includes: bonding and thermally coupling a plurality of IC dies to an IHS panel to yield a die-carrying IHS panel; mounting the die-carrying IHS panel onto a substrate panel including a plurality of package substrates to yield a combination including the die-carrying IHS panel mounted to the substrate panel; and singulating the combination to yield a plurality of microelectronic packages, each of the packages including: an IHS component of the IHS panel, one of the plurality IC dies bonded and thermally coupled to said IHS component and one of the plurality of package substrates, said IHS component and said one of the plurality of IC dies being mounted to said one of the plurality of package substrates to form said each of the packages.

As microelectronic components shrink in size, a trend has emerged to provide package substrates that may be characterized as thin core substrates (that is, substrates having a core with a thickness less than or equal to 400 microns and larger than zero), or no-core substrates (that is, substrates without cores).
Disadvantageously, with a thin or no-core substrate, however, errors may occur during the package manufacturing process, such as, for example, during flip chip bonding where substrate flatness and rigidity are required. To address the above issue, the prior art sometimes provides substrates that may have a thickness of at least several tens of microns or more. However, the above measure disadvantageously detracts from further package size minimization.
The prior art fails to provide method or structures that address the above disadvantages.
For simplicity and clarity of illustration, elements in the drawings have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements may be exaggerated relative to other elements for clarity. Where considered appropriate, reference numerals have been repeated among the drawings to indicate corresponding or analogous elements,

Method of making microelectronic package using integrated heat spreader stiffener panel and microelectronic package formed according to the method


An optical fiber containing an alkali metal and capable of reducing Rayleigh scattering loss is provided. An optical fiber has a core and a cladding made of silica glass and enclosing the core. The cladding contains fluorine and has a refractive index lower than the refractive index of the core. The core contains first group dopants selected from the group of Na element, K element, or a compound thereof at an average concentration of 0.2 ppm or more and 10 ppm or less. The core also contains second group dopants for reducing the viscosity of silica glass and having a diffusion coefficient of 1×10−12 cm2/s or more and smaller than the diffusion coefficient of the first group dopants, by an average concentration of 0.2 ppm or more at a temperature of 2000° C. to 2300° C.

An optical fiber having a silica-based glass core containing an alkali metal is known as an optical fiber exhibiting low Rayleigh scattering loss and low attenuation. If an alkali metal is contained in the core region of an optical fiber preform, the viscosity of the core region can be lowered, whereby the network structure of silica glass will be unified when the optical fiber preform is drawn into a fiber, and consequently the Rayleigh scattering loss due to structural unevenness can be decreased.
WO 2004/020357 and US 2006/0130530A indicate a diffusion method as a way of doping an alkali metal into silica glass. In the diffusion method, vapor of materials, such as an alkali metal or alkali metal salt, is introduced into a glass tube, and the alkali metal is diffusion-doped onto the inner surface of the glass tube by heating the glass tube with an outside heat source or by generating plasma in the glass tube.
After doping the vicinity of inner surface of the glass tube with an alkali metal in the above-mentioned manner, the diameter of the glass tube is reduced by heating it. After such diameter reduction, the inner surface of the glass tube is etched by a certain thickness in order to remove transition metal elements such as Ni and Fe, which were simultaneously added when the alkali metal was doped. It is possible to keep the alkali metal elements to remain even if the transition metal elements are removed by etching the glass surface by a certain thickness, because the diffusion of the alkali metal elements is quicker than that of the transition metal elements. After such etching, the glass tube is collapsed by heating, whereby a core rod containing an alkali metal is made. The core rod containing an alkali metal may be provided with glass around the perimeter thereof so that a core region for making a core of an optical fiber may be formed as a whole.
An optical fiber preform is produced in a manner in which a cladding region having a refractive index lower than that of the core region containing an alkali metal is formed around the outside of the core region. An optical fiber can be produced by drawing the optical fiber preform by a well-known method.


Embodiments of neural interfaces according to the present invention comprise sensor modules for sensing environmental attributes beyond the natural sensory capability of a subject, and communicating the attributes wirelessly to an external (ex-vivo) portable module attached to the subject. The ex-vivo module encodes and communicates the attributes via a transcutaneous inductively coupled link to an internal (in-vivo) module implanted within the subject. The in-vivo module converts the attribute information into electrical neural stimuli that are delivered to a peripheral nerve bundle within the subject, via an implanted electrode. Methods and apparatus according to the invention incorporate implantable batteries to power the in-vivo module allowing for transcutaneous bidirectional communication of low voltage (e.g. on the order of 5 volts) encoded signals as stimuli commands and neural responses, in a robust, low-error rate, communication channel with minimal effects to the subjects' skin.

Prior work in neural interfaces is largely directed toward the restoration of lost natural capabilities or functions in amputees and victims of neurological injuries, e.g. the restoration or augmentation of the natural sensory capability of a subject. See for example: Buerger, S., et al., "Portable, Chronic Neural Interface System Design for Sensory Augmentation", Proceedings of the IEEE/EMBS conference on Neural Engineering, Kohala Coast, Hi., USA, May 2-May 5, 2007, the contents of which are incorporated herein in their entirety. In contrast, embodiments of the neural interface methods and apparatus according to the present invention are directed to providing an "artificial" sensory capability to a subject, which includes healthy subjects. The possibility of adding new capabilities (i.e. artificial sensory capabilities) to individuals (i.e. subjects) depends on a central hypothesis: That there exists sufficient and accessible excess capacity in the nervous system of an individual, to permit the performance of significant additional, unnatural functions without substantially interfering with the natural functions of the individuals' nervous system.
An artificial sensory capability is defined herein as providing to a subject, information pertaining to an environment within which the subject is operating, the information being obtained from sensors that are sensing environmental attributes beyond the natural sensory capability of the subject and, recording of neural responses from the subject. Within the context of the present invention, a neural interface includes apparatus and methods for conveying information obtained from environmental sensors to the subject, in the form of electrical neural stimuli applied to the nervous system of the subject.
For example, in a human or laboratory animal subject, artificial sensory capabilities can include providing the subject with the ability to sense wavelengths of light in the infra-red ("IR") and ultra-violet ("UV") spectrum (i.e. beyond the natural visible range of the subject) by interfacing the nervous system of the subject with input from IR or UV sensors. Other examples of an artificial sensory capability that can be provided to a subject include; i) the ability to sense a source of radiation through a neural interface to a radiation sensor, ii) the ability to sense range to a target as determined by a range sensing device (e.g. radar or sonar), iii) locational information provided by a positional sensor (e.g. global positioning system or "GPS"), iv) locational information pertaining to location and drift of a chemical plume as can be obtained from a plurality of chemical sensors, v) visual information in directions/locations that differ from the position/orientation of a subject's eyes, e.g. eyes in the back of the head, eyes at the end of a pole, vi) sound waves outside of the audible range in either frequency, volume or location, vii) sensor data indicating the location of or directional vector to specific (i.e. tagged) objects or other people, vii) sense of spatial direction such as from a compass or direction of a local reference, viii) sense of relative or absolute timing, and ix) sensors conveying status of (e.g. vital signs, cortisol levels, EEG measurements, galvanic skin response) or voluntary communication from other people or networks.
The sensed environment can include the physical environment containing the subject, or as well can comprise a virtual environment within which the subject is operating. Virtual environments can include for example, electronically generated simulations (e.g. simulated environment) with which a subject interacts, as well as a remote environment (e.g. telepresence) through which a subject may remotely interact with physical objects. An example of the latter is in providing a subject with a remote presence, allowing intuitive control with instantaneous response to aid in guiding remotely-located vehicles or robots. For example, sensors located on a remotely guided vehicle can be configured to sense the forces and accelerations acting on the vehicle in real time (e.g. such as the effects of choppy air on an aerial vehicle) with this information being conveyed to the subject via an embodiment of a neural interface according to the present invention, thereby providing the subject with the intuitive feel of guiding the vehicle and a level of control not currently available as in conventional tele-operation of the vehicle. Other examples related to remotely controlled or simulated environments include sensory input related to proprioceptive or other feedback from remotely controlled robots or machines as well as data generated as the output of automated algorithms that monitor data and draw conclusions, e.g. software that monitors a broad set of sensor data and sends only certain information to the neural interface based on programmed algorithms.
Embodiments of the present invention comprise sensors for sensing environmental attributes beyond the natural sensing capability of the subject, and communicating those attributes to an externally mounted module attached to and portable by the subject (i.e. ex-vivo to the subject). The externally mounted module receives the environmental attributes and communicates the attributes to an internally mounted module within the subject (in-vivo to the subject). The internally mounted module converts the environmental information into electrical neural stimuli that are delivered through implanted electrodes (e.g. probes) to the nervous system of the subject, comprising either peripheral or central neurons. Embodiments of the present invention include the capability for bidirectional communication of neural stimuli and neural responses, between the nervous system of the subject, internal and external modules and (optional) external communication systems and networks.
Neural interfaces according to the present invention find application in many fields. In the military arena alone, conflicts are increasingly fought in confusing, complex environments that decrease the advantages brought by technology due to the unwieldiness of heavy weaponry, the proliferation of small arms and night vision technology, including the affect of an often-overwhelming amount of sensor data to digest. The enhancement of situational awareness for individual soldiers through a set of neurally-tied artificial sensors can provide a new advantage to soldiers operating in challenging environments and create new means of protection. Similarly, bidirectional neural interfaces can enable an advanced form of "remote presence" allowing intuitive control with instantaneous response to guide remotely-located vehicles, robots and prosthetic devices.

Neural interface methods and apparatus to provide artificial sensory capabilities to a subject


A method and apparatus for implementing a snoop filter unit associated with a single processor in a multiprocessor system. The snoop filter unit has a plurality of ports, each port receiving snoop requests from exactly one dedicated source. Associated with each port is a snoop cache filter that processes each snoop cache request and records addresses of the most recent snoop requests for exactly one source. The snoop cache filter uses vector encoding to record the occurrence of snoop requests for a sequence of consecutive cache lines. All addresses of snoop requests are added to the snoop cache unless a received snoop cache request matches an entry present in the associated snoop cache, in which case the snoop request is discarded. Otherwise, the associated snoop cache request is enqueued for forwarding to the single processor. Information from all snoop cache filters assigned to all ports in the snoop filter unit are removed in the case that data corresponding to any one of the memory addresses contained in snoop cache filter is loaded in the cache hierarchy of the processor the snoop cache filter is assigned to.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to computer systems having multiprocessor architectures and, more particularly, to a novel multi-processor computer system for processing memory accesses requests and the implementation of cache coherence in such multiprocessor systems.
2. Description of the Prior Art
To achieve high performance computing, multiple individual processors have been interconnected to form multiprocessor computer system capable of parallel processing. Multiple processors can be placed on a single chip, or several chips—each containing one or several processors—interconnected into a multiprocessor computer system.
Processors in a multiprocessor computer system use private cache memories because of their short access time (a cache is local to a processor and provides fast access to data) and to reduce number of memory requests to the main memory. However, managing caches in multiprocessor system is complex. Multiple private caches introduce the multi-cache coherency problem (or stale data problem) due to multiple copies of main memory data that can concurrently exist in the multiprocessor system.
Small scale shared memory multiprocessing system have processors (or groups thereof) interconnected by a single bus. However, with the increasing speed of processors, the feasible number of processors which can share the bus effectively decreases.
The protocols that maintain the coherence between multiple processors are called cache coherence protocols. Cache coherence protocols track any sharing of data block between the processors. Depending upon how data sharing is tracked, cache coherence protocols can be grouped into two classes: 1) Directory based and 2) Snooping.
In directory based approach, the sharing status of a block of physical memory is kept in just one location called the coherency directory. Coherency directories are generally large blocks of memory which keep track of which processor in the multiprocessor computer system owns which lines of memory. Disadvantageously, coherency directories are typically large and slow. They can severely degrade overall system performance since they introduce additional latency for every memory access request by requiring that each access to the memory go through the common directory.
FIG. 1 illustrates a typical prior art multiprocessor system 10 using the coherence directory approach for cache coherency. The multiprocessor system 10 includes a number of processors 15a, . . . ,15d interconnected via a shared bus 24 to the main memory 20a, 20b via memory controllers 22a, 22b, respectively. Each processor 15a, . . . ,15d has its own private cache 17a, . . . ,17d, respectively, which is N-way set associative. Each request to the memory from a processor is placed on the processor bus 24 and directed to the coherency directory 26. Frequently, in the coherency controller, a module is contained which tracks the location of cache lines held in particular subsystems to eliminated the need to broadcast unneeded snoop request to all caching agents. This unit is frequently labeled "snoop controller" or "snoop filter". All memory access requests from the I/O subsystem 28 are also directed to the coherency controller 26. Instead of the main memory, secondary cache connected to the main memory can be used. Processors can be grouped into processor clusters, where each cluster has its own cluster bus, which is then connected to the coherency controller 26. As each memory request goes through the coherence directory, additional cycles are added to each request for checking the status of the requested memory block.
In a snooping approach, no centralized state is kept, but rather each cache keeps the sharing status of data block locally. The caches are usually on a shared memory bus, and all cache controllers snoop (monitor) the bus to determine whether they have a copy of the data block requested. A commonly used snooping method is the "write-invalidate" protocol. In this protocol, a processor ensures that it has exclusive access to data before it writes that data. On each write, all other copies of the data in all other caches are invalidated. If two or more processors attempt to write the same data simultaneously, only one of them wins the race, causing the other processors' copies to be invalidated.
To perform a write in a write-invalidate protocol based system, a processor acquires the shared bus, and broadcasts the address to be invalidated on the bus. All processors snoop on the bus, and check to see if the data is in their cache. If so, these data are invalidated. Thus, use of the shared bus enforces write serialization.
Disadvantageously, every bus transaction in the snooping apporach has to check the cache address tags, which could interfere with CPU cache accesses. In most recent architectures, this is typically reduced by duplicating the address tags, so that the CPU and the snooping requests may proceed in parallel. An alternative approach is to employ a multilevel cache with inclusion, so that every entry in the primary cache is duplicated in the lower level cache. Then, snoop activity is performed at the secondary level cache and does not interfere with the CPU activity.
FIG. 2 illustrates a typical prior art multiprocessor system 50 using the snooping approach for cache coherency. The multiprocessor system 50 contains number of processors 52a, . . . ,52c interconnected via a shared bus 56 to the main memory 58. Each processor 52a, . . . ,52c has its own private cache 54a, . . . ,54c which is N-way set associative. Each write request to the memory from a processor is placed on the processor bus 56. All processors snoop on the bus, and check their caches to see if the address written to is also located in their caches. If so, the data corresponding to this address are invalidated. Several multiprocessor systems add a module locally to each processor to track if a cache line to be invalidated is held in the particular cache, thus effectively reducing the local snooping activity. This unit is frequently labeled "snoop filter". Instead of the main memory, secondary cache connected to the main memory can be used.
With the increasing number of processors on a bus, snooping activity increases as well. Unnecessary snoop requests to a cache can degrade processor performance, and each snoop requests accessing the cache directory consumes power. In addition, duplicating the cache directory for every processor to support snooping activity significantly increases the size of the chip. This is especially important for systems on a single chip with a limited power budget.
What now follows is a description of prior art references that address the various problems of conventional snooping approaches found in multiprocessor systems.
Particularly, U.S. patent application US2003/0135696A1 and U.S. Pat. No. 6,704,845B2 both describe replacement policy methods for replacing entries in the snoop filter for a coherence directory based approach including a snoop filter. The snoop filter contains information on cached memory blocks—where the cache line is cached and its status. The U.S. patent application US2004/0003184A1 describes a snoop filter containing sub-snoop filters for recording even and odd address lines which record local cache lines accessed by remote nodes (sub-filters use same filtering approach). Each of these disclosures do not teach or suggest a system and method for locally reducing the number of snoop requests presented to each cache in a multiprocessor system. Nor do they teach or suggest coupling several snoop filters with various filtering methods, nor do they teach or suggest providing point-to-point interconnection of snooping information to caches.
U.S. Patent Applications US2003/0070016A1 and US2003/0065843A1 describe a multi-processor system with a central coherency directory containing a snoop filter. The snoop filter described in these applications reduces the number of cycles to process a snoop request, however, does not reduce the number of snoop requests presented to a cache.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,966,729 describes a multi-processor system sharing a bus using a snooping approach for cache coherence and a snoop filter associated locally to each processor group. To reduce snooping activity, a list of remote processor groups "interested" and "not-interested" in particular cache line is kept. Snoop requests are forwarded only to the processor groups marked as "interested" thus reducing the number of broadcasted snoop requests. It does not describe how to reduce the number of snoop requests to a local processor, but rather how to reduce the number of snoop requests sent to other processor groups marked as "not interested". This solution requires keeping a list with information on interested groups for each line in the cache for a processor group, which is comparable in size to duplicating the cache directories of each processor in the processor group thus significantly increasing the size of chip.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,389,517B1 describes a method for snooping cache coherence to allow for concurrent access on the cache from both the processor and the snoop accesses having two access queues. The embodiment disclosed is directed to a shared bus configuration. It does not describe a method for reducing the number of snoop requests presented to the cache.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,572,701 describes a bus-based snoop method for reducing the interference of a low speed bus to a high speed bus and processor. The snoop bus control unit buffers addresses and data from the low speed bus until the processor releases the high speed bus. Then it transfers data and invalidates the corresponding lines in the cache. This disclosure does not describe a multiprocessor system where all components communicate via a high-speed bus.
A. Moshovos, G. Memik, B. Falsafi and A. Choudhary, in a reference entitled "JETTY: filtering snoops for reduced energy consumption in SMP servers" ("Jetty") describe several proposals for reducing snoop requests using hardware filter. It describes the multiprocessor system where snoop requests are distributed via a shared system bus. To reduce the number of snoop requests presented to a processor, one or several various snoop filters are used.
However, the system described in Jetty has significant limitations as to performance, supported system and more specifically interconnect architectures, and lack of support for multiporting. More specifically, the approach described in Jetty is based on a shared system bus which established a common event ordering across the system. While such global time ordering is desirable to simplify the filter architecture, it limited the possible system configurations to those with a single shared bus. Alas, shared bus systems are known to be limited in scalability due to contention to the single global resource. In addition, global buses tend to be slow, due to the high load of multiple components attached to them, and inefficient to place in chip multiprocessors.
Thus, in a highly optimized high-bandwidth system, it is desirable to provide alternate system architectures, such as star, or point-to-point implementations. These are advantageous, as they only have a single sender and transmitter, reducing the load, allowing the use of high speed protocols, and simplifying floor planning in chip multiprocessors. Using point to point protocols also allows to have several transmissions in-progress simultaneously, thereby increasing the data transfer parallelism and overall data throughput.
Other limitations of Jetty include the inability to perform snoop filtering on several requests simultaneously, as in Jetty, simultaneous snoop requests from several processors have to be serialized by the system bus. Allowing the processing of several snoop requests concurrently would provide a significant increase in the number of requests which can be handled at any one time, and thus increase overall system performance.
Having set forth the limitations of the prior art, it is clear that what is required is a system incorporating snoop filters to increase overall performance and power efficiency without limiting the system design options, and more specifically, methods and apparatus to support snoop filtering in systems not requiring a common bus.
Furthermore, there is a need for a snoop filter architecture supporting systems using point-to-point connections to allow the implementation of high performance systems using snoop filtering.
There is a further need for the simultaneous operation of multiple snoop filter units to concurrently filter requests from multiple memory writers to increase system performance.
There is further a need to provide novel, high performance snoop filters which can be implemented in a pipelined fashion to enable high system clock speeds in systems utilizing such snoop filters.
There is an additional need for snoop filters with high filtering efficiency transcending the limitations of prior art.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Method and apparatus for filtering snoop requests using multiple snoop caches

International Busniess Machines Corporation


A flow control device comprises an outer sleeve having at least one aperture through its wall, and an inner sleeve having at least one aperture through its wall. Relative sliding movement of the sleeves is provided between xe2x80x9copenxe2x80x9d positions allowing for variable flow of fluid through the apertures of the sleeves and xe2x80x9cclosedxe2x80x9d positions. A pressure-reducing region is arranged to reduce the pressure of fluid flowing through at least one aperture of one of the sleeves.

This invention relates to flow control devices, such as chokes for hydrocarbon wells.
In a hydrocarbon well, chokes control flow of fluid into production tubing from the well bore or into regions of the well bore from the production tubing. Conventionally, such chokes have been simple on/off devices that merely filly opened or fully closed the production tubing. Recently, there has been a requirement for variable flow control which has given rise to particular problems. A conventional variable flow control choke is shown in the schematic drawing of FIG. 1a.
The basic features of this device are an outer sleeve 1 and an inner sleeve 2, each having respective sets 3, 4 of apertures located about their respective circumferences. The outer sleeve 1 may be an integral part of a section of production tubing. The inner sleeve 2 is slidably moveable by means of an actuator (not shown). FIG. 1a shows the location of the sleeves in a xe2x80x9cclosedxe2x80x9d position. FIGS. 1b and 1c show the relative positions of the sleeves in two different xe2x80x9copenxe2x80x9d positionsxe2x80x94partly open and fully open, respectively. The arrows of FIGS. 1b and 1c represent the flow of fluid from the well bore into the production tubing via the apertures 3, 4.
Annular seals 5, 6 and 7 are located between the inner 2 and outer 1 sleeves. These seals separate the annular gap between the inner and outer sleeves into chambers whilst allowing the inner sleeve to move freely. For example, there is an annular chamber 8 between seals 6 and 7, which chamber includes the apertures 3 of the outer sleeve 1.
Activation of the actuator causes the inner sleeve 2 to be moved in the direction of the arrows shown in FIG. 1a. FIG. 1b shows the apparatus of FIG. 1a in a partially open position, wherein the apertures 4 of the inner sleeve encroach on the chamber 8, thereby opening up a flow path. In the fully open position of FIG. 1c, the apertures 4 of the inner sleeve are located entirely within the chamber 8.
Various problems may be encountered with this conventional type of flow control device. For example, as the device begins to enter an xe2x80x9copenxe2x80x9d position, pressure on one side of the seal tends to distort the seal and extrude it in the direction of fluid flow. Therefore, in the example shown in FIG. 1b, the seal 6 tends to be extruded into the apertures of the inner sleeve. Should the fluid flow be in the opposite direction (i.e. from the production tubing to the well bore), the seal tends to extrude into the annular gap between the sleeves.
Another problem with this type of flow control device is that, at the point of opening, the fluid is flowing very quickly through the apertures, and at high pressure, with the result that the seal 6 can be damaged or dragged into the apertures 4 of the inner sleeve.
The high velocity of the fluid flow in the xe2x80x9cjust openxe2x80x9d position of FIG. 1b can also cause another problem, namely that of erosion of the edges of the apertures, particularly when the fluid is contaminated with solid particles such as sand. Yet another problem which may be encountered with conventional flow control devices is that the increase in fluid flow rate is not linear with linear movement of the tube and so accurate variable flow control is difficult, especially when low flow rates are required.
In accordance with a first aspect of the invention there is provided a flow control device comprising an outer sleeve having at least one aperture through its wall, an inner sleeve having at least one aperture through its wall and means for providing relative sliding movement of the sleeves between xe2x80x9copenxe2x80x9d positions allowing variable flow of fluid through the apertures of the sleeves and xe2x80x9cclosedxe2x80x9d positions, characterised by a pressure-reducing region arranged to reduce the pressure of fluid flowing through the at least one aperture of one of the sleeves.
The provision of a pressure-reducing region reduces the risk of damage of the seal 6 and reduces the likelihood of it being dragged into the apertures of the sleeve. Furthermore, erosion of the apertures is reduced.
According to a second aspect of the invention, there is provided a flow control device comprising an outer sleeve having at least one aperture through its wall, an inner sleeve having at least one aperture through its wall, means for providing relative sliding movement of the sleeves between xe2x80x9copenxe2x80x9d positions allowing variable flow of fluid through the apertures of the sleeves and xe2x80x9cclosedxe2x80x9d positions and a sealing arrangement between the inner and outer sleeves comprising at least one seal, characterised by seal bypass means arranged to permit a portion of fluid to seep around the seal so that the fluid pressure acting on a region of the seal is reduced.
The provision of a seal bypass reduces the likelihood of extrusion of the seal which was hitherto encountered. As the fluid seeps around the seal, the pressure on the opposite sides of the seal tends to equalise.
According to a further aspect of the invention, there is provided a flow control device comprising an outer sleeve having at least one aperture through its wall, an inner sleeve having at least one aperture through its wall and means for providing relative sliding movement of the sleeves between xe2x80x9copenxe2x80x9d positions allowing variable flow of fluid through the apertures of the sleeves and xe2x80x9cclosedxe2x80x9d positions, characterised in that an edge region of the at least one aperture of one of the sleeves includes erosion resistant means.
The provision of an erosion resistant means prolongs the lifetime of the flow control device. Preferably the erosion resistant means includes tungsten.
A further aspect of the invention comprises the provision of tapered edge regions for the apertures of the sleeves, also for the purpose of reducing erosion.
According to yet another aspect of the invention there is provided a flow control device comprising an outer sleeve having a set of apertures through its wall, an inner sleeve having a set of apertures through its wall and means for providing relative sliding movement of the sleeves between xe2x80x9copenxe2x80x9d positions allowing variable flow of fluid through the apertures of the sleeves and xe2x80x9cclosedxe2x80x9d positions, characterised in that one set of apertures includes an aperture extending beyond the others in the direction of opening movement.
The provision of the extended aperture enables low flow rates to be achieved when the device enters a xe2x80x9cjust openxe2x80x9d position.
Preferably the shape, size and spacing of the apertures is arranged to provide a constant percentage change of the velocity co-efficient characteristic of the fluid with linear movement of the inner sleeve.
The invention will now be described, by way of example, with reference to the accompanying drawings.


A pressure detection sensor for detecting a tire internal air pressure and a wheel side communication device for transmitting a detection result of the pressure detection sensor using a preset transmission mode are provided on each wheel. The detection result from the pressure detection sensor is transmitted to an ECU via a vehicle body side communication device provided on a vehicle body. The ECU is able to notify a transmission mode determination device provided on each wheel that adjustment of the tire internal air pressure is being performed by manipulating a state of the tire internal air pressure. The transmission mode determination device determines a transmission mode to be used by the wheel side communication device such that a transmission frequency of a notification related to the occurrence of an abnormality of the wheel is reduced while adjustment of the tire internal air pressure is being performed.

1. Field of Invention
The invention relates to a wheel state adjustment system and a wheel state adjustment method for adjusting a predetermined quantity of state of a wheel, which may be, for example, an internal air pressure of a tire.
2. Description of Related Art
As noted in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. JP-A-7-137515 and No. JP-A-2003-94917, it is desirable to monitor various quantities of state of a wheel, such as an internal air pressure of a tire, in order to maintain the wheel in an appropriate state and achieve comfortable running of a vehicle. Accordingly, various related methods have been proposed for monitoring wheel quantities of state, like changes in the internal air pressure within the tire.
Many of the disclosed systems for monitoring wheel quantities of state and maintaining them appropriately, detect a wheel quantity of state such as the internal air pressure of the tire by using (a) sensors attached to a vehicle body, or (b) sensors provided in integrated units with vehicle instruments attached to the vehicle body.
However, recently, systems are being widely adopted that use sensors provided on each wheel to detect the respective wheel quantity of state such as the internal air pressure of the tire, and then transmit the detection results to an Electronic Control System (ECU), or the like, provided on the vehicle body. Such systems are epitomized by Tire Pressure Monitoring Systems (TPMS). In these systems, the sensors provided on each wheel are usually capable of switching between different operating modes depending on the wheel quantity of state. For example, some TPMS utilize sensors that switch between (a) infrequent detection of the wheel quantity of state at normal times, and (b) frequent detection of the wheel quantity of state when it is determined that an abnormality is likely to have occurred. By adopting such a configuration, it is possible to improve safety.
However, the sensors provided on the wheels often use a battery provided on each wheel as an energy supply rather than a battery provided on the vehicle body. Accordingly, in order to enable the sensors to be operated over extended periods using the respective wheel batteries, it is important to operate the sensors efficiently and reduce energy consumption. For example, some TPMS pro-actively adjust the tire internal air pressure to an appropriate level to suit the road being run along. With such systems, however, there is a possibility that use of this pro-active adjustment of the tire internal air pressure will cause the sensors to operate improperly and frequently detect the wheel quantity of state and transmit the detection results even when there is no likelihood that the wheel is in an abnormal state. However, as will be apparent, from the point of view of reducing energy consumption it is clearly undesirable if the sensors operate improperly and detect the wheel quantities of state more than necessary.

Wheel state adjustment system and method thereof


A fluidic diverter valve for use in flight control systems that includes a non-spherical shuttle element disposed within a cavity formed in the valve housing. In one embodiment, the shuttle element has a disc-shaped main body with first and second sides that are substantially flat and extend substantially parallel to one another, and a substantially symmetrically shaped peripheral section located between the first and second sides.

The movements involved in flight of some missiles and space vehicles, such as pitch, yaw, and spin rate, are controlled with flight control systems that use reaction jets. In some systems of this type, a pressurized gas source, such as a gas generator, supplies a pressurized gas to one or more fluidic amplifier stages. In response to a control signal supplied from flight control equipment, a fluidic amplifier stage can selectively divert the pressurized gas into one of two or more flow paths. Each flow path may have a nozzle on its outlet that is located external to the missile or vehicle. These nozzles may be positioned to provide thrust in different or opposite directions. Thus, the fluidic amplifier stages can affect one or more flight parameters by selectively diverting the pressurized gas to selected outlet nozzles.
The fluidic amplifier stages incorporated into the above-described flight control system can include non-vented fluidic amplifiers, which are generally known in the art. However, non-vented fluidic amplifiers may not provide 100% flow diversion. Thus, some systems incorporate an additional fluidic element, such as a fluidic diverter valve, between the final fluidic amplifier stage and the output nozzles, which allows the system to substantially achieve 100% flow diversion.
One particular type of fluidic diverter valve uses a spherically shaped ball shuttle element. The ball element is solid, and is located in a chamber formed in the valve housing. The housing includes an inlet port and two outlet ports. The ball element is moveable within the chamber and selectively blocks one of the two ports so that pressurized gas entering the inlet port is selectively directed out the port that is not blocked.
Although the above-described type of fluidic diverter valve is robustly designed and manufactured, and operates safely, it suffers certain drawbacks. For example, it can be fairly complex, costly, and some of the materials that may be used to make the ball may not be sufficiently robust. In particular, the ball may erode in the flow of pressurized gas. In addition, the size and weight of the ball should be selected to maximize valve performance. However, some of the materials that may be used in a high temperature environment may be weight prohibitive for use as a solid ball. Alternatively, some materials that are not weight prohibitive may erode in the gas flow and/or the materials may be costly.
Hence there is a need for a fluidic diverter valve that addresses one or more of the above-noted drawbacks. Namely, a hot gas fluidic diverter valve having a shuttle element that is not complex and/or costly, and/or is structurally robust. The present invention addresses one or more of these needs.

Fluidic diverter valve with a non-spherical shuttle element


A method and apparatus for sensing electric and electromagnetic fields incorporating a fiber-optic transducer which mounts directly on a conventional optical fiber waveguide. The transducer employs a conductive Fabry-Perot microcavity bounded by a conductive, thin and corrugated diaphragm. When the conductive microcavity is placed in an electric field, the electric field is excluded from within the equipotential microcavity and a net electrostatic force acts on the diaphragm. Likewise, when the conductive microcavity is exposed to an electromagnetic wave, the wave exerts a radiation pressure on the diaphragm. In both cases, the diaphragm deflects linearly and uniformly under the influence of the extremely low electrostatic pressures which are induced. The diaphragm deflection modulates the reflectance within the optical fiber by varying the gap of the cavity. The change in reflected light is measured and correlated to the field strength using an improved dual-wavelength referencing technique which compensates for bending and transmission losses in the optical fiber.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the measurement of electrostatic field strength, and more particularly, to a fiber-optic sensor incorporating a conductive Fabry-Perot microcavity bounded by a thin conductive diaphragm for measuring the strength of electric and electromagnetic fields.
2. Description of the Background
The monitoring of electric fields in high voltage high-power equipment is of fundamental importance in the power industry. Both AC and DC fields must be measured in many high-voltage components in order to understand their operation, and to prevent or repair malfunctions. The need for monitoring has become especially apparent in recent months as a result of the public concern over radiation from high-power transmission lines.
Consequently, there exists a considerable demand for an unobtrusive, accurate and inexpensive electric field sensor which is dielectric or otherwise immune to electromagnetic interference.
Recent efforts to fulfil the demand have turned to fiber optic technology for its superior sensitivity, wide dynamic range, and immunity to electromagnetic interference.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,933,629 issued to Kozuka, et al., discloses an optical fiber sensing device for measuring AC magnetic quantities based on the Faraday effect. Light is passed through a Faraday cell which phase-modulates the light in proportion to a surrounding magnetic field. The strength of the AC field can be calculated from the amount of phase modulation.
Similar interferometric electric field sensors have been proposed, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,899,042 issued to Falk, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,477,723 issued to Carome, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,631,402 issued to Nagatsuma, et al., and U.S. Statutory Invention Registration No. H371 issued to Bobb, all of which generally employ phase modulation to measure electric field strengths. However, the measurements carried out by the above-described devices are based on electro-optic phenomena such as the Pockel's and piezoelectric effects. Sensors based on electro-optic phenomena are unusually bulky and are highly prone to ambient temperature and pressure variations. It would be more advantageous to provide a fiber-optic sensor based on electrostatic force effects. This would eliminate the susceptibility to temperature and pressure variations. However, the electrostatic forces which result from electric fields are very weak and difficult to measure with accuracy. Currently available field-sensitive elements lack the necessary sensitivity, and they exhibit a non-linear response to varying fields. The non-linearity prevents an accurate relative measurement. The problem becomes especially severe for weak electric fields.
The problem of non-linearity arose previously in a different context. Researchers first began to exploit the mechanical properties of silicon during the integrated circuits revolution by developing microsensors to measure pressure. The development efforts led to a variety of thin film diaphragms which converted pressure to a proportionate electrical signal. For example, A. D. Kurtz, et al. (U.S. Pat. No. 3,654,579) disclose a piezoresistive pressure transducer employing a thin film diaphragm which is displaced by pressure. The displacement alters the resistivity of the transducer, and the change in resistivity is measured electronically. The thin film diaphragm improved the linearity of response to changing pressure.
Near perfect linearity was later achieved through the use of convoluted diaphragms, such as that disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,467,656 issued to Mallon, et al. As shown in FIG. 1, the Mallon, et al. device is a pressure-sensing diaphragm formed with a plurality of concentric recesses or corrugations. As the piezoresistive diaphragm is displaced, the corresponding change in resistance can be measured at terminals 50 and 51. The corrugations significantly improve the linearity of response to pressure. The improved response allows a more accurate relative determination of pressure. Moreover, the corrugations can easily be produced on thin silicon diaphragms by conventional etching and diffusing techniques.
It would be greatly advantageous to employ corrugated diaphragm technology in developing an electrostatic force-effect sensor capable of linear modulation of light in a Fabry-Perot cavity connected to an optical waveguide, to improve thereby the accuracy of electric field measurement while reducing ambient pressure and temperature effects.

Electric and electromagnetic field sensing system including an optical transducer


Image defogging method and system. The method includes: acquiring minimum intensity values corresponding to pixels in a foggy image, and selecting the largest values of intensity values of R, G, and B channels of pixels in an area, covered by a brightest area of a predetermined size in a local minimum intensity image, in the foggy image as component values of R, G, and B channels of an atmosphere light value; acquiring a transformation image of the foggy image with atmosphere light value of the foggy image; acquiring a transmission map of the foggy image by edge-preserving filtering the transformation image; and acquiring intensity values of R, G, and B channels of pixels in a defogged image using transmission map and atmosphere light value of the foggy image and intensity values of R, G, and B channels of pixels in the foggy image.

In the case that the weather is bad, the visibility and color of an image are usually degraded by the fog in the atmosphere. It is usually needed to improve the quality of images and videos captured in the weather by defogging. The process of removing the fog in an image is called image defogging.
Currently, there are many image defogging methods, in which an image defogging method based on dark channel prior is a method having the best effect. The dark channel prior is obtained by making statistics on an outdoor non-foggy image database, i.e. every local areas in outdoor non-foggy images have a pixel, the intensity value of at least one color channel of which is very low. A defogging model established by utilizing the dark channel prior can directly estimate the thickness of the fog, and can restore a foggy image to a high quality image after removing the interference of the fog (called defogged image for short).
In the image defogging method based on dark channel prior, an intensity value "J" of a defogged image is solved by using an intensity value "I", an atmosphere light value "A", and a transmission map t of an input fogging image according to a foggy image model I=Jt+A(1−t).
Currently, there are the following two image defogging methods based on dark channel prior: 1) acquiring a transmission map for performing defogging processing on the foggy image based on dark channel prior, optimizing the transmission map by soft matting interpolation, and solving the intensity value of the defogged image by using the optimized transmission map. The defect of this method lies in that the processing of soft matting interpolation takes too much time, leading to the completion of the processing of image defogging taking too much computation time. 2) filtering the minimum values of R, G, B components of every pixels in an input image by using a median filter to obtain the atmosphere light value and the transmission map for performing defogging processing on the input image, and solving the intensity value of the defogged image by using the atmosphere light value and the transmission map. The defect of this method lies in that existing median filters cannot obtain a defogged image of good enough effect.


Systems and methods for accessing data secured and encrypted using a file system manager are disclosed. One method includes determining whether a community of interest (COI) key obtained from a security appliance matches a COI key associated with a file structure managed by the file system manager that is the subject of a file system request issued by a caller. The method further includes identifying an entry included in a key bank associated with the COI key and the file structure that is the subject of the file system request, the key bank storing encrypted versions of a metadata key. The method also includes decrypting the metadata key using the COI key, decrypting at least one block encryption key using the metadata key, and decrypting a block of data associated with the at least one block encryption key.

File systems generally utilize a file system manager that may be included in an operating system, and provides access to files and/or directories that are managed in that file system. Such file system managers have some abilities to protect the data stored within the respective file systems. For example, an Access Control List or an Access Control Record associated with a directory or a file can be used to control whether a user may have read or write access to a directory or a file. Using such mechanisms, file access requests are received by a file system manager and from a caller (typically an application associated with a particular user or endpoint). The file access request may identify one or more directories and a file, and may determine that the caller does not have an appropriate access right (e.g., read or write access) associated with the file access request. The Access Control List or Record is accessed to determine if the caller has access rights to the file based on the request (e.g., read or write access). If the caller has adequate access rights, the file system manager may return a file handle to the caller for use. If the caller does not have adequate access rights, an error message is returned to the caller. In either case, the file or directory is visible to the user.
Existing file system manager capabilities have shortcomings with respect to protecting a directory or file from unauthorized access. For example, existing file system managers allow all users who can access a directory, using a user credential such as a user identification and password, to see all the directories and files included in that particular directory to which the user has access. Such knowledge of the presence or absence of a directory or file can be valuable to a hacker or an unauthorized user (e.g., due to names of files or directories, which may be indicative of contents or the value thereof). Accordingly, improvements in the area of file system manager security are desirable.


A trench shield or manhole shield which has tapered side shields. The walls of each side shield are tapered. The outer walls are tapered inwardly from front to rear (in the case of the trench shield) or from top to bottom (in the case of a manhole shield). This taper allows the shield to be pulled out of an excavated hole by reducing friction because the trailing portion of the shield is tapered inwardly and does not contact the sides of the hole. The inner wall of each side shield of the trench shield is tapered outwardly from front to rear, further reducing friction. In different embodiments either the outer or the inner walls or both are tapered.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to trench shields and manhole shields.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Trench shields and manhole shields are designed to protect workers in deep excavations, e.g. when laying pipe, from a slope failure of an exposed earth wall. In laying pipe, a pipe joint is laid and the space within the trench or manhole shield is partially backfilled and compacted. The shield is then pulled forward in order to lay the next section of pipe. Frictional forces resulting from the pressures of the soil collapsing against the exterior walls of the shield and the material backfilled and compressed against the interior walls of the shield exist. These forces must be overcome in order to advance the shield in a trench or extract it.
Previous patents, for example U.S. Pat. No. 2,922,283, issued on Jan. 26, 1960 to F. S. Porter, U.S. Pat. No. 3,089,310, issued on May 14, 1963 to E. Torti, U.S. Pat. No. 4,019,330, issued on Apr. 26, 1977 to James L. Griswold, U.S. Pat. No. 4,752,157, issued on Jun. 21, 1988 to Ernst-Friedrich Ischebeck et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,993,880, issued on Feb. 19, 1991 to John Collins, U.S. Pat. No. 5,232,312, issued on Aug. 3, 1993 to Charles B. Jennings et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,277,522, issued on Jan. 11, 1994 to Joseph F. Pertz, U.S. Pat. No. 5,290,129, issued on Mar. 1, 1994 to Kenneth G. Rody et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,310,290, issued on May 10, 1994 to Dennis I. Spencer, U.S. Pat. No. 5,503,504, issued on Apr. 2, 1996 to Wilhelm Hess et al., and U.S. Pat. No. 5,527,137, issued on Jun. 18, 1996 to Dennis I. Spencer, Great Britain Patent Nos. 2,094,373, published on Sep. 15, 1982, 2,115,453, published on Sep. 7, 1983, and 2,171,735, published on Jan. 22, 1986, French Patent No. 2,615,218, issued on Nov. 18, 1988, and German Patent No. 3,820,625, issued on Jan. 5, 1989, teach shoring devices and machines. Further, the Efficiency Production, Inc. brochure, published in 1991, teaches trench shields.
These prior trench shields all suffer from the above-noted disadvantage, namely that frictional forces must be overcome, e.g. by the use of heavy equipment. The shields of the instant invention have tapered side shields, thereby resulting in reduced frictional forces as they are advanced forward in the trench or extracted from the trench.