A solid electrolyte of the present invention is represented by a general formula: LixMOyNz, where M is at least one element selected from the group consisting of Si, B, Ge, Al, C, Ga and S, and x, y and z respectively satisfy x=0.6 to 5.0, y=1.050 to 3.985, and z=0.01 to 0.50. The solid electrolyte hardly deteriorates in a wet atmosphere.

With the development in portable devices such as personal computers and mobile phones, demand is growing for batteries as power sources for such devices.
In batteries for such application, an electrolyte composed of a liquid such as organic solvent has been used as a medium for transferring ions. For this reason, there is a possibility that problems such as leakage of electrolyte from the battery might occur.
In order to solve the above problems, development is under way to produce an all solid state battery using, instead of a liquid electrolyte, a solid electrolyte. An all solid state lithium secondary battery, in particular, is vigorously being studied in many fields as a battery capable of providing a high energy density. This is because Li has a low atomic weight, the greatest ionization tendency, and the lowest reduction potential, and thus, for example, the use of Li metal as a negative electrode active material yields a high electromotive force.
Well-known examples of the solid electrolyte used for the all solid state lithium secondary battery are lithium halide, lithium nitride, lithium oxyacid salts and derivatives thereof. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,597,660 reports in the specification that lithium phosphorus oxynitride (LixPOyNz: where x, y and z satisfy x=2.8 and 3z+2y=7.8) obtained by introducing nitrogen (N) into lithium orthophosphate (Li3PO4) has a very high lithium ion conductivity of 1×10−6 to 2×10−6 S/cm although it is an oxide-based material.
When the lithium phosphorus oxynitride is exposed to a wet atmosphere, however, phosphorus atoms (P) forming the lithium phosphorus oxynitride react with water molecules present in the wet atmosphere, during which the phosphorus atoms are reduced to a lower oxidation state from an oxidation state of +5. Thereby, lithium phosphorus oxynitride is decomposed, which significantly decreases the ion conductivity thereof.
When such decrease in ion conductivity occurs in an all solid state battery using a solid electrolyte composed of lithium phosphorus oxynitride, internal impedance will increase. For this reason, its charge/discharge rate characteristics will be significantly impaired.
In view of the above, an object of the present invention is to provide a solid electrolyte capable of preventing the ion conductivity from decreasing even in a wet atmosphere, and an all solid state battery using the solid electrolyte.

Solid electrolyte and all solid state battery using the same

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.


A device and method for packaging a web roll with a packaging sheet dispenser that dispenses a packaging sheet at an adjustable angle relative to the radial direction of the web roll, that can be moved parallel to the axial direction of the web roll, and on which a supply roll of the packaging sheet is provided, along with a motor-drive for the web roll to be packaged.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a device and method for packaging a web roll with a packaging sheet dispenser that dispenses a packaging sheet at an adjustable angle relative to the radial direction of the web roll, that can be moved parallel to the axial direction of the web roll, and on which a supply roll of the packaging sheet is provided, along with a motor-drive for the web roll to be packaged.
2. Discussion of Background Information
A web packaging device is disclosed in GB 1 429 445. As shown in this reference, a web roll, for example a paper roll, is wrapped with a plastic sheet. The plastic sheet has a substantially smaller width than the web roll being packaged. During the packaging process, the plastic sheet is first aligned to the circumferential direction of the web roll and secured thereon. The web roll is then rotated, resulting in the formation of an edge- or end-packaging. After a predetermined number of rotations of the web roll, the packaging sheet dispenser is then turned, such that the width direction of the packaging sheet leaves its orientation parallel to the web roll being packaged and forms an acute angle therewith. When the web roll rotates further, the packaging sheet dispenser simultaneously moves parallel to the axis of the web roll, resulting in helical packaging.
A similar principle is shown in publication DE 195 35 746 A1. Packing paper, whose specific weight is somewhat higher than that of a plastic sheet, is the packaging material used therein.
The advantage to this type of helical packaging lies in the fact that with a single width of packaging sheet, a multitude of web rolls can be wrapped, regardless of their widths. It is not necessary to stock packaging sheets in varying widths. Helical packaging thus simplifies the inventory of packaging sheet material, thereby increasing the economy of roll packaging.
A disadvantage, however, is that it is not sufficient to merely rotate the web roll a number of times corresponding to the amount of packaging sheet layers desired, for example two or three times. A multitude of rotations are necessary before the web roll is enveloped along its entire length. This requires increased packaging time. Moreover, the possibility for increasing packaging speed is limited. Especially when using packing paper, there is considerable danger of the packaging sheet tearing if wrapping velocity is increased too much within a short period of time. Increased wrapping velocity, however, is necessary for attaining higher packaging speeds.

Device and method for packaging a web roll with a packaging sheet


An electric storage device includes: a power generating element; a housing container that houses the power generating element; a connecting body electrically connected to the power generating element; and an insulating member that fits the housing container at a plurality of fitting portions, secures the connecting body, and insulates a conductive path, which includes the power generating element and the connecting body, and the housing container from each other.

A secondary battery is used as a substitute for a primary battery. In addition, the secondary battery is in widespread use as a power source for an electronic device such as a mobile phone and an IT device. Especially, the nonaqueous electrolyte secondary cell typified by a lithium ion battery has a high energy density. Accordingly, application of the nonaqueous electrolyte secondary cell is being developed for a large industrial electrical machine such as an electric vehicle.
FIG. 12 is an exploded perspective view illustrating a schematic configuration of a related nonaqueous electrolyte secondary cell. This type of nonaqueous electrolyte secondary cell is described in, for example, JP-A-2010-097822. The nonaqueous electrolyte secondary cell 100 includes an exterior in a hexahedron shape. This exterior is constituted of a container main body 110 and a plate-shaped cover portion 120. The container main body 110 has a box shape with an opening. The opening of the container main body 110 is sealed by the cover portion 120. The material of the cover portion 120 is aluminum.
The cover portion 120 has an opening as a through-hole 120a for extracting a terminal. On an upper side of the through-hole 120a, an insulation sealing material 122 is positioned. The insulation sealing material 122 has an outline in a shape of an octagonal prism. The insulation sealing material 122 is a component made of insulating material. The insulation sealing material 122 includes a bottom surface 122b surrounded by the framing body 122a. On the bottom surface 122b, a through-hole 122c is formed. The through-hole 122c extends to the through-hole 120a of the cover portion 120. That is, the through-hole 122c communicates with through-hole 120a.
A connecting member 123 is a component made of conductive metal. At the center of the connecting member 123, a main body part 123a in a shape of an octagonal prism is positioned. Respective tubular portions 123b and 123c protrude from both surfaces of the main body part 123a. The main body part 123a fits the framing body 122a of the insulation sealing material 122. The tubular portion 123b is inserted into the through-hole 120a of the cover portion 120. This connects the tubular portion 123b to a current collector (not shown) housed inside of the container main body 110. The current collector is connected to a power generating element inside of the container main body 110.
A convex part 120b is formed on both ends of the cover portion 120 and at the outer side with respect to the through-hole 120a. The convex part 120b is a protrusion of the cover portion 120. The convex part 120b has a rectangular planar shape. Additionally, the convex part 120b is covered with a retainer 121, which is secured. The retainer 121 has a low-profile quadrangular prism shape. The retainer 121 is a component made of synthetic resin. The retainer 121 includes a backside surface (not shown) with a depression corresponding to the shape of the convex part 120b. Accordingly, the retainer 121 is secured on the cover portion 120 by fitting to the convex part 120b.
Additionally, a terminal member 125 is positioned on an upper side of the retainer 121. The terminal member 125 electrically connects the nonaqueous electrolyte secondary cell 100 to an external load or another battery. The terminal member 125 is a component made of high-strength conductive metal such as iron and stainless steel. The terminal member 125 includes a bolt portion 125a and a base portion 125b. The bolt portion 125a includes a surface with a thread. The base portion 125b is formed at a root portion of the bolt portion 125a. The base portion 125b has an outline in a quadrangular prism shape.
On a principal surface of the base portion 125b at a side facing the cover portion 120, a depressed part 125c is formed. The depressed part 125c has a shape corresponding to the shape of the retainer 121. The depressed part 125c fits the retainer 121. Accordingly, the terminal member 125 is secured to the cover portion 120 in a state insulated from the cover portion 120.
Additionally, a bridge member 124 is placed to cover both the connecting member 123 and the terminal member 125. The bridge member 124 includes a surface on which a through-hole 124a and a through-hole 124b are formed. The bridge member 124 is a plate-shaped component made of conductive metal. The tubular portion 123c of the connecting member 123 is inserted into the through-hole 124a. The bolt portion 125a of the terminal member 125 is inserted into the through-hole 124b. In this state, a distal end of the tubular portion 123c is swaged. Accordingly, the bridge member 124 is secured to the connecting member 123. This electrically connects the connecting member 123 and the terminal member 125 together.
In this nonaqueous electrolyte secondary cell 100, electricity stored inside of the container main body 110 is available through the terminal member 125. Specifically, wiring (not shown) of the external load is mounted on the bolt portion 125a of the terminal member 125, and fastened by a nut and similar member. This electrically connects the nonaqueous electrolyte secondary cell 100 and the external load together.
In the nonaqueous electrolyte secondary cell 100 as described above, the terminal member 125 is secured to the cover portion 120 via the insulative retainer 121 as illustrated in FIG. 12. In this case, rattling may occur between the retainer 121 made of insulative resin material and the convex part 120b of the cover portion 120 made of metallic material. Accordingly, in this technique, it is difficult to stably secure the terminal member 125 to the cover portion 120.
In an electric storage device like the nonaqueous electrolyte secondary cell 100, a conductive path that extends to the outside of the housing container from the power generating element connects to a connecting terminal like the terminal member 125 in a state insulated from the housing container by an insulation structure like the retainer 121. However, there has been a problem that it is difficult to stably secure this insulation structure to the housing container.

Electric storage device and power source module


An object of the present invention is to shorten the time required by processing, and to simplify the work and increase the number of samples processed, in the X-ray analysis of a specific substance contained in a sample. To achieve the object, a method for assaying the content of a specific substance in a sample 106, comprises a measurement step (S3) of irradiating the sample 106 with X-rays, and measuring the spectrum of the sample 106, and an assay step (S4) of comparing the components of the specific substance in the spectrum of the sample 106 and in a reference spectrum that has been pre-stored for the sample 106, and determining whether the specific substance is contained in the sample 106 in an amount equal to or greater than a specific value.

In the field of industry, heavy metal- and bromine-based flame retardants and so forth in various materials and products have been indicated to be hazardous to humans and the environment, and the regulation of harmful substances has been growing around the world. For instance, in Europe, the "Directive on the restriction of the use of certain hazardous substances in electrical and electronic equipment (RoHS Directive)" prohibits the use of parts containing more than 100 ppm cadmium (Cd) or more than 1000 ppm lead (Pb), mercury (Hg), certain bromine-based flame retardants (polybrominated biphenyls (PBB) or polybrominated biphenyl ethers (PBDE)), or hexavalent chromium (Cr (VI)). Accordingly, it is absolutely essential that manufacturers of electrical and electronic equipment confirm that the various parts they make do not contain more than the regulated amounts of hazardous substances.
In general, the content of a hazardous substance such as an environmental hazardous substance is assayed or measured by performing quantitative analysis. In this quantitative analysis, fluorescent X-ray analysis is utilized because it makes compositional analysis possible on the order of a few tens of parts per million, and allows non-destructive measurement. Quantitative analysis featuring fluorescent X-ray analysis is used to assay contents in many other fields as well (see Patent Documents 1 and 2, for example).
With the above-mentioned conventional assay methods, quantitative analysis is performed on all parts that are supposed to be assayed, regardless of whether or not any environmental hazardous substances or other hazardous substances are actually contained, so detailed analysis ends up being performed even on parts containing no hazardous substances, which wastes time in the processing step. For example, it takes about 12 minutes to perform quantitative analysis of five elements for a single part. Consequently, it is desirable to eliminate unnecessary processing and shorten the processing time, particularly in processing steps involving a large quantity of parts. Also, since the analysis results are outputted as numerical values, the operator has to visually confirm the values and make a decision about the content, which imposes a significant burden on the operator.
Furthermore, if the sample is a composite part composed of a plurality of materials, determining by X-ray analysis which of the parts in the composite part contains the hazardous substance requires that the composite part be taken apart to its constituent parts composed of single materials prior to analysis. Therefore, the time it takes for disassembly and the burden on the operator are major obstacles.
Patent Document 1: Japanese published unexamined patent Application No. H7-49317
Patent Document 2: Japanese published unexamined patent Application No. H7-63707

X-ray fluorescence analysis to determine levels of hazardous substances


A configurable vibration sensor having a sensor circuit, an analog-to-digital converter and a processor is provided. The sensor circuit employs a vibration sensing element and a variable bandwidth filter controllable by the processor. In addition to the variable bandwidth filter, other configurable elements may also be employed in the sensor circuit, including a variable gain amplifier. These configurable elements allow the configurable vibration sensor to be configured for different vibration measurement applications when measuring vibrations from vibrating structures such as machinery and the like.

Machines and other vibrating structures generate characteristic vibrations during their normal operations. These vibrations can vary from a simple sinusoidal type, to a complex, multi-frequency, non-linear oscillation or random type. Changes in the oscillation form of vibrations emanating from such machinery can result from a simple change in operation, but they may also be the result of wear, failure or fatigue of mechanical parts. By analyzing and isolating the characteristics of the vibrations of a machine, early warning signs of machine failures can be detected. This information may be used to prevent unscheduled downtime of the machine, thereby increasing machine efficiency.
Vibrations are typically measured using analog vibration sensing elements, such as analog accelerometers, positioned on machinery at strategic locations. The vibration sensing elements are selected so that the observed amplitude and frequency range optimally measure the vibrations at a specific location. Separate analog filters, such as band-pass and low-pass filters, may be attached to the analog output of a vibration sensing element to further adjust the vibration signal measured by the vibration sensing element. The result is that a cornucopia of vibration sensing elements and filters may be distributed on a single machine.
The output of a vibration sensing element may also be subject to further analysis. Typical calculations can include the Root-Mean-Square Average (RMS), peak-to-peak amplitude, as well as a Fast Fourier Transform of the vibration signal, to determine the dominant frequencies in the signal. In simple vibration sensors containing a vibration sensing element, these calculations are typically accomplished in embedded hardware.
Where more complex analysis is desired, vibration signals are often digitized. The analog signals output from vibration sensing elements spread across a machine may be wired to a single point for analog-to-digital conversion. From these digital signals, not only may the above-mentioned typical calculations be performed, but also more sophisticated calculations such as modal analysis, correlations, and other computationally intensive functions may be performed.
A number of vibration sensors and vibration monitoring devices exist in the prior art. For example, in one prior art device, vibrations are measured at a single point on a machine using a vibration data logger. The data logger is a self-contained unit that includes a vibration sensing element together with an analog-to-digital converter and random access memory (RAM). This device is secured to the machine, and stores a record of the vibrations measured over a period of time. The device may be subsequently detached from the machine in order to download stored vibration data to a personal computer for analysis.
Further examples of other prior art vibration sensors or vibration monitoring devices are described in the following references: U.S. Pat. No. 5,309,149; U.S. Pat. No. 5,847,658; U.S. Pat. No. 6,032,109; U.S. Pat. No. 6,205,872; U.S. Pat. No. 6,295,510; U.S. Pat. No. 6,297,742; and U.S. Pat. No. 6,601,005.


A nonradiative communication terminal and a communication system which use visible light for communication are provided. The nonradiative communication terminal includes a visible light emission module, a visible light reception module, and a central processing unit. The visible light emission module and the visible light reception module are connected with the central processing unit. By using visible light to communicate with other visible light communication terminals, the advantages, such as nonradiation, saving frequency resources, stability and reliability in communication performance, low-cost communication, and high transmission speed are achieved.

With the development on technology, a person has one or more communication terminals, such as mobile phones. The communication terminals have become people's indispensable communication tools in daily life and work. Nowadays, the communication terminals, such as mobile phones, use radio waves as a medium for communication. As is well known, the radiation intensity of the radio frequency waves is greater, so that people's health will be affected and the communication quality will greatly be affected by the signal quality. Thus, the radio frequency communication technique also suffers from a number of disadvantages.

Nonradiative communication terminal and communication system using visible light for communication

HUIZHOU TCL MOBILE COMMUNICATION CO., LTD.


A connector includes a housing, a housing cover for covering at least part of the housing, and a plurality of terminals arranged in the housing. The housing cover has a tongue portion extending in a direction perpendicular to the plugging direction. The side edge of the tongue portion is brought into close contact with the housing by means of cutting by the tongue portion.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a connector with a housing cover and, particularly, to a connector with part of a housing cover embedded therein.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIGS. 7 and 8 are top and rear views of a conventional connector 100 with a housing cover that is disclosed in Japanese Publication No. 7-220814. The connector 100 includes a housing 121, a metal cover 110 to cover part of the housing 121, and a contact 130 fixed to the housing 121. As best shown in FIG. 8, a strip portion 115 of the metal cover 110 is bent into the indentation 124 of the housing 121 to fix the metal cover 110 to the housing 121.
The width (K) of the strip portion 115 is set less than the width (L) of the indentation 124 in the plugging direction so that there is a gap (M) between the strip portion 115 and the indentation 114. Consequently, there is a play between the metal cover 110 and the housing 121 or a crack in the solder between the metal cover 110 and a board. The height of the metal cover 110 becomes large because there is a space where the strip portion 115 is bent vertically.


A circulation-air generating unit directly generates circulation air that flows along a surface of a cleaning tank. The circulation air is applied to cleaning medium accumulated on the cleaning tank from a direction orthogonal to a direction of face of the cleaning medium to deliver and flow up the cleaning medium. The cleaning medium is flown up inside the cleaning tank by the force of the circulation air. The cleaning medium flowing inside the cleaning tank collides with a cleaning target object by high-velocity air supplied from a cleaning-medium accelerating unit to remove dust on the cleaning target object.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to an image forming apparatus, and specifically relates to a technology for performing dry cleaning of components used in an image forming apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, manufactures of office equipments, such as copying machines, facsimile machines, and printers, have been proactively making recycling activities to create a resource recycling society. Such recycling activities include collecting used products from users, disassembling, cleaning, and reassembling the products, and reusing the products themselves or certain components of the products. In the case of image forming apparatuses, such as copying machines, facsimile machines, and printers, toner, which is a very fine powder, generally inevitably adheres to the components inside the image forming apparatuses. When recycling the image forming apparatuses itself or the components thereof, it is necessary to clean the toner.
Some conventional methods, i.e., wet cleaning methods, use water or solvent for cleaning the toner. However, in such methods, there is a problem of increase of energy consumption, environmental burdens, and costs because of processes necessary for disposing effluent that contains toner and for drying the components after the cleaning is finished.
Some other conventional methods, i.e., dry cleaning methods, use air blow for cleaning the toner. However, because cleaning performance is not sufficient for removing toner attached with strong adhesive force, an extra process is necessary for manually removing toner using a cloth or the like. Thus, the cleaning process is considered as one of bottleneck processes in a product reusing/recycling process.
Some still other conventional methods, i.e., blast cleaning methods, use dry ice for the toner. However, these methods have higher running costs and they put a lot of burden on the environment because they use a large amount of dry ice.
For counteracting above problems, Japanese Patent No. 3288462 discloses a dry cleaning device that removes dust attached to a cleaning target object. In this technology, the dry cleaning device agitates an electrified cleaning target object with an elastically flexible contact member in a rotating cylinder to neutralize the cleaning target object, so that adhesive force of the dust can be weakened, and the dust can be removed from the cleaning target object. However, it is difficult to remove dust with strong adhesive force because contact force between the contact member and the cleaning target object due to agitation is not sufficient.
Furthermore, Japanese Patent No. 2889547 discloses a technology for removing attachment from a cleaning target object by blowing particles finely cut from a small sphere or a wire rod made of steel, aluminum or stainless to the cleaning target object. Moreover, Japanese Patent No. 3468995 discloses a technology for a shot blast method of removing dust and dirt from a container made of resin by blowing high-velocity air containing particulate solids to a surface of the container.
Furthermore, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2005-329292 discloses a dry cleaning method of removing attachment from a cleaning target object. In the dry cleaning method, a particulate cleaning medium that adsorbs fine particles is introduced into a cleaning target container, and a cleaning nozzle is put into an opening portion of the cleaning target container. High-velocity air is injected into the cleaning target container and discharged from the cleaning nozzle to blow up the cleaning medium inside the cleaning target container. The cleaning medium that has been blown up removes particles attached to internal surfaces of the cleaning target container. Subsequently, the cleaning medium collides with a mesh portion at an end portion of the cleaning nozzle, so that fine particles adsorbed on the cleaning medium is removed and filtered to make it possible to reuse the cleaning medium. Recycled cleaning medium is re-blown up by air to repeatedly clean the cleaning target container.
However, in the dry cleaning device disclosed in the Japanese Patent No. 3288462, the contact force between the contact member and the cleaning target object due to agitation is not sufficient. Therefore, it is difficult to remove dust attached with strong adhesive force.
Furthermore, in the shot blast method disclosed in the Japanese Patents No. 2889547 and No. 3468995, because a small piece or a particulate solid finely cut from a metal small sphere or a wire rod is used, a surface of the cleaning target object is scratched and scrubbed, making the surface rough during a process of removing dust from the cleaning target object. Therefore, the shot blast method is not suitable when it is not allowed to scratch the cleaning target object.
Moreover, in the dry cleaning device disclosed in the Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2005-329292, processes of flowing up the cleaning medium and recycling the cleaning medium by adsorption are simultaneously performed, which is effective for a small-sized container. However, for a large-sized cleaning tank in which a cleaning target is introduced and moved for cleaning, there is a possibility that the cleaning medium is accumulated without being flown up in the cleaning tank, causing stagnation flow of the cleaning medium, because energy for flowing up the cleaning medium is dispersed. Therefore, it is difficult to sufficiently flow up and recycle the cleaning medium in the large-sized cleaning tank, resulting in degrading cleaning performance.

Dry cleaning device and dry cleaning method


Disclosed are LED backlight subassemblies and LCD displays making use thereof. The backlight subassembly includes at least one string of serially connected LEDs in which single LED failures do not lead to a partial or complete loss of image content.

There are essentially two methods used to backlight transparent mode LCD panels, namely direct-lit (sometimes referred to as "array-lit") and edge-lit. As is known a direct-lit LED backlight provides a surface of illuminating light behind the entire image-producing area of an LCD panel used in a television, computer monitor or similar display apparatus, whereas an edge-lit backlight provides lighting from the edge of the LCD panel.
Due to the small and point source nature of conventional LED bulbs and chips many individual LED bulbs or chips ("LED Units") are needed to form the desired surface of light to adequately illuminate the relatively large image area involved. Typically, the LED units comprising the direct backlight are geometrically arranged in a simple checkerboard or skewed ("criss-cross") grid pattern. Further, the LED units are electrically connected in series or "strings" in order to match the relatively low forward voltage drop of the individual LED units to the typically higher and available power supply voltage within the television or video monitor.
The white LED units (whether in bulb form or chip form) used in LCD backlights have a forward voltage drop characteristic of between approximately 3.0 and 4.0 volts. This characteristic is considered the "operating voltage" of the LED. All LEDs, whether white or color, are generally operated in constant current ("CC") mode. This is because although LEDs have a fixed forward voltage characteristic, their light output is proportional to the current which flows through them, but not the voltage applied across them. This current is commonly referred to as the "operating current" of the LED. Unlike the more or less fixed operating voltage, the LED's operating current can be varied over a wide range in order to control the light output of the LED. In a typical direct LED backlight the operating current of each individual LED unit is in the range of tens of milliamps to hundreds of milliamps—depending primarily on the type of LEDs incorporated and the desired illumination level.
Most modern day electronic equipment incorporates an AC-to-DC power supply to derive the relatively low DC voltages needed by the equipment's internal electronic circuitry from the relatively high 60 Hz power mains of our public electrical distribution system. These "resident" DC power supplies typically produce an output in the range of 12 to 48 volts DC—considerably higher than the operating voltage (3-4 volts DC) of the white LEDs used in the subject backlights. Thus, a common design practice has developed of connecting the LED units in series-connected strings in which the forward voltages of the LEDs add arithmetically by well-known electric circuit laws, thereby achieving a voltage "match" between the LED operating voltage and the resident DC power supply. For example, if a power supply voltage of 24 VDC is present for other reasons in the equipment, the LED strings are composed of 6, 7 or 8 LED units to "match" the available supply voltage. Since a direct LCD backlight may need dozens or hundreds of LED units to fulfill the illumination area requirements, many such LED strings are utilized to fulfill that total required LED unit count. For example, a 20 inch diagonal LCD direct backlight might require 160 LED units to produce a sufficient and uniform backlight illumination surface. If the resident power supply is 24 VDC, the natural backlight topology would consist of 20 strings each containing 8 LEDs. Each string is equipped with its own CC driver circuit deriving its power from the resident power supply. All 20 strings with their associated CC drivers are essentially connected in parallel.
Such a typical backlight circuit topology is shown in FIG. 3. Six strings each containing eight LED units are shown. The LED symbols are shown in a physical rectilinear grid arrangement as is typical of contemporary industry practice. Current generated in the DC Power Supply is regulated to a fixed value by the constant current driver C, which connects to LED A, then LED B, and so forth, though to LED H and back into the negative side of the DC Power Supply. The LED units' operating current is thus set by the constant current source C, while their individual operating voltages are set by the E-I curve of the individual LED units.
This circuit topology, often referred to as "parallel-series strings", is ubiquitous in the contemporary LCD backlight universe—both for edge-lit and direct types. Although the physical arrangement of the LED units in an edge-lit backlight is different than for a direct backlight, the same parallel-series string ("PSS") circuit topology is found in edge-lit backlights for the same electrical reasons.
LED units can fail in two ways—open or shorted. The general cause of failures in backlights is overheating because of the physically constrained nature of the LED strings and the consequent lack of an adequate thermal transport mechanism to carry away the copious heat produced by the LED units. It is not known which failure mechanism is more dominant (failed-open or failed-short), but it is known that each type of failure has been experienced in real world equipment.
The effect of each failure type (i.e., open or shorted) is quite different when it occurs in a single LED unit in the ubiquitous string PSS topology. If a single LED unit fails open in a string, the complete string will extinguish. If a single LED unit fails shorted in a string, the remaining LED units will continue to illuminate at approximately their pre-failure output level. Obviously, the fail-open mechanism is the more onerous of the two, as a complete section of the dependent LCD image is lost to some degree to the viewer. The degree of loss is dependent on how much illumination is available from adjacent, still-operating LED strings. The detrimental impact of this partial loss-of-image on the end-use of the equipment depends on the criticality of the application and the type of image displayed. As an extreme example, in an air traffic control display, a dark (un-illuminated) bar-shaped area can hide aircraft momentarily or long-term depending on the direction of travel of the aircraft symbol across the screen.
Accordingly, a need exists for an LED illumination subassembly which overcomes the disadvantages of the prior art. The subject invention addresses that need by providing an LED illumination display which minimizes if not eliminates the effect of at loss of light from an LED string. For example, in accordance with one aspect of this invention the LED units are electrically connected in such a way that the loss of one string of LED units does not seriously diminish the picture content of the displayed image. In accordance with another aspect of this invention a "standby" LED unit automatically illuminates when a primary LED unit fails open. In accordance with yet another aspect of this invention, when a single LED unit in a string fails open, the remaining LED units of the string continue to operate normally.

Fault tolerant LED backlight for an LCD display


When a color negative film is developed in 2 minutes or less at a temperature of less than 40.degree. C. and contains in overlying blue and green recording layer units high bromide silver halide grains containing from 1 to 10 mole percent iodide, based on silver, and in an underlying red recording layer unit high bromide silver halide grains containing less than 0.05 mole percent iodide, based on silver, and at least 1.times.10.sup.-6 mole per silver mole of a hexacoordination complex of a Group 8 metal and coordination ligands, at least four of the ligands being anionic and at least one of the ligands being more electronegative than halide ligands, loss of lower scale contrast in the red record attributable to the faster time of development is avoided.

In a simple construction, a conventional color negative film intended for in-camera exposure typically takes the following form:
______________________________________ CNF-I ______________________________________ OC BRLU YFL GRLU IL RRLU AHL TRANSPARENT FILM SUPPORT ______________________________________
On the transparent film support are coated in the order shown, a series of processing solution penetrable hydrophilic colloid layers: antihalation layer AHL, a red recording layer unit RRLU containing a red sensitized silver iodobromide (AgIBr) emulsion and a cyan dye-forming coupler, an interlayer IL containing an oxidized developing agent scavenger, a green recording layer unit GRLU containing a green sensitized AgIBr emulsion and a magenta dye-forming coupler, a yellow filter layer YFL containing a Carey Lea silver or a processing solution decolorizable yellow filter dye and an oxidized developing agent scavenger, a blue recording layer unit BRLU containing blue sensitive (optionally blue sensitized) AgIBr emulsion and a yellow dye-forming coupler, and a transparent protective overcoat OC. In the simplest possible construction capable of producing a color negative image, all of the hydrophilic colloid layers, except BRLU, GRLU and RRLU can be omitted. In the overwhelming majority of practical applications all of the layers of CNF-I described above are employed and, most commonly, many additional addenda are incorporated for performance enhancement.
Camera speed films in general and color negative films in particular employ emulsions that contain silver iodobromide grains. Iodide in concentrations down to about 0.1 mole percent, based on silver, are well known to increase speed without increasing granularity. However, iodide ion released from the grains during development has the known disadvantage of slowing development rates. The reduction of development rates shows up particularly in the red recording layer unit of color negative films, since this recording layer unit receives developing agent only after the developer solution has already penetrated the overlying blue and green recording layer units.
The Kodak Flexicolor.TM. C-41 process is commonly employed for processing imagewise exposed color negative films. Since minor adjustments of the C-41 process are undertaken from time to time, the following detailed description is provided:
______________________________________ Develop 3'15" Developer 37.8.degree. C. Bleach 4' Bleach 37.8.degree. C. Wash 3' 35.5.degree. C. Fix 4' Fixer 37.8.degree. C. Wash 3' 35.5.degree. C. Rinse 1' Rinse 37.8.degree. C. Developer Water 800.0 mL Potassium Carbonate, anhydrous 34.30 g Potassium bicarbonate 2.32 g Sodium sulfite, anhydrous 0.38 g Sodium metabisulfite 2.96 g Potassium Iodide 1.20 mg Sodium Bromide 1.31 g Diethylenetriaminepentaacetic acid 8.43 g pentasodium salt (40% soln) Hydroxylamine sulfate 2.41 g N-(4-amino-3-methylphenyl)-N-ethyl- 4.52 g 2-aminoethanol Water to make 1.0 L pH @ 26.7.degree. C. 10.00 +/- 0.05 Bleach Water 500.0 mL 1,3-Propylenediamine tetra- 37.4 g acetic acid 57% Ammonium hydroxide 70.0 mL Acetic acid 80.0 mL 2-Hydroxy-1,3-propylenediamine 0.8 g tetraacetic acid Ammonium Bromide 25.0 g Ferric nitrate nonahydrate 44.85 g Water to make 1.0 L pH 4.75 Fix Water 500.0 mL Ammonium Thiosulfate (58% solution) 214.0 g (Ethylenedinitrilo)tetraacetic acid 1.29 g disodium salt, dihydrate Sodium metabisulfite 11.0 g Sodium Hydroxide (50% solution) 4.70 g Water to make 1.0 L pH at 26.7.degree. C. 6.5 +/- 0.15 Rinse Water 900.0 mL 0.5% Aqueous p-tertiary-octyl-(.alpha.- 3.0 mL phenoxypolyethyl)alcohol Water to make 1.0 L ______________________________________
Koboshi et al U.S. Pat. No. 4,937,178 discloses a process of producing a color negative image having a magenta dye density equal to at least 2 during a development time of not more than 3 minutes employing an imagewise exposed color negative film that produces a magenta dye density of less than 2 during development under conditions essentially similar to the Flexicolor.TM. C-41 process described above, except that to get higher magenta dye densities in a shorter development time "unconventionally active conditions" are employed. Development temperatures above 40.degree. C. are indicated to be one approach for reducing development times, but, with various adjustments of the recording layer units, lower development temperatures are shown to be feasible. Koboshi et al requires that the silver halide grains contain at least 0.1 mole percent iodide, based on silver.
The use of dopants in silver halide grains to modify perfonnance characteristics is well recognized in the art. The use as dopants of coordination complexes of a Group 8 metal and one or more ligands more electronegative than halide ligands to increase photographic speed by acting as shallow electron traps (SET's) is disclosed in Research Disclosure, Vol. 367, November 1994, Item 36736. The SET dopants are identified to be useful for increasing photographic speed.

Reduced development time color negative process and process compatible color negative elements


A flexible OLED display panel and a manufacturing method for a flexible OLED display panel are provided. A through hole defined in a flexible substrate is filled with a transparent layer such that the flexible OLED display panel looks as an integral structure visually and more conforms to visual effect of full screens.

Full screen mobile phones are used more and more extensively, and displays with a high body to screen ratio are more and more popular. The so-called body to screen ratio is the ratio of an area of the screen and an area of the entire display panel. A higher body to screen ratio brings better visual experience to users. Full screen display has a high body to screen ratio and has excellent displaying effect. Therefore, full screen display panels are more and more popular among consumers and have become an inevitable trend in the future development of electronic devices such as mobile phones.
Active-matrix organic light emitting diode (AMOLED) display panels are widely used display panels. In the current design of the AMOLED display panel, it is required to employ a laser cutting process to cut an upper portion of the display panel to for a notch, as so-called "bangs screen".
FIG. 1 is a schematic top view of a conventional flexible OLED display panel. With reference to FIG. 1, an upper portion of the display panel 1 is cut by laser to form a notch 10. Devices such as a camera lens 11 and sensor 12 are disposed in the notch 10. Disadvantage of such display panel 1 is that the upper portion of the display panel 1 to form the notch 10 such that the display panel 1 is shaped irregularly, lacks visual aesthetic feeling, and looks fragmental instead of being an integral screen.

Flexible organic electroluminescence device (OLED) display panel and manufacturing method thereof

WUHAN CHINA STAR OPTOELECTRONICS SEMICONDUCTOR DISPLAY TECHNOLOGY CO., LTD.


A method and apparatus for inspecting the upper portion of a core shroud of a nuclear power plant is provided. The upper shroud scanner mounts on an arcuic section of a steam dam of the core shroud and moves back and forth there along. A vertical arm with transducers thereon extend down from a Y-car portion of the upper shroud scanner. Transducers adjacent the core shroud emit and receive an ultrasonic sound to inspect for flaws and defects in the core shroud.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a method and apparatus of inspecting welds and, more particularly, inspecting welds in an upper core shroud of a reactor vessel of nuclear power plant.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In a nuclear power plant, the nuclear reaction occurs inside of a reactor containment vessel which further has a reactor vessel therein. Inside of the reactor vessel is located a core shroud in which a nuclear reaction occurs. The inside of the core shroud is subjected to wide variations in temperature and pressure. As a result of the wide variations in temperature and pressure, metal fatigue could occur in the core shroud. To ensure that does not occur, or monitor potential problems if they do occur, there are requirements by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that the core shroud be periodically inspected, especially any welds in the core shroud.
In the past, various types of inspection devices for inspecting the core shroud have been developed such as is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,586,155 to Erbes et al. However, the invention as shown in the Erbes patent has some practical problems. The assembly mounts on the steam dam and is propelled around the steam dam by conical tractor drive wheels. Because of the slippage of the tractor drive wheels, the operator at the top of the reactor containment vessel cannot tell exactly where the sensors are located within the core shroud.
The inspection of the core shroud occurs when the particular reactor of a nuclear power plant is shut down. While that reactor is shut down, the top of the reactor containment vessel is opened, the top of the reactor vessel is opened and the top of the core shroud is opened. Due to the nuclear radiation, the person performing the inspection has to remain at the top of the opened reactor containment vessel. The inspection device must be operated entirely from the top of the reactor containment vessel. Typically at the time the inspection is being made of the core shroud and the welds therein, numerous other activities are occurring in the shut-down unit of the nuclear power plant. Therefore, numerous people performing other functions will be at the open top of the reactor containment vessel. Hence, space at the top of the reactor container vessel is limited.
One of the problems that existed for prior inspection methods of a core shroud is that they required a ring to be mounted all the way around the top of the core shroud, typically on the steam dam. This meant a lot of room had to be taken at the top of the reactor containment vessel during the period of shut down, which is when other people are needing space to perform their functions. Also, the shroud at the steam dam was not perfectly circular and many times the rings would not fit on the steam dam.
In addition to the Erbes patent described herein above, other patents have been published and/or issued on various tools that can be used to inspect core shrouds from the top of the containment vessel. Such patents or patent applications include Johnson (U.S. Pat. No. 6,332,011), Ortega (U.S. Patent Publication No. US 2008/0165911), Morris (U.S. Patent Publication No. US 2007/0125190) and Morris (U.S. Patent Publication No. US 2008/0205575). Each of these patents show various types of ways of inspecting core shrouds located within a reactor vessel of a reactor containment vessel.

Method and apparatus of inspecting the upper core shroud of a nuclear reactor vessel


The present invention relates to a wavelength division multiplexing optical receiver and eliminates excess loss of one polarization component while eliminating the need for a polarization-independent operation of a light receiver. An input waveguide, made of a silicon wire waveguide, is connected to a loop waveguide equipped with a polarization rotator over a polarization beam splitter. A ring waveguide equipped with an output waveguide configuring an add-drop ring resonator array is optically connected to the loop waveguide. The output light from ports at both sides of the output waveguide is incident onto first and second light-receiving surfaces of a light receiver such that the optical distances are equal to each other.

In recent years, silicon photonics has attracted attention as a promising technology for large capacity interconnection and it is expected to increase the transmission capacity per optical wire within Si chips through wavelength division multiplexing (WDM).
In order to transmit and receive WDM optical signals within a Si chip, it is necessary to multiplex (MUX) or demultiplex (DeMUX) the WDM optical signals by using a wavelength multiplexer/demultiplexer (MUX/DeMUX) if necessary. Usually, Si wire waveguides have a very large structural birefringence. Therefore, the transmission properties of a MUX/DeMUX formed of Si wire waveguides differ significantly depending on the polarization state of optical signals. That is to say, normal operation is possible only in the polarization state of either the TE mode or the TM mode.
Meanwhile, the polarization state is not kept constant in the transmission path of optical signals. Therefore, optical signals that enter into a light-receiving unit formed of a Si wire DeMUX and a light receiver (photodiode) are polarized into random components and thus deterioration of the reception properties is inevitable depending on the polarization state.
In order to overcome this problem, a WDM polarization diversity configuration that includes Si wire waveguides has been proposed. Here, a conventional wavelength division multiplexing optical receiver is described in reference to FIG. 12. FIG. 12 is a schematic plan diagram illustrating a conventional wavelength division multiplexing optical receiver, where a WDM optical signal that has entered into an input waveguide 71 made of a silicon wire waveguide is divided into TE beam and TM beam of which the polarization planes are orthogonal to each other by means of a directional coupler type polarization beam splitter (PBS) 72 made of silicon wire waveguides so as to be outputted into a loop waveguide 73 made of a silicon wire waveguide. The TM beam has its polarization plane rotated 90° by an eccentric double core type polarization rotator (PR) 74 made of a silicon wire waveguide inserted into the loop waveguide 73 and is outputted as TE* beam. In contrast, the TE beam, which has been divided by the polarization beam splitter 72, retains its polarization plane as it is guided through the loop waveguide 73.
TE beams that are guided in opposite directions to each other through the loop waveguide 73 are demultiplexed to the respective wavelengths due to the demultiplexing functions of add-drop micro-ring resonators (AD-MRRs) 751 and 752 wherein the optical paths thereof differ in length. The respective TE beams that have been demultiplexed are outputted into loop waveguides 761 and 762 having polarization rotators 771 and 772 and optical path length compensation waveguides 781 and 782.
From among the outputted TE beams, the TE* beam that is guided through the loop waveguide 761 or 762 in the clockwise direction in the figure has its polarization plane rotated 90° by the polarization rotator 771 or 772 so as to be outputted as a TM beam and is inputted into a polarization multiplexer 791 or 792. At this time, the TE beam that is guided through the loop waveguide 761 or 762 in the counter-clockwise direction in the figure is inputted into the directional coupler type polarization multiplexer 791 or 792 at a timing that is made to match the TM beam by the optical path length compensation waveguide 781 or 782 so as to be multiplexed (MUX), and is divided into the respective wavelengths when outputted from the output waveguide 801 or 802 so as to be received by light receivers (not shown).
In this case, the MDW beams that enter the AD-MRR have a constant polarization state, that is to say in the TE mode or in the TE* mode, and therefore the deterioration in the properties due to the demultiplexing (DeMUX) can be prevented. Accordingly, WDM optical signals can be multiplexed or demultiplexed without being affected by the polarization state of the WDM optical signals that enter the AD-MRR.

Wavelength division multiplexing optical receiver


A turning behavior control device for vehicle has a left and right wheel driving force adjustment mechanism for adjusting a difference in driving force between rear wheels, a braking force adjustment mechanism for adjusting a difference in braking force between the wheels, a vehicle velocity sensor, a steering wheel sensor and a yaw rate sensor for detecting the behavior of the vehicle, and a control unit for controlling the left and right wheel driving force adjustment mechanism and the braking force adjustment mechanism, based on the vehicle velocity, the steering angle and the yaw rate detected by the sensors, and changing at least one of the left and right driving force control amount of the left and right wheel driving force adjustment mechanism and the braking force control amount of the braking force adjustment mechanism.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a turning behavior control device for vehicle.
2. Description of the Related Art
In general, the vehicle is provided with a left and right wheel driving force adjustment mechanism and a braking force adjustment mechanism to control the behavior of vehicle and stabilize the vehicle while turning. The left and right wheel driving force adjustment mechanism is one that adjusts a difference in driving power between the left and right wheels according to a behavior of the vehicle, and improves the turning performance of the vehicle by controlling the driving force transfer to the left and right wheels while turning. Also, the braking force adjustment mechanism is one that puts a difference in the braking effort between the wheels according to a turning state of the vehicle, to improve stability and turning performance of the vehicle by individually controlling the braking pressure distribution among the wheels while turning.
One example of the conventional turning behavior control device comprises the left and right wheel driving force adjustment mechanism and the braking force adjustment mechanism as mentioned above and controls both the mechanisms according of a yaw rate deviation that is the difference between the target yaw rate calculated based on the vehicle velocity and a steering wheel angle and the actual yaw rate actually occurring in the vehicle. In this example, when the yaw rate deviation is greater than or equal to the first threshold value and less than the second threshold value, the left and right wheel driving force adjustment mechanism is only operated, and when it is greater than or equal to the second threshold value, both mechanisms are operated.
The conventional turning behavior control device of the vehicle was disclosed in Japanese Patent No. 3183124, for instance.

Turning behavior control device for vehicle

Mitsubishi Jidosha Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha


Disclosed is a health-care information management system that utilizes modular and reusable software objects to allow for user configuration. The disclosed information management system allows for the creation by the user software objects representative of specific events and resources which will occur or be utilized during the provision of health-care to patients. These user configured software modules then allow the user to track the provision of health-care, the utilization of resources during the provision of health-care, the allocation of resources to perform medical procedures and identify opportunities for enhancing efficiencies in the provision of health-care services. In on embodiment of the invention described, the system allows for the user to create, manage and maintain software modules representing specific clinical pathways to be performed in a health-care institution. The user creates these modules using user configurable software objects that function to represent containers, resources and data. The software objects are modular and re-usable and allow the user to select components for creation of the modules. The created modules may then be used to provide information management relating to the provision of the medical procedures represented by the clinical pathway modules.

In the provision of medical services, one way of describing the process by which medical services are provided is through the concept of a clinical pathway. Any given treatment regime or clinical procedure, may be easily described as a related series of care events. Each care event has a some relation to the preceding and/or following care events that is logical and reasonable. For example, take a simple procedure such as suturing a wound. The task of suturing a wound can be described as a series of care events: 1) examination of the wound; 2) cleansing of the wound; 3) anesthesia; 4) suturing of the wound; and 5) dressing the sutured wound. Thus, each of these related care events, make up a clinical pathway for the procedure of suturing a wound. To a person familiar with the medical environment, it will be apparent that each of the care events could be broken down into a more detailed series of sub-care events, thus, the concept of the clinical pathway is scaleable; that is, any given care event may be made of a series of care events and can therefore be described as a clinical pathway.
The concept of the clinical pathway may also be expanded to more involved procedures. For example, a patient might go to her doctor complaining of particular symptoms. The doctor might then make an examination, or order tests. Based upon the result of the examination and/or tests, the doctor would make a diagnosis and prescribe a treatment regime. Assume that the treatment regime included a surgical procedure to be performed in a hospital, as well as follow-up care. In this case, the clinical pathway might look like: 1) patient induction (basic administration getting the patient into the doctor's system); 2) examination; 3) testing; 4) diagnosis; 5) prescription of treatment; 6) admission to the hospital; 7) pre-surgical testing; 8) pre-operative preparation; 9) anesthesia; 10) surgery; 11) post-operative recovery; 12) discharge from hospital; 13) follow-up treatment; 14) final discharge. Once again, it is obvious that each care event in the given example might be further broken down into smaller incremental care events and, thus, represent a clinical pathway of its own. For example, the surgery could be broken down into each step associated with the surgery from the initial incision until the incision is closed.
In addition to the fact that each care event represents the provision of some type of medical (or administrative) service, each care event will also require the allocation of some type of resources in order to be performed. These resources may be in the form of labor (doctor, nurse, technician, data clerk, etc.), equipment (x-ray machine, respirator, vital signs monitors, etc.), or supplies (sponges, surgical instruments, drapes, x-ray film, sutures, medications, etc.). Thus, for each care event it is possible to identify the allocation of resources necessary for completion of the care event. For example, for the examination step described in the second example, the allocation of resources could be: 15 minutes of doctor's time, use of a specimen collector, use of a specimen container, and the use of a blood collection kit. Likewise, the testing step might include the use of an imaging device (such as an x-ray or MRI machine), 30 minutes of technicians time, use of x-ray film, use of an x-ray developer and associated chemical supplies, and 15 minutes of a radiologist's time to interpret the images.
By describing events in the context of a procedural pathway, a framework is provided which allows for the systematic classification of the steps necessary to treat a particular patient as well as identifying the resource allocation necessary to properly complete the clinical pathway. In the current healthcare environment of cost control and containment, the use of the clinical pathway framework provides an effective and efficient method for characterizing and analyzing the provision of health-care services in the clinical environment.
One important consideration in the provision of health-care is the allocation, utilization and consumption of resources such as labor, durable equipment, reusable supplies and disposable supplies. The provision of medical supplies for use in the clinical environment, most particularly in the hospital environment, has evolved through over time as the nature of health care provision and, importantly, cost reimbursement, has changed. For example, in the past, the most common way for supplies to be obtained by hospitals was for a central supply service to order the individual supplies anticipated to be needed for a given time period. These supplies would be maintained in a supply room until needed for a given procedure. Once a procedure had been scheduled, a pick list (a list of supplies) would be generated based on the procedure and the doctor performing the procedure. A hospital employee would then use the pick list to withdraw the desired items from inventory and place them in the operating room where the procedure would take place. After the procedure was completed, unused supplies would be returned to inventory, a list of used supplies provided to the billing department, and the used supplies disposed of or re-sterilized. However, this system was costly and inefficient.
For example, a relatively large inventory of supplies had to be maintained, particularly for standard items such as drapes, sponges, sutures, clamps, etc., which could be used in a large variety of procedures. The inventory of such items had to be large in order to insure that sufficient quantities were on hand for every procedure. Furthermore, the act of picking items for surgery and, later, restocking unused items, was onerous and expensive since relatively highly skilled labor was utilized to insure that the proper items were collected and that the restocked items were placed in the proper location. In particular, the restocking of unused items was a substantial burden on the hospital. Due to the then current mode of reimbursement for supply costs each item pulled from inventory had to be either used (and billed for) or restocked (and not billed for). If an item was not used during the procedure and was billed for anyway, the billing for that product could be considered fraud on the reimburser. Since items were often individually wrapped, the restocking procedure could be very time consuming, particularly where sufficient quantities of items were picked from inventory to cover any situation during surgery (i.e., it would not be uncommon to withdraw 10 clamps from inventory and use only 3 or 4, except in situations where heavy bleeding is encountered, which might necessitate the use of all 10).
This situation led to the development of the procedural pack. Initially, suppliers started noting that certain combinations of supplies were used in almost all surgeries. For example, a series of drapes would almost always be used. Thus, a procedural drape pack was developed which included a collection of the most commonly used drapes in numbers commonly used. These drapes were packaged and sterilized as a unit, so that the use of any portion of the unit constituted use of the entire unit. For example, the pack might contain 5 drapes, but only four might be used during surgery. However, since the package was opened, and sterility was thereby compromised, the entire unit could legitimately be considered used. Although some waste occurred, this system cut out the required re-stocking cost.
Initially, small procedural packs and packs were developed for common events. Incision packs, anesthesia packs, suture kits and a variety of other procedural packs, or supply bundles, were developed. As hospitals grew more used to the concept of procedural packs and packs, the demand for more comprehensive supply bundles increased. The procedural pack or pack ultimately evolved into a large bundle, differentiated by surgical procedure, that included all disposable components for that procedure.
In the era of cost--plus reimbursement, the hospitals had an incentive to use ever growing, comprehensive procedural packs. Use of a large pack, with all possible components present, served to minimize the amount of labor required to pick items from inventory and restock unused item. Additionally, it allowed hospitals to greatly reduce their inventory since such packs could be ordered on an as-needed basis, instead of maintaining a large inventory supplies. However, in order to increase these efficiencies, the packs had to be able to cover any possibility that might reasonably be encountered during the procedure, and often included a large amount of supplies which were not often used in most procedures.
With the advent of cost-containment in the health-care environment, the care providers are required by the reimbursers, to minimize expense and cost wherever possible. Under the tenets of managed care, if a supply is not used during a procedure, then the reimburser is not willing to pay for that supply. This environment leads back toward the concept of having an inventory of supplies which are pulled and then restocked when unused. However, reimbursers do realize that some waste in the use of supplies is justified in order to minimize labor expenses concerned with the pulling and restocking of supplies. Thus, the pressure on suppliers led to the development of "custom procedural packs." These custom packs attempt to be comprehensive, but are tailored to the circumstances to attempt to minimize waste. For example, there is a "parts list" or supply list generated by each doctor for each procedure performed by that doctor in a given hospital. Thus, doctors are able to specify the supplies desired, the quantities desired and, if a preference is felt, the brand and type of the desired supply. Thus, if Doctor A uses more lap sponges than Doctor B, their preference cards will differ. Under the cost-plus reimbursement scenario, a procedural pack would have been developed which just had the maximum number of lap sponges used by any doctor. The extra lap sponges in a pack provided to Doctor B would just be wasted. However, under managed care, a custom procedural pack could be developed for Doctor A and Doctor B which allowed for the differing preferences. Once again, however, the more specialized the custom procedural pack, the more inventory will have to be maintained. Since there is the potential for each doctor to have a different custom procedural pack for each different procedure performed by the doctor, there would be no standardization of packs in inventory and, therefore, a number of each custom procedural packs would be required for each doctor.
In the final analysis, a balance must be met between standardization of procedural packs, which will allow for the greatest savings in inventory, because more standardized packs can be used for more different doctors and procedures, and customization which minimizes the waste developed due to usage differences from doctor to doctor and procedure to procedure. It will be apparent to one skilled in the art that the proper balance of standardization and customization will result in the minimum of cost, by minimizing both waste and inventory. Thus, with proper balancing, both the reimburser will save money, due to decreased waste, and the care provider will save money, due to inventory control.
Custom procedural packs have been present in the medical supply industry almost since the inception of the procedural pack. As a marketing technique, the pack manufacturers were willing to customize packs to gain a competitive advantage over other manufacturers and gain an entree to new accounts. However, recently, the industry has become more sophisticated in developing custom packs and packs with the cooperation of the customers. Initially, custom procedural packs were slight variations of standard packs or packs already offered by the manufacturer. However, with increasing customization demands and ever changing product offerings, a more sophisticated method of developing custom procedural packs was required.
One approach to the problem is described in U.S. application Ser. No. 08/889,948, filed Jul. 10, 1997, entitled Method for the Supply of Medical Supplies to a Health-care Institution Based on a Nested Bill of Materials on a Procedure Level, which is a continuation in part of U.S. Pat. No. 5,682,728, issued Nov. 4, 1997, entitled, Method for the Supply of Medical Supplies to a Health-care Institution Based on a Nested Bill of Materials on a Procedure Level, the entire specification of which is hereby incorporated by reference. As may be seen in this application, using the clinical pathway approach described above, each medical procedure may be described as a series of procedures to be performed in a specified order. Thus, at each step in the clinical pathway, the supplies needed to complete that step can be expressed as a supply bundle (or bundles) which will be utilized during that step. Thus, using the clinical pathway model, a nested bill of materials for a given clinical pathway, at the procedural level, may be generated to develop a supply list for the contents of a custom procedural pack. The clinical pathway model allows for an easier approach to analyzing the supplies which will be needed at each step, since it provides a break-down of each phase of a medical procedure.
The procedure for developing the types of custom procedural packs described herein will include some starting point based upon historical usage. For example, say that the hospital already has a standard procedural pack for a laparoscopic gall bladder surgery. The supply list for this standard procedural pack could provide the template for developing the custom procedural packs for that hospital. After first organizing the template supply list into a nested bill of materials as described in the above referenced application and patent, the template would be modified by each doctor's preference card to develop a custom nested bill of materials for each doctor who performs that procedure in the hospital. The step of organizing this initial bill of materials for each doctor will require some judgment in order that minor differences in supply usage are minimized (i.e., if one doctor uses 2 units of a low cost item, and another doctor uses 3 units of the same item, it is probably cheaper to standardized both bills of materials to 3 units; conversely, if the item is a high cost item, it is best to differentiate the bills of materials). The result is that a bill of materials for a procedural pack is developed for each doctor for each procedure.
With a bill of materials developed for each procedural pack for each procedure, the various suppliers of the products can then develop supply bundles for each step set out in the clinical pathway. Typically, not all of the supplies will be provided by a single supplier or manufacturer, so that, as described in the above-referenced application and patent multiple supply sources will develop supply bundles for inclusion into the procedural pack for a given customer. As described in that application, a container may be shipped to each source of supplies and the supplies provided by that source can be added to the container, thus reducing the time and shipping costs associated with collecting and shipping various components to a single assembly location. In operation, the initial source of the container would develop a work order based on the nested bill of materials which each supplier would use to add the appropriate supply bundles to the container. Alternatively, each supplier could ship its supply bundle to a centralized assembly location for assembly of the container and shipment to the ultimate customer. This supply paradigm provides the customer and the suppliers with a framework within which the suppliers can respond very rapidly to an order by the hospital for a custom procedural pack. Thus, even though there exists the possibility that a large number of different packs may be developed for each hospital, the hospital need not maintain a large inventory of such custom procedural packs since the supply process has been streamlined. With proper implementation of the system, a very small number of custom procedural packs may be kept in inventory by the hospital (maybe one week's worth) which will obviously reduce the inventory costs of the hospital. Similarly, since the parts list, or nested bill of materials for each pack has been analyzed, waste is minimized and efficiency is enhanced.
In this supply paradigm, which has been implemented by the assignee hereof, DeRoyal Industries, Inc., under the trademark and service mark TRACEPAK, an attempt is made at the time of the development of the nested bill of materials for each custom procedural pack to minimize waste while maximizing standardization to ultimately reduce the overall cost to the care provider. However, this initial analysis is not sufficient to insure that the bill of materials remains optimized. For example, doctors are constantly revising their supply usage based upon new surgical techniques. Similarly, manufacturers are constantly updating their products to incorporate new products and developments. Also, prices are constantly changing in the marketplace.
Upon review of the foregoing, there are several areas where intervention is necessary to insure that the process results in the best balance between waste minimization and standardization, in addition to the ultimate requirement that all of the supplies required during a procedure are actually available when the procedure is conducted. First, the clinical pathway must be developed. Second, bills of materials must be developed in the context of the clinical pathway and balanced to account for doctor preferences, standardization and waste minimization. Finally, usage of materials must be tracked in order to insure that the bills of materials currently in use are optimized to continue to minimize waste while maximizing standardization, as well as providing a basis for documenting resource usage during a procedure in order to allow for proper billing of the procedure to the party responsible for paying for the procedure.
An additional element that must be considered in the clinical pathway is not only the optimization of the bill of resources through utilization review and standardization, is the scheduling of the resources so that the proper resource is in the proper location at the proper time. Prior art methods of scheduling resources have been organized around OR scheduling programs such as the OR scheduling program available from DeRoyal Business Systems, LLC, an affiliate of the assignee hereof. This software is typical of OR scheduling software in that it provides a calendaring function for reserving OR's for use by doctors and allows for the scheduling of various related items such as durable medical equipment, etc. Also, some OR scheduling packages provide a database function for maintaining doctor "preference cards," which are lists of specific supplies that a given doctor will require during the surgery.
However, such software, usually marketed as a stand-alone package, does not function under the clinical pathway management and is not integrated with resource management. Thus, information is typically unnecessarily entered multiple times, in multiple locations, on multiple information systems. For example, a bill of materials may be generated for a given medical procedure for use by the supply department of a hospital in order to insure that the needed supplies will be available; separately, the doctor preference card from the OR scheduling package will be used to make sure that the supplied materials matches the doctor's preferences; the availability and provision of labor resources will be handled by a different department with a different information system. Usually, these information systems are not integrated and their use results in a myriad of duplication of data entry, along with substantial opportunities for error. Finally, these information systems do not typically provide a basis for calculating medical procedure costs in an efficient manner, so that cost recovery and cost reductions processes must be done on an ad hoc basis.
Returning to the top level of the clinical pathway analysis, the performance of a medical procedure represented by the clinical pathway requires that all of the necessary resources be brought together at the appropriate time and place, which requires that supplies be accounted for and personnel and other resources be scheduled. Once the procedure has been performed, it is important that resource consumption/utilization be recorded for the purposes of cost recovery and utilization review. Finally, it is important that the information be available for analysis in order to allow the process to be analyzed in order to facilitate more efficient resource utilization and to identify economies which may be realized in the clinical pathway.
To date, no hospital information system provides an integrated package for OR scheduling/preference card management, resource consumption logging/storage and resource utilization analysis/bill of resource standardization. Furthermore, even the most comprehensive hospital information systems are written in monolithic style which either represents a 100% custom application written specifically for the customer, or an off-the-shelf application that does not meet all of the needs of the customer. Neither situation fits the current health-care environment of reform, cost-cutting and change. Monolithic software packages require the review and revision of large blocks of source code and a small change at one point may well affect the functioning of other portions of the code. In large applications, hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of lines of code must be reviewed for every change, even if relatively minor. This state of affairs often results in health-care institutions refusing to adopt cost-saving and efficiency enhancing measures, since the potential benefits are often outweighed by the cost and problems which would be involved in adapting their current information systems to the better processes. Also, since different institutions are different sizes, serve different populations, use different doctors, have different areas of core competency, etc., the one size fits all approach to off-the-shelf information systems often results in some institutions adopting procedures which, while they may work well in some environments, aren't the most efficient for that institution just to enable the use of a given information system. However, such a system is in actuality backwards, the institution should be able to determine the most efficient way to operate and then have an information system which is adaptable, at no great expense, to the needs of the institution.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide an integrated information system for use in healthcare institutions for managing, optimizing and analyzing the use of resources within that institution.
It is yet a further object of the present invention to provide an integrated information system for us in healthcare institutions for managing, optimizing and analyzing the use of resources within that institution utilizing a modular, component-ware software structure.
It is yet a further object of the present invention to provide an integrated supply, scheduling, and resource utilization management system for use in the health-care environment.

Modular health-care information management system utilizing reusable software objects


Disclosed herein are fiber reinforced thermoplastic composite with desired physical properties, such as high strength, high impact and high flow while maintaining the OSU heat release compliancy.

Metal replacement with lightweight materials is a major focus of the airline industry to achieve fuel economy. Carbon fiber reinforced thermoplastic composites are attractive candidates for load bearing parts in the aircrafts as the carbon fiber can significantly improve the mechanical properties of the thermoplastic resin used in the composite. A high loading of the carbon fibers in the thermoplastics is necessary to meet the stiffness and strength requirements of the load bearing parts where aluminum or other metals are currently being used. However, the high loading of carbon fibers causes a significant increase in melt viscosity of the composites that creates processing difficulties.
Polyetherimides are amorphous thermoplastic resins that have found applications in thermoplastic composites used in the aircraft industries due to their high glass transition temperatures, high heat resistance, good mechanical properties, low warpage and inherent flame retardant properties. The melt flow rate of polyetherimide composites are significantly lower compared to semicrystalline thermoplastic resin composites, e.g. polyphenylene sulfide, polyetheretherketone and the like, which prevents their use in large size load bearing parts, e.g. in aircraft seat back frames. There remain certain applications wherein an increased melt flow rate of polyetherimide composites than is currently available would be desirable. Low molecular weight polyetherimides offer higher flow but at the expense of other properties, e.g. impact strength.
In addition to processing requirements, a thermoplastic resin used in aircraft industries must also pass specified flammability tests that include a vertical Bunsen burner test, a heat release test and a smoke test. Historically, the heat release test, which is also known as the OSU (Ohio State University) test, is the most difficult test to pass with the thermoplastics. Thus, the challenge in developing thermoplastic composites lies in the manipulation of the thermoplastic composites to achieve a combination of good mechanical properties (e.g. high strength, high impact) and high flow while maintaining the OSU heat release compliancy.
Accordingly, there is a need for high flow polyetherimide composites, devices thereof and methods thereof that comprise carbon fiber, wherein the polyetherimide composites have high strength, e.g. strength that is similar or greater than that of die-cast aluminum, high impact; and are compliant with the OSU 65/65 heat-release parameters. Such thermoplastic composites, devices comprising thermoplastic composites, and methods related thereto are described herein.

High strength high impact high flow OSU compliant polyetherimide-carbon fiber composites


A system is dynamically configured according to a state of a device connected to a network. An electronic device includes a device information management unit, an acquisition unit, a detection unit, and a device cooperative processing unit. The device information management unit manages device information related to a different device connected through a network. An acquisition unit acquires surrounding information. A detection unit detects generation of a specific event on the basis of the acquired surrounding information. In a case where a function necessary for processing the surrounding information in response to detection of the specific event is not included in itself, the device cooperative processing unit selects a device including the function from the different device on the basis of the device information and gives a request for proxy of the processing thereto through the network.

Along with a spread of the Internet, a system comes to include a plurality of devices connected through the Internet. For example, a system in which device configuration is performed by a system server on the basis of a user input has been proposed in a system of so-called the Internet of things (IoT) (see, for example, Patent Document 1).

Electronic device, processing proxy requesting method of electronic device, and information processing system

Sony Semiconductor Solutions Corporation


A combined regulator and pulsing circuit may comprise a first diode having a cathode that is electrically connected to a positive terminal of a supply of direct current and to a first output terminal of the combined regulator and pulsing circuit. A first switching device is electrically connected between the anode of the first diode and a negative terminal of the supply of direct current. An inductor is electrically connected between the anode of the diode and a second output terminal of the combined regulator and pulsing circuit. The first plate of a capacitor is electrically connected to the first output terminal, and a second switching device is electrically connected between the second plate of the capacitor and the second output terminal. A control system is operatively associated with the first and second switching devices and operates the first and second switching devices between the conducting and non-conducting states.

Plasma deposition refers to any of a wide variety of processes in which a plasma is used to assist in the deposition of thin films or coatings onto the surfaces of objects. For example, plasma deposition processes are widely used in the electronics industry to fabricate integrated circuits and other electronic devices, as well as to fabricate the magnetic tapes and disks used in audio, video, and computer applications. Plasma deposition processes may also be used to apply coatings to various objects to improve or change the properties of the objects. For example, plasma deposition processes may be used to apply wear resistant coatings to machine tools, while other types of coatings may be used to increase the corrosion resistance of other items, such as bearings, turbine blades, etc, thereby enhancing their performance. In still other applications, plasma deposition may be used to apply coatings to various types of surfaces in the optics and glass industries.
In most plasma deposition processes the plasma is created by subjecting a low-pressure process gas (e.g., argon) contained within a vacuum chamber to an electric field. The electric field, which is typically created between two electrodes, ionizes the process gas and creates the plasma. In the case of a DC sputter deposition plasma process, the material (commonly referred to as the target) to be deposited on the object or substrate is connected as the negative electrode (i.e., cathode), whereas some other element, commonly the vacuum chamber itself, is connected as the positive electrode or anode. Ionized process gas atoms comprising the plasma are accelerated toward and ultimately impact the negatively charged cathode/target, dislodging or sputtering atoms from the target material. The sputtered atoms subsequently condense on various items in the chamber, including the substrate that is to be coated. The substrate is usually positioned with respect to the target so that a majority of the sputtered target atoms condense on the surface of the substrate.
Sputter deposition processes of the type described above are usually referred to as "non-reactive" processes in that the sputtered atoms deposited on the surface of the substrate do not react with other materials. However, sputter deposition processes have also been developed wherein the target material is sputtered in the presence of a reactive material (e.g., oxygen or nitrogen gas). Such "reactive" sputtering processes may be used to deposit a film comprising the sputtered target material and the reactive species. A wide variety of compounds, such as SiO.sub.2, Al.sub.2 O.sub.3, Si.sub.3 N.sub.4, and TiO, can be deposited by reactive sputter deposition processes.
While reactive sputtering processes are known and have been used for years, they continue to be plagued by the periodic occurrence of electrical discharges or arcs within the vacuum chamber. Such electrical discharges or arcs can take on different forms depending on the characteristics of the sputtering apparatus and on the particular plasma process being used. For example, arcs may occur between the target material, which is typically connected as the cathode in a DC sputtering process, and the substrate itself, certainly causing a defect in the coating, if not ruining the substrate entirely. Alternatively, the arc may occur between the target and some other part of the vacuum chamber, in which case the deleterious effects of the arc are usually less severe, but nevertheless tend to degrade the overall quality of the coating. The arcs can be short lived, lasting only a few milliseconds or so, or may be continuous, again depending on the particular apparatus and process being used. While such arcing can occur in nearly every kind of plasma process, the tendency of such arcs to occur is much greater in reactive processes where the compound film being deposited is an electrical insulator, such as Al.sub.2 O.sub.3.
Several methods for preventing, or at least reducing the frequency of such arc discharges, rely on the selective control of the power supply used to place the charge on the electrodes. For example, one such method has been to simply turn-off the power supply as soon as an arc is detected, then turn it back on again once the arc has dissipated. While this method can effectively quench sustained arcs, the stored energy in most power supplies takes time to dissipate, increasing the response time, i.e., the time it takes to remove the electrical potential from the electrodes, to the point where such devices cannot effectively quench short duration arc events. Consequently, all that is really accomplished is a reduction in overall deposition rate, with little or no reduction in the adverse effects produced by the arc event itself.
Another control method has been to momentarily interrupt (i.e., disconnect) the power supply from the electrodes during the arc event. While the response time of this method is usually considerably faster, i.e., the voltage can be removed from the electrodes within a few milliseconds or so, it is difficult to dissipate the stored energy in the power supply. Consequently, such methods tend to stress the power supply or switching devices used to disconnect the power supply to the point of burn-out.
Another method of interrupting the voltage placed on the electrodes has been to use a tapped inductor connected in series between one terminal of the power supply and one of the electrodes. When an arc is detected, the center tap of the inductor is momentarily connected to the other terminal of the power supply. This has the effect of momentarily reversing the voltage on the electrodes. In certain cases, the magnitude of the reversed voltage charge is usually sufficient to quench the arc. Unfortunately, however, this method is not effective in suppressing arcs having impedances lower than the impedance of the switching network and center tap, which is a common occurrence. Consequently, the use of such center-tapped inductors has not proven to be a panacea.
While other devices exist and are being used with some degree of success, none are without their disadvantages. For example, many such other devices can only effectively suppress certain types of arc events or only arcs created under certain conditions. Other devices may have more effective arc suppression characteristics, but are usually plagued with complex electronic circuits and devices, which may be expensive to produce and/or prone to failure.
Consequently, a need exists for a method and apparatus for preventing and/or suppressing arc events in plasma processes and under various operating conditions. Such a method and apparatus should allow for the effective suppression of arcs under a wide range of conditions, but without the need to resort to expensive or complex circuit elements. Additional advantages could be realized if such a device could be used in conjunction with conventional power supplies.

Power supply having combined regulator and pulsing circuits


A multicylinder engine intake system includes: a plurality of intake paths; a plurality of bypasses detouring throttle valves and connected to the intake paths; and a common bypass control valve for opening and closing the bypasses. The bypass control valve is constituted by a valve body and an electrically operated actuator provided above the valve body and operated for opening and closing the valve body. A portion of a bypass upstream path in the bypasses on upstream side of the valve body is placed below the valve body. Idling air paths branch off from the portion of the bypass upstream path to reach the corresponding intake paths. Thus, it is possible to prevent fuel or dater droplets from staying in the bypasses and appropriately control the amount of first idling air by the bypass control valve.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an improvement in a multicylinder engine intake system comprising: a plurality of intake paths communicating with intake ports of a multicylinder engine; a plurality of throttle valves for opening and closing the intake paths; a plurality of bypasses having upstream ends opened to atmosphere or the intake paths on upstream sides of the throttle valves, and having downstream ends opened to the intake paths on downstream sides of the throttle valves; and a common bypass control valve which opens and closes the bypasses.
2. Description of the Related Art
A bypass control valve in a multicylinder engine intake system is operated to regulate the amount of first idling air supplied to the engine through bypasses in order to appropriately control a first idling rotational speed mainly during engine warm-up operation.
A multicylinder engine intake system of this type is known from, e.g., Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2003-129924.
In the multicylinder engine intake system disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2003-129924, the bypass control valve is horizontally placed, leading to a possibility that fuel or water droplets entering the bypasses stays around the bypass control valve, and thus there is a need to provide an expensive sealing means for the bypass control valve. There is also a possibility that the fuel or water droplets staying around the bypass control valve hinders appropriate control of the amount of first idling air by the bypass control valve.


A method comprises registering, by an enhanced CPM server, to receive IMS registrations for a client device, receiving, by the enhanced CPM server, a message intended for the client device, storing the message in a network store, setting a Message Waiting Indicator flag in a HLR associated with the client device, receiving, from the HLR, an alert message that the client device has registered in a non-IMS network, and delivering, by the enhanced CPM server, at least a reference to the message stored in the network store to the client device.

The 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) has defined the IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) as the service engine or service delivery architecture for next-generation IP networks. The IMS includes a set of network nodes that provide various multimedia services and control calls in a mobile communication network environment. The IMS combines an Internet Protocol (IP) network with the mobile communication environment. Further, under standards developed by Open Mobile Alliance (OMA), there has been a convergence of messaging services called "Converged IP Messaging (CPM) Service" that is a Session Initiation Protocol (SIP)-based service capable of servicing users of conventional Short Message Service (SMS), Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS), and Instant Messaging (IM) services, etc., as well as users of CPM service.

Enhanced converged IP message server system and method