Disclosed are an electrode assembly and a method for manufacturing the electrode assembly.

Secondary batteries capable of being repeatedly chargeable and dischargeable may be provided in various types. In general, such a secondary battery includes an electrode assembly having a structure in which an electrode and a separator are alternately stacked.
The demand and type of electronic devices are increasing, and in particular, as the demand of electronic devices having an irregular shape, which deviates from the typical simple shape, increases, a secondary battery mounted on an electronic device having an irregular shape is also increasingly required to have an irregular shape.
The secondary battery having the irregular shape may have, for example, a curved surface. The secondary battery having the curved surface is often manufactured so as to form a certain radius of curvature.
The assembled secondary battery is subjected to a formation step of charging and discharging the secondary battery several times in order to form the secondary battery before the shipment. In the formation step, a swelling phenomenon in which the electrode assembly and the secondary battery are swollen to increase in volume of the secondary battery may occur generally.
As the swelling phenomenon occurs, the electrode assembly and the secondary battery may be deformed from an initially assembled form. Thus, there has been a problem that the secondary having an originally intended shape is not manufactured. Particularly, in case of a secondary battery having a curved surface having a constant curvature radius, an initial curvature radius and a curvature radius after the swelling are different from each other due to the swelling phenomenon to deteriorate assemblability and storage ability of the secondary battery with respect to electronic devices.
For example, in case of an electrode assembly having a curved surface as the assembled electrode assembly, the entire curvature radius of the curved surface after the swelling phenomenon occurs is greater than the entire curvature radius of the curved surface before the swelling phenomenon occurs (i.e., the curved surface formed on the electrode assembly is relatively flat due to the swelling phenomenon).
Particularly, deformation of the curved surface largely occurs at both ends of the curved surface. That is, even though the electrode assembly is assembled so that a central portion and each of both ends of the curved surface have the same curvature radius, the curvature radius at both ends of the curved surface may be greater than that at the central portion after the swelling (i.e., each of both ends of the electrode assembly is relatively more flat due to the swelling phenomenon).

Electrode assembly, secondary battery including the electrode assembly, and method for manufacturing the electrode assembly

Abstract: According to the present invention, the electrode assembly may be manufactured in consideration of deformation of the electrode assembly and a secondary battery due to a swelling phenomenon to improve assemblability and storage ability of the secondary battery having a curved surface with respect to electronic devices.

Abstract: According to an aspect of the present invention for achieving the above effects, provided is an electrode assembly having a curved surface, wherein a curvature radius (Re) of each of ends of the curved surface is less than a curvature radius (Rc) of a central portion of the curved surface.


A link actuating device connects an output member to an input member through three or more link mechanisms for alteration in posture. Each of the link mechanisms includes end portion link members on input and output sides, and an intermediate link member. The link mechanisms are of such shapes that geometric models representing the link members by straight lines are such that input and output side portions are symmetrical to each other relative to an intermediate portion of each of the intermediate link members. Immobilizing mechanisms are provided in all of the link mechanisms to immobilize the output member in an arbitrary attitude relative to the input member. A structure body is provided to connect the input and output member to each other while being in contact with contacted portions formed in the input and output member.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a link actuating device that may be used in a link mechanism such as a parallel link mechanism which executes work such as complicated processing or article handling in a three-dimensional space at high speed and with accuracy, or a link mechanism such as a robot joint.
2. Description of Related Art
One example of working devices including a parallel link mechanism is disclosed in Patent Document 1. The working device changes, by means of the parallel link mechanism, a position and an attitude of a traveling plate to which a tool is attached. The parallel link mechanism includes a plurality of links having lower ends to which the traveling plate is connected, and upper portions of the links are supported by universal joints such that the angles of the links are changeable and, the effective lengths of the links positioned below the universal joints are also changeable.


The sealing tape for sealing a joint comprises two foam strips of flexible foam, which are not formed as integral parts of each other, and which are arranged next to each other in the functional direction of the sealing tape. A film strip is arranged between the foam strips and is bonded to both foam strips. Adhesion sites between the film strips and the first foam strip are arranged only in an upper area of the first foam strip and in a lower area of the first foam strip, whereas, in an intermediate area between the upper area and the lower area of the first foam strip, the film strip is not adhesively bonded to the first foam strip.

The present invention relates to a sealing tape for sealing joints. Sealing tapes unwound from sealing tape rolls are usually used to seal joints between the frame profile of a window, for example, or of a door and the wall of a building to seal off the joints against drafts and driving rain. Films additionally provided on a side surface of the sealing tape, furthermore, increase the impermeability of the tape to water vapor; see, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,401,716, US 2010/0009118 A1 or US 2010/0003465 A1. Nevertheless, films which are attached externally to the sealing tape suffer from the disadvantage that they can be damaged during the transport or installation of the sealing tape.
A sealing tape roll which comprises at least one barrier layer extending in the radial direction and which is arranged between two layers of the foam and thus in the interior of the sealing tape roll is known from DE 196 41 415 A1. As a result, the barrier layer is protected more effectively from damage. The barrier layer consists of an adhesive or of a lamination material. To produce a sealing tape of this type, large two-dimensional barrier layers are formed on sheets of an open-pore foam material by lamination or adhesive bonding. Several layers of foam sheets and barrier layers are stacked to form laminate blocks. These laminate blocks are cut into plates at right angles to the large two-dimensional barrier layers. The plates are then wound up into wide rolls in such a way that the barrier layers and the foam material are arranged in a row in the axial direction on the circumference of the rolls. A wide roll of this type is then cut into disks between the individual barrier layers to obtain several sealing tape rolls. This method requires many complicated work steps, and the length of the sealing tapes produced is limited by the size limitation imposed by the laminate blocks, which must be small enough to be processed by machine.


A robot unit includes a robot main body that is an arm-type robot including multiple links connected to one another via at least one joint, and one or more protective housings that cover and protect at least a portion of a circumferential surface of one or more of the multiple links. One or more fastening portions that attach and detach the protective housing are provided on a circumferential surface of the one or more of the multiple links.

Arm-type robots having multiple links connected to one another via joints have been widely known. Such arm-type robots are installed, for example, in factories and are used to manufacture products. In recent years, arm-type robots are sometimes proposed to be installed, in particular, in machining chambers of machine tools. For example, JP 2017-202548A discloses an arm-type robot attached to a spindle of a machine tool; JP 2017-213658A discloses an arm-type robot attached to a tool post of a machine tool; and JP 2018-020402A discloses an arm-type robot attached to a spindle of a machine tool.


A novel miscible blend of component polymers comprised of from about 5 weight percent to about 95 weight percent of a polybenzimidazole and from about 95 weight percent to about 5 weight percent of an aromatic polyamide, aromatic polyamide-hydrazide or aromatic polyamide containing heterocyclic linkages. Miscibility of the component polymers of the blend is indicated by infrared, X-Ray and Differential Scanning Calorimetry analyses and scanning electron photomicrographs. In a film or molded article of a blend mostly comprised of a polybenzimidazole, it is preferred that the aromatic polyamide, aromatic polyamide-hydrazide or aromatic polyamide containing heterocyclic linkages be present in the blend in an amount sufficient to result in a blend with improved tensile properties compared to the polybenzimidazole and that is more thermally processable than the polybenzimidazole. In a blend mostly comprised of an aromatic polyamide, aromatic polyamide-hydrazide or aromatic polyamide containing heterocyclic linkages, it is preferred that the polybenzimidazole be present in the blend in an amount sufficient to result in a blend with increased thermal stability and nonflammability compared to the aromatic polyamide, aromatic polyamide-hydrazide or aromatic polyamide containing heterocyclic linkages. The blends, particularly in the form of films or molded articles, may be post-treated with heat or sulfonating agent in order to minimize their shrinkage when subsequently subjected to heat and in order to increase their resistance to solvents and acids.

The number of known classed of high performance polymers which are useful under severe environmental conditions is limited. In addition, some of the known classes of polymers are deficient in some properties, e.g., physical properties, solvent and thermal resistance, and processability. Some are also quite expensive.
Developments in the synthesis of rigid rod-like polymers have generated interest in forming composites by blending those polymers with conventional flexible coil polymers. This interest is based on potential improvements in fracture and impact toughness as well as other properties. In other words, the rigid rod-like polymer might behave as a strength member in a ductile matrix while the flexible matrix might provide toughness. However, achieving the potential benefits has been elusive in practice.

Blends of polybenzimidazoles and aromatic polyamides, aromatic polyamide-hydrazides or aromatic polyamides containing heterocyclic linkages


Embodiments of the present invention provide a wireless transmission method, an access point, and a station. The method includes: sending, by the access point, a first message to a first station, where the first message includes a channel service period allocated by the access point to the first station, and the first message is used to indicate that the first station sends data to a relay station of the first station in the channel service period; and receiving, by the access point, the data from the relay station of the first station.

At present, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) standard organization of the United States of America is formulating the 802.11ah standard and puts forward a requirement that a coverage area of an access point should cover one kilometer. This means that a distance of 100 meters covered by the access point supported by the existing 802.11 standard is increased by 100 times. In addition, a primary application scenario proposed for the 802.11ah standard is a sensor network, for example, a wireless sensor network for detecting a forest fire. The access point supported by the 802.11ah standard has a coverage radius of 1 kilometer, which is far greater than the 100-meter coverage-radius defined in such standards as 802.11a/b/g/n. However, to implement effective detection in an area with a radius of 1 kilometer, the number of 802.11ah-compliant sensors required to be deployed may exceed 6,000. However, because a station (Station, STA) used for sensor detection is usually powered by a battery, and due to the number of the stations to be deployed and a deployment scenario (for example, a mountain forest), it is inconvenient for a user to replace and maintain a battery of an STA.
According to the current Wi-Fi standards, for example, the series of 802.11 standards, on both an uplink and a downlink, an STA working in basic network mode directly communicates with an access point (Access Point, AP) at a power negotiated with the AP. The negotiated communication power is directly related to a distance between the STA and the AP. Therefore, during communication with the AP, STAs that are deployed in a coverage area of the AP and have different distances from the AP have different power consumption rates. In general, on a precondition of a transmission task with a same amount of data, an STA farther from the AP consumes more power. In addition, more power may be consumed due to deployment of an STA (for example, a barrier exists between the STA and the AP). Therefore, a few STAs with low capacity may be unable to continuously perform normal data transmission with the AP due to excessively quick power consumption.

Wireless transmission method, access point, and station


A vehicle door lock apparatus includes a housing, a fork, a pawl, a first lever displaceably provided in the housing such that the first lever can act on the pawl, and a second lever pivotably provided in the housing. One end of the second lever has a linkage coupled to a lower end of a transmission rod, which is coupled to an exterior door handle. The second lever pivots in response to an opening operation being performed on the exterior door handle and acts on the first lever. A plane of rotation contains an arcuate trajectory traced by the linkage when it pivots in response to the opening operation being performed, and is located farther in a frontward direction of a vehicle frame than a fixing surface. The plane of rotation is inclined relative to a plane containing the fixing surface, and intersects this plane in the vehicle downward direction.

Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2002-129806 (Patent Literature 1) discloses a known vehicle door lock apparatus that includes a housing, a fork, a pawl, a first lever, and a second lever. More specifically, the first lever is an open link and the second lever is an open lever.
The housing includes a base plate. The base plate is fixed such that a fixing surface thereof contacts a door that is openable and closable with respect to a vehicle frame, to which a striker is affixed. An entry opening, into which the striker can enter, is formed in the base plate.
As illustrated, e.g., in FIG. 4 of JP 2002-129806, the fork is pivotably provided on the base plate. The fork is displaceable to a latched position, where the fork retains the striker in the entry opening, and to an unlatched position, where the fork allows the striker to separate from the entry opening. The pawl is pivotably provided on the base plate. The pawl fixes or releases the fork. A lift lever is affixed to the pawl so as to integrally rotate therewith. As illustrated in FIG. 4 of JP 2002-129806, the pawl is supported so as to be pivotable about a pawl axis that is substantially orthogonal to the fixing surface of the base plate.
The first lever is displaceably provided in the housing. The first lever can be displaced upward to come into contact with the lift lever and thereby act on the pawl and is capable of causing the pawl to release the fork. The second lever is pivotably provided in the housing. One end of the second lever is coupled to an exterior door handle via a transmission rod. The other end of the second lever is coupled to the first lever. As illustrated, e.g., in FIGS. 2 and 5, of JP 2002-129806, the second lever pivots in response to an opening operation being performed on the exterior door handle to act on the first lever and is capable of displacing the first lever upward.
As illustrated in FIG. 2 of JP 2002-129806, a linkage is formed at one end of the second lever. The lower end of the transmission rod is coupled to the linkage. As illustrated in FIG. 4 of JP 2002-129806, the pivot axis of the second lever is located frontward with respect to the pawl and extends in parallel to the pawl axis.
In this known vehicle door lock apparatus, when the transmission rod descends in response to the opening operation being performed on the exterior door handle and the lower end of the transmission rod pushes down the linkage of the second lever, the second lever pivots and the first lever, which is displaced upward, comes into contact with the lift lever. As a result, the pawl releases the fork and it is possible to open the door.
Incidentally, such a vehicle door lock apparatus may generally be used as both a vehicle door lock apparatus mounted on a front door and a vehicle door lock apparatus mounted on a rear door. Depending on the shape of the door on which the vehicle door lock apparatus is mounted, as illustrated in FIG. 1 of JP 2002-129806, the vehicle door lock apparatus is sometimes mounted on the door such that the fixing surface of the base plate is inclined relative to the vertical direction. In such a case, a plane of rotation, which contains an arcuate trajectory traced by the linkage of the second lever when it pivots in response to the opening operation being performed on the exterior door handle, is located farther in a frontward direction of the vehicle frame than the fixing surface of the base plate and is parallel to the fixing surface. Therefore, the plane of rotation is also inclined relative to the vertical direction.
Therefore, this plane of rotation is inclined relative to a plane that contains an arcuate trajectory traced by the upper end of the transmission rod when it pivots in response to the opening operation being performed on the exterior door handle (i.e. when the exterior door handle is manually pulled to open the door). Due to this arrangement, the transmission rod might be distorted when the opening operation is being performed on the exterior door handle; distortion of the transmission rod could lead to a deterioration of operation sensitivity (manual responsiveness), a loss of transmission stroke, etc. Therefore, in such a known vehicle door lock apparatus, a distorted transmission rod may impair the smooth transmission of the opening operation (pulling stroke) from the exterior door handle to the second lever via the distorted transmission rod.


A protective baseboard for protecting a building wall in an industry requiring sanitary requirements. The protective baseboard is positionable substantially adjacent the ground surface. The protective baseboard includes a substantially rigid and substantially water proof casing. The casing defines a casing external wall, the casing external wall having a casing wall inner surface. The casing also defines a casing inner volume and a filling aperture extending therethrough. The casing is positionable in a predetermined relationship relative to the building wall. A filler is provided within the casing inner volume. The filler substantially contacts the casing inner surface for minimizing an amount of air between the filler and the casing external wall.

In many industries, walls are sometimes protected by baseboards. These baseboards typically protect the wall against impacts, for example against impacts from carriages. In industries requiring sanitary precautions, for example in the food industry, some traditional baseboards used for protecting walls are made of concrete coated with an epoxy. The epoxy is required because the walls and their baseboards are typically washed relatively often to maintain sanitary conditions within a building into which they are provided.
The above-described baseboards have many drawbacks. For example, such baseboards may take a relatively long time to build if the concrete used in these baseboards takes a relatively long time to solidify. For example, a typical baseboard used in the food industry may take up to two weeks to solidify before an epoxy coating can be applied.
In addition, the epoxy is relatively fragile and may be broken by relatively small impacts. Furthermore, it also sometimes happens that the epoxy delaminates from the concrete. In both cases, there is a need to repair the baseboard.
Such repairs imply that the factory into which the baseboard is provided may need to be shut down, at least in part. In addition, such repairs are relatively labor intensive. Therefore such repairs are relatively expensive.
In addition, not any type of baseboard is usable in industries requiring sanitary precautions. Indeed, the baseboards need to be relatively easily washable and to be relatively resistant to the implementation of pathogens thereinto, thereon or both thereinto and thereon.
Against this background, there exists a need in the industry to provide a novel protective baseboard. Accordingly, an object of the present invention is therefore to provide an improved protective baseboard.


A plate heat exchanger for solar heating includes a plurality of channels extending between an inlet and an outlet for conducting a heat transferring fluid. The plurality of channels is defined between a first plate and a second plate, the first and second plates being formed by stainless steel. Each of the plurality of channels has a single-curved extension between the inlet and the outlet as seen in a plane corresponding to the major surface extension of the first and second plates. Each of the plurality of channels has along at least a portion of its longitudinal extension a triangular or a chamfered triangular cross-section or a parallelogram or a chamfered parallelogram cross-section. The side walls of two adjacent channels define an angle α corresponding to, or smaller than, 100 degrees and more preferred smaller than 90 degrees.

It is well known in the art to provide flat panel solar collectors for heating water or other fluids. The collectors are used in areas of high solar radiation and to improve the efficiency, the rays of light may be directed onto the collector by using a reflector.
One example of a solar collector is known from U.S. Pat. No. 4,007,726. The collector comprises a member having a hollow interior comprising a panel having an exterior flat surface which is coated with a heat absorbing material. The panel further comprises a plurality of pyramidal reflector bodies projecting from the panel. The reflector bodies are distributed across the surface of the panel. The exterior surfaces of the pyramidal reflector bodies reflect radiation incident thereto toward the flat surfaces of the panel. A fluid that circulates through the hollow member also circulates through the interior of the reflector bodies. Although the solution of this piece of prior art may be held to increase the power efficiency by reflecting the incident rays of light between the plurality of reflector bodies, the surface pattern is very complex to produce by pressing a sheet metal without cracking. Also, it is very hard to control the flow of heat transfer fluid from the inlet to the outlet and also to use the full available heat transfer surface.
EP 1 811 245 B1 discloses another example of a solar collector in which the solar collector is formed by a brazed plate heat exchanger having an upper absorber sheet having a selectively absorbing coating and a lower sheet. One or both sheets are provided with impressions. The two sheets are joined by brazing to thereby delimit one or several channels. In case of one channel, the channel may be meander shaped. Also examples of a plurality of parallel channels are disclosed. This type of solar collector corresponds more or less to a traditional single flow plate heat exchanger in its design and allows a controlled throughput of heat transfer fluid. However, the efficiency is low in terms of using the available energy of the incident rays of light.


The present invention is a LED connector principally comprised of two compatible halves with flat opposing surfaces, which form a complete cylinder when placed together. Its cross sectional area is no larger than that of the LED lamp.

A. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electric component, and more particularly to a miniature pin-mount connector for light emitting diodes used in electric signage or other displays.
B. Description of the Prior Art
Small light bulb arrays with supporting sockets are previously identified in the art, as suggested by U.S. Pat. No. 2,265,360 to F. M. Dessart and U.S. Pat. No. 2,506,620 to E. V. Sundt. Their primary uses are for Christmas ornaments that connect multiple small bulbs in parallel to a pair of electric wires by their respective terminal structures or sockets. The wires are enclosed either permanently in the sockets' manufacture, yielding a molded structure, or semi-permanent structure. Both methods generally require heat energy in setting the sockets to hold the electric wires in place.
These and other prior art sockets are designed for holding separate bulbs at a distance from each other. The introduction of the semiconductor and subsequent development of light emitting diodes (LEDs) have made this the preferred light source in many areas that desire simple and economical display lighting. LEDs are commonly used for illuminating signs, traffic signals, automobile taillights and display lights. One such application is electric signage, wherein a designed array of LEDs are safely energized by a 12-volt DC source to display characters and/or shapes recognizable from distant locations. A single LED is comprised of a small transparent solid lamp with two leads extending outwardly.
Wiring of the LEDs to the power source can be facilitated by utilizing connectors or sockets, one of which is suggested by U.S. Pat. No. 5,944,463 to Savage, Jr. In this patent, LED is housed with a pair of electric wires between two clamping elements. Metal terminals are also provided to automatically make electrical connections between the electric wire cores and the LED leads. When the clamping elements of the terminal are closed toward each other and a latching mechanism locks them in position, an electrical connection is created. This prior art connector may be suitable for a single dot of light, however it does not provide for a LED array wherein numerous dots of LEDs are packed tightly into plain layout areas. Such design is necessary to create the continuous lines of letters or shapes in electric signs, as well as many other modern LED devices.
A problem lies within conventional LED connectors when they are applied to electric signage. They are unable to array the LEDs in necessary lateral proximity because conventional LED connectors' inherently large latitudinal space keeps the LEDs from adjoining each other. Additionally, conventional connectors are quite expensive compared to the cost of LEDs themselves, which have been steadily decreasing in price with the improvement of manufacturing.
A new, lower cost microstructure of LED connector is therefore needed for universal applications in single to large volumes, including electric signage.
It is the primary object of the present invention to provide a miniature LED connector with a latitudinal cross section area no larger than the LED itself.
An additional objective is to provide an LED connector that can be manufactured at a fraction of the cost of the LED.
The final objective of the present invention is to provide an LED connector that ensures high security electrical connection, while still allowing instant uninstallation without the additional aid of special tools or heat energy.

Abstract: The solid-dome shaped LED component has an annular flat bottom that holds an outwardly extended pair of leads. Two parallel L-shaped recesses extend longitudinally over the connector half's flat surface. A large groove aligned with longer recess is included to accommodate the resister's solder. A pair of strategically spaced slots are formed longitudinally in the connector half's central region. The top slot holds a first conductive terminal member, and the bottom slot holds a second terminal member with their bases, respectively.

Abstract: The opposing connector's flat surface bears the same layout of recesses, slots and grooves. When the connector's halves are adjoined, electrical connections between the LED lamp and wires can be firmly secured and insulated. This interaction is conducted within the radius of the LED component, and is easily reversed by simple rewiring via the unique fastening means. Fastening means include three perpendicularly protruding posts with corresponding pinholes within the connector. Each of said posts and pinholes are individually sized and located in corresponding orientations of the first and second connector halves.


The present invention relates to an LED lens, in which a planar bottom has a pair of halves symmetrically connected with each other about a reference line and narrowed in the vicinity of the reference line. A pair of substantially semicircular reflecting surfaces are extended from both edges of the bottom connected with both ends of the reference line. A radiating surface is connected with remaining edges of the bottom and semicircular edges of the reflecting surfaces. The reflecting surfaces reflect light beams are introduced from the LED chip through the bottom toward the radiating surface. The radiating surface radiates the light beams to the outside when the light beams are introduced to the radiating surface through reflection from the reflecting surfaces and directly through the bottom, so that the light beams are radiated to the outside in a predetermined beam angle.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a lens, and more particularly, to a Light Emitting Diode (LED) lens for radiating light from an LED chip in a predetermined beam angle to the outside and a backlight apparatus incorporating the same.
2. Description of the Related Art
A Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) is gaining attention as a next generation display according to the development of the electronic industry. The LCD is generally equipped with a backlight apparatus for illuminating an LCD panel from behind since the LCD panel does not light spontaneously.
FIG. 1 is a cross-sectional view illustrating a conventional LED which is proposed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,679,621 as a light source of a side emitting LCD backlight apparatus. Referring to FIG. 1, an LED 10 includes a plastic package 11 containing a heat conductive material therein, a pair of leads 12 for the input/output of electric signals, an LED chip 14 installed within the plastic package 11 and a lens 13 placed on the frame 11. The lens 13 functions to redirect light beams generated from the LED chip 14 to horizontal directions.
The lens 16 is optically designed so that the light beams, which are generated from the LED chip 14 and propagate in all directions, are refracted horizontally. While FIG. 1 illustrates the lens 13 having a generally mortar-shaped structure, the lens 13 may have more sophisticated structure according to angles of light emitted from the LED chip 14. There is a problem in that some of the light beams maybe uncontrollably directed in a vertical direction rather than being horizontally refracted.
In addition, when an LCD backlight apparatus is realized by using LEDs 10 as above, the LEDs 10 functioning as point light sources are mounted in line on PCBs of a predetermined length to form LED arrays 20 functioning as linear light sources as shown in FIG. 2. The LED arrays 20 are arranged in parallel with each other at a predetermined distance and reflectors 31 are attached to both sides of the LED arrays 20 to form a backlight apparatus 30, in which the reflectors 31 are designed to reflect light beams from the LED arrays 20 in vertical directions.
In the backlight apparatus 30 using the conventional LEDs as described above, since the light beams generated from the light sources or the LED chips 14 are refracted horizontally by the lens 13 and then reflected vertically by the reflectors 31, the light beams change their paths for several times. Therefore, the complicated paths cause light loss.
In addition, since the light beams emitted from the LED chips 14 spread for 360° about optical axes having vertical direction as shown in FIG. 1, their brightness reduces significantly in proportion to the distance from the light sources or the LED chips 14. Therefore, it is required to arrange the LED arrays 20 adjacent to each other in order to prevent brightness reduction.

Light emitting diode lens and backlight apparatus having the same


A balloon catheter of novel configuration, which is capable of both efficiently heating a heating element by using a laser light and of ensuring durability by avoiding the laser light directly heating members other than the heating element. Provided is a balloon catheter with a balloon disposed in a distal end section of a shaft and wherein: a tightly wound coil shaped heating element is housed and arranged in the balloon; an optical fiber that irradiates a laser light inside the heating element is disposed; and a supply path that supplies a fluid to inside the balloon through an inside of the heating element and a discharge path that discharges the fluid from inside the balloon through a discharge port positioned on an outside of the heating element are disposed.

From the past, balloon catheters have been used with percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA). A balloon catheter is equipped with a shaft through which a guide wire is inserted, and a balloon attached to the front end section of the shaft, and by supplying fluid into the balloon, the balloon is expanded at the stenosis portion of the blood vessel, and the stenosis portion is pushed open.
For the stenosis portion of the blood vessel that is pushed open by the balloon, with plain old balloon angioplasty (POBA), by pushing against the blood vessel wall a balloon for which the internal pressure of the balloon has been raised, the blood vessel wall is plastically deformed, and blood vessel expansion is realized.
However, with plain old balloon angioplasty, the problem of the blood vessel constricting again after treatment may occur. One reason for this is possibly due to the fact that the blood vessel wall is merely temporarily crushed by the pushing pressure of the balloon, and after the restriction by the balloon is released, it gradually recovers its original shape. As other reasons for restenosis, we can additionally list intimal thickening, negative remodeling or the like.
Also, when performing expansion of a stenosis portion using a balloon, similarly, blood vessel wall injury due to applying pressure is also a problem. Specifically, the stenosis portion is not necessarily flexible, and is typically harder than the other parts of the blood vessel, so sufficient pressurization of the balloon to push open the stenosis portion is required. However, when the pressure of the balloon is made high, there is the risk of injury occurring into the deep layer of the blood vessel, which is undesirable, and there was the risk of the blood vessel becoming stenosis again during treatment of the injury.
As one means of addressing these problems, for example in Japanese Published Patent No. JP-B-2535250 (Patent Document 1), a balloon catheter is proposed by which it is possible to realize deformability during expansion, and shape maintainability after expansion by adjusting the temperature of the blood vessel wall. Specifically, by heating the fluid inside the balloon and pushing the blood vessel wall open while warming it, it is possible to increase the flexibility of the blood vessel wall during expansion of the stenosis portion, so injury to the blood vessel due to expansion is prevented and restenosis is also avoided.
However, with the balloon catheter noted in Patent Document 1, a laser light absorbing heating tube heated by laser light is a braided structure made of stainless steel or the like, so it is easy for the flexibility to be insufficient, and it was difficult to ensure sufficient deformation following capability in relation to the blood vessel shape. In fact, fluid is made to be supplied inside the balloon through tiny gaps of the laser light absorbing heating tube with a braided structure, so it was necessary to spend a long time for balloon expansion deformation, and there was the problem that the surgery time became long, and this placed a big burden on the surgeon and the patient.
In addition, the front end fitting which adheres the front end section of the laser light absorbing heating tube is made of metal, and the front end fitting has a structure by which it is exposed to the outside (blood vessel interior), and the balloon and a third tube are also adhered to the front end fitting. Because of that, there is the risk that the front end fitting heated by laser light will contact the blood vessel wall and injure the blood vessel wall, and also the risk that the front end fitting will heat the balloon and third tube more than is necessary, bringing the risk of a decrease in durability or an injury.
Also, with Japanese Published Patent No. JP-B-2864094 (Patent Document 2), proposed is a constitution by which the balloon expansion speed is quickened by supplying fluid into the balloon through a through hole provided on the laser light absorbing heating tube. However, with the constitution noted in Patent Document 2 as well, the laser light absorbing heating tube has a metal braided structure, and in addition, a double structure part is provided on the laser light absorbing heating tube, so an increase in flexibility of the laser light absorbing heating tube was not yet realized.
Providing a gap in the braided structure of the laser light absorbing heating tube and increasing the flexibility of the laser light absorbing heating tube is also possible, but by doing that, when fluid is heated using laser light, there is the possibility of laser light leaking to outside the heating member. As a result, the heating efficiency by the laser light decreases, and there was the risk of a decrease in durability due to irradiation of laser light on the shaft or balloon.


A golf club of the type for putting and driving a golf ball. The golf club has a reflective surface which is positionable to direct toward a golfer's eye an alignment image including an image of the ball and the target into which the ball is directed so as to aid the golfer in positioning the head of the golf club relative to the ball. The reflective surface is removable from the head so as to be stowed when not in use. The golf club also includes a leveling device in the head of the club to indicate to the golfer when the head is aligned horizontally. The golf club further includes a first striking surface with a tilted striking surface portion for imparting spin to the golf ball, and a second striking surface opposite the first for directing the ball in an upward trajectory. The tilted striking surface may include a flat central portion and an adjacent flat end portion, both of which contact the golf ball. Third and fourth striking surfaces are positioned between the first and second striking surfaces at opposite ends of the head. To strike the ball with the third or fourth striking surfaces, the golfer positions himself behind the ball and astride a desired path between the ball and the target.

During the course of a typical golf game, a golfer is at times required to putt a golf ball a short distance in order to sink the ball in a hole. To putt the ball, the golfer typically stands facing the ball so that his shoulders are parallel to the path he intends the ball to take. The golfer then extends the golf club toward the ball so that a head of the golf club is aligned with the ball. The golfer swings the head of the club toward the ball, striking the ball and propelling it toward the hole.
A drawback of conventional golf clubs is that when the golfer aligns the head of the golf club with the ball, the golfer's eyes are not aligned with the path he intends the ball to take. This is so because the golfer typically stands to the side of the path and looks across the path rather than sighting along the path. As a result, the golfer may misalign the head of the club with the ball. The potential for misalignment is greatest on mid-range putts because the distance between the ball and the hole is of the same order as the distance between the ball and the golfer's eyes. A golfer using conventional clubs on mid-range putts must therefore be aware of the fact that his eyes are not accurately aligned with the path he intends the ball to take and must correct for this misalignment as he adjusts the position of the club head relative to the ball. The golfer must then maintain this correction as he moves the head of the club away from the ball and swings the head toward the ball. If the golfer does not accurately maintain the proper alignment between the ball and the head of the club, the ball will miss its target and the golfer's game will suffer.
A further drawback with conventional golf clubs is that the golfer has no way of accurately determining when the head of the golf club is horizontal. If the head of the club is not horizontal when the golfer strikes the ball, it may not strike the ball squarely causing the ball to diverge from its intended path and miss its target.


A device for closing a septal defect, such as a patent foramen ovale, includes a clip formed from a superelastic material that is inserted into a septum wall of a heart. The clip is advanced through a patient's vasculature, e.g., within a delivery apparatus, until the clip is disposed within a first chamber adjacent the septal defect. Tines of the clip are directed through a flap of tissue of the septal defect until the tines of the clip are disposed within a second opposing chamber. The clip then transforms into its relaxed state, wherein the tines of the clip engage with a surface of the second chamber, thereby substantially closing the septal opening.

During development of a fetus in utero, blood is generally oxygenated by the mother's placenta, not the fetus' developing lungs. Most of the fetus' circulation is shunted away from the lungs through specialized vessels or foramens that are open during fetal life, but generally close shortly after birth. Occasionally, however, these foramen fail to close and create hemodynamic problems, which may ultimately prove fatal unless treated.
One defect that may occur is a patent foramen ovale ("PFO"), which may occur between the left and right atria of the heart. During fetal life, an opening called the foramen ovale allows blood to pass directly from the right atrium to the left atrium (bypassing the lungs). Thus, oxygenated blood from the placenta may travel through the vena cava into the right atrium, through the foramen ovale into the left atrium, and from there into the left ventricle for delivery via the aorta to the fetus' body. After birth, with pulmonary circulation established, the increased left atrial blood flow and pressure causes the functional closure of the foramen ovale. This closure is then followed by the anatomical closure of the foramen ovale.
In some humans, however, the foramen ovale fails to completely close. This condition can pose serious health risks for the individual, particularly if the individual has other heart abnormalities. For example, recent studies suggest an association between the presence of a patent foramen ovale and the risk of paradoxical embolism or stroke. See P. Lechat J et al., Prevalence of Patent Foramen ovale in Patients with Stroke, N. Engl. J. Med. 1988;318: 1148-1152.
Still other septal defects may occur within a septum between the various chambers of the heart, such as atrial-septal defects (ASDs), ventricular-septal defects (VSDs), and the like. To close such defects, open heart surgery may be performed to ligate and close the defect. Such procedures are obviously highly invasive and pose substantial morbidity and mortality risks.
Alternatively, catheter-based procedures have been suggested. These may involve introducing umbrella or disk-like structures into the heart that include opposing expandable structures connected by a hub or waist. Generally, the device is inserted through the defect, and the expandable structures are deployed on either side of the septum to secure the tissue surrounding the defect between the umbrella or disk-like structure in an attempt to seal and close the defect. Such devices, however, involve frame structures that often support membranes, either of which may fail during the life of the patient being treated, opening the defect and/or releasing segments of the structure within the patient's heart.
Accordingly, apparatus and methods for closing septal defects, and in particular a patent foramen ovale, would be considered useful.

Clip apparatus for closing septal defects and methods of use


Provided is a method of treating a cancer in an individual using activated T cells or PBMCs induced by antigen presenting cells (such as dendritic cells) loaded with a plurality of tumor antigen peptides. The method may further comprise administration of the antigen presenting cells loaded with the plurality of tumor antigen peptides to the individual. The methods may be used singly or in combination with an immune checkpoint inhibitor. Also provided are precision therapy methods customized for the individual using neoantigen peptides or based on the mutation load in the tumor of the individual, methods of preparing the activated T cells, methods of monitoring the treatment, methods of cloning tumor-specific T cell receptors, an isolated population of cells comprising the activated T cells, and compositions and kits useful for cancer immunotherapy.

The human body has an elaborate immune system to defend itself against diseases, including internal malignancies. Unleashing the body's own immune power to treat and prevent cancer has therefore been a long-standing ideal in oncology. The natural immune response against a tumor is typically elicited by tumor antigens, including mutated proteins exclusively expressed in cancer cells, and tumor-associated antigens (TAAs) overexpressed in cancer's tissue of origin but are nonetheless not completely recognized as "self". Antigen presenting cells (APCs), notably dendritic cells (DCs), that encounter tumor antigens can process and present the tumor antigens on their cell surface. Upon maturation, DCs loaded with tumor antigens can trigger T cell response, which involves cytotoxic T cells, helper T cells, and functionally distinct effecter and memory T cells, against cancer cells hosting the tumor antigens. A particularly powerful type of T cell response involves production of cytotoxic T cells that can kill cancer cells by releasing cytokines, enzymes, and cytotoxins, or by inducing pro-apoptosis signaling cascade via cell-cell interactions.
Cancer immunotherapies aim to take advantage of the above process to treat cancer, but success has been rather limited until recently. Initial attempts have focused on developing cancer vaccines based on particular antigen peptides, full-length antigen proteins, or viral vectors encoding tumor antigens. Few cancer vaccines have made into the clinics, and even fewer generated any impressive clinical outcome. Unlike traditional cancer therapy, such as chemotherapy, radiation therapy and surgical resection, in general, the bodily response to cancer immunotherapy treatments, especially cancer vaccines, is much delayed because it takes time for APCs to process and present the antigen to T cells, and for T cells to mature and to elicit an immune response. When a tumor is present in a patient, the cancer cells in the tumor already have mechanisms to escape surveillance by the immune system. Therefore, a successful tumor vaccine must be able to bypass the defects in immune surveillance to elicit a strong immune response. Additionally, several bottleneck issues exist in cancer vaccines that prevent the approach from producing specific and durable clinical effects. First, cancer cells, even of the same histological type, are rather heterogeneous in their genetic composition and expression profile among different patients and among different lesions within the same patient—a phenomenon well documented by a plethora of genetic data from recent next-generation sequencing experiments on cancer cells available in the literature and public databases. Consequently, the limited number of tumor antigen(s) in a particular cancer vaccine treatment is unlikely to represent the spectrum of antigens characteristic of individual tumors in all patients. Secondly, many antigen moieties in cancer vaccines are not effectively loaded onto the APCs due to serum half-life and bioavailability issues. Third, even when APCs are properly primed by antigens contained in cancer vaccines, lack of suitable activation signals and microenvironments can result in production of the wrong subpopulation of T cells, especially immunosuppressive regulatory T cells (TREG), which inhibit, instead of stimulate, immune response against tumors. The origin of the last two issues has to do with the complete lack of control by clinicians in patients' actual response to any cancer vaccine once it is administered.
Cell-based cancer immunotherapy approach alleviates some of the above challenges in cancer vaccines by administering to patients immunity-mediating cells or cell products that are prepared under relatively defined and controlled conditions. In particular, DC-based methods have garnered much interest, especially after the FDA approved PROVENGE® (sipuleucel-T) in April 2010 for advanced prostate cancer. A typical DC-based immunotherapy method involves isolating DCs from a cancer patient, loading the DCs with a tumor antigen (or antigens, including tumor cell lysates and total mRNA) ex vivo, and then administering the DCs back to the patient to elicit cancer-killing T cell response. PROVENGE®, for example, comprises exposing a patient's peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) to a fusion protein comprising a tumor-derived antigen coupled to a cytokine (such as GM-CSF), and then infusing the PBMCs (presumably containing activated DCs that can present the tumor-derived antigen to T cells) to the patient (see U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,976,546, 6,080,409, and 6,210,662). In the pivotal Phase III trial (Kantoff P W, Higano C S et al. (2010) "Sipuleucel-T immunotherapy for castration-resistant prostate cancer." N J Med 363:411-22), the specific embodiment of PROVENGE® was prepared using a recombinant protein of prostatic acid phosphatase (PAP), a prostate cancer-associated antigen, fused to GM-CSF, a cytokine known to attract and induce DCs. Although PROVENGE® was able to prolong median survival of the patients in the experimental group (25.8 months) as compared to those in the control group (21.7 months), the clinical trial results did not show evidence of statistically significant delay in tumor progression or reduction in tumor size. More troubling is the fact that survival of individual patients does not seem to correlate with specific T cell responses to either the fusion protein or PAP in the PROVENGE® treatment (Cheever M A, Higano C S (2011) "PROVENGE (Sipuleucel-T) in prostate cancer: the first FDA-approved therapeutic cancer vaccine." Clin. Cancer Res. 17:3520-6).
A second method in the cell-based immunotherapy approach, named adoptive lymphocyte therapy, involves isolating tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes (TIL) from a patient's tumor, expanding the TILs ex vivo, and infusing the TILs back to the patient after depleting the patient's native non-myeloid lymphocytes. Dramatic clinical responses, including complete tumor recession and long disease-free survival, have been reported in clinical applications of adoptive lymphocyte therapy to patients with melanoma (Restifo N P, Dudley M E, and Rosenberg S A. (2012) "Adoptive immunotherapy for cancer: harnessing the T cell response." Nat. Rev. Immunol. 12: 269-81). It has further been shown that the clinical benefits of TIL are correlated with or resulting from tumor-specific T cells present in the TIL population (Robbins P F et al. (2013) "Mining exomic sequencing data to identify mutated antigens recognized by adoptively transferred tumor-reactive T cells." Nature Medicine 19: 747-752; and Tran E et al. (2014) "Cancer immunotherapy based on mutation-specific CD4+ T cells in a patient with epithelial cancer" Science 344: 641-645). Recently, T cells with engineered T cell receptors having modified affinity to certain tumor antigens or chimeric antigen receptors (CAR-T) further expand the capacity of the adoptive lymphocyte therapy method by modifying the microenvironment of T cell-tumor interactions. A major issue with the current adoptive lymphocytes therapy methods concerns multiple reports of severe adverse events, including CNS toxicity, in clinical trials, likely having to do with improper selection of targets (so called on-target off tumor effect) and biased expansion of T cell populations. Another issue of the approach is the lack of durable response in some patients, because of rapidly developed immune tolerance to the tumor-specific antigens presented on the infused T lymphocytes, as well as immune escape by cancer cells.
Immune tolerance and immune escape are often mediated by checkpoint molecules, or co-inhibitory signals, on cells interacting with T cells in the microenvironment of the tumor site, in addition to an elevated level of immunosuppressive cells, such as TREG and MDSC (myeloid-derived suppressor cells). A well-studied pair of checkpoint molecules involves the immune-inhibitory PD-1 receptor on T cells and the PD-L1 ligand on APCs (such as DCs), MDSCs and cancer cells. Binding of PD-L1 to PD-1 triggers a signal to inhibit pro-inflammatory cytokine (e.g. IL-2) production and proliferation of cytotoxic T cells. In many scenarios, PD-L1 binding to PD-1 triggers apoptosis of cytotoxic T cells. On the other hand, the PD-1/PD-L1 signaling induces TREG cells, which act to further inhibit T cells with tumor-attacking capacity. Antibodies against PD-1, PD-L1, and other checkpoint molecules (such as CTLA-4 on T cells) are currently developed by several pharmaceutical companies as a distinct approach in cancer immunotherapy, based on the theory that blockade of the T-cell checkpoints can help overcome immune tolerance and immune escape in the tumor site. It is worth noting that the anti-tumor effects of the checkpoint blockade approach require pre-existence of tumor-specific T cells in vivo (Boussiotis V A (2014) "Somatic mutations and immunotherapy outcome with CTLA-4 blockade in melanoma" N. Engl. J. Med. 371:2230-2232; Wolchok J D and Chan T A, (2014) "Cancer: antitumor immunity gets a boost" Nature 515: 496-498).
Given the promises and challenges of the various cancer immunotherapy approaches as described above, it is desirable to provide a new cancer immunotherapy method that combines the advantages of the previous methods while avoiding the known pitfalls.
The disclosures of all publications, patents, patent applications and published patent applications referred to herein are hereby incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.

Methods of cancer treatment using activated T cells


A differential scanning calorimeter apparatus includes reference and sample cells and controlled temperature shields. The temperature of the shields is controlled such that baseline curvature is reduced by eliminating heat flow from the furnaces to their surroundings (quasi adiabatic conditions) and by controlling heat flow through a well defined solid state heat resistance between the furnaces and a temperature controlled heat sink. The temperature of each shield can be controlled independently to reduce differential heat flow over the whole temperature range of the scan, or maintained at a constant temperature for conventional power compensated DSC operation. The temperature/time profile for each shield can be controlled according to actual furnace temperature, obtained from an empty run, or stored in the computer memory and recalled for sample measurements.

The differential scanning calorimeter ("DSC") is an apparatus which, when a sample and a reference substance are placed therein, and the temperatures of both are varied at a constant rate, detects and analyzes differentially a heat flow generated or absorbed by the sample as compared with the reference substance.
As the sample material goes through various physical changes, such as fusing, crystallization, freezing, oxidation, and the like, its temperature is affected by the changes in internal energy. The differences in temperature between the sample and the reference are recorded and, from this data, calculations may be made for determining the internal energy changes occurring in the sample. Such information is useful in evaluating materials such as pharmaceuticals, plastics, films and the like.
One type of DSC is power compensation DSC. It is generally structured by a combination of two independent calorimeters for a sample and a reference, and both are provided with a resistance temperature sensor and heat flow feedback heater. The average value of temperatures detected by both temperature sensors is compared with a temperature output of a temperature programmer which varies at a constant rate. Two calorimeters are heated up such that both are brought into coincidence by the heat flow feedback heaters. Also, if a difference is caused in temperature output of the both temperature sensors, both heaters are immediately increased or decreased in power to return the difference to zero. Thereupon, the difference of power supplied to the both heaters is continuously recorded as a differential heat flow signal.
Various power compensated differential scanning calorimeters are known in the art such as U.S. Pat. No. 6,530,686 (herein incorporated by reference) relating to a DSC having low drift and certain response characteristics. The sample temperature is controlled according to a program temperature by a furnace temperature controller, and at the same time controlled by a detector temperature controller. Also, if a temperature difference occurs, the supply powers to heaters separately provided close to the sample and reference are adjusted such that the temperature difference is returned to zero by a differential heat compensating circuit, outputting a difference in supply power as a differential heat flow.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,263,484 (herein incorporated by reference) relates to a method of performing an analysis by changing the temperature of a sample material in accordance with a desired program by varying the temperature of an external medium in heat exchanging relationship with the sample. The difference in temperature between the sample and program is measured and the applied heat is varied to maintain zero temperature difference there between. The power required to maintain the zero temperature differences is then measured.
The power compensation type differential scanning calorimeter is responsive and can quickly realize a heat compensation time constant. However, as for the baseline performance, there has been a difficulty in obtaining stability. The main reason of this lies in that the power compensation type sensor has a large temperature difference from surrounding members during measurement with a result that a comparatively large amount of heat leak occurs from the sensor to the outside, causing a drift factor in the baseline. Moreover, there is operating difficulty and lag time between cycles due to frost formation on the cells during cool down.

Differential scanning calorimeter (DSC) with temperature controlled furnace


Planishing or stress relief in a welded joint (34) is accomplished with a hammer (12) and a backing bar (26). The hammer is applied on a first side (1) to a first surface (31) of the structure (30). To indicate the proper position of the backing bar, a first magnet (20; 320) is associated with the hammer, and a magnetic sensor arrangement (24; 224; 300) is located on the other side (2) of the structure. In one embodiment, the sensor arrangement is a second magnet (24) which is held in place by the magnetic field (40) of the first magnet. In a second embodiment, the sensor includes a line array (262) of individual sensors, each associated with an indicator of a line array (264) of indicators. In a third embodiment, the sensor includes a line array (300) of two magnetic sensors, which are coupled to a differential indicator (324).

When fabricating large structures such as external propellant tanks for the Space Shuttle, large sheets of aluminum alloy are curved and welded along joints to define the overall shape of the tanks. The welding is preferably performed by automatic welding machinery, such as, for example, that described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,483,039, issued Jan. 9, 1996 in the name of Gallagher. It has been found that stress relieving or planishing of the welded joint is advantageous, as described, for example, in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/803,481, filed Feb. 20, 1997 in the name of Shah et al. As described therein, planishing is accomplished by use of a planishing hammer applied to the weld on one side of the structure, and a backing or bucking bar held in a corresponding location on the other side of the structure.
It will be appreciated that the metal from which the propellant tank of the Space Shuttle is fabricated may, in some locations, be relatively thin, for weight minimization. During the planishing operation, the backing bar must be applied to the reverse side of the plates being welded, to prevent damage or actual puncturing of the plates by the hammer. As mentioned, the tanks are very large, so a human operator and either a backing bar or a power hammer can easily be accommodated within the tank, and the curvature of the plates is so large that, at any particular location, the joint or weld to be planished lies in an essentially planar structure.
It has been found to be difficult to reliably maintain the backing bar at a position on one side of the structure which corresponds to the location of the head of the planishing hammer. While the weld is visible from both sides of the structure, the exact position along the weld which is being planished must be identified to within the diameter of the backing bar. Attempts have been made to use radio communications to give instructions and information across the welded walls, but this has not proven to be effective.
Improved arrangements for identifying the location of a planishing hammer are desired.


Chemical conversion treatment agents for surface treating a metal substrate and a method for surface treating a metal substrate using the same are described in this disclosure. The chemical conversion agent includes at least one metal element, a fluorine element, and a co-condensate of a first silane coupling agent (A) and a second silane coupling agent (B).

In the coating of workpieces such as metal substrates, chemical conversion treatments have been conventionally performed on the surfaces of the metal substrates by using various chemical conversion treatment agents in order to form chemical conversion coating films on the surfaces of the metal substrates and thereby secure the adhesion of coat films and corrosion resistance. A known example of the chemical conversion treatments is the chromate chemical conversion treatment using a chemical conversion treatment agent (a chromic acid salt or the like) containing chromium. However, it has been pointed out that the chromate chemical conversion treatment is hazardous because of chromium. Moreover, another known example of the chemical conversion treatments is a chemical conversion treatment using a chemical conversion treatment agent containing a so-called zinc phosphate. However, the chemical conversion treatment agent containing zinc phosphate has a high metal ion concentration and a high acid concentration and is extremely highly reactive, in general. Hence, the chemical conversion treatment using the chemical conversion treatment agent containing zinc phosphate has a problem of requiring wastewater treatment. In addition, the chemical conversion treatment using a chemical conversion treatment agent containing zinc phosphate also has a problem that deposit called sludge is formed due to formation of water-insoluble salts, and that a removal and disposal of the sludge is necessary. As described above, the chemical conversion treatment using a chemical conversion treatment agent containing zinc phosphate has problems in terms of economical efficiency and workability. For this reason, studies are being made recently on chemical conversion treatments using chemical conversion treatment agents other than the chemical conversion treatments agent containing chromium and the chemical conversion treatment agent containing zinc phosphate.
For example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2007-262577 (PTL 1) discloses a chemical conversion treatment agent containing a zirconium compound and/or a titanium compound and an organosiloxane. Moreover, PTL 1 shows examples of the organosiloxane such as a co-condensate of 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane and 3-glycidoxypropyltrimethoxysilane (described in Example 6 in PTL 1) and a co-condensate of N-2-(aminoethyl)-3-aminopropyltrimethoxysilane and 3-glycidoxypropyltrimethoxysilane (described in Example 17 of PTL 1). However, conventional chemical conversion treatment agents as described in PTL 1 are not necessarily sufficient in terms of coat film adhesion.

Chemical conversion treatment agent for surface treatment of metal substrate, and surface treatment method of metal substrate using same


A decoding approaching suitable for architectures such as Very Long Instruction Word (VLIW), in which throughput performance would be reduced in case if large blocks of conditional core are executed repetitively. Some of the code-words are received according to escape modes, which require different kinds of processing depending on specific mode. The decoding logic is partitioned into two parts, with the first part accessing entries in tables corresponding to code-words. The first part writes the symbol value retrieved from the accessed entry into an output buffer. In case of escape modes, the first part writes an intermediate decoded value to the output buffer, and an escape mode identifier retrieved from an accessed entry, and a position identifier in the output buffer for the symbol sought to be decoded in an intermediate buffer. The second part then performs the specific processing required for each entry in the intermediate buffer. The block sizes executed on conditions are reduced, thereby facilitating higher degree of parallelism and thus higher throughput performance.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to compression technologies, and more specifically to a method and apparatus for decoding variable length codes (e.g., Huffman Encoding) while using optimal resources.
2. Related Art
Symbols are often encoded using variable length codes. Huffman encoding provides an example approach to such encoding. Variable length encoding has been used in several environments, typically due to the loss-less nature and the level of compression achieved.
In a typical scenario, an encoder encodes each input symbol to a corresponding bit string (code-word) using a pre-specified table, with the length of code-word potentially being different for different input symbols. In general, short length code-words are chosen for frequently occurring input symbols. A decoder then receives a bit stream containing such variable length code-words and constructs the symbols by using the inverse encoding tables (or corresponding information).
The decoding technique may need to be implemented while meeting various constraints in the corresponding environments. For example, in devices using VLIW (very large instruction word) processors, it may be desirable to avoid if conditions in the decoding operation. In addition, it may be desirable that the input characters be constructed quickly (using minimal processing power).
In the drawings, like reference numbers generally indicate identical, functionally similar, and/or structurally similar elements. The drawing in which an element first appears is indicated by the leftmost digit(s) in the corresponding reference number.

Decoding bit streams encoded according to variable length codes


The image processing system includes: an image pickup apparatus (10) including image pickup elements of a color difference line sequential system that outputs, as video signals, a luminance signal (Y) and a line sequential, color difference signal (U/V); and an image processing apparatus (20) which includes a signal interpolator (21) for interpolating the line sequential color difference signal (U/V) to separate the line sequential color difference signal (U/V) into two color difference signals (V) and (U). With this configuration, only two video signal lines are required to connect the image pickup apparatus (10) and the image processing apparatus (20), and even though the number of signal lines is reduced, image quality deterioration is suppressed.

The present invention relates to an image processing system wherein an image obtained by an image pickup apparatus is transmitted to and processed by an image processing apparatus. In particular, the present invention pertains to an appropriate image processing system for reducing the number of signal lines required for a connection between an image pickup apparatus and an image processing apparatus, as well as for suppressing the deterioration of an image quality, and an image pickup apparatus and an image processing apparatus that constitute this image processing system.
In an image processing system wherein an image obtained by a camera (an image pickup apparatus) is transmitted to an image processing system, the camera is connected to this image processing apparatus by signal lines so that the camera may be located at a distance from the image processing apparatus. An image processing system disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication No. Hei. 11-78692 respectively provides for the mounting of multiple cameras on the front, the rear, the left and the right side of a vehicle, and for a single image processing apparatus to be employed that fetches and synthesizes the images obtained by these cameras. For this conventional image processing system, the transmission to the image processing system of video data obtained by the cameras is performed using an arbitrary transmission method, such as RGB or YUV, or Y/C separation video or composite video.
When all video data acquired by an image pickup element, such as a CCD used for a digital camera, are to be transmitted to an image processing system, the video data are converted into RGB signals or YUV signals by the camera and the resultant signals are output to the image processing apparatus. In this case, since video data for each color element are output by the camera to the image processing apparatus, a total of three transmission paths (signal lines) are required.
To effect a reduction in the number of required signal lines, methods such as Y/C separation video and composite video are available. With the first method, two paths are required for the transmission of data, while with the second method, one path is required. However, since when these methods are employed, the amount of data that is transmitted for an image is reduced from that which is acquired by an image pickup element, and the quality of the image, when it is subsequently reproduced, is deteriorated.
When transmission along two paths is to be preformed without a reduction in the amount of data, a point sequential system for alternately transmitting a color difference U/V signal for each pixel is employed. According to the point sequential system, since a color mixture occurs when the U/V separation timing is shifted at the reception time, accurate timing management is indispensable. Therefore, when the point sequential system is employed for a monitoring system, or a vehicle-mounted system, for transmitting data a long distance of several meters to several tens of meters, deterioration of the signal occurs and using the system is difficult.
Three transmission paths are required for the transmission of a high quality video signal. However, this involves an increase in the number of lines, and the transmission at a long distance is indispensable for the application to the monitoring system, so that the costs for laying long cables would be increased. Further, as is disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication No. 11-78692, for an image processing system for which multiple cameras are mounted on a vehicle, because the available mounting space is severely limited, it is imperative that the number of signal lines and the size of the apparatus be reduced. This is especially true when multiple cameras are employed for a monitoring or a vehicle mounted system, since then, either multiple scenes are alternately displayed or multiple images are synthesized and the resulting image is displayed or recorded. As a result, therefore, when the number of cameras is increased, the accompanying increase in the number of video signal transmission paths and in the size of the processing circuit constitute a formidable problem.
Specifically, when for a conventional image processing system all video data acquired by cameras are to be transmitted to an image processing apparatus, the number of signal transmission lines that are required is increased, as are the number of circuits in the image pickup apparatus and the size of the video signal input/output section of the image processing apparatus. This problem becomes evermore apparent as the number of mounted cameras is increased.

Image processing system, image pickup apparatus and image processing apparatus

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.


A communications system includes a base station; and a mobile communications terminal, where the base station and the mobile communications terminal execute a random access procedure, and perform radio communication. The base station is configured to assign to the mobile communications terminal, in the random access procedure, an identifier that corresponds to preamble information, the base station assigning the identifier based on first correspondence information that indicates a given correspondence relation of the preamble information to be transmitted by the mobile communications terminal and the identifier assigned to mobile communications terminal. The mobile communications terminal is configured to execute the random access procedure with the base station by transmitting to the base station, the preamble information that corresponds to the identifier assigned by the base station.

Long Term Evolution (LTE) systems including LTE and LTE-Advanced, for example, are known as communications systems in mobile communications terminals such as mobile telephones (for example, refer to International Publication No. 2007/091675). In an LTE system, in a connection sequence for initial access to establish UE connection by user equipment ((UE) user terminal) or for connection to a handover destination, a random access channel (RACH) is used by the UE to request an evolutional Node B ((eNB) base station) to assign a communication channel.
Further in an LTE system, a RACH is used for resynchronization and reconnection, and UL/DL resumption (return from a power-saving state). Thus, in an LTE system, for example, compared to a 3G system, the frequency of RACH utilization is several times higher. RACHs include two types, contention based RACHs and non-contention RACHs.
With contention based RACHs, the UE side randomly selects a preamble and therefore, multiple UEs may select the same preamble resource and collisions in the transmitting and receiving of RACH responses and RACH messages 3 have the potential of occurring. Such collisions are responsible for interference in the random access procedure (RA procedure).
A contention based RACH assumes such collisions and, the UE that properly decodes RACH message 3 is ultimately considered the winner UE by the eNB side and the random access procedure is successful. On the UE side, RACH message 3 is used to transmit a contention resolution (resolution) ID that is unique to each UE. If the contention resolution ID returned in RACH message 4 from the eNB coincides with the contention resolution ID of the UE, the UE recognizes the random access procedure to be successful.
On the other hand, with non-contention random access, although the same preamble number is not simultaneously used, 64 preamble resources for one cell are provided, among which a portion is used as dedicated preambles for non-contention random access. Therefore, if the number of UEs in a single cell increases, preamble resources for non-contention random access are depleted causing transition to contention based random access, in turn causing interference in the random access procedure.
In an LTE system in this state, to suppress interference if the UE repeatedly increases the preamble, a back-off indicator that controls the interval at which the UE preamble is transmitted is prepared. Further, if the number of preambles that the eNB receives increases consequent to an increase in the UEs in the cell, the back-off indicator is used to increase the interval at which each UE transmits the preamble, whereby interference is reduced. The back-off indicator provides control on a cellular basis.
In the reception of a preamble from a UE, power ramping is implemented to increase the success rate of the RACH sequence by increasing the preamble output power each time the preamble is retransmitted. However, as described above, with consideration that in the LTE system, the frequency of RACH utilization is high, since the UEs randomly select a preamble, if the number of UEs in the cell increases, it can be assumed that the RACH sequence will be performed simultaneously by numerous UEs. Therefore, the probability of RACH sequence failure consequent to PRACH interference increases.
Further, control that adjusts the preamble transmission interval by the back-off indicator is insufficient in reducing interference when the number of UEs increases. In other words, even if preamble transmission intervals for UEs are made available, if the UEs request the RACH sequence at an identical timing, reduction in interference is not achieved. Further, if the preamble transmission interval is increased by back-off indicator control, the time increases until preamble transmission for resynchronization and UL resumption, thereby inviting increased delays in UE resynchronization and recovery from a power-saving state.
Meanwhile, if the number of UEs in a cell in a LTE system increases, improved system throughput by reductions in interference consequent to the RACH sequence and improved RACH success rates reduce delays in UE resynchronization and recovery from a power-saving state. Therefore, reduction of preamble collisions occurring in the contention based RACH procedure is sought.
Nonetheless, with the conventional contention based RACH schemes above, a problem arises in that since the UEs randomly select a preamble, reductions in interference cannot be facilitated by controlling via the eNB, the preamble that the UEs select.

Communications system, communications method, mobile communications terminal, and base station


A bearing cover assembly configured to assemble to a bearing housing in which a rolling element bearing is accommodated. The bearing housing assembly includes an end cap with a sleeve portion that mates to an interior conical surface of the bearing housing with a complementary outer bevel formed on the sleeve portion.

Rolling element bearings and babbitt bearings are anti-friction devices used to rotatably support shafts in industrial settings and mechanical equipment. Rolling element bearings include a plurality of rolling elements such as spherical balls or cylindrical rollers that are located between inner and outer bearing rings, commonly referred to as races, and the rolling elements are arranged so that they can roll along the inner and outer circumferences of the respective inner and outer bearing races. The rolling elements enable the inner and outer bearing races to rotate with respect to each other. A rotating shaft that is mounted to the inner bearing race can thus rotate with respect to the outer bearing race that may be fixedly mounted to a stationary supporting structure.
The rolling element bearings and races are typically supported in a bearing housing such as, for example, a pillow block housing or a flange housing that mounts the bearing to the supporting structure. The bearing housing includes a housing bore disposed through the structure in which the rolling element bearing is located. The shaft can extend into the housing bore from either or both sides of the housing structure. In some embodiments, the axial end of the shaft may be located in the bearing housing such that the shaft is anchored by the rolling element bearing mounted therein, while in other embodiments the shaft may extend through and beyond the bearing housing. The bearing housing may be made of cast iron or a similar structural material to rigidly support the bearing and transfer loads from the shaft to the supporting structure.
In order to maximize the safe operation of equipment, it has become a requirement that shafts and the bearing assemblies that permit rotation of the shafts are covered. To cover the housing bore, for example, to prevent unintended contact with the rotating shaft positioned therein, and to further prevent contamination and debris from entering and interfering with the operation of the bearing, bearing covers may be attached to the bearing housing. Common attachment mechanisms include using bolts or setscrews to fasten the bearing cover to the housing or press-fitting a polymer or steel cap into the housing bore to prevent the cover from being unintentionally dislodged due to incidental contact. Such attachments methods, however, may require that machining processes be undertaken after the bearing assembly is installed which is costly and can create other problems such as damage to the cover and/or the bearing. These attachment methods may further require compatibility between the style and/or dimension of the bearing housing and the corresponding bearing cover. Bearing housings are cast with a draft angle that facilitates removal of the part from a die. The draft angle creates non-parallel faces of the exterior of the housing, which poses a challenge to reliable attachment of a protective cover to the housing. Such modifications, for various reasons, can compromise the operation or performance of the bearings and/or shafts and can be costly to perform. The present disclosure is directed to an improved bearing cover assembly to facilitate attachment to a bearing housing and provide protection from incidental contact.


Disclosed is a metal-insulator-metal (MIM) capacitor structure formed by a metal interconnection process of trench-exposed metal layers formed on stacked interlayer insulating layers. The MIM capacitor uses a conductive layer conformally formed on the metal interconnection and/or trench regions to enlarge constituent electrode surface areas.

Embodiments of the present invention relate generally to a metal-insulator-metal (referred to as "MIM" hereinafter) capacitor structure having high capacitance, and an integrated circuit chip including same.
This application claims the benefit of Korean Patent Application 2004-101183 filed on Dec. 3, 2004, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference.
Capacitors may be classified accordingly to their junction structure, for example, as metal-oxide-silicon (MOS), p-n junction, polysilicon-insulator-polysilicon (PIP), metal-insulator-metal (MIM), etc. All the above-mentioned examples, except MIM capacitors, comprise at least one electrode material formed from a mono-crystalline silicon or polycrystalline silicon material. However, this use of the mono-crystalline silicon or a polycrystalline silicon limits attempts to reduce the inherent electrical resistance of the constituent electrode. As a result, if a bias voltage is applied to the mono-crystalline silicon or polycrystalline silicon electrode, a depletion region may form, thereby destabilizing the voltage applied to the electrode. When this happens, the capacitance value of the capacitor is not uniformly maintained.
In contrast, the resistance of MIM capacitor electrodes may be additionally reduced, thereby making the capacitor less frequency dependent. Additionally, MIM capacitors have a good capacitance change rate in relation to variations in applied voltage and/or temperature.
As a result of these positive voltage capacitance and/or temperature coefficient characteristics, MIM capacitors are often used in analog products, products receiving mixed signal modes, and products based on system-on-chip (SOC) structures. For example, MIM capacitors are frequently used as an analog capacitor or a filter capacitor in analog or mixed mode signal applications, such as those found in cable/wireless communications. MIM capacitors are also frequently used as a decoupling capacitor on a main process unit board, or an RF capacitor in a high frequency circuit, such as those associated with an embedded DRAM.
FIG. (FIG.) 1 is a cross-sectional view illustrating a semiconductor device having a conventional trench-type MIM capacitor and related interconnections. Referring to FIG. 1, the MIM capacitor comprises a lower electrode 110a, a dielectric layer 130, a conductive layer 140a, and an upper electrode 150a. Also associated with the MIM capacitor structure are related interconnection layers, including lower interconnection 110b and upper interconnection 150b.
Lower electrode 110a and a lower interconnection 110b, typically formed with the same thickness, are formed on a substrate 100. An interlayer insulating layer 120 is then formed on lower electrode 110a and lower interconnection 110b. An opening 125a is formed in interlayer insulating layer 120 to expose a portion of an upper surface of lower electrode 110a. Thereafter, dielectric layer 130 and conductive layer 140a are sequentially formed to predetermine thicknesses within opening 125a on the exposed portion of the upper surface of lower electrode 110a. Upper electrode 150a is then formed on conductive layer 140a. At the same time, upper interconnection 150b is formed on interlayer insulating layer 120.
Prior to the formation of upper interconnection 150b, a contact hole 125b is formed through interlayer insulating layer 120 to expose a portion of lower interconnection 110b. A contact plug 140b is formed to fill contact hole 125b, such that lower interconnection 110b is electrically connected to upper interconnection 150b.
As can be seen from the illustrated conventional example, only a portion of the upper surface of lower electrode 110a (e.g., a laterally extending conductive surface) is used to form the capacitance structure of the MIM capacitor (i.e., to develop a capacitive charge). As lateral layout space in semiconductor devices comes at an increasing premium, this conventional arrangement suffers from real limits in a designer's ability to increase the overall capacitance of the MIM capacitor. Indeed, as emerging design rules mandate smaller MIM capacitors, the conventional design fails to provide sufficient capacitance.

Semiconductor device and method for manufacturing the same