A method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device includes interposing a thermosetting adhesive between the insulator that is inserted in the housing portion while the comb-shaped electrodes are directed upward and a bottom portion of the housing portion, and curing the adhesive by heating in a state in which a conductive member is disposed near the opening portion to come in contact with the comb-shaped electrodes, such that the conductive member is separated from the comb-shaped electrodes. Accordingly, a process of forming a conductive film made of carbon and a process of removing the conductive film are not required. Therefore, it is possible to provide a method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device that has high productivity and that prevents pyroelectric breakdown between the comb-shaped electrodes at low cost.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device suitable for wireless apparatuses, such as cellular phones.
2. Description of the Related Art
A method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device according to the related art will be described with reference to the drawings. FIG. 5 is a cross-sectional view of a surface acoustic wave device that is manufactured by a method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device according to the related art. FIG. 6 is a diagram illustrating a first process of the method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device according to the related art. FIG. 7 is a diagram showing a second process of the method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device according to the related art.
Next, the configuration of the surface acoustic wave device according to the related art will be described with reference to FIGS. 5 to 7. A base substrate member 51 made of ceramic has a housing portion 51b composed of a concave portion having an opening portion 51a at the top thereof. A plurality of terminals 52 are disposed on the base substrate member 51. In this case, the plurality of terminals 52 extend from the housing portion 51b to the outer surface the base substrate member 51.
Further, a surface acoustic wave element 53 is constituted by an insulator 54 made of ceramic and a plurality of comb-shaped electrodes 55 that are provided on one surface (top surface) 54a of the insulator 54. The surface acoustic wave element 53 is housed in the housing portion 51b, and the other surface (bottom surface) 54b of the insulator 54 is attached to the base substrate member 51 via a thermosetting adhesive 56 that is provided on a bottom portion 51c of the housing portion 51b.
Furthermore, the terminals 52 and the comb-shaped electrodes 55 are connected to each other in the housing portion 51b by bonding wires 57, and a lid 58 is attached to an upper end of the base substrate member 51 to close the opening portion 51a. In such a manner, the surface acoustic wave device according to the related art is formed.
Next, the method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device according to the related art will be described with reference to FIGS. 5 to 7. First, in the first process, as shown in FIG. 6, a conductive film 59 made of carbon is formed on the one surface 54a of the insulator 51, and the plurality of comb-shaped electrodes 55 are conducted by the conductive film 59. The other surface 54b of the surface acoustic wave element 53 is disposed on the thermosetting adhesive 56 that is provided on the bottom portion 51c.
Next, in this state, heating is performed to cure the thermosetting adhesive 56, such that the insulator 54 is adhered to the bottom portion 51c by the adhesive 56. Subsequently, in the second process shown in FIG. 7, the conductive film 59 is removed by oxygen plasma.
Next, as shown in FIG. 5, the terminals 52 and the comb-shaped electrodes 55 are connected to each other by bonding the wires 57 and then the lid 58 closes the housing portion 51b. In such a manner, the surface acoustic wave device according to the related art is manufactured.
According to the method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device according to the related art, in the state in which the plurality of comb-shaped electrodes 55 are conducted by the conductive film 59, the thermosetting adhesive 56 is heated, such that the insulator 54 is adhered to the bottom portion 59. Accordingly, pyroelectric breakdown between the comb-shaped electrodes 55 does not occur. However, the method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device according to the related art requires the process of providing the conductive film 59 for conducting the plurality of comb-shaped electrodes 55 and the process of removing the conductive film 59 by oxygen plasma. Therefore, the productivity is degraded and the manufacturing cost is increased.
According to the method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device according to the related art, in the state in which the plurality of comb-shaped electrodes 55 are conducted by the conductive film 59, the thermosetting adhesive 56 is heated, such that the insulator 54 is adhered to the bottom portion 59. Accordingly, the pyroelectric breakdown between the comb-shaped electrodes 55 does not occur. However, the method of manufacturing a surface acoustic wave device according to the related art requires the process of providing the conductive film 59 for conducting the plurality of comb-shaped electrodes 55 and the process of removing the conductive film 59 by oxygen plasma. Therefore, the productivity is degraded and the manufacturing cost is increased.

Method of manufacturing surface acoustic wave device


A meat thermometer and cutting device combination is provided including a thermometer housing for being removably situated within a piece of cooking meat. Also included is a thermometer situated on the thermometer housing for detecting and indicating a current temperature of the meat. A cutting edge is situated on the thermometer housing for cutting the meat to view an interior thereof.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to meat thermometers and more particularly pertains to a new meat thermometer and cutting device combination for measuring a temperature of a piece of meat and cutting the same with a single device.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The use of meat thermometers is known in the prior art. More specifically, meat thermometers heretofore devised and utilized are known to consist basically of familiar, expected and obvious structural configurations, notwithstanding the myriad of designs encompassed by the crowded prior art which have been developed for the fulfillment of countless objectives and requirements.
Known prior art meat thermometers include U.S. Pat. No. 4,059,997; U.S. Pat. No. 4,083,250; U.S. Pat. No. 3,373,611; U.S. Pat. No. 5,312,188; U.S. Pat. No. 1,918,258; and Foreign patents WO 90/11497 and 0 291 571 A1.
In these respects, the meat thermometer and cutting device combination according to the present invention substantially departs from the conventional concepts and designs of the prior art, and in so doing provides an apparatus primarily developed for the purpose of measuring a temperature of a piece of meat and cutting the same with a single device.

Meat thermometer and cutting device combination


Disclosed is an apparatus and method for making a loose tube buffered optical fiber, the apparatus comprising an extrusion crosshead having an inlet and exit port connecting a plastic flow passageway circumscribing another passageway in which there is disposed a grease injection unit having three concentrically disposed tubes, the first tube delimiting a path for optical fiber travel, the first and second tubes spaced apart from one another forming a travel path therebetween for jelly or grease-like hydrocarbon filling material and the third tube (circumscribing the first and second tube) forming a chamber at a terminal end portion, the chamber in communication with the travel paths of both the grease and optical fibers and in which the grease comes in contact with the optical fibers, the chamber being so disposed that the contact point of the grease and fibers is only after the grease and fibers have traveled a majority of the length of the grease injection unit.

Fiber optic cables usually come in either the loose tube or tight buffered variety and their chief component is made by horizontal or vertically disposed apparatus. This invention concerns a horizontally disposed improved apparatus and method of making a loose tube cable component, which comprises a grease or hydrocarbon jelly like substance coated optical fibers loosely disposed inside of a tube made from some kind of suitable polymer, such as polycarbonate. The grease or jelly coated fibers are so disposed so that they may move relative to one another and to the tube itself. To make a loose tube fiber optic cable component, the prior art teaches one to assemble one or more optical fibers or a bundle of optical fiber ribbons in an elongated stream, a petroleum grease or jelly is applied thereto and then a plastic tube is extruded over the previously coated fibers. Such components are assembled into a core over which a plastic jacket is formed to complete a cable assembly. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,828,352, the contents of which are herein incorporated by reference.
Horizontally disposed prior art loose tube component making apparatus employ a long needle that extends from a grease injection head (where optical fibers, or ribbons, are coated with a jelly like hydrocarbon and then introduced into the needle) and a polymer extrusion crosshead, which forms a plastic tube about the coated fibers as they exit the polymer crosshead. Such apparatus requires that the needle have a centering device to manually center the needle in the X-Y position. Satisfactory results can be achieved using this type of apparatus if the polymer crosshead has a plastic flow passageway that is less than six (6) inches. Unsatisfactory results have been observed with crossheads having a plastic flow passage in the neighborhood of 12 inches or more. The longer the crosshead the longer the needles must be to extend through it to a point (outside of the crosshead) where molten polymer is caused to also exit (through a die) to form a tubular like body circumscribing the grease coated optical fibers. Long needles tend to produce higher tensions on the grease coated optical fibers because of the increased drag inside the needle, i.e., the grease comes into and stays in contact with the fibers or ribbons a longer time giving rise to stress on the fibers or ribbons. The present invention has as its objectives three things: (1) decreased tension on the fiber, short needles can be used; (2) prior art X-Y positioning apparatus is eliminated, the disclosed apparatus is self centering; and, (3) elimination of a tendency to waste jelly or grease like hydrocarbon fill material experienced in prior art apparatus arising out of grease back flow and/or prewetting.

Method and apparatus for making a loose tube fiber optic cable component


A puncture sealing agent for a tire is disclosed that has a rubber latex, an adhesive agent, and an anti-freezing agent, wherein glycerin, potassium acetate or a solution of glycerin and potassium acetate is used as the anti-freezing agent.

When a puncture occurs in a tire, a puncture sealing agent is frequently used. The sealing agent is an agent which is introduced into the tire to seal up the punctured portion from the inside, thereby ensuring the airtightness of the tire so that the tire can be refilled with air.
Puncture sealing agents are known of the type in which a rubber latex is blended with at least an anti-freezing agent. The anti-freezing agent of this known puncture sealing agent may be ethylene glycol or propylene glycol. However, when this known puncture sealing agent is stored for a long term, the rubber particles or adhesive agent particles therein aggregate near the surface so that the sealing agent tends to be transformed into a creamy material. The creamy material clogs the outlet of a tire sealant container hindering the passage of the sealing agent out of the contained into the tire so that smooth puncture sealing operation cannot be carried out.
The creamy material is presumably generated by the following mechanism: in the puncture sealing agent, which is a latex wherein rubber particles and adhesive agent particles are dispersed and floating in an aqueous ethylene glycol solution by ionic repulsive force between the particles and a surfactant, the gravity of the dispersed particles is smaller than that of the aqueous ethylene glycol solution, which is a medium; therefore, the respective rubber particles gradually rise up (float up) in the medium by the action of gravity and the rising particles form a particle-concentrated layer near the surface, whereby the puncture sealing agent is transformed to the creamy material. Thus, it is desirable to provide a puncture sealing agent that overcomes this problem and limitation of the typical puncture sealing agent and it is to this end that the present invention is directed.

Puncture sealing agent for a tire, and process for producing the same


A system such as a vehicle system or building system may have an enclosing structure such as a wall that surrounds an interior region and separates the interior region from an exterior region. An occupant of the system may be located in the interior region. An adjustable window in the enclosing structure may be located between the interior and exterior regions. Control circuitry in the system may use an exterior sensor system in the exterior region to capture an image of the environment surrounding the system, to locate external objects such as light sources, and to make other measurements. User input can be gathered from the occupant of the system and the location of the occupant and inanimate objects in the interior region can be gathered using an interior sensor system. The control circuitry can adjust the window based on the gathered information.

Buildings, vehicles such as automobiles, boats, and planes, and other systems may have windows. Window blinds may be used to control sunlight and maintain a desired degree of privacy. In some systems, electronically adjustable windows are used. For example, a vehicle may be provided with electrochromic window tinting that allows the windows of the vehicle to be turned clear or dark. Systems such as these may be used to make adjustments to the amount of light entering the vehicle, but can be inflexible and difficult to control.


Embodiments of this application provide a data processing method, a base station, and a terminal. A base station receive first data from a first terminal on a first resource, and receive second data from the first terminal and third data from a second terminal on a second resource, where a modulation order of the second data is lower than a modulation order of the first data, and/or a code rate of the second data is less than a code rate of the first data, and/or a transmit power of the second data is less than a transmit power of the first data. The base station demodulates and decodes the first data, the second data and the third data. Therefore, the embodiments of this application can effectively improve decoding success rates of data that is of different users and that is transmitted on a same resource.

In an uplink solution of a Long Term Evolution (LTE) system, a user needs to initiate a resource scheduling request before uplink transmission. Usually, at least seven transmission time intervals (TTI) are needed from the initiation of the resource scheduling request to data sending. A mechanism for the resource scheduling request cannot satisfy a requirement of a low-latency service. For example, an ultra-reliable and low-latency communications (URLLC) service requires very high reliability and a very low latency, where typical values of the reliability and the latency are 99.9990 and 1 millisecond (ms), respectively.
In a current technology, for a low-latency service (where a URLLC service is used as an example for description below), a base station groups uplink system resources into a primitive resource and a reserved resource. The reserved resource is a resource reserved for the URLLC service. When URLLC service data arrives, the data is directly transmitted on a nearest reserved resource in time domain. For another non-low-latency service, for example, an enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) service, after receiving a resource scheduling request for the service, the base station determines all uplink system resources, that is, both the primitive resource and the reserved resource, as transmission resources for the non-low-latency service (an eMBB service is used as an example for description below). An eMBB terminal sends eMBB service data on both a primitive resource and a reserved resource. When URLLC service data arrives, a URLLC terminal also sends the URLLC service data on the reserved resource. In this case, the reserved resource is non-orthogonally multiplexed for the eMBB service data and the URLLC service data, and the eMBB service data and the URLLC service data interfere with each other. Consequently, the eMBB service data may not be successfully decoded. Because interference of the eMBB service data cannot be cancelled, the URLLC service data cannot be successfully decoded either. Therefore, transmission performance of both the eMBB service data and the URLLC service data is reduced.

Data processing method, base station, and terminal


A choke device for an intake system of an internal combustion engine; the choke device has at least one choke body fitted movably inside an intake conduit, and an actuating device for moving the choke body to and from a work position in which the choke body reduces the cross section of the intake conduit; and the actuating device has a filiform actuating member made of a shape-memory material that changes shape when subjected to physical external stress, and having a first portion embedded in the choke body, and a second portion located outside the choke body and secured mechanically to a fixed part.

An internal combustion engine has a number of cylinders, each connected to an intake manifold by at least one intake valve, and to an exhaust manifold by at least one exhaust valve. The intake manifold is supplied with fresh air (i.e. from outside) by a feed conduit fitted with a throttle valve, and is connected to the cylinders by respective intake conduits, each terminating at least one intake valve.
A choke device has recently been proposed to adjust the cross section of the intake conduits as a function of engine speed (i.e. drive shaft rotation speed). At low speed, the airflow section of the intake conduits is reduced to generate turbulence in the air intake and so improve mixing of the air and fuel in the cylinders, so that all the injected fuel is burnt, thus reducing combustion-generated pollutant emissions. At high speed, the airflow section of the intake conduits is maximized to fill the cylinders completely and achieve maximum power.
Choke devices as described above may be tumble types, referred to simply as tumble devices, or swirl types, referred to simply as swirl devices. A tumble device employs, for each intake conduit, a choke body movable to and from an active position in which the choke body reduces the cross section of the intake conduit. In a swirl system, each intake conduit comprises two parallel, side by side channels, and, for each intake conduit, a choke body is used which is movable to and from an active position completely closing one of the two intake conduit channels.
In currently marketed choke devices, all the choke bodies are fitted to a common shaft to rotate together to and from the work position under the control of a common actuator, which simultaneously and synchronously controls the position of all the choke bodies. The actuator is defined by an electric motor having a rotor connected mechanically to the common shaft. This solution, however, is relatively heavy, is relatively bulky (also on account of the electronics controlling the electric motor), and is only sufficiently, though not particularly, dependable (due to frequent malfunctioning of the electronics controlling the electric motor). In currently marketed engines, it has also been proposed to operate the common shaft using a pneumatic actuator. This solution, however, is also relatively heavy and, above all, extremely bulky.
EP1568866 discloses a choke valve for an intake manifold with a retracting tumble system for an engine provided with a number of cylinders. The choke valve is adapted to vary the passage section of the air through an intake duct which connects each cylinder with the intake manifold and is regulated by at least one intake valve; the choke valve comprises a butterfly mounted to rotate about an axis of rotation disposed transversely and externally with respect to the corresponding intake duct under the thrust of a corresponding rotary electric motor which comprises a stator and a rotor housed directly in the butterfly.

Choke device for an internal combustion engine intake system


A method of recovering optically active epoxy alcohols from asymmetric epoxidation reaction mixture is provided whereby the epoxy alcohol may be obtained in high yield with minimal degradation of optical purity. The process is also suitable for the synthesis of useful organic sulfonate derivatives of chiral epoxy alcohols.

Optically active (non-racemic) epoxy alcohols such as (R)- and (S)- glycidol are extremely useful and versatile starting materials and intermediates in the synthesis of chiral natural products and natural product analogues or derivatives. Many such optically active products derived from chiral epoxy alcohols have a high physiological activity and thus are of great interest in the pharmaceutical field. The synthetic utility of non-racemic epoxy alcohols has been extensively reviewed in Hanson, Chemical Reviews 91(4), 437-473 (1991).
Recently, the preparation of optically active epoxy alcohols from inexpensive racemic starting materials such as allylic alcohols has become feasible on a commercial scale due to the development of an asymmetric epoxidation method by Dr. K. Barry Sharpless and co-workers wherein an allylic alcohol is reacted with an organic hydroperoxide in the presence of a titanium/chiral carbinol complex catalyst. While this method affords good yields of epoxy alcohol having high optical purity, recovery of the epoxy alcohol from the crude epoxidation reaction mixture is not simple due to the number of different substances present (typically, epoxy alcohol, unreacted allylic alcohol, unreacted hydroperoxide, organic solvent, the alcohol derived from reduction of the hydroperoxide during epoxidation, and catalyst are all present). In addition, glycidol and related compounds are notoriously unstable and reactive. Significant losses due to polymerization, ring-opening (e.g., hydrolysis or alcoholysis), acid-catalyzed or thermal decomposition, and the like are often encountered during purification of these substances.
The development of improved methods whereby optically active glycidol or the like may be isolated from an asymmetric epoxidation reaction mixture in high yield with minimal loss of optical purity would therefore be of considerable value.

Process for recovering an optically active epoxy alcohol


A dual purpose PCI-X DDR configurable terminator/driver providing programmable termination of the interface in a PCI-X system a plurality of N-channel devices divided into at least two groups and a plurality of P-channel devices also divided into at least two groups. A driver control individually controls selected ones of the groups of N-channel and P-channel devices on or off for providing internal termination to the transmission line. The configurable PCI-X DDR driver/terminator is configurable in three termination modes: pull-up mode, pull-down mode, and symmetric mode.

The Peripheral Component Interface (PCI) is used in personal computers as an interface between the central processing unit (CPU) and various peripheral components such as VGA controllers, and the like. The PCI-X 2.0 DDR provides PCI technology with Double Data Rate (DDR) transfers. The original PCI bus was an unterminated transmission media mostly used in the point-to-point connections. This methodology worked well as long as the board trace length was restricted and the clock/data rates were below 100 MHz (legacy PCI systems have data rates equal to 33 MHz and 66 MHz). The signal integrity deteriorates rapidly in data transmission systems utilizing the unterminated transmission lines. The mismatch between the transmission line characteristic impedance and the load impedance (in this case the load impedance is an open circuit) will cause the signal reflections and negatively affect the signal integrity.
Future generations of PCI, such as PCI-X DDR, will increase the data rates to frequencies (f) of 133 MHz and beyond. Shorter signal periods (T=1/f) will not allow sufficient time for the signal overshoot/undershoot and ringing to settle out. Even with short transmission lines (board traces) the reflections must be minimized and controlled by proper line termination. Use of external line termination is unacceptable for a number of reasons. First, external termination is costly, incurring additional component, assembly labor and board area costs. Further, signal integrity is degraded due to the added external devices and trace parasitics. Moreover, the terminator must be made switchable, i.e. must be turned off, when the direction of data transfer is reversed.
The addition of an on-chip terminator costs an unacceptable silicon area penalty. The PCI-X DDR transceivers are located on the silicon chip periphery, called pads. The PCI-X DDR driver consumes the largest portion of the pad due to large MOSFET output devices. The addition of another large MOSFET device for implementation of the discrete terminator will consume a large amount of additional pad silicon area and will increase the PCI pad parasitic capacitance which is harmful to the signal integrity.
FIG. 1 illustrates a typical PCI-X system 100. As shown in FIG. 1, data transfer is from the PCI1 block 102 to the PCI2 block 104. The driver DX1 106 is enabled to drive the transmission line X1 108 such as PC board trace. The transmission line X1 108 far-end terminal X1out 110 is connected to the input of the enabled receiver RX2 112. The receiver RX1 114 and the driver DX2 116 are disabled during this data transmission.
For high signal integrity, it is desirable to have the driver DX1 106 output impedance Zout equal to the transmission line characteristic impedance Zo, i.e. Zout=Zo. Thus, it is desirable to have the input impedance Zin of the receiver RX2 112 also equal to the transmission line characteristic impedance Zo, i.e. ZIN=Zo. In the embodiment shown in FIG. 1, the input impedance ZIN of receiver RX2 116 is many orders of magnitude higher than the characteristic impedance Zo of the transmission line, i.e. ZIN>>Zo. In existing PCI systems no termination is used at the far end of the transmission line. This results in impedance mismatch for the unterminated transmission line. Consequently, signal reflections will cause severe distortions to the signal and negatively affect the reliability of data transmission.
During the mode of transmission described, the far end driver DX2 116 is tri-stated, idle, while the receiver RX2 112 is receiving the incoming data stream. The present invention employs the unused driver DX2 devices 116 for the purpose of implementation of proper far end transmission line termination.

Dual purpose PCI-X DDR configurable terminator/driver


A mechanism for improved data transmission between units in a telecommunication network, where at least one of the units utilizes multiple transport channels for transmitting data. An acknowledgeable data transmission is started over a first transport channel if no other on-going acknowledgeable data transmission on a second transport channel starts or ends within a pre-defined or assigned transmission period for the first channel. Thereby, unique identification of acknowledgements messages is enabled.

With regard to uplink enhancements for dedicated transport channels several techniques are currently being discussed for standardization in 3GPP, among them several retransmission functionalities, including so called Node B controlled Hybrid Automatic Repeat reQuest (HARQ). In such a scheme, a mobile unit or user equipment (UE) transmits data units (DU) in the uplink and the Node B or base station tries to decode each of them and requests retransmissions of erroneously received data units. In addition, the Node B may optionally combine received soft information from multiple transmission attempts to further increase the performance.
Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA) systems use a concept of transport channels, where the attributes of each transport channel determine the manner and characteristics for transmitting data over the air interface. One important characteristic of a transport channel is the transmission period or Transmission Time Interval (TTI), which denotes the period of time over which coding and interleaving is performed. Currently, TTI:s of 10, 20, 40, and 80 ms are supported in the uplink, although additional values may be introduced in the future. On each transport channel, data arrives in form of one or several transport blocks per TTI. Typically, multiple transport channels are configured in a user equipment, by the radio network controller (RNC), in order to support a mix of different services; however, multiple transport channels may notwithstanding also be configured for a single service. The transport channels are coded and multiplexed into a single Coded Composite Transport CHannel (CCTrCH), which is subsequently transmitted over the air interface from the UE to the Node B. Rate matching is used to balance the quality requirements between different transport channels. The multiplexing of multiple transport channels is schematically illustrated in FIG. 3.
Retransmission functionalities, such as for example so called Hybrid ARQ, if introduced, cannot operate on the CCTrCH since not all services, e.g. voice, allow for retransmissions. Hence, the hybrid ARQ mechanism is preferably defined per transport channel. Furthermore, if so-called soft combining is supported, the corresponding ARQ mechanism has to be located between the coding and transport channel blocks. In FIG. 3, the hybrid ARQ mechanism precedes the rate matching (RM) block. However, it is equally possible for the RM block to precede the ARQ mechanism, or be merged together to constitute one single block
Hybrid ARQ is currently not used for the uplink of a WCDMA-based communication system. For the HS-DSCH downlink in WCDMA, where hybrid ARQ is used, only a single transport channel with a fixed 2 ms TTI is used.

Method, arrangement, node and mobile unit for improved transmission between two units of a telecommunication system


A wing for use in a flapping wing aircraft, having a strut assembly including a main strut and a plurality of support struts each oriented at an angular interval between 30 degrees and 90 degrees with respect to the support strut, at least a section of the support struts having a front section, a connecting section adjacent thereto, and a rear section adjacent thereto, and wherein each of said support struts is secured to said main strut by said connecting section, and further having a group of planking members made of a resilient and dimensionally stable sheet material and connected to said strut assembly.

The invention relates to a wing for use in a flapping wing aircraft.
From GB 885,273, an ornithopter with movable wings is known, each of the wings having a rigid front portion of wing cross-section and a flexible rear portion movable upwardly or downwardly relative to the front rigid portion when the wing is moved upwardly or downwardly, the portion tapering outwardly so that its surface area is greatest at the inner end of the wing and the surface area of the portion is greatest at the outer end of the wing. The rear part consists of a number of overlapping flap sections with rigid spars connected to the front part and arranged so that air is trapped under the wing when the wing is moved downward, but so that air can pass through the wing from top to bottom when the wing is moved upward.

Wing for use in a flapping wing aircraft


A tank suitable for containing cryogenic propellant includes an inner liner structure comprised of two layers forming a gap. An intermediary layer comprised of micro-particles is disposed in the gap formed between the two layers of the inner liner structure. A structural overwrap layer covers the inner liner structure in a manner that enables the inner liner structure to float within the structural overwrap layer. The inner floating liner structure can be formed by two thin interlocking (outer and inner) shell s formed in a cylindrical, end dome geometry. The inner and outer shells are both sectioned beyond the tank midpoints. The micro-particles can be comprised of PTFE. An outer structural overwrap comprised of graphite/epoxy covers the double shell liner. A pair of separately fabricated polar bosses seal against the inner of the two interlocking floating liner shells are then each bonded to the tank, fittings, and piping.

Historically, propellant tanks for liquid rockets have been manufactured using metal. Recently, composite tanks made using, for example, graphite or epoxy have been used for storable propellants such as kerosene and as high pressure tanks in order to reduce their structural weight, and thus the overall weight of dependent systems.
Liquid oxygen (LOX), a cryogenic propellant, is one of the most efficient oxidizers from a mass and performance aspect. Other cryogenic propellant fuels include liquid hydrogen and liquid methane. There has been no successful demonstration of cryogenic propellants such as LOX in a high-pressure composite tank. Most composite tank failures using LOX can be attributed to microcracking of the composite resin matrix due to large differences in the coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) between fibers and the resin used to manufacture such tanks. Also, there are no known resins that won't microcrack under these conditions.

Composite cryogenic propellant tank including an integrated floating compliant liner

The United States of America as represented by the Secretary of the Air Force


In a connector 1 comprising: a connector housing 11 including two guide grooves 25 respectively for receiving two cam pins 15, and a lever 12 including two cam grooves 44 respectively engageable with the cam pins 15 and rotatably supported on the connector housing 11, wherein, in the initially engaged state of the connector 1 with a partner connector 2, the cam pins 15 are disposed in the entrance openings of the guide grooves 25 and the cam grooves 44, and, when the lever 12 is operated and rotated, the cam pins 15 are respectively engaged with the cam grooves 44 and are pushed deep into the guide grooves 25, whereby the connector 1 is completely engaged with the partner connector 2; and, the connector 1 further including a dustproof cover 13 removably mounted on the connector housing 11 for covering the insertion opening of the connector housing 11 into which the partner connector 2 can be inserted, wherein the dustproof cover 13 includes a pressure portion 54a to be pressed against the lever 12 and, by applying pressure to the lever 12 using the pressure portion 54a, the lever 12 can be held at its initial position where the entrance openings of the cam groove 44 coincide with the entrance openings of the guide grooves 25.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a connector which can be engaged with a partner connector by rotationally operating a lever.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, as a connector which can be engaged with a partner connector by rotationally operating a lever, there is known a connector shown in FIG. 10 (for example, see Japanese Patent Publication Hei-5-129048).
As shown in FIG. 10, a connector 100 disclosed in Patent Reference 1 includes a female connector 101, a frame 102 to be mounted on the female connector 101, and a male connector 105 including a cam pin 106 provided on and projected from the male connector 105.
In the female connector 101, there are formed pin guide grooves 103 which respectively extend backwardly from the insertion opening of the female connector 101 into which the male connector 105 can be inserted. And, in the frame 102 as well, there are formed guide grooves 104 which can coincide with the pin guide grooves 103 of the female connector 101 in a state where the frame 102 is mounted on the female connector 101.
And, a lever 107 is rotatably mounted on the frame 102 and, in the lever 107, there is formed a cam groove 108. The cam groove 108 is structured such that, in a state where the lever 107 is held at an initial position (a position shown in FIG. 10), the entrance opening of the cam groove 108 coincides with the entrance opening of the pin guide groove 104 and the cam groove 108 extends from the entrance opening thereof so as to approach gradually the rotation axis of the lever 107.
When the male connector 105 is inserted into the female connector 101 with the frame 102 mounted thereon, the cam pin 106 of the male connector 105 not only enters the entrance openings of the pin guide groove 103 of the female connector 101 and the pin guide groove 104 of the frame 102 but also enters the entrance opening of the cam groove 108 of the lever 107 held at the initial position, so that the cam pin 106 is engaged with the cam groove 108.
And, when the lever 107 is operated and rotated, the cam groove 108 catches the cam pin 106 and pushes the cam pin 106 toward the rear ends of the guide grooves 103 and 104, whereby the female and male connectors 101 and 105 can be completely engaged with each other.
However, in the lever type connector 100 disclosed in Patent Reference 1, when the lever 107 is not held at the initial position and the entrance opening of the cam groove 108 of the lever 107 is not coincident with the entrance opening of the pin guide groove 104 of the frame 102, the cam pin 106 of the male connector 105 cannot be made to enter the pin guide groove 103 of the female connector 101 and the pin guide groove 104 of the frame 102, with the result that the female and male connectors 101 and 105 cannot be engaged with each other. Therefore, it takes time and labor to return the lever 107 to the initial position.
In view of this, in the connector 100, in the frame 102 and lever 107, there are provided engaging projections which can be engaged with each other, so that the lever 107 can be held stably at the initial position due to the mutual engagement of these engaging projections.
However, if sufficient strength to positively hold the lever 107 at the initial position is given to the engagement of the engaging projections, when rotating the lever 107 for bringing the female and male connectors 101 and 105 into mutual engagement, there is necessary great power to remove the engagement between the engaging projections, which raises a fear that the operation efficiency of the connector can be lowered.
On the other hand, when the strength of the engagement between the engagement projections is set relatively low while priority is given to the operation efficiency in engaging the female and male connectors 101 and 105, there is a fear that, for example, while delivering the connector 100, an external force can be applied to the lever 107 due to the contact of the connector 100 with other connector to thereby remove the engagement between the engaging projections easily. Especially, since the lever 107 is exposed to the outside, there is a relatively high possibility that an external force can be applied to the lever 107.


A process for quenching, in a quenching zone, a gaseous reaction mixture that includes a diisocyanate, phosgene and hydrogen chloride that is obtained in a reaction zone upstream of the quenching zone by phosgenation of a diamine in the gas phase. The process includes injecting a deposit preventing liquid in a deposit preventing zone located between the reaction zone and the quenching zone by passing the deposit preventing liquid through spray nozzles for the deposit preventing liquid at the entrance to the deposit preventing zone. Each spray nozzle for the deposit preventing liquid sprays the deposit preventing liquid (i) onto a wall segment of the deposit preventing zone that is adjacent to said spray nozzle for the deposit preventing liquid to produce a film of the deposit preventing liquid flowing along the wall, and/or (ii) to areas in a cross-sectional plane of the deposit preventing zone before the entrance to the quenching zone.

The preparation of isocyanates by phosgenating the corresponding amines can in principle be effected by a liquid phase or gas phase phosgenation. Gas phase phosgenation is notable in that a higher selectivity, a lower holdup of toxic phosgene and a reduced amount of energy are required.
The preparation of diisocyanates by reacting diamines with phosgene in the gas phase is described, for example, in EP 0 289 840 A1. The amine and the phosgene react with release of hydrogen chloride (HCl) to give the corresponding isocyanates. The diisocyanates formed in a cylindrical reaction chamber, such as a tubular reactor, are not thermally stable at the reaction temperatures of 300 to 500° C. Rapid cooling of the reaction gases after the phosgenation reaction to temperatures below 200° C. is therefore needed to avoid the formation of undesired secondary products due to the thermal decomposition of diisocyanate or by further reaction. For this purpose, in EP 0 289 840 A1, the gaseous mixture continually leaving the reaction chamber, which contains, inter alia, diisocyanate, phosgene and hydrogen chloride, is passed into an inert solvent, e.g. dichlorobenzene. The disadvantage of this process is that the rate of flow at which the gas mixture is passed through the solvent bath has to be relatively low because at too high rates of flow the solvent and the compounds dissolved therein would be carried over. In a subsequent step, the liquid compounds have to be separated from the gas. Another disadvantage is that, due to the low rates of flow and a small heat transfer term, large solvent containers have to be used to produce the cooling effect.
Furthermore, processes are known which use heat exchangers and/or expand the gases into a vacuum to cool the reaction gases. The disadvantage of heat exchangers is that, due to poor heat transfer, large exchange surfaces and thus large heat exchangers are required for effective cooling. In addition, deposits of solids on the relatively cold surfaces of the heat exchangers takes place due to secondary reactions of the gas mixture on these surfaces, such as e.g. decomposition or polymerization. The transfer of heat is further impaired by these deposits and this leads to a higher residence time and thus results in a further increase in secondary product formation. On top of that, undesired shutdown times are produced for the entire plant due to cleaning of the cooling stage.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,800,781 B2 (also published as U.S. 2004/0068137 A1) discloses a process for quenching a gaseous reaction mixture during the phosgenation of diamines in the gas phase to produce diisocyanates, by injecting a quenching liquid into the gas mixture continuously flowing out of a cylindrical reaction zone into the downstream cylindrical quenching zone, wherein the quenching liquid is injected with the aid of at least two spray nozzles arranged at the entrance to the quenching zone at equal distances along the circumference of the quenching zone. The disadvantage of such a process is that there are solid deposits above the nozzles for injecting the quenching liquid after operation for a period of time (for example several weeks). The solid deposits horizontally grow, finally blocking the passage of the gaseous reaction mixture, meanwhile the growing solid deposits lead to high differential pressure in the gas phase over the reactor. As a consequence, the reactor has to be shut down after operation for a period of time (for example several weeks) because the whole reactor needs to be hydroblasted to remove the solid deposits above the quench zone, resulting in decrease of productivity.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,615,662 B2 (also published as U.S. 2008/167490 A1) relates to a process for the preparation of isocyanates by reaction of corresponding primary amine(s) with phosgene in the gas phase. In this process, the reaction is terminated by guiding the reaction mixture out of the reaction chamber through a cooling stretch into which liquids are injected. Direct cooling takes place in the cooling stretch in one stage in two or more cooling zones connected in series.
U.S. 2012/0004445 A1 is concerned with a process for preparing isocyanates by reacting the corresponding amines with phosgene in the gas phase, in which undesired reactions and the formation of solid deposits are prevented or at least greatly reduced. The hot gaseous reaction gas mixture obtained in the phosgenation step is cooled in a quench step by adding, in a quenching zone, a liquid medium to form a mixture of reaction gas and quench medium as the product stream, which process is carried out such that the walls of the quenching zone are essentially completely wetted with a liquid. The application does not teach to wet the walls above the quenching zone, i.e. before entrance to the quenching zone.
Thus there is a need for an improved quenching process to avoid the formation of solid deposits above the quenching zone and/or remove the solid deposits formed above the quenching zone.

Process for quenching a gaseous reaction mixture obtained in the gas phase phosgenation of diamines


An apparatus for detecting cardiac events in electrograms has a feature extraction unit that derives features of the cardiac events for discriminating among different types of cardiac events. A clustering unit groups cardiac events with similar features into respective clusters defined by predetermined cluster features. The feature extraction unit determines a feature vector describing waveform characteristics of cardiac events in the electrogram by a wavelet transform. The clustering unit determines the distance between the feature vector and corresponding cluster feature vectors in order to assign the cardiac event in question to that cluster which results in a minimum distance, providing that the minimum distance is less than a predetermined threshold value. A heart stimulator provided with such a cardiac event detecting apparatus detects the occurrence of an arrhythmia and appropriately controls a pulse stimulator to treat the arrhythmia.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus for cardiac events detected in electrograms, EGMs, and to a heart stimulator provided with such an apparatus.
In the following the expression "cardiac event" denotes the depolarization phase in the cardiac cycle, which for atrial signals is commonly known as P wave and for ventricular signals as R wave or QRS complex.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the field of devices for cardiac rhythm management (CRM), accurate rhythm classification is an increasingly important aspect. Pacemakers are primarily used to assist in bradycardia or when the electrical propagation path is blocked, whereas the primary use of implantable cardioverter defibrillators (ICD) is to terminate ventricular arrhythmia, a life-threatening condition if not immediately treated. In both types of devices, accurate event classification of the electrogram signal is needed for identifying, e.g., atrial and ventricular fibrillation in order to give appropriate therapy for the detected arrhythmia. For pacemakers, this may necessitate changing the pacing mode in order to stabilize the ventricular rhythm during an episode of atrial fibrillation. An ICD responds to ventricular fibrillation by giving a defibrillating shock intended to terminate the fibrillation.
Ever increasing demands are put on both kinds of devices to better handle their primary task as well as to manage other tasks than those originally intended for. One such task may be, for an implantable medical device, to identify atrial flutter in order to terminate it by atrial pacing or to defibrillate atrial fibrillation. Although it is not a life-threatening arrhythmia, atrial fibrillation is an inconvenience to the patient and increases the risk for other diseases such as stroke. Atrial pacing may also be one way of terminating supraventricular tachycardias. An ICD specific task is to identify atrial fibrillation in order to not mistake it for ventricular fibrillation and the risk of giving an unnecessary, and possibly harmful, defibrillation shock. Another, more general, utilization is to efficiently store rhythm data for later analysis and evaluation, already done in modern ICD's. By collecting data, better knowledge of the evolution of cardiac diseases and the functionality of the device can be obtained.
Clustering represents an important task within the classification problem where each individual event is assigned to a cluster of events with similar features. Labelling of the clusters, i.e., associating the cluster with a specific cardiac rhythm, completes the classification such that the device can provide proper therapy when needed. However, certain constraints distinguish clustering in CRM devices from clustering in general. In order to give immediate therapy, it requires clustering to be done in real-time, thus excluding many iterative clustering algorithms such as k-means clustering and competitive learning. Various methods have recently been presented concerning clustering of signals from the surface electrocardiogram (ECG), based on, e.g., self-organizing maps or fuzzy hybrid neural networks, see M. Lagerholm, C. Peterson, G. Braccini, L. Edenbrabdt, and L. Sörnmo, Clustering ECG complexes using Hermite functions and self-organizing maps", IEEE Trans. Biomed. Eng., vol. 47, pp. 838-848, July 2000, and S. Osowski and T. Linh, "ECG beat recognition using fuzzy hybrid neural network", IEEE Trans. Biomed. Eng., vol. 48, pp. 1265-1271, November 2001. However, most clustering algorithms used for ECG analysis are computationally rather complex and therefore unsuitable for implantable CRM devices. Furthermore, not much a priori morphologic information is associated with the various rhythms in the electrogram (EGM); this is in contrast to the more well-defined ECG.
Previous work in the area of intracardiac event classification mainly focused on discrimination of a specific condition in order to discern, e.g., atrial fibrillation from other atrial tachyarrythmias, see A. Schoenwald, A. Sahakian, and S. Swiryn, "Discrimination of atrial fibrillation from regular atrial rhythms by spatial precision of local activation direction", IEEE Trans. Biomed. Eng., vol. 44, pp. 958-963, October 1997. Other applications involve discrimination of ventricular from supraventricular tachycardia, see L. Koyrakh, J. Gillberg, and N. Wood, "Wavelet based algorithms for EGM morphology discrimination for implantable ICDs", in Proc. Of Comp. In Card. (Piscataway, N.J., USA), pp. 343-346, IEEE, IEEE Press, 1999, and G. Grönefeld, B. Schulte, S. Hohnloser, H.-J. Trappe, T. Korte, C. Stellbrink, W. Jung, M. Meesmann, D. Böcker, D. Grosse—Meininghaus, J. Vogt, and J. Neuzner, "Morphology discrimination: A beat-to-beat algorithm for the discrimination of ventricular from supraventricular tachycardia by implantable cardioverter defibrillators", J. Pacing Clin. Electrophysiol., vol. 24, pp. 1519-1524, October 2001. More general classification algorithms, which in turn involve training on individual patients, have been based on analog neural networks or wavelet analysis for morphologic discrimination of arrhythmias.
PCT Application WO 97 39 681 describes a defibrillator control system comprising a pattern recognition system. The intracardiac electrogram signal is digitised and delivered for feature selection into a selector. The feature selector outputs selected features to a trained classifier to provide information as to what group the produced signal should be clustered, e.g. ventricular tachycardia. The classifier outputs the classified information for use for a therapeutic decision.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,271,411 discloses an ECG signal analysis and cardiac arrhythmia detection by extraction of features from a scalar signal. A QRS pattern vector is then transformed into features describing the QRS morphology, viz. a QRS feature vector. A normal QRS complex is identified based on the population of QRS complexes located within clusters of QRS features within a feature space having a number of dimensions equal to the number of extracted features. The extracted morphology information is then used for judging whether a heartbeat is normal or abnormal.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,638,823 describes non-invasively detecting of coronary artery diseases. A wavelet transform is performed on an acoustic signal representing one or more sound event caused by turbulence of blood flowing in an artery to provide parameters for a feature vector. This feature vector is used as one input to neural networks, the outputs of which represent a diagnosis of coronary stenosis in a patient.
In Michael A. Unser et al, "Wavelet Applications in Signal and Image Processing IV", Proceedings SPIE—The International Society for Optical Engineering, 6-9 Aug. 1996, vol. 2825, part two of two parts, pp. 812-821, a wavelet packet based compression scheme for single lead ECGs is disclosed, including QRS clustering and grouping of heart beats of similar structures. For each heart beat detected, its QRS complex is compared to templates of previously established groups. Point-by-point differences are used as similarity measures. The current beat is assigned to the group whose template is most similar, provided predetermined conditions are satisfied. Otherwise a new group is created with the current QRS complex used as the initial group template.


Described herein are methods of cleaning a tooth comprising administering a composition comprising a zinc amino acid halide complex to the oral cavity; and retaining the composition in the oral cavity for a time sufficient to form a precipitate.

There is a need for oral care products to whiten teeth. Bleaching materials such as peroxide are commonly used to whiten teeth, but peroxide is difficult to formulate and deliver in sufficient concentrations to provide a good whitening effect. White pigments such as zinc oxide are also used, but such insoluble pigments are also difficult to formulate and deliver.
There is also a need for improved, consumer-friendly products and methods to encourage users to brush their teeth for a longer period of time. It is recommended that children should brush their teeth for at least 45-60 seconds, and adults for at least 90 to 120 seconds. Most people, especially children, do not brush their teeth for a sufficient period of time to obtain maximum benefit, and moreover have difficulty accurately estimating the time necessary to brush the teeth. Toothpaste comprising colored film fragments or encapsulates that release pigment upon adequate brushing are known, but these pigments provide no particular benefit to the teeth.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Teeth whitening methods, visually perceptible signals and compositions therefor


A method of attaching a line to a hooked item such as a fishing hook, plug, gig, lure or spoon. Each hooked item includes an elongated shank and an open-ended slot disposed contiguous with one end of the shank. Formed when the material from which the shank is fabricated is bent back upon itself, the slot is tapered, having a slight divergence toward the open end of the slot. For a particular slot, a line having a transverse cross-section with a radius approximately equal to the radius of curvature of the closed end of the slot is employed; but because of the tapered slot, each slot size can be used with a wide range of line sizes. To attach the line to the hooked item, one simply places an end of the line through the slot, runs a portion of the line past the slot along the shank, wraps the line extending beyond this portion around it and the shank, and finally pulls the free end of the line into the slot and towards the closed end thereof of the slot. When the line is so pulled, it entwines upon itself, bunches and wedges into the slot. The resultant tie becomes stronger as load is applied to the line. Repeated tests have shown that the line will break before this knot becomes dislodged.

Tying fine lines to fish hooks presents may problems. The use of such lines makes knot tying difficult even under good conditions. With wet and/or cold hands, the problem is greatly magnified. Because of the popularity of fishing, much interest has been directed towards finding ways of simplifying the attachment of lines to fish hooks.
One of the earliest patents teaching a simplified method of attaching a line to a fish hook was issued to Hiltz, U.S. Pat. No. 86,154, in 1869. Hiltz discloses a fish hook with a hole and a slot which communicate with each other. For use with this hook, a preformed knot, which is substantially larger than the width of the slot, is slipped through the hole; and the line is pulled into the slot, so that the knot extends outwardly from one side and the line from the other side.
Subsequently, Adams and later Fry improved upon Hiltz' combination. Adams, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,092,796 issued in 1978, discloses a fish hook with an open-ended slot for receiving a line with a preformed knot. Fry, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,535,562 issued in 1985, teaches a fish hook having a large, open-ended slot which communicates with a narrower slot.
Another invention which is an integral part of a fish hook or lure and is designed to facilitate knot tying is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,848,345, issued to Austad et al. in 1974. Their quick tie device comprises a double loop in which two loops are disposed generally perpendicularly to and proximate with each other. With these loops, a user can attach a line to the hook or lure by wrapping the line first about one loop and then about the other.
Similarly, Manno, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,905,403 issued in 1990, discloses a hook with double loops arranged side-by-side but with open portions of these loops facing in opposite directions. A fish line can be attached to this hook by doubling the line back upon itself and passing the closed end of the line over the loop closest to the hook so as to hold this closed end in place. The remainder of the line that is doubled back on itself is then wrapped repeatedly about a portion of the hook disposed between the double loops before being pulled through the other open-ended loop, thereby completing the attachment of the line to the hook.
Accessories have also been employed to facilitate tying lines to fish hooks, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,675,276 issued to Nuse in 1972 and in U.S. Pat. No. 3,913,185 issued to James in 1975. Nuse's device is a flat sheet member interposed between the primary fish line and a leader for the hook. The leader for the hook is, however, tied with a conventional knot. James' accessory is a clip which can be threaded through the eye of a fish hook; but once the eye is so threaded, the line is slipped through an opening in the clip and tied--again in a conventional manner.


A method for measuring the azimuthal strike orientation of induced fractures in subterranean formations from which the maximum and minimum in situ stress direction can be inferred. The method utilizes an oriented core of a formation and computed tomography imagery for measuring the azimuthal strike orientation of induced fractures.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method for measuring the azimuthal strike orientation of induced fractures in subterranean formations from which the maximum and minimum in situ stress direction can be inferred. More particularly, the present invention relates to a method for direct measurement of the azimuthal strike orientation of induced fractures by using an oriented core and computed tomography imagery. The method of the present invention can also be extended to the direct measurement of the spatial orientation of other planar rock fabrics causing mechanical rock anisotropy which can be compared to the induced fracture orientation.
2. Background
The ability to predict and/or measure hydraulic fracture orientation and in situ stress direction in an oil and gas reservoir is important for optimum field development in hydraulically stimulated reservoirs, for well placement, stimulation design, injection of fluids and is important for decisions for optimum placement of horizontal oil and gas wells. Knowing the fracture direction allows the field well spacing to be determined, and the shape of the drainage area to be established. Several methods exist in the oil and gas industry for measuring, or at least inferring, hydraulic fracture orientation in subterranean formations and for inferring the direction of the maximum horizontal in situ stress.
One of the previously known methods for determining fracture orientation involved performing an open hole microfrac test in a well, and thereafter, taking an oriented core sample from the bottom of the well bore and visually observing the direction of the fractures induced during the microfrac test.
Another prior art technique for inferring fracture orientation involves the use of anelastic strain ("ASR") techniques. An ASR test consists of immediately sectioning and placing in a test apparatus a portion of a freshly cut and recovered oriented core section for recording the expansion/contraction of the rock due to the release of the stress pattern it has been under in place. The core is placed in a test fixture and the minute oriented displacements recorded for 24 to 48 hours, until movement ceases. Since the stress within a formation is proportional to the strain relaxation in the core sample, the direction of the minimum and maximum horizontal stress within the formation may be inferred from the relaxation data.
A recently developed non-prior art technique for determining fracture orientation is through use of an acoustic scanning tool (CAST) to determine fracture orientation after fractures have been induced in the formation by an open hold microfrac test. The CAST is an oriented sonic tool that may be used to observe the interior of a well bore. Observation of the induced fractures with the CAST allows an operator to directly observe the orientation of both natural and induced fractures.
Yet another new non-prior art method for measuring the direction of hydraulic fracture orientation has been developed. This technique involves the use of downhole extensiometers to measure borehole diameter changes before and after fractures have been initiated in the formation. This method and technique is the subject of a separately filed application which is assigned to the assignee of the present invention (application Ser. No. 07/902,108, filed Jun. 22, 1992). A downhole extensiometer such as Halliburton Services, Inc.'s THE.TM. tool is an instrument which measures borehole deformation during a fracture. THE.TM. tool is a high precision oriented, multi-armed caliper with a high accuracy memory pressure gauge. This tool will be in the hole during a microfracture treatment to measure the actual fracture width created. THE.TM. tool uses straddle packers to isolate and test individual zones in an open hole. Deformation of the borehole will give an indication of the azimuthal strike orientation of the induced fracture.
The data from the existing prior art methods is often not available, lacks verification, is only obtained as a single measurement lacking statistical certainty or is inferred from indirect techniques which can be difficult to interpret. The method of the present invention is one which may provide verification of these other methods in a particular field and is a direct measurement which can be coupled with several of the existing methods. The method of the present invention can also be extended to the direct measurement of the planar rock fabrics causing mechanical rock anisotropy which can be compared to the hydraulic fracture orientation.
The method of the present invention provides a direct measurement of azimuthal strike orientation of induced fractures from which maximum and minimum stress directions can be inferred. Maximum in situ stress is shown to be aligned parallel to the strike orientation of induced core fractures. A hydraulically induced fracture will propagate perpendicular to the least principal stress and in the direction of the greatest principal stress. The proposed method requires the use of an oriented whole core and computed tomography (CT) imagery.
Coring and core orientation techniques are well-known in the industry. One such technique for core orientation includes the use of a downhole camera and compass. Orientation data is obtained by taking photographs of the downhole compass at desired intervals over the cored section. By way of example, downhole compass photographs are obtained every three feet through the section being cored. Rotation of the core bit is stopped at the desired depth to obtain a readable photograph of the downhole compass.
Orientation grooves, the principal and secondary scribe lines, are marked on the core as the core is being cut. Knives inside the core barrel cut the scribe lines as the core enters the core barrel. The orientation of the principal scribe with respect to the compass is recorded prior to running the core barrel into the borehole. Thus, one can determine the orientation of the principal scribe line from the compass readings at each recorded interval. The secondary scribe lines are used as a reference for identifying the principal scribe. A survey record will exist at the conclusion of the cored section which accurately reflects the orientation of the core's principal scribe line throughout the interval. Orientation of the core is considered a critical part of obtaining accurate orientation measurements of planar core features such as fractures. State of the art continuous orientation technology which is now available to the industry is an alternative to "camera" technique of core orientation described above.
Computed tomography (CT), commonly known in the medical field as CAT scanning ("computerized axial tomography" or "computer assisted tomography"), is a nondestructive technology that provides an image of the internal structure and composition of an object. What makes the technology unique is the ability to obtain imaging which represents cross sectional "axial" or "longitudinal" slices through the object. This is accomplished through the reconstruction of a matrix of x-ray attenuation coefficients by a dedicated computer system which controls the scanner. Essentially, the CT scanner is a device which detects density differences in a volume of material of varying thicknesses. The resulting images and quantitative data which are produced reflect volume by volume (voxel) variations displayed as gray levels of contrasting CT numbers.
Although the principles of CT were discovered in the first half of this century, the technology has only recently been made available for practical applications in the non-medical areas. Computed tomography was first introduced as a diagnostic x-ray technology for medical applications in 1971, and has been applied in the last decade to materials analysis, known as non-destructive evaluation. The breakthroughs in tomographic imaging originated with the invention of the x-ray computed tomographic scanner in the early 1970's. The technology has recently been adapted for use in the petroleum industry.
A basic CT system consists of an x-ray tube; single or multiple detectors; dedicated system computer system which controls scanner functions and image reconstructions and post processing hardware and software. Additional ancillary equipment used in core analysis include a precision repositioning table; hard copy image output and recording devices; and x-ray "transparent" core holder or encasement material.
A core is laid horizontally on the precision repositioning table. The table allows the core to be incrementally advanced a desired distance thereby ensuring consistent and thorough examination of each core interval. The x-ray beam is collimated through a narrow aperture (2 mm to 10 mm), passes through the material as the beam/object is rotated and the attenuated x-rays are picked up by the detectors for reconstruction. Typical single energy scan parameters are 75 mA current at an x-ray tube potential of 120 kV. After image reconstruction, a cross-sectional image is displayed and the data stored on tape or directly to a computer disk. One example of obtaining image output is through hard copies in the form of 35 mm slides directly from image disks which may then be reproduced into 8.5.times.11 inch photographic sheets directly from the slides.
A cross sectional slide of a volume of material can be divided into an n x n matrix of voxels (volume elements). The attenuated flux of N.sub.o x-ray photons passing through any single voxel having a linear attenuation coefficient .mu. reduces the number of transmitted photons to N as expressed by Beer's law: EQU N/N.sub.o =e.sup.-.mu./x
where:
N=number of photons transmitted PA1 N.sub.o =original number of emitted photons PA1 x=dimension of the voxel in the direction of transmitted beam PA1 .mu.=linear attenuation coefficient (cm). PA1 (.mu./.rho.).sub.w =mass attenuation coefficient of water PA1 .rho..sub.w =density of water
Material parameters which determine the linear attenuation coefficient of a voxel relate to mass attenuation coefficient as follows: EQU .mu.=(.mu./.rho.).rho.
where: (.mu./.rho.) is the mass attenuation coefficient (MAC) and .rho. is the object density.
Mass attenuation coefficients are dependent on the mean atomic number of the material in a voxel and the photon energy of the beam [approx. (KeV).sup.-3 ]. For a heterogeneous voxel, i.e., compounds and mixtures, the atomic number depends on the weighted average of the volume fraction of each element (partial volume effect). Therefore, the composition and density of the material in a voxel will determine its linear attenuation coefficient.
Computed tomography calculates the x-ray absorption coefficient for each pixel as a CT number (CTN), whereby: ##EQU1## where: .mu..sub.w is the linear attenuation coefficient of water.
Conventionally, CT numbers are expressed as normalized MAC's to that of water. The units are known as Hounsfield units (HU) and are defined as O HU for water and (-1000) HU for air. Rearrangement of the previous equation can therefore be expressed as: EQU CTN (CT number)=1000.times.((.mu./.rho.).rho./(.mu./.rho.).sub.w .rho..sub.w -1)
where:
Core lithology can be determined by single scan CT with the knowledge of the density (or grain density) and attenuation coefficient of the material. For sandstones, limestones, and dolomites, the grain densities are usually close to the literature values (2.65, 2.71, and 2.85 g/cm.sup.3, respectively). Typical densities can also be used for rock of mineral types such as gypsum, anhydrite, siderite, and pyrite.
The mass attenuation coefficients of various elements and compounds can be found in the nuclear data literature. The mass attenuation coefficient for composite materials can be determined from the elemental attenuation coefficients by using a mass weighted averaging of each element in the compound as shown: ##EQU2## where M.sub.i is the molecular weight for element i.
Note that calcite MAC values are higher than those for dolomite, even though dolomite has a higher grain density than calcite. This is because of the atomic number dependence. Water and decane have very similar MAC values. The higher atomic number (and MAC value) materials are more nonlinear with x-ray energy than the lower atomic number materials.
In general, sandstones or silicon-based materials have CT numbers in the 1000-2000 range, depending on the core porosity. Limestones and dolomites are typically in the 2000-3000 CTN range.
Small impurities of different elements in a core can change the core's CT numbers. For instance, the presence of calcium in a sandstone core maxtrix will increase the core's CT number above what would be predicted from the porosity vs. CTN curve. An estimate of the weight fraction of each element in the core can give a better estimate of the core porosity.
The occurrence of abrupt changes in CT number may indicate lithology discontinuities in the core. For instance, the presence of small high density/high CT number nodules (CTN<2000) usually indicates the presence of iron in the core (pyrite, siderite, glauconite). For limestones the presence of higher density/CTN nodules (CTN>3400) in the limestone matrix may indicate anhydrite in the core. A high CTN/high density region near the outer part of the core may indicate barite mud invasion. This procedure is an excellent way to verify mud invasion and estimate its extent.
Quantitative CT scanning of cores requires modifications to the techniques employed for medical applications. The CT scanner must be tuned for reservoir rocks rather than water in order to obtain quantitatively correct measurements of CT response of the cores. Since repeat scanning of specific locations in the sample is often necessary, more accurate sample positioning is required than is needed in medical diagnostics.

Measuring in situ stress, induced fracture orientation, fracture distribution and spacial orientation of planar rock fabric features using computer tomography imagery of oriented core


An easily assembled furnishing article includes a plurality of elongated ribs having a decorative contour, a support plate and a secondary plate. A notched interface is provided between each of the ribs and each plate so that the ribs may be engaged around the perimeter of the plates to define the outer contours of the furnishing article. The notched interface is sized for a friction fit between the ribs and the plates and for easy manual engagement without the need for tools. In one embodiment the furnishing article is a light fixture in which the support plate defines a center opening for supporting a light socket and the secondary plate defines a center opening to receive a power cord of the socket therethrough. The support plate can define a plurality of interior openings to provide for heat convection away from a light bulb engaged within the socket.

The present invention relates to furnishings, such as light fixtures, and particularly to furnishings that may be easily assembled or disassembled.
Low-cost furnishings are often desirable, such as for a college student or a person with a limited budget for less essential furnishings. Many furnishings are made low cost by requiring the purchaser to assemble the item. The assembly can be time consuming and may require tools or skills not available to the purchaser. Moreover, may so called "ready-to-assemble" furnishings cannot be disassembled, at least one easily, for transport and/or storage.
Many low cost furnishings are formed of plastic and/or are exceptionally unattractive. For many people it is important to purchase "green" furnishings that are formed of recycled material and/or recyclable themselves. Thus, any articles formed of plastic would be very undesirable. On the other hand, "green" materials are often not easily used for attractive furnishings.
There is a need for low-cost furnishings that are attractive, easily assembled and disassembled and inexpensive.

Easily assembled and disassembled furnishing


The invention relates to a method of making a casing-and-diverging-portion unit, the method comprising the following steps:                forming fiber reinforcement from a first fiber preform made with a first type of fiber and a second fiber preform made with a second type of fiber different from the first type of fiber, said second preform being placed on the first preform;        maintaining the fiber reinforcement in tooling so that it has a shape identical to the shape of the casing-and-diverging-portion unit that is to be made; and        impregnating said fiber reinforcement with a thermosetting resin and impregnating the resin.

The invention relates to making a casing-and-diverging-portion unit for use in particular in making components for rocket exhaust nozzles or outlet cones.
That type of part comprises an internal portion referred to as the "diverging portion", that is required essentially to present good ability at withstanding temperature and ablation since it is subjected directly to the flow of hot gas. The part also has an external portion, referred to as its "casing", having the main function of imparting good stiffness to the part.
Particularly because of the specific properties that the diverging portion and the casing need to present, these two portions are made separately. Thereafter they are united to form a casing-and-diverging-portion unit.
A method presently in use for forming composite diverging portions or casings consists in draping and molding plies of carbon fabric preimpregnated with a resin, e.g. a phenolic resin. More precisely, the method comprises draping plies of preimpregnated fabric in a rosette pattern on a mold presenting the shape of the unit to be made, compacting the plies in a vacuum by means of a diaphragm, installing a female mold if necessary, polymerizing the unit in an autoclave or a press, and unmolding the part. This produces a rigid part with fiber reinforcement.
There also exist other known methods of making composite diverging portions or casings such as methods comprising, for example, filamentary winding, braiding, or knitting sleeves.
Nevertheless, with those methods of fabrication, the number of components needed for making the casing-and-diverging-portion unit is relatively large, as is the time required, thus leading to a manufacturing cost that is high.
Furthermore, since the diverging portion and the casing are made separately, assembling these two elements together can be complex and can present difficulties of implementation. For example, aligning the contact surfaces between the casing and the diverging portion requires additional machining, thereby increasing the time and the cost of fabrication accordingly. In addition, bonding the two elements together requires the assembly surfaces to be prepared and good control over the adhesive used in order to obtain good adhesion at all points.
In addition, the above methods are difficult to implement. In particular, draping fiber plies to form the fiber reinforcement is a manual operation that is performed directly on a shaping support and that does not enable accurate control to be maintained over the orientation and the quantity of fibers at all points in the reinforcement.
Furthermore, most existing methods use preimpregnated fibers that are less flexible than dry fibers, thereby making it even more difficult to shape the plies to match the shape of a body of revolution such as a diverging portion and the associated casing.

Method of making a unit comprising a casing and diverging portion


An image or object support apparatus holds and displays an image or object, such as a photograph, drawing or other graphic work in a spaced position relative to a backing plate. The backing plate is itself supported in the place of display, as by picture hanging means or a stand. The image or object is supported by struts having grippers enabling easy changing of the image or object, and easy adapting to images of various size.

DESCRIPTION OF RELATED ART
Prior art picture frames generally hold an image or object inside of some type of framework. A common type of picture holder is the slotted frame. Typically, the frame requires a paper backing or the like to be placed in the slots behind the photograph. A picture or other artwork is then supported in a position relative to the backing. Often slotted frames are clumsy, unattractive, and make framing artwork awkward.
Other types of display devices utilize a wire bracketing engaging the corners of the artwork to hang the framed image or object. Most of these wire hangers, like the slotted frame require the image or object to be mounted on some form of rigid backing, otherwise, the object may be damaged.
Some display frames will hold an image by interlocking it with a flexible "picture wire". Flexible wire is looped through each of four brackets. Similar to dinner plate hangers, these devices use wires that are held in tension and apply compression to the object in order to hold up the object. However, many images such as ordinary photographs will bend if placed under in compression in a device like this.
Alternative prior art framing approaches also include a combination of slots and magnets to hold the image. Some devices use combinations of adhesives and magnetic mounting devices. Specific male and female configurations are also available with mechanical securement means. A magnetic "L" shaped bracket has been used in the prior art as well. Notwithstanding the variety of display devices, the prior art all suffer from the fact they are complicated to construct and/or use, and if the user is not careful, the artwork may be damaged.
Other known prior art display devices include a changeable display construction as shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,419,988. This structure is designed to make outside sign displays simpler to change. This display structure consists of a main support plate having rods attached at each corner of the support plate. The rods are of a relatively large diameter and must be sufficiently stiff to support displays of significant weight. Hence, this design is impractical for household picture display.
A need exists for an apparatus capable of supporting an art objects such as a picture, image and the like, suitable for household use, simple to use and construct which supports artwork such as an image, photograph or other small object without compressing or bending it.


A process for etching semiconductor substrates using a deep reactive ion etching process to produce through holes or slots (referred to collectively as “slots”) in the substrates. The process includes applying a first layer to a first surface of substrate to provide an etch mask material layer on the first surface of the substrate. A second layer is applied to a second surface of the substrate to provide an etch stop material layer on the second surface of the substrate. The first layer and the second layer have similar solubilities in one or more organic solvents. The substrate is etched from the first surface of the wafers to provide a slot in the substrate. After etching the substrate, the etch mask material layer and the etch stop material layer are removed by contacting the first surface and the second surface of the substrate with a single organic solvent.

Semiconductor substrates are used in a wide variety of applications. For example, semiconductor substrates having a slot formed therethrough may be used to provide ejection actuators for micro-fluid ejection heads. Slots in a silicon wafer containing multiple substrates may be formed by a variety of micro-machining techniques including, but not limited to, sand blasting, chemical wet etching, dry etching, laser cutting, and the like. Deep reactive ion etching (DRIE) of slots through silicon wafers offers significant advantages over other technologies such as grit blasting, laser cutting, and wet etching. Specifically, the DRIE process provides better dimensional control of the topside and backside openings compared to the grit blasting process. In addition, chips with a slot formed by the DRIE process are approximately 5 times stronger in 3-point bend testing than grit blasted chips.
When compared to wafers that have slots etched therethrough using KOH or TMAH in a wet chemical process, wall angles of the slots may be much smaller using the DRIE process. For example, re-entrant wall angles between 0° and 8° may be achieved with a DRIE process whereas wet processes produce wall angles of 54.7° in <100> silicon. Hence, DRIE processes for slots may provide a more efficient use of silicon.
The DRIE process for etching slots through a thickness of a semiconductor substrate wafer includes a series of sequential steps of alternating etching and passivation. Such dry etching techniques are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,611,888 and 5,626,716 to Bosch et al., the disclosures of which are incorporated herein by reference.
During deep reactive ion etching (DRIE) of semiconductor wafers, the wafers are positioned and held in place on an electrostatic clamping disk. The clamping disk uses a DC power source to induce a charge on the surface of the wafer to be etched. The charge on the wafer provides an electro-static force that pulls the wafer onto the clamping disk. As opposed to mechanical clamping, an electrostatic clamping mechanism increases a surface area of the wafer available for etching.
The clamping disk also includes a cooling mechanism for cooling a back side of the wafer during the DRIE etching process. The cooling mechanism provides helium gas which flows through channels in the clamping disk to the back side of the wafer. Helium gas serves as a heat transfer medium between the wafer and the clamping disk.
If DRIE etching of the wafers is used to form slots through a thickness of the wafers, an etch stop material must be used on the back side of the wafers to protect the clamping disk from an etching plasma generated during the DRIE process and to prevent escape of helium gas used to cool the back side of the wafers. The escape of helium gas can cause inadequate cooling of the wafers during the etching process, and/or the wafers may be pushed off of the clamping disk by an increase in helium pressure to compensate for helium gas escape.
Various etch stop materials may be applied to the back side of the wafers to protect the clamping disk from damage and to prevent the escape of helium gas. Of the etch stop materials that may be used, relatively hard etch stop materials provide the best protection for the clamping disk. However, relatively hard etch stop materials are difficult to completely remove from the back side of the wafers once the etching process is complete.
Relatively, soft etch stop materials, such as photoresist polymers, are easier to remove from the back side of the wafers. However, under etching conditions, degradation products or a film residue from the relatively soft etch stop materials may accumulate on the clamping disk making it difficult to adequately clamp and seal the wafers on the clamping disk. The residue may also interfere with the flow of cooling gas to the back side of the wafers and may reduce thermal conduction between the wafers and the clamping disk. Removal of the residue may require significant downtime for the etching system thereby reducing product yield. Accordingly, improved methods for DRIE etching of wafers are needed to improve product yield and reduce problems associated with use of apparatus for DRIE etching of wafers.
With regard to the foregoing, the disclosure provides a process for etching semiconductor substrates using a deep reactive ion etching process to produce through holes or slots (referred to hereafter collectively as "slots") in the substrates (which may be collectively part of a wafer of semiconductor substrates). The process includes applying a first layer to a first surface of substrate to provide an etch mask material layer on the first surface of the substrate. A second layer is applied to a second surface of the substrate to provide an etch stop material layer on the second surface of the substrate. The first layer and the second layer have similar solubilities in one or more organic solvents. The substrate is etched from the first surface of the wafers to provide a slot in the substrate. After etching the substrate, the etch mask material layer and the etch stop material layer are removed by contacting the first surface and the second surface of the substrate with a single organic solvent.
Advantages of the exemplary embodiments described herein may include the ability to protect semiconductor substrate during a dry etching process with materials that are easily removed once the etching process is complete. Since the etch mask material and the etch stop material are soluble in a single organic solvent, the process for removing the etch mask and etch stop from the substrate is substantially simplified since only one substrate solvent contact step is required. Another advantage is that a wider variety of etch stop materials may be used that have an increased resistance to residue formation on the clamping disk thereby reducing interference in the flow of cooling gas to the back side of the substrate and improving a seal between the substrate and the clamping disk.