A stable platform supports a cell, the stable platform comprises a lower mainframe, an upper mainframe, and a dampener system. The upper mainframe includes a plurality of recesses. Each recess is configured to receive a cell. The dampener system connects the lower mainframe to the upper mainframe. In one embodiment, the dampener system comprises a dampener element, such as sand, to dampen vibrations between the lower mainframe and the lower mainframe.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a support structure. More particularly, the present invention relates to the mainframe to support a process cell.
2. Background of the Related Art
Electroplating, previously limited in integrated circuit design to the fabrication of lines on circuit boards, is now used to deposit metal films, such-as copper, on substrates to form interconnect features, e.g. vias, trenches, or contacts. One feature filling embodiment that utilizes electroplating requires initially depositing a diffusion barrier layer on the substrate by a process such as physical vapor deposition (PVD) or chemical vapor deposition (CVD). A seed layer is deposited on the substrate by PVD or CVD to define a plating surface. A metal film is then deposited by electroplating on the seed layer. The seed layer is typically formed from the same metal as the subsequently electroplated metal film, so the seed layer becomes contiguous with the metal film. Finally, the deposited metal film can be planarized by another process, e.g., chemical mechanical polishing (CMP), to define a conductive interconnect feature. Electroplating is performed by establishing a voltage/current level between the seed layer on the substrate and a separate anode to deposit metal ions on the seed layer.
Such PVD, CVD, electroplating, CMP, or other operations associated with semiconductor processing require a stable platform. In electroplating, for example, any vibration/motion that is transferred to an electrolyte cell can be transferred to the electrolyte solution contained within the electrolyte cell. Such vibration/motion of the electrolyte solution within the electrolyte cell can effect the uniformity of the metal film that is deposited on the seed layer during electroplating. Other processes such as CVD or PVD are also adversely effected by vibration and/or motion of the cell of the processing chamber carrying out the particular process during processing.
Robots are often used in conjunction with processing systems such as those that perform electroplating, PVD, CVD, or CMP operations. The robots are accurately aligned with the process cells to effect transfer of the substrate from a robot blade in which the robot blade supports the substrate, to the process cell, or a substrate holder system associated with the cell. Modern systems are designed so multiple substrate can be processed in identical, though different, process cells simultaneously to increase processing throughput. The robots are therefore often required to simultaneously transfer multiple substrates between multiple sets of cells. To provide for such simultaneous transfer of multiple substrates between multiple sets of process cells, all of the robots are correctly aligned with the appropriate sets of process cells. Such alignment is compromised by any vibration/displacement that occurs between the robot and the process cell, or the substrate holder system associated with the process cell.
Therefore, there remains a need for a stable cell platform to support process cells, metrology cells, SRD cells, etc. The stable platform should preferably limit displacement/vibration between the platform and the cell.


A method for providing synthesized speech using regular-pulse excitation includes a first step (300) of processing input speech to provide a residual excitation signal. A next step (302) includes defining important samples of the residual signal. Low frequency residual signals are particularly important. A next step (304) includes coding the important samples using regular-pulse excitation. A next step includes storing the important samples to random regular-pulse excitation grid positions in a memory using a first set of pseudorandomly generated numbers to assign the grid positions of each of the important samples. In this way, code rate for controlled, voice-only signals can be increased. This best applies to non-real time speech storage of voice tags, prompts and messaging.

Several new features recently emerging in radio communication devices, such as cellular phones, and personal digital assistants require the storage of large amounts of speech. For example, there are application areas of voice memo storage and storage of voice tags and prompts as part of the user interface in voice recognition capable handsets. Typically, recent cellular phones employ standardized speech coding techniques for voice storage purposes.
Standardized coding techniques are mainly intended for real time two-way communications, in that, they are configured to minimize buffering delays and achieving maximal robustness against transmission errors, maximal robustness against multiple encodings, and the ability to operate with non-voiced signals. Clearly, for voice storage tasks, neither buffering delays nor robustness against transmission errors, multiple encodings, and non-voiced signals are of any consequence. Moreover, the timing constraints, error correction, and noise immunity require higher data rates for improved transmission accuracy.
Although speech storage has been discussed for multimedia applications, these techniques simply propose to increase the compression ratio of an existing speech codec by adding an improved speech-noise classification algorithm exploiting the absence of coding delay constraint. However, in the storage of voice tags and prompts, which are very short in duration, pursuing such an approach is pointless. Similarly, medium-delay speech coders have been developed for joint compression of pitch values. In particular, a codebook-based pitch compression and chain coding compression of pitch parameters have been developed. However, none of these approaches take advantage of the voice-only, quiet environment, single encoder requirements for the storage of voice tags or prompts to further improve data compression efficiency.
Therefore, there is a need for a codec with a higher compression ratio (lower data rate) than conventional speech coding techniques for use in dedicated voice storage applications. In particular, it would be an advantage to use randomization criteria in a dedicated speech codec. It would also be advantageous to provide these improvements without any additional hardware or cost.
The exemplification set out herein illustrates a preferred embodiment of the invention in one form thereof, and such exemplification is not intended to be construed as limiting in any manner.


Provided is a method for driving a surface emitting semiconductor laser including an active region that generates light, a resonator structure disposed such that it sandwiches the active region, and a driving electrode that provides power to the active region. The surface emitting semiconductor laser has an internal resistance defined by voltage and current applied to the driving electrode. The method includes applying a modulation signal to the driving electrode, in which the modulation signal has a current amplitude defined by a first current value and a second current value that is greater than the first current value. The modulation signal is in a negative gradient region in which the internal resistance decreases in contrast to the increase of the current.

1. Technical Field
This invention relates to a method for driving a surface emitting semiconductor laser, an optical transmission module, and a handheld electronic device.
2. Related Art
For an optical transmission module that is modulated at a high speed in a gigahertz or higher frequency band, a surface emitting semiconductor laser (Vertical-Cavity Surface-Emitting Laser diode: hereinafter referred to as VCSEL) that is designed to have a small internal resistance is typically used. Some of single-mode VCSELs have an internal resistance of greater than 50 ohms; for example, an internal resistance of several hundred or several thousand ohms. However, such a high resistant VCSEL has a higher resistance than a resistance of, for example, 50 ohms, that is typically used for a driving circuit or wiring and thus causes impedance mismatching.
For devices, such as handheld devices, that are susceptible to electromagnetic noises, the use of an optical transmission module in which a VCSEL is used as a light source for signal transmission has been considered. A major technical difficulty therein is the reduction in power consumption of the VCSEL. One method for reducing power is to lower the threshold current of the VCSEL and reduce the driving current However, in general, if the threshold current is lowered, the internal resistance becomes high, and thus it becomes difficult to drive the VCSEL at a high speed.
The present invention addresses the issues of related arts described above, and aims to provide a method for driving a surface emitting semiconductor laser at a high speed while reducing power consumption.
The present invention further aims to provide an optical transmission module that is appropriate for reducing power consumption of handheld devices or the like.

Method for driving surface emitting semiconductor laser, optical transmission module, and handheld electronic device


An information hiding system such as a digital-watermark information system has an embedding side and an extracting side for recognizing an identical character string in which digital-watermark information is embedded, and the extracting side reliably extracts all digital-watermark information from the character string. In order to realize this, an image processing method of the present invention includes a determining step of determining whether a predetermined distance between each target character and an adjoining character can be maintained if any digital-watermark information which may be embedded in the target character is actually embedded; and a setting step of setting an object which is to be embedded with digital-watermark information according to the determination result.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to an information processing method, information processor, computer program, and storage medium for storing the program, and more specifically to an information processing method for hiding information to protect digital data, and an information processor, computer program and storage medium for same.
2. Description of the Related Art
Under the recently promoted standard for digitization of text, image and voice data, prevention of illegal copying of digital data and association of digital data with metadata are required.
For document images on printed materials, digital data and printed material are combined. And so, in order to protect such combined digital data, the access control system must be capable of linking both the digital data and printed material. Under these circumstances, information-hiding techniques such as digital-watermark information embedding have been employed.
In digital-watermark information embedding, part of original data is modified so that it is imperceptible to a human being, additional information is then embedded in the image, voice, or text data.
Specifically, when digital-watermark embedding is applied to multi-valued images, redundancy of pixel density is employed. However, since binary images such as document images have little or no redundancy, digital-watermark embedding is difficult to apply. In view of this problem, other methods that use characteristics peculiar to document images have been proposed.
These methods include moving the baseline of lines, modifying the length of spaces between words, modifying inclination of characters by rotating them, and modifying the length of spaces between characters. By such minimal modification, additional information can be embedded in a document image.
As a specific example, a method for modifying the length of space between characters is described with reference to FIGS. 9 and 10.
FIG. 9 shows part of a document image before digital-watermark information is embedded therein. FIG. 10 shows part of the document image after digital-watermark information has been embedded in part of the document image shown in FIG. 9. Space lengths P0, S0, P1, and S1 between characters in FIG. 9 are changed to space length P0′, S0′, P1′, and S1′ shown in FIG. 10 by embedding digital-watermark information therein. In FIGS. 9 and 10, five characters and four spaces between them are shown. In this case, two spaces are allocated to 1 bit, and thus four spaces can be embedded with two bits.
For example, P>S represents "1" and P<S represents "0". In this state, if the character between P0 and S0 is shifted to the left and the character between P1 and S1 is shifted to the left in FIG. 9, P0′<S0′ and P1′<S1′ are satisfied in FIG. 10, which shows part of the document image after embedding. Accordingly, a bit string (2 bits) of "1" and "0" can be embedded.
The above-described method for modifying the length of space between characters is disclosed in, for example, "Electronic document data hiding technique using inter-character space", The 1998 IEEE Asia-Pacific Conf. On Circuits and Systems, 1998, pp. 419-422, by King Mongkut University.
In such digital-watermark information embedding, information cannot be embedded in some portions of the document due to the positions of circumscribed rectangles. For example, as shown in FIG. 11, when the length of each of P and S is 1 pixel, the circumscribed rectangle can neither be moved to the right nor the left because the rectangle would contact the adjoining rectangle.
In such a case, the watermark extracting side cannot determine whether this portion of the document contains embedded digital-watermark information or whether it contains the original unmodified portion in which information cannot be embedded.
That is, in the known art, it is difficult for both the embedding and extracting sides to recognize the same character string, which includes digital-watermark information.

Information processing method and information processor


Queues are provided, which are a high-speed small-capacity queue disposed in a high-speed small-capacity medium inputting and outputting online form messages at high speed and a low-speed large-capacity queue disposed in a low-speed large-capacity medium inputting and outputting batch form messages at a speed slower than the high-speed small-capacity medium. A residence rate detection unit detects a residence rate of the form messages in the high-speed small-capacity queue. When the form message is received, a storage control unit stores the form message into the high-speed small-capacity queue or the low-speed large-capacity queue determined based on the priority, the availability of the high-speed small-capacity medium and the residence rate. A dynamic allocation change unit transfers the form messages between the queues based on the residence rate of the high-speed small-capacity queue 30-1 and the availability of the high-speed small-capacity medium.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a program, and a form output method and apparatus for outputting form messages processed by an application to predetermined devices after storing the form messages into queues and, more particularly, to a program, and a form output method and apparatus for outputting online-processed or batch-processed form messages to predetermined devices after storing the form messages into queues at the same output destination.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, in a form output server, a queue is arranged for each output destination such as a printer, FAX or electric medium, and after form messages are output from an application for business processing and the like and are stored into the queues, the form messages are retrieved and transferred from the queues in accordance with processing situations of the output destinations. If the queue is arranged for each output destination of the form, in consideration of requirements such as a maximum residence amount of the queues and acceptable time period until output of the forms, the queue is allocated to a separate storage media for each business operation in advance. If one (1) queue is shared by multiple applications, for example, if the queue is shared by an online business application and a batch business application, the storage medium for allocating the queue is selected in conformity to form output processing with the most rigid conditions.
However, in such a conventional form output server, when queuing and outputting are performed for form messages from multiple applications with widely different acceptable time period and maximum residence amount of the form messages, especially, when queuing and outputting are performed for form messages from a backbone system where online processing and batch processing are mixed, if the batch processing is operated in parallel with the online processing, the output amount of the form message is temporarily increased, resulting in a problem of great fluctuations of the form output amount. In this case, in consideration of the risk, a queue is usually allocated to a medium with a large capacity but low speed. However, although this can accommodate the fluctuations of the form output amount in the case that the batch processing is operated, it is problematic that output performance cannot be increased for the forms from the online business.

Program, method and apparatus for form output


A technique for spreading information signals in a spread spectrum communication system to provide increased signal acquisition speed. A first PN spreading code or code set is used to spread information signals along with a second PN spreading code sequence or function. The second PN code is synchronized with the first PN spreading code, but has a larger code period so that each code chip of the second PN code extends over the entire period of the first PN code. The longer period spreading code forms an outer code which helps provide unambiguous beam identification and easily acquired frame timing in the presence of dynamically changing signal path delay, improving signal acquisition.

I. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to spread spectrum communication systems, such as wireless data or telephone systems, and satellite communication systems. More particularly, the invention relates to a method and apparatus for generating, identifying, and acquiring spread spectrum communication signals using layered or overlayed PN spreading and identifier codes having differing periods or chip rates.
II. Description of the Related Art
A variety of multiple access communication systems and techniques have been developed for transferring information among a large number of system users, such as code division multiple access (CDMA) spread spectrum techniques. CDMA techniques in multiple access communication systems are disclosed in the teachings of U.S. Pat. No. 4,901,307, which issued Feb. 13, 1990 under the title xe2x80x9cSpread Spectrum Multiple Access Communication System Using Satellite Or Terrestrial Repeatersxe2x80x9d, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,691,974, which issued Nov. 25, 1997, under the title xe2x80x9cMethod And Apparatus For Using Full Spectrum Transmitted Power In A Spread Spectrum Communication System For Tracking Individual Recipient Phase Time And Energy,xe2x80x9d which are both assigned to the assignee of the present invention, and incorporated herein by reference.
These patents disclose communication systems in which a large number of generally mobile or remote system users or subscribers use transceivers to communicate with other system users or desired signal recipients, such as through a connected public telephone switching network. The system users communicate through gateways and satellites, or terrestrial base stations (also referred to as cell-sites or cells) using CDMA spread spectrum communication signals.
In a typical spread-spectrum communication system, one or more sets or pairs of preselected pseudorandom noise (PN) code sequences are used to modulate or xe2x80x98spreadxe2x80x99 user information signals over a predetermined spectral band prior to modulation onto a carrier for transmission as communication signals. PN spreading is a method of spread-spectrum transmission that is well known in the art, and produces a communication signal with a bandwidth much greater than that of the underlying data signal. In the base station- or gateway-to-user communication link, also referred to as the forward link, PN spreading codes or binary sequences are used to discriminate between signals transmitted by different base stations or between signals of different beams, satellites, or gateways, as well as between multipath signals.
These codes are typically shared by all communication signals within a given cell or beam, and time shifted or offset between adjacent beams or cells to create different spreading codes. The time offsets provide unique beam identifiers which are useful for beam-to-beam handoff and for determining signal timing relative to basic communication system timing.
In a typical CDMA spread-spectrum communication system, channelizing codes are used to discriminate between signals intended for different users within a cell or between user signals transmitted within a satellite beam, or sub-beam, on a forward link. That is, each user transceiver has its own orthogonal channel provided on the forward link by using a unique xe2x80x98coveringxe2x80x99 or xe2x80x98channelizingxe2x80x99 orthogonal code. Walsh functions are generally used to implement the channelizing codes, with a typical length being on the order of 64 code chips for terrestrial systems and 128 code chips for satellite systems. In this arrangement, each Walsh function of 64 or 128 chips is typically referred to as a Walsh symbol.
PN code based modulation techniques used in CDMA signal processing allow spectrally similar communication signals to be quickly differentiated. This allows signals traversing different propagation paths to be readily distinguished from each other, provided path length differential causes relative propagation delays in excess of the PN code chip period. If a PN chip rate of say approximately 1.22 MHz is used, a spread spectrum communication system can distinguish or discriminate between signals or signal paths differing by more than one microsecond in path delay or time of arrival.
Wideband CDMA techniques permit problems such as multipath fading to be more readily overcome and provide a relatively high signal gain. However, some form of signal diversity is also generally provided to further reduce the deleterious effects of fading and additional problems associated with acquiring and demodulating signals in the presence of relative user and satellite or source movement within a communication system. Such movement along with large distances causes substantial dynamic changes in path lengths. Generally, three types of diversity are used in spread spectrum communication systems, including time, frequency, and space diversity. Time diversity is obtainable using error correction coding or simple repetition and time interleaving of signal components, and a form of frequency diversity is inherently provided by spreading the signal energy over a wide bandwidth. Space diversity is provided using multiple signal paths, typically, through different antennas or communication signal beams.
Typical CDMA spread spectrum communication systems contemplate the use of coherent modulation and demodulation techniques for forward link user terminal communications. In communication systems using this approach, a xe2x80x98pilotxe2x80x99 signal (or other known signal) can be used as a coherent phase reference for gateway- or satellite-to-user and base station-to-user links. That is, a pilot signal, which typically contains no data modulation, is transmitted by a base station or gateway throughout a given region of coverage. A single pilot is typically transmitted by each gateway or base station for each frequency used, typically referred to as a CDMA channel, an FDM channel, or as a sub-beam in some systems. This pilot is shared by all users using that CDMA channel, from a common source. Generally, sectors each have their own distinct pilot signals while satellite systems transfer a pilot within each satellite beam, or frequency or sub-beam, which originates with gateways using the satellite. This provides signals that can be readily distinguished from each other, also distinguishing between beams and cells while providing simplified signal acquisition.
Pilot signals are employed by user terminals to obtain initial system synchronization, and provide robust time, frequency, and phase tracking of transmitted signals and a channel gain reference. Phase information obtained from a pilot signal is used as a phase reference for coherent demodulation of communication system or user information signals. Since pilot signals do not generally involve data modulation, they essentially consist of the PN spreading codes which are modulated onto a carrier frequency. Sometimes, the PN spreading codes are referred to as pilot code sequences. The PN spreading codes are generally time shifted with respect to each other to achieve distinguishable pilot signals.
Pilot signals are generally used to gauge relative signal or beam strength for received communication signals. In many systems, pilot signals are also generally transmitted at a higher power level than typical traffic or other data signals to provide a greater signal-to-noise ratio and interference margin. This higher power level also enables an initial acquisition search for a pilot signal to be accomplished at high speed while providing for very accurate tracking of the pilot carrier phase using relatively wide bandwidth, and lower cost, phase tracking circuits.
As part of the process of establishing a communication link, the user terminal employs a receiver referred to as a xe2x80x98searcher receiverxe2x80x99, or simply xe2x80x98searcherxe2x80x99, to synchronize with the pilot phase and PN spreading code timing in the presence of unknown carrier frequency offsets. Several techniques and devices have been used to provide this searcher function. One such technique is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,109,390 entitled xe2x80x9cDiversity Receiver In A CDMA Cellular Telephone System,xe2x80x9d issued Apr. 28, 1992, which is assigned to the assignee of the present invention, and incorporated herein by reference.
One of the problems associated with pilot acquisition/synchronization and signal demodulation processes is the amount of time required for users to acquire the pilot signals. More accurately, it is the amount of time required to acquire the phase or timing of the PN spreading codes used in generating pilot signals, for use in demodulating other communication signals.
In terrestrial repeater based systems, such as land based wireless cellular telephone services, a relatively long PN code sequence of 32,687 chips in length is used, which is docked at a chipping rate on the order of 1.2288 mega-chips per second (Mcps). This length is useful in differentiating signals in a system having a large number of closely spaced cells. Since such wireless systems have consistently strong pilot signals, acquisition times can remain short for this length. That is, with robust pilot signals, and little or no Doppler frequency shifting, or similar effects, the time required to select and verify a correct phase, or signal timing, is still relatively short. However, for satellite based systems, Doppler effects on the frequency, and degradation of pilot signal power along with lower power pilot signals, generally results in longer times for acquiring and verifying pilot signal timing.
Therefore, shorter PN spreading codes have been contemplated in order to help substantially shorten the overall searching or acquisition time in view of the lengthened time taken for testing hypotheses, verification, and so forth. In this type of communication environment, PN codes on the order of 1024 chips in length have been contemplated, which results in a code length of about 833 xcexcsec., at the chip rate mentioned above. Many systems package information bearing channels into blocks of bits, or xe2x80x9cframes,xe2x80x9d where frame synchronization is required before the bits can be used. The exact meaning or subsequent processing of the information bits is a function of location within the frames. Such data frames are typically 20 to 80 msec. in length, which creates problems in determining proper frame timing when working with the much shorter PN codes. A short PN code by itself leaves many unresolved hypotheses of frame timing. The correct frame timing can only be found by trial and error of the different hypotheses. This uncertainty in frame timing delays the acquisition of the information channels or signals.
Unfortunately, the path delays for signal transfers from gateways-to-satellites and satellites-to-users or transceivers also create a major problem for shortening the PN codes. The distances involved, even for low Earth orbits, impose significant path delays on signals, which can vary widely depending on satellite orbital positions. This results in the signal time offsets for different satellites or signal sources being significantly shifted relative to each other, so that signals otherwise offset from each other begin to be aligned, which prevents proper signal differentiation. That is, signals are affected by a dynamic range of path delays on the order of 7 msec. which means they are no longer adequately separated in time and cannot be properly distinguished as to beams or signal sources. The obvious solution of lengthening the PN spreading codes by even a small amount re-introduces undesirable time delays in signal acquisition.
Therefore, what is needed is a new technique for spreading forward link signals so that receivers can still acquire phase and beam identification information used for signal demodulation over short time intervals while compensating for relatively high signal delay paths and lower power pilot signals associated with satellites moving relative to signal recipients.
In view of the above and other problems found in the art relative to acquiring and processing communication signals in spread spectrum communication systems, one purpose of the present invention is to improve signal acquisition.
One advantage of the present invention is that it provides for the use of short PN sequences for signal acquisition while maintaining signal differentiation for identification, and improving synchronization to information channel timing.
These and other purposes, advantages, and objects of the invention are realized in a method and apparatus for spreading signals in a spread spectrum communication system in which digital information signals are bandwidth spread using a preselected pseudorandom noise (PN) spreading code to produce spread spectrum modulation signals. An exemplary communication system is a wireless data or telephone system that uses multiple satellite repeaters to receive communication signals from gateway type base stations and transfer them to one or more of a plurality of mobile or portable stations having receivers. Information signals in such systems are generally converted from analog to digital form, as necessary, and then interleaved and encoded for error detection and correction purposes before being transferred to system users. The encoded signals may be combined with one or more orthogonal functions to provide channelization of the information signals.
In a preferred embodiment, a first PN spreading code is generated with a preselected first code length and first period or periodicity. This code is referred to as an inner code. A second PN code sequence is produced having a second predetermined code length, and a period substantially longer than the first. This code is referred to as an outer code. The PN codes can be generated using first and second PN generators, respectively. In some systems PN code generation devices or circuits may be time shared in generating some of the codes or sequences. The update or generation rate or xe2x80x9cchipping ratexe2x80x9d for the second PN code or code generator is significantly less than the update or generation rate of the first.
Typically, the first PN spreading code is input to a first spreading means or element where it is used to spread the information signals to be transmitted, resulting in the production of first spread spectrum signals. The resulting first spread spectrum signals are input to a second spreading element where they are combined with the second PN code sequence to produce second spread spectrum signals. Typically, multipliers are used to combine the PN codes and signals at each step. The resulting spread spectrum signals can be transferred to transmission circuits for modulating onto a carrier signal, followed by transmission by the communication system to one or more system users.
However, in further aspects of the invention the second PN code is combined with the information signals first and then the first PN code is used for spreading the resulting signals. Alternatively, the two codes are combined to produce a unique spreading code that is essentially an outer code modified inner code, which is then used to spread the information signals.
In an exemplary spread spectrum system, information signals are applied equally to an In-Phase channel and a Quadrature-Phase channel and the first spreading element uses a PN code generator to produce an In-Phase PN chip code for one channel using a first polynomial function, and a second PN code generator to produce a Quadrature-Phase PN chip code for the other channel using a second, different, polynomial function. The second spreading element uses a third PN code generator to produce a third PN chip code using yet another polynomial function
The entire first PN spreading code period is equal to one chip period for the second PN code, and the respective periods of the PN codes are synchronized to begin at the same time. These codes can be implemented, for example, as pre-selected portions of m-sequence PN codes, or augmented length maximal-length linear sequence PN codes. The longer total code period PN code or code sequence forms an xe2x80x98outerxe2x80x99 code for which system timing is easier to acquire, while the shorter period PN spreading code forms an xe2x80x98innerxe2x80x99 code that maintains a desirable level of signal non-interference. The overall affect is to provide improved signal identification and synchronization to signal timing, while maintaining reasonably fast signal acquisition.
A code sequence found useful for the second PN code of the invention when a first PN code of length 1024 is used, is 288 chips long and has chip values beginning with the series or set xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 1 xe2x88x921 1 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 1 1 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 1 xe2x88x921 1 1 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 1 xe2x88x921 1, and ending with all remaining chips being 1. Alternatively, a code found useful is xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 1 1 xe2x88x921 1 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 1 xe2x88x921 1 1 1 xe2x88x921 1 1 1 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 xe2x88x921 1 1 1 . . . 1. Another code found useful is generated using the characteristic polynomial Q(z)=1+z3+z4+z6+z9, and then using a 288 chip sequence.
In further aspects of the invention, spreading elements can be implemented by storing pre-selected PN codes in data storage means or memory elements, such as ROM or RAM circuits. The codes are then retrieved and provided as inputs to multipliers that also receive corresponding information or spread signals as inputs.
The second PN code can also be differentially encoded, to reduce requirements for phase coherence, by passing the retrieved code through a one-chip delay element and inputting it to another multiplier which also receives undelayed code. The multiplier forms a product between the delayed and undelayed PN code, and provides the product as a differentially encoded output. Alternatively, the data storage could contain a differentially encoded version of the second PN code sequence.
On the reception side of the communication system, the timing of such multi-layered spread spectrum communication signals is acquired using a receiver in which communication signals are first demodulated to remove the carrier and then despread. A despreader or despreading means combines the received spread spectrum signal with the second or inner PN spreading code to produce a first level or intermediate despread signal. An accumulator is used to accumulate this despread signal over the period of the second PN code or a chip period of the first code, and differentially detects the phase shift between consecutive accumulated signals, or decodes the accumulated signals. The detected signal is subjected to a matched filtering process, and the results compared to a preselected threshold value. In addition, the threshold value used in this comparison can be preselected or produced by determining an average value for the magnitude of the detected signal over the first PN code period. This value can be scaled appropriately.

Multi-layered PN code spreading in a multi-user communications system


An exemplary illuminating device comprises a light source module, a light reflective module, a lens array and a light transmissive module. The lens array is for expanding a light field of the illuminating device along a first direction and compressing the light field of the illuminating device along a second direction. The light transmissive module comprises a first surface facing towards the lens array and a second surface opposite to the first surface. The second surface has a plurality of microstructures formed thereon thereby expanding the light field of the illuminating device along the first direction.

1. Technical Field
The present disclosure generally relates to illuminating devices, particularly, to an illuminating device having improved utilization rate.
2. Discussion of Related Art
With the continuing development of scientific technology, light emitting diodes (LEDs) have been widely used in illumination devices to substitute for conventional cold cathode fluorescent lamps (CCFL) due to their high brightness, long life-span, and wide color gamut.
Conventional illuminating devices incorporating LEDs generally generate butterfly-type light fields or diffusion-type light fields. Referring to FIG. 9, a diffusion-type light field is shown. The diffusion-type light field is substantially circular. In other words, a part of the light field along an x-direction is substantially the same as a part of the light field along a y-direction. However, this type of light field is not a good fit for street lights, which usually requires a strip-type light field. If the diffusion-type light field is applied in the street lamp, part of light will be lost, which decreases utilization rate of the light emitted from the LEDs.
What is needed, therefore, is an illuminating device which can improve utilization rate of the light emitted from LEDs.


A method for detecting a vital sign of a subject (102) comprises: receiving (302) a reflected radio frequency signal from the subject (102), the reflected signal being based on a transmitted signal, which is Doppler-shifted due to mechanical movements corresponding to the heart rate and/or the respiratory rate; dividing (304) a baseband signal into a sequence of sliding windows (200), each sliding window (200) representing a time interval; estimating (306) a vital sign parameter in at least one sliding window (200); determining (308) whether a vital sign parameter may be reliably estimated in at least one sliding window (200); on condition that the vital sign parameter may not be reliably estimated in a sliding window (200), determining (310) a vital sign parameter of the sliding window (200) based on vital sign parameters estimated in a plurality of windows representing time intervals close to the time interval of the window (200).

In recent year, contactless health monitoring has become an increasingly hot topic. For that reason, radar techniques are of high interest as it offers contactless monitoring. Radar techniques have been investigated for vital signs monitoring, such as determining a heartbeat rate and/or a respiratory rate of a subject.
The radar techniques may utilize a Doppler shift that is caused by mechanical movements of heart and chest (lungs) in order to detect the mechanical movements which may be converted to measurements of the heartbeat rate and respiratory rate.
The limit of current devices is that it is possible to monitor heartbeat and respiration rate under "ideal condition", that is, with subjects constrained to be motionless (i.e., seated or lying down avoiding any kind of random body movement). In fact, the received signals may be strongly disturbed by the influence of random body movements, such as movements of arms and legs or other parts of the body. The random body movements may be at least an order of magnitude larger than the pulmonary activity (typical frequency is within 0.1-0.3 Hz and the amplitude is about 10 mm) and the heart movement (typical frequency is within 1-1.5 Hz and the amplitude is about 0.1 mm).
Some solutions have been proposed for solving the problem of random body movements destroying possibilities of determining vital signs. For instance, in US 2010/0198083, a method for cancelling body movement effect for non-contact vital sign detection is described. The method comprises sending a first electromagnetic signal to a first side of a body and sending a second electromagnetic signal to a second side of a body, wherein the first and second electromagnetic signals have different frequencies. Based on first and second reflected electromagnetic signals, first and second baseband complex signals are extracted. The first baseband complex signal is mathematically combined with the second baseband complex signal to cancel out a Doppler frequency drift therebetween to yield a periodic Doppler phase effect.
However, the method is based on a human subject being perfectly positioned in between two radars, positioned respectively in front and on the back of the human subject. Further, the method is based on the random movements producing two baseband signals with the same amplitude but out-of-the-phase, while the periodic vital signs movements produce two identical signals. Adding the two baseband signals, the resulting single channel signal will contain only the desired information. As it can be easily understood, this method still applies to random body movements occurring in ideal conditions. In fact, (1) the body random movements have to be within few millimeters, (2) the subject has to be perfectly in between the two radars, (3) the radars should perform exactly the same without any unbalance, and (4) the vital signs displacements are the same from the front and the back.
Thus, there still remains a need of decreasing sensitivity of vital signs detection to random body movements.

Method and a system for detecting a vital sign of a subject


The present invention relates to a method of preventing abnormal large grains from being included in a NCD thin film during a hot filament CVD process by appropriately controlling the deposition condition regarding a temperature-measuring means, a deposition pressure, an electrical potential and/or the composition of a raw material gas flow.

A thin NCD film, which has grain sizes of nm dimensions, represents a low surface roughness, low deposition temperature, low residual stress, and equiaxed grain structure, as compared to a columnar structure of a thin microcrystalline diamond (MCD) film having grain sizes of micron level. Accordingly, the NCD film has been applied to a wide variety of fields.
A microwave plasma-assisted CVD and a hot filament CVD have been most widely employed in depositing the NCD film. The microwave plasma-assisted CVD produces less contamination during process, and high decomposition efficiency due to the use of plasma, but has disadvantages of requiring an expensive equipment. Whereas, the hot filament CVD has advantages in that it is cost-effective and readily employable to mass production and to make large area films.
One of the most important interests in depositing the NCD film is to reduce the size of grains to a level of nm and also uniformly implement a microstructure thereof. This microstructure characteristic may include the size and distribution of grains, the surface roughness, the existence of pinholes or voids, and so on. Of them, the size and distribution of grains is the most important parameters. For example, there is a possibility that large grains having several hundreds nm or μm or more in size may be included in a NCD film comprised of grains having a size of a level of 20 to 50 nm. This inclusion of these abnormal large grains is a known phenomenon in microstructure of ceramic sintered body and hard carbonaceous sintered body, and there has been made many efforts to prevent such phenomenon because it causes to degrade fracture strength (see [Cha et al. Material Science and Engineering A, 356:381-389, 2003] and [Cho et al., J. Am. Ceram. Soc., 87(3):443-448, 2004]).
For example, in documents [Wei Liu, et al., Thin Solid Films, 467:4-9, 2004], Shr-Ming Huang, et al., Surface and Coatings Technology, 200:3160-3165, 2006] and X. T. Zhou, et al., Applied Physics Letters, 80:3307-3309, 2002], a method of reducing the size of grains by continuously applying a negative bias to a substrate during a deposition process has been attempted. However, this method gives damage to the surface of the diamond thin film due to the collision of ions having a large mass, and has disadvantages in that the content of non-diamond phase on the surface of the diamond thin film increases and residual stress significantly increases.
Further, in a document [Wu Nan-Chun, et al., Chin. phys. lett., 22(11):2969-2972, 2005], a method of applying a positive bias to a substrate while lowering a gas pressure to 7 torr or less in an electron-associated (EA) CVD process were used in order to make finer size of grains to a size of a nm level. This document discloses that since the fine grains are generated by the collision of electrons caused by the positive bias, a mean free path of the electrons increases by lowering the gas pressure, thereby increasing the acceleration of electrons and thus, resulting in finer grains. However, in this document, a carbon source (e.g., CH3COCH3) including oxygen was used, and the range of a gas pressure used was very low. This document also reported that a gas pressure of 15 torr generates MCD, whereas lowering of the pressure to 7.5 torr and 0.75 torr stepwise can reduce grain sizes.
As described above, although many efforts have been made to prevent the inclusion of abnormal large grains occurring in the microstructure of a NCD film deposited by a hot filament CVD process, there is still a need for the improvement of this technique.

Method of preventing abnormal large grains from being included into thin nano-crystalline diamond film

Korea Institute of Science and Technology


The present invention provides high throughput screening systems for identifying compounds that modulate the biological activity of a biochemically functional sarcomere. The method can be performed in plurality simultaneously with fluorescence or absorbance readouts.

The invention relates to methods for the identification of contractile modulators of the cardiac sarcomere and use of such methods for the identification of therapeutic agents.
Congestive heart failure is a growing epidemic in our aging population. Its prevalence has been growing as the population ages and as cardiologists are more successful at reducing mortality from ischemic heart disease, the most common cause of congestive heart failure. Roughly 4.6 million people in the United States have heart failure with an incidence approaching 10 per 1000 after age 65 years. Hospital discharges for congestive heart failure rose from 377,000 in 1979 to 957,000 in 1997 making congestive heart failure the most common discharge diagnosis in people age 65 and over. The five year mortality from congestive heart failure approaches 50%. Hospitalization for heart failure is usually the result of inadequate outpatient therapy. Hence, while heart failure therapy has greatly improved over the last several years, new and better therapies are still required to improve these still dismal statistics.
Inotropes are drugs that increase the contractile ability of the heart. As a group, all current inotropes have failed to meet the gold standard for heart failure therapy, that is, to prolong patient survival (FDA Cardiorenal Panel: Minutes Jan. 27, 1998 afternoon session, www.fda.gov). Despite this fact, intravenous inotropes continue to be widely used in acute heart failure to allow for reinstitution of oral medications or to bridge patients to heart transplantation, whereas in chronic heart failure, oral digoxin is used as an effective inotrope to relieve patient symptoms, improve the quality of life, and reduce hospital admissions for heart failure.
Currently, there is a paucity of agents that can safely improve cardiac function; most agents have detrimental side effects if given for more than a few days. As for chronic inotropic use, only digoxin has proven safe to administer even though it has a narrow therapeutic range. The most recently approved short-term intravenous agent, milrinone, is now over ten years old. The only available oral drug, digoxin, is over 200 hundred years old. There is a great need for agents that exploit new mechanisms of action and may have better outcomes in terms of relief of symptoms, safety, and patient mortality, both short-term and long-term. The present invention provides methods for identifying such agents.
The present invention provides methods to identify candidate agents that bind to a protein or act as a modulator of the binding characteristics or biological activity of a protein. In one embodiment, the method is performed in plurality simultaneously. For example, the method can be performed at the same time on multiple assay mixtures in a multi-well screening plate. Furthermore, in a preferred embodiment, fluorescence or absorbance readouts are utilized to determine activity. Thus, in one aspect, the invention provides a high throughput screening system.
In one embodiment, the present invention provides a method of identifying a candidate agent as a modulator of the activity of a target protein complex. Preferably, the target protein complex either directly or indirectly produces ADP or phosphate. More preferably, the target protein complex comprises a preparation comprising one or more of the following proteins: myosin, actin, and cardiac regulatory proteins. In a particularly preferred embodiment, the target protein complex is a reconstituted sarcomere consisting of actin, myosin, and the cardiac regulatory proteins.
The method further comprises adding a candidate agent to a mixture comprising the target protein complex under conditions that normally allow the production of ADP or phosphate. The method further comprises subjecting the mixture to an enzymatic reaction that uses said ADP or phosphate as a substrate under conditions that normally allow the ADP or phosphate to be utilized and determining the level of activity of the enzymatic reaction as a measure of the concentration of ADP or phosphate. The phrase xe2x80x9cuse ADP or phosphatexe2x80x9d means that the ADP or phosphate are directly acted upon. In one case, the ADP, for example, can be hydrolyzed or can be phosphorylated. As another example, the phosphate can be added to another compound. As used herein, in each of these cases, ADP or phosphate is acting as a substrate. A change in the level between the presence and absence of the candidate agent indicates a modulator of the target protein complex.


A photomask has a plurality of transparent regions defined in an opaque region and classified into first and second groups. Each of the transparent regions belonging to one of the first and second groups is provided with a phase shifter, so that the phase of light transmitted through the transparent region belonging to the first group becomes different from the phase of light transmitted through the transparent region belonging to the second group. The photomask includes: a pair of first transparent regions belonging to the first group and including linear portions disposed in parallel, a virtual straight line interconnecting one ends of the first transparent regions intersecting at a right angle with the extension direction of the linear portions; and a second transparent region belonging to the second group and disposed at the center between, and in parallel to, the linear portions of the pair of first transparent regions, the second transparent region including a linear thickportion and a linear thin portion, the linear thin portion being disposed in an area between the pair of first transparent regions and continuously coupled to the linear thick portion, and a connection portion between the thick and thin portions being indented from the virtual straight line toward the area between the pair of first transparent regions.

a) Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a photomask to be used in a photolithography process of semiconductor device manufacture, and to a method of manufacturing a semiconductor device by using such a photomask. The invention specifically relates to a phase shift type photomask and a method of manufacturing a semiconductor device using such a phase shift type photomask.
b) Description of the Related Art
In a Levenson type phase shift photomask, a phase shifter is disposed at one of each pair of adjacent transparent regions. Light transmitted through the transparent region provided with the phase shifter has a phase shift of, for example, 180.degree. relative to light transmitted through the transparent region not provided with the phase shifter. Therefore, the intensity of light exposed on a semiconductor substrate is lowered by light interference at the middle of substrate regions corresponding to each pair of transparent regions. In this manner, a resolution of adjacent bright regions can be improved.
By using a Levenson type phase shift photomask, resolution at the area where the same pattern is regularly repeated can be improved. However, in a practical semiconductor integrated circuit device, not only regularly repeated patterns but also irregular patterns or isolated patterns from nearby patterns are used. There are also connection areas between regular patterns and irregular patterns or isolated patterns.
A sufficient resolution may not be obtained at connection areas between regular patterns and irregular patterns or isolated patterns.

Levenson type phase shift photomask and manufacture method of semiconductor device using such photomask


Embodiments of the invention describe a modulator having first and second synthesizers, for example, fractional-N synthesizers, that generate first and second outphased modulated signals with aligned phases. Embodiments of the modulator may align the phases of the outphased signals using first and second feedback loops associated with first and second modulation paths of the modulator.

Mobile Stations (MS), handheld devices, Base Stations (BS), Access Points (AP) and other devices of wireless communication systems may include transmitters to transmit Radio Frequency (RF) signals. The transmitters may be linear transmitters, outphasing transmitters, and the like. Transmitters that are used to transmit continuous phase modulation signals, such as, for example, Gaussian Minimum Shift Keying (GMSK) signals, and the like, may combine a linear amplification technique using non-linear components (LINC) with direct modulation through one or more modulation paths that may include fractional-N synthesizers with built in data modulators and power amplifiers. Combination of the modulated, amplified signals may be implemented by a quarter wave combiner, Wilkinson combiner, reactive termination combiner and the like. Alignment of the phases of the amplified outputs to be combined may be important because even minor phase misalignment may lead to reduced efficiency of the transmitter, and may also result in a non-monotonic response that may degrade a desired linearity of the modulation process.
It will be appreciated that for simplicity and clarity of illustration, elements shown in the figures have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements may be exaggerated relative to other elements for clarity. Further, where considered appropriate, reference numerals may be repeated among the figures to indicate corresponding or analogous elements.


An active user interface assembly includes a user interface, and one or more feedback motors coupled to the user interface. The one or more feedback motors, when energized, supply a feedback force to the user interface that opposes user interface movement. One of the feedback motors is disposed such that its center of gravity is located at a position relative to the user interface to mass balance the user interface when it is in the null position. The configurations allow for the center of gravity of a feedback motor to be positioned in a manner that alleviates the need for counterbalance weights.

Aircraft typically include a plurality of flight control surfaces that, when controllably positioned, guide the movement of the aircraft from one destination to another. The number and type of flight control surfaces included in an aircraft may vary, but typically include both primary flight control surfaces and secondary flight control surfaces. The primary flight control surfaces are those that are used to control aircraft movement in the pitch, yaw, and roll axes, and the secondary flight control surfaces are those that are used to influence the lift or drag (or both) of the aircraft. Although some aircraft may include additional control surfaces, the primary flight control surfaces typically include a pair of elevators, a rudder, and a pair of ailerons, and the secondary flight control surfaces typically include a plurality of flaps, slats, and spoilers.
The positions of the aircraft flight control surfaces are typically controlled using a flight control surface actuation system. The flight control surface actuation system, in response to position commands that originate from either the flight crew or an aircraft autopilot, moves the aircraft flight control surfaces to the commanded positions. In most instances, this movement is effected via actuators that are coupled to the flight control surfaces.
Typically, the position commands that originate from the flight crew are supplied via some type of input control mechanism. For example, many aircraft include two yoke and wheel type of mechanisms, one for the pilot and one for the co-pilot. Either mechanism can be used to generate desired flight control surface position commands. More recently, however, aircraft are being implemented with control stick type mechanisms, which may be implemented as either side sticks or center sticks. Most notably in aircraft that employ a fly-by-wire system. Similar to the traditional yoke and wheel mechanisms, it is common to include multiple control stick mechanisms in the cockpit, one for the pilot and one for the co-pilot.
Most control stick mechanisms are implemented with some type of mass balance, such as counterbalance weights, to alleviate a potentially large moment that may exist when an aircraft experiences accelerations resulting from longitudinal and lateral accelerations. These additional counterbalance weights can be undesirable in some instances. For example, the counterbalance weights, when included, are in addition to the mounting, control, and feedback hardware associated with the control stick mechanism. Thus, overall size envelope and weight may increase, which may result in a concomitant increase in costs.
Hence, there is a need for a flight control stick mechanism that is mass balanced, but does not increase, or at least significantly increase, overall control stick size and/or weight. The present invention addresses at least this need.

Motor balanced active user interface assembly


A fluid filter media including a first media layer, a second media layer, a filter layer disposed between the first media layer and the second media layer, and a plurality of spaced apart weld points that couple the first media layer, the filter layer, and the second media layer together, where the weld points distort the surface of the first media layer and the second media layer, the fluid filter media is folded back on itself to form a plurality of pleats, and the surface distortions permit fluid flow through the fluid filter media when adjacent surfaces of the fluid filter media touch.

The subject invention relates generally to fluid filter media products and more specifically to fluid filter media products comprising a pleated fluid filter medium.
Fluid Filters are used in a variety of applications to remove particulates and debris (i.e., contaminants) from fluids. For example, fluid filters are commonly used in machinery (e.g., vehicles, engines, etc.) to filter oil, gas, air, and/or other fluids. For example, most vehicles (e.g., cars, trucks, tractors, etc.) contain an oil filter, gas filter, transmission filter, and air filter that remove contaminants from the oil, gas, transmission fluid, and air. Industrial equipment (e.g., compressors, hydraulics, vacuums, purifiers, etc.) often use fluid filters as well to remove contaminants and/or to purify fluids.
Fluid filters often include a filter medium that is placed in the fluid stream or fluid path so that the fluid is forced to flow through (i.e., pass through) the filter medium. The filter medium may be made of a porous or semi porous material that entraps and sequesters suspended contaminants as the fluid passes through the filter medium. The porosity and/or permeability of the filter medium may be varied depending on the application and/or the size of the particles/contaminant to be filtered. For example, in applications that require virtually contaminant free fluids, the filter medium may be constructed to filter very fine particles. In applications where filtering very fine particles is less of a concern, the filter medium may be constructed to only filter larger particles. Because the fluid is forced to flow/pass through the filter medium, a pressure drop normally exists across the filter medium. The pressure drop across the filter medium may depend on the size and/or type of particle/contaminant to be filtered, with finer particle/contaminant filtering resulting in an increased pressure drop.
The amount of fluid that can be filtered by a fluid filter in a given amount of time and pressure depends on several factors including the surface area of the filter medium. Generally, as the surface area of the filter medium increases, the more fluid the filter is able to filter in a given amount of time. Similarly, over time, the increase of the pressure drop across a filter medium is generally reduced as the surface area increases due to an increased ability to filter particles without becoming saturated. Thus, the lifespan of the fluid filter is also increased because the filter is able to filter more fluid before becoming saturated with filtered contaminants/particles and exceeding the pressure drop limits. However, the surface area of the filter medium is often limited by the volume that the fluid filter may occupy. To increase a filter medium's surface area for a given volume, the filter medium may be pleated by bending the filter medium back on itself several times.
A problem associated with pleating the filter medium is that adjacent pleats may collapse, or in other words, the surfaces of adjacent pleats may touch. Adjacent pleats may collapse due to the pressure drop across the filter medium and/or due to prolonged use. Pleat collapsing generally may increase over the life of the fluid filter due to pressure drop increases due to media loading. Pleat collapsing often restricts or eliminates fluid flow through the collapsed area of the filter medium, which may result in an additional increased pressure drop across the filter medium and/or in a failure of the fluid filter to properly filter a fluid (e.g., the fluid filter does not filter a sufficient amount of fluid in a given amount of time).
High performance (e.g., finer particle/contaminant filtering) and/or long life fluid filters often require greater filtration efficiency and higher dirt loading properties, which means that an increased number of pleats may be required when compared to similar lower quality filters. Such high quality filters may experience a greater risk of pleat collapsing due to the increased number of pleats and/or due to the reduced spacing between the pleats. In addition, high quality filters are often subjected to increased pressure drops due to finer particle filtration, which may further increase the risk of pleat collapsing.
To reduce the pleat collapsing problem, a separator may be applied between the pleats on either or both the upstream side and downstream side of the filter medium. The separator may be a thin strip or bead of glue applied between the pleats (e.g., hot melt glue beads), crimps in the filter medium, nylon mesh or screen applied to the filter medium, etc. The need for separators may increase as the risk of pleat collapsing increases. Adding separators to fluid filters, however, often increases the manufacturing time, manufacturing costs, and/or material costs of the fluid filter. Additionally, adding an extra layer to act as separators in the pleat configuration takes up media space, thus reducing the number of pleats in the filter or requiring an increase in the filter element size. In addition, pleat collapsing may still occur despite the use of a pleat separator.


Tooth portions are formed at unit angles on a rotor connected with a crankshaft of an internal combustion engine. A toothless portion is formed on the rotor by irregularly changing the regular arrangement of the tooth portions. A controller of the engine estimates times necessary for rotation of unit angles of an arbitrary angular range of 50° CA including the toothless portion and a pair of tooth portions adjacent to the toothless portion by using times necessary for rotation of unit angles of a different angular range of 50° CA distant from the arbitrary angular range by 180° CA. Thus, the controller can maintain high controllability of the engine even when there occurs a range where the time necessary for the rotation of the crankshaft is not sensed appropriately.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a controller of an internal combustion engine having a function of sensing a time necessary for a unit angle of a crankshaft of the engine to rotate based on an output of a crank angle sensor sensing sensed portions formed for respective unit angles at equal intervals on a rotating body rotating in synchronization with rotation of the crankshaft.
2. Description of Related Art
It is common knowledge to sense multiple tooth portions (sensed portions) formed at equal intervals on a rotor provided on a crankshaft of an in-vehicle internal combustion engine with a crank angle sensor in order to calculate a time necessary for the crankshaft to rotate. A magnetic flux between the crank angle sensor and the rotor changes regularly because a positional relationship between the crank angle sensor, which is located near the rotor, and the tooth portions of the rotor changes regularly. Paying attention to this fact, the rotation of the tooth portions of the rotor is sensed based on the regular flux change.
In order to sense a reference position of the rotation angle of the crankshaft, a toothless portion is usually provided on the rotor by irregularly changing the disposal of the above-described tooth portions. Accordingly, the regularity of the flux change is disturbed if the crank angle sensor approaches to the toothless portion while the magnetic flux between the crank angle sensor and the rotor changes regularly with the rotation of the crankshaft. The reference position of the rotation angle of the crankshaft can be sensed based on disturbance of the regularity of the flux change.
However, since the regularity of the flux change is disturbed near the toothless portion, the rotation angle cannot be sensed with high accuracy. Control based on information with high accuracy about the rotation angle of the crankshaft cannot be performed if the engine is controlled based on the sensing value of the crank angle sensor. As a result, controllability deteriorates and there is a possibility that exhaust characteristics and drivability are deteriorated. For example, JP-A-2005-48644 describes a controller that controls an internal combustion engine based on a rotation angle of a crankshaft.
The problem of the deterioration of the controllability of the engine is not limited to the angle range having the toothless portion. This problem is common to a range where the time necessary for the rotation cannot be sensed appropriately, such as, a range where the time necessary for the rotation of the crankshaft cannot be sensed temporarily.

Controller of internal combustion engine


In an LSI package, terminal resistance elements are formed of resistive paste which, consisting of a mixture of fine powder of either oxidized metal or carbon and fine powder of glass, is buried and sintered in a ceramic wiring board in the direction to penetrate it. Front side wiring, connecting the parts of the terminal resistance elements exposed on the front face of the ceramic wiring board to input/output circuits of the LSI chip to be mounted on the front face of the ceramic wiring board, is formed on the front face of the ceramic wiring board and in the top layer of the ceramic wiring board. Back side wiring, connecting the parts of the terminal resistance elements exposed on the back face of the ceramic wiring board to a voltage clamp wiring network, is formed on the back face of the ceramic wiring board.

The present invention relates to an LSI package in which large scale integrated circuits (LSIs) for use in computers and other electronic apparatuses are installed in high density and a manufacturing method thereof, and more particularly to an LSI package having a built-in terminal resistor and a manufacturing method thereof.
In recent years, most of the main functional blocks of electronic apparatuses including computers above all, other data processing equipment and communication systems have come to be incorporated into LSIs to meet the need for ever faster processing. If LSIs become even larger in the scale of integration to enable a plurality of functional blocks to be incorporated into a single LSI chip, wiring between functional blocks will be shortened to further enhance the overall processing speed of the apparatus.
On the other hand, available industrial technology limits the extent of enhancing the scale of circuit integration and, from the viewpoint of economic optimization, the plurality of functional blocks constituting an electronic apparatus are divided into a plurality of LSI chips, which are arranged in high density to minimize the distances between them and thereby to increase the processing speed of the apparatus.
In particular, what consist of bare LSI chips, not encased, installed on a small wiring board at minimized spacing are known as an LSI package (typical of which is a multi-chip module, abbreviated to MCM). This configuration is being increasingly applied as a technique to reduce the wiring distances between LSI chips and thereby to effectively achieve faster processing by electronic apparatuses. One example is disclosed in Rao R. Tummala et al., Microelectronics Packaging Handbook, 1989, Van Nostrand Reinhold, pp. 786-790.
In such an LSI package, circuits linking LSI chips, which should ideally be accommodated within the LSI chips themselves, span the spaces between the LSI chips, and accordingly are required to permit significantly high speed. At present, square wave signals of tens to hundreds of MHz are used for transfers over these circuits.
To drive such LSI chip circuits in an LSI package, emitter coupled logic (ECL) output circuits of emitter follower type or gunning terminal logic (GTL) output circuits of source follower type, both capable of operating at high speed and having a large load driving capacity, are used.
In signal wiring connected to such output circuits (ECL circuits and GTL circuits), reflection occurs at ends, and transferred signals are distorted by multiple reflection. Therefore, in high speed signal transfers, signal wiring should be terminated with intrinsic impedances.
In an LSI package, generally, 10 to 100 LSI chips are mounted on a wiring board. As the wiring board is rectangular, having 6 to 15 cm long sides, the signal wiring length between LSI chips is 10 to 30 cm. Accordingly, when driving with LSI chips whose pulse rise characteristic is no more than 1 ns, terminal resistors are indispensable.
According to the prior art, such terminal resistors are either arranged on the wiring board surface as independent chips along with LSI chips or formed in advance on the wiring board as described in the Gazette of the Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 119047 of 1989 or that of the Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 227561 of 1991.
As stated above, terminal resistors provided on an LSI package, according to the prior art, are either arranged on the wiring board surface as independent chips along with LSI chips or formed in advance on the wiring board.
As the corresponding area of the wiring board surface is occupied by the terminal resistance elements in either of these manners, the distances either between adjoining LSI chips or between the terminal resistors and input/output circuits of the LSI chips are extended, resulting in cumbrance to high speed signal transfers. Therefore, the prior art involves the problem that the benefit of using an LSI package in an electronic apparatus (the benefit of increasing the processing speed of the electronic apparatus in which the LSI package is used) cannot be fully realized.
An object of the present invention is to provide, in view of the above-stated problem, an LSI package (LSI package with built-in terminal resistors), typically an MCM, which makes it possible to reduce the area of the wiring board surface occupied by terminal resistors, to position the terminal resistors close to input/output terminals of LSI chips and thereby to transfer signals at high speed. Another object of the invention is to provide a method to manufacture such LSI packages with built-in terminal resistors.

LSI package and manufacturing method thereof


A high-purity cycloaliphatic diepoxy compound of General Formula (II) is an epoxidized product of a cycloaliphatic diolefinic compound of General Formula (I) having an isomer content as detected in gas chromatography (GC) of 15% or less:

A variety of diepoxy compounds each having two cycloaliphatic skeletons per molecule are currently commercially available as, for example, CEL-2021 (3,4-epoxycyclohexylmethyl 3′,4′-epoxycyclohexanecarboxylate), CEL-3000 (1,2,8,9-diepoxylimonene), and CEL-2081 (a ∈-caprolactone oligomer combined with 3,4-epoxycyclohexylmethanol and 3,4-epoxycyclohexanecarboxylic acid at both ends through ester bond, respectively), each of which is available from Daicel Chemical Industries, Ltd. CEL-3000 contains methyl group in carbon constituting epoxy group and thereby has a lower reactivity of epoxy group than compounds which do not contain such methyl group. CEL-2021P and CEL-2081 are hydrolyzable, because they have ester bond in the molecule. Accordingly, cured products of them may have impaired properties when used at high temperatures and high humidity or used under such a condition that a strong acid is formed. Demands have therefore been made to provide epoxy compounds having a cycloaliphatic skeleton with no ester bond in the molecule.
Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication (JP-A) No. 48-29899 discloses a cured article of a cycloaliphatic diepoxy compound obtained by synthetically preparing a diepoxy compound represented by following compound (II):
wherein X is CH2; and R1 to R18 are each hydrogen atom, and carrying out a curing reaction of this compound with an acid anhydride. The document mentions that the resulting cured article has improved properties as compared with cured articles of known cycloaliphatic diepoxy compounds. This technique, however, uses perbenzoic acid for the preparation of the cycloaliphatic diepoxy compound and is hard to use industrially. Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication (JP-A) No. 58-172387 discloses a technique of synthetically preparing a percarboxylic acid from hydrogen peroxide, an acid catalyst, and an organic acid, extracting the percarboxylic acid with an organic solvent, and carrying out epoxidation of the extracted compound. This technique employs long procedures, yields large amounts of waste materials, and requires complicated operations. In addition, the percarboxylic acid contains not only water but also hydrogen peroxide and the acid catalyst, even though in trace amounts, and may thereby become unstable and be reduced in concentration in a short time in the reaction step for the preparation of the percarboxylic acid and extraction step. The reduction in concentration of the percarboxylic acid also causes oxygen formation, and formed oxygen makes inside of the reactor dangerous and invites side reactions of the epoxidized product typically in the epoxidation reaction step and a step of purifying the resulting epoxy compound. Such by-products reduce the recovery of the target product and contaminate the preparation apparatus. Thus, the technique is industrially disadvantageous.
Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication (JP-A) No. 2002-275169 discloses a technique of synthetically preparing a cycloaliphatic diepoxy compound represented by General Formula (II) by oxidizing acetaldehyde with air to yield peracetic acid, and epoxidizing a compound having two cycloaliphatic olefin skeletons and containing no ester bond in the molecule with the peracetic acid. However, only desolvation is conduced in the synthetic preparation of the cycloaliphatic diepoxy compound, and the product contains high-molecular weight components having shorter elution times than that of the cycloaliphatic diepoxy compound detected in gel permeation chromatography (hereinafter referred to as "GPC") analysis; impurities having shorter retention times than that of the cycloaliphatic diepoxy compound represented by General Formula (II), as well as reaction intermediates, as detected in analysis using a gas chromatograph (hereinafter referred to as "GC"). The product is insufficient in color (APHA) and insufficient for use in display materials, such as liquid crystals, requiring thermal stability and/or optical transparency.
Patent Document 1: Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication (JP-A) No. 48-29899
Patent Document 2: Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication (JP-A) No. 58-172387
Patent Document 3: Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication (JP-A) No. 2002-275169

High-purity cycloaliphatic diepoxy compound and preparation process thereof

Abstract: wherein X represents a bivalent group selected from the group consisting of, for example, O, S, —SO—, —SO2—, —CH2—, and —C(CH3)2—; and R1 to R18 may be the same as or different from each other and each represent hydrogen atom, a halogen atom, a hydrocarbon group which may contain oxygen atom or a halogen atom, or an alkoxy group which may be substituted. Such a high-purity cycloaliphatic diepoxy compound is prepared by producing the cycloaliphatic diolefinic compound through distillation, epoxidizing the compound with an aliphatic percarboxylic acid containing substantially no water, carrying out desolvation, and further purifying the epoxidized compound through distillation.


A scroll compressor includes a housing, a discharge passage, a rotary shaft, a fixed scroll, a movable scroll, an oil separator and an oil reservoir for compressing refrigerant gas containing lubricating oil. The housing has a rear housing which has a partition wall. The discharge passage is formed in the housing. The discharge passage has a discharge chamber, a discharge hole and an accommodation chamber. The discharge chamber and the accommodation chamber are communicated with each other through the discharge hole. The oil separator is provided in the accommodation chamber. The oil separator has a separation member and an oil reserved area. The oil reservoir is defined around an entire circumference of the partition wall which defines the discharge chamber therein. The oil reservoir is formed so as to communicate with the oil reserved area of the oil separator.

The present invention relates to a scroll compressor in which a plurality of compression chambers is moved with reducing volume reduced by orbital motion of a movable scroll of the compressor to draw refrigerant gas from a suction chamber to the compression chambers and then to discharge the refrigerant gas compressed in the compression chambers into a discharge chamber.
In a conventional electric scroll compressor for a vehicle air conditioning apparatus, its housing is so formed that a front housing is joined to a rear housing. A fixed scroll which is fixed to the front housing and a movable scroll which faces the fixed scroll are provided in the front housing. In addition, the front housing has a motor chamber defined therein, and in the motor chamber an electric motor is disposed. The front housing also has a suction passage formed on a lower portion thereof so as to communicate with the motor chamber.
The front housing also has a suction chamber defined therein, and the suction chamber is formed so as to communicate with the motor chamber through the suction passage. As the electric motor is operated to rotate the movable scroll around the central axis of the fixed scroll, a plurality of compression chambers formed between spiral walls of both scrolls are moved toward the center of both spiral walls with decreasing in volume thereof. During the above motion of the compression chambers, refrigerant gas is introduced into the suction chamber through the motor chamber and the suction passage and introduced from the suction chamber into the compression chambers to be compressed in the compression chambers.
The refrigerant gas compressed in the compression chambers is discharged into a discharge chamber defined by the fixed scroll and the rear housing in the housing. The refrigerant gas discharged into the discharge chamber includes lubricating oil which circulates in the housing for lubricating drive mechanism for rotating the movable scroll around the central axis of the fixed scroll. In order to avoid the lubricating oil in the refrigerant gas in the electric scroll compressor from escaping into an external refrigerant circuit of the vehicle air conditioning apparatus, an oil separator is provided in a discharge passage of the refrigerant gas. Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No,. 2004-301090 discloses one example. If the lubricating oil is taken into the external refrigerant circuit, the lubricating oil adheres to, for example, the inner wall surface of a gas cooler or an evaporator to reduce the efficiency of heat exchange.
The above oil separator is provided with, for example, a centrifugal oil separator which separates the lubricating oil from the refrigerant gas by centrifugal separation caused by circling motion of the refrigerant gas to introduce only the refrigerant gas into the external refrigerant circuit. The lubricating oil separated from the refrigerant gas falls from the oil separator to be temporarily reserved in a lower portion of the oil separator and then returned into a back pressure chamber which is lower in pressure than the discharge chamber through a passage. The lubricating oil which has lubricated the drive mechanism in the back pressure chamber is introduced into an oil reservoir through a passage. In a region between the fixed scroll and the rear housing, the oil reservoir is defined on an outer peripheral side of the discharge chamber.
Meanwhile, in the region between the fixed scroll and the rear housing, the suction passage is formed on the lower portion of the outer peripheral side of the discharge chamber. The suction passage is surrounded by a gasket to prevent the refrigerant gas circulating in the suction passage from leaking into the oil reservoir. Therefore, the region on the outer peripheral side of the discharge chamber is partly occupied by the suction passage and is only partly occupied by the oil reservoir. Specifically, the oil reservoir can be secured only on the upside region of the gasket.

Scroll compressor having an oil reservoir surrounding the discharge chamber and an oil separator in the rear housing


There are provided a connection structure and process for connecting a eye-joint and a slender metal pipe, which is enabled by making the welding operation completely unnecessary to eliminate the working troubles and a fear of cracking or breakage, as might otherwise be caused by deteriorations in the mechanical properties in the vicinity of the connection end portion, which can use the eye-joint body and the metal pipe, as plated with a corrosion-resistance substance or coated with a resin in advance, to improve the productivity drastically thereby to ensure the connection with neither axial nor circumferential movement, and which can connect a metal pipe, if necessary, as having a diameter larger than the width of the eye-joint body. The connection structure comprises: an eye-joint body having an annular groove in its head and two side through holes leading to the annular groove to form parallel flat seat surfaces on the outer circumferences off the through holes, and including a branch pipe protruded integrally from the eye-joint body and having a stepped fitting hole formed in the circumferential side and leading to the annular groove; and a slender metal pipe adapted to have its connection end portion fitted in the fitting hole of the branch pipe of the eye-joint body. An elastic seal ring member is fitted either in the inner circumference of the fitting hole or on the outer circumference of the connection end portion of the metal pipe. The vicinity of the end portion of the branch pipe is caulked together with the connection end portion, after the connection end portion is inserted into the pipe, thereby to effect the connection.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a relatively thin and slender metal pipe having a diameter of about 20 mm or Iess and arranged as feed passages for feeding oil and air to automobiles and various machines and apparatus and, more particularly, to a connection structure and process for connecting an eye-joint acting as a connecting fitting at a connecting end portion.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A branch pipe (21'), which has a fitting hole (23) leading to an annular groove (22) formed in the head of an eye-joint body (21), and a metal pipe (P.sub.1) are connected to each other by welding them at (W), such that a connection end portion (P.sub.1 ') of the metal pipe (P.sub.1) is inserted in the fitting hole (23) of the branch pipe (21') .
In this prior art, however, the welding work (W) has not only invited a reduction in the workability but also often caused a leakage because of the uncertain work. At the same time, the overheating by the torch for the welding operation has raised a problem that a cracking or breakage is caused with the arrangement in a vibrating state at the side of the metal pipe (P.sub.1) in the vicinity of the connection end portion. In relation to the welding work (W), on the other hand, it has been impossible to use the eye-joint body (21) and the metal pipe (P.sub.1) which are either plated with a corrosion-resistant material or coated with a resin in advance, and this plating or coating treatment is required after the welding operation. As a result, the metal pipe (P.sub.1), which has already been bent into a complicated shape, may be poorly plated or coated to an uneven thickness in the plated or coated film.

Connection structure and process for connecting eye joints and slender metal pipes


A filter element, especially for filtering intake air for an internal combustion engine, which filter element is composed of a coiled filter, through which a flow of air passes axially, and which has an annular gasket on at least one end face, the annular gasket being connected to the filter element by a welded, glued, extruded or fused connection, such that the annular gasket is inserted into a suitably constructed receptacle in a filter housing and radially and/or axially positions the coiled filter. The annular gasket is arranged directly on the end face of the coiled filter and is pressed axially and/or radially into the receptacle of the housing.

This invention relates to a coiled filter element configured for axial flow and to a filter system which utilizes such a filter element.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,322,602 discloses an air filter having a filter element through which air flows axially arranged in a cylindrical filter housing. The receptacle space for receiving the filter element in the filter housing is closed by a housing cover on one axial end face in the area of the oncoming flow side of the filter. This cover is detached to enable replacement of the filter element, whereupon the filter element is removed axially from the receiving space and can be replaced by a new filter element.
This embodiment has the disadvantage that in order to replace the filter element, the housing cover in the oncoming flow area must be removed, which initially requires dismantling the entire filter housing from its installed position, because the housing cover is connected to the inlet lines for supplying the air to be cleaned. Therefore, the filter element can be replaced only with a great deal of effort, which lengthens the time required for the maintenance and results in high maintenance costs.
Furthermore, WO 2004/020075 proposes a filter system for the intake air of an internal combustion engine in particular. This filter system comprises a housing with at least two housing parts and a filter element comprising a coiled filter, in which the housing parts can be separated in the area of the fastening of the filter element. The coiled filter has a profiled gasket on its circumference, which profiled gasket consists of an elastic band designed in the form of a bead-shaped bulge. The two housing parts can be clamped over this bulge.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.


Systems and methods involve an input layer function of a function-as-a-service (FaaS) pipeline that receives trigger data from a trigger layer function of one or more processors of enterprise processing systems, calls one or more processors of an enrich layer function of the FaaS pipeline that adds enriching context to the trigger data, and creates an event based at least in part on the enriched trigger data. A route layer function of the FaaS pipeline invoked by the input layer function creates an action based on the event created by the input layer function. An action layer function of the FaaS pipeline invoked by the route layer function creates a command based on the action created by the route layer function, and the action layer function sends a remediation action to a command layer function of the enterprise processor based on the action created by the route layer function.

Enterprises currently employ many different cyber security tools for searching and protecting against malware and suspicious activities. In large scale networks, such cyber security tools generate high volumes of security events, which are typically accompanied by audit logs. Such security events may then be triaged to determine their relevance, severity and possibly their remediation. Enterprises must thereby allocate resources to monitor and act on these security events.
Large enterprises often have multiple organizational layers, which require alerts to be redirected to different teams before security events can be triaged. In addition, such security events are often enriched with additional data from sources that may be outside or inside the enterprise, some of which data may be internal or confidential. Finally, when it is necessary to react to alerts, for example, with notifications, remediation actions, and/or reports, it may be necessary for different teams to refer to the same data from different perspectives, such as research and development perspectives, compliance perspectives, legal perspectives, and management perspectives.
As a result of the substantial complexity of the current process, automation of the process is extremely challenging, and there are no currently available products that facilitate such automation.
There is a present need for security monitoring systems and methods implemented with serverless architectures running, for example, over function-as-a-service solutions in which different layers of function-as-a-service components perform different functions with information being passed between such layers in a hierarchical architecture that overcome the deficiencies of legacy systems. The problem solved by embodiments of the invention is rooted in the technical limitations of the legacy approaches, and improved technology is needed to address the problems of existing approaches.

Serverless auto-remediating security systems and methods