In an apparatus for the extra-corporal treatment of blood wherein blood is supplied from a body to a vacuum bottle via a conduit and an insertion spike, the insertion spike is in communication, by way of a gas hose, with a pressure compensation bag from which a predetermined amount of gas can be supplied to the insertion spike for foaming the blood in the vacuum bottle, whereby no excess pressure can be generated in the vacuum bottle. The blood conduit further includes a quartz glass portion to permit UV irradiation of the blood while passing therethrough.

The invention relates to an apparatus for treating blood taken from a human body or an animal.
Apparatus for the treatment of human or animal blood with oxygen, activated oxygen or with so-called Singuletoxygen are generally known. The use of oxygen-containing treatment agents will be designated below by the expression "gas treatment". With this treatment, the blood taken is subjected to gas in a vacuum bottle or a plastic bag and is then returned to the human or animal blood vessels. Such apparatus are described in DE OS 12 38 884 and 43 40 730; they are used for the oxygen enrichment of the blood.
DE OS 35 21 802 discloses an apparatus for the gas treatment of blood by the hematogen oxidation therapy (HOT), wherein, during removal from a body, the blood is pumped into a collection container into which, subsequently, an apparatus for the HOT therapy is inserted. According to this publication, the blood is foamed in the collection container by the addition of oxygen, and is then forced, by the excess pressure generated with the addition of oxygen, through a quartz glass bulb into a second collection container. During the transfer, the foamed blood is subjected to UV radiation. From the second collection container, the blood is returned to the blood vessels.
DE OS 44 10 411 discloses an apparatus for the extra-corporal treatment of blood which, instead of a vacuum bottle, uses a flexible blood bag which facilitates HOT treatment and provides a completely mounted re-transfusion set which, altogether, is contained in a relatively small package in a sterile manner. However, since no vacuum is employed for the removal of blood, the blood removal procedure is relatively time consuming.
For this reason, methods which use vacuum bottles are still in wide use since they permit rapid removal of the blood.
A problem encountered with the gas treatment of blood is caused by the fact that the gas is supplied from a high pressure storage bottle by way of a pressure reducing valve. the pressure reducing valves generally used can usually be adjusted only to a relatively high discharge pressure so that it is difficult to avoid the formation of excess pressure in the vacuum bottle or in the blood bag during the gas treatment.
It is therefore the object of the present invention to provide a procedure by which the desired amount of gas can be supplied to the blood in a simple manner without the generation of excess pressure in the vacuum bottle or in the blood bag.


A method of completing a call to a remote directory assistance operator comprises the steps of attempting to place the call and disconnecting an operator position manned by a live operator from the call. Once the operator is disconnected, the call is supervised for a remote answer and a time-out clock started. In the event of a call to a remote directory assistance operator whose country or region is notorious for not answering their phone lines, the time of the attendant operator in supervising the call is saved during the automatic answer supervision period. Periodic announcements may be provided the caller over time and new services offered by these periodic announcements. For example, in one embodiment, the user is offered the opportunity to place the call at a predetermined callback time in the future when the call may be more likely to succeed. In yet other embodiments, the call to the remote directory assistance operator may be queued with other such requests for directory assistance, responses to requests in the queue obtained and each user called back at their requested callback time (or in advance thereof) with the requested information. Automated prompts/announcements may be made in a preselected language of choice to the user or to the remote directory assistance operator.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to the field of telecommunications directory assistance and, more particularly, to the processing of a call between a first operator and a second, remote directory assistance operator, to assist a caller to obtain a telephone number or related signaling address without consuming the first operator's time.
2. Description of the Related Arts
Directory assistance is provided by telecommunications operators from typically specialized operator service position systems. Many of these services are automated and implemented through automated prompting and speech recognition systems known in the art. For example, in a typical directory assistance call in the United States, a caller dials 411 for a local exchange area and receives a pre-recorded prompt "Directory assistance: For what city please;" then once the city is voiced, there is a prompt: "For what listing;" and in response to the prompt and depending on the response the caller gives, a live operator need not intervene in the call. A desired telephone number is announced through a speech synthesized announcement. Moreover, the call may be completed to that number without redialing according to a known service offering. Long distance directory assistance may be provided in a similar manner, the difference being the access telephone number or address dialed, typically comprising an area code for a local exchange area, followed by a predetermined telephone number 555-1212.
Not all directory assistance is automated, however. Also, for example, in less sophisticated regions of the United States or in trying to reach international directory assistance, live operator assistance is often needed, if not required. For example, in a call to a carrier providing a manual directory assistance, the telephone positions of live directory assistance operators may ring and ring with no response. A live operator, intervening in the call to the ringing telephone line, may be tied up during the call along with the calling party for many seconds.
In an international call, and referring to FIG. 1, a customer 10 who is interested in obtaining a telephone number of an international party typically dials "0-0" in the United States to reach a long distance operator at operator services position system 30, typically associated with an end office 20. When the customer 10 asks for directory assistance in a remote country, for example, India, the long distance operator may transfer the call to a centralized international directory assistance position 40 for a chosen carrier, for example, AT&T, who will attempt to reach India directory assistance, represented in the drawing as foreign country directory assistance FCDA1 for a first country, 60-1, FCDAn for a country n, 60-n, where country n may be France, Japan, India or any foreign country the caller desires. Gateway switch 50 represents an international gateway switching center to a foreign country which typically comprises a #4ESS :system available from Lucent Technologies or other electronic toll switch known in the art. In the United States, other carriers than AT&T may not provide a centralized international directory assistance position and the long distance operator may attempt a call to a foreign directory assistance position from dispersed toll or tandem offices in the long distance carrier served region.
Assuming either case, the live operator typically records the caller's desired information in a database (what country? what city? what listing?) and must personally supervise the call to foreign directory assistance for an answer. The telephone line to the foreign directory assistance operator may ring and ring with no answer. Both the caller and the live operator may become annoyed. After a predetermined time interval, for example, 60 seconds, the operator may tell the customer that there is no answer and they must try again later. While the customer is not charged for the call, the customer may have spent as much as 3 to 4 minutes attempting to make the call while the long distance carrier or carriers have incurred costs in attempting the connection and in operator time supervising the ring-no-answer with no revenue in return.
It is well known in the art to mechanize or automate portions of a directory assistance call, a collect call (for example, verification of the collect call) and even to automate and centralize features and functionalities, for example, via the so-called More Efficient Call Handling project for automating AT&T Operator Services initiated in the 1990's. Yet, there remains a need in the art to more efficiently provide directory assistance information in the event of a directory assistance call to a remote region of the United States or in an international call for directory assistance. By an international or intercontinental call is intended herein a call to an area outside of the so-called North American Numbering Plan which is typically represented by a telephone number of the format NPA-NXX-XXXX, where NPA is typically referred to as an area code. Moreover, it is an object of the present invention to save operator time in supervising a directory assistance call. Also, it is an object of the present invention to save the caller's time in placing a directory assistance call. Through the caller's saving time and further being able to receive service more quickly, customer satisfaction is improved. Finally, through the greater liklihood that a call will go through to obtain both directory assistance and to ultimately connect to a called party, revenues to the service provider will increase.

Automated ringing of an operator for directory assistance calls


A storage and measurement container for retaining a quantity of particulate material and dispensing a measured serving thereof. The container comprises an interior volume that is dividable into an upper volume and a lower volume via a slide, a sliding member that selectively occupies the lower volume, and a bottom lid for dispensing the contents of the lower volume. Pulling the slide and the sliding member out from the container causes granular material, such as flour or spices, to fall from the upper volume to the lower volume that is vacated by the sliding member. Measurement indicia on the slide corresponds to the amount of volume vacated by the sliding member. Once the desired amount of material has been deposited into the lower volume, the slide can be closed to seal the upper volume from the lower volume, and the contents of the lower volume can then be dispensed therefrom.

Graduated measuring cups are well known in the art and provide a means to measure quantities of a product while preparing or serving food. These are generally singular or a set of graduated measuring devices with a visible measurement scale for reference along their interior or exterior surfaces, allowing a user to accurately measure a serving size or follow recipe instructions. These devices comprise stackable cups, spoons, cylinders and other structures whose sole purpose is to measure a quantity of food product and provide a dispensing means thereof.
Storage containers for granular food products such as spices, sugar and similar ingredients are likewise well described in the art. These devices are typically re-sealable containers that provide an air tight or vacuum seal lid for preserving interior contents for periods of time. The ability to adequately seal the contents slows any aerobic process that may result in spoilage or loss of freshness. These devices are generally formed of acrylic or similar plastic material with no means to accurately dispense a given quantity of product without use of a measuring device.


A method and apparatus for transferring a web wound about a loaded core. The steps include providing a core shaft axially extending between a core shaft first end and a core shaft second end, providing a web wound about a loaded core, the loaded core coaxially related to the core shaft, axially supporting the core shaft by a first axial support operatively engaged with the core shaft first end and a second axial support operatively engaged with the core shaft second end, axially moving the loaded core from the core shaft to the second axial support, and removing the first axial support and the second axial support.

Webs of materials are commonly produced on production lines in which the end step of the production line is to wrap the web of material onto a core in a winding operation. The core can be supported by a core shaft that is rotatably mounted at the end of the production line. An example of such a web of material wound on a core tube can be thought of as being much like the way in which a web of paper towel material or toilet paper is wound on a cardboard core.
In producing webs of materials in commercial quantities, the mass of web wound on a core can greatly exceed the mass that manufacturing line workers can handle easily. For instance, webs can have a width of several meters and tens of meters of material can be wound about a core. If the web material is something of the nature of household carpet or field turf, the mass can be over one-thousand kilograms. Even for webs commonly thought of as being lightweight materials, such as paper, toilet paper, paper towel material, or absorbent webs for sanitary articles, the mass of the web wound on the core at the end of a production line can exceed one-hundred kilograms.
On a production line, once the desired quantity of the web of material is wound on the core, the web material is cut from web of material upstream of the winding operation. The core shaft, which supports the core, can be moved to a position in which the wound core can be removed from the production line and taken to another production line in which the web of material is integrated into another product, altered further towards the ultimate commercial embodiment, or prepared for storage and/or shipping. Then the core shaft is removed from within the core or the core is removed from the core shaft and the core shaft is moved to a position in which the core shaft can be used again to support another empty core that is subsequently wound with a web.
One approach for removing a core shaft is to support the core shaft, core, and web of material by supporting the web of material by the outer plies whereby the mass of the web is relieved from resting on the core shaft and the core shaft and core can relatively easily slide with respect to one another. For sensitive materials, such as tissue webs and thin porous foams, stress applied to the outer plies of the web wound on the core to relieve the stress between the core shaft and core can damage the web material. Furthermore, applying stress axially to the web to force the web and core to slide off of the core shaft can damage the web of material.
One approach to removing the core shaft from a loaded core without stressing the web material is to support the loaded core shaft at each end of the core shaft, connect an axial support to one end of the core shaft, remove the support at the end of the core shaft proximal the axial support, slide the loaded core onto the axial support, replace the support at the end of the core shaft proximal the axial support, separate the axial support from the core shaft, connect an axial support loaded with an empty core to one end of the core shaft, remove the support at the end of the core shaft proximal the axial support, slide the core onto the core shaft, replace the support at the end of the core shaft proximal the axial support, and moving the core shaft and empty core from the supports into a position in which the core shaft can be used again to support another empty core that is subsequently wound with a web. One drawback to such an approach is that many steps of supporting and removing support from the core shaft are required, thus increasing the time required to remove a core shaft from a loaded core and increasing the possibility of the loaded core falling, thereby damaging the web material.
With these limitations in mind, there is a continuing unaddressed need for a method for removing a core shaft from a loaded core in a simple and time-efficient manner that will not damage web material. There is a further continuing unaddressed need for a method for removing a core shaft from a loaded core that provides for a simple process for providing a fresh core on core shaft.

Method and apparatus for transferring a wound web


Exposure apparatus are disclosed that are particularly adapted for exposing relatively large patterns on a photosensitive substrate. The apparatus include an optical illumination system for illuminating a reticle supported by a reticle stage, an optical projection system for projecting an image of a pattern on the reticle to a photosensitive substrate supported on a plate stage, a reference mark on the plate stage, a fixed mark between the position at which the reticle is loaded and the optical projection system, and three position detecting systems. A first position detecting system detects the position of a substrate on the plate stage and/or the position of the reference mark; a second position detecting system detects the relative position of the reference mark and a reticle on the reticle stage; and the third position detecting system detects the relative position of the reference mark and the fixed mark. Applying the third system, the reference mark is used, together with a plate stage interferometer system, to check the relative position of the fixed mark, using an optical path through the optical projection system. Any deviation in the measured position of the fixed mark is corrected, as drift of the reference mark. The correction is then applied to the use of at least one of the first and second systems.

Reference positions within an exposure apparatus for producing relatively large patterns, such as are required to produce a large-scale liquid crystal display panel, may be determined by means of one or more reference marks arranged on a plate stage. Using such a reference mark on the plate stage, a reticle positioning mark (or marks) on a reticle are compared to the reference mark through an optical projection system, and the position of the reticle, as projected through the optical projection system, is thus measured relative to a plate-stage coordinate system.
In an exposure apparatus for exposing patterns, such as for a liquid crystal panel, in which a single large image must be formed using a plurality of reticles, each of the plurality of reticles is loaded successively onto a reticle stage, positioned by a reticle alignment system, and measured relative to a plate-stage coordinate system. In this way, a baseline is obtained for each reticle before any exposure is made.
Conventional methods to detect the position of each reticle include a method as described in Japanese Patent Publication No. 61-143760. According to this method, the relative position between the reticle and the plate stage is detected by the use of reticle positioning marks on the reticle and reference marks on the plate stage, with a light-receiving sensor disposed under the reference marks. Another conventional method is described in Japanese Patent Publication No. 63-284814 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,943,73, wherein a slit on the reference mark on the plate stage receives light from the plate stage side, and the relative position of a slit-type reticle positioning mark is detected through an optical projection system by a light-receiving sensor located inside an illuminating optical system.
The reference marks on the plate stage are conventionally placed at the side of the top surface of the stage, on a raised platform or rim next to the location at which a substrate is to be supported, such that the marks are approximately at the height of the image plane. In an exposure apparatus for use with an especially large, generally square-shaped substrate, such conventional reference marks have the disadvantages of increasing the width and weight of the stage, and of requiring a large range of stage movement to bring the marks to various measurement locations.
An exposure apparatus of the type for exposing large substrates also typically includes a plate alignment system for aligning a plate. (A plate is a substrate, e.g., glass, on which a display is to be formed, typically having been prepared with a photosensitive coating thereon). When a device layer is to be exposed on a plate, the plate alignment system detects the position of the plate, or the position on the plate of a previously exposed device layer. In preparation for such use of the plate alignment system, the one or more reference marks are used to measure the position of the plate alignment system. The baseline of the plate alignment system in an exposure apparatus is obtained in this way.
Normally, before an exposure is made, after executing the above baseline measurement processes for the plate alignment system, and for the reticles to be used, the plate alignment system monitors plate alignment marks on a plate that is transported onto the plate stage, and thereby measures the plate position. The exposure apparatus then properly positions the plate, using the plate alignment system, and the reticle(s), using the reticle alignment system, according to the measured baseline values, and then performs an exposure.
Also during exposure, twisting (yawing) of the plate stage, which can occur when the stage steps from one substrate exposure location to another, may be corrected. The twisting is measured by the interferometer system of the plate stage. The reticle is rotated appropriately to compensate for the measured twisting by determining an offset of a reticle alignment mark relative to an index mark inside the reticle alignment system, and rotating the reticle to this offset position by, for example, a motor or a push-pull spring.
According to the above-described technology, when using a plurality of reticles, time is required to exchange the reticle and to detect the position of the plate alignment system and reticle. Additional time is required to inspect for foreign matter on the reticle. Although a total of four reticles has been used for one pattern layer, because of device optimization and larger panel sizes in recent years, it is becoming necessary to provide six or more reticles for a single pattern layer. In an apparatus utilizing a reference mark to detect the relative position of a reticle loaded on a reticle stage and the position of a plate alignment system, use of additional reticles increases the time required to measure the relative position of each reticle and the position of the plate alignment system. During this time, forces due to movement of the stage and thermal variations result in drifting of the position of the reference mark itself. This leads to a problem wherein the measured values change increasingly with passage of time.
Certain problems have also existed in standard reticle alignment systems. Because a standard reticle alignment system itself is formed on quite a large base and the relative positions of the index mark and the reticle alignment mark are measured through an optical system, relative deformation of the base of the reticle alignment system may be caused by temperature variations over time. Changes to the optical system of the reticle alignment system may also occur over time, as well as fluctuations due a relatively long space between the index mark located inside the reticle alignment system and the reticle alignment mark of the reticle. Vibrations of the apparatus can also cause fluctuations and drift in the reticle alignment system.


A multivalent antigen-binding protein comprises a first Fv fragment bound to at least one further Fv fragment by a connecting structure which links the Fv fragments to each other but which maintains them spaced apart such that the proteins are capable of binding to adjacent antigenic determinants. Typically the connecting structure comprises a spacing polypeptide sequence, which may be about 3 to 16 amino acids in length, connected to a linkage unit which may be a synthetic chemical linker, e.g., a maleimide linker, or is a polypeptide sequence leading from the spacing sequence. In a particularly preferred embodiment, the multivalent antigen binding protein comprises a VH domain having attached to its C-terminal end a V-C joining sequence and an antibody hinge sequence. Preferably one or more of the Fv fragments is a single chain Fv (scFv). The proteins are preferably prepared by recombinant DNA techniques and are useful for in vivo therapeutic and especially diagnostic applications.

There has been much interest in recent years in antibodies and their fragments. It is well known that complete antibody molecules comprise four polypeptide chains, two heavy chains and two light chains. Each light chain consists of two domains, the N-terminal domain being known as the variable or VL domain and the C-terminal domain being known as the constant or CL domain. Each heavy chain consists of four or five domains, depending on the class of the antibody. The N-terminal domain is known as the variable or VH domain. The next domain is known as the first constant or CH1 domain. The next part of each heavy chain is known as the hinge region and this is then followed by the second, third and, in some cases, fourth constant or CH2, CH3 and CH4 domains respectively.
In an assembled antibody, the VL and VH domains associate together to form an antigen binding site. Also the CL and CH1 domains associate together to keep one heavy chain associated with one light chain. The two heavy-light chain heterodimers associate together partly by interaction of the CH2, CH3 and CH4 domains of the two heavy chains and partly because of interaction between the hinge regions on the two heavy chains.
Each heavy chain hinge region includes at least one, and often several, cysteine residues. In the assembled antibody, the cysteine residues in the heavy chains are aligned so that disulphide bonds can be formed between the cysteine residues in the hinge regions covalently bonding the two heavy-light chain heterodimers together. Thus, fully assembled antibodies are bivalent in that they have two antigen binding sites.
It has been known for some long time that if the disulphide bonds in an antibody's hinge region are broken by mild reduction, it is possible to produce a monovalent antibody comprising a single heavy-light chain heterodimer.
It has also been known for some long time that treatment of antibodies with certain proteolytic enzymes leads to the production of various antibody fragments. For instance, if an antibody is cleaved close to the N-terminal side of each hinge region, two antibody binding fragments (Fab) and one constant region fragment (Fc) are produced. Each Fab fragment comprises the light chain associated with a truncated heavy chain comprising only the VH and CH1 domains. The Fc portion comprises the remaining domains of the heavy chains held together by the hinge region.
Alternatively, the antibody may be cleaved close to the C-terminal side of the hinge. This produces a fragment known as the F(ab ).sub.2 fragment. This essentially comprises two Fab fragments but with the CH1 domains still attached to the hinge regions. Thus, the F(ab ).sub.2 fragment is a bivalent fragment having the two antigen binding sites linked together by the hinge region.
It has also proved to be possible, by careful control of digestion conditions, to cleave an antibody between the VL and CL and between the VH and CH1 domains. This gives rise to two fragments known as FV fragments. Each Fv fragment comprises a VL and a VE domain associated with one another. Each Fv fragment is monovalent for antigen binding.
In more recent years, there has been much interest in producing antibodies or their fragments by use of recombinant DNA technology. The patent literature is replete with disclosures in this area. Recombinant DNA technology has been used not only to reproduce natural antibodies but also to produce novel antibodies. For instance, it is now possible to produce chimeric antibodies, wherein the variable domains from one species are linked to constant domains from another species.
It is also possible to produce CDR-grafted antibodies, in which the regions in the VH and VL domains responsible for antigen binding activity (usually referred to as the Complementarity Determining Regions) have been changed in sequence so that a different antigen can be bound. CDR-grafting an antibody is a useful procedure in that it allows a specificity from, for instance, a mouse monoclonal antibody to be transferred to a human antibody without altering the essentially human nature of the antibody. This has advantages where it is desired to use the antibody in vivo.
Relatively recently, there has been interest in producing Fv fragments by recombinant DNA technology. For instance, production of Fv fragments by recombinant DNA technology has been suggested by Skerra and Pluckthun 1!. (A list of references is appended at the end of the description.) The production of Fv-producing recombinant host cells has been described in published International patent application Ser. Nos. WO 89/02465 and WO 89/09825.
It is envisaged that Fv fragments will be of particular use in in vivo diagnosis and in therapy because of their small size as compared to Fab fragments or complete antibodies. This will mean that they are likely to be less antigenic and more able to penetrate tissue. In particular, it is envisaged that they may be able to penetrate cancerous tissue and therefore deliver a cytotoxic drug or diagnostic label to the site of the cancer.
Fv fragments have the disadvantage that they are monovalent with respect to antigen binding. Most naturally occurring antigens are multivalent, i.e. they display multiple antigenic determinants. Therefore, the Fv fragments, with only one antigen binding site per molecule, will bind to such antigens less strongly than the bivalent whole antibody or an F(ab ).sub.2 fragment. This may reduce the usefulness of the Fv fragment, for example in targeting a cell surface antigen.


Strains of Leuconostoc mesenteroides ssp. cremoris which provide, upon culturing, dextran, and the strains include deposited strains CNCM I-1692 and CNCM I-1693.

State of the Art
Dextran is a polysaccharide formed of glucose units, the chain lengthening of which is catalyzed by dextran sucrase. The biosynthesis of dextran has been demonstrated in numerous bacteria, especially in Streptococcus mutans, Leuconostoc mesenteroides ssp. mesenteroides and Leuconostoc mesenteroides ssp. dextranicum. Leuconostoc produce the enzyme dextran sucrase and secrete it into the culture medium in the presence of sucrose. This enzyme, dextran sucrase, then synthesizes dextran from the sucrose substrate. Dextran has applications in several fields. It is used especially in biochemistry as a support for filtration chromatography on a gel of the Sephadex type. Additionally, in the field of therapeutics, it is used as a substitute for blood plasma (Biochimie generale (General Biochemistry)--J. H. WEIL--Masson, 6th edition--1990--p. 171).
Furthermore, dextran synthesized by a strain of Leuconostoc dextranicum is applied in the food industry for the texturing of food products such as yoghurts, cream desserts, milk-based drinks and salad dressings. European Patent Application Publication No. EP 0 363 633 demonstrates the synthesis of dextran by a strain of Leuconostoc dextranicum and in particular by the strain Leuconostoc dextranicum NRRL-B-18242. Additionally, that patent application describes especially a composition containing dextran synthesized by this bacterium and the use of this composition in the food sector. Moreover, the taxonomy of the bacterial strains of the genus Leuconostoc has been revised several times.
Garvie et al. (International Journal of Systematic Bacteriology, 118-119, 1983) describe the taxonomy of the bacterial strains of the genus Leuconostoc, established according to a criterion of homology in terms of the deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA). The bacteria, previously classed as Leuconostoc mesenteroides, Leuconostoc dextranicum and Leuconostoc cremoris, although of different phenotype, have a very high degree of homology in respect of their DNA. Therefore, according to this taxonomy, these bacteria are subspecies of Leuconostoc mesenteroides and are respectively called Leuconostoc mesenteroides ssp. mesenteroides, Leuconostoc mesenteroides ssp. dextranicum and Leuconostoc mesenteroides ssp. cremoris.
In addition, J. B. Milliere et al. (Journal of Applied Bacteriology, 67, 529-542, 1989) describe a taxonomic analysis performed on 81 strains of the genus Leuconostoc, including 11 strains of Leuconostoc mesenteroides ssp. cremoris. This analysis relies on the taxonomy established by Garvie et al. and is based on the following criteria in particular: the capacity of these strains to ferment various sugars, the capacity of these strains to utilize citrate and the capacity of these strains to produce dextran. The document notes the fact that a strain of Leuconostoc mesenteroides ssp. cremoris does not synthesize dextran. Also, such a strain is distinguished and defined by the fact that it does not ferment pentoses.
No strain of Leuconostoc mesenteroides ssp. cremoris has yet been isolated which is capable of synthesizing dextran. Now, Leuconostoc mesenteroides ssp. cremoris is of major importance in the manufacture of dairy products such as, for example, yoghurt-type fermented specialities or dairy creams. It would therefore be very valuable to be able to use such bacteria, capable of synthesizing dextran of pleasant texture and taste, especially for texturing this type of food product.
The object of the present invention is to meet this need.

Leuconostoc strains for biosynthesis of dextran


TruCast is a method for management, by way of gathering, storing, analyzing, tracking, sorting, determining the relevance of, visualizing, and responding to all available consumer generated media. Some examples of consumer generated media include web logs or “blogs”, mobile phone blogs or “mo-blogs”, forums, electronic discussion messages, Usenet, message boards, BBS emulating services, product review and discussion web sites, online retail sites that support customer comments, social networks, media repositories, and digital libraries. Any web hosted system for the persistent public storage of human commentary is a potential target for this method. The system is comprised of a coordinated software and hardware system designed to perform management, collection, storage, analysis, workflow, visualization, and response tasks upon this media. This system permits a unified interface to manage, target, and accelerate interactions within this space, facilitating public relations, marketing, advertising, consumer outreach, political debate, and other modes of directed discourse.

As used herein, the term "Consumer Generated Media" (hereinafter CGM) is a phrase that describes a wide variety of Internet web pages or sites, which are sometimes individually labeled as web logs or "blogs", mobile phone blogs or "mo-blogs", video hosting blogs or "vlogs" or "vblogs", forums, electronic discussion messages, Usenet, message boards, BBS emulating services, product review and discussion web sites, online retail sites that support customer comments, social networks, media repositories, audio and video sharing sites/networks and digital libraries. Private non-Internet information systems can host CGM content as well, via environments like Sharepoint, Wiki, Jira, CRM systems, ERP systems, and advertising systems. Other acronyms that describe this space are CCC (consumer created content), WSM (weblogs and social media), WOMM (Word of Mouth Media) or OWOM, (online word of mouth), and many others.
As used herein, the term "Keyphrase" refers to a word, string of words, or groups of words with Boolean modifiers that are used as models for discovering CGM content that might be relevant to a given topic. Could also be an example image, audio file or video file that has characteristics that would be used for content discovery and matching.
As used herein, the term "Post" refers to a single piece of CGM content. This might be a literal weblog posting, a comment, a forum reply, a product review, or any other single element of CGM content.
As used herein, the term "Site" refers to an Internet site which contains CGM content.
As used herein, the term "Blog" refers to an Internet site which contains CGM content.
As used herein, the term "Content" refers to media that resides on CGM sites. CGM is often text, but includes audio files and streams (podcasts, mp3, streamcasts, Internet radio, etc.) video files and streams, animations (flash, java) and other forms of multimedia.
As used herein, the term "UI" refers to a User Interface, that users interact with computer software, perform work, and review results.
As used herein, the term "IM" refers to an Instant Messenger, which is a class of software applications that allow direct text based communication between known peers.
As used herein, the term "Thread" refers to an "original" post and all of the comments connected to it, present on a blog or forum. A discussion thread holds the information of content display order, so this message came first, followed by this, followed by this.
As used herein, the term "Permalink" refers to a URL which persistently points to an individual CGM thread.
The Internet and other computer networks are communication systems. The sophistication of this communication has improved and the primary modes differentiated over time and technological progress. Each primary mode of online communication varies based on a combination of three basic values: privacy and persistence and control. Email as a communications medium is private (communications are initially exchanged only between named recipients), persistent (saved in inboxes or mail servers) but lacks control (once you send the message, you can't take it back, or edit it, or limit re-use of it). Instant messaging is private, typically not persistent (some newer clients are now allowing users to save history, so this mode is changing) and lacks control. Message boards are public (typically all members, and often all Internet users, can access your message) persistent, but lack control (they are typically moderated by a central owner of the board). Chat rooms are public (again, some are membership based) typically not persistent, and lack control.
privacypersistenceauthor controlChat Rooms/IRCnononoInstant MessagingyesnonoForumsnoyesnoEmailyesyesnoBlogsnoyesyessocial networksyes/noyesyesSecond Lifeyesyesyes+
Blogs and Social Networks are the predominant communications mediums that permit author control. By reducing the cost, technical sophistication, and experience required to create and administer a web site, blogs and other persistent online communication have given an unprecedented amount of editorial control to millions of online authors. This has created a unique new environment for creative expression, commentary, discourse, and criticism without the historical limits of editorial control, cost, technical expertise, or distribution/exposure.
There is significant value in the information contained within this public media. Because the opinions, topics of discussion, brands and celebrities mentioned and relationships evinced are typically totally unsolicited, the information presented, if well studied, represents an amazing new source of social insight, consumer feedback, opinion measurement, popularity analysis and messaging data. It also represents a fully exposed, granular network of peer and hierarchical relationships rich with authority and influence. The marketing, advertising, and PR value of this information is unprecedented.
This new medium represents a significant challenge for interested parties to comprehensively understand and interact with. As of Q1 2007 estimates for the number of active, unique online CGM sites (forums, blogs, social networks, etc.) range from 50 to 71 million, with growth rates in the hundreds of thousands of new sites per day. Compared to the typical mediums that PR, Advertising and Marketing businesses and divisions interact with (<1000 TV channels, <1000 radio stations, <1000 major news publications, <10-20 major pundits on any given subject, etc.) this represents a nearly 10,000-fold increase in the number of potential targets for interaction.
Businesses and other motivated communicators have come to depend on software that perform Business Intelligence, Customer Relationship Management, and Enterprise Resource Planning tasks to facilitate accelerated, organized, prioritized, tracked and analyzed interaction with customers and other target groups (voters, consumers, pundits, opinion leaders, analysts, reporters, etc.). These systems have been extended to facilitate IM, E-mail, and telephone interactions. These media have been successfully integrated because of standards (jabber, pop3, smtp, pots, imap) that require that all participant applications conform to a set data format that allows interaction with this data in a predictable way.
Blogs and other CGM generate business value for their owners, both on private sites that use custom or open source software to manage their communications, and for massive public hosts. Because these sites can generate advertising revenue, there is a drive by author/owners to protect the content on these sites, so readers/subscribers/peers have to visit the site, and become exposed to revenue generating advertising, in order to participate in/observe the communication. Because of this financial disincentive, there is no unifying standard for blogs which contains complete data. RSS and Atom feeds allow structured communication of some portion of the communication on sites, but are often very incomplete representations of the data available on a given site. Sites also protect their content from being "stolen" by automated systems with an array of CAPTCHAs, ("Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart") email verification, mobile phone text message verification, password authentication, cookie tracking, Uniform Resource Locator (URL) obfuscation, timeouts and Internet Protocol (IP) address tracking.
The result is a massively diverse community that it would be very valuable to understand and interact with, which resists aggregation and unified interaction by way of significant technical diversity, resistance to complete information data standards, and tests that attempt to require one-to-one human interaction with content.

Systems and methods for consumer-generated media reputation management


A method of correcting the deviation of a position at which a human face is detected using a face detection frame F. An image G within the detection frame F is divided left and right along the portion of the center axis C. The degree of similarity of mirror-symmetrical relationship between the image portions G-1 and G-2 obtained by the division is calculated. An amount of positional deviation d that maximizes the degree of similarity and its direction are found. The frame F is moved a distance corresponding to the amount of positional deviation d in the direction. Thus, the deviation of the detection position due to the detection frame F can be corrected by a quick and simple method.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to pattern recognition and object recognition techniques and, more particularly, to a human face detection position deviation-correcting method, correcting system, and correction program capable of detecting whether a detected human face has deviated in position and of correcting the position.
2. Related Art
In recent years, as pattern recognition technology and information-processing apparatuses such as computers have improved in performance, the accuracy at which characters and voice are recognized has improved at an amazing rate. It is known, however, that it is still difficult to recognize persons, objects, and scenes within images taken, for example, by a still image camera by pattern recognition technology, and that it is especially quite difficult to precisely and quickly recognize whether a human face is contained in such an image.
However, it has become quite important to recognize whether a human face is contained in such an image and to identify who is in the picture precisely and automatically using a computer in establishing biometric recognition technology, improving security, speeding up criminal investigations, increasing the rates at which image data are put in order, and speeding up search operations.
Meanwhile, in the case of ordinary users who are fond of photography and designers professionally engaging in image processing, they frequently want to make layouts about the subject human face from the taken digital photograph. In one case, for example, a picture where the face has been zoomed in is created from a picture containing the entire human body. In another case, a picture for a personal history is created.
In such cases, it is necessary to zoom into the face while precisely aligning the center of the face or to align the center of the face to the center of the photograph frame manually. Hence, complex and skilled operations are necessary.
Therefore, in the past, a method of detecting the position of a face using a facial image detection technique and aligning the position of the facial image has been proposed.
For example, in H. A. Rowley, S. Baluja, and T. Kanade, "Neural network-based face detection", IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence, Vol. 20, No. 1, pp. 23-38, 1998, there is disclosed a technique for detecting a facial image by training a neural network using facial images.
Furthermore, in the above paper and so on, a decision is first made as to whether there is any region of human flesh color within an input image. A mosaic size is automatically determined about the region of human flesh color. A mosaic candidate region is created. The proximity to the dictionary of human faces is calculated. Thus, a decision is made as to whether there is a human face. The face is extracted. This reduces erroneous extraction due to the effects of the background. Consequently, human faces are found from images automatically and efficiently.
With the method of the above-cited paper, it is possible to detect a facial image but there is the problem that the center of the position of a human face can not always be precisely calculated as disclosed in the paper.
On the other hand, in JP-A-H9-171560, it is necessary to calculate the center line of the rotation while creating data about rotation of the face. Hence, there is the anxiety that the processing time is increased. Furthermore, it is assumed that every assumed pixel has symmetry. Therefore, it is quite difficult to stably gain the center line due to noise.
Accordingly, the present invention has been devised to effectively solve these problems. It is an object of the present invention to provide a novel human face detection position deviation-correcting method, correcting system, and correcting program capable of judging whether a detected human face has deviated from the detection position and of correcting the positional deviation from the detection position by a quick and simple method.

Method of correcting deviation of detection position for human face, correction system, and correction program


A fuse programming circuit having reduced energy consumption is coupled between a first potential and a second potential for providing a programmable voltage level at an output node. The electrical circuit has a fuse element having a first terminal coupled to the output node and a second terminal coupled to the first potential. The electrical circuit also has means for providing a path for passing electrical charge between the second potential and the output node, which the path between the second potential and the output node has substantially infinite resistance when the electrical charge is being transferred.

In the manufacture of semiconductor memory devices, it is known that production yield can be increased by provision of a set of redundant cells. With the availability of redundant cells, a certain number of defective cells in a device become tolerable because they can be substituted by the redundant cells. The increased tolerance allows production yield to increase.
In a typical manufacturing process of memory devices with redundant cells, a test is performed after a memory device is fabricated to determine if it contains any defective cells. If a defective cell is found, the entire row or column of cells containing the defective cell is substituted. The substitution is achieved by programming the row or column address into an internal programming circuit. During normal operation of the memory, if the address of an memory access is the same as the content of the programming circuit, the access is directed to the redundant cells.
The programming circuit typically comprises a set of fuse elements, each for programming an address bit. The number of fuse elements provided in the programming circuit depends upon the substitution scheme. For example, if the substitution is performed on a row basis (i.e. the entire row of cells is substituted when one cell therein is found to be defective) , then the number of fuse elements required may be equal to the width of the row address. On the other hand, if the substitution is performed on a column basis (i.e. the entire column of cells is substituted when one cell therein is found to be defective), then the number of fuse elements required may be equal to the width of the column address.
In most prior art fuse programming circuits, each fuse element is connected in series with a resistor between a first voltage source (e.g. Vdd) and a second voltage source (e.g. Vss) as shown in FIG. 1. The programming circuit is programmed by selectively removing the fuse elements based upon the row or column address of the defective cell. The fuse can be removed either by laser-cutting or by passing a sufficiently high current through the fuse. A specific example of the later technique is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,532,607 issued on Jul. 30, 1985 to Y. Uchida.
When the fuse is removed, the output voltage of the circuit is equal to Vdd. When the fuse element is kept, the output voltage is equal to Vss. The output voltage level represents the binary value of the corresponding bit in forming a defective cell's address.
One problem with the above described prior art fuse programming circuit is that when the fuse element is preserved, a constant current flows through the resistor from Vdd to Vss,, causing power consumption and heat dissipation. To reduce such power consumption and heat dissipation, the value of the resistor can be increased. Unfortunately, the resistance required is typically in the order of megohms. To provide a resistance of such magnitude requires a high-resistive mask layer and such a requirement is undesirable in a semiconductor manufacturing process.


A flexible circuitized interposer (50) and method of making same wherein the interposer includes at least one flexible circuitized substrate (53) having a dielectric (e.g., polyimide) layer (54) with a conductor (55) and plated elements (56), e.g., copper pad, including possibly with dendrites (57) thereon for enhanced connection, an apertured support member (58) aligning with the conductor, and a support member (60) having the apertured member thereon. When the interposer is engaged, the flexible circuitized substrate (53) is depressed within the aperture (59). Various alternatives, including a support (60") formed with compression portions (69) that extend into respective apertures (59) in the support member (58), and an interim, compressible support (60""), are disclosed. Flexure is also enhanced by utilization of patterns of one or more apertures (64) in the flexible substrate relative to and substantially surrounding the positioned conductors (56). Electrical assemblies including a pair of circuitized substrates electrically interconnected by the defined interposers are also described.

Semiconductor devices and other electronic components (e.g., chip carriers) have been connected to circuitized substrates such as printed circuit boards (e.g., for computers) using a variety of methods, including conductive pins, wirebonds, solder balls and/or columns, compressible leads, etc. In some embodiments, the conductive elements (e.g., leads) have been positioned within an interposer housing. In others, an insulative housing including a semiconductor chip therein has been used, with projecting leads or pins soldered to the circuitized substrate or inserted within receiving conductive openings (e.g., plated through holes) in the substrate. One example of the latter is a dual-in-line (dip) package. Several other examples are also known, some of which are described in the documents cited hereinbelow.
For example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,971,610 (Buchoff, et al), 4,050,756 (Moore), 5,033,675 (Shino), and 5,261,826 (Leeb, et al) also discuss various types of interconnectors using conductive elastomer contacts, including use of such contacts to provide electrical connection between two components such as a semiconductor device (chip) and printed circuit board. The resistivity of such conductive elastomer elements can be dependent on the force applied to such elements, the amount of filler material as well as type of filler, etc. Such variables can have a significant impact on the functionality of an electronic assembly built with these elements. U.S. Pat. No. 4,548,451 (Benarr, et al), assigned to the assignee of the instant invention, defines an elastomeric core--flexible circuit member type of interconnection wherein the flexible circuit is subjected to a non-zero mean stress with a cyclic stress applied during actuation or mating (e.g., to a semiconductor device and printed circuit board). Such a form of stress may shorten the fatigue life of the circuit lines on the flexible circuit, thereby possibly resulting in a failed connection. U.S. Pat. No. 4,954,878 (Fox, et al) discusses a interposer system in which a single layer interposer forms an electrical connection between a chip and substrate. The ability of such a system to accommodate manufacturing tolerances of the components being connected is limited by the compressibility of the various components in the system. U.S. Pat. No. 5,041,183 (Nakamura, et al) discusses a method of fabricating an interposer using hot melt adhesive. Such application of hot melt adhesive is of course limited to use at a temperature less then the melting point of the adhesive, thus limiting the temperature range in which this device can be utilized. U.S. Pat. No. 5,207,585 (Byrnes et al) also assigned to the instant invention's assignee, defines a flexible circuit member having raised features for being imbedded into solder balls such as might be used on a semiconductor device and/or printed circuit board. The flexible circuit member forms a membrane member with associated in-plane stresses. These stresses limit the amount of possible out-of-plane deflection when a given force is applied to one or more of the contact members.
Other patents that also discuss various types of electronic packaging interconnection structures include U.S. Pat. No. 4,991,290 (MacKay), U.S. Pat. No. 5,069,628 (Crumly), U.S. Pat. No. No. 5,095,628 (McKenney, et al), U.S. Pat. No. 5,147,208 (Bachler), and U.S. Pat. No. 5,248,261 (Conroy-Wass, et al).
Recently, as packaging requirements have increased, it has been found that solder coupling can be effectively used in relatively high density applications. Various packaging structures (e.g., those referred to in the art as "ball grid array" packages) have been successfully developed, particularly by the assignee of the present invention. An example of such a structure is defined in U.S. Pat. No. 5,435,732 (Angulas et al), assigned to the assignee of the instant invention. Such an example is also referred to in the industry as a tape ball grid array, or "TBGA". Other ball grid array packages are presently being used in the industry, including those referred to as ceramic ball grid array ("CBGA") and plastic ball grid array ("PBGA") packages.
As defined herein, the interconnector of the present invention is particularly adapted for providing sound, effective interconnection between electronic components such as high density ball grid array packages and a receiving circuitized substrate such as a printed circuit board. Such a connection is possible with effective tolerance compensation for the components being connected. The structure of the invention is attainable using known materials in the industry (e.g., dielectric and conductive pad/line materials) and thus assures a cost savings for the finished product.
It is of course understood that the invention is not limited to array package-circuit board types of connections but instead can be readily adapted to many other forms of connection, including board-to-board, pad-to-pad, etc.
It is believed that an interconnector possessing the aforedefined advantageous features and others discernible from the teachings herein would constitute an advancement in the art.

Flexible circuitized interposer with apertured member and method for making same

International Business Machines Corporation


Methods of qualitatively and/or quantitatively detecting the presence of mutations, modifications or impurities in a protein sample are provided. The methods utilize isotopically labeled variants of amino acids incorporated into proteins prior to protein digest to enable comparisons of two protein samples in bottom-up liquid chromatography.

The present invention relates to an analytical method of comparing two or more protein samples using bottom-up Liquid Chromatography-Mass Spectroscopy (LC-MS) with a Stable Isotope-Tagged Reference Standard (SITRS).
Peptide mapping with mass spectroscopy (MS) detection is used in protein analytics for confirmation of the primary sequences. Known analytical methods primarily qualitatively confirm the presence of expected peptides.


A digital filtering system for filtering sample data includes a delay network for delaying input sample data to provide multiple delayed sample data outputs. The filtering system also includes a filter network represented by a decomposed coefficient weighting matrix for processing the delayed sample data outputs. A processor produces a filtered output by computing a weighted product summation of the delayed sample data outputs and the coefficient weighting matrix. The decomposed coefficient weighting matrix is derived by factoring a first coefficient weighting matrix with a common row factor and/or sparse matrix or by factoring based on matrix row or column symmetry.

There are a variety of applications requiring conversion of digital data samples occurring at a first data rate to digital data samples occurring at a different second data rate. In these applications, data sampled at one rate is interpolated to provide estimates of data at a different rate or sampling phase. Sample rate conversion applications include, for example, conversion between different video standards such as between High Definition TV (HDTV) data and CCIR601 standard data and conversion between different video display formats such as between interlace and progressive display formats. Other applications include, for example, multi-media composite image formation and display e.g. for Picture-in-Picture (PIP) presentation, and data processing for digital data storage such as for CDROM or DVD applications and digital demodulation involving digital sample rate conversion for establishing frequency, phase or symbol timing synchronization. The widespread use of sample rate conversion in cost sensitive applications means that there is a need to optimize configurations for both sample rate converters and their interpolator and digital filter sub-components.
Known, classical interpolator configurations have been thought to be optimal in terms of maximizing performance and minimizing the hardware complexity involved, i.e., the numbers of adders, multipliers, registers etc. that are used. However, the sample rate converter, interpolator and digital filter systems and the methods of their derivation presented herein provide improvements over the known filter designs in both performance and reduced complexity.


Adjoining heat exchange modules of a recuperative cross flow plate-type heat exchanger are joined into a single unit by means of common plate spacer bars. Each common spacer bar extends between and into the adjacent modules. The prior art mid-module gaps are eliminated.

The present invention relates to recuperative cross flow plate-type heat exchangers and particularly to the way in which multiple heat exchange modules are joined into a single pass unit.
Recuperative cross flow plate-type heat exchangers are comprised of a large number of parallel spaced plates with the flow of the hot material and the material to be heated flowing through alternate spaces between the plates. The flow of one material is in a first direction across the unit and the flow of the other material is in a second direction perpendicular to the first direction. This is referred to as cross flow.
Recuperative cross flow plate-type heat exchangers are typically used to transfer heat from one gas, such as hot flue gas, to another gas such as air. The design of these cross flow heat exchangers is usually limited by the standard dimensions of the plate material which is available. Therefore, it is typical that the larger units are formed from multiple modules. The prior art method of joining these modules into a single pass unit is by means of flanged connecting structures. These connecting structures create an open volume between the modules resulting in an increased overall size for a specific heat exchange capacity, in increased pressure drop and in increased fouling.


The present invention relates to the production of multipotent migratory cell (MMCs) which can be differentiated into mesoderm or endoderm lineages. Multipotent Migratory Cells (MMC) are stable and robust and can be passaged at least 20 times (perhaps indefinitely), can be recovered after freezing, reamplified and differentiated into multiple lineages. They are therefore storage stable. The method of producing these cells points to a way to generate a multipotent cell type (mesendoderm) from blastocycts for the generation of therapeutically useful cell types without going through a classical hESC state. The production of multipotent migratory cells, mesendoderm cells and mesoderm cells (Isl1+) is also described.

Human embryonic stem cells (hESC's) (markers for hESCs include SSEA3, SSEA4, TRA-1-60, TRA-1-81 antigens, Nanog, Oct4) are a pluripotent population of cells that can be differentiated into cells derived from all three embryonic germ layers and extraembryonic lineages. This property of hESC's has important implications in cell therapy (e.g. diabetes, heart disease, neurodegenerative diseases), drug discovery and developmental modeling.
Other pluripotent cell types have been identified in mouse. Primitive ectoderm like (EPL; Rathjen et al., 1999, J. Cell Sci) cells were shown to form from mESC's with the ability to dedifferentiate into mESC's. Recently, a new mouse cell, post-implantation epiblast stem cells (EpiSC; Tesar et al., Nature 448: 196-202; 2007) was identified that shares characteristics of hESC's (Nanog+ Sox2+Oct4+). All of these pluripotent cell types from mouse can generate the three embryonic germ layer in vitro or in a teratoma assay.
Epiblast stem cells (EpiScs) and induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS) fit into the broad pluripotent cell category and in concept, the technology described in the application could apply to these and other pluripotent cell types (ie, primate pluripotent cells). EpiSc epiblast stem cells are isolated from early post-implantation stage embryos and express Oct4 and are pluripotent (Tesar et al, Nature, Vol 448, p. 196 12 Jul. 2007). Induced pluripotent stem cells (iPS cells) are made by dedifferentiating adult skin fibroblasts or, other adult somatic cells, back to a pluripotent state by retroviral transduction of four genes (c-myc, Klf4, Sox2, Oct4) (Takahashi and Yamanaka, Cell 126, 663-676, Aug. 25, 2006).
The advantage of developing other non-ESC, self renewing, pluripotent/multipotent stem cells would help in improve developmental models, improve directed differentiation into adult cells and allow more efficient and less costly approaches to conventional methods.

Early mesoderm cells, a stable population of mesendoderm cells that has utility for generation of endoderm and mesoderm lineages and multipotent migratory cells (MMC)

TheUniversity of Georgia Research Foundation, Inc.


A volumetric fluid dispensing device can include a fluid reservoir having at least one flexible wall and a dispensing reservoir oriented above the fluid reservoir. The dispensing reservoir can have an overflow return fluidly connected to the fluid reservoir such that the dispensing reservoir holds a measured volume of fluid. A reservoir conduit can be fluidly connected to the fluid reservoir and the dispensing reservoir to allow excess fluid to return from the overflow to the fluid reservoir. A dispensing conduit can also be fluidly connected to the dispensing reservoir to allow fluid to exit the dispensing reservoir. A mechanical wall actuator can be operatively associated with the walls for controllably flexing at least a portion of the walls sufficient to force fluid from the fluid reservoir to the dispensing reservoir via the reservoir conduit.

Delivery of small fluid volumes in biomedical and research activities can be an important part of medical treatments or in performing various experimental routines. In particular, delivery of small amounts of fluid in highly repeatable volumes can be useful for a variety of applications, such as intravenous delivery of medicaments or other biologically active materials for treatment of a patient.
A number of devices are currently used to deliver fluids in medical applications. However, many current devices also suffer from various drawbacks such as expense, lack of precision, inconvenience, and others. For example, peristaltic pumps can suffer from a lack of precision due to the tube materials taking a set such that delivery volumes change over time with constant pump revolutions or strokes. Further, peristaltic pumps typically require highly precise tube lumen and actuator mechanisms which can increase manufacturing costs. On the other hand, conventional IV bags are hung from a stand and do not stand on their own. This can result in some degree of inconvenience during use and can make marking or coding of delivery bags with written labels or smart chips difficult. Further, precision pumps also generally require sophisticated software and hardware control to effectively deliver fluids as designed. A steady increase in medical costs and drawbacks of currently available devices make improvements in this area of technology desirable.

Volumetric is fluid dispensing devices, systems, and methods

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L. P.


A combined coffee grinder and filter coffee maker has a filter compartment comprising a perforated container. A releasable cup surrounds the compartment and fit to a housing in use. A motor is provided to drive blades to grind the coffee and the coffee is then made with the compartment in situ.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to coffee makers.
2. Description of Prior Art
The invention relates more particularly to a combined coffee grinder and coffee maker. It is well-known to make coffee in a coffee maker that comprises a reservoir, an electric water heater that is arranged to heat the water supplied from the reservoir and pass the hot water into a filter compartment. A coffee pot or vessel is provided under the filter compartment to collect coffee that is made by passing the hot water through coffee grounds supported by a filter in the bottom of the filter compartment. It is also known to have a keep-warm function that retains the coffee warm in the coffee pot as required until the coffee pot is removed to pour coffee into cups for drinking. Electrically operated coffee grinders are also known in which a blade or set of blades is rotated at high speed to grind coffee beans into suitably sized coffee grounds for use in a filter compartment. At present, the coffee makers and coffee grinders are provided as quite separate domestic appliances.


A split transport wheel is described including first and second wheel halves, each having an arcuate external tire receiving surface spanned by a joint surface. The two halves may be selectively assembled with the joint surfaces in juxtaposition and with the tire receiving surfaces forming a relatively continuous tire receiving surface. A clamp assembly releasably joins the first and second wheel halves and is selectively operable to (a) draw the respective joint surfaces together in juxtaposition and (b) release the first and second wheel halves to be separated. A tire, formed of a strip of tire material, may be releasably wrapped about the tire receiving surfaces of the wheel halves. A first tire end anchor on the first wheel half releasably receives one of the strip ends, and a second tire end anchor on the second wheel half releasably receives the remaining tire strip end. The tire end anchors are positioned inwardly adjacent the first end of each joint surface to receive and clamp the strip ends responsive to operation of the clamp assembly to draw the respective joint surfaces together.

Many different materials in various industries are transferred from one location to another by use of powered transfer wheels. Such wheels are typically used in multiples on driven shafts to rotate against the various materials to impart movement. The same form of wheels are used as idlers, free-wheeling to guide and support moving materials. In all instances, the outer peripheral surfaces of the wheels eventually wear.
A typical transfer wheel is formed of a plastic material such as nylon, or high density polyethylene, with a peripheral tire formed of a softer material. The soft tire material is often molded onto the wheel rim and is replaced only by a re-molding process. The wheel must therefor be removed from its drive or idler shaft and taken to a facility where the re-molding process is performed. Unless spare wheels are provided, costly down time for the associated machinery can result. Further, considerable labor expense becomes involved in removing, then re-mounting the wheels. Still further, the re-molding process is both time consuming and costly.
A long felt need has thus been recognized for a transfer wheel that makes use of inexpensive, readily available tire materials, and that can be reconditioned by changing tire materials without requiring removal of the wheel from the supporting shaft. This need is fulfilled as will be seen from the following description, drawings and claims which set forth the presently preferred embodiments of my invention.


(-)-2,5,5,8a-Tetramethyl-1-(carboxymethyl)-2-hydroxydecalin is subjected to lactonization by dehydration to form decahydro-3a,6,6,9a-tetramethyl(3a.alpha.,5a.beta.,9a.alpha.,9b.beta.)-(+) -naphtho[2,1-b]furan-2(1H)-one, which is then reduced with a metal hydride to convert it into (-)-2,5,5,8a-tetramethyl-1-(carboxymethyl)-2-hydroxydecalin, followed by dehydrative cyclization to give L-ambrox.. The (-)-2,5,5,8a-tetramethyl-1-(carboxymethyl)-2-hydroxydecalin is produced from its racemic mixture. The resolution is performed using a 1-(aryl)ethylamine. The starting material for the synthesis is beta-ionone.

Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a process for producing (-)-3a,6,6,9a-tetramethyl-dodecahydronaphtho[2,1-b]furan (hereinafter "L-ambrox") represented by Formula (1); ##STR1## which is an important perfumery substance having an excellent aroma of an amber. More particularly, this invention relates to a process for producing the L-ambrox by the use of a (-)-2,5,5,8a-tetramethyl-1-(carboxymethyl)-2-hydroxydecalin (hereinafter "(-)HC acid") represented by Formula (10a): ##STR2## as a starting material, at a low cost and in an industrial scale. This invention also relates to a process for optically resolving (.+-.)-2,5,5,8a-tetramethyl-1-(carboxymethyl)-2-hydroxydecalin, which is a mixture of equal quantities of (-)HC acid and (+)-2,5,5,8a-tetramethyl-1-(carboxymethyl)-2-hydroxydecalin (hereinafter "(+)HC acid"), into (-)HC acid and (+)HC acid to thereby obtain the optically active (-)HC acid or (+)HC acid represented by Formula (10b): which is useful as a starting material for synthesizing a compound having a trimethyl-transdecalin skeleton represented by Formula (A): ##STR3## having a physiological activity or a characteristic aroma, as exemplified by the L-ambrox or the like.


Alumina-based adsorbents containing at least one compound of an alkali or alkaline earth metal, wherein the alkali or alkaline earth metal values are present in an amount ranging from 15 mmole to 100 mmole per 100 g of alumina, are useful for the adsorptive purification of polyolefins prepared by the polymerization of olefins in the presence of a metallic coordination catalyst, to remove contaminating catalyst metal values therefrom with but negligible monomer/solvent isomerization.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to novel adsorbents for the purification of polyolefins and, more especially, to novel alumina-based adsorbents for the purification of polyolefins prepared by the polymerization of olefins in the presence of a system of coordination catalysts. This invention particularly relates to the purification of the reaction medium provided by the aforesaid polymerization process.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The polymerization of olefins is typically carried out in the presence of polymerization catalysts containing elements of Groups IVB, VB and VIB of the Periodic Table and, more particularly, containing vanadium, titanium and zirconium values. These catalysts also contain, as reducing agents, organometallic compounds (alkyl metallics), metallic hydrides or metal hydroxides. These catalysts are generally designated transition catalysts and have a high catalytic activity for the polymerization of olefins.
However, the polyolefins obtained are contaminated by metallic residues originating in the catalysts. It is thus strictly necessary to purify them prior to use, in order to prevent any coloration or degradation and to reduce their toxicity.
The processes for the polymerization of olefins generally entail apparatus for the recovery of the solvents and monomers contained in the polyolefins, such solvents and monomers being recycled back into the polymerization vessels. The presence of metals in these compounds promotes corrosion problems in the apparatus employed.
To purify the product polyolefin, it is known to this art to use different adsorbents, in particular the aluminas, for example.
Among the adsorbents used for such purpose, it is advantageous to utilize adsorbents in the form of pellets, which are handled more easily than powder or block articles of different shapes. In effect, a product in the form of pellets may be easily transported both for charging and discharging the purification columns, for example by use of various pneumatic systems.
From among such adsorbents, alumina is converted most readily into pellets. However, alumina, which is advantageous in view of its ease of handling and its good metal adsorption properties, presents a major disadvantage, i.e., it favors the isomerization of the solvents contained in the polyolefins, such as, for example, 1-butene.
Consequently, the solvents recovered cannot be completely recycled and most often they must be subjected to an additional purification to eliminate the isomerized products.

Alumina-based adsorbents for the purification of polyolefins


A liftable seat in a vehicle includes: a base frame; a seat cushion frame disposed on the base frame and to which a seat cushion is coupled; a seat back frame coupled to the seat cushion frame which is foldable in a forward direction and to which a seat back is coupled; and a lifting member in which the first end is connected to the base frame and the second end of which is coupled to the seat cushion frame, and configured to lift the seat cushion frame upward from an unlifted position to a lifted position.

(a) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a liftable seat in a vehicle. In particular, the liftable seat in a vehicle is typically found in the middle seat of the second row.
(b) Description of the Related Art
Generally, the back seat of the second row seat in a vehicle can be folded to a seat cushion and can slide in a longitudinal direction along the vehicle. Such a seat is generally referred to as a folding and drive seat mechanism. Since the folding and drive seat is provided in a vehicle, a wide cargo space can be obtained by folding the seat back when the seat is not occupied by a passenger.
Additionally, an unoccupied seat can be folded. However, since the height of the folded seat in the conventional folding and drive seat is similar to a seating position of a passenger, there is a drawback in that the space on the folded seat cannot be used for other purposes (i.e. putting objects on the folded seat).
Accordingly, a seat mechanism which allows the space obtained by folding the seat to be effectively used thereby providing convenience to a passenger is being sought.
The above information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the invention and therefore it may contain information that does not form the prior art that is already known in this country to a person of ordinary skill in the art.

Hyundai Motor European Technical Center GmbH


A method for disposing of infectious medical waste in a closed system includes the steps of shredding the waste in the closed system to reduce the waste to small particles and indirectly heating the waste particles in the closed system by contacting the waste particles with a heated surface. The waste particles are indirectly heated to a sufficiently high temperature and for a sufficient period of time to produce a quantitative assurance of sterilization of the waste particles. Air is continuously drawn through the closed system to control the pressure and moisture in the closed system.

The present invention relates to systems and processes for the environmentally safe disposal of infectious medical waste.
The safe disposal of infectious medical waste has become a major environmental and public safety concern in recent years. Public safety concerns include the spread of disease by the indiscriminate disposal of infectious medical waste in municipal landfills, or by dumping at sea. A major environmental danger concerns many substandard medical waste incinerators operated at hospitals across the United States. Usually concentrated in populous urban areas, these facilities each year emit tons of toxins into the atmosphere, including dioxins, furans, heavy metals, and acid gases. The current state of medical waste disposal in the United States is chronicled by Hershkowitz, Alan, "Without a Trace: Handling Medical Waste Safely", MIT Technology Review, August/September 1990, incorporated herein by reference.
Under current U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rules, medical waste must be both treated to substantially remove or reduce any biological hazard and destroyed so that it is no longer generally recognizable as medical waste. After the waste has been treated and destroyed in this way, the EPA does not require it to be tracked and it may be disposed of in the same manner as ordinary garbage.

Processing facility for disposing of infectious medical wastes


A package arrangement for storing a container includes a carton having a receiving cavity, and a die cut insert. The die cut insert is detachably disposed in the receiving cavity of the carton, and includes a top panel having at least a top panel cavity and a bottom panel having at least a bottom panel cavity aligned with the top panel cavity of the top panel, wherein the die cut insert is adapted for substantially retaining the container in the carton when the container is slidably inserted into the die cut insert through the top panel cavity and the bottom panel cavity at a position that an upper portion of the container is encircling supported by the top panel and a lower portion of the container is encircling supported by the bottom panel.

1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to a packaging, and more particularly to a package arrangement in which a die cut insert is fittedly disposed in a fiberboard carton for substantially and securely supporting a container within that carton.
2. Description of Related Arts
Cartons have widely been used for transportation of industrial products. As a matter of conventional practices, a particular kind of goods is first contained in a specifically-designed holder. That holder, with the goods contained therein, is ultimately packed into the cartons for transportation. The primary reason for utilizing the specifically-designed holder is to avoid unwanted movement of the goods inside the carton during transportation, thus minimizing unwanted damages of the goods upon arriving to the receiving side.
Under this particular background, there exists a pressing problem for transporting goods contained in a substantially cylindrical and fragile container, such as glass wine bottles, because it is rather difficult to constraint movements of cylindrical container inside the carton.
One way of doing that is to give up fiberboard carton altogether and utilize a styrofoam rack having a plurality of storage compartments for receiving the cylindrical containers. While styrofoam racks generally achieve satisfactory performance in reducing unwanted damages of the containers, they inevitably increase the logistic cost and the ultimate selling price of the relevant goods.
Moreover, the use of plastic racks is definitely not environmentally friendly because the papers used for making the fiberboard cartons can usually be recycled, whereas it is more difficult to deal with the used styrofoam racks.

Fiberboard carton with secured die cut insert


Disclosed are a method and a system for processing fault information of a decoding chip in a rotary transformer. The method includes: reading data information transmitted by the decoding chip according to a preset period; determining whether the data information includes alarm information; when the data information includes the alarm information, estimating a rotor-position value after an alarm occurs in real time according to a rotational speed in the data information obtained before the alarm occurs; determining whether a difference between a current rotor-position value and the estimated rotor-position value is greater than a fault threshold; and when the difference between the current rotor-position value and the estimated rotor-position value is greater than the fault threshold, controlling a motor using the estimated rotor-position value.

At present, a rotary transformer is a widely used device for detecting a motor-position. Generally, output signals of the rotary transformer are two orthogonal signals including a sine signal and a cosine signal, and a rotor-position value of the motor is obtained by decoding the two signals. There are two types of decoding methods, one is software decoding. The sine and cosine signals output from the rotary transformer are decoded by designing peripheral circuits and corresponding algorithm programs. The disadvantage of the software decoding is that there are many circuit devices required, and the risk of decoding failure due to the device damage is high. Another decoding method is to use a decoding chip, the advantage is that it is convenient to use and there are many protection functions, the disadvantage is that various protection alarms occur in an actual application. When an alarm occurs, it may be stopped to control the motor, such that the operation reliability of the motor system may be affected.
In addition, in most cases, the alarm of the rotary transformer only has a certain influence on an accuracy of the position detection, and the alarm information may be ignored within an allowable range of the accuracy.

Method and system for processing fault information of decoding chip in rotary transformer


A process for implementation on a programmed digital computer includes providing a placement of clusters of cells which are assigned to regions on an integrated circuit chip, and combining the regions to form region groups. The region groups collectively constitute a "jiggle" which resembles a sieve. The clusters in each region group are re-assigned to the regions in the region group. The regions are recombined to form different region groups (a different jiggle), and the clusters in each different region group are re-assigned to the regions in the different region group. These steps are repeated using at least two, preferably four different jiggles, until an end criterion is reached. Then, the regions and clusters are hierarchically subdivided, and the process is repeated for each hierarchical level until the clusters have been reduced to individual cells. The regions of the region groups at each level are contiguous, and the region groups overlap, such that a cluster can be moved from any region to any other region on the chip by sufficient repetition of the assignment step using alternating jiggles.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to the art of microelectronic integrated circuits, and more specifically to a physical design automation system and process for designing integrated circuit chips using highly parallel sieve optimization with multiple "jiggles".
2. Description of the Related Art
Microelectronic integrated circuits consist of a large number of electronic components that are fabricated by layering several different materials on a silicon base or wafer. The design of an integrated circuit transforms a circuit description into a geometric description which is known as a layout. A layout consists of a set of planar geometric shapes in several layers.
The layout is then checked to ensure that it meets all of the design requirements. The result is a set of design files in a particular unambiguous representation known as an intermediate form that describes the layout. The design files are then converted into pattern generator files that are used to produce patterns called masks by an optical or electron beam pattern generator.
During fabrication, these masks are used to pattern a silicon wafer using a sequence of photolithographic steps. The component formation requires very exacting details about geometric patterns and separation between them. The process of converting the specifications of an electrical circuit into a layout is called the physical design. It is an extremely tedious and an error-prone process because of the tight tolerance requirements and the minuteness of the individual components.
Currently, the minimum geometric feature size of a component is on the order of 0.5 microns. However, it is expected that the feature size can be reduced to 0.1 micron within several years. This small feature size allows fabrication of as many as 4.5 million transistors or 1 million gates of logic on a 25 millimeter by 25 millimeter chip. This trend is expected to continue, with even smaller feature geometries and more circuit elements on an integrated circuit, and of course, larger die (or chip) sizes will allow far greater numbers of circuit elements.
Due to the large number of components and the exacting details required by the fabrication process, physical design is not practical without the aid of computers. As a result, most phases of physical design extensively use Computer Aided Design (CAD) tools, and many phases have already been partially or fully automated. Automation of the physical design process has increased the level of integration, reduced turn around time and enhanced chip performance.
The objective of physical design is to determine an optimal arrangement of devices in a plane or in a three dimensional space, and an efficient interconnection or routing scheme between the devices to obtain the desired functionality. Since space on a wafer is very expensive real estate, algorithms must use the space very efficiently to lower costs and improve yield. The arrangement of individual cells in an integrated circuit chip is known as a cell placement.
Each microelectronic circuit device or cell includes a plurality of pins or terminals, each of which is connected to pins of other cells by a respective electrical interconnect wire network or net. A goal of the optimization process is to determine a cell placement such that all of the required interconnects can be made, and the total wirelength and interconnect congestion are minimized.
Prior art methods for achieving this goal comprise generating one or more initial placements, modifying the placements using optimization methodologies including Genetic Algorithms such as simulated evolution, force directed placement or simulated annealing, and comparing the resulting placements using a cost criteria.
In conventional chip design, the positions of certain "unmovable" cells (external interconnect terminals or pads, large "megacells" etc.) will be fixed a priori by the designer. Given those fixed positions, the rest of the cells are then placed on the chip. Since the unmovable cells and pads are located or placed before the placement for the rest of the cells of chip has been decided on, it is unlikely that the chosen positions will be optimal.
In this manner, a number of regions, which may have different sizes and shapes, are defined on the chip for placement of the rest of the cells.
It is desirable to assign individual microelectronic devices or cells to the regions, or "partition" the placement such that the total interconnect wirelength is minimized. However, methodologies for accomplishing this goal efficiently have not been proposed heretofore.
The general partitioning methodology is to hierarchically partition a large circuit into a group of smaller subcircuits until each subcircuit is small enough to be designed efficiently. Because the quality of the design may suffer due to the partitioning, the partitioning of a circuit has to be done carefully.
One of the most common objectives of partitioning is to minimize the cutsize which is defined as a number of nets crossing a cut. Also the number of partitions often appears as a constraint with upper and lower bounds. At chip level, the number of partitions is determined, in part, by the capability of the placement algorithm.
The prior art accomplishes partitioning by means of a series of "bipartitioning" problems, in which a decision is made to assign a component to one of two regions. Each component is hierarchically bipartitioned until the desired number of components is achieved.
Numerous methodologies for cell placement and assignment are known in the art. These include quadratic optimization as disclosed in an article entitled "GORDIAN: VLSI Placement by Quadratic Programming and Slicing Optimization", by J. Kleinhans et al, IEEE Trans. on CAD, 1991, pp. 356-365, and simulated annealing as described in an article entitled "A Loosely Coupled Parallel Algorithm for Standard Cell Placement", by W. Sun and C. Sechan, Proceedings of IEEE/ACM IC-CAD Conference, 1994, pp. 137-144.
The major drawbacks of these methodologies is they are sequential or almost sequential nature, have low capability for parallelization, and have long run times when implemented on a digital computer. These drawbacks are especially evident in a methodology described in an article entitled "An Improved Simulated Annealing Algorithm for Row-Based Placement", by C. Sechan and K. Lee, Proceedings of the IEEE Conference on CAD, 1987, pp. 478-481.
Prior art methods can not simultaneously solve the partitioning problem and the problem of placing partitions on the chip, and thereby their applicability to physical design automation systems for integrated circuit chip design is limited.

Physical design automation system and process for designing integrated circuit chips using highly parallel sieve optimization with multiple "jiggles"


A plethysmograph is described that includes a reference chamber having a top wall, a bottom wall, a barrier wall spaced beneath the bottom wall, a continuous side wall having a lower edge, and a first continuous flange with a lower edge below the bottom wall and above the barrier wall; a test chamber having a bottom wall, a continuous side wall with an upper edge, and a second continuous flange extending upwardly from the upper edge, the interior face of one of the flanges including an annular groove with an O-ring in the groove, and the interior face of the other flange being tapered from vertical by up to about 1°; and a manifold having airflow openings in communication with the reference and test chamber and a common exterior airflow opening through a passageway, and a sampling port in communication with the passageway.

(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to plethysmographs used to measure changes in air volume, such as in non-invasive pulmonary testing of small animals, and in particular to larger plethysmographs that provide a test chamber with an airtight seal without the use of clamps, but which can be readily opened when desired. The invention further relates to a reduced noise plethysmograph that include means for air sampling.
(2) Description of the Prior Art
Plethysmographs are used in research to collect data relating to changes in air pressure within a test chamber. An example of such data is pulmonary data from small animals, such as mice. Most plethysmographs are comprised of a test chamber to enclose the test subject, a reference chamber, and a differential pressure transducer connected to the two chambers, e.g., via tubing extending from a port in each chamber to the transducer. Both chambers are in communication with the ambient air, i.e., the air within the room where the tests are being conducted, through restricted airflow openings, or pneumotachs.
As changes to the air volume within the test chamber occur, pressure variations are recorded by the transducer, which normally displays the recorded data in numerical form or as a graph. Air pressure within the test chamber can also vary due to changes in the pressure of air entering the test chamber through the pneumotachs. This non-chamber originated air pressure variation, known as background noise or simply noise, can adversely affect the accuracy of the recorded data, since the transducer also measures the noise.
Plethysmographs are commonly used to measure the pulmonary activities of test animals that are completely or substantially enclosed within the test chamber. As the test animal inhales or exhales, the changes in air volume results in pressure variations that are recorded by the transducer.
The purpose of the reference chamber is to partially reduce the noise affect. A second tube extends from a reference chamber outlet to the transducer. The transducer simultaneously measures variations in air pressures within the two chambers, and subtracts the reference chamber measurements from the animal chamber measurements. As a result, the net pressure variations are essentially attributable to the respiration patterns of the test animal. Preferably, the test and reference chamber pneumotachs are close to each other to minimize variations in exterior air patterns.
A representative plethysmograph of the type used to measure small animal pulmonary responses is shown and described in commonly assigned U.S. Pat. No. 5,379,777 to Lomask, the entire disclosure of the patent being incorporated herein by reference.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,902,532 to Lomask, the entire disclosure of this patent also being incorporated herein by reference, describes an apparatus for further reducing background noise. In accordance with the disclosure of the '532 patent, a noise-reduction manifold is provided to direct exterior air from a common opening into both the reference and test chambers. Preferably, the distance from the exterior air opening to the two chambers is approximately the same, so that any changes in air entering the manifold will be equally experienced by both chambers. As a result, subtraction of reference chamber pressures from test chamber pressures provides essentially a noise-free measurement of pressure changes within the test chamber that is attributable to the test subject.
However, further improvements in plethysmographs of the type described in the above patents are still desired, especially in plethysmographs sized to accommodate larger test subjects. In particular, there is a need for a plethysmograph having a reference chamber that is attachable to a test chamber in a manner that will result in an airtight enclosure of the test chamber without the use of latches or clamps, while still enabling the operator to quickly and easily open the test chamber when desired. There is also a need for a reduced noise plethysmograph that includes a means for quickly and accurately sampling the air that is entering the test chamber.