A lock-up device 7 includes a front cover 2, an impeller 3, a turbine 4, and a piston 22 positioned to divide a space between the front cover 2 and the turbine 4, and is engageable with the front cover 2. The piston 22 is formed with a plurality of projections 41 extending in the radial direction on a surface 42. The projection 41 has a straight front edge 51 and a straight rear edge 52, and an arced radially outer edge 53 and radially inner edge 54. The rear edge 52 in the rotation direction overlaps a straight line Ls connecting a radially inner end 52a with the rotation center O, or the rear edge 52 in the rotation direction is inclined to the straight line Ls such that a radially outer end 52b is positioned rearward of the straight line Ls in the rotation direction.

Torque converters are apparatuses that transmit torque from the engine to the transmission via a working fluid therein, and mainly include a front cover to which torque is input from the engine, an impeller fixed to a transmission side of the front cover to constitute a fluid chamber therebetween, a turbine located opposite an engine side of the impeller to output the torque to the transmission, and a stator located between a radially inner portion of the impeller and a radially inner portion of the turbine to adjust the flow of the working fluid from the turbine to the impeller.
A lock-up device is located in a space between the turbine and the front cover, and directly transmits the torque from the front cover to the turbine by mechanically engaging the front cover with the turbine. The lock-up device includes, for example, a disc-like piston to be pressed against a friction surface of the front cover for engagement, and an elastically coupling mechanism to transmit the torque between the piston and the turbine.
In the lock-up device, the piston has a frictionally coupling portion at a radially outer portion that is frictionally engageable with the front cover. Furthermore, the piston divides a space between the front cover and the turbine into a first hydraulic chamber near the front cover and a second hydraulic chamber, and can move in the axial direction due to a differential pressure between the first hydraulic chamber and the second hydraulic chamber (Refer to Patent Document 1, for example.). Next, the operation of the lock-up device will be described. When torque is transmitted through the fluid, working fluid is supplied to the first hydraulic chamber from the center, i.e., the working fluid flows radially outward and flows into the fluid operating chamber of the torque converter. Accordingly, the piston is separated from the front cover in the axial direction, i.e., in a clutch disengagement state. Then, at the lock-up engagement operation, the hydraulic circuit is switched to exhaust the working fluid in the first hydraulic chamber radially inward. Accordingly, the hydraulic pressure in the first hydraulic chamber becomes lower than that in the second hydraulic chamber so that the piston approaches the front cover. As a result, the frictionally coupling portion of the piston is forcefully pressed against the front cover, i.e., in a clutch engagement state.
Patent Document 1: Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication H11-63151

Lock-up device of hydraulic torque transmitting apparatus


A distribution module for use in a traditional electrical panel that provides coupling functionality for optical and electrical connectors. The distribution module is comprised of a housing with a passage defined therein. The distribution module further includes high density, modular coupling strips, which are chosen based on the type of connectors to be coupled. These coupling strips are joined together and then secured in the passage formed in the housing. Once assembled, the distribution module is received into an opening in the panel thereby integrating both optical and electrical couplers in a single panel.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of optical fiber distribution systems, and more particularly to a distribution module that can be used in an electrical panel to facilitate multi-fiber connections and to integrate optical and electrical couplers onto a single panel.
2. Description of Related Art
Couplings for optical fiber transmission systems are known in the art. Often times it becomes necessary to arrange a plurality of optical fiber couplings in a panel to facilitate multi-fiber connections. These panels are typically found in telecommunications closets where connections are made between cables by patching one cable connector to another. Desirably, devices for holding couplings are mounted in the panel, but the couplings themselves are not connected to incoming or outgoing fiber paths until actually needed to provide service.
Optical couplings come in a variety of types, each having a unique interface designed to mate with an optical fiber connector of like type. One frequently used coupling is referred to as an ST.RTM. coupling, which is disclosed, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,934,785 to Mathis et al. ST is a registered trademark of Lucent Technologies, Inc. Another common type of optical fiber coupling is the SC type coupling that is shown and described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,212,752 to Stephenson et al. Other types of optical fiber couplings include the FC type coupling and the LC type coupling. U.S. Pat. No. 5,274,729 to King et al. shows examples of couplings for the ST, SC and the FC types of couplings.
Heretofore, coupling systems for panels used individual or duplex couplings for making connections between the fiber optic cables. These systems do have their drawbacks, however. Depending on the application, the number of couplings used in an optical cable panel may number in the hundreds or even thousands resulting in a very time consuming assembly process for the panel. With such a large number of individual or duplex coupling locations, a technician's job in making the appropriate connections can be complicated. Moreover, because optical couplings have unique physical designs, they are often relatively expensive to manufacture.
In addition, panels have traditionally been designed to furnish either optical coupling functionality or electrical coupling functionality. This dichotomy is driven in primary part by the physical design of the panels. Electrical panels are generally designed with elongated rectangular openings for receiving electrical coupling apparatus that terminates a plurality of electrical connectors. Conversely, optical panels are generally designed with small openings that receive either a single or duplex optical coupler. It is therefore desirable to integrate both optical and electrical couplers in a single panel to make best use of space in a telecommunications closet rather than dedicating panels on an optical versus electrical basis.
Accordingly, there exists a need for a high density, distribution module that provides coupling functionality for a plurality of fiber optic connectors and is more cost efficient to assemble and manufacture than individual coupling systems. Moreover, the distribution module should be designed for use in a traditional electrical panel so that both electrical and optical couplers can be integrated onto a single panel.

Distribution module for optical couplings


The invention relates to a process and an apparatus for the microsuspension polymerization of vinyl chloride in vessels whose contents are agitated predominantly by natural convection where, in a reactor having a ratio of height H to diameter D of H/D 2, which is equipped externally or internally with a heat exchanger provided with water and connected to a pumped circulation system provided with water, the introduction of the cooling water takes place in the upper third of the heat exchanger and the cooling water is conducted downward and is conducted away in the lower third of the heat exchanger.

The invention relates to a process and an apparatus for the microsuspension polymerization of vinyl chloride in vessels whose contents are agitated predominantly by natural convection.
Polymerization reactors for polymerizing ethylenically unsaturated monomers in an aqueous medium, for example, for polymerizing vinyl chloride by a suspension, emulsion or microsuspension process, are predominantly constructed as vertically oriented pressure vessels with a stirrer and a cooling jacket. A pump is used to convey the cooling medium in the cooling jacket with the aim of increasing the flow velocity in the jacket and achieving a temperature which is, as far as possible, identical in all parts of the jacket. Dissipation of the heat of polymerization is improved by stirring the polymerization batch with a stirrer.
However, there are polymerization processes which have to be carried out without a stirrer because the aqueous polymerization mixture is sensitive to shear. An example of this is microsuspension polymerization of vinyl chloride homo- or copolymers, in which a homogenized aqueous dispersion of monomer, dispersing agent and free-radical generator is fed to the reactor and induced to polymerize. The homogenized dispersion cannot be stirred because it is sensitive to shear.
EP A 93936/(U.S. Pat. No. 4,528,337) describes an apparatus and a process for the microsuspension polymerization of vinyl chloride. The polymerization is carried out in a tubular shaped pressure vessel which has a large length to diameter ratio and is positioned vertically, optimizing heat exchange due to a large ratio of heat-exchange surface to contents and insuring agitation of the contents by natural convection, i.e., upwardly acting forces resulting from differences in temperature and/or density.
FIG. 1 depicts a reactor 1 of this type, representing the prior art. The reactor 1 is equipped with a cooling jacket 2 which serves as a heat exchanger to dissipate the heat of reaction. Water, as the cooling medium, is fed into a pumped circulation system 4 via a control valve 3, and, using a pump 5, is conveyed into the cooling jacket 2 via the inlet 6, which is arranged at the lower end of the reactor 1. The pump 5 is operated to insure a high circulation rate in order to insure uniform temperatures in the entire cooling jacket. The amount of water discharged at the overflow 7 at the upper end of the reactor 1 corresponds to the amount fed at the control valve 3. The flap valve 14 serves to direct the cooling water into the circulation system and prevents it from flowing out directly at the overflow 7.
At the start of the polymerization, the temperature in the water-filled pumped circulation system 4 is raised by feeding in steam via the control valve 8, in order to heat the reactor contents to polymerization temperature. After initiation of the exothermic polymerization reaction, the steam feed is stopped and the pumped circulation system 4 is cooled by feeding in cooling water via the control valve 3 in such a way that the heat of polymerization arising is dissipated to precisely the extent required to keep the temperature and/or the pressure of the reactor contents constant. To this end, pressure and temperature in the reactor 1 are determined with a thermometer 9 and a manometer 10; the thermometer 9 determines the inlet temperature of the cooling water, and after the measurements have been assessed, the appropriate amount of cooling water is introduced using the control valve 3.
The exothermic heat balance causes the polymerization batch to be more strongly heated in the middle of the reactor (in the vicinity of its axis) than in the vicinity of the walls. The resultant differences in density lead to an upward movement of the reactor contents in the vicinity of the axis and a downward movement in the cooled zone near the walls. This results in convective circulation, leading to agitation of the reactor contents together with improved heat transfer. In the embodiment described in EP-A 93936, this circulatory movement is supported by what is called "gas-bubble agitation", i.e., by blowing in an inert gas at the base of the reactor via the pipe 12 and, at the pipe 13, conducting away the inert gas which has been blown in.
A disadvantage of this method of operation is that the temperatures in the upper region of the reactor are markedly higher than in its lower region; these temperature differences become even greater as the polymerization progresses because the polymerization proceeds exothermically. A result of this is that the polymerization takes place at different temperatures and at different times in the regions mentioned, and therefore, there can be an undesirably broad distribution of properties decisive for quality such as the K value of the product.

Process and apparatus for the microsuspension polymerization of vinyl chloride


A heating element with a radiant heating body for glass ceramic hobs, including four heating conductors which extend substantially concentrically and parallel to each other; and a ten-stage switch for switching said heating conductors through the intermediary of five output terminals.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention concerns a heating element, preferably a radiant heating body for glass ceramic hobs.
2. Discussion of the Prior Art
Heating elements of the above-indicated kind are known per se. Thus DE 33 15 438 A1 discloses such a heating element which is formed from an insulating carrier and a receiving dish and which, for heating glass ceramic cooking hob areas, is arranged beneath the glass ceramic plate. The heating element has three heating conductors of which two are arranged in series one behind the other, while the third heating conductor extends parallel to them. That arrangement is intended to achieve an improved relationship between heating conductor length and heating conductor output power. A particularly advantageous use arises in the case of radiant heating bodies in order to use a seven-stage switch.
A seven-stage circuit for hot plates, which is also known from a practical context, is disclosed in German patent specification No. 12 39 034. In that arrangement a respective end of two heating conductors or heating spirals is connected to an output terminal of the switch. The remaining four ends of the heating conductors are brought together in pairs and also connected to a respective output terminal. A graduation in terms of output power is achieved by virtue of connecting the output terminal of the switch to the two pole terminals of a dc or ac network system, in a predetermined switching sequence. That patent specification is based on the realisation that, while retaining the known seven-stage switch arrangement, it is not possible to provide between switching stages II and I a further switching position in which the third output terminal is not connected to one of the two pole terminals. It was therefore necessary to look for a way of completely avoiding that pole change without in that respect anything changing in terms of the series connection of the three heating conductors in the first switching position of the series circuit of the second and third heating conductors in switching position II. Therefore, in accordance with patent specification No. 12 39 034, the inevitable pole change was effected on the one hand in relation to switching positions II and IV and on the other hand in relation to switching positions IV and II. More specifically, in the former case the neutral switching position III is between the pole change, while in the second case that involves the two neutral positions I and OFF.
Those heating elements in the state of the art have been found to suffer from the disadvantage of the excessively great power graduation effect and the temperature distribution, which is at least in part not an optimum one, in regard to seven-stage heating with a seven-stage switch. It was further realised that the energy regulator cycles the output power in respect of time. As a result in the low output power stages the energy regulator has excessively long OFF-times.


Provided is a support member assembly suitable for use in a contact probe head comprising a support member formed with a plurality of holder holes for supporting conductive contact members in a mutually parallel relationship, and a reinforcing member integrally formed with the support member and extending in a part of the support member devoid of any holder holes. The reinforcing member increases the overall mechanical strength of the support member assembly, and prevents the thermal deformation of the support member. Because the holder holes are formed in the support member made of material suitable for forming holes, such as plastic material and ceramic material, the holder holes can be formed at high precision and at low cost.

In recent years, burn-in tests are routinely conducted as a part of a test process for semiconductor related components, and in such a test a voltage is applied to an object for a prolonged period of time (from few hours to tens of hours) at an elevated temperature (approximately 150° C.). It is more and more preferred to conduct such a test on a wafer level (8 inch or 200 mm wafer) rather than on a package level so that the yield factor may be improved. At any event, when applying a contact probe head for simultaneously accessing a large number of points during a burn-in test, the heat resistance and thermal expansion of the support member for electric contact members are important factors that need to be taken into account.
The conductive contact member is desired to be able to accommodate variations in the height of the corresponding electrode on the wafer by resiliently engaging such an electrode. Such an example is illustrated in FIG. 14. Referring to FIG. 14, a plurality of stepped holder holes 2 are passed across the thickness of a support member 21 in the form of a plate member. A small diameter section 2a of each holder hole 2 slidably receives a conductive needle member 23, and a large diameter section 2b of the holder hole 2 receives a conductive coil spring 24. The conductive needle member 23 includes a radial flange 23a which is received in the large diameter section 2b, and is resiliently urged by the coil spring 24 having one end wound around a stem portion 23b extending from the flange 23a. The other end of the coil spring 24 resiliently engages a corresponding terminal 25a of a circuit board 25 which is placed over the support member 21. The terminal 25a is connected to an electric circuit of a tester not shown in the drawing.
A number of such conductive needle members 23 are arranged in parallel to each other in the support member 21 as illustrated in FIG. 14 to form a contact probe head capable of accessing a plurality of points at the same time. An electric test is conducted by pushing such conductive needle members 23 onto the electrodes 26a of a wafer 26 (object to be tested) in a resilient manner.
To allow a plurality of electrodes 26a on the wafer 26 to be accessed at the same time as mentioned above, it is necessary to arrange in the support member 21 a same number of conductive contact members 23 as the number of the electrodes 26a on the wafer 26, and the support member 21 is required to be formed with a large number of holder holes 2 in a precise manner. Furthermore, because an elevated temperature in the order of 120 to 150° C. is maintained for tens of hours in a burn-in test, the contact probe head is required to be provided with a corresponding heat resistance and low thermal coefficient.
The materials having a heat resistance and thermal coefficient comparable to that of silicon serving as the material for a wafer include ceramics, glass and low thermal expansion alloys such as invar as well as silicon. However, machining a silicon member is a time-consuming process, and silicon requires electric insulation. Ceramics are known to be difficult to machine. Glass involves significant dimensional errors when machining, and this results in a poor yield factor. A low thermal expansion alloy is difficult to machine, and requires electric insulation. Therefore, when such materials are selected for the support member of a contact probe head, the production efficiency is low, and the production cost is high.
Plastic material suited for precision machining is suitable as the material for the support member. However, in a contact probe head having a large number of conductive contact members arranged in a support member at a high density, the pressure produced from such a large number of conductive contact members may cause a warping of the support member. The thermal expansion may cause positional errors of the conductive contact members (conductive needle members), and the access point of each conductive contact member may unacceptably offset from the desired point.

Support member assembly for conductive contact members


A communications system includes an optical receiver for receiving optical signals and for converting the optical signals into electrical signals, a transimpedance amplifier (“TIA”) for filtering the electrical signals, a limiting amplifier coupled with the TIA, an automatic threshold control (“ATC”) coupled with the TIA for providing a reference voltage for the limiting amplifier. The ATC further includes a common emitter circuit and an emitter follower circuit, wherein logic high signals and logical low signals in the electrical signals are determined based on the reference voltage output from the ATC.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a communications system and, more particularly, to a burst mode optical receiver and system and method therefor.
2. Description of the Related Art
Optical communications systems utilize receivers capable of receiving data continuously transmitted (i.e., in continuous mode) or data transmitted in a burst mode (i.e., a direct unencoded transmission of data wherein the data being transmitted have long strings of only 1s or long strings of only 0s). FIGS. 1A, 1B, 1C and 1D are diagrams illustrating waveforms of data transmission in continuous mode and in burst mode, each with and Without direct current ("DC") offset. In particular, FIGS. 1A and 1B diagrams that illustrate waveforms of data transmission in a continuous mode with and without DC offset, respectively. FIGS. 1C and 1D are diagrams that illustrate waveforms of data transmission in a burst mode with and without DC offset, respectively. Alternating current ("AC") coupled optical receivers capable of performing continuous data transmission are also employed in conventional communications systems.
DC coupled optical receivers capable of performing burst mode transmission are also employed in conventional communications systems. Data encoding and decoding required in burst mode transmission, however, undesirably increases system complexity and reduces transmission speed. Examples of conventional communications systems utilizing burst mode transmission are illustrated in, e.g., U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,025,456, 5,371,763 and 5,875,050. When digital data signals are received from a data channel, those signals are often degraded to analog signals having uncertain amplitude and non-discernible transitions between logic 1s and 0s. As the logic transitions become difficult to identify, the effects of noise and pulse width distortion adversely affect the system sensitivity and bandwidth.
There is thus a general need in the art for a system and method overcoming at least the aforementioned shortcomings in the art. A particular need exists in the art for a burst mode optical receiver and system and method overcoming disadvantages with respect to signal degradation in deciphering logic transitions, noise and distortion effects in communications networks employing burst mode transmission.

Burst mode optical receiver and system and method therefor

Industrial Technology Research Institute


A new cultivar of Heuchera, ‘Dark Secret’, characterized by its foliage that is dark purple-bronze in color with a silvery sheen with margins that are serrated and heavily ruffled, its petioles that are deep purple in color, its panicles of creamy white flowers held on purple stems, its vigorous growth habit, and its hardiness at least in U.S.D.A. Zones 4 to 9.

The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Heuchera of hybrid origin and is hereinafter referred to by the cultivar name 'Dark Secret'.
The inventor discovered the new cultivar, 'Dark Secret', as a naturally whole plant mutation in his garden in Lorgies, France in spring of 2007. The parent plants of 'Dark Secret' are unknown, however Heuchera 'Frosted Violet' (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 15,085), Heuchera Crimson Curls (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 13,729) and Heuchera 'Obsidian' (U.S. Plant Pat. No. 14,836) are possible parents based on the characteristics of 'Dark Secret' and their proximity in the same growing area.
Asexual reproduction of the new cultivar was first accomplished under direction of the inventor by in vitro propagation in Rijswijk, The Netherlands in August of 2007. Asexual reproduction of the new cultivar has shown that the unique features of 'Dark Secret' are stable and reproduced true to type in successive generations.


An application gateway server is provided for managing communication between an application executing in a runtime environment on a device and at least one backend server. The application gateway server comprises a message listener, a connector subsystem, and a messaging subsystem. The message listener receives messages from the component applications. The connector subsystem comprises a plurality of connectors, each of the plurality of connectors for communicating with one or more associated backend servers. The messaging subsystem comprises a message broker for processing messages received from the message listener and transmitting them to an associated one of the plurality of connectors and a communication mapping for identifying which of the plurality of connectors is to be used for each message in accordance with an origin of the message.

Due to the proliferation of wireless networks, there are a continually increasing number of wireless devices in use today. These devices include mobile telephones, personal digital assistance (PDAs) with wireless communication capabilities, two-way pagers and the like. Concurrently with the increase of available wireless devices, software applications running on such devices have increased their utility. For example, the wireless device may include an application that retrieves a weather report for a list of desired cities or an application that allows a user to shop for groceries. These software applications take advantage of the ability to transmit data of the wireless network in order to provide timely and useful services to users, often in addition to voice communication. However, due to a plethora of different types of devices, restricted resources of some devices, and complexity of delivering large amounts of data to the devices, developing software applications remains a difficult and time-consuming task.
Currently, devices are configured to communicate with Web Services through Internet based Browsers and/or native applications. Browsers have the advantage of being adaptable to operate on a cross-platform basis for a variety of different devices, but have a disadvantage of requesting pages (screen definitions in HTML) from the Web Service, which hinders the persistence of data contained in the screens. A further disadvantage of Browsers is that the screens are rendered at runtime, which can be resource intensive. Applications for browsers are efficient tools for designing platform independent applications. Accordingly, different runtime environments, regardless of the platform, execute the same application. However, since different wireless devices have different capabilities and form factors, the application may not be executed or displayed as desired. Further, browser based application often require significant transfer bandwidth to operate efficiently, which may be costly or even unavailable for some wireless devices.
On the other hand, native applications are developed for a specific wireless device platform, thereby providing a relatively optimized application program for a runtime environment running on that platform. However, a platform dependent application introduces several drawbacks, including having to develop multiple versions of the same application and being relatively large in size, thereby taxing memory resources of the wireless device. Further, application developers need experience with programming languages such as Java and C++ to construct such native applications.
Systems and methods disclosed herein provide a communication system for managing communication with component-based applications on devices to obviate or mitigate at least some of the aforementioned disadvantages.

System and method for managing communication for component applications


A touch sensing device is provided. A shielding plate is provided for covering and shielding wires that route sensing electrodes to a flexible circuit board. Alternatively, a conductive layer of the circuit board is applied for shielding a plurality of contacts of the electrodes and wires. Wires that couple two same typed electrodes extend as a shielding plate for shielding contacts of another type of electrodes. An auxiliary electrode bordering outside the sensing electrodes can be provided to compensate fringe effects of the sensing electrodes.

1. Technical Field
The invention relates in general to a touch sensing device, and more particularly to a capacitive touch sensing device with a shielding plate and/or an auxiliary electrode applied for reducing cost and improving touch sensing accuracy of the touch sensing device.
2. Description of the Related Art
The touch control technology brings people a user-friendly, intuitive and easy-to-use user interface, and is thus one of the most prevailing human-machine interface (HMI) technologies. It is therefore a research and development target for manufacturers in the modern information industry to provide a low-cost and high-performance touch sensing device/touch panel.


A method of forming low dielectric insulation between those pairs of conductive lines, of a level of interconnection for integrated circuits, having a gap of about 0.5 microns or less by depositing a nonconformal source with a poor step function for the insulating material, such as silane (SiH.sub.4) as the silicon (Si) source for silicon dioxide (SiO.sub.2), so as to create, in the gap, a large void whose dielectric constant is slightly greater than 1. After the formation of the void in the 0.5 microns or less gaps, the deposited nonconformal material is etched either simultaneously or sequentially along with deposition to fill the remaining gaps with void free insulation. The surface of the deposited insulating material is planarized at the desired thickness. Alternatively, a thin conformal insulating layer is first deposited as a liner on the conductive lines. The resulting structure of the interconnection level comprises a layer of insulation between and on the conductive lines with the dielectric constant of the insulation between the pairs of conductive lines with gap of 0.5 or less being, in combination with the void, at least about 3 or lower, and all of the remaining gaps are filled with void free insulating material with a dielectric constant of greater than about 3.5.

This invention relates to the fabrication of integrated circuits semiconductor devices and, more particularly, to forming an insulating layer on and between metal conductive lines which provide an interconnection between the active and/or passive elements of the integrated circuit.
In very large scale integrated (VLSI) circuit devices, several wiring layers are required to connect together the active and/or passive elements in a VLSI semiconductor chip. The interconnection structure consists of thin conductive lines separated by insulation in one layer or level and connected through vias or studs from contacts of the elements of the semiconductor chip or to a similar layer in another level of interconnections. This interconnection structure is similar to a transmission line in that there is a propagation delay of the signals being transmitted in these wiring layers. The delay is referred to as RC delay because it is a result of the resistance (R) of the material of the wire and the capacitance (C) between adjacent wires. With the trend of higher and higher levels of integration in semiconductor devices to ultra large scale integrated (ULSI) circuits, the space or gap between the wires or conductive lines to be filled with insulation is becoming extremely narrow between some of the conductive lines, such as about 0.5 microns and smaller. Such a narrow space or gap between conductive lines increases the capacitance and places greater demands on the insulating properties of the insulation between the conductive lines. Capacitance (C) is the product of dielectric constant (DC) of the insulating material times the area (A) of the opposing faces of the conductive line divided by the distance (D) between the conductive lines. With a decrease in distance (D), the capacitance (C) increases. Since signal delay of signal transmitted on the conductive line is controlled by the RC constant, an increase in capacitance (C) degrades the performance of the integrated circuit.
At the present state of the art, the insulating material used to fill these gaps is a silicon compound, such as silicon dioxide, which has a dielectric constant (DC) of between 3.5 and 4.0. A vacuum has a perfect dielectric constant (DC) and is the basis for the measurement of the dielectric constant of other materials. For example, air and other insulating gases have a dielectric constant (DC) of slightly greater than 1, but less than 1.1. Air has a dielectric constant of 1.00059 and oxygen (O.sub.2) has a dielectric constant of 1.000523. The use of insulating material with dielectric constants (DC) lower than 3.5 in the narrow gap will lower the capacitance (C) and offset the increase caused by the smaller distance (D) between adjacent conductive lines. Attempts have been made to use organic insulating materials, such as polyimides which have a DC of between 3.2-3.4, but are hydroscopic and any absorbed moisture can potentially cause corrosion of metal lines. Other possible insulating materials are boron nitride (BN.sub.x) and fluorinated silicon oxide (SiO.sub.x F.sub.y), but they also have dielectric constants above 3.
In addition to the demands placed on the insulating property of the insulation between the conductive lines, these narrow gaps of about 0.5 microns and smaller make it much more difficult to deposit the insulating material into the gaps so that the gaps may not be completely and properly filled. In addition, when the height of the conductive line is increased, it makes it more difficult to fill, especially when the aspect ratio is 2 to 1 or greater with a gap distance of 0.5 microns or smaller. Aspect ratio is the height (h) of the conductive line divided by the distance (d) or gap between the conductive lines. It is pointed out in U.S. Pat. No. 5,124,014 to Pang-Dow Foo et al. that when the gap or distance (d) is less than the height (h) of the conductive line, it is difficult to fill uniformly. This patent states that the top tends to accumulate deposited material, growing shoulders that may eventually close off before the bottom is filled, leading to the formation of voids in the deposited material. U.S. Pat. No. 5,275,977 to Otsubo et al. confirms this problem and sets the same objective for their process as Pang-Dow Foo et al. set for theirs; namely, the formation of the insulating film free of voids. This patent discloses the combination of chemical vapor deposition (CVD) and etching a silicon dioxide film (SiO.sub.2) using tetraethylorthosilicate (TEOS) [Si(OC.sub.2 H.sub.5).sub.4 ] as the source silicon gas and oxygen (O.sub.2) for deposition of SiO.sub.2 and carbon tetrafluoride (CF.sub.4) as the etching gas. With TEOS as the source gas, the deposited SiO.sub.2 films are conformal in that the deposition follows the contour of the surface on which it is being deposited. This patent also suggests the use of other source gases, one of which is silane (SiH.sub.4). However, other than this suggestion, no description is given for forming an insulating layer between and on the conductive lines with SiH.sub.4 as the source. The Pang-Dow Foo et al. patent describes the use of an electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) plasma reactor, which can be operated to both deposit and sputter etch either simultaneously or sequentially, to deposit high quality silicon dioxide layers which are void-free. The deposition of SiO.sub.2 occurs in a vertical direction while the sputtering is angle dependent with its highest yield being at 45.degree.. Instead of SiH.sub.4, either TEOS or tetramethycyclosiloxane (TMCTS) is used as the silicon containing source gases. Both of these source gases produce conformal films. This patent states that as the aspect ratio approaches and exceeds unity, it becomes more difficult to deposit void-free oxide. To prevent voids in the insulating layer in filling these narrow gaps, the bias potential is increased to induce a greater amount of sputter etching. Alternatively, a separate etching step may be performed.
One advantage of using ECR plasma deposition is that the substrate does not have to be heated to more than 150 degrees C. Above about 400 degrees C., hillocks tend to form in the aluminum conductive lines and, if the growth is lateral, it could bridge the narrow gap between lines and create a short. Other plasma apparatus that can perform deposition and etching and operate at low substrate temperatures are a transformer coupled plasma (TCP) reactor and a helicon coupled plasma (HCP) reactor.
The description in the specification of both of these patents describes methods for forming void-free insulating layers between the conductive lines and they teach that, from a detrimental standpoint, voids will form in the narrow gaps under certain conditions.

Bias plasma deposition for selective low dielectric insulation


An integrally molded object body is disclosed for retaining fasteners in a pre-attachment position and deforming to accommodate attachment tolerances. The object body has a fastener retaining portion that has an aperture defined therein that has a fastener-engaging edge that grips the shaft of the fastener in the pre-attachment position. The fastener retaining is deformable to allow the fastener to move laterally and be attached off-center from the pre-attachment position to accommodate attachment tolerances. The fastener retaining portion can have areas of weakness to allow deformation. These areas of weakness can comprise areas of reduced thickness or radial extensions that extend towards the perimeter of the fastener retaining portion. The object body also has a clearance portion that defines a mounting face that the fastener does not extend past in the pre-attachment position. The object body can further comprise a compression portion that engages with the shoulder of the fastener and is compressed between the shoulder the object that the object body is attached onto in the attachment position. The compression portion can also have a bushing that provides increased torque retention by engaging with the fastener shoulder and the object that the object body is attached onto.

The current trend in the automobile manufacturing sector, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 7,743,559 to Papi et al. and incorporated by reference herein, is to group components to obtain modular systems that simplify and facilitate mounting instead of mounting individual elements separately. One example of this type of modular system is to assemble hardware components onto a carrier panel that is then mounted to the vehicle on the assembly line. For example, a door carrier can have several accessories or functional components of the door pre-mounted, such as elements of the window lift, the lock, impact absorption systems, loudspeakers, etc. On the assembly line the door carrier is attached to the door to facilitate the final assembly of the vehicle and reduces the assembly times. Therefore, the use of this type of modular carrier simplifies the assembly of the functional components, as these components are pre-mounted on a single carrier that can be mounted on the vehicle in a single assembly stage.
Attachment of the carrier to the vehicle involves assembly line workers handing, inserting and seating every fastener for the carrier. For a typical door carrier this can involve handling 8 to 12 attachment screws for each carrier. Handling and insertion of fasteners increases the line time involved for installing components, particularly carriers. The potential for dropping or mishandling fasteners can cause delays that decrease the productivity of the entire assembly line.


A system, method, and medium are provided for presenting a user-interface to a user during a search session that includes information about the user's search history during that search session. A search session is instantiated, and search queries, search results, user selections of search results, and other information is recorded. Search results pages provided to the user in response to queries include a session tracker module that displays interactive information associated with recent search queries issued by the user during the same session, such that the user can quickly recall previously issued queries and corresponding search results.

Search engines and search services are becoming staples of user interaction with the Internet, and as the wealth of information available online increases, so too does people's reliance on effective and efficient search services for a multitude of projects and situations. Recent research indicates that the majority of time spent by computer users interacting with search services is spent in long search sessions that involve many search queries and selections of search results. Moreover, the data suggests that users spend a significant portion of long search sessions trying to re-find content that they have already viewed.

Providing recent history with search results


Embodiments relate to prefetch address translation in a computer processor. An aspect includes issuing, by prefetch logic, a prefetch request comprising a virtual page address. Another aspect includes, based on the prefetch request missing the TLB and the address translation logic of the processor being busy performing a current translation request, comparing a page of the prefetch request to a page of the current translation request. Yet another aspect includes, based on the page of the prefetch request matching the page of the current translation request, storing the prefetch request in a prefetch buffer.

The present invention relates generally to computer processors, and more specifically, to prefetch address translation using a prefetch buffer in a processor.
In a computing system, the main computer memory may be relatively slow compared to the computer processor; therefore, one or more caches may be provided in the processor to reduce or avoid accesses to the main memory. A cache is a relatively small, high-speed buffer of memory placed between the processor and the main memory that holds most recently used sections of the main memory for use by the processor. The sections of memory that are stored in the cache are referred to as a cache lines. Any request made by the processor that is satisfied by the cache may be completed relatively quickly. However, when a request by the processor is not satisfied by the cache, a cache miss occurs, which may cause delays in the processor while the request is satisfied from the main memory.
Prefetching is a technique that is used to reduce delays to the processor caused by cache misses. Prefetching attempts to predict requests (for example, requests for instructions or operands) that will be made by the processor and stage lines of memory into the cache before the processor requests them. If prefetching is successful, cache lines are transferred from the main memory into the cache before the processor requests them, avoiding cache misses and reducing overall latency in the processor. However, successful completion of prefetch requests is not necessary for the correct execution of a software program by the processor, as prefetch requests have no observable effect on the observed execution of software by the processor beyond affecting the timing of instruction completion. Therefore, a prefetch request may be discarded if the resources necessary to complete the prefetch request are not available in the processor at the time of issuance of the prefetch request.

Prefetch address translation using prefetch buffer based on availability of address translation logic

International Business Machines Corporation


The invention relates to a method for producing an acidified milk product including the steps of: providing a milk raw material; concentrating the milk raw material by membrane filtration to provide a filtration retentate; acidifying the filtration retentate with an acidic aqueous solution to provide an acidified filtration retentate having a pH in the range of about 5.2 to about 6.5, a calcium/protein ratio of at most about 0.03, and a phosphorous/protein ratio of at most about 0.025; processing the acidified filtration retentate to the acidified milk product having moisture on a fat-free basis of at least 70%. The invention also relates to an acidified milk product having moisture on a fat-free basis of at least 70% and a calcium/casein ratio of at most about 0.04 and a calcium/protein ratio of at most about 0.03 and a phosphorous/casein ratio of at most about 0.03. The invention also relates to an acidified milk product having moisture on a fat-free basis of at least 70%, a calcium/casein ratio of at most about 0.04, a calcium/protein ratio of at most about 0.03 and a phosphorous/protein ratio of at most about 0.025.

Production of fresh acidified milk products is well known to those familiar with the art. Production of high protein products, such as quarks, Greek yoghurts and fresh cheeses, typically involves a concentration step after acidification, where acidic liquid, commonly described as "acid whey", formed in the acidification is removed from the coagulated/acidified/gelled mass by draining using centrifugal separator and/or membrane filtration(s). The acid whey typically contains lactose, milk minerals, metabolic products such as lactic acid, and a quantity of whey proteins. The composition of the acid whey depends on the preceding heat treatment of milk carried out before acidification, and an acidifying medium used. A main portion of lactose of milk is caught in acid whey. Since the solubility of calcium phosphate is pH-dependent and colloidal calcium phosphate dissolves at low pHs, the acid whey also contains the major portion of dissolved calcium and phosphates. At present, acid whey constitutes a by-product which has low economical value.
There is also a method in which acidified milk products are produced without acid whey separation. The problems of the products prepared by this method lie in the organoleptic properties. More specifically, due to the presence of acid whey, these products have unpalatable, strong sensory acidity and a bitter taste caused by a substantial amount of calcium in the product. Especially, it has been challenging to prepare high protein acidified milk products without impairing the sensory properties, such as taste, of the products.
It is well known that high buffering capacity of milk is because of high concentration of insoluble calcium and phosphates bound in casein micelles. The buffering capacity is increased when milk is concentrated, e.g. by ultrafiltration or microfiltration, due to concentration of casein micelles. It is also well known that lowering the pH of milk the calcium content and thus the buffering capacity of milk are reduced, since the solubilisation of calcium and phosphate is increased. Generally, a high amount of an acidifying medium is needed in the current methods for producing acidified milk products due to the high buffering capacity of milk.
We have now found a method in which the problems of the current methods for producing acidified milk products are avoided.

Modification of mineral composition of milk for the production of an acidified milk product


Provided herein are specially modified blocking nucleotides allowing for the sensitive detection of low copies of variant sequences, while significantly reducing signals from non-variant sequences that are similar but not identical to the variant sequence. These nucleotides can be used to detect rare variants in a sample mixture, as described in the present methods.

In 2013 there were at least 387 targeted drugs marketed or in the pipeline for oncology. Common for all these drugs are that they only work on people/diseases with a certain genetic composition. Hence, treatment of disease is linked to genetics and is moving away from the one-size fits all concept and into a more personalized approach. Drugs for oncology are the front runners in this new treatment paradigm, but other areas are expected to follow. In personalized medicine the patient is matched with the drug(s) by using what is called companion diagnostic, giving the patient a significantly higher chance of positively responding to the treatment, than if the drug was given randomly to patients with that disease. For example, metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC) is one of the most commonly diagnosed cancers and one of the most common causes of cancer-related deaths in the world. Approximately one million new cases are diagnosed each year and the incidence of new cases of CRC is predicted to be 9.7% of the global cancer cases by 2020. Therapeutics (like Cetuximab and Panitumumab) targeting the Epidermal Growth Factor Receptor (EGFR) are effective for treatment of a subgroup of mCRC patients, but unfortunately, approximately 70% of mCRC patients do not respond to these expensive drugs. It is now clear that the main reason for the lack of response is the development of somatic mutations (SMs) at specific positions in certain genes of the primary tumour and metastases of the patient. In particular, it has been widely demonstrated that mutations in the oncogene KRAS exon 2, codons 12/13 correlate with lack of response to and with inferior overall survival (OS) when treating with anti-EGFR drugs alone or in combination with chemotherapy (like FOLFOX4 or FOLFIRI schemes). Consequently, an analysis on biopsies for the seven most common mutations in KRAS codon 12/13 (exon 2) mutations has been required since 2009 before administration of these drugs. In January 2014 the list of mandatory SMs to test for were expanded to more than 30 SMs in the KRAS and NRAS genes in total, in order to identify even more non-responders of anti-EGFR drugs. Approximately 40% of all mCRC patients are found to have mutations in exon 2 of KRAS (KRAS codon 12/13) with current assays. With the extended version looking at more RAS mutations, approximately 50% are now found to harbour a RAS mutation rendering them resistant to anti-EGFR drugs. Despite this stratification based on the connection between mutations in all RAS genes and anti-EGFR resistance, 40-60% of patients found to carry wild type RAS tumours do still not respond to treatment with anti-EGFR therapies.
This means that these patients are either falsely diagnosed as RAS wild type (false negatives) or that the presence of other genetic variations may confer resistance to the treatment.
One of the challenges when detecting somatic mutations is that there is potentially a lot of wild type material present in the sample and/or often only a few copies of the mutated template in the mixture. The sensitivity and specificity of the method used for detecting somatic mutations is therefore important to reduce the number of false negatives and false positives.
Two additional types of cancers characterized by high incidence and mortality are Non Small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC) and Malignant Melanoma (MM). Both tumors are usually resistant to chemotherapies, while it has been demonstrated that a great benefit can be achieved for patients who can be treated with targeted therapies (EGFR-targeted therapies in NSCLC, BRAF-targeted therapies in MM). In NSCLC, however, there is a specific type of EGFR mutation (located in exon 20, the T790M change) which is linked with lack of efficacy of EGFR-targeted therapies. This type of mutation can occur in non-treated patients, but usually represents the main mechanism of acquired resistance to EGFR-targeted therapies. Therefore, a precise evaluation of EGFR T790M mutation is of primary importance in setting the appropriate treatment for NSCLC patients. For MM, a type of disease characterized, when at late stage, by a very severe prognosis, the possibility to receive BRAF-targeted therapies can significantly improve patients' follow-up. Overall, the use of high sensitive methodologies for RAS, EGFR and BRAF mutations in CRC, NSCLC and MM patients, respectively, lead to reduced spending on inefficient treatments and increasing progression free survival (PFS) and OS for patients.
Blood is usually the carrier allowing cancer to migrate into other organs and researchers have therefore been attracted by the analysis of this material. Furthermore, SMs can arise in a separate subset of cells in the often heterogeneous primary tumour or in one or more of the metastases and thereby escape detection when done on slices from biopsies. In the blood system, there are at least two types of cancer-associated materials: Circulating Tumour Cells (CTCs) and cell-free circulating DNA (cfDNA). During tumour expansion at local level, the tumoral mass requires an increased quantity of nutrients, and therefore cancer cells lead to the organization of new blood vessels, which are linked to the normal blood system. This process, named neo-angiogenesis, is required for a further expansion of tumour mass. Cancer cells close to the blood system may also acquire the capability to enter into blood vessels, and therefore their detection into blood directly represents the identification of an aggressive disease. In addition, due to apoptotic-necrotic processes not completely understood, cancer cells in the blood system or close to blood vessels may lysate, leading to the dispersion of genetic material like cfDNA into the blood. Also, in this case, the possibility to detect cfDNA may lead to an early identification of an aggressive disease (i.e. tumor relapse).
Somatic mutations are not only found in cancer related diseases but for example also in disorders of neuronal migration in the brain. Mutations in the gene lissencephaly-1 (LIS1) are typically associated with a "smooth brain" phenotype of lissencephaly. The mutations were detectable in mosaic form in leukocytes, suggesting that a relatively early postzygotic, somatic mutation occurred. Somatic mutations have also been described in cases without visible focal lesions, including in epilepsy. For example, severe myoclonic epilepsy of infancy (Dravet syndrome), typically caused by de novo mutations in the gene encoding the sodium channel alpha-1 subunit, SCN1A, has been described.
Non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT) of fetal genetic material is another situation where rare variants in a mixed sample are analysed for. Fetal aneuploidy using cell-free fetal DNA is for example becoming part of routine clinical practice. The possibility to detect rare variants is important and can help change clinical practise in genetic analysis of fetal DNA.

Methods and materials for detection of mutations


A data channel includes a data detector that approximates both inter-symbol-interference (ISI) and random timing perturbations using a single finite-state hidden Markov model. The ISI is approximated by a finite impulse response and the timing perturbations are approximated by a first order random walk. The data signal, which is subject to inter-symbol interference and timing perturbations, is sampled periodically over a succession of time epochs without regard to timing perturbations. Timing perturbation values and data states are then assigned for each epoch, and each timing perturbation value is paired with each data state to arrive at a set of composite states. Probabilities are then assigned between composite states in successive epochs to arrive at the most probable composite state sequence corresponding to the sequence of detected data values from the sampled data. A Viterbi algorithm is then applied to find the maximum likelihood sequence of composite states. The resulting composite state sequence then defines both the data sequence and timing trajectory which, jointly, are most likely given the observations.

In high speed communication systems and high density data storage systems, intersymbol interference (ISI) makes direct peak detection of the data pulses impractical. As a result Viterbi detectors are often used to provide a maximum likelihood estimate of the original data sequence, based on possible states of ISI. Viterbi detectors are commonly used in data storage systems, such as magnetic recording hard disk drives.
In addition to ISI, timing irregularities are present to a greater or lesser degree in most communications systems and all data storage systems. In particular, because most data storage systems involve a moving recording medium, usually a rotating optical or magnetic disk, random fluctuations in the motion of the recording medium during the read and write processes cause timing perturbations or distortions of the readback signal. In a magnetic recording hard disk drive the read-back signal is typically filtered, sampled, digitized and equalized and the resulting equalized samples are passed to a Viterbi detector. The detector relies upon a well defined, time-invariant relationship between the recorded data and the read-back signal to enable detection. To ensure that the relationship between recorded data and the read-back signal does not vary, the frequency and phase of the sample clock must be continually adjusted to compensate for the slowly changing timing distortions caused by the system. The process of adjusting the sample clock is often referred to as timing recovery.
Timing recovery is usually treated as a secondary feedback function separate from the Viterbi detector. The phase and frequency of the sample clock are set at the beginning of each data block using a fixed preamble pattern. The timing recovery system estimates the timing error on each received symbol and applies feedback to the sample clock to correct the frequency and phase. The feedback nature of the timing loop limits the performance of the timing recovery process.
What is needed is a data channel that uses a Viterbi detector but without the need for a timing recovery feedback loop. Such a data channel would be more reliable, since instabilities inherent in a timing recovery feedback loop would be eliminated. Such a data channel would also be more efficient since a preamble pattern would not be required.

Data channel with joint data estimation and timing recovery


Disclosed herein is an array of field emission cathodes of the type, in which each element is made up of a substrate 1 (which serves as a first electrode 1), an insulating layer 2 in which is formed a cavity 6, a cathode 9 formed in the cavity 6 and on the first electrode 1, and a second electrode 3 formed on the insulating layer 2, and the second electrode is coated with a protective metal layer having good conductivity and corrosion resistance. The record electrode (the gate electrode) protected from oxidation permits stable electron emission. Also disclosed herein is an array of field emission cathodes in which each element is made up of a first electrode 11 to apply voltage to a plurality of cathodes 9, a resistance layer 12, an insulating layer 2, and a second electrode 3 which are formed on top of the other, a cavity 6 formed in the second electrode 3 and insulating layer 2, and a cathode 9 formed in the cavity 6 and on the resistance layer 12, with the first electrode 11 having a void under the cathode 9. This structure prevents short circuits between the cathode and the gate electrode, which contributes to high yields and long life.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an array of field emission cathodes.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There is an array of minute field emission cathodes, each element having a cathode of several microns in size. It is known as the Spindt-type field emission cathode, which will be explained with reference to FIG. 11.
Referring to FIG. 11, there is shown an electrically conductive substrate 1 made of silicon or the like, which serves as a first electrode. On the substrate 1 is a sharply pointed conical cathode 9 made of such a metal as tungsten and molybdenum, which has a high melting point and a low work function. Around the conical cathode 9 is an insulating layer 2 made of SiO.sub.2 or the like. On the insulating layer 2 is a second electrode 3 (as a gate electrode or a counter electrode of the cathode 9) made of a high-melting metal such as molybdenum, tungsten, and chromium. There is an alternative structure in which a first electrode 11 is formed separately on a substrate 10 as shown in FIG. 12.
An array of field emission cathodes mentioned above is produced by the process explained below with reference to FIG. 13. As shown in FIG. 13A, the process starts with forming consecutively on a silicon substrate 1 an insulating layer 2 of SiO.sub.2 (1-1.5 .mu.m thick) by CVD (chemical vapor deposition), a metal layer 3a of a high-melting metal such as molybdenum and tungsten (in thickness of the order of thousands of angstroms, say 4000 .ANG.) by vacuum deposition or sputtering, and a resist 4 by coating.
As shown in FIG. 13B, the resist 4 is subsequently exposed and developed by photolithography to form an opening 5a, about 1 .mu.m in diameter (indicated by w). The metal layer 3a undergoes anisotropic etching through the opening 5a by RIE (reactive ion etching) to form an opening 5 of the same diameter as the opening 5a. Thus there is formed a gate electrode 23 from the metal layer 3a. The insulating layer 2 undergoes over-etching through the opening 5 to form a cavity 6. This over-etching is carried out such that the periphery of the opening 5 of the gate electrode 23 projects from the inside wall of the cavity 6 in the insulating layer 2.
As shown in FIG. 13C, an intermediate layer 7 is formed on the gate electrode 23 by oblique deposition in the direction of arrow a (at such an angle as to avoid deposition in the opening 5 and cavity 6), with the substrate 1 turning. This intermediate layer 7 is made of aluminum or nickel, which can be removed later by etching. The angle of oblique etching should be 5.degree.-20.degree. with respect to the surface of the substrate 1. The oblique deposition takes place such that the intermediate layer 7 has an opening which is smaller than the opening 5.
As shown in FIG. 13D, a material layer 8 of molybdenum or the like is deposited over the entire surface by vertical deposition so as to form a conical cathode 9 in the cavity 6. (Since the opening in the intermediate layer 7 is smaller than the opening 5 on account of the oblique deposition, the opening of the material layer 8 becomes smaller as the deposition proceeds. This makes the cathode 9 being formed on the substrate by deposition through the opening 5 become tapered off with time.)
Finally, the material layer 8 is removed by lift-off as the intermediate layer 7 is removed by etching with a sodium hydroxide solution which dissolves the intermediate layer 7 alone. Thus there is obtained a field emission cathode as shown in FIG. 11.
The thus formed field emission cathode emits electrons upon application of a voltage of about 10.sup.6 V/cm or above across the cathode 9 and the gate electrode (or the second electrode 3), with the cathode 9 unheated. This kind of minute field emission cathode can operate at a comparatively low voltage, with the gate voltage being of the order of tens to hundreds of volts. An array of hundreds of millions of such field emission cathodes arranged at intervals of about 10 .mu.m may be used as electron guns for a thin display that operates at a low voltage (or with a low electric power).
A disadvantage of the foregoing field emission cathodes is that the gate electrode 23 made of a high-melting metal such as molybdenum, tungsten, and chromium is liable to oxidation, which lowers its conductivity and hence leads to unstable electron emission.
Another disadvantage of the foregoing field emission cathodes is that the intermediate layer 7 made of aluminum or nickel is not completely removed from the gate electrode 23 by wet etching, but some residues (which are electrically conductive) remain undissolved. Residues remaining on the gate electrode 23 may adversely affect the electron emission characteristics and cut-off characteristics, or short-circuit the gate electrode 23 and the cathode 9. This leads to an increase in defective products and a decrease in yields.
The present inventors had previously proposed a process for producing an array of field emission cathodes without using the oblique deposition. (See Japanese Patent Laid-open No. 160740/1981.) This process consists of covering the obverse of a substrate of silicon single crystal with a masking layer having a patterned opening, performing crystallographic etching through the opening, thereby forming a conical hole, forming an electrode layer on the inside of the conical hole by vacuum deposition or sputtering of tungsten or the like, filling the conical hole with an insulating reinforcement material, performing ordinary etching (or non-crystallographic etching) on the reverse of the substrate (so that the apex of the electrode layer formed in the conical hole is exposed), thereby forming the tip of the cathode, forming an insulating layer so as to embed the cathode therein, and covering the insulating layer with a conducting layer. Finally, the conducting layer and insulating layer undergo etching as shown in FIGS. 13A and 13B, so that the cathode is exposed.
This process offers an advantage that the conical cathode invariably has an acute vertical angle and there are no problems involving the residues of the intermediate layer 7. However, there still remains the problem associated with the oxidation of the gate electrode which leads to a decrease in conductivity. The effect of oxidation is serious because the gate electrode is very thin (thousands of angstrom). The oxidized gate electrode will not operate satisfactorily with a gate voltage of the order of tens to hundreds of volts.
There is an alternative structure as shown in FIG. 15. It is characterized by a thin resistance layer 12 of silicon interposed between the first electrode 11 and the cathode 9. The resistance layer 12 has a thickness from several angstroms to several microns and also has a resistance of the order of hundreds to millions of .OMEGA..cm. The resistance layer 12 permits each cathode 9 to emit electrons at a constant rate. This will be described in more detail with reference to FIGS. 14 and 15 which are schematic enlarged sectional views showing an array of field emission cathodes.
Referring to FIG. 14, there are shown a plurality of cathodes 9.sub.1 and 9.sub.2 formed directly on the first electrode 11, which is not provided with the resistance layer 12. The electron flow is indicated by arrows e. In actual mass production of flat displays as mentioned above, the electrodes 9.sub.1 and 9.sub.2 will vary slightly in size and shape as shown in FIG. 14. This variation leads to the fluctuation of the electric field strength required for electron emission, which in turn causes the emissivity to fluctuate. For example, there would be an instance where the cathode 9.sub.1 emits electrons at 50 V, while the cathode 9.sub.2 needs 100 V for electron emission. There would be another instance where the cathode 9.sub.1 alone emits electrons at 50 V, while the cathode 9.sub.2 does not work at 50 V. There would be another instance where the cathode 9.sub.2 emits electrons at 100 V, while the cathode 9.sub.1 is broken at 100 V.
If a flat display is made up of field emission cathodes which are not uniform in shape as mentioned above, the screen will vary in brightness from one spot to another on account of the uneven electron emission. Moreover, the lack of uniformity causes some elements to be broken, which shortens the life of the flat display.
The foregoing problem does not arise from the field emission cathode as shown in FIG. 15. It has a resistance layer 12 interposed between the cathode and the first electrode 11. The resistance layer 12 gives rise to resistance R.sub.1 and R.sub.2 between the electrode 11 and the cathodes 9.sub.1 and 9.sub.2, respectively. It is assumed that when a voltage V.sub.0 is applied, the current i.sub.1 flowing to the cathode 9.sub.1 is larger than the current i.sub.2 flowing to the cathode 9.sub.2 so that the cathode 9.sub.1 emits more electrons than the cathode 9.sub.2. In this situation, the cathode 9.sub.1 experiences voltage drop due to the resistance R.sub.1, and hence the voltage applied to the cathode 9.sub.1 becomes EQU V.sub.1 =V.sub.0 -.DELTA.V.sub.1 =V.sub.0 -R.sub.1 i.sub.1
Similarly, the voltage applied to the cathode 9.sub.2 becomes EQU V.sub.2 =V.sub.0 -.DELTA.V.sub.2 =V.sub.0 -R.sub.2 i.sub.2
and V.sub.1 becomes smaller than V.sub.2. A moment later, the cathode 9.sub.1 emits less electrons than the cathode 9.sub.2. As the result, the emission of electrons from each cathode levels out. In this way, it is possible to keep uniform the screen of the flat display.
In addition, the resistance layer 12 prevents current from flowing freely from the tip of the cathode to the second electrode even when an electrically conductive minute particle of dust gets in between them, as shown in FIG. 16 which is a schematic enlarged sectional view. This situation permits adjacent cathodes to continue emitting electrons, with a prescribed voltage applied across the cathode and the second electrode.
However, the resistance layer 12 will not function properly if it has a defect such as a pinhole 20 as shown in FIG. 17, which is a schematic enlarged sectional view. In this case, the pinhole 20 connects the cathode 9 to the first electrode 11 and hence a short circuit takes place between the tip of the cathode 9 and the second electrode 3 when an electrically conductive minute particle of dust gets in between them. This situation prevents adjacent cathodes from emitting electrons.
The foregoing defect is liable to occur in a display composed of hundreds of millions of cathodes. In addition, short circuits by dust prevent a plurality of cathodes from emitting electrons and hence reduce the life of the display.


A data processing apparatus is provided for processing an image signal obtained from a solid-state image pickup device, in which a plurality of types of color filters are discretely provided on pixels, and a pixel to be interpolated and surrounding pixels thereof have image signals. The apparatus comprises an interpolation section for generating a missing color signal in the image signal of each pixel by interpolation using at least the image signals of the surrounding pixels among the image signals of the pixel to be interpolated and the surrounding pixels thereof. The interpolation section obtains an interpolation pattern, which is similar to a pattern of data values of the pixel to be interpolated and the surrounding pixels thereof, depending on uniformity and gradient of the image signals of the pixel to be interpolated and the surrounding pixels thereof, and performs interpolation depending on the interpolation pattern.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a data processing apparatus (e.g., a camera signal processing apparatus, etc.) for interpolating a missing color signal into an image signal of each pixel, which is used in cameras having a solid-state image pickup device (e.g., video cameras, digital cameras, etc.). Also, a data processing method using this data processing apparatus, an image processing apparatus using the data processing method, and a camera using this image processing apparatus and a solid-state image pickup device (e.g., video cameras, digital cameras, mobile telephones with a camera, etc.).
2. Description of the Related Art
In conventional cameras (e.g., video cameras, digital cameras, etc., and hereinafter, referred to as cameras), which utilize a single solid-state image pickup device, color filters are discretely disposed on pixels of the solid-state image pickup device.
Each color filter has one of three colors (three primary colors), e.g., red (R), green (G), and blue (B). One of the R, G and B filters is disposed on each pixel. A color (color signal) other than the color of the color filter that is provided to a pixel, can be obtained by calculation. In this case, spatially continuous data (here, two-dimensional) can be obtained as if three color filters were continuously provided. Such a calculation for obtaining spatially continuous data is called interpolation.
Hereinafter, interpolation will be described in detail.
FIG. 8 is a diagram showing an arrangement of colors in a conventional color filter.
Generally, in a color filter plate, G color filters are arranged in a checkerboard pattern, while R and B color filters together are also arranged in a checkerboard pattern where the R or B color filters are arranged on other line (FIG. 8). This arrangement is called a Bayer array.
If a solid-state image pickup device digitizes an image signal via a color filter plate having the Bayer array, each pixel provides an image signal indicating only one color. Therefore, color data, which is not provided to a pixel, needs to be interpolated based on the image signals of the other pixels having the missing color in order to obtain a full-color image signal (including all of R, G, and B colors) for each pixel.
In this case, G pixels, and R and B pixels are interpolated by separate methods.
FIGS. 9A and 9B are diagrams for explaining a conventional interpolation technique. In these figures, the pixels, to which the G filters are provided, are indicated by G. Since the R and B filters are arranged on pixels to be interpolated, the pixels, to which the R and B filters are provided, are indicated by P and Q, respectively.
As shown in FIG. 9A, for example, G33 is assumed to be a pixel to be interpolated. The R and B (P and Q) data of the pixel needs to be obtained by interpolation. The G pixel neighbors are R pixels and B pixels.
P and Q obtained by interpolation of G33 are represented by P33 and Q33. Specifically, P33 and Q33 are calculated based on P's and Q's neighboring G33 by the following expressions:G33=G33P33=(P32+P34)/2Q33=(Q23+Q43)/2.
Next, as shown in FIG. 9B, Q33 is assumed to be a pixel to be interpolated. The G and P data of the pixel is obtained by interpolation. The Q pixel neighbors are G pixels and P pixels.
G and P obtained by interpolation of Q33 are represented by G33 and P33. Specifically, G33 and P33 are calculated based on G's and P's neighboring Q33, respectively, by the following expressions:G33=(G23+G32+G34+G43)/4P33=(P22+P24+P42+P44)/4Q33=Q33.
However, the above-described general interpolation technique raises image distortion and a reduction in resolution at an edge portion, as described below.
Hereinafter, this problem will be described with reference to FIG. 10A, where a vertically striped pattern is imaged.
In FIG. 10A, a line formed of G11 to G15 is a high luminance line, which is typically displayed white. A line formed of Q21 to Q25 is a low luminance line, which is typically displayed black.
FIG. 10B is a diagram showing an image signal value of each pixel in the vertically striped pattern of FIG. 10A, where each white pixel has a value 100, while each black pixel has a value 0.
G33 is now assumed to be a pixel to be interpolated. Interpolation is performed in accordance with the above-described expressions. As a result,G33 =100,P33=(P32+P34)/2=100, andQ33=(Q23+Q43)/2=0.
Similarly, all other pixels are subjected to interpolation in accordance with the above-described expressions. The results are shown in FIGS. 10C to 10E. FIG. 10C shows the values of G's after interpolation. FIG. 10D shows the values of P's after interpolation. FIG. 10E shows the values of Q's after interpolation.
As shown in FIG. 10C, the interpolated data of G's does not represent the vertically striped pattern, thus the image is distorted. As shown in FIG. 10E, the interpolated data of Q's does not represent the vertically striped pattern, where the stripes disappear, i.e., the image is distorted.
An attempt has been made to solve such an image distortion problem caused by interpolation in, for example, Japanese Laid-Open Publication No. 7-59098. In this document, the gray levels of pixels are obtained based on the differences between the horizontally or vertically neighboring pixels. The gray level is compared with a predetermined threshold. Based on the result of comparison, interpolation is performed.
Hereinafter, the interpolation technique disclosed in the above-described document will be described with reference to FIG. 11A, where a horizontally striped pattern is imaged.
In FIG. 11A, lines respectively formed of G11 to G51, G13 to G53, and G15 to G55 each have a low luminance, which are typically displayed black. Lines respectively formed of P12 to P52 and P14 to P54 each have a high luminance, which are typically displayed white.
FIG. 11B shows an image signal value of each pixel of the horizontally striped pattern of FIG. 11A, where each white pixel has a value 100, while each black pixel has a value 0.
According to the above-described document, if pixel Q23 of FIG. 11A is assumed to be a pixel to be interpolated, color data G23 and P23 are calculated by:Q23=Q23P23=0.25×[P14-Adap(G14)+P12-Adap(G12)+P32-Adap(G32)+P34-Adap(G34)]+Adap(G23) G23=Adap(G23)  (1)
Adap in expression (1) is calculated by expression (2) according to the above-described document, which includes conditional branches. Expression (2) below corresponds to pixel G23 of FIG. 11A. In expression (2), "Threshold" represents a predetermined threshold, "Gdiff-hor" represents a horizontal difference in luminance, and "Gdiff-ver" represents a vertical difference in luminance.For Gdiff−hor=|G13−G33|Gdiff−ver=|G22−G24|Threshold=Predetermined value If (Gdiff−hor<Threshold) and (Gdiff−ver<Threshold) or (Gdiff−hor>Threshold) and (Gdiff−ver>Threshold) then |Adap(G23)=(G13+G33+G22+G24)/4|If (Gdiff−hor<Threshold) and (Gdiff−ver>Threshold) then |Adap(G23)=(G13+G33)/2|If (Gdiff−hor>Threshold) and (Gdiff−ver<Threshold) then |Adap(G23)=(G22+G24)/2|  (2).
However, some images may be distorted by the interpolation technique disclosed in the above-described document.
For example, G23 is calculated based on the data values of FIG. 11B in accordance with expressions (1) and (2). As a result,Gdiff−hor=Gdiff−ver=0.
And, irrespective of the value of Threshold,G23=Adap(G23)=|G13+G33+G22+G24|/4=50.
G43 is similarly calculated to be 50.
According to the above-described document, G13, G33 and G53 are all calculated to be 0 based on the data of each pixel.
The resultant data of G13 to G53 is shown in FIG. 11C.
In FIG. 11C, interpolation causes false white signals, which are otherwise black in FIG. 11A, so that a difference in luminance occurs on a horizontal line. The resultant pattern shows alternating black and white or weak and strong luminance, which is called zipper noise. That is, the image is distorted.
Also in the interpolation technique of the above-described document, vertical and horizontal differences in luminance values are compared with the predetermined threshold. This technique is effective if image signals are free from noise and the like. However, if horizontal and vertical differences in luminance value fluctuate near the threshold due to noise or the like, the interpolation calculation fluctuates in a time-series manner, so that data fluctuates. For example, a pixel to be interpolated is likely to flicker in a time-series manner.

Data processing apparatus, image processing apparatus, camera, and data processing method


Here is described a portable chiller with which an ophthalmic solution, cosmetic preparation, beverage or the like in a small container can be conveniently chilled. This portable chiller consists generally of a cylinder filled with a liquefied refrigerant gas and a chiller case. This chiller case includes a cylinderloading compartment, a cooling compartment in which the article is chilled, and a refrigerant ejection device for ejecting the refrigerant from the cylinder accommodated in the cylinder compartment into the cooling compartment. Disposed in the cooling compartment is a device adapted to keep a vent orifice of the cooling compartment to withhold gasification of the refrigerant during the period from immediately before the beginning of ejection of the refrigerant to completion of the ejection and, then, release the vent orifice to allow the refrigerant to be gasified after completion of the ejection or a porous element enshrouding the container loaded into the cooling compartment and adapted to absorb the refrigerant from the cylinder in liquid form and, then, allow the refrigerant to be gasified around the article to be chilled.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a portable chiller for a liquid pharmaceutical preparation, cosmetic preparation, beverage or the like which is available in a comparatively small container.
2. Brief Description of the Prior Art
Portable chillers of this type are disclosed in Japanese Kokai Tokkyo Koho No. 51-85546 and Japanese Kokai Jituyo Shinan Koho No. 60-125479, among others.
These known chillers generally comprise a housing for accommodating an article to be chilled, a cylinder filled with a compressed liquid refrigerant, a nozzle communicable with said housing and cylinder and adapted to deliver said compressed liquid refrigerant into said housing and a valve operable to open and close said nozzle.
The working principle of these prior art chillers is that as an article to be chilled, which may for example be a handkerchief, a bottled drug or a canned beverage, is accommodated in the housing and the valve is opened, the compressed liquid refrigerant is ejected from the nozzle of the cylinder into the housing to chill the article by the heat of vaporization.
In these prior art chillers wherein the article is directly exposed to the gasified refrigerant, the consumption of the refrigerant is high and the cylinder must be changed with high frequency. This is not only troublesome but also uneconomical. These problems could be solved by increasing the capacity of the refrigerant cylinder but this practice would increase the whole bulk of the chiller to cause inconveniences in carrying.
Moreover, since the refrigerant impinges only on a limited surface, i.e. on the surface of the article that faces the nozzle, the cooling efficiency is inevitably low. This, in turn, means an increased consumption of the refrigerant to achieve the required chilling effect, amplifying the above-mentioned problems.


A stent is adapted for deployment at a preselected site in a duct within the body of a patient to inhibit the lumen of the duct at that site from narrowing to a point that resists passage through the lumen. The stent is a generally cylindrical open-ended element having a perforated self-supporting sidewall of substantially uniform thickness adapted to be selectively expanded radially when the stent is to be deployed, to engage the wall of the duct and to resist radial contraction under forces exerted on said sidewall by the wall of the duct in the region of the engagement. The sidewall has greater rigidity in the midsection of the length of the cylindrical element and greater flexibility at each end thereof, by virtue of its having a composite design of different patterns, each pattern being a network of interconnected links with openings therebetween that determine the relative rigidity and flexibility of the sidewall along the length of the cylindrical element. The links may be sized to produce the differences in relative rigidity and flexibility along the length of the sidewall, and the sizing may undergo an abrupt or a continuous change between the midsection and each end of the cylindrical element. For sizing, the links may exhibit a decrease in width from the midsection to either end of the cylindrical element. Where the duct is a blood vessel with side branches emanating from the lumen of the main vessel, at least some of the openings between links in the midsection of the sidewall may be sized to enable access to the side branches from the lumen of the stent when the stent is deployed at the selected site in the main vessel.

The present invention relates generally to stents which are implantable or deployable in a vessel or duct within the body of a patient to maintain the lumen of the duct or vessel open, and more particularly to improvements in stent structures, stenting procedures, and processes for making stents.
Stents are expandable vascular and endoluminal prostheses, usually employed to keep a particular site in the blood vessels open and unoccluded, especially in the coronary and femoral arteries, following treatment such as dilatation by balloon catheter angioplasty (i.e., percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty, or PTCA). But these devices are also quite useful in other applications as well, such as in other tracts or ducts in the human body where support of the tract or duct wall is required along a preselected target site to maintain the lumen open and unobstructed. Examples of such other applications are the tracheo-bronchial system, the biliary hepatic system, the esophageal bowel system, and the urinary tract system. A vascular stent in particular must be sufficiently dimensionally stable to keep the vessel and lumen open while resisting recoil of its elastic wall that naturally occurs when the site within the vessel or luminal structure has been subjected to outwardly directed forces that are necessary to expand the elastic fibers, compress fatty deposits on the wall, and/or to deploy the stent, and to prevent an acute closure following dissection of the vessel.
To date, various studies have demonstrated that coronary stenting has major clinical benefits. For example, among several recent studies, those designated as STRESS and BENESTENT have indicated that the implantation of coronary stents can serve not only to reduce acute complications following a balloon PTCA intervention in the coronary system, but also to improve the long term outcome. The local recoil of the vessel wall, which is normally a principal reason for restenosis after balloon PTCA, is prevented as a result of the scaffolding and support of the vessel wall provided by the stent. Experience gained from the profusion of coronary stenting has indicated that patients who had not been considered candidates for the procedure are now eligible for such implantation. In this respect, improvements in the design of stents and in the skill of the implanting physician have been factors in extending the suitability of stent implantation beyond merely type A or B.sub.1 lesions (with reference to the American Heart Association (AHA)/American College of Cardiology (ACC) coronary stenosis morphology), to more severely curved, longer and complex lesions.
According to studies recently performed at the Technische Universtat Munchen and the German Heart Center Munchen, the mortality rate with stents in acute infarction decreases to less than 2%, which represents the lowest mortality reported to date with any kind of treatment for acute myocardial infarction. But the prerequisites for stenting continue to increase, especially for emergency interventions which are frequently encountered in contrast to elective procedures, making it imperative that stent design be improved to enable availability for use over a wider range of coronary morphology types.
Several different stent designs have become available for clinical use or experimental evaluation. Among these are the self-expanding mesh type, the coil type with a helical wire configuration typically of 100 to 200 micron (.mu.) thickness, the slotted tube type such as that disclosed in co-pending U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/599,880, filed Feb. 14, 1996, and its German counterpart application DE 19537872A1, and the multicellular type which is a modification of the slotted tube type with less surface coverage and smaller openings. Each of these stent designs has its individual benefits and limitations. Slotted tube stents provide the greatest support strength and the lowest recoil, which is particularly important for patients with very hard, even calcified, and a higher degree of stenosis. Recoil of less than 5% is experienced with slotted tube stents, whereas coil and multicellular stents typically allow recoil of about 10 to 15%. Consequently, within a short time after a stent of either of the latter types has been implanted in the vessel, the vessel diameter will decrease to some 10 to 15% of what it was when the balloon was fully inflated to deploy the stent.
While slotted tube stents allow the least recoil, they are somewhat less flexible than the other design types, and, to overcome this reduced flexibility, slotted tube stents of increased length generally incorporate a link or a bridge that interconnects two or more members of the basic principal design, such as shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,449,323 of Pinchasik et al. Although such a design gives the longer stents--say 15 millimeters (mm), 23 mm, or even 30 mm versions--greater flexibility, it sacrifices mechanical strength at the site of the bridge. Coil stents tend to have wider openings and somewhat greater flexibility than the slotted tube stents, but exhibit less rigidity. Examples of various stent types are found in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,443,498; 4,580,568; B1-4,733,665; 4,739,762; 5,102,417; and 5,195,984; European patents and applications EP 0221570B1; 0606165A1; and 0364787A1; and German patent DE 4334140A1.
It is a principal aim of the present invention to provide an improved stent of flexible but still mechanically supportive design, which is particularly suited for the longer configurations.

Flexible implantable stent with composite design


A data receiver has a reception circuit and a fail-safe circuit. The reception circuit has an input amplifier, a logic signal processing circuit, and a reception stop control circuit. The fail-safe circuit has a high-pass filter, a comparator, and a pulse width extending circuit. The reception circuit receives a serial data of differential input signals based on a predetermined standard, converts the serial data into a serial data of a single-ended output signal, and outputs a converted serial data. The fail-safe circuit detects whether the differential input signals have a nonstandard small amplitude and outputs a fail-safe detection signal indicating a detection result.

The present invention generally relates to a data receiver that receives serial data of differential input signals based on a low voltage differential signaling (LVDS) standard and outputs serial data of a single-ended output signal, and a fail-safe circuit that is used in the data receiver, and detects whether or not the differential input signals have nonstandard small amplitude.
The LVDS is a serial interface technique for transmitting data at a high speed from a data transceiver to a data receiver. In a data transmission system using the LVDS, serial data of differential output signals based on an LVDS standard is transmitted from the data transceiver to the data receiver. In the data receiver, serial data of differential input signals transmitted from the data transceiver is received, converted into serial data of a single-ended output signal, and supplied to a processing circuit which processes the serial data.
In a data reception circuit for the LVDS, in a case where differential input signals with nonstandard small amplitude not based on the predetermined amplitude of the LVDS standard are received (in other words, when a failure occurs in the amplitude of the differential input signals), a fail-safe function is needed.
JP 2010-34733 A discloses a squelch detection circuit. The squelch detection circuit includes a peak detection circuit and a pulse width extending circuit. When the potential amplitude of received differential signals exceeds a predetermined value, the peak detection circuit outputs a voltage signal corresponding to a difference between the differential signals, outputs a shift reference voltage obtained by level-shifting an intermediate potential between first and second reference voltages, compares the voltage signal with the shift reference voltage, and outputs a detection signal thereof as a pulse. The pulse width extending circuit extends the pulse width of the detection signal by at least one period of the differential signals.


A liner rotates a bit to make more hole. The liner has openings with inserts in them to lend torque resistance to the liner. The inserts have a passage with a send control media in the passage and a seal so that the liner can hold pressure for run in to get proper circulation through the bit. When sufficient hole is made, the liner is hung off an existing cemented tubular and the seal for the passages with the sand control media is removed by a variety of techniques so that the formation can be produced in a single trip.

Saving trips into the well saves the well operator money. One such time saving technique that has been developed is running a liner with screens on a drill string so that as the bit advances so does the liner. When the desired location is reached, the drill string up to the bit is released from the bit that is rotatably mounted to the liner. The liner doesn't rotate as the bit turns. After the drill string is disconnected from the bit and removed, a swage can be run in to expand the screen or an isolation packer and a crossover can be run in and a gravel pack operation can be performed. This technique is illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 7,108,083. The bit can be driven by a drill string or a downhole motor supported by coiled tubing.
Drill strings have been used with screens in the liner when running in liner while drilling the hole because of the need to deliver pressurized drilling mud to the bit nozzles to displace the drill cuttings and cool the bit. Since the screen is an open structure, it has not been practical to deliver liner while making hole without using a drill string inside the liner so that pressurized mud can be directly delivered to the bit while the drill string supports the liner in a manner where the liner doesn't see fluid pressure in advance of the bit.
In trying to eliminate the drill string and rotate a bit with a liner, particularly a liner that has screens or an array of slots, the problem that is confronted is the limited ability of such a structure to tolerate the applied torque from drilling and how to make the structure a conductor of pressurized fluid so that the bit nozzles could be supplied with cooling fluid and a means to get drill cuttings out of the way. Another consideration is to avoid perforation using explosives as it can cause damage to sensitive formations and the perforating guns can become stuck after detonation in low bottom hole pressure wells. The present invention solves these problems by providing a robust liner structure that can withstand the applied torque and drive the bit while still having the capability to convey pressure to the bit nozzles and when drilling is concluded to open passages with sand control features so that production can begin with the liner suspended and sealed to an existing and cemented well tubular. These and other features of the present invention will be more readily apparent from a review of the description of the preferred embodiment and the associated drawing while recognizing that the claims determine the full scope of the invention.

Method of using a drill in sand control liner


An A-D converter includes an A-D converter circuit, a D-A converter circuit, a subtraction circuit, a second amplifier circuit, a reference voltage control circuit, a timing control circuit 18, an amplifier control circuit 19, and an output circuit. The reference voltage control circuit controls the range of reference voltage in the A-D converter according to a step or stage of conversion in the A-D converter. In particular, the reference voltage control circuit performs a control so that the range of reference voltage in the A-D converter circuit at the time of conversion in the third step is larger than that in the first and the second step.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to analog-to-digital converters and it particularly relates to an analog-to-digital converter in which analog signals are converted to digital signals in such a manner that the analog signal is converted a plurality of times.
2. Description of the Related Art
As an example of a circuit for converting the inputted analog signals into the digital signals, there is available a pipeline-type A-D converter. A pipeline-type A-D converter is configured such that sub-A-D converters of low bits are connected in a plurality of stages. The inputted analog signal is A-D converted in stages through the respective sub-A-D converters. Each sub-A-D converter is provided with a plurality of comparators, and each comparator compares the inputted analog signal with the reference voltage so as to convert the analog signal into the digital signals.
When the inputted analog signal is to be A-D converted from the higher-order bit to the lower-order bit in stages, a redundancy range is provided in the sub-A-D converters. As a result, the result of conversion to the higher-order bits can be corrected based on the result of conversion to the lower-order bits. However, the A-D conversion terminates when the conversion to the least significant bit has been done. Thus, the above-mentioned correction will not be performed on the result of conversion to the least significant bit. This will directly affect the precision of the analog-to-digital converter as a whole.

Analog-to-digital converter with a plurality of conversions