A wafer processing method for processing a wafer (20) having bumps (B) formed on a front surface (21) comprises the steps of: holding on a table (51), a bump region-conforming member (40) that has an outer shape conforming only to a bump region (25) where said bumps are formed in the wafer; forming a resin layer (29) by applying resin around the bump region-conforming member up to a thickness equal to or greater than that of the bump region-conforming member; grinding the bump region-conforming member along with the resin layer to a predetermined thickness; removing the bump region-conforming member from the table to form a concave part (45) in the resin layer; applying a film (11) on the front surface of the wafer; and disposing the wafer in the concave part of the resin layer and holding the wafer on the table so that a back surface (22) of said wafer faces upward. After that, the back surface of the wafer can also be ground. As a result, a change in the size of the bumps can be easily accommodated without creating clearance.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a wafer processing method for processing a wafer having a plurality of bumps formed on its front surface.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the field of semiconductor manufacturing, wafers tend to become larger year after year and the wafers are made thinner for increasing packing density. In order to make a semiconductor wafer thinner, a backgrinding process for grinding a back surface of the wafer is performed. In the backgrinding process, a surface protection film is applied to a front surface of the wafer for protecting chips formed on the front surface of the wafer.
After the backgrinding process is finished, a dicing film application device applies a dicing film to the back surface of the wafer, so that the wafer is integrated with a mount frame. Then, the surface protection film that has been applied to the front surface of the wafer is removed, and then, the wafer is diced into chips. Each chip formed by the dicing process is picked up and mounted on a lead frame.
FIG. 8 is a cross-sectional view of a wafer before the backgrinding process in the conventional art. As illustrated in FIG. 8, bumps B as electrical contacts are formed on each chip C on the front surface of the wafer. Because of chips C and bumps B formed thereon, front surface 21 of wafer 20 is not flat. As can be seen from FIG. 8, when surface protection film 110 is applied to front surface 21 of wafer 20, a central region of wafer 20 is elevated from its peripheral region. In other words, a step is formed on the front surface protection film 110.
As illustrated in FIG. 9, wafer 20 is turned upside down and mounted on a table 51 for grinding the back surface 22 of wafer 20. Table 51 is provided with a suction section 52 that is slightly smaller than the outer shape of wafer 20. Because surface protection film 110 is elevated in the central region, it is not in contact with suction section 52 in the peripheral region. Therefore, as illustrated in the figure, in the peripheral region, an annular clearance is formed between the surface protection film 110 and suction section 52.
In this state, when back surface 22 of wafer 20 is ground, stress may be concentrated on the central region of wafer 20 and, as a result, bumps B located in the central region and/or wafer 20 itself may be damaged. Further, because the peripheral region of wafer 20 is not sucked by suction section 52, the edge of wafer 20 may be broken during the backgrinding process. Still further, during the backgrinding process, shavings may be sucked through the annular clearance by suction section 52 and, as a result, suction section 52 may be clogged.
In order to solve these problems, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2005-109433 discloses a technique for covering the front surface of the wafer by a cup-shaped protection member that is provided with a peripheral adhesive part adhering to the peripheral region of the wafer. When such protection member is used, the stress during the backgrinding process is distributed over the entire wafer, and therefore the above-mentioned problems can be avoided.
However, the protection member disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2005-109433, which is a special-purpose product conforming only to the bumps of a particular size, is expensive and therefore the cost of the resultant semiconductor chip is increased. Considering the fact that this protection member is used only during the backgrinding process and eventually discarded, it is desirable to reduce the cost of the protection member as much as possible.
Further, because the protection member is the special-purpose product, even when the height of the bumps is changed only slightly, the protection member cannot protect the bumps properly. In this case, if the protection member is used as it is without modification, the problems such as the damage to the wafer and/or bumps, the breakage of the edge of the wafer, and the clogging of the suction section may occur again.
The present invention has been made in view of such circumstances and it is an object of the present invention to provide an inexpensive wafer processing method that can easily accommodate change of size of bumps without creating clearance between a wafer and a table.

Wafer processing method for processing wafer having bumps formed thereon


For example, of a first intensity distribution waveform WF1 indicated by a distance distribution of an intensity of light which returns to one end of a core of a multicore fiber, and a second intensity distribution waveform WF2 indicated by a distance distribution of an intensity of light which returns to the other end of the core, the second intensity distribution waveform WF2 is inverted. Further, for example, an inverted intensity distribution waveform WF3 which is inverted and the first intensity distribution waveform WF1 which is not inverted are added.

The present invention relates to a crosstalk measuring method and a crosstalk measuring device, and is suitable to measure crosstalk in a multicore fiber.
A multicore fiber has a structure which includes a plurality of cores and a clad which fills between the cores and surrounds all of the plurality of cores, and can transmit signals through respective cores.
In this multicore fiber, crosstalk occurs between cores, and it is important to learn characteristics of this crosstalk.
A measuring method of measuring a level of crosstalk is a measuring method disclosed in, for example, the following documents. According to this measuring method, a power ratio of light which enters one given core of the multicore fiber and light which is output from a core adjacent to the core is measured.
K. Takenaga et al., "Reduction of Crosstalk by Trench-Assisted Multi-Core Fiber" OFC2011, OWJ4.

Crosstalk measuring method and crosstalk measuring device

NIPPON TELEGRAPH AND TELEPHONE CORPORATION


This robot system includes a first imaging portion detachably mounted to a robot arm and a control portion controlling the operation of the robot arm and a grasping portion, and the control portion is so formed as to detach the first imaging portion from the robot arm before moving an object to be grasped that is being grasped by the grasping portion to a prescribed processing position.

1. Field of the Invention
The present, invention relates to a robot system and a method for operating a robot system.
2. Description of the Background Art
Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 2011-000669 discloses a robot system (working articulated robot system) including a dual-arm robot and a camera fixedly mounted to a first robot arm of the dual-arm robot. The robot system according to the aforementioned Japanese Patent Laying-Open No. 2011-000669 is so formed as to take images of a work that is being grasped by a hand unit mounted on the first robot arm of the dual-arm robot by the camera mounted to the first robot arm while rotating the work and detect a mark on the work.

Robot system and method for operating robot system


Cargo boxes for trailers that support boats, jet skis, motorcycles, off road vehicles and power equipment A first embodiment has ninety degree angled channels in rectangular shape that are bolted to the front of a boat trailer frame or rear bumper of a towing vehicle. A hinged strap fits through the handle on five gallon gas cans or ice chests. One end of the strap is welded to the channels, the second end has a slot for fitting about a loop attached to a front channel. A key/combination padlock inserts through the loop locking the storage container to the channels A second embodiment has an I-Frame formed by two angled channels separated by telescoping adjustable plates wherein the storage containers, or a hinged box can be attached thereon by bolts, and BUNGEE.RTM. cords. The components of the cargo boxes can be formed from stainless steel, aluminum, galvanized steel, molded plastic, fiberglass and the like.

Gasoline driven power boats usually need separate gasoline containers such as five gallon cans for storage of extra fuel. The traditional trailers used for transporting these boats do not allow for storing these extra gasoline containers. While transporting these boats, the gasoline cans are usually stored in the trunk or passenger compartment of the vehicle towing the trailer. Transporting gasoline cans in the towing vehicle itself has inherent problems. The gasoline vapors can effect passengers in the towing vehicle. Gas spillage can occur and the flammability is a destructive risk to the towing vehicle as well as to the passengers therein. Likewise, merely trying to strap the cans within the boat on the trailer during transport has similar problems. The gasoline cans can spill their contents into the boat. Strapping the gas cans to the trailer could be accomplished with ropes. However, such a loose, flimsy attachment does not provide a stable and safe support for the gas cans themselves.
Several U.S. Pat. Nos. are of related interest. See U.S. Pat. Nos.: DES.215,541 to Smith; DES. 159,286 to Morton; 2,622,887 to Prior; 3,583,718 to Meyer; 3,779,580 to Thelen; 4,006,852 to Pilsner et al.; 4,135,596 to Silba; 4,643,441 to Schwartz; and 5,002,325 to Fought et al. However, none of the prior art adequately addresses and overcomes the above referenced problems.


Provided are an organic light emitting display (OLED) device and a method of repairing the same. The OLED device includes: a first pixel including: a first thin-film transistor (TFT) including a source electrode, a second TFT, and a third TFT including a top gate electrode, a second pixel including an OLED including a first electrode, a repair line extending over: the first electrode of the OLED of the second pixel, the source electrode of the first TFT of the first pixel, and the top gate electrode of the third TFT of the first pixel, an insulating layer between at least a portion of: the top gate electrode of the third TFT of the first pixel, and the repair line.

1. Technical Field
The following description relates to an organic light emitting display device and method of repairing the same, and more particularly, to an organic light emitting display device in which a defective pixel can be repaired.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
Organic light emitting display devices are devices that have a structure in which an emission layer is formed between a cathode, through which an electron is injected, and an anode through which a positive hole is injected, and use the principle in which, when the electron generated from the cathode and the positive hole generated from the anode are injected into the emission layer, the injected electron and positive hole are combined to generate an exciton, and the exciton is shifted from an excited state to a ground state to emit light.
Hereinafter, a related art organic light emitting display device will be described with reference to the drawings.
FIG. 1 is a circuit diagram of a pixel configuring a related art organic light emitting display device.
As seen in FIG. 1, the pixel configuring the related art organic light emitting display device includes a gate line GL, a data line DL, a high power line VDD, a reference line Ref, a switching thin film transistor (TFT) T1, a driving TFT T2, a sensing TFT T3, a capacitor C, and an organic light emitting diode OLED.
The switching TFT T1 is turned on according to a gate signal supplied through the gate line GL, and supplies a data voltage, supplied from the data line DL, to the driving TFT T2.
The driving TFT T2 is turned on with the data voltage supplied from the switching TFT T1, and generates a data current from power supplied from the high power line VDD to supply the data current to the organic light emitting diode OLED.
The sensing TFT T3 is for sensing a threshold voltage deviation of the driving TFT T2 that causes a degradation in a quality of an image, and sensing of the threshold voltage deviation is performed in a sensing mode. The sensing TFT T3 supplies a current of the driving TFT T2 to the reference line Ref in response to a sensing control signal supplied through the gate line GL.
The capacitor C holds the data voltage supplied to the driving TFT T2 during one frame, and is connected to a gate electrode and a source electrode of the driving TFT T2.
The organic light emitting diode OLED emits light with the data current supplied from the driving TFT T2. A cathode of the organic light emitting diode OLED is connected to a low power line VSS.
In the pixel of the related art organic light emitting display device, an error can occur due to various causes. For example, a dark spot error can occur when a line or an electrode is disconnected, such that black is always displayed because a pixel is not driven; and a hot spot error can occur when a line or an electrode is short-circuited, such that white is always displayed.
Because a quality of a displayed image is degraded due to the dark spot error or the hot spot error, a method of repairing a defect of a pixel is needed.

Organic light emitting display device and method of repairing the same


A compression-forming system comprising a molten resin mass-feeding device equipped with the holding portions for holding the molten resin masses, a compression-forming machine equipped with the metal molds, and a molten resin mass position detector, wherein said molten resin mass position detector is a temperature sensor, and said temperature sensor measures the temperature of a portion on the outer side of an allowable range in which the molten resin masses are fed to the metal molds, and judges the presence of the molten resin masses on said portion by the temperature of said portion of the metal molds to detect that the molten resin masses are defectively handed over.

Plastic containers obtained by forming a polyethylene terephthalate and the like have been widely put into the practical use as containers for containing beverages. A preform which is a precursor to the plastic container is, usually, formed in an injection-forming machine. In recent years, however, forming has been attempted by using a compression-forming system, and various improvements have been made. In carrying out the compression-forming, the molten resin extruded from the extrusion port of a die head is fed (conveyed) to the compression-forming system in a manner as described below.
The synthetic resin heated and melted in the extruder is extruded from the extrusion port of the die head provided in the extruder and is, thereafter, cut by a cutter of a molten resin mass-feeding (conveying) device that is rotating, and is cut from the extrusion port. The molten resin mass after cut is fed into a holder of a holder unit provided in the molten resin mass-feeding device. The holder unit so moves as to follow up part of the rotary track of the metal mold provided in the compression-forming system. The holder of the holder unit moves the molten mass that is fed to a position over the metal mold, permits it to fall into a forming hole of the metal mold (usually, a female mold) in a section in which it is following up the rotary track so that the molten resin mass is handed over thereto.
The following patent document 1 discloses a compression-forming system inclusive of an extruder, a molten resin cutting/conveying device (molten resin mass-feeding device) and a compression-forming machine.
The following patent document 2 discloses a compression-forming system in which a molten resin mass fed into the female mold of the metal mold is compression-formed by the female mold in cooperation with a male mold provided in the compression-forming system so as to be formed into a preform of a predetermined shape.


The present invention relates to polymers comprising structural units which contain alkylalkoxy groups, and blends which comprise the polymers according to the invention. The invention is also directed to the use of the polymers and blends according to the invention in opto-electronic devices and to these devices themselves.

The present invention relates to polymers comprising structural units which contain alkylalkoxy groups, and blends which comprise the polymers according to the invention. The invention is also directed to the use of the polymers and blends according to the invention in opto-electronic devices and to these devices themselves.
Electronic devices which comprise organic, organometallic and/or polymeric semiconductors are being used ever more frequently in commercial products or are just about to be introduced onto the market. Examples which may be mentioned here are charge-transport materials on an organic basis (for example hole transporters based on triarylamine) in photocopiers and organic or polymeric light-emitting diodes (OLEDs or PLEDs) in display devices or organic photoreceptors in copiers. Organic solar cells (O-SCs), organic field-effect transistors (O-FETs), organic thin-film transistors (O-TFTs), organic integrated circuits (O-ICs), organic optical amplifiers or organic laser diodes (O-lasers) are in an advanced stage of development and may achieve major importance in the future.
Many of these electronic devices have, irrespective of the respective application, the following general layer structure, which can be adapted for the respective application:    (1) substrate,    (2) electrode, frequently metallic or inorganic, but also comprising organic or polymeric conductive materials,    (3) charge-injection layer(s) or interlayer(s), for example for compensation of the unevenness of the electrode ("planarisation layer"), frequently comprising a conductive, doped polymer,    (4) organic semiconductor,    (5) optionally further charge-transport or charge-injection or charge-blocking layers,    (6) counterelectrode, materials as mentioned under (2),    (7) encapsulation.
The above arrangement represents the general structure of an organic electronic device, where various layers may be combined, meaning that in the simplest case an arrangement results from two electrodes, between which an organic layer is located. The organic layer in this case fulfils all functions, including the emission of light. A system of this type is described, for example, in WO 90/13148 A1 on the basis of poly(p-phenylenes).
In the case of a solution-processed system, this individual layer can either be a copolymer, in which case the corresponding functional units are present in the main chain or side chain of the polymer, or it can be a polymer blend, in which case different polymers comprise one or more functional units as structural units, or it may comprise soluble small molecules or mixtures of one or more polymers with one or more small molecules. All variants exhibit advantages and disadvantages. However, a main problem is the operating voltage of such systems, which is still relatively high, inadequate efficiency and an inadequate lifetime.
Solution-processable materials for OLEDs have caused a lot of excitement recently, in particular for a new generation of flat screens or as lighting element. Although great improvements in solution-processed OLEDs have been achieved in recent years, they still exhibit deficits with respect to their efficiency and lifetime compared with vacuum-evaporated SMOLED devices. By contrast, the advantage lies in simple processing from solution, where various layers can easily be produced by known coating methods (printing, spin coating), in contrast to a complex vapour-deposition process in a vacuum chamber.
Colour homogeneity is also in some cases very difficult to establish in the case of vapour-deposited small molecules, since small amounts of a dopant have to be dispensed accurately. In the case of copolymers, polymer blends or small molecules in solution, the requisite components, such as, for example, emitters or charge-transport units, can be dispensed very accurately in the correct concentration.
Many OLEDs in accordance with the prior art comprise an active polymer within a layer, where the polymer comprises all requisite functional units. This polymer layer is frequently applied to an interlayer, which is responsible, for example, for hole injection.
Polymer blends can also be employed and may be useful for various purposes, for example for white-emitting devices via a mixture of polymers emitting in different colours (turquoise and yellow, red, green and blue in increasing concentrations, for example GB 2340304), for improving hole injection in order to render an interlayer superfluous (for example WO 2008/011953), or in order to adapt the rheological properties by employing polymers having different properties.
Polymer blends frequently do not exhibit advantages overall over copolymers, but are nevertheless employed. However, systems in which the blend produces additional advantages over a copolymer would be advantageous. In WO 99/48160, an advantage of this type is achieved for the performance data of the OLED produced: a mixture is used in which the highest HOMO (highest occupied molecular orbital) in the mixture and the lowest LUMO (lowest unoccupied molecular orbital) in the mixture are localised on two different components, i.e. these two components form a so-called "type II heterojunction", i.e. the component having the higher HOMO also has the higher LUMO. Thus, the separation between the HOMO relevant for hole injection and the LUMO relevant for electron injection is reduced without the band gap of the individual components being reduced and thus the emission colour being shifted to lower energy. Charge-carrier injection is thus simplified independently of the emission colour of the OLED component, i.e. also for deep blue-emitting OLEDs.

Polymers comprising structural units which contain alkylalkoxy groups, blends comprising these polymers, and opto-electronic devices comprising these polymers and blends


The electrical connector of the present invention has an insulative housing having a first face across from a first electrical circuit and a second face across from a second electrical circuit. A plurality of contacts are mounted in the insulative housing, each of which contacts a contact point of the first electrical circuit at the first face, and contacts a contact point of the second electrical circuit at the second face, thereby interconnecting the first and second circuits. Each of the contacts has one portion of the contact supported by the insulative housing so as to be capable of pivoting in response to the displacement of the first contact portion and the second contact portion.

With a conventional Ball Grid Array (BGA) package, soldering is performed directly onto a circuit board in order to electrically connect an electrical circuit having a plurality of contact points arranged as an array such as an integrated circuit (IC) with another electrical circuit formed on a board. However, because the heat produced by soldering can have an adverse effect, and because this soldering makes replacement work more difficult, for example, Land Grid Array (LGA) packages have been used, in which connection to the circuit board is made via a socket-type electrical connector, rather than soldering directly to the board.
With the electrical connectors that are sandwiched between and electrically connect these LGA packages and circuit boards, a gap is produced between the contact points if there is any warping or the like of the circuit board on which the package is mounted, which is a problem in that it results in difficulty maintaining a reliable electrical connection. In order to provide an electrical connector capable of solving this problem, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application H6-89764 states that a contact is constituted by disposing a flexible circuit member along with a spring means. Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application H5-226043 and Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application H11-154545 discuss the use of a contact that is C-shaped and a contact that is elastic and spiral-shaped, respectively. Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application 2000-231401 discusses the use of a springy, cantilevered contact.
However, when the contact discussed in H6-89764 is used, a positioning member has to be separately installed in order to hold the contact within the housing, and it is difficult to dispose the contacts at high density or to make the contacts shorter in height. When the contacts discussed in H5-226043 and H11-154545 are used, a lid has to be separately provided to the top of the housing in which the contact is held, making it difficult to reduce the height, and the shape of the contact itself is complicated, which makes molding more difficult. When the contact discussed in 2000-231401 is used, the contact has to be supported at at least two points of the housing, so the spacing at which the contacts are disposed cannot be reduced, and the work of mounting the contacts is also troublesome.


An image forming apparatus includes, an upper cabinet disposed openably and closably on a main cabinet, reader cover disposed openably and closably on the upper cabinet and covering the image reader when the reader cover is closed and restriction mechanism preventing the reader cover from opening relative to the upper cabinet when the upper cabinet is open relative to the main cabinet. The restriction mechanism includes a first engagement member disposed at the upper cabinet and a second engagement member disposed at the reader cover and engageable with the first engagement member. The reader cover is prevented from opening relative to the upper cabinet when the first engagement member engages with the second engagement member. The second engagement member is urged to project from the reader cover towards the upper cabinet and movable from the upper cabinet to the reader cover.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus that forms an image on a sheet of medium such as a sheet of paper, or the like.
2. Related Art
An image forming apparatus such as a copying machine has been known, which includes a main cabinet that has an image forming unit for forming an image on a sheet of medium based on image information, an upper cabinet that has an image reader for acquiring image information by reading an image on a document and that is disposed openably and closably at an upper portion of the main cabinet, and a document conveyance unit including a reader cover that is disposed openably and closably at an upper portion of the upper cabinet and covers the image reading unit when the reader cover is closed.
This type of image forming apparatus is provided with a restriction mechanism for preventing the document conveyance unit from opening with respect to the upper cabinet when the upper cabinet is open with respect to the main cabinet. The restriction mechanism prevents a phenomenon in which the document conveyance unit is open with respect to the upper cabinet when the upper cabinet is open with respect to the main cabinet.
The restriction mechanism includes a first engagement member provided at the upper cabinet and a second engagement member that is provided at the reader cover to project towards the upper cabinet and engageable with the first engagement member. The restriction mechanism prevents the reader cover from opening with respect to the upper cabinet when the first engagement member engages with the second engagement member.
When the reader cover is opened or closed by a user while the upper cabinet is closed with respect to the main cabinet, it is likely that the user gets injured due to the projecting second engagement member coming into contact with a hand or the like of the user if the second engagement member projects towards the upper cabinet. Since the second engagement member of the restriction mechanism projects towards the upper cabinet, it is also likely that the user gets injured due to the second engagement member coming into contact with the hand or the like of the user when the user opens or closes the reader cover while the upper cabinet is closed with respect to the main cabinet.


An equalizer circuit, a method for sampling data and a memory are provided. The equalizer circuit includes a first input buffer circuit, a second input buffer circuit and a selecting and sampling circuit. The first input buffer circuit and the second input buffer circuit are respectively connected with the selecting and sampling circuit, and reference voltages used in the first input buffer circuit and the second input buffer circuit are different from each other. The selecting and sampling circuit selects to perform data sampling on a data signal outputted by the first input buffer circuit or the second input buffer circuit according to data outputted previously by the equalizer circuit, and takes sampled data as data outputted currently by the equalizer circuit.

In high-speed links of computers, as a transmission speed of a data signal becomes faster, obvious Inter Symbol Interference (ISI) is generated inevitably. Therefore, equalizing data signals of the high-speed links is required, to obtain available data signals.
In design for a receiver circuit in the memory, continuous Time Linear Equalizer (CTLE) architecture is used for equalizing. A function of the CTLE architecture includes performing signal compensation according to attenuation characteristics of a channel, so as to improve the quality of the data signal.
However, it is difficult for the existing equalizing method to meet a requirement of a high-speed receiver for the receiving quality of a data signal. Therefore, how to further improve the receiving quality of the data signal is an urgent problem to be solved.

Equalizer circuit, method for sampling data and memory


A thrust sliding bearing (1) includes an upper casing (3) which is made of polyacetal resin and has an annular lower surface (2); a lower casing (5) which is made of a reinforced synthetic resin including, in addition to polyacetal resin, reinforcing fibers such as glass fibers contained in this polyacetal resin, is superposed on the upper casing (3) so as to be rotatable about an axis O of the upper casing (3) in an R direction, and has an annular upper surface (4) opposed to the annular lower surface (2) of the upper casing (3); an annular thrust sliding bearing piece (6) which is made of polyacetal resin and is interposed between the annular lower surface (2) and the annular upper surface (4); and a tubular radial sliding bearing piece (7) made of polyacetal resin.

In general, a strut-type suspension is mainly used in a front wheel of a four-wheeled motor vehicle, and is constructed such that a strut assembly incorporating a hydraulic shock absorber in an outer cylinder formed integrally with a main shaft is combined with a suspension coil spring. Among such suspensions, there is a type of structure in which the axis of the suspension coil spring is actively offset with respect to the axis of the strut, so as to allow the sliding of a piston rod of the shock absorber incorporated in the strut to be effected smoothly. There is another type of structure in which the suspension coil spring is disposed by aligning the axis of the suspension coil spring with the axis of the strut. In either structure, a thrust bearing is disposed between a mounting member for a motor vehicle body and an upper spring seat member of the suspension coil spring to allow the rotation to be effected smoothly when the strut assembly rotates together with the suspension coil spring by the steering operation.
In this thrust bearing, a rolling bearing using balls or needles, or a synthetic resin-made sliding bearing is used. The rolling bearing is extremely favorable since it is capable of lowering the friction torque and effecting the steering operation lightly. However, since the rolling bearing is expensive, in a case where a low price is required, a sliding bearing instead of the rolling bearing is used as the thrust bearing.
Incidentally, either thrust bearing is interposed between the mounting member for the motor vehicle body and the upper spring seat member of the suspension coil spring, as described above. However, since the upper spring seat member is generally made of sheet metal, the upper spring seat member is relatively heavy. In addition, as a result of the fact that the upper spring seat member made of sheet metal needs to be provided with coating for the prevention of rust, even if the sliding bearing is used instead of the expensive rolling bearing to attain the light weight and a low price of the undercarriage of the motor vehicle, there is a limit to such attempts for the light weight and the low price owing to the weight, manufacturing cost, assembly cost, and the like of the upper spring seat member.
The present invention has been devised in view of the above-described aspects, and its object is to provide a strut sliding bearing which makes it possible to omit the upper spring seat member made of sheet metal, thereby making it possible to attain the light weight and a low price of the undercarriage of a motor vehicle.


A process for oxidizing fuel and transferring the heat produced to a particular use in a combustion system such as fuels conversion. A bed of a mixture of materials forming an unmixed combustion catalyst, which in an oxidized state is readily reducible and in a reduced state is readily oxidizable, is placed in efficient thermal contact with a heat receiver for use in the combustion system. Fuel and air are alternately contacted with the bed, whereby the fuel is oxidized, the air is depleted of oxygen, and heat is liberated. The heat is efficiently transferred to the heat receiver by careful selection of the materials of the bed such that the temperatures produced when the fuel is oxidized and when the air is depleted of oxygen are advantageous to the particular use in the combustion system.

1. The Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to methods for producing and utilizing heat by oxidizing fuels without mixing the fuels with air and thereby producing a fire. More particularly, the invention is directed to an autothermal process for fuels conversion, including methods and systems for generating heat by oxidizing fuel without mixing the fuel with air, with the subsequent transfer and utilization of the generated heat being an improvement over the heat transfer which is possible when fire is used to produce heat.
2. The Relevant Technology
Historically, the primary method by which mankind has used fuel to generate heat has been fire. For many applications, however, the use of fire to produce heat has a number of substantial disadvantages and limitations. One of the limitations of fire is that mixtures of fuel and air must contain more than some critical amount of fuel in order to burn. This is the well known flammability limit.
Another of the limitations of fire relates to its thermodynamics, i.e., fire is an irreversible process. While energy can neither be created nor destroyed, it can become less available for doing useful work. A fuel contains chemical energy, some fraction of which is potentially available to do useful work. Upon combustion of a fuel by fire, that chemical energy is converted into heat energy. The fraction of this heat energy which is potentially available to do useful work is less than the fraction of the chemical energy which was potentially available to do useful work.
A further disadvantage of fire relates to heat transfer. For all fuels in common usage, combustion produces hot gases. In many applications it is necessary to recover heat from these hot gases. This is commonly done by passing the hot gases over heat transfer surfaces, but the amount of heat that can be transferred between hot gases and a fixed amount of solid surface is generally relatively low. Thus, to recover the heat efficiently, large amounts of heat transfer surface are needed. For industrial processes using fire as a heat source, the cost of providing heat transfer surfaces to recover the heat is frequently a major part of the total process cost.
Fire also has the property of being an intense phenomenon. For a flame to sustain itself, large amounts of heat must be liberated at very high temperatures with a very high rate of heat release. For many applications heating in a more controlled manner is needed. For these applications electrical heating is frequently used.
In efforts to overcome one or another of the disadvantages of fire, a number of alternatives to fire have been proposed. The flammability limits are a problem in some situations, i.e., there are industrial operations which produce mixtures of one or more toxic organic materials with air. These mixtures must be disposed of in an environmentally acceptable manner, but frequently they are below the flammability limit and hence will not sustain a fire. One frequently employed solution to this problem is the use of catalytic incineration wherein the mixture of air and toxic organic matter is passed through an oxidation catalyst.
In an article by H. J. Richter et al., Reversibility of Combustion Processes, Efficiency and Costing, Second Law Analysis of Processes, ACS Symposium Series 235, pp. 71-85 (1983), an alternative to fire is proposed in combustion processes. The teachings of this article are restricted to providing improvement of thermodynamic efficiency, however, with no teaching or suggestion of any means for improving heat transfer.
Fluid bed combustion is also an alternative to fire. In some applications, fluid bed combustion can provide better heat transfer than can fire. In other applications, there are substantial heat transfer problems that the use of fluid bed combustion does not avoid.
One example of an application with substantial heat transfer problems is the industrial process known as steam reforming in which hydrogen is produced by passing steam and a hydrocarbon through a nickel catalyst. Typically this is done at temperatures in the range of about 700.degree. C. to 800.degree. C. and at pressures of about 100 to 700 psig. These conditions are too severe for the use of reaction vessels made of mild steel or even stainless steel. Despite their great cost, inconel or some other high nickel alloy must be used. Furthermore, heat must be supplied since the reaction is highly endothermic. While the heat needed can readily be generated by burning fuel, transferring this heat to where it is needed is a problem since the catalyst is in the form of a packed bed. Packed beds are poor conductors of heat and the outer sections of the bed tend to insulate the inner sections. In order to get an adequate rate of heat transfer to the interior of the reaction vessel, the reaction vessels used are long narrow tubes. Thus, to get an adequate rate of heat transfer it is necessary to use very large amounts of expensive alloy tubing.
To avoid this disadvantage there have been proposals to do what is called "adiabatic" steam reforming. Department of Defense Report Number AD-A134224, Evaluation of Adiabatic Reformer in Mixed-Gas-Cycle, by the Power Systems Division of United Technologies Corporation (1983), is a typical example of this technology. In this approach, the heat necessary for the endothermic steam reforming reaction is provided by adding some air to the steam hydrocarbon mixture passing through the reactor. The oxygen in the air reacts with the hydrocarbon, liberating heat. Unfortunately, however, combustible mixtures either ignite or they do not. If ignition does not occur, the needed heat is not liberated. If ignition does occur, the heat is not liberated throughout the reactor where it is needed but at the point of ignition. Since the heat is not liberated uniformly throughout the reactor, there is again a severe heat transfer problem.
The gasification of coal with water is, like steam reforming, an endothermic reaction. A proposal for the improvement of this endothermic reaction has been advanced in an article by G. P. Curran et al., CO.sub.2 Acceptor Gasification Process, Fuel Gasification Symposium, ACS Advances in Chemistry Series 69, Chapter 10, pp. 141-165 (1966). In this article, which is typical of the art, the use of CaO as an acceptor for CO.sub.2 is suggested. The reaction CO.sub.2 +CaO=CaCO.sub.3 is highly exothermic thereby supplying the heat consumed by the endothermic gasification reaction. Furthermore, CO.sub.2 and CO are in equilibrium via the water gas shift reaction H.sub.2 O+CO=CO.sub.2 +H.sub.2. Consequently, removing the CO.sub.2 has the effect of also removing the CO, allowing the production of a gas containing a large mole fraction of hydrogen. Unfortunately, however, for this process to be practical it is necessary to reconvert the CaCO.sub.3 back to CaO. While the heat necessary to do this could readily be generated by burning some fuel, transferring that heat to where it is needed is again a difficult and expensive problem.
Heat transfer is also a substantial problem in other industrial processes in which packed bed reactors are used to carry out endothermic reactions. Examples of such reactions include but are not limited to the cracking of ammonia to make hydrogen/nitrogen mixtures, the gasification of biomass, the catalytic reforming of petroleum hydrocarbons, and the decomposition of methanol.
Another group of applications in which heat transfer is a substantial problem involves the use of packed beds of sorbents. Typically, a gas containing some impurity is passed through the packed bed, the impurity being removed by a sorbent through adsorption or absorption. When the sorbent approaches saturation with the impurity, the sorbent must be regenerated. This is commonly done by heating the packed bed to drive out the impurity. Since, however, the outer portions of the bed tend to insulate the inner portions, heat transfer is not effectively achieved.
Yet another example of a technological problem for which presently available combustion and heat transfer technology do not provide a satisfactory solution is the production of shale oil. The United States has vast reserves of what is commonly referred to as oil shale, i.e., deposits of rock which yield oil when sufficiently heated. No economically acceptable method of producing oil from this resource is presently available because of the limitations of presently available combustion and heat transfer technology. For example, when shale rock is placed into a packed bed retort and heat is supplied to the exterior of the retort, the outer layers of the shale rock insulate the inner layers. This results in unacceptably slow rates of heat transfer and liberation of the oil from the rock. In principal, use of a fluid bed retort would provide a much higher rate of heat transfer, but once shale rock is retorted, it has a tendency to crumble into fine powder. This fine powder tends to fly out of the fluid bed, making operation of the process quite difficult.
From the examples above, it is clear that there is a need in the art for a new method of burning fuel which allows more effective heat transfer than is possible with fire and the presently available alternatives to fire, and accomplishes this without increasing emissions of pollutants.
In the work of R. K. Lyon described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,339,754 and 5,509,362 (hereafter the "Lyon Patents"), a method is described for improving heat transfer by using a method called unmixed combustion. In unmixed combustion, a metal is dispersed on a high surface area support. When this metal is exposed to air or a gas containing oxygen, the metal is oxidized producing a significant amount of heat. The gaseous product of this reaction is air that has been depleted of the oxygen consumed by reaction with the metal. Subsequently a gaseous organic fuel is passed over the hot metal oxide. Reaction between the fuel and the metal oxide results in the oxidation of the fuel to produce CO.sub.2 and H.sub.2 O, with the simultaneous production of additional heat and chemical reduction of the metal back to the original state.
In the process described in the Lyon Patents, a single metal is used, and although it is suggested that mixtures of metals may be used, no example of this is provided, nor is any benefit of using mixtures of metals described. Examples of metals described by the Lyon Patents include silver, copper, iron, and nickel. Depending on the process temperature, the fuel oxidation step may either be exothermic, thermoneutral, or endothermic. In general, the metal oxidation step will be strongly exothermic. Furthermore, in the process described in the Lyon Patents, the metal undergoes a transition between the metal in its standard state and one or more oxidation states of the metal. For many applications, this would not be a deficiency. However, in several applications, this would be a deficiency by prohibiting practical use of the process, reducing process efficiency, or requiring that the process be complicated by the addition of heat exchange and heat transfer surfaces which the process of the Lyon Patents is in part intended to avoid.
For example, in the case of the production of hydrogen from diesel fuel in a single step, copending U.S. application Ser. No. 08/428,032 to Lyon, issued as U.S. Pat. No. 5,827,496 on Oct. 27, 1998, the disclosure of which is incorporated by reference, teaches that this process can be conducted by using nickel and nickel oxide, respectively, as the metal and metal oxide. During the first step of the Lyon process, nickel oxide and a fuel, such as methane or a petroleum distillate, react to produce some of the energy required to permit the reforming reaction between additional fuel and steam, fuel+H.sub.2 O=CO+H.sub.2 and the subsequent water-gas shift reaction, CO+H.sub.2 O=CO.sub.2 +H.sub.2, to produce hydrogen. The remaining energy required for the production of hydrogen from fuel and steam is provided by the reaction between CO.sub.2 and CaO to form CaCO.sub.3. This total process can in fact be shown to produce more energy than is required to cause the efficient production of hydrogen. The excess energy is carried away as sensible heat of the product gases. During a subsequent regeneration step, air is allowed to react with the nickel to produce nickel oxide. The energy produced by this reaction is sufficient to cause the CaCO.sub.3 to decompose.
However, it can be shown that while the energy produced in the above Lyon process is sufficient for the decomposition of CaCO.sub.3, the resulting temperature of the reactor will not be high enough to permit the decomposition of all of the CaCO.sub.3. In other words, the conditions in the reactor as described in the Lyon Patents do not thermodynamically favor the complete decomposition of the CaCO.sub.3. Therefore, unless an additional source of heat is supplied to the reactor during the regeneration step, for example, by external heating by the effluent gases from a second reactor that is simultaneously undergoing the reforming step, all of the CaCO.sub.3 will not be decomposed. During subsequent reforming and regeneration steps, the CaO will be slowly consumed and will be unable to react with CO.sub.2, thereby shutting the reaction down. There exists a method for avoiding this deficiency within the Lyon process as described, which is to reduce that portion of the total fuel that is to be converted to hydrogen. Thus, the amount of CaCO.sub.3 produced will be lower relative to the amount of nickel oxide that is reduced to nickel metal, and the heat released during the oxidation of the nickel metal will be sufficient to decompose the smaller amount of CaCO.sub.3. However, this will reduce the thermodynamic efficiency of the total process.

Autothermal methods and systems for fuels conversion

Energy and Environmental Research Corporation


Low emissivity glazing which is an assembly of thin layers including at least one metal layer reflecting infrared rays between one or more dielectric layers located between the metal layer and the glass sheet and on the metal layer, the light transmission of one clear float glass sheet 4 mm thick coated with said layers being not less than 83%, the metal layer being selected such that the emissivity is not higher than 0.042.

The present invention relates to low-emissivity glazing, that is to say glazing which has the property of reflecting the infrared rays emitted, for example, by the inside of dwellings, and consequently limiting heat loss.
The demand for such glazing is often linked to that of having a light transmission as high as possible. The two demands of low emissivity and high transmission normally result in solutions that are opposing in terms of structure. It is necessary to carry out compromises which are difficult to establish.
The most common practice is to have systems of thin layers that comprise one or more layers capable of reflecting the infrared rays. Systems of this type are in general composed of metal layers, especially a silver layer with a thickness of a few nanometers. The layers must be thin enough not to reduce, in too significant a manner, the visible light transmission. The thickness must also be sufficient to block the transmission of infrared rays, the thickness directly determining the fraction of these rays which are effectively reflected.
The systems applied to glazing must simultaneously fulfill other conditions. Firstly, it is necessary to protect the reflective metallic layers against the chemical or mechanical attacks to which they may be exposed. The metal layers are normally deposited on the glass substrate by vacuum deposition techniques of the magnetically-enhanced sputtering type, more commonly known as magnetron sputtering. The layers obtained by these techniques offer the advantage of a high uniformity of the composition, thickness and surface finish. They are however very fragile and must be protected by additional layers. In a perfectly conventional manner, transparent dielectric layers made from metal oxides and/or nitrides, or else from mixtures of these, offering the required resistance, are used.
Simultaneously, the metal layers must also be protected from a possible diffusion from the substrate, a diffusion which would disadvantageously modify the properties of the reflective metal layer. The nature of the dielectric layers situated between the substrate and the metal layer is often similar to that of the layers located above this same metal layer. It is made from metal oxides and/or nitrides.
Conventionally, the sequence of the layers is composed in the following manner:
glass/dielectric I/metal/dielectric II
Among the most used dielectrics are, especially, ZnO, TiO2, SnO2, Si3N4, etc. These dielectrics offer various optical properties and are also distinguished by industrial production conditions.
The most common structures also incorporate one particular layer between the metal and the outer dielectric, a layer which has the role of protecting the metal, especially during the deposition of the layer of this dielectric. This is because, usually the formation of this dielectric is carried out in a "reactive" manner. Under these conditions, the dielectric (oxide or nitride) is formed at the same time as the deposition, by reaction of metal vapor emitted by bombardment of a metal cathode, with the atmosphere in which this deposition is carried out being at a very reduced pressure, for an oxide an atmosphere of oxygen or a gas mixture containing oxygen. Under these conditions, the deposited metal layer is in contact with this atmosphere and may be deteriorated, in particular due to the high reactivity of the plasma.
For protection against this deterioration, it is also common to have directly on the metal or suboxidized or nitrided layer reflecting the infrared rays, a so-called "barrier" or else "sacrificial" layer. This is a metal or partially oxidized layer of very small thickness, of which the role is to react with the constituents of the atmosphere which could deteriorate the metal layer that reflects the infrared rays. The barrier layer is carefully chosen both with regard to its nature and its thickness. It is not intended itself to be involved in the reflection of the infrared rays, but to react with the atmosphere in which the dielectric depositions of the layers deposited after that of the metal layer, that reflects the infrared rays, are carried out. To prevent this from substantially reducing the light transmission, it is important to ensure that the barrier layer on the one hand is as thin as possible, but more importantly, on the other hand, that it is practically completely converted into a transparent dielectric during its deposition or deposition operations following its own deposition.
Conventional systems consequently have the following succession of layers:
glass/dielectric I/metal/barrier/dielectric II
Where appropriate, the use of ceramic targets instead of metal targets avoids carrying out a reactive deposition. In other words, the oxide deposition may be carried out in an essentially inert atmosphere (as a general rule having less than 10% oxygen), thus avoiding the risk of oxidation of the previously deposited silver layer. In that case, it is possible to form a multilayer without a barrier layer on top of the silver.
The formation of these assemblies of layers must also result in colors that are satisfactory both in reflection and in transmission. The demand is for the most perfect neutrality possible. In the CIELab calorimetric coordinates, this corresponds to a* and b* values close to zero. Negative values, in particular for b*, are also acceptable. They give the glazing either a blue hue for negative values of b*, or a green hue for negative values of a*. Conversely, it is endeavored to avoid positive values of a*, which would result in purple and brownish hues.
The neutrality of the glazing depends on the choice of the combinations of layers. The layers forming the assemblies in question operate to form an interference system which makes it possible to remove the major part of the undesired wavelengths. The removal of these colors follows a mechanism that is well known in this field. The difficulty is in combining, at the same time, the calorimetric requirements with those linked to the "base" conditions: high light transmission and very low emissivity.
Furthermore, although the principles governing the optical properties of the materials forming the layers are well known, an additional difficulty comes from the techniques for producing this glazing. The deposition conditions, and especially the deposition rate, are dependent on the nature of the materials in question. For an economically acceptable industrial production, the rate must be sufficient. It depends on multiple factors which guarantee the stability of operation over time and over the entire surface of the sheet, and the absence of defects in the layer.


The present disclosure provides systems and methods for enhancing audience measurement data. Offline and online audience measurement data may be compared and correlated to improve the quality of each data and source set. Positive correlations between the offline and online data sets related to a particular event may indicate demographic traits that are likely true, such that outliers may be removed from the set or considered at a reduced weight. Negative correlations may indicate that demographic information within a source set, such as the online measurement data, may be false or suspect.

Traditional broadcast audience measurement systems utilize single-source data panels consisting of individuals or households recording media exposure over time. Because these individuals are typically paid for participation, measurement data tends to be of high quality, but for a limited population size. Accordingly, statistical confidence in applying the measurement data to a large population may be low. Conversely, online audience measurement systems may obtain measurement data from a very large population, but this data may be of questionable quality, as users may provide false or incomplete demographic data for various reasons.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Systems and methods for enhancing audience measurement data


A plasma display device for keeping cooling efficiency of the device uniform between both horizontal and vertical positions. The plasma display device, which has a plasma display panel and a circuit unit for supplying a driving signal to the panel, includes a cavity-type heat dissipator having a plate which is located near a portion of the circuit unit to dissipate heat generated at the circuit unit, and wings which are affixed to the plate and extend from the edges of the plate inward.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a plasma display device, and more particularly, to a plasma display device which maintains cooling efficiency of the device displaying in one position uniform with the cooling efficiency in another position when the plasma display device is rotated from the first position to the other.
2. Description of Related Art
Various flat display devices have been developed as substitutes for cathode ray tube (CRT) display devices. The flat display devices developed include, for example, liquid crystal display (LCD) devices, electroluminescence display (ELD) devices, field emission display (FED) devices, and plasma display panels (PDPs) which may also be referred to as plasma display devices.
The PDP displays an image using visible rays emitted when gas discharge is generated in a panel. A plurality of electrodes are formed on the panel of the PDP, and driving circuits for supplying driving signals to the electrodes are formed on printed circuit boards provided on a rear surface of the PDP.
A data driving unit, a scan driving unit, a sustain driving unit, a power supply unit, and a control circuit unit are typically separately formed on several printed circuit boards according to function or location.
Generally, the aforementioned driving units are separately formed on several printed circuit boards. The scan driving unit and the sustain driving unit may be formed on the same board. That is, the printed circuit boards include driving unit boards on which the data driving unit, the scan driving unit, and the sustain driving unit are formed, a board on which a power supply unit for supplying a voltage for generating driving signals is formed, and a board on which a control circuit unit for controlling the driving units and the power supply unit and processing external data is formed.
On the boards where the driving units are formed, at least one intelligent power module (IPM) separate from the power supply unit is mounted. The IPM converts a DC voltage supplied from the power supply unit into a signal voltage by controlling the driving unit. That is, the IPM converts the DC voltage into a voltage having a different level or inverts the polarity of the DC voltage to generate a signal voltage required for driving the PDP.
During operation, the IPM generates a large amount of heat in the PDP. This is because potentials of driving waveforms for driving the PDP are much higher and the number of the applied waveforms is much greater than those of the other display devices. When a subfield is divided into an address period, a reset period, and a sustain period, reset discharge, address discharge, and sustain discharge are generated during each period. The sustain discharge is generated up to a maximum of 128 times during one subfield and a magnitude of the signal voltage for generating each one discharge is several tens of volts to several hundreds of volts. The address discharge is generated by applying address signals having different polarities to two electrodes, and a difference between address signal voltages applied to the two electrodes reaches several hundreds of volts. Because such high voltage driving signals are applied several tens of times in one second, the IPM for generating the driving signals is designed to endure such a load.
When heating elements, or heat generating elements, such as the IPM can not efficiently dissipate the heat they generate, the heating elements deteriorate, are damaged, or the signals are distorted and thus the PDP can not operate normally. Accordingly, to dissipate the heat generated at the heating elements, a cooling means such as a heat sink is attached to one side of the IPM.
FIGS. 1A and 1B illustrate a conventional heat dissipator or heat dissipating element used in a conventional PDP 1. FIG. 1A illustrates arrangement of a conventional heat dissipator 2 and a corresponding air flow. FIG. 1B illustrates the heat dissipator 2 and a corresponding air flow when the PDP 1 is rotated by 90 degree.
The conventional PDP 1 is said to be mounted in a horizontal position when a horizontal side is longer than its vertical side. Conversely, the PDP is said to be mounted in a vertical position when the vertical side of the PDP is longer than its horizontal side. FIG. 1A schematically illustrates the arrangement of the heat dissipator 2 of the PDP 1 and does not illustrate other structures of the PDP 1. The heat dissipator 2 includes wings 2a and plate 2b. When the PDP 1 is mounted as shown in FIG. 1A, the heat dissipator 2 mounted in a heating portion, such as the IPM, is such that the wings 2a extend in a vertical direction. Air flows between the wings 2a of the heat dissipator 2 to cool the heat dissipator 2. This structure can increase the cooling efficiency using air convection, and is made in consideration of the convective circulation that occurs due to air density difference. In contrast, when the wings 2a extend in the horizontal direction, the cooling efficiency is remarkably reduced.
As shown in FIG. 1B, when the wings 2a of the heat dissipator 2 extend perpendicular to the air flow direction, all but the lowest wing have very low contact ratios with the flowing air and thus it is difficult to efficiently dissipate the heat.
PDP products that can be used in both horizontal and vertical positions, shown respectively in FIGS. 1A and 1B, have recently come into the market. Accordingly, a conventional PDP, which is normally used in the horizontal position, can also be used in the vertical position by rotating the PDP by 90 degree. A PDP which can display in both the horizontal and the vertical positions is known as a PDP having a pivot function.
However, the PDPs having the pivot function also have the cooling problem described with reference to FIGS. 1A and 1B. That is, because the heat dissipator mounted on the printed circuit board is fixed to the heating portion and the wings are fixed in one direction, when the PDP is rotated using the pivot function, the wings of the fixed heat dissipator extend perpendicular to the air convection direction. Therefore, when the conventional PDP 1 uses the pivot function, the cooling efficiency is remarkably reduced in one of the vertical or horizontal positions and thus the elements frequently malfunction or are damaged.


An information processing apparatus includes a managing unit that manages a scale calculated based on descriptions of an operation performed on a predetermined item and a series to which the item belongs in association with each other, a first extracting unit that extracts items belonging to the same series as top N series, obtained by sorting the scales, from among a plurality of items, a taste managing unit that manages taste of a user, a second extracting unit that calculates the degree of similarity between the taste managed by the taste managing unit and each item to extract items with higher degrees of similarity, and a recommending unit that recommends a predetermined number of items among the items extracted by the first extracting unit and the items extracted by the second extracting unit to the user.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and method for information processing, a program, and a recording medium, and in particular, relates to an information processing apparatus and method capable of more appropriately performing a process for recommendation of a predetermined item, a program, and a recording medium.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recommendation systems for recommending a predetermined item, e.g., a television (TV) broadcast program are becoming widespread. The recommendation systems are broadly divided into two types, "recommendation based on user taste" and "recommendation based on short-term user interest or habit" (refer to, for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication Nos. 2007-043471, 2007-323398, and 2004-192460).
In a related-art recommendation system based on user taste, taste of a user is learned on the basis of metadata added to an item which the user takes some kind of action on, e.g., the user viewed or bought. An item to be recommended is determined by processing, e.g., matching on the basis of the learned taste and pieces of metadata (hereinafter, "metadata blocks") added to respective items as targets to be recommended (hereinafter, "recommendation targets").
In a related-art recommendation system based on short-term user interest or habit, a next program of a serialized drama or that of a series is recommended on the basis of user habit.
In the recommendation system based on user taste, an item that matches user taste can be recommended to some extent. In some cases, however, a next program of a serialized drama or a series which the user views is not recommended properly. One of factors is that metadata added to an item provides a small amount of information, processing such as matching is performed on the basis of such small amounts of information, and a wrong item is thus selected. In some cases, when metadata added to an item which should be recommended to a user provides a small amount of information, another item provided with metadata providing a large amount of information is selected and recommended.
In the recommendation system based on short-term user interest or habit, information relating to short-term interest or habit of a user includes, for example, information indicating that the user records a program which is broadcasted from 8.00 p.m. on Monday every week. In this case, programs broadcasted from 8:00 p.m. on Monday can be recommended. If the programs broadcasted in this time zone include a next program of a serialized drama or a series, the program can be properly recommended.
However, if the serialized drama broadcasted in this time zone ends and the coming serialized drama does not match the user taste, the coming drama is recommended to the user. Furthermore, assuming that recommendation is performed using information, indicating a time zone or a broadcast station, associated with a program programmed to be recorded as a program which the user happened to be interested in, namely, a program programmed to be recorded on the basis of short-term interest, if a time zone or broadcast station associated with a program which the user is not interested in matches that of the programmed program, wrong recommendation is performed. In the above-described recommendation based on short-term interest or habit, a program that matches user taste is not necessarily recommended.

Method and apparatus for image processing, program, and recording medium


A catalyst for exhaust gas purification having superior exhaust gas purification performance is provided. Disclosed is a catalyst containing, as a catalyst support, a composite phosphate containing yttrium and phosphorus and having a composition ratio of yttrium to phosphorus (Y/P) of greater than 1 as a molar ratio.

Exhaust gas discharged from an internal combustion engine of an automobile or the like contains harmful components such as hydrocarbons (HC), carbon monoxide (CO) and nitrogen oxides (NOx), and therefore, it is necessary to purify these components. That is, hydrocarbons (HC) and carbon monoxide (CO) are purified by oxidizing the gases using catalysts, and nitrogen oxides (NOx) needs to be purified through reduction using catalysts.
Three-way catalysts have been traditionally used as catalysts for exhaust gas purification of this kind.
Regarding such three-way catalysts, there are catalysts obtained by arbitrarily combining a noble metal such as Pt, Pd or Rh with alumina, ceria, zirconia or a composite oxide thereof, and applying the combination on a honeycomb carrier formed of a ceramic or a metal. For example, catalysts for exhaust gas purification containing composite oxides having an apatite structure have been proposed (see, for example, Patent Documents 1 and 2).
Furthermore, there have also been proposed catalysts for exhaust gas purification, formed from an AlPO4 compound and at least one noble metal component selected from the group consisting of Pt, Pd and Rh supported on the AlPO4 compound (see, for example, Patent Documents 1, 3 and 4).