A projector has an image generating device for generating an image, and a housing, having the image generating device disposed therein and having an opening defined therein for emitting therethrough projection light representing the image from the image generating device. A projection mirror is mounted on an outer surface of the housing for reflecting the projection light to project the image onto a projection surface. An optical system is disposed in the opening for applying the projection light to the projection mirror. The projector also has a foreign matter detector for detecting foreign matter which enters a light path of the projection light between the optical system and the projection mirror.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a projector having a projection mirror for reflecting projection image light generated by an image generating device to project an enlarged image onto a projection surface such as an external screen or the like, and more particularly to a projector which is designed for higher luminance and has a foreign matter detecting means.
2. Description of the Related Art
Projectors for projecting an enlarged view of image light generated by an image generating device onto a projection surface such as an external screen or the like are used in various applications. In recent years, efforts have been made to increase the luminance of images projected by projectors, and, as a result, more and more projectors project highly intensive light to form bright images. Accordingly, such projectors have projection lens that are heated to very high temperatures.
Recently, there has been disclosed a projector having a housing from which projection light is emitted through an opening defined in the housing, and a projection mirror for reflecting the projection light to project an image onto a projection surface.
As shown in FIG. 1 of a schematic side elevational view, projector 50 has housing 51 with opening 52 defined therein. Opening lens 53 for projecting projection light is disposed in opening 52. Housing 51 supports thereon projection mirror 54 disposed in confronting relation to opening lens 53. When projector 50 is in use, projection image light 55 generated by an image generating device is emitted through opening lens 53 from opening 52, and reflected by projection mirror 54 to project an enlarged image onto an external screen (not shown). A light source, the image generating device, and an optical system of projector 50 are omitted from illustration. Projection mirror 54 may also be used as a lid for opening 52, and may be turned down to close opening 52 when projector 50 is not in use.
Japanese laid-open patent publication No. 11-119343 discloses a projection-mirror-type projector as shown in FIGS. 2A and 2B of the accompanying drawings. The disclosed projector comprises light source 64, liquid crystal display device 65, projection mirror 63 for projecting projection light modulated by an image which is displayed by liquid crystal display device 65 onto an external screen or the like, a pair of reflection mirrors 66, 67 for reflecting the projection light from liquid crystal display device 65 toward projection mirror 63, and housing 61 which accommodates therein the projection optical system including light source 64, liquid crystal display device 65, and reflection mirrors 63, 66, 67.
Housing 61 has opening 62 provided therein between liquid crystal display device 65 in housing 61 and projection mirror 63, for emitting the projection light from liquid crystal display device 65 toward projection mirror 63. Projection mirror 63 is angularly movably mounted on housing 61 for selectively opening or closing opening 62. Projection mirror 63 serves as part of the projection optical system when it opens opening 62, and serves as a lid for opening 62 when it closes opening 62.
As described above, with the projector having the projection mirror, the opening lens and the reflection mirrors which are heated to a relatively high temperature are exposed out of the housing. Furthermore, when foreign matter such as a user's finger, an object in the room, or dust particles enters the opening, a sharp temperature rise occurs because the projection light directed toward the projection mirror is blocked by the foreign matter. Since such a sharp temperature rise may possibly cause a burn on the user or a fire in worst cases, some countermeasures need to be combined with the projector.
For example, in case a detecting circuit with a sensor assembly for simply detecting foreign matter that enters the opening is added, huge quantities of sensors are needed. In case the sensor assembly generally detects foreign matter in a wide range of space, there needs a plurality of sensors. Furthermore, as the size of foreign matter to be detected is smaller, the sensor assembly requires an increased number of sensors, and hence the detecting circuit becomes larger in circuit scale.
If the projection-mirror-type projector disclosed in Japanese laid-open patent publication No. 11-119343 is designed for higher luminance, then the intensity of the projection light in the vicinity of the reflection mirrors is increased, resulting in a higher temperature at those reflection mirrors. However, there is nothing disclosed in Japanese laid-open patent publication No. 11-119343 about countermeasures against foreign matter which may possibly find its way into the path of the projection light.

Projector with foreign matter detecting means


A video data output device includes a memory unit which stores video data conforming with a first display mode, and a memory control unit which controls a write operation on the memory unit so that video data is written therein in the first display mode and controls a read operation thereon so that the video data is read at a timing based on the first display mode or a second display mode. Further, the video data output device includes a converter unit which converts the video data read from the memory unit at the timing based on the second display mode into video data conforming with the second display mode.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to information processing devices and methods, and more particularly to an information processing device and method capable of displaying an image based on video data in different display formations such as a monitor display formation such as a RGB display formation and a television display formation such as an NTSC formation.
Recently, there has been a demand to display images formed by the RGB display formation on a television on which images are displayed in a predetermined television display formation such as the NTSC formation. The above demand has increased due to reduction in the cost of personal computers and development of various multimedia products. The personal computers use a RGB monitor on which images can be displayed in the RGB display formation. A television display formation such as the NTSC display formation, which is widely used, is capable of forming a large picture plane.
As is well known, the RGB display formation and the NTSC formation have different synchronizing signals and different numbers of scanning lines. Hence, if an image formed by the RGB video signal is displayed on an NTSC-formation display, it is necessary to convert the RGB video signal into a signal which conforms with the NTSC display formation.
2. Description of the Related Art
Generally, an information processing device has a plurality of picture-plane modes. Examples of such picture-plane modes are a 320.times.200 resolution mode, 640.times.400 resolution mode, and 640.times.480 resolution mode. These resolution modes use different synchronizing signals of, for example, 15 kHz, 24 kHz and 31 kHz. When one of the resolution modes is selected, the corresponding synchronizing signal is selected. A display unit detects the selected synchronizing signal with which video data is transferred, and alters the number of horizontal scanning lines. The RGB display formation can handle various display modes at the display unit side and is increasingly used.
Generally, a scan converter is used to convert video data in conformity with the RGB display formation into video data in conformity with the NTSC display formation. It will be noted that the RGB display formation can have an arbitrary number of horizontal scanning lines, while the NTSC display formation has only a predetermined single number of horizontal scanning lines. The scan converter is equipped with video memories designed to facilitate outputting image data in the NTSC display formation. More particularly, the video memory built into the scan converter has video memories which amount to one picture plane and each of such video memories has 200 horizontal lines. The video data output in the RGB display formation is subjected to a predetermined image process, and is written into other video memories in conformity with the NTSC display formation. When video data amounting to one picture plane is completely written into the video memories for the NTSC display formation, the video data stored therein is read in synchronism with the NTSC synchronizing signal.
As described above, the scan converter needs video memories suitable for the RGB display formation and other video memories suitable for the NTSC display formation. Hence, the conventional scan converter has a large circuit scale.
With the above in mind, an improvement has been proposed in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 6-118925, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated by reference. This application discloses a device which converts video data formed in conformity with the RGB display formation into video data formed in conformity with a television display formation such as the NTSC formation.
More particularly, an instruction to output video data from a video RAM (VRAM) is given to the VRAM in accordance with a cycle defined by the ratio of horizontal scanning lines between the video data and a television signal. The video data thus read from the VRAM is cyclically latched in a plurality of buffers so that video data corresponding to one line is stored on one of the buffers. The video data cyclically latched in the buffers is subjected to an interpolation process in synchronism with the horizontal synchronizing signal of the television signal. In this way, the television signal having interpolated signal components is finally generated.
However, the device disclosed in the above application cannot function for outputting the RGB video data although the device can output the television signal obtained by performing the converting operation on the RGB video data.

Video processor which outputs a selected RGB or NTSC video display signal from a video memory that stores RGB data


Provided is an image processing device including a data conversion processing unit that receives an input of an RGBW array image and generates an RGB array image as an output image. The data conversion processing unit includes a pixel interpolation unit that calculates interpolated pixel values corresponding to an array of the RGB array image by performing a pixel interpolation process on the RGBW array image, a purple fringe detection unit that detects whether each pixel is a purple fringe pixel by analyzing the RGBW array image, a corrected value calculation unit that calculates corrected pixel values by correcting pixel values of the purple fringe pixels, and a blend processing unit that calculates constituent pixel values RGB of the output image by performing a blend process of blending the interpolated pixel values calculated by the pixel interpolation unit with the corrected pixel values calculated by the corrected value calculation unit.

The present disclosure relates to an image processing device, an image processing method, and a program, and more particularly, to an image processing device, an image processing method, and a program capable of performing a correction process on a false color or the like produced in an image photographed by a camera.
In an image photographed by a camera, a problem of aberration of a photographing lens occurs in some cases. Specifically, for example, chromatic aberration is one aberration caused due to the influence of lens aberration. Chromatic aberration occurs when a refractive index of light in a photographing lens of a camera differs depending on a wavelength, and causes a false color on an imaging surface.
As representative examples of the chromatic aberration, for example, axial chromatic aberration in which color blur occurs because a focal position on an optical axis differs depending on a wavelength and magnification chromatic aberration in which color deviation occurs because an image high-power differs due to a wavelength are known.
A false color of purple produced in the periphery of a high-contrast edge in which there is an overexposed pixel of which luminance reaches a saturated value is generally called purple fringe. This purple fringe is caused due to axial chromatic aberration or magnification chromatic aberration, and thus results in deterioration in image quality.
The color of the purple fringe is a color closer to purple in many cases. In practice, however, a color other than purple is produced in some cases due to lenses, photographing conditions, or the like. Here, a false color produced in the periphery of an overexposed high-contrast edge is referred to as purple fringe, irrespective of a color of the false color.
An occurrence cause and an occurrence region of the purple fringe will be described with reference to FIGS. 1(a) and 1(b).
FIG. 1(a) is a graph in which the horizontal axis represents a pixel position and the vertical axis represents a pixel value.
FIG. 1(b) is a schematic diagram illustrating a photographed image.
A Bayer array frequently used as a pixel array of an image sensor of a general camera includes pixels with three colors of red (R), green (G), and blue (B).
In FIG. 1(a), a region of pixel positions 0 to X1 is a so-called overexposed region in which the pixel value is the maximum. The pixel position X1 corresponds to an edge position at which the luminance value is sharply changed. A region of the pixel position X1 to a position subsequent to the pixel position X1 is a region in which the original pixel value is set to nearly 0.
Thus, a false color is produced since there is a difference between the pixel values of RGB due to chromatic aberration in the vicinity of the overexposed region in the periphery of the edge in which a pixel value is sharply changed from the overexposed region with the maximum pixel value.
In order to reduce the chromatic aberration, it is ideal to use a lens made of special material glass such as fluorite in which chromatic aberration hardly occurs. However, there is a disadvantage that a manufacturing cost is high.
Methods of reducing a false color produced due to such chromatic aberration by image processing are disclosed in, for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2009-124598 and Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2006-14261.
In processes disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2009-124598 and Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2006-14261, however, a false color is detected and corrected using an RGB image after a de-mosaic process of setting all pixel values of RGB in respective pixels is performed through signal processing such as pixel value interpolation on a mosaic image in which one pixel value of RGB is set in each pixel output from an image sensor.
Accordingly, the processes disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2009-124598 and Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2006-14261 may not be applied as processes on a mosaic image immediately output from the image sensor, that is, a mosaic image in which one pixel value of RGB is set in each pixel.
Further, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2010-136225 discloses a process of removing a false color through image processing on a mosaic image before a de-mosaic process.
However, the disclosed process is merely a process performed on a Bayer-array image with a pixel array shown in FIG. 2(a) frequently used in cameras according to the related art.
On the other hand, in recent years, a problem has arisen in that the pixel density of image sensor has increased, the amount of incident light per pixel has decreased, and thus relative noise has increased. As a method of resolving this problem, an image sensor that has an RGBW array including all-wavelength transmission type white (W) pixels in addition to RGB colors has been suggested.
Specifically, an image sensor that has an RGBW array including white (W) pixels is shown in FIG. 2(b). A mosaic image which is an image photographed by an image sensor having the RGBW array and output from the image sensor is configured as a mosaic image in which only a pixel value of one color of RGBW is set in each pixel according to the pixel array shown in FIG. 2(b).
A technology for reducing purple fringe in a mosaic image photographed by an image sensor that has such an RGBW array has not been disclosed in the related art. Further, there is a problem that correction processes on an RGB array previously disclosed in the related art may not be directly applied.

Image processing device, image processing method, and program to perform correction processing on a false color


A binding machine for spirally binding a sheaf of papers into a book uses an adjustable speed drive to rotate a flexible plastic spiral element into respective holes in the book. The book has a plurality of holes in a row adjacent one edge of the book to receive the leading edge of the spiral bonding elements. A cylindrically shaped mandrel is spaced apart from a glidable block. The plastic pre-formed spiral binding element is fed onto the mandrel from the distal end thereof, with the leading edge of the binding element facing and spaced apart from the book. A spring is mounted on the slidable block for engaging and adjustably press the spiral binding element on the mandrel so that the upper portion of the binding element is spaced from the top of the mandrel.

While most of the prior art in the field of spiral binding apparatus relates to the use of metallic wire spirals, two patents specifically relate to the use of plastic spirals. The patent of Penner (U.S. Pat. No. 2,638,609) describes a machine for binding books with special features for aligning the perforations of a sheaf of papers to be bound and to confine the travel of the plastic spiral binding material. The patent of Pfaffle (U.S. Pat. No. 4,249,278) describes a machine for spiral binding which feeds plastic thread from a bulk spool, softens the thread, winds it on a mandrel to form a spiral, cools it to harden and then feeds the rigid spiral into a perforated sheet group.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,378,822 of Morris describes a spiral binding machine with a drive component. However, the mandrel of Morris '822 is fixed, not laterally adjustable as in the present invention, and the mandrel of Morris '822 has a closed end, which requires pre-feeding of the spiral thereon.

Semi-automatic plastic spiral binding machine


Embodiments of the present invention are directed to a method of processing document image data for printing. The method comprises rasterizing all objects in the document image data into a bitmap format including designating black portions of the objects as composite black pixels. Color objects are identified in the document image data that contain color or are adjacent to color. All composite black pixel designations in the identified color objects are maintained as composite black pixel designations without substitution to true black pixel designations. Print data is generated in which the composite black pixel designations will be half-tone printed on a print medium as a portion of composite black ink and a portion of true black ink.

Liquid ink printers, such as inkjet printers, place many small dots or drops of ink into very close proximity to each other on a print medium, such as plain paper, photo paper, etc. With little time to dry, different colored inks often bleed into each other on paper. Bleeding results from many factors including differing properties of different types of ink, such as pigment-based inks as compared to dye-based inks, as well as the type of media (such as photo paper or plain paper) onto which the ink is printed. Similarly, inks are carried in different vehicle formulations, such as non-reactive formulations and reactive formulations, which may include or omit salts, acids, or other additives. These differing properties affect many aspects of the appearance of each ink on the paper, such as edge quality, tone, etc. In one example, black inks and/or color inks are modified to be reactive, thereby causing a chemical reaction with each other as part of a bleed-reduction mechanism at a black-color interface.
Black-color bleeding results in color shift, ragged edges, as well as degradation of other print quality parameters. Maintaining optimal print quality (e.g. edge crispness, uniform tone, etc) for each color ink and for black inks is generally accomplished in different ways so that achieving optimal print quality for black text/objects may conflict with achieving optimal print quality for color text/objects. This conflict caused by different solutions for controlling ink/paper behavior has led to other hardware adaptations, such as maintaining separate sets of nozzles in printheads, one set for color and another set for black. In other words, one or more printheads have one orifice plate of nozzles for color inks and another separate orifice plate of nozzles for black inks. While this arrangement prevents cross-contamination of color and black inks at the nozzles, it also increases the complexity, size and cost of the printhead.
For these reasons, and many others, printers still face the challenge of placing color and black inks together on print media in a way that achieves optimal print quality for both the color ink and the black ink.

Method for black pixel designation in document image data

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.


The present invention concerns a detergent additive for lubricating oil compositions comprising at least two of low, medium, and high TBN detergents. Preferably the detergent is a calcium salicylate. The present invention also concerns lubricating oil compositions comprising such detergents, and at least one of Group II base stock, Group III base stock, or wax isomerate base stock.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to lubricating oil compositions suitable for use in internal combustion engines.
2. Background
Contemporary lubricants such as engine oils use mixtures of additives such as dispersants, detergents, inhibitors, viscosity index improvers and the like to provide engine cleanliness and durability under a wide range of performance conditions of temperature, pressure, and lubricant service life.
Lubricating oil compositions use a variety of detergents to minimize varnish, ring zone deposits, and rust by sobulizing oil insoluble particles. Overbased detergents are used to help neutralize acids that accumulate in lubricating oil during use.
A typical detergent is an anionic material that contains a long chain oleophillic portion of the molecule and a smaller anionic or oleophobic portion of the molecule. The anionic portion of the detergent is typically derived from an organic acid such as a sulfur acid, carboxylic acid, phosphorous acid, phenol, or mixtures thereof. The counter ion is typically an alkaline earth or alkali metal. Salts that contain a substantially stochiometric amount of the metal are described as neutral salts and have a total base number (TBN; measured by ASTM D2896, TBN is defined as mg KOH/g) of from about 0 to 80. Many compositions are overbased, containing large amounts of a metal base that is achieved by reacting an excess of a metal compound (a metal hydroxide or oxide, for example) with an acidic gas (such as carbon dioxide). The resulting overbased detergent is an overbased detergent that will typically have a TBN of 150 or higher, often 250 to 450 or more.
Typical detergents include the alkali or alkaline earth metal salts of sulfates, phenates, carboxylates, phosphates, and salicylates.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,458,790 discloses preparation and use of alkaline earth metal hydrocarbyl salicylate detergents with a TBN of 300 or more. Japanese Patent Application 10053784-A describes a lubricating oil composition for diesel engines which contains base oil, 0.04-0.2 weight percent calcium as calcium salicylate with a basicity of 100 mg KOH/g or higher, 0.01-0.1 weight percent calcium salicylate or calcium phenate with a basicity of less than 100 mg KOH/g, and at least 0.02 weight percent nitrogen as polyalkenyl succinimide.
With engines increasingly demanding higher performance, there is a need for detergents that provide increased friction reduction, detergent film maintenance, and engine cleanliness.

Mixed TBN detergents and lubricating oil compositions containing such detergents

ExxonMobil Research and Engineering Company


The disclosure is related to printing an image as a multi-layered textured image on a substrate. The printing system prints one or more layers of a texture of the image as a base layer on the substrate and the image above the base layer. The base layer includes one or more layers of the texture. The printing system prints the texture using the ink from the print heads of the printing system. The process of printing a multi-layered textured image can include printing one or more layers of texture as a base layer on the substrate, printing one or more layers of white ink above the base layer, and printing one or more layers of the image above the white layers. The printing system can also insert one or more blank layers between different types of layers, e.g., texture layers, white layers and image layers.

Certain types of printing systems are adapted for printing images on large-scale print media, such as for museum displays, billboards, sails, bus boards, and banners. Some of these systems use so-called drop on demand ink jet printing. In these systems, a piezoelectric vibrator applies pressure to an ink reservoir of the print head to force the ink out through the nozzle orifices positioned on the underside of the print heads. A set of print heads are typically arranged in a row along a single axis within a print head carriage. As the carriage scans back and forth along the direction of the print head axis, the print heads deposit ink across the width of the substrate. A particular image is created by controlling the order at which ink is ejected from the various nozzle orifices.
Some of these systems use inks with different colors to create the desired image. For instance, black, yellow, cyan, and magenta colored inks are commonly employed alone or in combination to generate the image. Thus, combinations of these four colors are used to create various other colors. Some of these printers are also used for textured printing, that is, printing images having a texture. For example, images are printed on surfaces that are rough, grainy or have a particular pattern. The current printers print textured images using techniques such as 3D Inkjet printing with or without support material, small format multiple pass texture printing, vacuum forming after printing, texturing by casting/molding and then inkjet printing. These techniques are either slow, complicated—involves significant amount of labor, resources, etc., or expensive.
Further, some of these techniques use white ink or fillers to form a texture layer. Some of them form the texture using solid or composite color materials, colored binder in powder. Some of them form the texture after screen printing or inkjet printing, or print onto molded/cast texture. However, these do not provide a method for printing base relief images.


The present invention has an object to provide a technology for monitoring the quality of a WDM signal light, capable of quickly and accurately judging an occurrence of quality deterioration of signal light and a deterioration factor thereof. To this end, according to a quality monitoring apparatus of WDM signal light of the present invention, a part of the WDM signal light being propagated through an optical transmission path is branched as a monitor light, a signal light of one wavelength contained in the monitor light is selected as a channel to be measured. Then, the frequency of occurrences of bit error for the channel to be measured is repeatedly measured for a plurality of times, and whether or not the signal quality is deteriorated is judged, together with the deterioration factor based on the measurement results, and a control signal light for adjusting the signal light power according to the judgment result is transmitted to the optical transmission path, to achieve the improvement of a characteristic of the WDM signal light.

(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to technology for monitoring the quality of wavelength division multiplexed signal light transmitted in optical communications, and more particularly, relates to a method and apparatus for monitoring deterioration of signal quality based on a state of occurrence of bit error and an optical transmission system using the same.
(2) Related Art
Heretofore, in a long distance optical transmission system, an optical signal has been converted into an electrical signal to be transmitted using regenerative repeaters which perform reshaping, retiming, and regenerating. At the present time, however, with the development of optical devices including optical amplifiers and the development of transmission technology including the wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) optical transmission system, it is possible to transmit optical signals of large capacity over a distance of several thousand kilometers without converting them into electrical signals. In addition, in next generation optical transmission networks, it is expected that, by introducing not only optical amplification repeater nodes but also optical add/drop multiplexer (OADM) nodes, optical cross-connect (OXC) nodes, hub (HUB) nodes and the like, photonic networking of mesh topology will be performed.
FIG. 13 is a diagram showing an example of configuration of a conventional optical transmission system using electrical regenerative repeaters. In the optical transmission system of FIG. 13, a plurality of optical transmission/reception sections 100 are connected with each other by an optical transmission path 101 on which regenerative repeaters 102 are arranged at required intervals. The most direct technique for monitoring signal quality in such a conventional optical transmission system is a method of monitoring a bit error rate (BER) at an electrical stage when performing the electrical regenerative repeating in each regenerative repeater 102. Specifically, in SONET/SDH system optical transmission networks currently in practical use, it is possible to estimate the bit error rate utilizing an error detection bit (i.e., B1, B2 byte) in the overhead of transmission data and therefore, it is possible to obtain an amount of deterioration of signal quality at each link connecting optical transmission/reception sections 100. In such a network, if the signal quality is significantly deteriorated, a measure to switch the path or the like is adopted. If the deterioration is in an allowable range, a simple measure to adjust the signal light power or the like is adopted. Further, in a system adopting error correction technology, it is also possible to measure the frequency of error corrections to estimate the bit error rate. Further, a method of estimating the Q-value from a signal light waveform is also known.
Other than the above methods requiring the measurement of the bit error rate, for example, as shown in FIG. 14, there is a method in which an optical branching device 106 is provided on an optical transmission path 105 between an optical transmission section 103 and an optical reception section 104, the signal quality is monitored by extracting a part of WDM optical signal to measure the optical spectrum of the extracted optical signal by an optical spectrum analyzer 107. With this method, the signal quality is estimated based on the optical power level of the optical signal at each wavelength.
Further, as described above, at the present, the long distance transmission is possible without converting an optical signal into an electrical signal. Examples of configuration of such an optical transmission system are shown in (a) to (c) of FIG. 15.
The system of (a) of FIG. 15 is a long distance transmission system using only optical amplification repeater nodes N1 as a plurality of repeater nodes existing on an optical transmission path 202 connecting an optical transmission section 200 and an optical reception section 201. A signal light is transmitted just as in a state of light from the optical transmission section 200 to the optical reception section 201. Each of the optical amplification repeater nodes N1 usually has an optical amplification function and a wavelength dispersion compensation function. Further, the system of (b) of FIG. 15 adopts a compensation node N2 in addition to the above optical amplification repeater nodes N1. If the WDM signal light is transmitted just as in the state of light over a long distance, depending on the accumulation of gain deviation in the optical amplifiers or wavelength dispersion, there occurs a channel in which a transmission characteristic required in the system cannot be satisfied. To suppress the occurrence of such a channel to enable the long distance transmission, as shown in (b) of FIG. 15, it becomes necessary to adopt the compensation node N2 having not only the optical amplification function and the dispersion compensation function, but also a gain equalization function, a dispersion slope compensation function or the like, corresponding to required compensation intervals. Further, as shown in (c) of FIG. 15, by using a plurality of compensation nodes N2, it becomes possible to realize an ultra-long distance optical transmission system.
Further, in the next generation optical transmission system as shown in FIG. 16 for example, in addition to the optical amplification repeater nodes N1 and compensation nodes N2, hub nodes N3 each having an optical path switching function are adopted to realize an optical network different from the conventional point-to-point transmission.
When the monitoring of signal quality is introduced to a system in which a WDM signal is transmitted for a long distance just as in the state of light as shown in FIG. 15 or FIG. 16, it is possible to use, for example, an optical branching device to extract a part of the WDM signal light at each node and utilize an optical spectrum analyzer to monitor the signal quality as shown in the above-mentioned FIG. 14, or to convert the extracted WDM signal light into an electrical signal, and then measure the bit error rate to monitor the signal quality (refer to Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 8-321805 and Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 2000-31900).
However, there are problems in the above conventional technology for monitoring the signal quality: (a) an increase of the time required for improvement of the signal quality and the complication of the process required for maintenance of the signal quality; and (b) the reduction in the measurement accuracy of the signal quality.
First, the above problem (a) will be described specifically. In general, as one method for setting a wavelength path (optical path) in a network, there is a method of determining, at the time of installing the network, the types of wavelength paths which can be set for combinations of a certain transmission node and a certain reception node, and when a request for setting a wavelength path is issued at the in-service time, selecting to use a wavelength path not being used among the wavelength paths determined at the time of installation. Another method is for actually transmitting a light of candidate wavelength in a candidate route when a request for setting a wavelength path is issued at the in-service time, and after confirming that the sufficient signal quality is ensured, transmitting signal light carrying actual data. The latter method has an advantage of enabling the construction of a more flexible network.
However, in a system using the latter method, if the wavelength spacing is narrowed or the signal light wavelength bandwidth is extended by increasing the wavelengths, there is a possibility that the quality of transmitted signal light is deteriorated, due to a nonlinear effect which never occurred in previous operation time, such as, cross-phase modulation (XPM), intra-channel four-wave mixing (IFWM), stimulated Raman scattering (SRS) or the like. When the signal quality no longer satisfies a value required by the system, the working becomes necessary for improving characteristics, such as, specifying a deterioration factor of the signal quality and then specifying the transmission block requiring countermeasures. In practice, a system manager has to achieve the improvement of the characteristic while repeating a trial and error process. Such working by the system manager has a high possibility of requiring a long time until the suitable setting is performed, causing a major demerit to a communication common carrier using the system.
Further, for example, in the case where a deterioration rate of the signal quality has been increased caused by the deterioration with age of system components such as the optical transmission path, it is desirable to quickly improve the characteristic using a simple method other than the switching of the wavelength path, while the signal quality still satisfies an allowable value of the system. One of the most effective methods is to adjust the optical power of each wavelength in the WDM signal light. However, in a system adopting optical add/drop multiplexer nodes, optical cross-connect nodes, or hub nodes, there is a possibility that since the quality deterioration factor of the signal light of each wavelength cannot be specified, the location where the power of the signal light is to be adjusted and a reset value of the signal light power will become unclear. Such a circumstance is particularly remarkable in a long distance transmission system and a network configuration system. Accordingly, there is caused a problem in that a long time is required until the suitable setting is performed or the process required for maintaining the signal quality is complicated.
Next, the above problem (b) will be described specifically. The conventional technology for monitoring the signal quality as described in the above requires a long time for measuring the bit error rate when directly measuring it. However, a relatively high speed process becomes possible by adopting a method of measuring the optical spectrum to investigate a signal light power to noise light power ratio (OSNR) or a method of estimating the signal quality from information of the signal light power of each channel. In monitoring by such optical spectrum measurement, however, high accurate measurement of the noise light power becomes difficult in a high density WDM transmission system with signal light wavelength spacing of 50 GHz or less. Therefore, it is difficult to expect accurate estimation of bit error rate, resulting in a problem in terms of measurement accuracy.

Quality monitoring method and apparatus for wavelength division multiplexed optical signal and optical transmission system using the same


Coating compositions are disclosed. In some embodiments, the coating compositions are used to coat substrates such as packaging materials and the like for the storage of food and beverages. The coating compositions can be prepared by reacting an epoxidized vegetable oil and a hydroxyl functional material in the presence of an acid catalyst to form a hydroxyl functional oil polyol, mixing the hydroxyl functional oil polyol (with or without epoxidized polybutadiene) and a functional polyolefin copolymer to form a mixture, reacting the mixture with an ethylenically unsaturated monomer component in the presence of an initiator to form a graft copolymer, and crosslinking the graft copolymer with a crosslinker to form the coating composition, wherein the graft copolymer or the crosslinked graft copolymer is inverted into water.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to coating compositions, methods of coating substrates with the coating compositions, and substrates coated with the coating compositions.
2. Description of Related Art
Current art is primarily based on epoxy resin technology cured with amino resins and phenolics. Coating compositions formed from bisphenol A based epoxy resins and polyvinyl chloride have been used to coat packaging and containers for foods and beverages. However, there is a desire among some consumers and brand owners for coating compositions free, or substantially free, of bisphenol A and polyvinyl chloride for packaging and containers for food and beverages.
Commonly-owned patent publication WO 2010/100122 discloses a coating composition comprising a hydroxyl functional oil polyol prepared by a method comprising reacting an epoxidized vegetable oil with a hydroxyl functional material in the presence of an acid catalyst. Commonly-owned patent publication WO 2010/100121 discloses a coating composition comprising a hydroxyl functional oil polyol acrylic graft copolymer prepared by a method comprising reacting an epoxidized vegetable oil with a hydroxyl functional material in the presence of an acid catalyst to form a hydroxyl functional oil polyol, reacting the hydroxyl functional oil polyol with an ethylenically unsaturated monomer component in the presence of an initiator to form a hydroxyl functional oil polyol acrylic graft copolymer, and crosslinking the hydroxyl functional oil polyol acrylic graft copolymer with a crosslinker to form the coating composition. However, some oil polyol technology does not have intrinsically good flexibility and can benefit from further modification when the material is to be used as a packaging coating composition.
UK patent application GB 2218704 disclosed an aluminum or tinned-steel can for carbonated beverages protected by an aqueous coating formulation of a polyethylene-maleic acid copolymer. The aqueous solution as applied preferably contains from 5-20% by weight solids which is too low for beverage can-ends applications. Also, the coating applied to the substrate was heat-cured at 200° C. for 10 minutes which is too long and not applicable for can-ends applications.
There is a desire to produce packaging coating compositions that do not contain bisphenol A or polyvinyl chloride or are substantially free of the same. The coating compositions of the invention can be used, inter alia, as packaging coatings for food and beverage packaging and containers. They can be formulated to provide higher solids for application and improved toughness, corrosion resistance, flexibility, blush resistance and retort resistance compared to some commercial coating compositions.


A reinforcement rib structure for a support column of a rotary machine tool is disclosed. The reinforcement rib structure includes a first set of ribs which are inclined clockwise with respect to the vertical and a second set of ribs which are inclined counterclockwise with respect to the vertical such that the first and second ribs intersect each other. In the preferred embodiment, the ribs are formed on opposing sidewalls of the support column and form acute angles with respect to a vertical within the range of 30.degree..+-.20%. With this reinforcing rib structure, the rotary machine tool may be operated at higher speeds while maintaining machining accuracy due to the enhanced rigidity of the support column with minimal weight increase.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention pertains to a support for a rotary machine tool and more specifically to a support column including various reinforcement ribs extending at an angle to the vertical to maximize the twisting and bending rigidity of the column while minimizing its weight.
2. Discussion of the Prior Art
Rotary machine tools which are mounted for linear movement between an operating position and a non-operating position are known in the art. In such machine tool arrangements, the machine tool itself is secured to a support column which is movable between these positions. Such machine tools generally include a motor, such an electric motor, and a working element which projects outwardly from the column support in the direction of movement. Such working elements generally comprise a rotating spindle head to which various tools, such as cutters and grinders, are detachably secured. These working elements engage a workpiece when the column support is moved to its operating position.
In recent years, it has become desirable to increase the operating speed of such machines while still maintaining or even increasing the machining accuracy. In the prior art, it has been found that raising the rotating speed of the spindle head causes known support columns to vibrate thereby decreasing the machining accuracy. Therefore, in order to increase the machining process speed while maintaining the machining accuracy, it is necessary to increase the rigidity of the support column. If the rigidity of the support column is made too low, the column is apt to vibrate by the reaction force from the machine tool which reduces machining accuracy as discussed above. In addition, while increasing the rigidity of the column is a main concern, it is also important to minimize the increase in the weight of the column since the column is required to move during operation.
Prior art arrangements have increased the rigidity of such support columns in basically two manners. First, it has been proposed to increase the thickness of the column itself. Unfortunately, although this solves the rigidity problem, the weight of the support column is substantially increased which, as stated above, is undesirable. In another known solution, both horizontal and vertical reinforcement ribs have been formed on the inside surface of the support column. These ribs intersect each other at right angles to form a lattice work. With this proposed solution, it has been found that numerous closely spaced, intersecting ribs must be provided in order to solve the rigidity problem. This prior art rib design again has been found to disadvantageously increase the weight of the column.
Therefore, it can be seen that prior art solutions to the present problem have resulted in support column weight increases which result in an increase in the column inertia mass and results in a drop in the transfer speed of the column between its operating positions. This reduction and transfer speed reduces production efficiency of the machine tool. Therefore, there exists a need in the art for a reinforced support column for a machine tool which will improve the column rigidity while minimizing its weight increase to therefore increase machining accuracy while maintaining a high machining process speed.


A semiconductor memory device includes a memory cell array which has a plurality of memory cells, a plurality of first bit line pairs which transfer data among the memory cells, a plurality of second bit line pairs disposed corresponding to the plurality of first bit line pairs, a plurality of variable resistance elements disposed to connect the plurality of first bit line pairs to the plurality of second bit line pairs, a plurality of data line pairs disposed corresponding to the plurality of second bit line pairs, a plurality of input/output gates which transfer data between the plurality of second bit line pairs and the plurality of data line pairs, a plurality of sense amplifier circuits which amplify data transferred to the plurality of second bit line pairs, and a bit line isolation control circuit which controls resistance values of the plurality of variable resistance elements.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a semiconductor memory device, and more particularly to a semiconductor memory device which comprises a circuit for writing data to a memory cell.
2. Description of the Related Art
A writing operation of a conventional semiconductor memory device such as a dynamic random access memory (DRAM) will be described. FIG. 57 is a circuit diagram showing a part of a DRAM configuration. This DRAM comprises a memory cell array in which memory cells MC are arranged in a matrix form, a plurality of bit line pairs BL, /BL, a plurality of word lines, a precharge circuit 2, a sense amplifier circuit 4, a DQ gate 5, and data line pairs DQ, /DQ (only one memory cell is representatively shown).
The memory cell MC is configured by serially connecting a cell transistor CT and a capacitor CC. A reference voltage VPL is supplied to the memory cell MC. A precharge voltage VBL is supplied to the precharge circuit 2. The precharge circuit 2 supplies VBL to the bit line pair BL, /BL by activating a bit line precharge signal BLP. At this time, the VBL is equal to a high-level bit line voltage VBLH, (VBLH-VBLL) /2, a low-level bit line voltage VBLL, another other potential or the like.
The high-level bit line voltage VBLH and the low-level bit line voltage VBLL are supplied to the sense amplifier circuit 4. The sense amplifier circuit 4 amplifies data of the bit line pair BL, /BL by activating sense amplifier activation signals SEN and SEP. The DQ gate 5 transfers data between the data line pair DQ, /DQ and the bit line pair BL, /BL by activating a column selection signal CSL.
FIG. 58 is a timing chart of the DRAM shown in FIG. 57. It is to be noted that VDD represents a power supply voltage of a peripheral logic portion, VPP represents a word line driving voltage boosting the VDD, and VSS represents a ground voltage.
The bit line precharge signal BLP changes from a "H" level (e.g., VPP, VBLH, VDD) to a "L" level (VSS) to release the precharging of the bit line pair BL, /BL. When a word line WL changes from a "L" level (VSS) to a "H" level (VPP), data stored in the memory cell MC appear in the bit line pair BL, /BL.
After the passage of certain time, the signal SEN is changed from a "L" level (VSS) to a "H" level (e.g., VBLH, VDD), and the signal SEP is changed from a "H" level (e.g., VBLH) to a "L" level (VSS), whereby the data appearing in the bit line pair BL, /BL are amplified.
Accordingly, the bit line of the high-level side becomes VBLH, while the bit line of the low-level side becomes VBLL (VSS normally). Then, by changing the column selection signal CSL from a "L" level (VSS) to a "H" level (e.g., VDD, VBLH), the data of the bit line pair BL, /BL are transferred to the data line pair DQ, /DQ in the case of reading. On the other hand, in the case of writing, the data of the data line pair DQ, /DQ are transferred to the bit line pair BL, /BL. Thus, a writing operation is performed.
Meanwhile, to meet a demand for high device performance (high-speed operation, suppression of power consumption), miniaturization based on a scaling rule has progressed, and a power supply voltage applied to the transistor in the chip has been lowered from generation to generation. With further miniaturization in the future, however, the fall of power supply voltage will probably become a large problem in designing of a semiconductor memory.
The fall of power supply voltage must be accompanied by a fall of threshold voltage of the transistor. However, for example, an increase of cell leakage caused by the fall of threshold voltage becomes a problem in a static random access memory (SRAM). In the DRAM, the progress in miniaturization has brought about a difficulty of securing a cell capacity or suppressing leakage current. Consequently, when the power supply voltage (high-level bit line voltage VBLH) is lowered, the amount of charges accumulated in the cell is reduced, deteriorating data saving performance.
To deal with the problem, the power supply voltage of the memory cell portion will have to be set higher than that of the peripheral logic portion in the future. In such a case, as shown in FIG. 59, external circuits (including DQ buffer) outside the data line pair DQ, /DQ operate by the same voltage VDD as that of the peripheral logic portion to suppress power consumption, while the sense amplifier circuit 4 operates by VBLH or the like, which is a voltage higher than the voltage VDD.
When a transistor of a type different from that of the peripheral logic portion is used in the memory cell portion of a high power supply voltage (e.g., transistor used at a low voltage has characteristics such as a short gate length, a thin gate oxide film and the like for the purpose of achieving a high speed), from the standpoint of reliability, the voltage VBLH used for the sense amplifier circuit 4 must not be applied to the circuits outside the data line pairs DQ, /DQ.
A simplest method as countermeasures is to drive the signal CSL by VDD. Then, when data reverse to that held in the sense amplifier circuit 4 is written to the memory cell MC at the time of writing, i.e., when the data of the bit line pair BL, /BL must be reversed, the data held in the sense amplifier circuit 4 by a voltage VBLH must be reversed by the DQ gate 5 driven by VDD lower than the VBLH. Thus, the data cannot be reversed unless a size of the transistor constituting the DQ gate 5 is set very large.
As other countermeasures, a method of making sizes of transistors (sense amplifier pair transistor, sense amplifier driver) constituting the sense amplifier circuit 4 small may be employed. In this case, however, a transition speed of the bit line pair BL, /BL becomes slow. Thus, unless deactivation timing of the word line WL is delayed, a voltage level of data stored in the memory cell MC during restoring (rewriting of data read to the bit line) and writing to the memory cell MC is lowered.
Conventional configurations of an sense amplifier driver (SA driver) and a common source line (NCS, PCS) are as follows.
To begin with, when only one SA driver (NSA driver, PSA driver) is arranged in a sense amplifier control circuit or the like for a sense amplifier bank (SA bank) constituted of a plurality of sense amplifiers, as shown in FIG. 60, sense amplifier circuits of all columns in the SA bank must be connected to one common source line connected to the SA driver. As shown in FIG. 61, for example, the sense amplifier control circuits are arranged in areas adjacent to the SA bank and a row decoder.
Next, when a plurality of SA drivers are arranged in the SA bank, the plurality are arranged corresponding to WL stitch areas (in the case of a layered WL configuration, area in which the SA bank and a sub WL driver area intersect each other) present in a plurality of places in the SA bank. In this case, at least the sense amplifiers of all the columns in the SA bank must be classified for each WL stitch area, and each classified sense amplifier group must be connected to the common source line connected to the SA driver arranged in each WL stitch area. Further, for a reason below, the sense amplifier circuits of all the columns in the SA bank are connected to one common source line.
When a plurality of SA drivers are arranged in the SA bank, in a period until potentials (high-level/low-level) of the bit line pairs BL, /BL determine by activating the sense amplifier circuit, the sense amplifier circuits of all the columns simultaneously perform sense operations. Thus, during this period, driving efficiency of all the plurality of SA drivers is distributed and assigned to all the columns.
However, in the case of a writing operation, normally, data of only a column to which writing is carried out from a state in which potentials (high-level/low-level) of bit line pairs BL, /BL of all the columns in the SA bank determined by activating the sense amplifier circuit is rewritten. At this time, if the plurality of SA drivers are all connected to the common source line connected to the sense amplifier circuit of the column to which the writing is carried out, the driving efficiency of all the plurality of SA drivers can be concentrated on the column to which the writing is carried out, and a writing speed can be made fast (especially, in the PSA driver). Thus, to achieve the highest writing speed, the sense amplifier circuits of all the columns and all the SA drivers are connected to one common source line.
As the common source line is connected to the sense amplifier circuits of all the columns, the SA drivers may be arranged in any places on the common source line. Such high layout freedom of the SA drivers enables optimization of the layout of the entire SA bank as a result, making it possible to minimize an area of the entire SA bank.
For example, in Document 1 (Published Japanese Patent No. 3202580) and Document 2 (Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 2002-208277), by setting an arranging pitch of a layout repeating unit in the SA bank smaller than a pitch of a bit line, a space is created in the SA bank, and the SA driver is arranged therein to make an area of the entire bank very compact. If the sense amplifier circuits of all the columns and all the SA drivers are connected to one common source line in the SA bank, such a layout can be easily realized.
Further reasons that the sense amplifier circuits of all the columns in the SA bank must be connected to one common source line are as follows.
If there is a leakage source (e.g., junction leakage due to a crystal defect) somewhere in the common source line, a potential of the common source line is somehow set equal to a well potential (e.g., P well potential (VSS or the like) in the case of NCS). This potential change of the common source line is similar to that of the common source line during the sense amplifier circuit operation. Thus, if the leakage causes a fall of the potential of the common source line to a certain level, before a sufficient signal is output from the cell to the bit line BL after the precharging of the BL is released, a sense operation is started (slowly), creating a possibility of an erroneous operation.
Thus, to prevent such an erroneous operation, the common source line must be precharged while the sense amplifier circuit is inactive. In other words, by precharging the common source line, even if leakage occurs in the commons source line, the potential of the common source line can be maintained at a level for preventing unintended operation start of the sense amplifier circuit. In reality, in the precharge period of a ½ VBLH precharge system, by short-circuiting the NCS of a VSS potential and the PCS of a VBLH potential, and connecting them to a VBL power source (bit line precharge power source, equal to ½ VBLH here), they are quickly precharged to VBL potentials. Accordingly, the precharge potential of the common source line is equal to the precharge potential VBL (not necessarily ½ VBLH) of the bit line.
Incidentally, the precharge transistor (FIG. 62) of the common source line is originally designed to compensate for a leakage current which is not large and to maintain the common source line at the VBL potential. Thus, its size does not need to be large. Arrangement of such a small precharge transistor for each column, or for some columns leads to low layout efficiency. That is, because of a design rule and to guarantee device characteristics, even if very small transistors are arranged for some columns, sizes thereof may be larger than necessary.
Even if transistors of necessary sizes can be arranged for some columns, a layout space in which nothing is arranged may be formed between the precharge transistors. Accordingly, by connecting the sense amplifier circuits of all the columns in the SA bank to the common source line, and arranging the precharge transistor in the sense amplifier circuit or the WL stitch area to be shared by many columns, an area increase caused by the arrangement of precharge transistors can be virtually eliminated.
As the common source line is connected to the sense amplifier circuits of all the columns, the precharge transistor may be arranged in any place on the common source line. For example, even in the case of arrangement in the WL stitch area, it is not necessary to arrange precharge transistors in all the WL stitch areas. In this case, other devices can be arranged in the WL stitch areas in which precharge transistors are not arranged.
As described above, as long as the common source line is connected to the sense amplifier circuits of all the columns, the layout freedom of the precharge transistors can be increased. As a result, the layout of the entire SA bank can be optimized, making it possible to minimize the layout area of the entire SA bank.
As described above, the power supply voltage of the memory cell portion will have to be set higher than that of the peripheral circuit portion (logic portion), making difficult the writing operation of the semiconductor memory in the future. Under such circumstances, connecting of the sense amplifier circuits of all the columns and all the SA drivers in the SA bank to the common source line to achieve a high writing speed makes the writing operation more difficult. Then, in reality, there will be no practical solutions.
Furthermore, when the miniaturization is accompanied by a fall of potential amplitude of the bit line connected to the memory cell, the threshold voltage of the NMOS sense amplifier transistor or the PMOS sense amplifier transistor must be lowered to realize a stable sense operation. When the threshold voltage falls to a certain level or lower, a reduction of a signal on the bit line BL during signal development due to an influence of a leakage current via the NMOS sense amplifier transistor or the PMOS sense amplifier transistor cannot be ignored any more, and this influence is larger as the number of columns connected to the common source line is larger.


A system and method provide rewards or loyalty incentives to transaction account customers. The system includes a computing platform comprising application programming interfaces that enable users to define marketing programs. The system thus enables an efficient, automated and extensible platform for creating, managing and executing rewards and other marketing related programs.

Loyalty incentive or reward programs are used as a form of highly customizable and targeted marketing. A loyalty program provider will attract customers who signup for a loyalty program. Shopping benefits such as discounts are offered to the customers by the provider. The provider then markets to merchants that the provider can bring customers to the merchant. For example, a loyalty program provider may approach a merchant, such as the clothing retailer GAP® Inc., with an offer to bring customers to the GAPS in exchange for a fee. The provider would then send a solicitation (via email or regular mail) to its customers offering, for example, a 10% discount coupon that may be redeemed at the GAP® on a particular day. The success of the solicitation can be assessed based on the number of coupons redeemed.
In such a loyalty solicitation, the merchant would pay the loyalty program provider a percentage of the sales (e.g., 10%) that result from the solicitation. The merchant benefits from the increased sales. The loyalty program provider benefits from the commission that it receives, and the customers benefit from the received discount.
There are several areas that could be improved in such traditional loyalty programs. For example, such traditional programs suffer from leakage. Leakage occurs when the merchant does not fully report sales resulting from the solicitation. Leakage results in loss revenues for the loyalty program provider. Further, administration marketing programs such as coupon redemption is costly. For example, setting up and maintaining offers, eligibility criteria, redemption criteria, reporting criteria and other functions of a promotion system traditionally requires business analysts of the reward program platform provider to manually configure the platform. What is needed is a marketing and promotions platform that enables intelligent, automated (e.g., via application programming interfaces) interfaces with a reward platform.

System and method for administering marketing programs

AMERICAN EXPRESS TRAVEL RELATED SERVICES COMPANY, INC.


A heat sink assembly includes a heat sink having a first shoulder and a second shoulder, and a locking device having a retention module, a first clip and a second clip. The first clip has two extension portions engaging with the retention module and a pressing portion between the two extension portions. The second clip comprises a pressing portion located on the second shoulder, an axle connecting with the pressing portion and pivotably engaging with the retention module and a locking portion connecting with the pressing portion. The second clip can rotate around the axle thereof when the heat sink assembly is in an unlocked position; the locking portion engages with the retention module and the pressing portion presses the second shoulder of the heat sink toward the retention module when the heat sink assembly is in a locked position.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a heat sink assembly with a locking device, and more particularly to a heat sink assembly with a locking device for securing a heat sink to a heat-generating electronic device.
2. Description of Related Art
It is well known that heat is produced during operation of electronic devices such as central processing units (CPUs). The heat produced must be quickly removed to ensure normal operation of the CPU. Typically, a heat sink assembly is used to remove heat from the CPU.
Conventionally, a heat sink assembly comprises a heat sink and a locking device for secure the heat sink to an electronic device. The locking device generally comprises a retention module around the electronic device and a clip matching with the retention module to keep the heat sink in intimate contact with the electronic device. An example of a related heat sink assembly is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,464,054. The related heat sink assembly comprises a wire clip fastening a heat sink onto an electronic device. The wire clip comprises a central portion and two fastening portions extending from two opposite ends of the central portion, respectively. The heat sink comprises a base and a plurality of fins extending upwardly from the base. A longitudinal slot is defined in the base. The central portion of the wire clip is retained in the slot. End portions of the fastening portions engage with corresponding tabs extending from opposite sidewalls of the retention module, thereby resiliently securing the heat sink to the electronic device. However, it is awkward and difficult to manipulate the wire clip to mount the heat sink to the electronic device; furthermore, subjected to vibration or shock during use, the clip is prone to rotate in a plane that is parallel to the base and is prone to move along an extending direction of the slot. This can adversely affect thermal engagement of the heat sink with the electronic device.
What is needed therefore is a heat sink assembly with a locking device which can conveniently and stably secure a heat sink to a heat generating electronic device.

Heat sink assembly with a locking device

Fu Zhun Precision Industry (Shen Zhen) Co., Ltd.


A rotary slurrifier of this invention comprises a pair of spinning discs, which throw a first fluid into a larger mass of second fluid in paired and flow connected impact cavities, within a counter-rotating cavity shell. The first fluid is to be largely insoluble in the second fluid. Impact of the first fluid with the larger mass of second fluid, in the impact cavities, causes atomization of the first fluid into a slurry of many small first fluid particles suspended in a continuous phase of second fluid. The final slurry flows out of the rotating cavity shell via a slowdown reaction turbine.

Use of high viscosity, residual, petroleum fuels, in our surface transportation system, is currently limited to large bore, low speed, marine diesel engines. Other surface transportation, such as railroads, tug and barge, trucks and buses, use small or medium bore diesel engines, which now require use of low viscosity, distillate petroleum fuels, which are in short supply and expensive. New petroleum discoveries in recent years have tended toward a higher residual fuel content, the Athabaska tar sands being an example of a crude oil almost entirely composed of residual fuel. Residual fuels can be processed partially into distillate fuels, but stock, and hence energy, losses result. National energy independence could be substantially assisted if a major portion of our surface transportation system could be operated on low cost residual petroleum fuels and tars.
None of the apparatus drawings are to scale.

Abstract: High viscosity residual petroleum fuels and tars as first fluids can be thusly preatomized in a fuel in water slurry, and can then be cleanly and efficiently burned in small bore, high speed, diesel engines, which now require use of expensive low viscosity distillate fuels, which are in short supply.


An apparatus includes a pair of frame members adapted for mounting to opposing surfaces of a passageway. A door is mounted to at least one of the frame members for movement between a closed position, in which the door and frame members substantially traverse the passageway and an open position, in which a portion of the passageway is free of the door and frame members, the portion being large enough to permit passage of an adult therethrough. A lock is coupled to at least one of the frame members and adapted to retain the door in the closed position, the lock including an actuator adapted to release the lock to permit movement of the door from the closed position toward the open position upon application to the actuator of a force of at least a predetermined weight of a child.

The invention relates to gates and in particular unlocking of gates.
Gates are useful to inhibit undesired access through the gate while permitting relatively easy access if desired. Child safety gates are useful to help prevent injuries to children by inhibiting access through the gate by a child while permitting easy access through the gate by an adult. These gates can be mounted, e.g., in doorways, in hallways, between a wall and a stairway railing, or between two stairway railings (such as on a deck). With the gate in place, children are inhibited from accessing areas that are undesirable for the child to access. For example, it may be desirable to inhibit a child from accessing a kitchen, where toxic cleaners may be stored, or a stairway that the child may fall down. Safety gates can also inhibit children from gaining access to a pet or vice versa. A door of the gate can permit access if the door is moved to provide a passageway through the gate.
The invention provides a mechanism to guard against children undesirably opening a gate and also provides hands-free unlocking and opening of a gate. Among other uses the invention is highly effective in providing an obstruction to help prevent children or animals from accessing an area that it is undesirable for the child or animal to access. For example the invention can be used to block a doorway, hallway or other passageway.
In general, in one aspect, the invention provides an apparatus including a pair of frame members adapted for mounting to opposing surfaces of a passageway. A door is mounted to at least one of the frame members for movement between a closed position, in which the door and frame members substantially traverse the passageway, and an open position, in which a portion of the passageway is free of the door and frame members, the portion being large enough to permit passage of an adult therethrough. A lock is coupled to at least one of the frame members and adapted to retain the door in the closed position, the lock including an actuator adapted to release the lock to permit movement of the door from the closed position toward the open position upon application to the actuator of a force of at least a predetermined weight of a child.
Implementations of this aspect of the invention may include one or more of the following features. The actuator is disposed near a bottom portion of a frame member when the pair of frame members are mounted to the opposing surfaces. The predetermined weight is approximately 40 pounds. The lock is adapted to couple a frame member to the door near both a top of the door and a bottom of the door.
The actuator is adapted to move a recess camming surface, defining a portion of a recess, relative to and against a detent camming surface, of a detent that is biased into the recess when the door is in the closed position and the lock is in a locked position, to substantially remove the detent from the recess. The door is pivotally mounted to the frame about a pivot axis and the detent is a pin that is biased radially outward from the pivot axis. A substantially U-shaped frame includes the frame members and a cross member, the frame members being first and second arms forming sides of the U and the cross member connecting the arms and forming a bottom of the U, the door being pivotally attached to the first arm, and the actuator includes a bracket slidably carried by the second arm and including the recess camming surface. The door includes another pin, and the actuator includes a foot pedal, coupled to the bracket and movably mounted to the frame, including a foot pedal camming surface that provides a wall of a foot pedal recess and that moves relative to and against a pin camming surface, of the another pin that is biased radially outward from the pivot axis and into the foot pedal recess when the door is in the closed position and the lock is in the locked position, to substantially remove the another pin from the foot pedal recess when the foot pedal moves relative to the frame. The arms extend away from the cross member and away from each other.
In general, in another aspect, the invention provides a safety gate for use in a doorway, hall, or the like. The safety gate includes a substantially U-shaped frame having first and second arms connected by a cross member, the frame providing a passageway between the arms above the cross member. A bracket is movably coupled to the second arm and provides a bracket recess, a part of the bracket recess being provided by a bracket camming surface. A foot pedal is coupled to the bracket and movably coupled to the frame near the bottom end of the second arm. A spring is coupled to the foot pedal and requires a predetermined force to change a length of the spring. A door is pivotally mounted to the first arm along a pivot axis and includes a pin biased away from the pivot axis and configured to be received by the bracket recess, the door substantially preventing an infant from passing through the passageway when the pin is received by the bracket recess. When the foot pedal is moved toward a bottom of the frame in a gate-opening direction, the bracket camming surface bears against the pin to move the pin substantially out of the bracket recess.
Implementations of this aspect of the invention may include one or more of the following features. The predetermined force is about a weight of a three-year-old child. The passageway extends from a first side of the frame to a second side of the frame, and a portion of the foot pedal is disposed on the first side of the frame and another portion of the foot pedal is disposed on the second side of the frame. The first and second arms are adapted to engage opposing surfaces and extend from the cross member and away from each other such that when the arms are coupled to the surfaces such that the arms extend substantially perpendicular to the cross member, a force of less than about 40 pounds applied to the gate is insufficient to slide either arm relative to a respective one of the surfaces.
The bracket and the foot pedal are slidably carried by the second arm. The pin is a first pin, the foot pedal provides a foot pedal recess, partially provided by a foot pedal camming surface, the door includes a second pin biased away from the pivot axis and configured to be received by the foot pedal recess, and when the foot pedal slides relative to the frame in the gate-opening direction, the foot pedal camming surface bears against the second pin to move the second pin substantially out of the foot pedal recess.
In general, in another aspect, the invention provides an apparatus for use with a door movably mounted to a frame member between an open position and a closed position. The apparatus is adapted to inhibit the door from moving from the closed position toward the open position while in a locked position and to change to an unlocked position to permit the door to move from the closed position toward an open position if a force of at least a predetermined weight of a child is applied to the apparatus.
Implementations of this aspect of the invention may include one or more of the following features.
The door includes a door member having a door member camming surface and the apparatus includes an apparatus camming surface. The apparatus is further adapted to move the apparatus camming surface relative to the door when the force is applied to the apparatus and to remain substantially fixed relative to the door otherwise. The apparatus camming surface is configured and disposed to cause one of the camming surfaces, biased into a recess provided at least partially by the other camming surface, to be substantially removed from the recess. A portion of the apparatus is adapted to be slidably carried by the frame. The apparatus includes a bracket, slidably coupled to the frame, and an actuator to which the force is applied, the bracket including the apparatus camming surface. The recess is a first recess, the member is a first member, and the member camming surface is a first member camming surface, and the actuator includes an actuator camming surface configured and disposed to cause one of the actuator camming surface and a second member camming surface of a second member of the door, biased into a second recess provided at least partially by the other one of the actuator camming surface and the second member camming surface, to be substantially removed from the second recess when the force is applied to the apparatus. The apparatus comprises a foot pedal to which the force is applied.
Various aspects of the invention may provide one or more of the following advantages. A gate can be unlocked in a hands-free manner. A gate can also be unlocked and opened in a hands-free manner. Accidental opening of a gate can be guarded against. Undesired opening of a gate by a child or an animal such as a pet can also be guarded against.


A device and a method are provided for isolating a circuit well from a substrate of the same conductivity type. In particular, an integrated circuit is provided which includes a circuit well arranged over a semiconductor substrate with no layer of opposite conductivity type arranged between the well and the substrate. The integrated circuit may further include a pair of isolation wells extending along opposite lateral boundaries of the circuit well. The isolation wells and circuit well may be adapted such that a single continuous depletion region underlying the circuit well may be formed upon application of an isolation voltage between the substrate and the pair of isolation wells. The formation of such a depletion region may beneficially isolate the circuit well from the underlying substrate.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to semiconductor device manufacturing, and more particularly, to an improved method for forming an integrated circuit.
2. Description of the Related Art
The following descriptions and examples are not admitted to be prior art by virtue of their inclusion within this section.
In the fabrication of metal-oxide-semiconductor (xe2x80x9cMOSxe2x80x9d) transistors, a gate conductor may be arranged upon a gate dielectric, which may be formed upon a substrate. Typically, the gate dielectric is laterally interposed between source and drain regions formed in the substrate, where the source and drain regions may be doped to opposite conductivity type (either n-type or p-type) than the substrate. N-type source/drain regions may be used to form n-channel transistors, and p-type source/drain regions may be used to form p-channel transistors. In complementary MOS (xe2x80x9cCMOSxe2x80x9d) circuits employing both n-channel and p-channel transistors, n-channel transistors may be formed in p-type xe2x80x9cwellsxe2x80x9d within the substrate, while p-channel transistors may be formed in n-type wells. Such wells may be formed by selectively doping the region of the substrate underlying the subsequently formed gate conductor.
In many instances, electrical isolation between a transistor and an underlying substrate may be beneficial, particularly between a well and a substrate of a CMOS transistor. For example, electrical isolation may be beneficial in non-volatile memory circuits, which use negative voltages for program/erase operations. The electrical isolation between the well and underlying substrate may allow for negative voltages to be used without causing excessive leakage current. In other applications, electrical isolation of integrated circuits that include analog and digital circuit portions, such as mixed signal or mixed mode transistors, may reduce noise coupling between the digital portions and the analog portions. Problems from noise coupling can arise since analog circuit portions tend to be noise-sensitive, while relatively high-power switching transistors, such as output transistors associated with the digital circuit portions, tend to generate noise. In a mixed signal circuit, noise from an output transistor can be coupled to an analog circuit portion through the semiconductor substrate shared by the entire integrated circuit. The severity of this noise coupling problem therefore depends upon how effectively the transistor is isolated from the substrate.
Electrical isolation between a transistor and an underlying substrate may be accomplished by various methods. One approach may include surrounding a circuit well with a material which is dissimilar to that of the substrate, such as a dielectric or a layer of an opposite conductivity type to that of the circuit well. Unfortunately, such a method may require several process steps, thereby increasing overall process time and manufacturing costs. Consequently, production throughput may also be reduced. It would therefore, be desirable to develop a method and a structure, which effectively isolates a transistor from an underlying substrate in a reduced number of process steps.
The problems outlined above may be in large part addressed by a device and a method for isolating a circuit well from a substrate of the same conductivity type. In particular, an integrated circuit is provided which includes a circuit well arranged over a semiconductor substrate, with no layer of opposite conductivity type arranged between the well and the substrate. The integrated circuit may further include a pair of isolation wells extending along opposite lateral boundaries of the circuit well. The isolation wells and circuit well may be adapted such that a single continuous depletion region underlying the circuit well may be formed upon application of an isolation voltage (e.g. the power supply voltage of the integrated circuit) between the substrate and the pair of isolation wells. The formation of such a depletion region may beneficially isolate the circuit well from the underlying substrate. Consequently, a method is provided in which to form such an integrated circuit. As such, a method is provided for forming a circuit well over a semiconductor substrate and forming a pair of isolation wells extending along opposite lateral boundaries of the circuit well. In addition, a method of operating such a transistor is provided. In particular, the method may include applying an isolation voltage between the semiconductor substrate and the isolation well surrounding the circuit well to form a single continuous depletion region isolating the circuit well from the underlying substrate.
As stated above, the integrated circuit as recited herein may include a circuit well and a pair of isolation wells. In a preferred embodiment, the circuit well and the isolation wells are adapted such that a single continuous depletion region underlying the circuit well may be formed upon application of an isolation voltage between the substrate and the isolation wells. For example, the circuit well may be arranged within a semiconductor substrate of the same conductivity type. Preferably, there is no layer of opposite conductivity type formed between the circuit well and the substrate. In addition, the pair of isolation wells may extend along opposite lateral boundaries of the circuit well. In an embodiment, the circuit well may be elongated in one lateral dimension and the pair of isolation wells may extend parallel to the respective lateral dimension. In addition, the pair of isolation wells may form opposite sides of an annular isolation structure. In some embodiments, a dielectric isolation region may be interposed between the circuit well and each of the pair of isolation wells. The isolation wells may be of opposite conductivity type to the circuit well. Furthermore, the carrier concentrations of the circuit well and the isolation wells may be greater than that of the substrate.
The integrated circuit may further include a transistor formed within the circuit well and a contact connected to the circuit well. In one embodiment, the transistor and the contact may be spaced apart along an elongated dimension of the circuit well, such that the contact is not interposed between the transistor and either of the isolation wells. Alternatively or in addition, the integrated circuit may include metallization adapted to connect the isolation voltage between the substrate and the pair of isolation wells. The metallization may be further adapted to connect a well voltage to the circuit well. Such a well voltage may be equal to the voltage level of the voltage applied to the substrate. Alternatively, the well voltage may be above or below the substrate voltage in order to produce a reverse bias across a junction between the circuit well and the isolation wells. In some cases, the reverse bias across the junction between the circuit well and isolation wells may be larger than across a junction between the substrate and the isolation wells. For example, in an embodiment in which the substrate and circuit well are p-type and the pair of isolation wells is n-type, the metallization may be adapted to connect the circuit well to a more negative voltage than the substrate. In addition, the metallization may be further adapted to connect a source of a transistor formed within the circuit well to the well voltage.
A method for forming such an integrated circuit is contemplated herein. The method may include forming a circuit well over a semiconductor substrate of the same conductivity type. Preferably, no layer of opposite conductivity type is formed between the circuit well and the substrate underlying the circuit well. The method may further include forming a pair of isolation wells of opposite conductivity type to that of the circuit well. In particular, the isolation wells may be formed along opposite lateral boundaries of the circuit well. In a preferred embodiment, the circuit well and the isolation wells are adapted such that a single continuous depletion region underlying the circuit well is formed upon application of an isolation voltage between the substrate and the isolation wells. In an embodiment, the isolation voltage may be the power supply voltage used for the integrated circuit. In addition, the method may include forming a transistor within the circuit well.
In a further embodiment, the method may include forming metallization above the transistor and isolation wells, such that the metallization is adapted to connect the isolation voltage between the substrate and the pair of isolation wells. The metallization may be further adapted to connect a well voltage to the circuit well. Such a well voltage may be equal to the voltage level of the voltage applied to the substrate. Alternatively, the well voltage may be higher or lower than the substrate voltage in order to produce a reverse bias across a junction between the circuit well and the isolation wells. In some cases, the reverse bias across the junction between the circuit well and isolation wells may be larger than across a junction between the substrate and the isolation wells. For example, in an embodiment in which the substrate and circuit well are p-type and the pair of isolation wells is n-type, the metallization may be adapted to connect the circuit well to a more negative voltage than the substrate.
A method for operating such a transistor may include applying an isolation voltage between a semiconductor substrate and an isolation well surrounding a circuit well within the substrate. Such an application of voltage may form a single continuous depletion region isolating the circuit well from the underlying semiconductor substrate. The operating method may further include applying a well voltage to the circuit well to reverse bias a junction between the circuit well and the isolation well. In particular, applying a well voltage may include forming a larger reverse bias between the circuit and isolation wells than is formed between the isolation well and the substrate. As such, in an embodiment in which the substrate and circuit well are p-type and the isolation well is n-type, the circuit well may be at a more negative potential than the semiconductor substrate.
There are several benefits from forming a single depletion region between a circuit well and a substrate. For example, the depletion region may allow a transistor to be electrically isolated from the underlying substrate. In particular, sensitive transistors in integrated circuits, such as mixed signal integrated circuits, may be isolated from noise sources. In addition, a single depletion region may allow a transistor to be operated at voltages below the substrate voltage, such as in non-volatile memory circuits in which negative voltages are used for program/erase operations. Furthermore, the circuit well and substrate may be isolated without the formation of a dissimilar material within the substrate. As such, the method for forming a transistor, which is capable of producing a single depletion region, may reduce the number of costly processes, such as multiple well formations. In addition, the formation of such a transistor may enhance the performance of the circuit, lower manufacturing costs, and increase production throughput.


Conversion of communications from a first device over a firsts communication channel to a second communication channel that is utilized by a second communication device such that an enterprise employee can interface with and communication with a customer using the customer's preferred channel or application for communication.

The crazy thing about the advancements in technology that are geared toward making our life easier, is that generally, they end up making our life more complicated, at least at first. For example, there was a time when you watched a show on TV with your family, you enjoyed it, then it was over. Then came the advent of the video cassette recorder (VCR), which seemed like a wonderful advancement that would make our life much easier. However, what happened was parents could work later and not worry about missing a show, kids could stay out and just catch up on the show later, and so, piles of VCR tapes started piling up and they even had to invent special cabinets to hold all of the recorded VCR tapes. So this simple technology advancement that was to make life easier, ended up being a gateway to family chaos, disorder and fractioning.
Similar situations have occurred in the world of communications. First we had a telephone. If you were home when it rang, then you could answer it, if you were in the mood to talk. But if you were not home, it just was not that big of an issue. Then came pay telephones so that if you were out and about, at least you could call others. This led to pagers and mobile phones. All the while internet technology was expanding at breakneck speeds giving rise to emailing, skyping, facebook posting, tweeting, VOIPing, etc. In the blink of an eye our world changed from "catch me if I am home" to "catch me 24-7 in multiple ways at the same time, and don't you dare dump me".
In today's highly connected world, we find that we are in the midst of a communicative ocean that is diversely interfaced with multiple modalities and seamless connectivity. The present disclosure presents systems and methods to reign this ocean in so that users can remain focused and functional.
At any one time, a particular user may be reachable through multiple channels. For instance, a user may have a mobile telephone that can accept a call, an SMS, a text. That same mobile telephone may allow the user to be on FACEBOOK, INSTAGRAM, TWITTER, SNAPCHAT, SKYPE, TINDER, MATCH.COM, LINKED IN, etc. In addition, that same platform can enable the user to shop at AMAZON.COM, listen to music playlist on SPOTIFY while navigating to a next destination with GOOGLE MAPS and receiving the weather from WEATHERBUG. On top of all of this, the user also bounces in and out of other environments that provide other access platforms such as the user's desktop computer, ALEXA, smart TVs, smart refrigerators, smart thermostats, in vehicle systems, etc. Further, there are also public channels that are reaching out to the user in stores, at checkout point of sale terminals, at the gas station pump, etc.
What is needed in the art is a system and method that can harness all of this communicative capability and all the power to be efficiently applied, exploited and utilized in maximizing communication and interaction with users.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Multi-channel engagement platform converter


‘Pacific Deluxe’ is a new raspberry cultivar particularly distinguished by having large fruit throughout the season, bright color, excellent post-harvest quality and resistance to Phytophthora rubi, is disclosed.

This invention relates to a new and distinct variety of raspberry (Rubus idaeus L.) plant named 'Pacific Deluxe'. 'Pacific Deluxe' originated as a seedling from the cross between the proprietary female raspberry parent '401' (unpatented) with the proprietary male raspberry parent '433' (unpatented) made in April 2003 in Oxnard, Calif.
The new cultivar was first propagated via vegetative cuttings and tissue culture in Watsonville, Calif. in June 2007 and has been asexually reproduced repeatedly by vegetative cuttings and tissue culture in Watsonville, Calif. for two generations. The present invention has been found to retain its distinctive characteristics through successive asexual propagations.
Plant Breeder's Rights for this cultivar have not been applied for prior to the filing of this application. 'Pacific Deluxe' has not been made publicly available more than one year prior to the filing of this application.