A liquid crystal display (LCD) device includes first and second substrates with a liquid crystal material therebetween; a first alignment film formed on the first substrate and a second alignment film formed on the second substrate; a first align mark on the first substrate, the first align mark formed of the same material as the first alignment film and formed in a shape of any one of a circle, square and cross; and a second align mark to be aligned with the first align mark on the second substrate.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a liquid crystal display, and more particularly to a liquid crystal display and fabricating method thereof that can improve productivity and yield.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
A liquid crystal display controls the light transmittance of liquid crystal by use of electric field, thereby displaying a picture. To this end, the liquid crystal display includes a liquid crystal display panel in which a plurality of liquid crystal pixel cells are arranged in a matrix at each crossing of data lines and gate lines, and a drive circuit for driving the liquid crystal display panel.
Generally, the liquid crystal display panel includes a thin film transistor substrate and a color filter substrate which face each other; liquid crystal injected between the two substrates; and a spacer for keeping a cell gap between the two substrates.
The thin film transistor substrate includes a pixel electrode which is formed at each of liquid crystal pixel cell areas defined by the crossing of the gate line and the data line; a thin film transistor connected to the gate line, the data line and the pixel electrode; a plurality of insulating films; and an alignment film formed for aligning the liquid crystal in an initial direction.
The color filter substrate includes a color filter formed at each liquid crystal pixel cell; a black matrix for dividing between color filters and blocking external light; a common electrode for supplying a reference voltage to the liquid crystal; and an alignment film for aligning the liquid crystal thereon.
The thin film transistor substrate and the color filter substrate are bonded together, and then the liquid crystal is injected and sealed to complete the liquid crystal display panel. Alternatively, the liquid crystal is spread over any one of the two substrates, and then the two substrates are bonded together to complete the liquid crystal display panel. At this moment, the color filter substrate and the thin film transistor substrate are bonded together by aligning the color filter of the color filter substrate and the pixel electrode of the thin film transistor substrate in a one-to-one relationship.
To this end, an align mark is formed for bonding together the thin film transistor substrate and the color filter substrate. The align mark of the thin film transistor substrate is formed together with a gate electrode in a process of forming the gate electrode on a lower substrate. And, the align mark of the color filter substrate is formed together with the black matrix in a process of forming the black matrix on an upper substrate.
When bonding together the thin film transistor substrate and the color filter substrate, if there is misalignment between the thin film transistor substrate and the color filter substrate, a light leakage defect can be generated in the liquid crystal display. In order to prevent such a problem, there is a method in which the width of the black matrix of the color filter substrate is wider, but this method degrades the aperture ratio of the liquid crystal display.
Accordingly, there has recently been proposed a color filter on thin film transistor (hereinafter, referred to as "COT"), where the color filter is formed on the thin film transistor substrate.
FIG. 1 is a cross sectional view illustrating a liquid crystal display of a COT structure according to the related art.
Referring to FIG. 1, the liquid crystal display of the COT structure according to the related art includes a thin film transistor substrate (hereinafter, referred to as a "lower plate") and a upper plate. The lower plate has a thin film transistor on a lower substrate 1; a color filter 34 for realizing R, G, B pixels formed on the thin film transistor and a black matrix 32; a pixel electrode 22 overlapped with the color filter 34 with an overcoat layer 52 therebetween; and a lower alignment film 38 for aligning liquid crystal. The upper plate has a common electrode 24 which supplies a common voltage to the liquid crystal pixel cells; and a upper alignment film 36 on an upper substrate 2 for aligning liquid crystal.
The thin film transistor includes a gate electrode 6 connected to a gate line (not shown), a source electrode 8 connected to the data line 4, and a drain electrode 10 connected to the pixel electrode 22. Further, the thin film transistor includes an active layer 14 which overlaps the gate electrode 6 with a gate insulating film 12 therebetween to form a channel between the source electrode 8 and the drain electrode 10; and an ohmic contact layer 16 for reducing a contact resistance between the active layer 14 and the source and drain electrodes 8 and 10.
A passivation film 18 is formed on the gate insulating film to cover the thin film transistor and the data line 4.
The color filter 34 divided by pixel area is formed on the passivation film 18.
The black matrix 32 is formed to overlap the thin film transistor and to be laid over the adjacent color filters 34 along the gate line and the data line 4 on the passivation film 18 where the color filter 34 is formed. The black matrix 32 prevents an interference between the color filters 34, an external light reflection by the metallic gate and data bus line, and a light leakage current caused when a channel part of the thin film transistor 30 is exposed to the external light.
An overcoat layer 52 made of an organic insulating material is formed on the color filter 34 and the black matrix 32. The overcoat layer 52 provides an even surface by compensating a step difference between the color filter 34 and the black matrix 32, and prevents foreign materials of the color filter 34 and the black matrix 32 from flowing into the liquid crystal.
The pixel electrode 22 is independently formed at each of the pixel areas so as to overlap the color filter 34 on the overcoat layer 52. The pixel electrode 22 is connected to the drain electrode 10 that is exposed through a contact hole 20 that penetrates the overcoat layer 52, the color filter 34 and the passivation film 18.
The upper and lower alignment films 36 and 38 for aligning liquid crystal are formed by performing a rubbing process after spreading an alignment material such as polyimide on the upper and lower substrates 1 and 2.
The lower plate and the upper plate are bonded together with a gap, the liquid crystal is then injected between the gap, and then they are sealed so as to complete the liquid crystal display panel. Alternatively, the liquid crystal is spread over any one of the two substrates, and then the two substrates are bonded together to complete the liquid crystal display panel.
In order to bond the lower and upper plates together, the liquid crystal display includes a lower align mark 26 on the lower substrate 1, and a upper align mark 28 on the upper substrate 2. The lower align mark 26 and the upper align mark 28 are removed in a scribing process after the bonding process.
The lower align mark 26 is formed together with the gate electrode 6 or the black matrix 32 on the lower substrate 1 in a process of forming the gate electrode 6 or the black matrix 32. However, the upper alignment mark 28 is formed on the upper substrate 2 by an extra photolithography process using an opaque metal material different from the common electrode 24. The common electrode 24 is formed of a transparent conductive material in a photolithography process. Accordingly, when fabricating the liquid crystal display of the COT structure, an additional photolithography process is required to form the upper alignment mark 28 on the upper substrate 2, thereby decreasing the productivity of the liquid crystal display of the COT structure.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Fabricating methods of a liquid crystal display comprising first and second align marks


In a holder having a holder base and holding arms and used for holding a hose clamp in position, the holder base is so constructed as to be capable of being positioned on the outer periphery of an annular hose clamp and a pair of holding arms protrude from each of a pair of opposite lateral edges of the holder base. Each pair of holding arms are so shaped as to define a pair of opposed arcs extending along a circumference A having a diameter somewhat smaller than the outside diameter of a hose. Each holding arm has a sharp projection B1 formed on its inner peripheral surface at its distal end and directed substantially toward the center of the circumference A, or more inwardly than it. The clamp holder facilitates the preliminary holding of a hose clamp in position on a hose without damaging the hose, and without slipping off the hose or being displaced easily.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a clamp holder. More particularly, this invention relates to a clamp holder for the preliminary fixing of a diametrically expanded hose clamp on a hose portion expected to be clamped at its joint with a pipe.
2. Description of the Related Art
It has hitherto been usual to carry out a pipe joining process for joining a rubber hose, etc. to a hard pipe and fixing their joint tightly with a hose clamp, as will be described below by way of example. A hose clamp 2 held in a diametrically expanded form by a stopper pin, etc. is fitted about a pipe 1 beforehand, as shown in FIG. 1A. Then, a hose 3 is joined with the pipe 1, and the hose clamp 2 is moved and positioned about their joint, as shown in FIG. 1B. Then, the hose clamp 2 is released from its diametrically expanded form to fix the joint tightly at a selected point. This method has, however, been low in working efficiency, since it necessitates the steps of moving the hose clamp and positioning it accurately in a busy pipe joining process. It has also been a useless effort to have to affix a clamp positioning mark on the hose for the accurate positioning of the hose clamp.
Therefore, the work becomes efficient if sub-assembly is carried out for the preliminary fixing of a diametrically expanded hose clamp on a hose portion expected to be clamped. A process for joining a hose to a pipe is completed only if a step of e.g. removing a stopper pin is taken to release the hose clamp from its diametrically expanded form after joining the hose.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,675,871, for example, discloses a clamp holder 6 as shown in FIG. 2. The clamp holder 6 has a base plate 4 adapted to engage the outer peripheral surface of a hose clamp and ring-shaped arms 5 for holding a hose. After the clamp holder 6 is fitted about the outer periphery of the hose clamp 7 in its diametrically expanded form, the hose 8 is inserted axially therethrough, as shown in FIG. 3. The arms 5 hold the hose 8 for the preliminary fixing of the hose clamp 7 on that portion of the hose 8 which is expected to be clamped.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,820,166 discloses a clamp holder 13 as shown in FIG. 4. The clamp holder 13 comprises a C-shaped curved base plate 10 adapted to engage the outer peripheral surface of a hose clamp 9 and having engaging projections 11 and sharp projections 12 formed on its inner peripheral surface. The base plate 10 has its gap widened to force the clamp holder 13 radially into engagement about the outer periphery of the hose clamp 9 fitted on a selected portion of a hose 14. The projections 11 are engaged in the openings or slots 15 of the hose clamp 9 to assemble the clamp holder 13 with the hose clamp 9, as shown in FIG. 5. At the same time, the sharp projections 12 engage positively with the outer peripheral surface of the hose 14 to fix the hose clamp 9 preliminarily on that portion of the hose 14 which is expected to be clamped.
JP-UM (utility model application)-A-5-87391 discloses a clamp holder 16 as shown in FIG. 6. The clamp holder 16 is a substantially semi-circular curved leaf spring and has positioning members 17 and 18 formed at its opposite ends. The positioning members 17 and 18 are engaged in the openings or slots of a hose clamp 19 to assemble the clamp holder 16 with the hose clamp 19. At the same time, the positioning members 17 and 18 engage tightly with the outer peripheral surface of a hose 20 to fix the hose clamp 19 preliminarily on that portion of the hose 20 which is expected to be clamped.
JP-A-2001-141154 discloses a clamp holder 21 as shown in FIG. 7. The clamp holder 21 has an attachment base 23 having projections 22 adapted to engage in the openings or slots of a hose clamp and a pair of arch-shaped arms 24 formed along the attachment base 23. The arms 24 have arcuately curved legs terminating in outwardly standing guides 25. The clamp holder 21 is pushed in the direction of the guides 25 and assembled with the hose clamp 27 held in its diametrically expanded form and having a hose 26 passed therethrough, as shown in FIGS. 8A and 8B. As a result, the arch-shaped arms 24 extend over the hose clamp 27. The arcuate legs of the arms 24 hold the hose 26, so that the hose clamp 27 may be preliminarily fixed on that portion of the hose 26 at which it will be clamped.
According to U.S. Pat. No. 5,675,871, the hose 8 is held by the C ring-shaped arms 5 extending about a circumferential range of 270° or more in a form of sub-assembly. Therefore, there is no fear of the clamp holder 6 slipping off the hose 8. It is, however, necessary to insert the hose 8 axially through the clamp holder 6 and hose clamp 7 put together. The problem is that the ring-shaped arms 5 are somewhat smaller in diameter than the hose 8 and make it impossible to insert the hose 8 easily.
Moreover, the force with which the hose clamp 7 is held in position on the hose 8 is weak, since it relies upon the frictional resistance between the arms 5 and the hose 8. The contact of the clamp holder 6 or the hose clamp 7 with another object is likely to cause the displacement of the hose clamp 7. Such displacement is particularly likely to occur as rotation around the hose, though it may also occur along the hose. In either event, such displacement usually requires troublesome correction in a pipe joining process.
According to JP-A-2001-141154, only the hose clamp 27 is inserted about the hose 26 beforehand and the clamp holder 21 is forced diametrically into engagement about the hose clamp 27 and the hose 26. Therefore, their sub-assembly is easy. The force with which the hose clamp is held in position on the hose 26 is, however, not strong enough, since it relies upon the frictional resistance produced when the hose 26 is held by a pair of arch-shaped arms 24. Moreover, the arch-shaped arms 24 projecting over the hose clamp 27 and the outwardly standing guides 25 formed at the ends of the arch-shaped arms 24 are likely to cause the displacement, etc. of the hose clamp 27 by contacting another object.
According to U.S. Pat. No. 5,820,166, the C-shaped curved base plate 13 is adapted to combine with the hose clamp 9 and hold it in position on the hose 14. Therefore, the base plate 13 is required to have a sufficiently large spring strength not to slip off the hose 14, while the sharp projections 12 engage so strongly with the hose 14 as to damage it. Moreover, the sharp projections 12 protrude outwardly (toward the opening of the base plate). Therefore, the sharp projections 12 damage the outer periphery of the hose 14 when the base plate 13 is forced into engagement with the hose clamp 9 and the hose 14. Moreover, the sharp projections 12 are not satisfactory for preventing any rotational displacement of the hose clamp 9, since all of a total of four projections 12 are directed outwardly and engage with only the upper half portion of the hose 14.
The device of JP-UM-A-5-87391 is similar to the invention of U.S. Pat. No. 5,820,166, but differs from it in having instead of the sharp projections 12 the positioning members 17 and 18 adapted to make surface contact with the hose 20. This makes it possible to avoid damage to the hose 20, but also weakens the force with which the hose clamp is held in position on the hose 20. Moreover, it appears from the combination of the hose clamp 19 and the clamp holder 16 as put together that the positioning members 17 and 18 of the clamp holder 16 come off the hose clamp 19 easily in a form of their sub-assembly. If they are so designed as not to come off easily, they are likely to interfere with the tightening of the hose clamp 19 in a pipe joining process and it is, therefore, undesirably essential to remove the clamp holder 16 in a pipe joining process.


A system for analyzing tissue samples, that generally comprises, a storage device for at least temporarily storing one or more images of one or more cells, wherein the images comprise a plurality of channels; and a processor that is adapted to determine the extent to which a biomarker may have translocated from at least one subcellular region to another subcellular region; and then to generate a score corresponding to the extent of translocation.

The invention relates generally to tissue micro array processing and diagnosis of disease.
Tissue micro arrays (TMA) are used for many analytic and diagnostic purposes, one of which is to diagnose diseased tissue at the molecular level. Cancer histopathology diagnosis has been based on cellular morphology using hematoxylin and eosin (H&E) stained biopsy tissue with bright field microscopy. Today, oncogenes are detected with immunohistochemistry (IHC) stains in selected diagnostic exams to prescribe drug therapy with new cancer drugs that are only effective in a fraction of patients. Until now, the process for analyzing TMAs to determine whether a given tissue sample indicates disease and more specifically, a certain type or stage of disease was performed by pathologists looking at a given TMA through a microscope and subjectively rendering a conclusion.
For example, breast cancer is not a single disease but multiple diseases where the tumor phenotype is recognizable at the molecular level; molecular marker quantization is needed for diagnosis to prescribe treatment. β-catenin subcellular distribution in breast cancer has been analyzed using immunohistochemistry (IHC) and immunofluorescence (IF) to predict survival. Treatment of breast cancer by estrogen ablation depends on the tumor having an estrogen receptor. As such, IHC testing for the estrogen receptor (ER) is used to prescribe such hormone ablation therapy. The human epidermal growth factor receptor-2 (Her2) is over expressed in approximately 20-30% of breast cancers associated with an aggressive disease course a poor prognosis. A second IHC stain has been used to test for Her2/neu over-expression. The brown staining is scored visually by a pathologist using categories 0, +1, +2, +3 using bright field microscopy. A short course of the monoclonal antibody trastuzumab (Herceptin®), when administered with docetaxel, is effective in women with breast cancer who have an amplified Her2/neu gene.
Translocation activities are used as indicators of various cancers, including but not limited to breast cancer and other epithelial-based cancers. For example, upon Wnt signaling, unphosphorylated β-catenin accumulates in the cytosol and translocates into the nucleus functioning as a transcription factor for a number of target genes that cause tumor development. In the absence of Wnt signaling in normal tissue, phospho-β-catenin is located at the cell-cell adherens junctions associated with cadherins and is rapidly degraded in the cytosol. Glycogen synthase-3β kinase-3β (GSK3β)-mediated phosphorylation promotes rapid β-catenin degradation in proteasomes. In breast cancer, membranous β-catenin expression correlates with improved survival, while phospho-β-catenin cytosol expression correlates with poor survival. Tamoxifen resistant cell lines undergoing an epithelial to mesenchymal transition involves modulation β-catenin phosphorylation. β-catenin plays a role in other epithelial cancers as well.
Manual analysis of TMAs is expensive and time consuming and necessarily dependent on the pathologist's visual assessment. Although tissue micro-arrays (TMAs) have had the potential to provide a means for high throughput analysis of large patient cohorts, the large amount of information in the TMAs and the high dimensional nature of the data require automated and robust image analysis tools that have not previously been available.


An image forming apparatus has an image forming device, a supplying path for supplying a sheet to the image forming device, a conveying path for conveying the sheet on which an image is formed by the image forming device means, and a re-feeding path branched from the conveying path and adapted to direct the sheet to the image forming device again. The image forming apparatus also has a both-surface frame including the re-feeding path and removably mounted on a body of the apparatus, and a reversing unit including a longitudinal substantially vertical path connecting the conveying path to the re-feeding path and pivotally mounted on the both-surface frame.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus having a re-feeding path, and more particularly it relates to an image forming apparatus capable of permitting both-surface recording operation.
2. Background Art
An example of a conventional image forming apparatus having the both-surface recording function is shown in FIG. 1. In FIG. 1, a sheet containing cassette 3 containing a plurality of recording sheets S is removably mounted on a body 2 of an image forming apparatus A. A sheet supply roller 5, and a separating pad 6 urged against the supply roller 5 and adapted to separate the sheets S are disposed at a downstream side of the cassette 3. Further, a pair of upper and lower regist rollers 7 and an image bearing member 9 are disposed in order at a downstream side of the supply roller 5. A scanner unit 10 serves to illuminate laser light onto the image bearing member 9 in response to the information from the outside, thereby forming a latent image.
A process cartridge 11 including the image bearing member 9 comprises various function portions for forming a toner image on the image bearing member 9 through a known electrophotographic process. An image transferring device 12 for transferring the toner image onto the sheet S is disposed below the image baring member 9, and a sheet conveying guide plate 13 and a fixing device 15 and the like are disposed in order at a downstream side of the image transferring device.
At a downstream side of the fixing device 15, there is disposed a sheet reversing unit 6 pivotably mounted on the body 2 via a support shaft 16a. The sheet reversing unit 16 includes a face-up ejector tray 17, a face-down/both-surface switching flapper 19, a both-surface/face-up switching flapper 20, an ejecting path 21, a pair of reversing rollers 22, a reversing feeding path 25 and the like. Further, below a frame 26 of the body 2, there is disposed a re-feeding path 27 which includes an inlet guide 29 connected to a downstream end of the reversing feeding path 25, inlet conveying rollers 30, a lateral regist guide member 31, re-feeding rollers 32, a re-feeding path 33 and the like.
After the toner image is transferred from the image bearing member 9 onto the sheet S supplied from the sheet containing cassette 3 by means of the sheet supply roller 5, the toner image is fixed on the sheet by means of the fixing device 15.
When the both-surface recording operation is performed regarding the sheet S, the latter is directed to the sheet reversing unit 16 via the two flappers 19 and 20. After the both-surface/face-up switching flapper 20 is switched or changed to a both-surface recording mode, the switching operation of the face-down/both-surface switching flapper 19 is permitted.
When a trailing end of the sheet S ejected by the reversing rollers 22 rotated in directions shown by the arrows is detected by a reversing sensor 35, the sheet is sent to the reversing feeding path 25 by rotating the reversing rollers 22 in reverse directions and then is conveyed to the lateral regist guide member 31 by means of the inlet conveying rollers 30. A new toner image is transferred onto a back surface of the sheet S re-fed from the lateral regist guide member 31 by the re-feeding rollers 32, thus completing the both-surface recording.
FIG. 2 shows another example of a conventional image forming apparatus B having the both-surface recording function. In FIG. 2, the arrangement from the sheet containing cassette 3 to the fixing device 15 is the same as that of the apparatus shown in FIG. 1.
An ejection/both-surface switching flapper 37 is disposed at a downstream side of the fixing device 15, and intermediate rollers 39, upper ejecting rollers 40, an ejector tray 41 and the like are disposed in order above the flapper 37.
Further, at a lower both-surface sheet re-feeding area, there is arranged an introduction feeding path 49 including an introduction guide plate 42, a flapper 42a inlet conveying rollers 43, a conveying guide plate 45, a reversing sensor 46 and outlet conveying rollers 47. In addition, a reversing guide is protruded from the body 2 of the apparatus B. A re-feeding path 56 is constituted by the reversing guide 50, a lateral regist guide plate 51, a pair of sheet re-supply rollers 52, a flapper 53, a re-feeding guide 55 and the like.
When the both-surface recording is performed regarding the recording sheet S, the sheet S to a front surface of which the toner image was fixed by the fixing device 15 is conveyed onto the reversing guide 50 through the introduction guide plate 42 and the conveying guide plate 45. The sheet S re-fed by the paired re-supply rollers 52 is sent, through the re-feeding guide 55, to the image bearing member 9, where a new toner image is transferred onto a back surface of the sheet. Thereafter, the toner image is fixed on the back surface of the sheet by the fixing device 15, thus finishing the both-surface recording operation.
However, in the conventional image forming apparatus A shown in FIG. 1, although the sheet reversing unit 16 has the face-up rejecting elements such as the face-up ejector tray 17 and the like, since an ejecting angle of the sheet S on which the toner images were fixed is limited, the sheet reversing unit 16 inevitably protrudes rearwardly from the body 2 of the apparatus greatly.
In this case, when the both-surface recording mode is selected, since the sheet S having one surface on which the toner image was recorded is conveyed until a trailing end of the sheet is detected by the reversing sensor 35, a leading end of the sheet further protrudes from the rear end of the sheet reversing unit 16 rearwardly, thus causing a problem that a large installation space is required for installing the image forming apparatus A.
Further, if the sheet is jammed in the reversing feeding path 25 or the re-feeding path 27, since the sheet reversing unit 16 itself protrudes rearwardly, it is very difficult to remove the jammed sheet by swinging the sheet reversing unit 16 around the support shaft 16a. Thus, a maintenance space 56a must be provided for permitting the removal of the jammed sheet from the rear side of the apparatus, thereby making the compactness of the apparatus difficult.
On the other hand, in the conventional image forming apparatus B shown in FIG. 2, particularly when the fixing device 15 performs a heat or thermal fixing process, since the sheet S passed through the fixing device 15 is curled, the feeding path must be straight as much as possible, or, if the feeding path is curved, a radius of the curvature of the path must be great. In this respect, in the image forming apparatus B, the jamming of the sheet is difficult to occur in the both-surface sheet re-feeding portion; however, since the reversing guide 50 protrudes from the body 2 of the apparatus, it is also difficult to make the apparatus small-sized, like to the aforementioned conventional image forming apparatus A.
Further, in both of the above-mentioned image forming apparatuses A and B, since there are many limitations such as the mechanical accuracy of the both-surface feeding mechanism regarding the body 2, the reliability of connections such as the electrical connection between the both-surface feeding mechanism and the apparatus, the safety in the attachment of the both-surface feeding mechanism and an appearance treatment, and since the attachment of the both-surface feeding mechanism is very troublesome, it was practice to manufacture such image forming apparatuses by the makers. Therefore, there arose problems that the maintenance such as maintenance/inspection, replacement of parts and/or repair in the sheet reversing portion and the both-surface sheet feeding portion was worsened, and two inconsistent requirements (compactness of the apparatus and the wider jam treatment space regarding the jam treatment) had to be satisfied.

Image forming apparatus with both-surface frame including a retractable re-feeding path unit


A light scattering liquid crystal device having a double structure composed of (1) a first display panel of light scattering type which comprises a pair of transparent substrates each having a transparent electrode layer and a light controlling layer formed therebetween, said light controlling layer containing a liquid crystal material and a transparent solid substance and (2) a second display panel comprising a pair of transparent substrates each having an electrode layer and a liquid crystal material filled therebetween, selected from a guest-host type liquid crystal display panel containing a dichroic dye and a twisted or super-twisted nematic liquid crystal display panel having a pair of polarizers. The device achieves brightness and high contrast.

Liquid crystal devices for practical use include TN (twisted nematic) or STN (super-twisted nematic) mode displays using nematic liquid crystals. Those utilizing ferroelectric liquid crystals have also been proposed.
The conventional devices require a polarizer and are therefore limited in brightness of the display.
It is known that use of a polymer film having dispersed therein microencapsulated liquid crystals makes it possible to produce large-sized and still inexpensive and high-contrast liquid crystal devices requiring neither a polarizer nor an alignment layer. Encapsulating materials proposed to date include gelatin, gum arabic, polyvinyl alcohol, etc. as disclosed in JP-W-58-501631 (the term "JP-W" as used herein means an "unexamined published international patent application") and U.S. Pat. No. 4,435,047. Such polymer-liquid crystal dispersed systems also include a dispersion of liquid crystals in an epoxy resin matrix (JP-W-61-502128), a film in which phase separation between liquid crystals and a polymer is fixed on exposure to light (JP-A-61-305528; the term "JP-A" as used herein means an "unexamined published Japanese patent application"), a dispersion of liquid crystals in a special ultraviolet-curing polymer (JP-A-62-2231), and a process for filming a mixture of polyester, liquid crystals, and a solvent (JP-A-63-144321).
However, the liquid crystal devices obtained by the techniques disclosed in JP-W-58-501631, JP-W-61-502128, and JP-A-61-2231 need a high driving voltage of at least 25 V and, in most cases, from 50 to 200 V for obtaining sufficient transparency. Further, the contrast ratio achieved with the liquid crystal devices disclosed in JP-A-61-305528 and JP-A-162615 is 10 at the highest and, in most cases, 8 or less, which is below the level required for practical use.
In order to satisfy the above-described characteristics of liquid crystal devices which are important for practical use, i.e., low power driving properties, high contrast, and multiplex driving properties, JP-A-1-198725 discloses a liquid crystal device having such a structure that a liquid crystal material forms a continuous phase in which a polymer forms a three-dimensional network.
The disadvantage of the above-mentioned light scattering type liquid crystal devices, when used as a display panel, is that the background black or any other color is not cut off even with no voltage applied and is slightly visible through opaqueness because of utilization of light scattering. This has made display of direct view type difficult, and particularly made full color display impossible.

Double-layer liquid crystal device having a three dimensional network structure


Aspects of a method and system are provided for error detection for improving data integrity in protocol offloading. Aspects of the invention may enable receiving a block of data having a modulo-based input error detection code and an error correction term appended thereto, calculating an output error detection code of the block, combining the input error detection code and the error correction term to produce a modified error detection code, and comparing the calculated error detection code to the modified error detection code so as to detect an error in the block. The error correction term may be equal to a binary difference between the input error detection code and the output error detection code. The input error detection code and the error correction term may be combined by applying an XOR operation.

Error detection codes are used in all sorts of digital communication applications to enable the receiver of a message transmitted over a noisy channel to determine whether the message has been corrupted in transit. Before transmitting the message, the transmitter calculates an error detection code based on the message contents, and appends the code to the message. The receiver recalculates the code based on the message that it has received and compares it to the code appended by the transmitter. If the values do not match, the receiver determines that the message has been corrupted and, in most cases, discards the message.
Cyclic redundancy codes (CRCs) are one of the most commonly-used types of error correcting codes. To calculate the CRC of a message, a polynomial g(X) is chosen, having N+1 binary coefficients g0 . . . gN. The CRC is given by the remainder of the message, augmented by N zero bits, when divided by g(X). In other words, the CRC of an augmented message D(X) is simply D(X) mod g(X), i.e., the remainder of D(X) divided by g(X). There are many methods known in the art for efficient hardware and software implementation of CRC calculations. A useful survey of these methods is presented by Williams in "A Painless Guide to CRC Error Detection Algorithms" (Rocksoft Pty Ltd., Hazelwood Park, Australia, 1993), which is incorporated herein by reference.
CRCs are sometimes applied to more than one protocol of a data communications protocol stack. For example, in the protocol stack of the recently proposed Remote Direct Memory Access (RDMA) over Internet Protocol (IP) standard, CRCs are applied to both the Ethernet MAC and Marker PDU Aligned (MPA) protocols.
In high bandwidth systems, e.g., systems supporting 10 Gbps line rates, protocol stack processing may be resource-intensive for a host that interfaces with a communications network. Therefore, it is sometimes desirable for the host to offload a portion of the protocol stack processing to a network interface device (NID) that provides the host with an interface to the network. Protocols that are processed entirely by the NID are said to be "terminated" by the NID.
A drawback to such offloading is that the data transferred from the NID to the host may be corrupted by the NID and/or during transfer from the NID to the host. When the host does not terminate the data-intensive protocol or protocols that include the CRC calculation, the host is generally unable to detect such data corruption using methods known in the art. To overcome this drawback, it has been proposed that the NID calculate a CRC for the data to be transferred to the host. If the data has already been corrupted in the NID prior to calculation of the CRC, however, the CRC merely ensures accurate transmission of corrupted data to the host.
It has been demonstrated that data corruption by network hardware is a common occurrence. For example, Stone et al., in "When the CRC and TCP checksum disagree," SIGCOMM 2000, pp. 309-319, studied nearly 500,000 IP packets which failed the Transport Control Protocol (TCP), User Datagram Protocol (UDP), or IP checksum. They write, "Probably the strongest message of this study is that the networking hardware is often trashing the packets which are entrusted to it."
The above-mentioned U.S. patent application Publication No. 2003/0066011, to Oren, describes a method for error detection that includes receiving a block of data that is divided into a plurality of sub-blocks having respective offsets within the block, and processing the data in each of the sub-blocks so as to compute respective partial error detection codes for the sub-blocks. The partial error detection codes of the sub-blocks are modified responsively to the respective offsets, and the modified partial error detection codes are combined to determine a block error detection code for the block of data.

Method and system for error detection for improving data integrity in protocol offloading


A supplying apparatus supplies a combustible material capable of enhancing the sealing effects of a supplying system for supplying a combustible material, such as combustible wastes, to a fluidized-bed chamber, stably supplies a combustible material having an undefined shape, and reduces cost for installation. A facility is also provided for gasifying a combustible material using the supplying apparatus for supplying a combustible material, and a method of gasifying combustible materials is also provided. The supplying apparatus supplies a combustible material onto the fluidized bed of a fluidized-bed gasifier chamber or a fluidized-bed combustion chamber. A screw conveyor is inclined, with transportation of the combustible material directed upward, at an angle of 20 degrees or more and 80 degrees or less with respect to a horizontal plane, causing a bed material to flow into a conveyor casing of the screw conveyor.

1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a supplying apparatus for supplying a combustible material to a fluidized-bed gasifier chamber or a fluidized-bed combustion chamber, a gasification apparatus for gasifying a combustible material and a method for gasifying combustible materials in a fluidized-bed gasifier chamber or a fluidized-bed combustion chamber for use in a facility for gasifying or incinerating combustible materials such as municipal wastes, industrial wastes, waste plastic, biomass (thinned plants, wood chips, construction scrap wood, sludge, etc.), coal, RDF, wastes of high water contents, and the like.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, a gasification and slagging combustion method has been employed as a treatment method of combustible wastes such as various wastes. In the gasification and slagging combustion method, combustible wastes are pyrolyzed and gasified. If the amount of oxygen supplied is larger than a required amount of oxygen, then the combustible wastes are excessively combusted to increase the temperature of a furnace. In such a case, stable operation may be inhibited. Thus, it has been desired to strictly manage the amount of air to be supplied.
However, a treatment system of combustible wastes is generally operated at a pressure lower than an atmospheric pressure in many cases in order to prevent ejection of a gas. Accordingly, the treatment system is problematic in that the system cannot sufficiently prevent leakage of air from a waste supplying system, which supplies combustible wastes into a furnace. Although a mechanical device such as a sealing valve has been used to prevent leakage of air, such a mechanical device has problems such as engagement into a sealing portion and generation of a bridge at a sealing portion because of undefined shapes of wastes. Thus, it has practically been difficult to provide a sealing system to achieve stable operation.
As described above, it has been attempted in recent years to gasify combustible wastes into a generated gas without complete combustion, then purify the generated gas, and utilize the purified gas as a raw material. In such a case, if unnecessary air flows into the generated gas, then the quality of the generated gas is degraded. Therefore, a system which can stably supply combustible wastes having undefined shapes and minimize leakage of air has been desired.
This invention has been made in view of the problems described above. It is therefore an object of the invention to provide: a combustible material supplying apparatus capable of enhancing the sealing effects of a supplying system for supplying a combustible material, such as combustible wastes, to a fluidized-bed chamber, stably supplying a combustible material having an undefined shape, and reducing costs for installation; and further to provide a facility for gasifying a combustible material using the combustible material supplying apparatus; and further to provide a method of gasifying combustible materials.

Supplying apparatus for supplying combustible material, a gasification apparatus for gasifying combustible material and method for gasifying combustible material


A system for determining a position of a vehicle includes a camera, a marker, a storage device, an external parameter system, and a controller. The camera is configured to capture an image of an area adjacent the vehicle, the image including an edge. The marker detection device is configured to detect a marker in the area adjacent the vehicle. The storage device is configured to store map data, the stored map data including edge data. The positioning system is configured to determine the location of the vehicle relative to the stored map data. The controller is configured to combine the marker detected by the marker detection device and the edge in the image captured by the camera, and compare the combined marker detected by the marker detection device and the edge in the image captured by the camera to the stored map data.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to an autonomous vehicle. More specifically, the present invention relates to a system for determining or estimating a position of an autonomous vehicle.
2. Background Information
Conventional vehicle position determination systems compute the position of a vehicle by comparing an image of a stored three dimensional map and a camera image. In particular, an edge image is extracted from the actual image acquired by a vehicle camera with which the vehicle is equipped. The position and attitude angle of the vehicle camera is adjusted so that a virtual image from a three dimensional map which recorded the position and type of edge of the environment by three dimensions is projected on the positional attitude of the vehicle camera. Accordingly, the position and attitude angle in three dimensional space of the vehicle camera can be estimated.
Moreover, successive images from cameras can be compared to determine the movement of the vehicle. Specifically, by comparing the location of a plurality of matching pixels from successive images, distance information can be obtained. The distance information can be compiled to determine movement of the vehicle in various directions and angles.


A digital video disk stores data codes and multifunctional synchronization codes in a data structure. The synchronization codes contain type information code identifying whether the synchronization code is located in a code sequence at the beginning of the data block, the beginning of a data block sector other than the first sector in the data block, the beginning of a line, or the middle of a line. The type information is expressed by two alternative patterns, type information code 1 and type information code 2, expressing the same information and differing in the number of is in the 5-bit sequence, i.e., an odd or even number of 1s. Which one of the two type information code pattern is used is selected according to the DSV so as to minimize bias in the dc component of the frame following the synchronization code.

Data recorded to a magnetic disk, optical disk, or other such recording medium is conventionally recorded with parity bits or other redundant bits added to enable correction of reading errors occurring in the data during reproduction. While this enables error correction processing to be applied to the reproduced data, demand has grown in recent years for more robust error correction capabilities. One method of improving the error correction capability is to increase the number of redundant bits added to the data. Increasing the number of redundant bits is not particularly desirable, however, because of the reduced recording density this implies. One method of improving the error correction capability without also increasing the size of the error correction code is to increase the size of the data unit to which error correction processing is applied. For example, one data block may comprise plural sectors, and the data block is used as the error correction processing unit.
FIG. 18 is used to describe the data format of the data block conventionally used as the processing unit for error correction processing.
Each data block comprises 32 sectors, an attribute line, and a parity block. Each sector comprises four lines; to each sector line are written 129 code words identified as D(i,0)-D(i,128), each code word equivalent to one byte of data, and sixteen parity code words P(i,0)-P(i,15) corresponding to the data bytes. Note that "i" represents the line number in the data block. Lines 0-3 are assigned to sector 1, lines 4-7 to sector 2, . . . and lines 124-127 to sector 32. Each sector thus has a 516 byte capacity, including 512 bytes of user data and 4 bytes of CRC code data.
Line 128 is the attribute line to which the block attributes and the attributes of each sector in the block are recorded by data bytes D(128,0)-D(128,128). Parity words P(128,0)-P(128,15) for data bytes D(128,0)-D(128,128) are also recorded to line 128.
As a result, 129 code words of data D(0,j)-D(128,j) (where 0.ltoreq.j.ltoreq.128), and 129 code words of parity data P(0,k)-P(128,k) (where 0.ltoreq.k.ltoreq.15), are thus written columnwise to the data block.
Sixteen code words of parity data Q(0,j)-Q(15,j) for the columnwise data words D(0,j)-D(128,J), and 16 code words of parity data Q(0,m)-Q(15,m) (where 129.ltoreq.m.ltoreq.144) for the columnwise parity words P(0,k)-P(128,k), are written to the parity block.
An address is assigned to each data block containing the code words and parity words arrayed as described above, and is written to a particular location on the recording medium.
However, because the address is only written to the beginning of the data blocks thus formatted, and an address is not added to each sector, access and search times both increase as the block size increases.
More specifically, if data reading starts from some midpoint in a block, it is not possible to determine where in what block data reading started. It is therefore necessary to always start reading from the beginning of the data block, making it necessary to wait until the address at the beginning of the block is recognized when accessing any particular block.
Because the address can only be determined when reading starts at the beginning of a block, the average time required for an address to be read increases as the block size increases. This makes searches take longer.
While it is possible to add a frame number to each frame as a means of reducing access time, the code word must be lengthened to express all frame numbers, and the recording density of the recording medium drops because these code words must also be added to each frame. In addition, these frame numbers cannot be used for any other function.

Recording medium, recording method and apparatus, and reproduction method and apparatus

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.


The present compound is a novel perfluoropolyether represented by the following general formula: ##STR1## wherein m is an integer of 1 to 3 and n is an integer of 2 to 6. This compound is quite useful as an inert liquid used as a heat transfer mediums in the filed of electronic materials.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a novel perfluoropolyether compound.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Since fluorine-containing inert liquids such as perfluoropolyether compounds are excellent in chemical stability, heat stability, and electrical insulating properties, in the field of electronic materials, they are very useful as heat transfer mediums for vapor phase reflow soldering (VPS) and as liquids used in thermal shock tests, liquid burn-in tests, and gross tests.


A compliant interconnect with two or more layers of metal of two or more compositions with internal stresses is described herein.

The present invention is related to the fields of electronics and Microelectromechanical Systems (MEMS). In particular, the present invention is related to electrical packaging of integrated circuits, circuit boards, electrode arrays, or other devices with compliant interconnects.
In ultra low k-ILD (interlayer dielectric) technology, the stress on the ILD layers should be minimized. Compliant interconnects with the modulated compliance to minimize the effects of mechanical and thermal stress on the ultra low-k ILD layers while still providing sufficient load bearing capability are desired.


An engine output control system for a vehicle detects a degree of slip of driving wheels of the vehicle and determines engine output reduction requirement by which the output of the engine is to be reduced in order to converge the degree of the slip of the driving wheels on a target value according to the degree of slip detected. The output of the engine is reduced by the engine output reduction requirement when the engine speed is not lower than a preset engine speed and reduction of the engine output is inhibited when the engine speed is lower than the preset engine speed. The preset engine speed is changed according to the engine output reduction requirement so that the preset engine speed is higher when the engine output reduction requirement is large than when it is small.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an engine output control system for a vehicle.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In a so-called traction control system, the engine output is reduced independent from the amount of depression of the accelerator pedal of a vehicle when the slip of the driving wheels of the vehicle reaches a predetermined value so that the slip of the driving wheels converges on a target value. However when the engine output is reduced at a low engine speed, the engine can stall.
In order to overcome such a problem, in a traction control system disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 60(1985)-121129, reduction of the engine output is inhibited when the engine speed is lower than a preset engine speed (e.g., 600 to 2000 rpm). That is, in the traction control system, slip of the driving wheels is detected on the basis of the difference between the wheel speed of the driving wheels and that of the driven wheels, and when the slip of the driving wheels thus detected reaches a predetermined value, fuel supply to one or more of the cylinders of the engine is cut to reduce the engine output so that the slip of the driving wheels converges on a target value. When the engine speed is lower than a preset engine speed, fuel cut is inhibited.
Though the traction control system is advantageous in that the engine is prevented from stalling since fuel cut is inhibited when the engine speed is low, it gives rise to the following problems due to the fact that the preset engine speed is fixed.
That is, when the engine output reduction requirement is large, for instance, to such an extent that fuel supply to all the cylinders is to be cut, the engine can stall since the preset engine speed is relatively low for the engine output reduction requirement and the engine output is abruptly lowered. On the other hand when the engine output reduction requirement is small, for instance, to such an extent that fuel supply to only one cylinder is to be cut every other intake stroke, the engine output cannot be sufficiently reduced though the engine is not apt to stall in such conditions since the preset engine speed is relatively high for the engine output reduction requirement.

Engine output control system for vehicle


A thrust reverser is disclosed for a turbojet engine having a cowling with an inner cowling surface forming an outer boundary of a gas flow duct through which gases flow from a front towards a rear portion, the cowling having an outer cowling surface and at least one reverse thrust opening communicating with the gas flow duct. The thrust reverser has a thrust reverser door pivotally connected to the cowling so as to move between a forward thrust position and a reverse thrust position, the thrust reverser door having front and rear edge portions, an outer door surface and an inner door surface with at least one of the outer and inner door surfaces being flush with at least one of the corresponding outer and inner cowling surfaces when the thrust reverser door is in the forward thrust position. The thrust reverser also has at least one thrust reversing panel having an outer panel surface and an inner panel surface mounted on the thrust reverser door so as to move along a linear path of movement relative to the thrust reverser door as the thrust reverser door moves between the forward and thrust portions. When the thrust reverser door is in the forward thrust position, the inner panel surface is flush with the inner cowling surface and forms a portion of the boundary of the gas flow duct.

The present invention relates to a pivoting door thrust reverser for a turbojet engine, more particularly to such a thrust reverser having a panel slidably mounted on the pivoting thrust reverser door.
Turbofan-type turbojet engines are well known in the art and typically comprise a fan at the front of the turbojet engine which directs a flow of bypass air through a duct bounded on the inside by the engine cowling and on the outside by a fan cowling. The generally annular duct bounded by the engine cowling and the fan cowling may channel both the bypass flow and the primary exhaust gas flow at a downstream portion or may channel only the bypass flow.
In aircraft on which the turbojet engine is mounted outside of the airframe structure, the fan cowling and the engine cowling are configured to form boundaries of the bypass flow duct and to provide aerodynamic outer surfaces to reduce drag.
FIGS. 1 and 2 illustrate a known pivoting door-type thrust reverser associated with the fan cowling of a turbofan-type turbojet engine. As illustrated in FIG. 1, an upstream portion of the fan cowling 1 which defines the outer limits of the bypass flow duct is generally concentrically arranged about the turbojet engine (not shown) and generally comprises an external cowling panel and an internal cowling panel interconnected by a frame 6. The outer surface of the external cowling panel has an aerodynamic surface over which the air external to the engine passes during aircraft flight. The inner surface of the inner cowling panel defines the outer boundary of the bypass flow duct 15 through which the bypass flow air passes.
The fan cowling also comprises a thrust reverser, illustrated generally at 2, and a downstream fairing 3. The thrust reverser 2 comprises a door 7 pivotally attached to the cowling 1 such that it is movable between a closed, forward thrust position, illustrated in FIG. 1, and an open, reverse thrust position in which the upstream end (towards the left as viewed in FIG. 1) of the thrust reverser door 7 is moved outwardly from the cowling, while a downstream portion is moved inwardly into the bypass flow duct 15 so as to redirect at least a portion of the bypass flow through an opening in the fan cowling in a direction that has a reverse thrust component.
An actuator 8 for moving the door 7 between its forward thrust and reverse thrust positions may comprise a hydraulic cylinder mounted to the frame 6, and having an extendible and retractable piston rod connected to the thrust reverser door 7.
The thrust reverser door 7 has an outer door panel 9 and an inner door panel 11 joined together by an internal structure. The upstream end of the door 7 may have a deflector 13 to maximize the efficiency of the thrust reverser when the door 7 is in the reverse thrust position. When the door is in the forward thrust position, as illustrated in FIG. 1, the outer door panel 9 is substantially flush with the external surfaces of the upstream panel and the downstream fairing 3.
As illustrated in FIG. 2, a plurality of thrust reverser doors 7 may be incorporated into the fan cowling, such doors being circumferentially spaced around the periphery of the fan cowling. A portion 18 of the fan cowling extends from an upstream portion 4 of the cowling axially between adjacent thrust reverser doors 7 to provide structural rigidity to the fan cowling and to provide pivot mounting points for attaching the doors 7 to the fan cowling. French Patents 1,482,538 and 2,030,034 illustrate typical, known thrust reversers.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,605,411 discloses a pivoting door-type thrust reverser in which the deflector mounted on the upstream or forward end of the thrust reverser door is movable to an extended position when the door is in the reverse thrust position.
French Patent 2,618,853 discloses a thrust reverser in which the deflector is retracted when the door is in its forward thrust position to optimize engine performance.
In some applications, as illustrated in FIG. 1, the deflector 13 projects from the inner panel 11 of the thrust reverser door 7 even when the door is in its forward thrust position without extending into the bypass flow duct. This forms a cavity 16 facing inwardly into the bypass flow duct which will slightly degrade engine performance.
French Patent 2,680,547 discloses a thrust reverser having a combination of spoilers and deflectors to attempt to optimize the direction of exhaust flow.
French Patent 1,482,538 also discloses the use of a linear actuator affixed to the stationary upstream portion of the cowling and to the pivoting thrust reverser door at a point in an upstream portion of the door.
As noted previously, the presence of the cavity 16 when the thrust reverser door 2 in its forward thrust position will create disturbances in the gases flowing through the duct 15 and thereby degrade engine performance in the forward thrust mode.

Pivoting door thrust reverser with sliding panel


A method is provided for scheduling regenerative braking torque, including: sensing a position of an accelerator pedal; generating a torque request value in response to the sensed accelerator pedal position; determining a speed of operation of a motor/generator; determining a torque limit in response to the torque request value and the determined speed of the motor/generator; generating a regenerative braking command in response to the torque limit; and outputting the regenerative braking command to the motor/generator.

Environmental concerns and limited natural resources are driving modern internal combustion engines toward improved fuel efficiency. A hybrid power train is one system that can be used to improve the fuel efficiency of an engine. Hybrid power trains include at least two power sources, with at least one of the power sources including energy storage capability that can be utilized during at least certain operating conditions to recover kinetic energy from a moving vehicle.
Hybrid power trains that include a diesel engine permit use of an electric motor to speed up the response time (e.g., during acceleration) of the diesel engine, which are known to be inherently slow. This improves the drivability of the hybrid vehicle. Electric motors, however, have inherently very fast response times, both when providing positive torque for acceleration and negative torque for regenerative braking. If the transient characteristics of the electric motor are not limited, the resulting drivability will be unacceptable. This is particularly true for vehicles with electric drive, direct drive systems with no transmission and no clutch such as pure electric vehicles or series hybrid vehicles where there is no connection between the engine and the wheels. Therefore, further technological developments are desirable in this area.

System and method for regenerative braking torque scheduling


A composite article and a method of manufacture for a composite article which includes an outer layer having optically-light coloration, thereby providing an outermost surface ready for application of visually-distinct sublimation print are described.

This invention relates in general to articles of composite materials suitable for imprinting with sublimation dyes, and to a method of manufacturing such composite articles.
The manufacture of structural elements and other articles from composite materials, with high strength fibers embedded in a polymer matrix, is known in the art. Such composite materials have excellent strength to weight characteristics and wide application.
Known processes for the manufacture of such composite articles generally include forming a series of layers or plies, where each ply may be the same or different, and where the fibers in each ply may be wrapped with different orientations or braiding patterns to meet the requirements of a particular structure. The processes employed and the apparatus for practicing these processes are known to those skilled in the art. They include a pultrusion process and a resin transfer molding process. Fiber materials which have been employed in the art include aramid, glass, carbon, or graphite, as well as materials such as ceramics and boron. The polymer matrix material typically is a thermoset resin such as polyester or epoxy resin. Alternatively, a variety of thermoplastic resins such as nylon, polypropylene, polycarbonate and the like have been used.
Sublimation-printing is a technique to imprint indicia in the form of designs, logos, characters, etc. into an article. Generally, a sublimation dye is encapsulated by an inert carrier that releases the dye into the surface of the article upon application of an external force. The encapsulated dye is contacted with the article and an external force, such as heat and/or pressure, is applied to rupture the carrier, causing the dye to migrate directly into the surface of the article.
Many manufactured articles require labeling on an external surface for environmental, aesthetic, identification or safety purposes. Quite frequently, the surface of the article does not lend itself to imprinting with indicia that are visually distinct and highly perceptible. For example, the composite can have an optically dark surface, due to coloration of the constituent resins and fiber, i.e., the optical quality is inherent. Therefore, a surface coating of an optically light color is desired before imprinting indicia by sublimation. Otherwise, indicia are visually indistinct, or of low distinctiveness, from the surface of the composite.
Coatings previously used in making the composite surface optically light include pigmented paints and the like. After coating the composite surface with such an optically-light material, a sublimation dye is transferred to the coated surface of the composite, leaving the image imprinted into the coated surface. Consequently, the current state of the art for the preparation of composite articles having an outermost surface which provides an optically-light color for application of visually-distinct sublimation print requires at least three steps. These steps include forming the article, coating the surface of the article with an optically-light surface ready for application of visually-distinct sublimation print, and sublimation printing.
The term "into", as used herein, means that the sublimation dye penetrates and/or coats the outer surface of the article.
Accordingly, an object of this invention is to provide a method for forming a composite article having a surface that is ready for visually-distinct sublimation print.
A further object of this invention is to provide a composite article that has a surface ready for visually-distinct sublimation print.
Other general and specific objects of the invention will in part be obvious and will in part appear hereinafter.

Composite article for sublimation-printing and method of manufacture


A doll is provided which performs dance motions and may be used as an instructional aide. In a novel instructional method, a dancer is instructed to perform dance motions by observing and repeating the sequence of motions performed by the doll. Dance motions, such as the plié, are performed by the doll in a fluent, life-like manner.

Dancing dolls are well known in the art. Many dolls exist which mimic movements of a ballet dancer, however most simply rotate about an axis through one foot or leg. The motions of other common dancing dolls are frequently jerky and would not be useful in training a dancer to perform a smooth series of motions. A dancing doll which can execute specific dance motions in a manner so precise that it may be used for instructing dancers to learn those moves does not exist in the art.

Animated dancing doll and instructional method therewith


A sequential, time-integrated collector having an electronic controller that actuates either of two electrically-actuated valves, each connected to a water reservoir. At a preset time interval (e.g., every 30 minutes), time-integrated water samples are transferred into sample vials in a multi-sample carousel. Evaporation that could change the isotopic composition of a precipitation sample is minimized by sealing the opening of each sample vial by pressing each vial against a flat, low-friction surface, such as a Teflon® sheet, from the time each sample vial is filled until it is removed from the collector.

The present invention is directed, in general, to water sample collectors and, more particularly, to the sequential, time-integrated collection of precipitation, surface water, and ground water samples for analysis.
Large land-falling cyclones produce more than 8 inches of rain in 24 hours and impact the West Coast of the United States, particularly Northern California. In such hydrologic events, the amounts of chemicals and the amounts of isotopes vary in precipitation. The concentrations or relative changes in amounts of chemical constituents or isotopes may provide information to understand physical processes in these complex systems. To determine the relative amounts of oxygen and hydrogen isotopes, precipitation samples need to be collected from these storms at 15- or 30-minute intervals over a period of 24 to 48 hours. Increased understanding of these storms should improve forecasting and allow the National Weather Service of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to alert earlier the public, the military, and emergency services of these storms.
Various types of liquid sample collectors have been designed. Some collectors contain only one collection vessel, such as a bottle, and are used in bulk precipitation collection for acid-rain studies, for example. While other collectors contain 8 or 24 bottles, these collectors only allow 4 or 12 hours worth of collections, respectively, assuming 30-minute collection intervals. These collectors are inadequate for applications in which 48 hours worth of collections at 30-minute collection intervals are needed. For these types of applications, at least 96 collection vessels are needed to collect at least 96 separate water samples.
Collectors with sample vessels having volumes of 0.5 liter or greater have been used. These sample vessels are unsatisfactory due to the amount of headspace and consequent evaporation that results when low volume (e.g., 0.5 mL to 1 mL) precipitation samples are collected. Evaporation of water from a sample vessel after collection leads to isotopic fractionation, which changes the relative amounts of the hydrogen and oxygen isotopes of the water. To minimize evaporation of low volume samples, collectors are needed that use small bottles (e.g., about 20 mL in volume) to reduce headspace, and also that seal the bottles after collecting each sample.
There are also collectors that collect samples instantaneously or intermittently. These types of collectors typically load a fixed quantity of water at a specific time or at specific times, without collecting and homogenizing the fluid over a time interval before drawing a sample. These types of collectors are inadequate to accurately determine the relative amounts of isotopes in precipitation. To accurately determine the amounts of isotopes, time-integrated samples are needed. In other words, each sample collected needs to be representative of the entire collection interval for that sample. Otherwise, important information can be missed if the fluid is changing, such as the precipitation during a storm. For example, a narrow peak can be missed in a ground water or surface water tracer test when an instantaneous sample is collected at a predetermined interval.
Thus, a precipitation collector is needed that can collect multiple sequential, time-integrated samples as small as 0.5 mL at, for example, 30-minute intervals over an extended period of time, such as 48 hours or longer, and that can also minimize sample evaporation or hold it as close to zero as possible.

Sequential, time-integrated collector of precipitation, ground water, and surface water for analysis of isotopes

The United States of America as represented by the Secretary of the Interior


A switching rectifier circuit includes a pulse width modulation controller, a voltage switching circuit, a pulse width modulation comparator, an error amplifier, a voltage reference, a high threshold voltage comparator and a low threshold voltage comparator. A varying output voltage of the voltage regulator is sampled and compared to a high threshold voltage reference and a low threshold voltage reference. When the sampled output voltage is equal to or greater than the high threshold voltage reference the output voltage is decreased. When the sampled output voltage is equal to or less than the low threshold voltage reference the output voltage is increased.

The present invention relates generally to switching voltage regulators, and more particularly, to methods and systems for pulse width modulated switching voltage regulators.
Voltage regulators perform the important function of providing a constant voltage level. The voltage level can then be used as a reference or for powering devices in a repeatable, reliable manner of operation. By way of example, a regulated 5 volts DC can be used as a logical 1 reference value with a ground or 0 volts DC being a logical 0 reference. Similarly, a regulated 5 volts DC can be used to cause a transistor to switch at a repeatable switching speed. Increasing the voltage to greater than 5 volts DC may decrease the time required for the transistor to switch (e.g., increase the switching speed) but may also damage the transistor. Decreasing the voltage to less than 5 volts DC may increase the time required for the transistor to switch (e.g., decrease the switching speed) or prevent the transistor from switching at all. Further, a voltage less than 5 volts DC may or may not be sufficient to be detected as a logical 1 reference and instead may be erroneously interpreted as a logical 0.
As semiconductor device (e.g., transistors, transistor gates and channels, capacitors, resistors, line widths, etc.) sizes have decreased, the operating voltages have also decreased. As a result, the operating voltages have been reduced from 5 volts to a low are 3.3 volts and even 1.1 volts DC. As the operating voltage has been reduced, the operating voltage regulation requirements have become ever more strict. As a result, the regulated operating voltage must be maintained within a narrower voltage tolerance.
Linear regulator circuits are relatively power inefficient as compared to a typical pulse width modulated switching regulator circuit. Increased power efficiency is also a constant demand corresponding with shrinking semiconductor device sizes.
Unfortunately, typical pulse width modulated switching regulator circuits can allow the regulated voltage output to dip or rise outside an acceptable output voltage range between modulation pulses. The undesirable output voltage dips or rises are typically due to transient circuit loads having a frequency greater than the pulse width modulating frequency. The undesirable output voltage dips or rises can cause data errors and can result in inconsistent circuit operations of the circuits driven by the output voltage. There is a need for an improved pulse width modulated switching regulator circuit that compensates for higher frequency transient loads without substantially affecting the power efficiency of the pulse width modulated switching regulator circuit.

Fast response pulse width modulation control for switching regulator


Embodiments are generally directed to compression for compression for sparse data structures utilizing mode search approximation. An embodiment of an apparatus includes one or more processors including a graphics processor to process data; and a memory for storage of data, including compressed data. The one or more processors are to provide for compression of a data structure, including identification of a mode in the data structure, the data structure including a plurality of values and the mode being a most repeated value in a data structure, wherein identification of the mode includes application of a mode approximation operation, and encoding of an output vector to include the identified mode, a significance map to indicate locations at which the mode is present in the data structure, and remaining uncompressed data from the data structure.

In computer operations, the compression of data, in which a certain set of data is reduced in size, is commonly performed in order to minimize the amount of data to be transmitted or stored in memory. The resulting reduction can provide significant savings in required storage capacity, transmission time, and data handling.
Delta compression refers to a manner of storing or communicating data utilizing data encoding in the form of differences (or deltas) between sequential data, as opposed to complete files. The differences may be in the form of archival histories of changes in a set of data, wherein the discrete files expressing the differences are commonly referred to as deltas or similar terms. Delta compression including data encoding of the delta values, which may have many zero values if a particular data set includes many values that do not change significantly between data sets.
However, conventional delta compression does not provide satisfactory compression in all circumstances. For examples, certain sparse data structures such as the sparse matrices used in machine learning contain very large differences between neighboring numerical values. There are generally very few smooth gradients such as those that as are seen in image data. Such data structures can effectively defeat a conventional delta compression based scheme when applied in machine learning or other processing.

Compression for sparse data structures utilizing mode search approximation


A method of using hop acids for increasing food and energy uptake from feed by livestock is described which includes delivering the hop acids for oral ingestion to the animals by mixing the acids with livestock feed. The acids are mixed with the feed in an amount to inhibit certain types of undesirable bacteria in the livestock's digestive system, thereby increasing the production of propionate and lactate and decreasing the production of methane gas.

The present invention is directed to an organic food supplement and an animal feed. In particular, the invention is directed at replacing antibiotics in animal feed with hop acids.
Livestock, such as cattle, chickens, and pigs, are fed some of the cheapest foodstuffs that farmers can purchase. Animals that graze and eat low quality feed are subject to a diet contaminated with bacteria and protozoa. The rumen of farm animals is a complex system composed of a variety of bacteria and protozoa. Most of the gram-negative bacteria are beneficial to food and energy uptake, commonly referred to as "good" bacteria and protozoa, while gram-positive bacteria and protozoa reduce food and energy uptake, commonly referred to as "bad" bacteria and protozoa. Antibiotics in animal feed can kill bacteria and protozoa which negatively impact animal growth. However, high levels of antibiotics can sterilize the rumen causing the animal to become sick, and in some cases, die. Therefore, very low levels of antibiotics are used to control harmful bacteria in the rumen.
High levels of microorganisms within the animal's digestive track can reduce food intake efficiency and cause the animal to become sick and even die. Inefficient utilization of feed also adversely effects the environment by increasing production of animal waste products containing high nitrate levels and increasing animal methane emission. Horses and zoological animals also experience digestive disorders due to bacteria and protozoa infection.
Ionophores are a class of antibiotics commonly used in animal feed. Ionophores are polyether antibiotics that transport ions across biological membranes. Ionophores are molecules which have several oxygen atoms spaced throughout the molecule. The positions of the oxygen atoms create a cavity that can entrap cations. Ionophores have polar and non-polar regions that enhance cation entrapment and interaction with bacteria cell membranes. Ionophores are effective against gram-positive bacteria and protozoa but not gram-negative bacteria. By killing or controlling the growth of these microorganisms, animal feed efficiency and the health and well being of the animals can be improved.
Many people desire the ability to purchase and consume organic meat and poultry products. For example, Europe heavily regulates the sale, use and importation of non-organic meat and poultry products. Meat and poultry products containing antibiotics are not considered organic products. The use of ionophores in animal feed causes the meat from those animals to be considered non-organic. There is a strong desire to discover alternatives to antibiotics which can be used in animal feed. These and other limitations and problems of the past are solved by the present invention.

Hop acids as a replacement for antibiotics in animal feed


A rotary engine includes: a frame; a flywheel rotor having an axle rotatably mounted on the frame; a plurality of erectable pistons respectively mounted in an annular trough concentrically recessed in a rim of the flywheel rotor; and a cylinder block fastened on a housing secured to the frame and cooperatively forming an engine cylinder with the annular trough of the flywheel rotor, whereby each erectable piston is operatively erected beyond a cylinder head of the engine cylinder to dynamically define an instant combustion chamber among the cylinder head, the cylinder block, the piston and the annular trough of the rotor; and whereby upon combustion and explosion in the combustion chamber, the explosion gases will force and drive the erectable piston to rotate the flywheel rotor for outputting mechanical energy.

US 2010/0263622 also invented by the present inventor disclosed a rotary engine including one or plural combustion chambers formed around a turbine, and a movable plate formed adjacent to an opening of the combustion chamber rotated in a right angle and protruded from the turbine, whereby when the engine is operated for explosion in the combustion chamber, the movable plate will drive the turbine to rotate for producing mechanical energy.
However, such a prior art has defects such that an inside friction may occur between the rotatable movable plate (23) and the steady groove (31) of the slide member (3), therefore requiring an increased clearance to prevent friction and thereby consuming much energy of combustion to decrease the engine efficiency. Meanwhile, each movable plate (23) is pivotally mounted to the turbine (2) merely at a plate bottom portion. The explosion force after combustion will majorly impact upon the plate bottom portion of the movable plate to easily deform the movable plate to possibly cause shutdown of the engine operation.
The present inventor has invented the present rotary engine to improve the structure and efficiency of the rotary engine.


A conveyor system that includes a first set of rive belts having a first set of flights that can receive individual products at a given rate per product and quickly advance several individual package positions when the first set of flights are full to a discharge position. The first set of flights can pause for a discharge period that can be longer than individual products reception rate. During the pause period a second set of drive belts locates a second set of flights such that the next product that is delivered to the conveyor system, without interrupting the continuous flow is received by the second set of flights.

This invention relates to a conveyor system that can receive products at a continuous rate and discharges groups of products without stopping or interfering with the reception of products. Individual products can be deposited on the surface of a conveyor system at extremely fast rates. When individual products are being deposited at relatively slow rates it may be possible to remove groups of products at the same rate however as the rate of depositing individual products increases it becomes impossible to remove groups of products at the same rate. When this occurs either the rate of depositing individual products must be decreased or the conveyor system must be stopped to allow the group to be removed. This is particularly true when the individual products are deposited on the conveyor in a systematic order and it is desired to maintain this order in the group after it is removed.
As an example, when bags of a snack food are fed from a form, fill and seal machine to a conveyor system they can be continuously deposited on the conveyor receiving surface in a systematic order. If it is desired to place these bags into a carton it would be advantageous to pick up the bags of snack food in groups that would fill a row in the carton. However, if it requires twelve bags to fill a row in the carton and the bags of snack food are being deposited on the conveyor system at a rate of one bag per second and it require three seconds to remove the group of twelve bags while maintaining the systematic order that they were deposited in, then the system cannot be operated continuously. If the conveyor system is stopped for three seconds to enable the group of twelve to be properly removed, then it will be necessary to either divert two packages or stop the form, fill and seal machine. Neither solution is acceptable.
For the foregoing reasons, there is a need for a conveyor system that can receive products at a continuous rate and will permit a groups of products to be held for a period of time in excess of the per unit reception rate without stopping or interfering with the continuous reception rate of products.

Conveyor system that receives articles at a constant rate and batch discharges


The invention describes the use of an electrical pulse that is a single square wave to excite a piezoelectric crystal. This pulse is applied alternately to either side of the crystal at twice the nominal resonant frequency of the crystal. This method provides a significant increase in net drive power to the crystal without the need to provide a sine wave excitation of plus and minus voltage to the crystal.

The present invention relates to a system for ultrasonically exciting the a piezoelectric crystal used in an ultrasonic ranging device.
In North America and throughout the world, there are substantial numbers of propane fuel tanks installed outside residential and commercial premises to provide energy for heating, cooling and cooking. These tanks can range in size from ones which have a relatively small capacity (e.g. 50 gallons) to ones which have a relatively large capacity (e.g. 1000 gallons or more). Often, the propane fuel is sold by a propane distributor to its customers under a contract where the distributor provides the customer with the tank in return for the exclusive right to supply the customer with the fuel.
Accordingly, there is a need in the propane industry for a direct method of monitoring customer inventory. In this respect, there are existing fuel tank mounted mechanical gauges which can be installed to provide an approximate indication of inventory. However, the readings they provide are typically quite unreliable (e.g. an error range of plus or minus 10% to 20%). An option that would provide improved accuracy would be to install on each tank a totalizing flow meter like that used by a fuel truck when delivering fuel to a tank, or comparable to that used by utilities that supply electricity, natural gas or water to utility customers. Then, the total volume of fuel removed from the tank then could be recorded and regularly compared with the volume when the tank was filled. However, apart from the cost of installing and maintaining such precision flow meters, the customers of a propane distributor are often located in non-urban areas. The distance between such customers can be too large to justify the repetitive manual collection of usage data.
It is known to sense the level of liquid contained in a tank utilizing sonic measurement techniques; typically sonic or ultrasonic measurements made with the use of a piezoelectric crystal. If the level of liquid is known and the geometry of the tank is known, then the volume of liquid in the tank can be calculated based upon the measured level. However, when the liquid in question is propane and the tank in question is a propane tank, problems arise. One problem is the adequacy of acoustic coupling between the ultrasonic transducer and the fuel tank. If the coupling is poor, then it may not be possible to obtain a measurement, or any measurement made may be unreliable. Another problem is the voltage levels which are generated by the transducer. If relatively high voltages are involved, then regulatory approval may be difficult or impossible to obtain. Dominating any solution to such problems is the question of cost. A solution which enables direct measurement but which requires a costly installation on each fuel tank of each customer is an impractical solution.

Method of exciting a piezoelectric crystal


A motor system provided with one motor, two batteries, and two inverters further includes a charger which is connected to a first battery and supplies external power; and a control unit which controls drive of the first inverter and the second inverter to drive the motor. When the second battery is charged with the external power, the control unit drives the first inverter and the second inverter to allow power from the first inverter to be transmitted to the second battery through the motor and the second inverter while the motor is in a stationary state.

JP 2000-324871 A discloses a motor system including two power supplies and two inverters. In this motor system, one motor is driven by outputs from the two inverters. In this system, each phase of the star-connected motor includes two windings connected in series. One inverter is connected to a winding end of each phase, and the other inverter is connected to an intermediate point between the windings. Accordingly, it is possible to drive the motor by an output from one inverter, using the two windings (a first drive winding) connected in series and to drive the motor by an output from the other inverter, using the winding disposed in the inner side of the intermediate point (a second drive winding).
Furthermore, JP 2000-125411 A discloses a system including two power supplies' that is, a battery and a fuel cell, and two inverters which are respectively connected to the power supplies. Herein, outputs of the two inverters are respectively connected to both ends of a three-phase coil of one motor. In this system, the two inverters are controlled independently while the battery and the fuel cell are made to have an equal midpoint voltage so as to meet a requirement of output from a motor, changing output from the battery and without changing output from the fuel cell.


A hydraulic control system for an automatic transmission includes a first clutch acting as an input element at first, second, and third forward speed ranges, a second clutch acting as the input element at third and fourth forward speed ranges, a third clutch acting as the input element at an R range, a fourth clutch operating at P, R, N, and L range for performing an engine brake function by stopping a one-way clutch at the first, second, and third forward speed ranges, a first brake acting as a response element at the P, R, N, and L ranges, a second brake acting as a response element at second and fourth forward speed ranges, a first switch valve for distributing hydraulic pressure controlled by a first solenoid valve to a damper clutch in a torque converter and to clutch control valves for the first clutch, and a second switch valve for distributing hydraulic pressure controlled by a second solenoid valve to the second clutch and the first brake.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a hydraulic control system of an automotive automatic transmission.
2. Description of the Related Art
In an automatic transmission, gear shifting is generally performed in such a way that a transmission control unit TCU controls a plurality of solenoid valves for guiding hydraulic pressure so as to apply and release the pressure to and from specific friction elements, resulting in obtaining a target gear ratio in the transmission.
That is, if a shift lever is manipulated to indicate a target speed range, a manual valve in a hydraulic system responsively converts its ports to a corresponding speed range arrangement such that hydraulic pressure from an oil pump is distributed to expected hydraulic lines. The distributed pressure is selectively supplied to various friction elements via various valves under control of the TCU.
Thus, the shift performance of the automatic transmission is determined in accordance with how timely corresponding friction elements respond to the shift lever manipulation.
FIG. 4 shows a hydraulic circuit to be modified by adapting a hydraulic pressure control system of the present invention.
As shown in FIG. 4, hydraulic pressure generated by an oil pump 200 is regulated at a predetermined level by passing a regulator valve 202 and is then partially supplied to each friction element through a shift control part 204, and is partially supplied to a damper clutch control valve 208 via a torque converter control valve 206. Subsequently, the hydraulic pressure supplied to the damper clutch control valve 208 is fed as a damper clutch operation pressure in a torque converter TC and is partially fed as a control pressure to the shift control part 204 by being reduced via a reducing valve 210, or to the damper clutch control valve 208 under a control of a damper clutch control solenoid valve DCCSV.
The shift control part 204 comprises various solenoid valves, shift valves, a manual valve, and friction elements.
A forward clutch FWD/C of the shift control part 204 operates at all forward speed ranges using the hydraulic pressure fed from the manual valve 212 via a forward clutch control valve 214 under control of a forward clutch solenoid valve FCCSV, and a 3-4 clutch 3-4/C and a low-reverse brake LR/B operates respectively at forward 3 and 4 speed ranges and at P, R, N, and L ranges using the hydraulic pressure fed from the manual valve 212 via a 3-4/low-reverse control valve 216 which is controlled by control pressure of a 3-4/low-reverse solenoid valve LRSV and a 3-4/low-reverse timing valve 218 which is controlled by a L range pressure from the manual valve 212.
However, this conventional hydraulic pressure control system has a drawback in that there exist two separate solenoid valves for the damper clutch and the forward clutch so as to cause the hydraulic system and a control algorithm therein to be complicated.
Furthermore, the usage of the L range pressure as the control pressure for the 3-4/low-reverse timing valve causes a shift shock since hydraulic pressure is supplied to the low-reverse brake in a state where the pressure applied to the 3-4 clutch is completely released, when shifting the range from high speed of the D range to the L range.
The present invention has been made in an effort to solve the above problems.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a hydraulic control system of an automotive automatic transmission capable of preventing shift shocks during N-D and D-L range shift as well as simplifying a structure of the system.
To achieve the above object, a hydraulic control system of the present invention comprises a first clutch acting as an input element at first, second, and third forward speed ranges, a second clutch acting as the input element at third and fourth forward speed ranges, a third clutch acting as the input element at an R range, a fourth clutch operating at P, R, N, and L range for performing an engine brake function by stopping a one-way clutch at the first, second, and third forward speed ranges, a first brake acting as a response element at the P, R, N, and L ranges, a second brake acting as a response element at second and fourth forward speed ranges, a first switch valve for distributing hydraulic pressure controlled by a first solenoid valve to a damper clutch in a torque converter and to clutch control valves for the first clutch, and a second switch valve for distributing hydraulic pressure controlled by a second solenoid valve to the second clutch and the first brake.

Hydraulic control system for automatic transmission


A data storing/reproducing apparatus includes a storing unit for storing inputted data, a range designating unit for designating an arbitrary range within the inputted data, an outputting unit for outputting the data stored in the storing unit, and a control unit for not outputting data in a range designated by said range designating unit when the data stored in the storing unit is outputted from the outputting unit. In this data storing/reproducing apparatus, when voice or sound is externally entered to be stored in the storing unit, and voice data is reproduced/outputted, a range used to limit the voice data output is set by the range setting unit. Then, when the data stored in the storing means is outputted by the outputting unit, since no data is outputted only in the designated range under control of the control unit, the secrecy of the stored voice data can be maintained.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to a data storing/reproducing method, a data storing/reproducing apparatus, and a recording medium for recording thereon a data recording/reproducing program. More specifically, the present invention is directed to data recording/reproducing method/apparatus for limiting reproduction outputs of recorded data.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Conventionally, various types of storing/reproducing apparatuses are known in the field. In one conventional storing/reproducing apparatus, a sound (voice) signal externally supplied is A/D-converted (namely, coded) into sound data, and then the sound data is stored into a semiconductor memory such as a RAM. The coded sound data stored in the RAM is read by operating a reproducing switch to be decoded (namely, D/A-converted), so that the sound is produced.
On the other hand, there are voice data which are not wanted to be disclosed to third parties among voice data recorded by an individual. However, in the conventional recording/reproducing apparatuses, when the reproducing switch is manipulated, anyone can hear the contents of the recorded data. Therefore, secrecy of the recorded data could not be maintained.
To avoid the above-described problem, various sorts of electronic notebooks and personal computers are commercially available. That is, in these appliances, passwords are previously determined, and are entered by using character keys to be stored. Then, character data such as names and telephone numbers are not displayed, or not erased unless the correct passwords are inputted.
In the case that such a password technique is utilized in the voice recording, namely where the voice cannot be reproduced unless the proper password is entered, there is a problem in that voice recordings whose secrecy need not be maintained could not be reproduced either.
Also, there is another problem in that even when the reproducing switch is manipulated, if no voice is reproduced, then the user could not grasp the actual condition. That is, the user could not understand whether voice data could not be reproduced because the password had been set or because no voice data had been recorded.
Furthermore, in order to avoid erroneous erasing of voice data, for instance, the such conventional devices do not enable voice data to be overwritten on previously stored voice data unless the correct password is entered. In this case, the correct password must be entered every time the voice data is overwritten. This results in very complex/cumbersome operations.

Data recording and reproducing apparatus capable of detecting an input for controlling an output