In a resistively heated heat-loss pressure gauge, electrical current is switched between a sensing element and a compensating element at different duty cycles. As a result, the sensing element is heated relative to the compensating element. A fixed resistance is placed in series with at least the compensating element. The current source applies current to heat the sensing element to a temperature at which the resistance of the sensing element matches the combined resistance of the compensating element and the fixed resistive element.

The rate of heat transfer through a gas is a function of the gas pressure. Thus, under certain conditions, measurements of heat transfer rates from a heated sensing element can, with appropriate calibration, be used to determine the gas pressure. This principal is used in the well-known Pirani gauge.
Many Pirani gauges comprise temperature sensitive sensing and compensating resistances in separate legs of a Wheatstone bridge. The compensating resistance is sized to minimize self-heating with current applied through the two resistances. The resultant resistance differences with heating of the sensing resistor is indicative of pressure of the surrounding environment.
In more recent heat loss gauge implementations presented in U.S. Pat. No. 6,658,941, the sensing element and compensating element are of like dimensions, but an additional heating current is applied to the sensing element to boost its temperature. Again, the relative resistances of the sensing and compensating elements with increase in temperature of the sensing element are indicative of the pressure of the surrounding environment. One implementation relies on a Wheatstone bridge, while another relies on a fixed ratio of current flow through the resistive elements under control of a feedback circuit responsive to the sensed resistances.

Method of operating a resistive heat-loss pressure sensor


On determining operating conditions for a nonvolatile semiconductor memory including a MOSFET (Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field-Effect Transistor), measurement is made, before completion of manufacture of the nonvolatile semiconductor memory and after completion of manufacture of the MOSFET, of characteristics of the MOSFET to obtain parameters which are used in simulating an operation of the nonvolatile semiconductor memory. By using the parameters, simulation of the operation of the nonvolatile semiconductor memory is executed to obtain a simulation result which is preferably a result relating to deterioration of operation characteristics of the nonvolatile semiconductor memory. The operating conditions for the nonvolatile semiconductor memory are obtained from the simulation result. The nonvolatile semiconductor memory may be an EEPROM (Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory).

This invention relates to a nonvolatile semiconductor memory, typically an EEPROM (Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory), including a MOSFET (Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field-Effect Transistor) and, in particular, to a method of predicting the life of a nonvolatile semiconductor memory as a predicted life and determining operating conditions for the nonvolatile semiconductor memory so that the predicted life achieves an objective value.
From a practical standpoint, it is required in manufacture of VLSI (very-large-scale integrated) circuits that manufactured products can perform their functions throughout their intended useful life, in other words, that the manufactured products are excellent in reliability. In order to achieve an excellent reliability of the products, attempts have been primarily made to improve a manufacturing process. In addition, it is important for a manufacturer to better predict the reliability of his products. In particular, when the reliability is deteriorated due to a particular type of reliability failure mechanism, it is critical for the manufacturer to detect the reliability failure mechanism.
It is believed that the deterioration in reliability of an EEPROM results from two major reliability failure mechanisms. The first mechanism is responsible for early reliability failures and involves submicroscopic defects present in a gate dielectric film (may be referred to as either a tunnel film or a tunnel dielectric film) of the EEPROM. The second mechanism is responsible for extensive reliability failures and involves defects or damages produced in the tunnel film after operation of the EEPROM. A so-called device life depends upon the second mechanism. As will later be described in detail, electrons pass through the tunnel film during operation of the EEPROM. The passage of the electrons causes the defects or the damages to occur in the tunnel film. The presence of the defects or the damages in the tunnel film will result in fluctuation of threshold levels of the EEPROM. Under the circumstances, it is a strong demand in view of the reliability of the tunnel film to predict in a factory stage post-operation characteristics of the EEPROM after operation and to assure the reliability of the products.
In the past, once a product had been completely manufactured, no way existed of predicting the life of the product. It has been a general practice to use screening procedures in which actual products are repeatedly tested to eliminate those products judged as failed products. However, the screening procedures are disadvantageous in that all the products are equally deteriorated through screening tests and that the life of good products surviving the screening tests is not known at all. In order to solve the above-mentioned problems, a proposal is made of a method of predicting a product life and is disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 195060/1991. In this method, measurement is made of the erase speed of ICs. The percentage of erased bits is plotted as a function of the applied gate threshold voltage. The percentage of bits located in an erase tail region of distribution is then identified. The bits located in the erase tail region are erased at a relatively high speed as compared with the remaining bits in an array. If the number of bits in the erase tail region exceeds a certain percentage of the total bits in the array, the IC is classified as one which is likely to suffer early endurance failure. Specifically, in the above-mentioned Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. 195060/1991, if the number of bits in the erase tail region of a device exceeds approximately 6% of the total bits in the array, the device is downgraded as less reliable. According to this method, it is possible to relatively easily and quickly carry out the screening tests as compared with known methods and to prevent deterioration through the screening tests.
In the above-mentioned conventional technique, however, the screening tests rely upon the early failures. In other words, the screening tests are to eliminate failed products very rapidly deteriorated. This technique is insufficient with respect to prediction of the life and the reliability of "good products" surviving the screening tests.
Furthermore, the prediction of the life in the above-mentioned technique can not be carried out until the device is completely manufactured. If the life then predicted does not reach the intended life, all products having been completely manufactured can not be shipped or delivered. Such problem will be avoided if the prediction of the life is carried out in an early stage of a manufacturing process of EEPROMs.

Method of determining operating conditions for a nonvolatile semiconductor memory


A method for controlling access to an entrance may include receiving, via a network from a user terminal associated with a user, identity information and biological information related to the user. The method may also include obtaining a first determination whether the identity information matches the biological information. The method may also include obtaining a second determination whether the identity information has been registered in response to a result that the identity information matches the biological information. The method may also include transmitting the biological information to one or more authorization devices to provide a permission to the user in response to a result that the identity information has been registered. The permission may permit the user to access the entrance by inputting the biological information related to the user through one of the one or more authorization devices.

With the rapid development of cities, security management of exclusive areas, such as private residences, businesses, and governments, construction sites, office buildings, laboratories, etc., is important. Only authorized persons (e.g., community residents, company staff, members of an institution) are allowed to enter these exclusive areas. Smart locks may be employed on doors or mechanical barriers at entrances of the exclusive areas to control access to the entrances, and to protect valuable contents and occupants from outside. Authorization to unlock the smart locks may be provided to the authorized people to access the entrances. When people with the authorization input into the smart locks their biological information (e.g., finger prints, facial features, eye patterns, voice characteristics, or handwriting), the smart locks then are automatically unlocked. However, how efficiently that a security system can provide such authorization is still a major concern. Thus, it is desirable to provide systems and methods with efficient authorization of access to an entrance.

Systems and methods for controlling access to an entrance


A computer based system, method, and computer program product for performing verification between two parties. The system generates buyer and seller sample data from data stored on buyer and seller systems based on a determined transaction time and the account numbers. The system sends the generated sample data to an administrator system, if a comparison between the generated buyer and seller sample data is positive. The administrator system completes the transaction, if the sent data compares positively to data previously stored in the administrator system.

Electronic transaction systems have been implemented as an electronic check, a debit card, a stored value card, electronic cash or the like. These systems and others are, to some extent, trying to model real cash currently passing in the real world. Real cash is easy to carry, easy to authenticate, transferable, untraceable, and anonymous. However, many of these systems fail to truly provide a simple system that can simulate real cash with a high level of assurances that the occurring electronic transaction is safe and secure.

Electronic verification system and method


A storage apparatus and method may store received data streams that each have data blocks distributed over a plurality of transmission frames. Adjacent memory addresses are allocated to store the data streams. For each data stream, a set of adjacent allocated memory addresses is assigned to store the corresponding data blocks such that sets having adjacent memory addresses are assigned to the data streams in an order of the data streams defined by a descending number of frames containing a data block of the respective data stream. Data of each received data block are stored at the assigned memory addresses of the storage component as each data block is received. The set of memory addresses assigned to each data stream are de-allocated, after the stored data stream is retrieved, such that the sets of memory addresses are de-allocated in the reverse order they were assigned to the data streams.

In a radio communication, data is transmitted in units of a certain time frame called a "radio frame." When a series of data is transmitted, the smaller the proportion of continuous errors (burst errors) in the transmission time of this data, the higher accuracy in error correction can be obtained on the receiving side. Therefore, this data maybe mapped to a plurality of radio frames and transmitted. In the 3GPP (3rd Generation Partnership Project) specification in particular, 1, 2, 4 or 8 radio frames are used according to the types and number of data pieces to send a series of data pieces.
When a plurality of types of data is transmitted simultaneously, data pieces to be mapped to the same radio frame are combined and a string of combined data pieces is mapped to the radio frame. Here, the data pieces to be transmitted simultaneously are not always transmitted with the same number of radio frames. That is, when for example, two kinds of data are transmitted, one type of data may be transmitted with two radio frames and the other type of data may be transmitted with four radio frames.
The data on the radio frames transmitted as described above is demodulated frame by frame at a reception apparatus and when a plurality of data pieces is combined, the data is divided into their respective data pieces and stored in a storage apparatus such as a memory for each data. When received data is the one sent with one frame, a series of data pieces has been received when one frame of data is received, and therefore the data stored in the storage apparatus is read at this point in time and subsequent processing such as frame combination and forward error correction is carried out. On the other hand, when received data is the one sent with a plurality of frames, a series of data pieces has not been received yet when one frame of data is received, and therefore data pieces to be received with subsequent radio frames are stored one by one in the storage apparatus. Then, after all radio frames including the series of data pieces is received, the data stored in the storage apparatus is read and subjected to subsequent processing such as frame combination and forward error correction.
In this process, there are various methods of securing storage areas to store the received data pieces in a storage apparatus such as a method of securing storage areas for the received data pieces in the order in which they are received or a method of securing storage areas corresponding in number to radio frames including their respective data pieces.
However, in the case of the method of securing storage areas for received data pieces for each radio frame in the order in which they are received, a series of data pieces spanning a plurality of frames is stored separately for every frame and at the same time a complete series of data is read from the storage apparatus for subsequent processing and the area where the relevant data was stored becomes a free space, which causes the area used in the storage apparatus to become thinned out, resulting in a problem that the required storage capacity increases.
Furthermore, in the case of the method of securing storage areas corresponding in number to radio frames including the relevant data pieces, when there is a plurality of data pieces spanning a plurality of radio frames, the area used in the storage apparatus may become thinned out as in the above described case resulting in a problem that the required storage capacity increases.
Specific examples of these problems will be explained with reference to FIGS. 1 to 3 below.
FIG. 1 illustrates a configuration example of radio frames that transmit a plurality of data pieces. As shown in the figure, data pieces A to J are transmitted with radio frames #1 to #4 and the radio frame #1 transmits the parts corresponding to the 1st frames of the data pieces A to D. Furthermore, the radio frame #2 transmits the part corresponding to the 1st frame of the data piece E and the parts corresponding to the 2nd frames of the data pieces B and C. In the like manner, the radio frames #3 and #4 transmit their respective data pieces. In the case of the data pieces A, D, E, F, I and J, one frame carries their complete set of data, while in the case of the data pieces B, G and H, two frames carry their complete set of data and in the case of the data piece C, four frames carry a complete series of data.
When storage areas are secured for the data pieces transmitted in this way in the order in which they are received, the state of the areas used is as shown in FIG. 2. As shown in FIG. 2, with the radio frame #1 the storage areas are secured for the parts corresponding to the 1st frames of the data pieces A to D which are stored one by one. The data pieces A and D which have their complete set of data with only the radio frame #1 are read for the subsequent processing and the areas of the data pieces A and D are released. In the case of the radio frame #2, storage areas are secured for the part corresponding to the 1st frame of the data piece E and parts corresponding to the 2nd frames of the data pieces B and C, which are stored one by one. At this time, the part in which the data piece A was stored was released and remains free, but since the amount of data of the parts corresponding to the 2nd frames of the data pieces B and C and the amount of data of the part corresponding to the 1st frame of the data piece E are greater than the data piece A, it is not possible to store the parts of the data pieces B, C and E using only this free space. Furthermore, if the parts of the data pieces B, C and E are divided and the above described free space is used for them, controlling these storage areas would be very complicated.
Likewise, storage areas are secured for the respective data pieces in the order in which they are received and the data pieces are stored. Here, for example, when the data included in the radio frame #3 is stored, the data C is stored in different pieces away from one another though they constitute a series of data pieces. Because of this, the processing when outputting a series of data pieces for subsequent processing becomes complicated. Furthermore, when even the data included in the radio frame #4 is stored, the areas used are thinned out, which prevents effective use of storage areas and increases the required storage capacity.
Furthermore, the state of the areas used when storage areas corresponding in number to the radio frames including the respective data pieces shown in FIG. 1 are secured and the data pieces are stored is as shown in FIG. 3. As shown in FIG. 3, in the case of the radio frame #1 , storage areas are secured for the data pieces A to D according to the number of radio frames that include these data pieces, and these data pieces are then stored. That is, storage areas corresponding to one frame for the data pieces A and D, two frames for the data piece B and four frames for the data piece C are secured. The data pieces A and D which have their complete set of data with only the radio frame #1 are read for the subsequent processing and the areas for the data pieces A and D are released. In the case of the radio frame #2, the parts corresponding to the 2nd frames of the data pieces B and C are stored in the secured areas and for the data piece E, a storage area corresponding to one frame is secured and the data piece E is stored there. At this time, the part in which the data piece A was stored was released and remains free, but since the amount of data of the part corresponding to the 1st frame of the data piece E is greater than the data piece A, it is not possible to use this free space.
Then, storage areas are secured for all the relevant data pieces when the start frame of each data piece is stored in the like manner. In this case, too, when, for example, data pieces up to the ones included in the radio frame #4 are stored, the areas used remain thinned-out, which prevents effective use of storage areas and increases the required storage capacity.

Apparatus and method for efficient storage of data streams that each comprise separately transmitted data blocks

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd.


In a wavelength converted semiconductor light emitting device with at least two wavelength converting materials, the wavelength converting materials in the device are arranged relative to the light emitting device and relative to each other to tailor interaction between the different wavelength converting materials in order to maximize one or more of the luminous equivalent, color rendering index, and color gamut of the combined visible light emitted by the device.

1. Field of Invention
This invention relates to wavelength-converted semiconductor light-emitting devices.
2. Description of Related Art
Semiconductor light-emitting devices including light emitting diodes (LEDs) are among the most efficient light sources currently available. Materials systems currently of interest in the manufacture of high-brightness light emitting devices capable of operation across the visible spectrum include Group III-V semiconductors, particularly binary, ternary, and quaternary alloys of gallium, aluminum, indium, and nitrogen, also referred to as III-nitride materials. Typically, III-nitride light emitting devices are fabricated by epitaxially growing a stack of semiconductor layers of different compositions and dopant concentrations on a sapphire, silicon carbide, III-nitride, or other suitable substrate by metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD), molecular beam epitaxy (MBE), or other epitaxial techniques. Sapphire is often used as the growth substrate due to its wide commercial availability and relative ease of use. The stack grown on the growth substrate typically includes one or more n-type layers doped with, for example, Si, formed over the substrate, a light emitting or active region formed over the n-type layer or layers, and one or more p-type layers doped with, for example, Mg, formed over the active region. III-nitride light emitting devices efficiently emit UV through green light.
Illumination systems have been proposed which convert the color of light emitted by light emitting diodes by means of a fluorescent material such as a phosphor.
A dichromatic illumination system, which mixes the primary emission of a blue LED with light emitted by a yellow phosphor is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,998,925. A Y3Al5O12:Ce3+ phosphor is coated on a III-nitride LED, and a portion of the blue light emitted from the LED is converted to yellow light by the phosphor. Another portion of the blue light from the LED is transmitted through the phosphor. Thus, this system emits both blue light emitted from the LED, and yellow light emitted from the phosphor. The mixture of blue and yellow emission bands are perceived as white light by an observer with a CRI between about 75 and about 80 and a color temperature, Tc, that ranges from about 6000 K to about 8000 K.
However, white light LEDs based on the dichromatic approach can only be used to a limited extent for general-purpose illumination, on account of poor color rendering caused by the absence of red color components.
A red-deficiency-compensating illumination system is illustrated in FIG. 1 and described in more detail in U.S. Pat. No. 6,351,069. LED 34 of FIG. 1 is designed to produce white output light that is well-balanced with respect to color to provide illumination for good color rendition. "The LED 34 includes the Gallium Nitride (GaN) die 12 that is positioned on the reflector cup lead frame 14 and is electrically coupled to the leads 16 and 18. The leads 16 and 18 provide excitation power to the GaN die 12. The GaN die 12 may generally be in a shape of a square. In the preferred embodiment, the GaN die 12 is configured to emit primary light having a peak wavelength of 470 nm, which lies within the blue region of the light spectrum, i.e., blue light. The GaN die 12 is covered by a spacing layer 36 made of a transparent material. The transparent material may be clear epoxy or glass.
"Adjacent to the spacing layer 36 is a fluorescent layer 38. The fluorescent layer 38 includes the fluorescent material 22 and a second fluorescent material 40. The fluorescent material 22 has a property to absorb the primary light and emit secondary light having a first peak wavelength, while the fluorescent material 40 has a property to absorb the primary light and emit secondary light having a second peak wavelength. Preferably, the secondary light emitted by the fluorescent material 22 has a broadband spectral distribution centered in the yellow region of the visible spectrum. However, the secondary light emitted by the fluorescent material 40 has a . . . spectral distribution that is intense in the red region of the visible spectrum. Thus, when the primary light and the secondary lights emitted by the fluorescent materials 22 and 40 are combined, white light is created that is rich in red color, in addition to other colors. The peak wavelengths of the secondary lights depend on the composition of the fluorescent materials 22 and 40, in addition to the peak wavelength of the primary light.
Layer 38 including the two fluorescent materials is a phosphor-resin mixture that "includes two fluorescent materials that are combined with a resin paste." The phosphor-resin mixture "is deposited over the encapsulation layer to form a fluorescent layer that uniformly covers the encapsulation layer. The deposited phosphor-resin mixture may then be gelled, i.e., partially cured." Thus, in the red-deficiency compensating system of U.S. Pat. No. 6,351,069, two fluorescent materials are mixed together, then suspended in a resin layer.

Wavelength converted semiconductor light emitting devices


A conditioner disk for use on a polish pad in chemical mechanical polishing process includes a base structure a plurality of curved blades supported by the base structure. The blades radiate outwardly from a center region of the base structure and curve in a common direction.

The present invention relates generally to chemical mechanical polishing of substrates, and more particularly to a conditioner disk for use in chemical mechanical polishing.
Integrated circuits are typically formed on substrates, particularly silicon wafers, by the sequential deposition of conductive, semiconductive or insulative layers. After each layer is deposited, the layer is etched to create circuitry features. As a series of layers are sequentially deposited and etched, the outer or uppermost surface of the substrate, i.e., the exposed surface of the substrate, becomes successively less planar. This non-planar outer surface presents a problem for the integrated circuit manufacturer as a non-planar surface can prevent proper focusing of the photolithography apparatus. Therefore, there is a need to periodically planarize the substrate surface to provide a planar surface. Planarization, in effect, polishes away a non-planar, outer surface, whether a conductive, semiconductive, or insulative layer, to form a relatively flat, smooth surface.
Chemical mechanical polishing is one accepted method of planarization. This planarization method typically requires that the substrate be mounted on a carrier or polishing head, with the surface of the substrate to be polished exposed. The substrate is then placed against a rotating polishing pad. The carrier head may also rotate and/or oscillate to provide additional motion between the substrate and polishing surface. Further, a polishing slurry, including an abrasive and at least one chemically reactive agent, may be spread on the polishing pad to provide an abrasive chemical solution at the interface between the pad and substrate.
Important factors in the chemical mechanical polishing process are: substrate surface planarity and uniformity, and the polishing rate. Inadequate planarity and uniformity can produce substrate defects. The polishing rate sets the time needed to polish a layer. Thus, it sets the maximum throughput of the polishing apparatus.
It is important to take appropriate steps to counteract any deterioration of the polishing pad which could present the possibility of either damaging the substrate (such as by scratches resulting from accumulated debris in the pad) or reducing polishing speed and efficiency (such as results from glazing of the pad surface after extensive use). The problems associated with scratching the substrate surface are self-evident. The more general pad deterioration problems both decrease polishing efficiency, which increases cost, and create difficulties in maintaining consistent operation from substrate to substrate as the pad decays.
The glazing phenomenon is a complex combination of contamination, thermal, chemical and mechanical damage to the pad material. When the polisher is in operation, the pad is subject to compression, shear and friction producing heat and wear. Slurry and abraded material from the wafer and pad are pressed into the pores of the pad material and the material itself becomes matted and even partially fused. These effects reduce the pad's roughness and its ability to apply fresh slurry to the substrate.
It is, therefore, desirable to continually condition the pad by removing trapped slurry, and unmatting, re-expanding or re-roughening the pad material. The pad can be conditioned after a number of substrates are polished. The pad can also be conditioned at the same time substrates are polished.

Conditioner disk for use in chemical mechanical polishing


A tool with an engine, a shaft, and a recoil starter pulley coupled to the shaft for rotation about an axis. A starter pull rope for winding and unwinding around the recoil starter pulley. An air chamber shroud extending about at least a portion of the pulley, the rope extending from the pulley through the shroud. A tube enclosing a portion of the rope and extending from a location adjacent to and aligned with the pulley to a location at an exterior of the shroud that is axially offset from the pulley. The tube may have flared ends to reduce gradual wear of the rope. The tube alters a trajectory of the pull rope to be substantially offset from the plane of the starter pulley so as to avoid interfering with neighboring structures inside the tool.

A pull rope for starting an engine is well known in the art and an engine that has a pull-rope may power a variety of manually operated tools, such as a chain saw, an air blower/vac or a lawn mower. The pull rope is attached at one end to a pulley that is in turn attached to a shaft of the engine. Often, a shroud or cover encloses the pulley and the pull rope extends out through the shroud.
One conventional structural arrangement is that a section of the pull rope that is between the pulley and the shroud lies within a plane of the starter pulley. Specifically, the rope section lies in the plane or at most nominally offset from the plane. Such an arrangement of the starter pull rope is acceptable so long as no inner structure of the tool is positioned to interfere with the rope.
In a conventional full crank engine as shown in FIG. 1, the shaft extends on both sides of the engine. Thus, the shaft is long enough to accommodate a flywheel on one side of the engine and a starter pulley on the other side engine. In a powered air blower/vac tool using a half-crank engine, the shaft does not offer as much space as a full-crank engine on which to install the starter pulley.
FIG. 1 shows a prior art device in the form of a full crank engine 100 with a pull-rope starter assembly arranged in a conventional manner. From the view shown in FIG. 1, a flywheel 125 that includes a magnet is located to the left side of an engine casing 101 on a shaft 115 and the rope-starter assembly is located on the right side. The rope-starter assembly includes a handle 145 that is fastened to one end of a starter pull rope 140. The pull rope 140 is within a center plane of a starter pulley 120 or nominally offset from the plane. Because the shaft 115 of the full crank engine 100 passes completely through the engine casing 101 and is located on both sides of the engine casing 101, the rope-starter assembly, with the starter pulley 120 and the pull rope 120, can also be installed to avoid interference with other components.

Engine-powered tool with a tube for guiding a starter pull rope


A method is disclosed for Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) service auto discovery. A first message is received from a first BGP host. The first message comprises first information that indicates that the first BGP host provides reachability information associated with one or more route types. The first information is stored. The first information is sent in a second message to a second BGP host, where the first BGP host and the second BGP host are not conducting a BGP peering session.

The approaches described in this section could be pursued, but are not necessarily approaches that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated herein, the approaches described in this section are not prior art to the claims in this application and are not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) is a path vector routing protocol for exchanging routing information among network elements in the same or different Autonomous System (AS). The function of a BGP-enabled network element (a BGP host or peer) is to exchange network reachability information with other BGP-enabled network elements. The most commonly implemented version of BGP is BGP-4, which is defined in RFC1771 (published by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) in March 1995).
To exchange routing information, two BGP hosts first establish a BGP peering session by exchanging BGP OPEN messages. The BGP hosts then exchange their full routing tables. After this initial exchange, each BGP host sends to its BGP peer or peers only incremental updates for new, modified, and unavailable or withdrawn routes in one or more BGP UPDATE messages. A route is a unit of information that pairs a network destination with the attributes of a network path to that destination. Examples of path attributes include, but are not limited to, the ORIGIN attribute (which indicates how a BGP peer learned about a route), the AS_PATH attribute (which indicates the Autonomous Systems through which a route passes), the NEXT_HOP attribute (which is the address of the border router that is the next hop in a route), and the LOCAL_PREF attribute (which indicates the BGP peer's degree of preference of an exit point from the local AS for a route).
As defined in RFC1771, BGP-4 accommodates the exchange of only Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) unicast routes. The Multiprotocol Extension for BGP (MP-BGP) defined in RFC2858 (published by IETF in June 2000) accommodates the exchange of routing information for multiple Network Layer protocols, such as, for example, Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6), Internetwork Packet eXchange (IPX), Appletalk, Banyan Vines, Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM), X.25, and Frame Relay.
In order to enable the exchange of multi-protocol reachability information, MP-BGP introduced two new path attributes that may be used in a BGP UPDATE message, MP_REACH_NLRI and MP_UNREACH_NLRI. The MP_REACH_NLRI path attribute provides for advertising feasible (or reachable) routes to a BGP peer, where the feasible routes are included in a Network Layer Reachability Information (NLRI) field as <length, prefix> tuples. The MP_UNREACH_NLRI path attribute provides for withdrawing multiple unfeasible (or unreachable) routes from service, where the unfeasible routes are included in a Withdrawn Routes field as <length, prefix> tuples.
FMP-BGP also introduced two single-value parameters which are included in both the MP_REACH_NLRI and MP_UNREACH_NLRI path attributes of a BGP UPDATE message: the Address Family Identifier (AFI) and the Subsequence Address Family Identifier (SAFI). The AFI parameter carries the identity of the network layer protocol associated with the network address that follows next in the path to the destination. The SAFI parameter provides additional information about the type of the Network Layer Reachability Information that is included in a BGP UPDATE message, and the values defined for this parameter usually indicate a type of communication forwarding mechanism, such as, for example, unicast or multicast. The AFI/SAFI combination is commonly used to identify a family of addresses. For example, an AFI/SAFI combination of "1/1" identifies IPv4 unicast addresses and an AFI/SAFI combination of "2/2" identifies IPv6 multicast addresses. In the context of BGP, the AFI/SAFI combination associated with a route usually indicates a type of the route's prefixes, the format the route's prefixes, and how to interpret the routes included in BGP UPDATE messages.
As networks grow more complex and the number of BGP hosts in Autonomous Systems increases, managing BGP sessions between BGP hosts in the same or different Autonomous Systems becomes more difficult. In a typical Autonomous System, it is desirable for each BGP host to exchange routing information with each other BGP host in the system in order to facilitate efficient routing of local and transit network traffic. However, to enable two BGP hosts to establish a BGP session, a user (such as a network engineer) must manually configure both BGP hosts so that the hosts can identify one another and establish a BGP peerin session. In an Internet Service Provider (ISP) autonomous system that has hundreds, sometimes even thousands of BGP hosts, it is a daunting task for a network engineer to fully mesh the BGP hosts by manually configuring BGP sessions among them.
An approach that reduces the need for manual configuration in the creation of a full BGP mesh among the internal BGP hosts of an Autonomous System is provided in a co-pending patent application Ser. No. 10/791,630, filed Mar. 1, 2004, entitled "TECHNIQUES FOR AUTOMATICALLY CREATING AN IBGP MESH," of Robert Raszuk, and assigned to the same assignee hereof. The approach described in Raszuk is suitable for exchanging IPv4 unicast routes in an Autonomous System in which a large number of internal BGP hosts need to participate in an internal BGP (iBGP) mesh, but does not fully address all issues described in this disclosure. For example, the approach described in Raszuk uses an Internal Gateway Protocol (IGP) for flooding auto-discovery information to the internal BGP hosts. The approach described herein is more suitable to be used in a network in which the BGP hosts are established on the edges of the network and in which there is not need to have any BGP state information flooded by IGP among internal BGP hosts.
Further, the approach described in Raszuk does not provide for automatically discovering BGP peers that are established on the edges of the Autonomous System and that exchange routes having a variety of route types that are maintained only by edge network elements. Examples of routes maintained only by edge network elements include, but are not limited to, Virtual Private Network (VPN) routes (as described in RFC2547, published by IETF in March 1999), Layer 3 VPN (L3VPN) routes, Layer 2 VPN (L2VPN) routes, and Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS)/IP tunnel core routes.
Further, in the approach described in Raszuk, the static information used for establishing a full iBGP mesh is flooded to the internal BGP hosts over an Open Shortest Path First (OSPF) protocol, which is an Internal Gateway Protocol (IGP) that is not used to facilitate inter-AS routing information exchange. Thus, the approach in Raszuk does not address the issue of providing automatic discovery of BGP peers within External Gateway Protocols (EGP), such as, for example, BGP-4 or MP-BGP compliant protocols.

Method and apparatus for border gateway protocol (BGP) auto discovery


A system for making a trust determination of a telephone number includes a memory, which stores the telephone number, communicatively coupled to a processor. The processor transmits a request message, which comprises the telephone number and at least two of a telephone porting information request, a call forwarding information request, a telephone switching information request, and a telephone simultaneous ring information request, to a service provider. The processor then receives from the service provider a response message, which includes at least two of a telephone information response, a call forwarding information response, a telephone switching information response, and a telephone simultaneous ring information response. The processor then determines a tampering concern associated with at least one of the responses in the response message and increases an inquiry level based at least upon the determined tampering concern.

Enterprises may sometimes wish to contact their customers to verify that a particular customer's transactions were actually performed by the customer and not by an imposter. These entities may attempt to reach out to the customer with a telephone call or an SMS text message regarding these transactions. Imposters, however, may tamper with the customer's telephone, frustrating the verification process. For instance, imposters may port the customer's telephone number, set up call forwarding on the customer's telephone account, switch the telephone hardware associated with the customer's telephone account, or set up simultaneous ring service on the customer's telephone account to intercept the call intended for the customer.

Mobile platform as a delivery mechanism for security capabilities


A sternal reconstruction system for securing parts of a sternum includes at least one flexible cable with crimp fitting, at least one cannulated screw and at least one reconstruction plate. Circumferential or parasternal fixation may be brought about by use of a sternal reconstruction system including a flexible cable and crimp fitting alone; a sternal reconstruction system including a flexible cable, crimp fitting and cannulated screws; or a system including a flexible cable, crimp fitting, cannulated screws and one or more reconstruction plates. The reconstruction plates are typically planar, having an upper and a lower surface, and containing generally perpendicular and transverse plate holes. The generally perpendicular plate holes are countersunk to better accommodate the heads of the cannulated bone screws. Also provided is a kit for sternal reconstruction.

Many surgical procedures require two or more parts of a sternum to be reapproximated, or fixed together, such as sternal reconstruction and repair of sternal trauma. In addition, various types of surgical procedures are currently performed to investigate, diagnose, and treat diseases involving tissues or organs located in a patient's thoracic cavity, such as the heart and lungs. These procedures typically require a partial or median sternotomy to gain access to the patient's thoracic cavity. A partial or median sternotomy is a procedure by which a saw or other appropriate cutting instrument is used to make a midline, longitudinal incision along a portion or the entire axial length of the patient's sternum, allowing two opposing sternal halves to be separated laterally. A large opening into the thoracic cavity is thus created, through which a surgeon may directly visualize and operate upon the heart and other thoracic organs, vessels, or tissues. Following the surgical procedure within the thoracic cavity, the two severed sternal halves must be reapproximated.
Various types of orthopedic devices are known for the reapproximation or fixation of bone fragments such as sternal halves. Such devices typically are used to stabilize bones by maintaining fractured bone portions in relatively fixed positions with respect to each other. The alignment and stability provided by the devices promotes the healing of fragments, allowing proper fusion to occur.
Internal fixation devices include bone screws, which are used in a variety of orthopedic applications for fixation of bone fragments. Bone fragments may be positioned in a desired configuration, and one or more holes may be drilled and tapped across the fracture. Compression and stabilization of the bone fragments may then be effected by screwing bone screws into the holes. One limitation associated with bone screws, however, is that repositioning or adjusting the bone screws following implantation is difficult. In order to accommodate a different alignment, it is often necessary to remove the original bone screws and drill new holes for subsequent bone screw implantation.
Metal pins also are often used to stabilize bones. Similar to bone screws, metal pins may be inserted in holes drilled across bone fragments to confer stability to the bone. However, as with bone screws, removal of the pins may be required if subsequent realignment of bone portions is necessary.
Bone plates are fastenable to the surface of a bone typically at both sides of a fracture to support and/or stabilize the fragments. Bone plates have typically been attached to the bone with bone screws that extend from the plate into the bone. In some examples, the head of the bone screw is locked to the plate (e.g., by threaded engagement between the screw head and the bone plate) and in other plates the head of the screw is free to angulate with respect to the plate, such that the screw may be placed in the bone at a surgeon-selected angle. In yet other examples, the screw head may cooperate with the bone plate to provide compression or distraction of the fragments (i.e., to push the bone fragments towards or away from one another).
Intramedullary implants are another device used for fixation of bone fragments. Such a device may be placed in the central canal of a fractured bone and locked thereto at the longitudinal ends of the device using screws. The use of intramedullary implants is very invasive, though, and the implants are difficult to manipulate once installed within the canals of bone fragments.
External fixation devices also are commonly used to stabilize bone segments. These devices employ a plurality of pins which extend through a patient's skin into holes drilled in fractured bone. Clamps are used to secure the pins to a common apparatus, which may for example take the form of a rod that is disposed generally parallel to the anatomically correct longitudinal axis of the fractured bone. The clamps in combination with the common apparatus create a rigid frame for immobilizing the fracture to promote healing.
External skeletal fixation is a preferred method of treatment for various limb deformities, injuries, and other conditions including: severe open fractures, fractures associated with severe burns, fractures requiring distraction, fractures requiring limb lengthening, arthrodesis, infected fractures, and nonunions. External fixation offers several advantages over the above-mentioned internal fixation approaches. For example, external fixation enables skeletal stabilization to be managed from a location that is generally remote from the deformity, injury, or disease, thereby permitting direct surveillance of the limb and wound during related or subsequent procedures. In addition, external fixation facilitates adjustment of fracture alignment, bone lengthening, bone compression, and fixed distraction following initial surgery. Furthermore, minimal interference with proximal and distal joints allows immediate mobilization of a wounded limb, and insertion of the fixator pins can be performed under local anesthesia.
Despite these developments, there remains a need for fixation devices with improved adjustability and selectivity.


A buffer circuit provided with a transistor each on the input and output terminal sides, in which the transistor has been provided in order to keep constant a difference between a collector-emitter voltage of the input terminal side transistor and that of the output terminal side transistor.

1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a buffer circuit for use in, for example, impedance conversion, an input unit for current feedback type operational amplifiers and the like.
2. Related Background Art
Heretofore, the buffer circuit is composed of diode-connected transistors 15 and 16 which are opposite to each other in polarity, transistors 17 and 18 matching those transistors 15 and 16 respectively, and constant-current sources 19 and 20 for feeding constant current to the transistors 15 and 16 as shown in FIG. 1.
In the above conventional example, however, the transistors 15 and 17, and the transistors 16 and 18, for which matching is required respectively, are operated by a different C-E (Collector-Emitter) voltage. Therefore, an offset appears between input (IN) and output (OUT) due to the Early's effect of transistors, possibly causing a malfunction.


Provided is a solid-state imaging device that realizes sensitivity improvement while maintaining flare prevention effect even when miniaturization of cell is advanced. The solid-state imaging device according to the present invention includes: light receiving units formed on a semiconductor substrate; an antireflection film arranged above the semiconductor substrate, except above the light receiving units; and microlenses arranged above the light receiving units, in which the antireflection film is formed at a position equal to or higher than a position of the microlenses.

(1) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a solid-state imaging device and a method for manufacturing the solid-state imaging device for sensitivity improvement and flare reduction.
(2) Description of the Related Art
In recent years, coupled with miniaturization of chip size and increase in the number of pixels in a solid-state imaging device, miniaturization and sophistication of a movie camera and the like have been advanced.
A conventional solid-state imaging device disclosed in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Laid-Open Publication No. 4-34977 (Patent Reference 1) will be described with reference to the drawings.
As shown in FIG. 1, an effective pixel region 102, an optical black (OB) region 103, and a peripheral region 104 are formed on a semiconductor substrate 100 by diffusion processes. After a planarizing film is applied, a resist containing a black pigment for improving a flare property (an antireflection film 110) is formed above the peripheral region 104 excluding at least the effective pixel region 102 and the OB region 103. Further, a transparent film (intermediate film) 108 under microlens is formed which is designed to have a desirable film thickness for planarizing a step created by the formation of the antireflection film 110 and maximizing a light collection effect. Microlenses 109 are formed thereon.
In other words, the antireflection film 110 having black color and the like is arranged to reduce flare occurring when high-luminance light enters the peripheral region 104. Transmittance of the antireflection film 110 is preferably equal to or less than 20% for flare reduction, and thus above a certain thickness is required for this reason. In addition, the microlenses 109 are formed to improve sensitivity of the solid-state imaging device.
However, as miniaturization of cell in a solid-state imaging device is advanced by downsizing a camera, in the conventional solid-state imaging device shown in FIG. 1, it is difficult to shorten a distance from light receiving units to microlenses, and light collection optimization is limited (the first problem).
The reason for such a problem will be described using FIG. 2.
FIG. 2(a) shows a cross-sectional structure of an effective pixel region of a large cell, and FIG. 2(b) shows a cross-sectional structure of an effective pixel region in the case where an intermediate film under miniaturized microlens cannot be thinned. As shown in FIG. 2(a), one of the microlenses 109 allows light to focus on one of light receiving units 101 in the pixel region having a large cell with relative ease. In contrast, as shown in FIG. 2(b), when being miniaturized, the microlens 109 does not allow light to focus on the light receiving unit 101 (a focus is above the light receiving unit 101), which makes the light collection optimization difficult. In particular, as a light collection property for oblique light component is worsened, sensitivity deterioration at a side where aperture is opened becomes remarkable as a camera (the second problem).
Moreover, although it is necessary to increase pigment concentration to perform film thinning on a resist containing a black pigment while maintaining transmittance characteristics, the current technique does not allow significant film thinning easily, and it is not easy to perform the film thinning while maintaining a flare prevention effect (the third problem).
Furthermore, although, as another proposal, it is conceivable that, in order to shorten a distance from the light receiving unit 101 to the microlens 109, at least the antireflection film 110 is arranged in the peripheral region 104 excluding the effective pixel region 102 and the OB region 103 after the microlens 109 is formed in advance, a problem arises that the antireflection film 110 cannot be formed on a surface of the solid-state imaging device as the antireflection film 110 has weak solvent resistance (the fourth problem).
An object of the present invention is to provide a solid-state imaging device that realizes the sensitivity improvement while maintaining the flare prevention effect even when the miniaturization of cell is advanced.

Method for manufacturing solid-state imaging device having improved sensitivity and reduced flare


A catalyst system and a method for manufacturing cyclic carbonate by the same are provided. The catalyst system includes a transition metal salt containing a halo group, an acetate group, or a combination thereof, and an organic phosphine ligand. The molar ratio of the organic phosphine ligand to the transition metal salt is greater than 0 and less than or equal to 50.

In the resin industry, a resin having a cyclic carbonate functional group may be used in the synthesis of non-isocyanate polyurethane resin (NIPU), and the isocyanate compounds having higher toxicity are abrogated from being applied in the synthesizing process. In the industry, the isocyanate monomer is produced using phosgene, in which both the raw materials and the end products are highly toxic chemicals. Accordingly, greener materials, for replacing the isocyanate polyurethane resin material, gradually become the focus of attention. Since the non-isocyanate material do not have moisture sensitive isocyanate functional groups, the storage and processing conditions are preferred over those of a conventional polyurethane resin.
The critical material for the non-isocyanate polyurethane resin is a cyclic carbonate compound, which is prepared by using carbon dioxide and an epoxy compound. The method of synthesis includes utilizing a Lewis base, an ionic liquid, a metal complex, a heterogeneous metal salt, a silica supported catalyst, an oxidized metal salt porous material or an ion exchange resin as a catalytic system to catalyze the reaction of carbon dioxide and the epoxy compound. Among the above catalysts, the salt type or the ionic liquid catalyst is the most commonly used. However, these catalysts are usually less soluble in an epoxy compound. Consequently, the amount of catalyst used is increased and the reaction conditions are adjusted to high temperature and high pressure in order to achieve the desired conversion rate. Further, by-products are generated. Alternatively, ligands synthesized through special designs or expensive metal ions may be utilized to prepare the catalyst. However, not only commercial production becomes difficult, the product cost increases and the recycling of catalyst is inevitable. Due to above reasons, the bar of the fabrication technology of cyclic carbonate is raised, and the yield of non-isocyanate polyurethane resin cannot be effectively improved.
Accordingly, the development of a new generation of catalyst system having high reaction activity, being producible under moderate reaction conditions, being able to preclude the requisite of being recycled from the product and being cost-effective has become the focus of attention in the fabrication technology of cyclic carbonate.

Cayalyst system and manufacturing method of cyclic carbonate by the same

Industrial Technology Research Institute


A method is provided for generating a group digital signature wherein each of a group of individuals may sign a message M to create a group digital signature S, wherein M corresponds to a number representative of a message, 0≦M≦n−1, n is a composite number formed from the product of a number k of distinct random prime factors p1·p2· . . . ·pk, k is an integer greater than 2, and S≡Md(mod n). The method may include: performing a first partial digital signature subtask on a message M using a first individual private key to produce a first partial digital signature S1; performing at least a second partial digital signature subtask on the message M using a second individual private key to produce a second partial digital signature S2; and combining the partial digital signature results to produce a group digital signature S.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to cryptographic systems, and more particularly to a system and method for generating an authentic cryptographic group signature.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The application of a signature to a document may serve to indicate that the document originates from the signer, or to show that the signer somehow endorses the information to communicated by the document. In the context of business, signatures are customarily applied to documents for the purpose of forming contracts and executing financial transactions. In government, a properly signed document may serve to ratify a law or a government action.
With the advent of computer networking, electronic documents have been gradually replacing paper documents. Validating the authenticity of electronic documents is a problem that has been addressed by digital signatures A digital signature of a message is a number which is the result of a calculation dependent on some secret known only to the signer, and also on the content of the message being signed. A signature must be verifiable. If a dispute arises as to whether a party signed a message, an unbiased third party should be able to resolve the matter without requiring access to the signer's secret information.
Digital signatures may be created and verified by cryptography. Digital signatures commonly use public key cryptography, which employs an algorithm using two different but mathematically related keys; one for creating a digital signature or encoding data, and another key for verifying a digital signature or decoding the message. Computer equipment and software utilizing this method are commonly known as asymmetric cryptosystems.
The keys of an asymmetric cryptosystem are commonly referred to as the private key, known only to the signer and used to create the digital signature, and the public key which is used to verify the digital signature. If many people need to verify a signer's digital signature, the associated public key must be available. A public key may be published or held in an on-line repository or directory where it is easily accessible. Although the public and private keys are mathematically related, it is extraordinarily difficult to derive the private key from knowledge of the public key. Thus, although people may know the public key of a given entity and use it to verify that entity's signatures, they cannot discover the private key and use it to forge digital signatures. This is sometimes referred to as the principle of irreversibility.
Hash functions are commonly used in software for creating and verifying digital signatures. A hash function is an algorithm used to create a digital representation in the form of a hash value or hash result of a standard length which is usually much smaller than the message. Any change to the message produces a different hash result when the same hash function is used. In the case of a secure hash function, sometimes termed a one-way hash function, it is computationally infeasible to derive the original message from knowledge of its hash value.
Use of a digital signature usually involves two processes, one performed by the signer and the other by the receiver of the digital signature. Creation of a digital signature usually includes deriving a hash value of the message to be signed and then performing a mathematical operation on that value using the private key. Typically, the digital signature is attached to the corresponding message and transmitted to a second party. Verification of the digital signature is accomplished by computing a new hash result of the original message using the same hash function that was used to create the digital signature. Using the public key to invert the received signature, and then comparing that with the new hash result, a verifier may check: whether the digital signature was created using the corresponding private key; and whether the newly computed hash result matches the original hash result which was transformed into the digital signature during the signing process. Verification software typically confirms the digital signature as verified if: the signer's private key was used to digitally sign the message, which is determined to be the case if the signer's public key is used to verify because the signer's public key will only verify a digital signature created with the signer's private key; and the message was unaltered, which is found to be the case if the hash result computed by the verifier is identical to the hash result extracted from the digital signature during the verification process.
The use of digital signatures has already proven to be a reliable and secure means of authenticating digital messages. However, the applicants of the present patent application have observed that conventional asymmetric cryptosystems do not provide a means for generating group digital signatures where a document must be signed by more than one person.
Corporations, government bodies, and other organizations often institute policies that require more than one authorized individual to endorse a certain type of decision before the organization may act as a whole. To approve a decision made on behalf of an organization, it is a necessary and common practice to prepare a document that must be signed by more than one individual. For example, a corporation may require that a purchase order for goods or services exceeding a certain amount must be signed by a requesting employee, a manager, and finally a vice president. This purchase order would bear the name of the corporation, and would explain that the purchase order is only valid if it bears all of the required signatures.
What is needed is a secure system and method for generating a group digital signature wherein each of a group of individuals may sign a message M to create a group digital signature.

Group signature generation system using multiple primes

Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.


An apparatus displaying a three-dimensional image is provided with a parallax barrier having optical openings arranged at a horizontal pitch n times as large as that of pixels arranged on a display surface. The parallax barrier reproduces rays from every n pixels on the display surface in a horizontal direction and no vertical parallaxes is displayed in a viewing area. Image data for a three-dimensional image is processed so as to be recorded in an efficient saving format which minimizes the degradation of image quality while accomplishing a high compression rate. Image data from a set of pixels constituting parallel rays in the same parallax direction are accumulated to obtain more than n parallax component images. Parallax component images corresponding to n-th adjacent parallax directions are combined together and thus converted into n connected images having the same numbers of vertical and horizontal pixels.

1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the structure of three-dimensional image data, a method of recording three-dimensional image data, and a method of displaying and reproducing three-dimensional image data, and in particular, to the structure of three-dimensional image data, a method of recording three-dimensional image data, and a method of displaying and reproducing three-dimensional image data, wherein three-dimensional display images suitable for compression are recorded.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various schemes are known for three-dimensional image display apparatuses that are able to display motion pictures three-dimensionally, that is, three-dimensional displays. In recent years, in particular, three-dimensional image display apparatuses of a flat panel type have been highly demanded which are based on a scheme not requiring any dedicated type of glass or the like. For flat panel type display apparatuses such as direct-vision or projection type liquid crystal display apparatuses and plasma display apparatuses whose pixels have fixed position in display surfaces, three-dimensional image display apparatuses can be easily implemented on the basis of the following scheme: a parallax barrier is installed immediately in front of the display panel to controllably direct rays from the display panel toward a viewer.
Light rays are controlled so that even when observing the same position on the parallax barrier, the viewer views different images depending on the angle. Specifically, a slit array or lenticular sheet, that is, a cylindrical lens array, is used to provide only lateral parallaxes, that is, horizontal parallaxes, or a pinhole array or a lens array is used to also provide vertical parallaxes. The scheme using the parallax barrier is further classified into a two-view (binocular) scheme, a multiview scheme, a super-multiview scheme that is a multiview scheme provided with super-multiview conditions, and integral photography (hereinafter simply referred to as IP). The basic principle of these schemes is substantially the same as that which was invented about 100 years ago and has been used for three-dimensional photography since then.
With either the IP scheme or multiview scheme, viewing distance is normally finite. Consequently, a display image is created so that a perspective image is actually viewed at that viewing distance. An IP scheme providing only horizontal parallaxes and no vertical parallaxes is disclosed in SID04 Digest 1438 (2004). This one-dimensional IP scheme generates a set of parallel rays if the horizontal pitch of the parallax barrier is set equal to an integral multiple (n times) of the horizontal pitch of the pixels (the one-dimensional IP scheme is hereinafter also referred to as parallel-ray one-dimensional IP). Accordingly, a parallax component image in which pixel columns constituting a set of parallel rays are accumulated is obtained by perspective projection for a given viewing distance in the vertical distance and by orthographic projection in the horizontal direction. A parallax synthetic image (an elemental image array) is created by dividing each parallax component image obtained by the perspective projection in the vertical distance and by the orthographic projection in the horizontal direction, into pixel columns and interleaving and synthesizing. When the parallax image synthetic image is displayed on a display surface and observed through the parallax barrier, the correct projection, that is, a three-dimensional image based on perspective projection in both horizontal and vertical directions, is obtained. Specific methods are disclosed in SID04 Digest 1438 (2004), Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication Nos. 2003-90738 and 2003-315356, and the like. The multiview scheme divides an image obtained by a simple perspective projection, into pixel columns and interleaving and synthesizing to obtain a three-dimensional image based on the correct projection.
It is difficult to implement an image pickup apparatus that varies the projection method or a projection center distance between the vertical direction and the horizontal direction. This is because such an apparatus requires a camera or lens of the same size as that of a subject for orthographic projection. Accordingly, a practical method of obtaining orthographic projection data by image pickup is to convert perspective projection image pickup data into orthographic projection data. A known practical method is a ray space method based on interpolation and using EPI (epipolar surface).
The parallel-ray one-dimensional IP scheme is advantageous in that an image obtained by this scheme is easier to see than one obtained by the binocular scheme. However, the parallel-ray one-dimensional IP scheme requires complex image formats for the projection method and the dividing and arranging method. The binocular and multiview schemes are three-dimensional image display schemes that display the simplest three-dimensional images, and thus use simple image formats. With these schemes, each parallax image is formed of the same number of vertical pixels and the same number of horizontal pixels. For example, two parallax component images for the binocular scheme or nine parallax component images for the nine view scheme may be divided into pixel columns, which may then be synthesized into a parallax synthetic image in an image format in which the image can be displayed on the display surface. However, the parallel-ray one-dimensional IP scheme requires a larger number of parallax component images than the multiview scheme, which achieves substantially the same resolution. With the parallel-ray one-dimensional IP scheme, the number of horizontal pixels (horizontal range used to display three-dimensional images) in each parallax component image varies depending on parallax direction, resulting in complex image formats.
Both the multiview scheme and parallel-ray one-dimensional IP scheme pose a problem if each piece of parallax information is divided into subpixels assigned to a parallax synthetic image. When a parallax synthetic image is irreversibly compressed by an encoding method such as JPEG or MPEG, parallax information may be mixed together, and decompression may degrade image quality. In particular, if the color arrangement of color filters or the like are mosaic arrangement in order to avoid a moire effect, color information may also be mixed together, and decompression may further degrade image quality. Reversible compression avoids the degradation but offers a compression rate considerably lower than that achieved by the irreversible compression. A method exists which allows each parallax component image to be irreversibly compressed and decompressed. This method can be used with the multiview scheme but is inefficient with the parallel-ray one-dimensional IP scheme because it involves a large number of parallax component images and a varying number of horizontal pixels.
As described above, the conventional three-dimensional image recording method based on the parallel-ray one-dimensional IP scheme is disadvantageous in that it achieves a considerably low compression rate and may involve degradation of image quality as a result of irreversible compression and decompression.

Structure of three-dimensional image data, method of recording three-dimensional image data, and method of displaying and reproducing three-dimensional image data


An electrical connector for a kitchen appliance includes a socket having at least one electrical contact and at least one metallic member. A plug having at least one electrical contact and a magnet which is movably positioned within the plug. A power cord is movably positioned within the plug and is operatively connected to the at least one electrical contact of the plug. An attractive force exists between the at least one metallic member and the magnet when the plug is engaged with the socket and the magnet is within a predetermined distance of the at least one metallic member. Movement of a leading end of the power cord toward a distal end of the plug moves the magnet toward the distal end of the plug to reduce a magnitude of the attractive force and permit the plug to be more easily removed from the socket.

The present invention is directed to a kitchen appliance for cooking foodstuff and, more particularly, to a deep fryer or other cooking apparatus that enables a user to quickly and conveniently operatively connect and/or disconnect a plug of a power cord to an electrical socket of the deep fryer to selectively provide power to and/or remove power from the deep fryer.
Deep fryers are a relatively common household or restaurant appliance that are used to cook or fry foodstuff, typically chicken breasts, turkey breasts, French fries or other foodstuff that is desired to be fried. A typical deep fryer includes a housing which holds cooking oil or other liquid to be heated, a basket which is placed inside the housing which holds the foodstuff to be cooked within the hot oil or other liquid and a lid mounted to the housing. A heating coil, located inside the deep fryer, heats the liquid to a desired temperature. A power cord operatively connects the heating coil to an electrical outlet to provide power to the heating coil.
When cooking is complete, the user desires to cut power to the deep fryer and dispose of the liquid within the deep fryer to eventually clean the deep fryer. To cut power to the deep fryer, the user often disconnects or removed the plug of the power cord from a socket of the deep fryer. However, in conventional deep fryers, the connection between the plug of the power cord and the socket of the deep fryer is relatively strong (typically a mechanical "interference fit") and, thus, requires a relatively high force to remove the power cord from the deep fryer. Therefore, in conventional deep fryers, it is not unusual for the user to inadvertently at least partially tip over the deep fryer while attempting to remove the plug of the power cord from the socket of the deep fryer. Tipping over the deep fryer can create an inconvenience to the user, as the user is left with spilled cooking oil or foodstuff to clean up.
Therefore, it would be desirable to create a deep fryer having a plug of the power cord that is easily removably attached to the deep fryer such that a relatively low force is required to remove the power cord from the deep fryer. Further, it would be desirable to create a deep fryer having a plug of the power cord that is easier to connect and/or disconnect from a socket of the deep flyer.

Electrical connector for a kitchen appliance


Methods are disclosed for improving security of computer software and preventing potential attackers from gaining control of computer software via function pointer overwrite attacks. One or more additional layers of complexity may be imposed that would have to be circumvented in order to gain execution control over portions of software. One or more function pointers can be encoded using a value that may be generated on program initialization and decoded before any dynamic function call occurs. In the event of memory corruption that affects an encoded function pointer, the value will cause the destination of the function pointer to decode to an invalid and random address and will induce an error. An application may be prevented from calling an attacker corrupted function pointer by introducing various checks around the call point at compile time that check the validity of the destination to which the function pointer points.

1. Field of the Disclosure
The disclosure generally relates to security of computer programs executed on computing devices, and more particularly to systems and methods for mitigating function pointer overwrite attacks on a portion of a computer program.
2. General Background
With the advent of advanced memory protections and vulnerability mitigations in software, attackers have been forced to use more complicated and challenging techniques to gain code execution. Due to the proliferation of DEP (Data Execution Protection) and ASLR (Address Space Layout Randomization) attackers are more and more relying on a technique called ROP (Return Oriented Programming) to circumvent these protections. ROP can be used to exploit certain types of memory corruption bugs introduced by developers such as buffer overflows and use after free conditions to modify heap or stack stored function pointers which are called later to gain limited control of execution by switching the executing process' stack context to a specially crafted one supplied by the attacker with the ultimate goal of gaining full control of execution.
One approach that can be used by attackers in the presence of DEP and ASLR to gain full code execution, is as follows:                Find an appropriate bug that would allow for a function pointer to overwrite.        Bypass ASLR in a module by either finding another vulnerability that leads to "information disclosure" about the address space, or force the loading of another module (such as a DLL library) that is not protected by ASLR into the address space.        Locate a stack pivot in the bypassed module which changes the context of the stack to that of the attackers.        Overwrite a function pointer with the location (address) of the stack pivot.        Force the application to call the function pointer to begin executing the ROP payload.        The ROP payload then must bypass DEP via either allocating new memory or disabling DEP on the actual functional payload.        The ROP payload then calls the functional payload which now has full control of the execution.
There is a need in the art for security measures that implement additional safeguards to prevent attackers from gaining execution control of a software program.
There is a need in the art for security measures that implement additional safeguards to prevent attackers from executing function pointer overwrite attacks on a portion of a software program.

Mitigation of function pointer overwrite attacks


A servo controller (10) includes a reversal change calculating part (24) which uses the position of a moving member (19) as the basis to calculate the amount of change of the position of the moving member, a distance calculating part (25) which uses a position of the moving member as the basis to calculate a distance from the servo motor to the moving member, an approximation equation determining part (26) which uses the amount of change of the position of the moving member, distance, and the torque command as the basis to calculate a position correction amount which corrects delay of the servo motor due to reversal of the servo motor, and a position correction calculating part (27) which uses the approximation equation as the basis to calculate the position correction amount.

1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a servo controller which corrects position error when a moving member reverses.
2. Description of the Related Art
A servo controller is used for making a moving member accurately operate based on a position command. Such a machine is a machine tool which makes a moving member move along a feed shaft. In this regard, when the feed shaft is a threaded shaft of a ball screw, when the direction of movement of the moving member reverses, backlash or friction causes the reversal operation to be delayed. As a result, position error occurs.
In general, to correct delay at the time of reversal, the practice has been to add a position correction amount which corresponds to the backlash to the position command and to add a speed correction amount which compensates for the delay due to friction to the speed command.
However, when the feed shaft is a threaded shaft of a ball screw, the threaded shaft extends and contracts in the axial direction. Due to this, delay is caused at the time of reversal. To eliminate this, Japanese Patent No. 3621278 discloses a configuration provided with a mechanical end correction constant multiplying part which multiplies the torque which the electric motor generates by a constant factor and an adder which adds the total torque command value which is multiplied by the constant factor to the position command. In this case, it is possible to change the position command while considering the amount of extension or contraction of the threaded shaft due to the torque and as a result accurately correct the delay at the time of reversal.
However, the amount of extension or contraction of a threaded shaft changes not only due to the torque of the electric motor, but also the position of the moving member at the threaded shaft. In Japanese Patent No. 3621278, the position of the moving member is not considered, so there are limits to control of the position of the moving member with a high precision.
Further, to calculate the position correction amount with a high precision, it is necessary to prepare an optimal approximation equation based on the relationship between the amount of deformation of the threaded shaft, which includes the amount of extension or contraction, the torque of the electric motor, and the position of the moving member. However, if utilizing all of this data, calculation of the approximation equation becomes complicated and tremendous effort is required for the servo controller.
The present invention was made in consideration of this situation and has as its object the provision of a servo controller which can correct the position error by a high precision and in a simple manner when the moving member reverses.

Servo controller for correcting position error when moving member reverses


A microprocessor heat sink retention module is described. That module comprises a first frame that has a first side and a second side. The first side is separated from the second side by a distance that is sufficient to enable a microprocessor to fit within the frame. The first and second sides each have at least one aperture for receiving a microprocessor heat sink. The module also has a heat transfer platform, which is integrated with the first frame. The heat transfer platform comprises a substantially flat metal slab for dissipating heat that is generated by a voltage regulator. Also described are an assembly for a computer and a computer system that include this microprocessor heat sink retention module.

The present invention relates to apparatus for retaining and cooling computer components. More specifically, the invention relates to mechanisms for cooling microprocessors and their associated voltage regulators.
Because microprocessors generate a significant amount of heat, computers that contain them rely upon various cooling mechanisms to dissipate the heat that they produce. Those mechanisms include different types of fans, heat sinks, heat spreaders, and ducting for delivering a cooling fluid (e.g., air) to the microprocessors for heat exchange. In addition to microprocessors, other computer components may produce heat that must be eliminated. One such component is the voltage regulator that converts a relatively high DC voltage to the relatively low DC voltage that microprocessor operation requires.
Computers generally segregate the microprocessor from the voltage regulator. As a result, the voltage regulator may need its own discrete cooling apparatus, which may include a separate heat sink and several additional parts required for assembly. Employing separate cooling mechanisms for the microprocessor and its associated voltage regulator adds cost and complexity to the overall cooling solution. Accordingly, there is a need for an integrated cooling assembly that serves to dissipate heat from both a microprocessor and a voltage regulator. There is also a need for such a device that can retain a microprocessor heat sink. The present invention provides such a device.

Microprocessor heat sink retention module


A pump includes a cam member and an armature plate received on an input shaft rotatably supported with a differential housing of a clutch. The pump also includes a cylinder rod slidingly received in a chamber of a master cylinder to pressurize a hydraulic fluid. The cam member includes a ring and a back plate. The ring has an outer, preferably symmetrical, surface with a variable radius defining a ramped portion for outwardly driving the cylinder rod when the cam member is rotated either forward or backward with respect to the differential housing. A coil generates an electromagnetic field when activated drawing the cam member towards the armature plate such that contact forces causes the cam member to rotate with the armature plate. A roller disc is rotatably supported at one end of the cylinder rod for rolling contact between the cylinder rod and the cam surface of the cam member ring.

Motorized vehicles include differentials for transferring torque from a drive shaft to driven shafts attached to wheels of the vehicle. Some differentials include an overrunning clutch providing four-wheel drive capability for transmitting torque to driven shafts of the vehicle as needed. U.S. Pat. No. 6,622,837 discloses a bi-directional overrunning clutch having roll cages shifted by application of an electromagnetic field into a position providing four-wheel drive capability in which slippage of primary drive wheels causes the rolls to become wedged between the tapered surfaces of a clutch housing and a race. The wedging of the rolls results in torque transfer between the clutch housing and the race.
The clutch of the '837 patent also provides engine braking capability ("backdriving") for use during steep descents. In the backdriving mode, the drive shaft of the vehicle becomes engaged by the driven shafts such that the drive shaft is actually driven by the driven shafts. The clutch of the '837 patent includes a clutch pack assembly having friction plates and drive plates interleaved with each other. The friction plates and drive plates are respectively engaged with the clutch housing and a driven shaft. When the backdriving feature is inactive, the friction plates and drive plates are free to rotate with respect to each other.
The clutch pack assembly of the '837 patent includes a hydraulic piston actuated by pressurized fluid from a hydraulic pressure source to apply pressure to the friction plates and drive plates. The pressure applied by the hydraulic piston forces to the friction plates and drive plates to rotate together such that the clutch housing and the driven shaft are engaged to each other. In the clutch of the '837 patent, the hydraulic pressure source supplying pressurized fluid to the clutch pack assembly is external to the clutch.

Self-energizing pump for overrunning clutch


A seat belt retractor for winding a seat belt includes a spool for winding the seat belt, a motor connected to the spool for generating driving torque to rotate the spool, a driving torque transmission mechanism disposed between the motor and the spool and formed of a gear for transmitting the driving torque of the motor to the spool, and a torque limiter mechanism disposed in the driving torque transmission mechanism for preventing a load greater than a predetermined level from being transmitted to the driving torque transmission mechanism.

The present invention relates to a seat belt retractor installed in a vehicle such as an automobile for winding a seat belt on a spool with driving torque of a motor to restrain and protect an occupant, and more particularly, to a seat belt retractor in which a load torque above a predetermined value is not transmitted from a spool to a driving torque transmission mechanism that transmits the driving torque of the motor to the spool. The present invention also relates to a seat belt device provided with the seat belt retractor.
Conventionally, a seat belt device is installed in a vehicle such as an automobile, and a seat belt restrains an occupant so that the occupant does not move out of a vehicle seat, thereby protecting the occupant in case of emergency such as a vehicle collision in which large deceleration is exerted on the vehicle. The seat belt device is provided with a seat belt retractor for urging a spool with the seat belt wound thereon in a direction of winding the belt all the time. The seat belt retractor locks the spool not to rotate in a direction of unwinding the seat belt when an emergency locking mechanism (ELR mechanism) is activated in case of emergency as mentioned above, thereby preventing the seat belt from being withdrawn.
As a conventional seat belt retractor, Japanese Utility Model Publication (Kokai) No. 61-134465 has disclosed a seat belt retractor in which a motor drives a spool with driving torque to rotate to wind a seat belt. In such a seat belt retractor, it is possible to control a tension of the seat belt with the motor for winding the seat belt. Accordingly, it is possible to select various modes of winding the seat belt, thereby adjusting the seat belt to restrain an occupant according to a condition such as a vehicle running condition.
In the conventional seat belt retractor as disclosed in Japanese Utility Model Publication (Kokai) No. 61-134465, when the automobile collides lightly in an extent that an ELR mechanism is not activated while the motor is winding the seat belt, the seat belt is withdrawn due to inertia of the occupant so that tension may be applied to the seat belt.
Accordingly, a load due to energy of the tension on the seat belt is transmitted to the spool. When the load is transmitted to a driving torque transmission mechanism via the spool when the motor rotates the spool in a direction of winding the belt, a load torque larger than that in a normal state acts on a component such as a gear composing the driving torque transmission mechanism. Accordingly, it is necessary to increase strength of the component such as a gear in the driving torque transmission mechanism, so that the component withstands such large torque. Further, the motor needs to generate the driving torque against the load transmitted to the driving torque transmission mechanism, thereby increasing load on the motor.
In view of the problems described above, the present invention has been made, and an object of the present invention is to provide a seat belt retractor driven with a motor in which load torque larger than a predetermined level is not transmitted to a driving torque transmission mechanism when the motor drives. Another object of the present invention is to provide a seat belt device provided with the seat belt retractor.
Further objects and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following description of the invention.

This patent is subject to a terminal disclaimer.

Seat belt retractor and seat belt device


An illustrative embodiment includes processing parse tree data. A parse tree data structure that is representative of a document object model (DOM) tree data structure is received. Concomitant to receiving the parse tree data structure, an assignment of index values for the DOM nodes consisting of distinct index values for each existing DOM node is received by the processor. Requests to manipulate the parse tree data structure that include node inserts and document order comparisons are also performed.

This disclosure relates generally to information and data management in a data processing system and, more specifically, to manipulating a parse tree structure and efficiently performing node order comparisons within the parse tree in support of a tree order enforcing expression language.
Data formats such as extensible markup language (XML) or JavaScript® Object Notation (JSON) are typically syntactically parsed into a general tree data structure containing a logical node for each pertinent syntactic component of the data. Regardless of the data format, this parse tree data structure is referred to as a document object model (DOM). Each node of a DOM typically contains information about the syntactic component being represented, such as an XML element tag name or content value, as well as index or pointer values that bind the DOM node into the tree structure, including an indicator of the parent, preceding sibling and next sibling, a child list, and possibly a separate attribute list. The document order of a DOM corresponds to a visitation order of DOM nodes resulting from a depth first traversal of the DOM tree. A depth first traversal, also known as a pre-order traversal, is a traversal of a tree structure in which a node is deemed visited or processed before any of its child nodes are visited or processed.
Creating a DOM for data enables querying or mutation of the data using an application programming interface (API) interface to the DOM. A tree addressing scheme is used to indicate a particular node or a set of nodes in the DOM. For example, an XML path language, XPath (a query language for selecting nodes from an XML document) expression can be used to obtain an XML node or set of nodes, and a dotted JavaScript notation expression can be used to obtain a JSON object. Typically, during the execution of either expression and production of a respective result, the referenced nodes are navigated in an organized manner relative to the DOM structure. For example, each XPath location step produces a set of nodes, in document order, before proceeding to a next location step. A key factor in placing nodes in document order is a DOM node comparator that determines which of two given DOM nodes is earlier in document order.
Once a DOM node (or set of nodes) is obtained, both informational and structural mutations can then be performed using the API, including changing tag names or content values (informational mutation) or performing insert and delete operations on a DOM node or nodes (structural mutation, or structural manipulation of the parse tree data structure).
Given two distinct DOM tree nodes of node DX and node DY, the DOM tree traversal comparison method first traverses the parent links of node DX and node DY to find the closest common ancestor node A (in this example). If one of node DX and node DY is the ancestor node A, then the node equivalent to node A is the earlier node in document order. Otherwise, the children node CX and node CY of the closest common ancestor A are obtained; where node CX is the root node of the DOM sub-tree containing node DX, and node CY is the root node of the DOM sub-tree containing node DY. When node CX is earlier in the child list of node A, then node DX is the earlier node in document order, and otherwise node DY is the earlier node in document order.
An advantage of the DOM tree traversal comparison method is that the method places no encumbrance on insert and delete operations, which normally have an O(1) cost for structural manipulations of the DOM. However a disadvantage of the method is the comparison can require O(n) time, where n is the traversal length of the tree path (node DX, . . . node CX, . . . , node CY, . . . node DY) that excludes node A. The comparison operation most typically becomes expensive in a DOM due to node A having a large number of children, for example, there is an O(n) distance between node CX and node CY.
To mitigate this disadvantage, a common practice is use of a node index method. The node index method performs a depth first search operation to associate a depth-first index (DFI), with each DOM node. The node index method has an O(N) cost, where N is the number of DOM nodes visited and indexed, but the advantage is that once the indexing operation is performed, all subsequent comparison operations have a very fast O(1) cost to compare the DFIs of the node DX and node DY, where the node with the lesser DFI is determined to be the earlier node. The disadvantage is that this efficiency only lasts until a next insert operation occurs, which alters the DOM structure. Since the newly inserted node or nodes do not have an associated DFI value, a common practice is to mark the whole node index map as stale and revert to using the DOM tree traversal comparison method.
To mitigate this problem, a depth first search after each mutation sequence (for example, script) can be used to re-index the nodes, which clear a stale flag and restore a previously efficient node comparison operation. However, mutation scripts containing few structural mutations in relation to a number of informational mutations tend to run faster by re-indexing after each insert operation. On the other hand, re-indexing after each insert operation places an O(N) worst case cost on each insert operation, so mutation scripts containing many structural manipulations of the parse tree data structure tend to run much slower due to re-indexing after each insert operation.
In a further proposed solution, a 2010 paper in the Journal of Information and Data Management: DeweyIDs—The Key to Fine-Grained Management of XML Documents, focuses optimization of XML document storage and retrieval in XML databases. The DeweyID proposal is derived from the Dewey decimal system of organizing library books. The DeweyID is a single key comprised of a variable number of integer index values that help achieve efficient B*-tree operations relative to prior XML database systems. While appropriate for XML databases and B*-tree operations, the DeweyID proposal is not appropriate for implementing efficient node comparison and structural mutation of an in-memory DOM.

Document order management via relaxed node indexing

INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION


Arrangements and methods for employing empirical evidence to estimate the performance of applications with very few data samples, in complex environments such as dynamic SDP environments, using one or more effective, data-plotting models.

In the sphere of web services, the mean time to deploy a new service has become an order of magnitude shorter than in earlier models, in which a solution typically is composed as a monolithic stack of software pieces. Accordingly, service delivery platforms (SDP) at present permit the rapid deployment of on line services. SDF platforms also offer a multi-tenant environment where deployed solutions can be shared by multiple businesses.
However, in such a context of multiple solutions and multiple tenants, basic management tasks can be encumbered with a challenging and dynamically evolving problems such as provisioning, monitoring and problem determination. Fault management is another management task that can present a challenge in an SDP environment.
Conventional arrangements are not sufficient to address these challenges mentioned above as they are either too slow or they are not scalable for dynamic environments and complex environments such as SDP.
Further, conventional methods do not present a unified approach to address all these challenges. All these approaches address one aspect of management functionality or another, but never a unified approach to enable simplified management of complex SDP environments.

System and method for performance management of large scale SDP platforms

International Business Machines Corporation