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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of soybean breeding. In particular, the invention relates to the novel soybean variety 01052178.
2. Description of Related Art
There are numerous steps in the development of any novel, desirable plant germplasm. Plant breeding begins with the analysis and definition of problems and weaknesses of the current germplasm, the establishment of program goals, and the definition of specific breeding objectives. The next step is selection of germplasm that possess the traits to meet the program goals. The goal is to combine in a single variety an improved combination of desirable traits from the parental germplasm. These important traits may include higher seed yield, resistance to diseases and insects, better stems and roots, tolerance to drought and heat, better agronomic quality, resistance to herbicides, and improvements in compositional traits.
Soybean, Glycine max (L.), is a valuable field crop. Thus, a continuing goal of plant breeders is to develop stable, high yielding soybean varieties that are agronomically sound. The reasons for this goal are to maximize the amount of grain produced on the land used and to supply food for both animals and humans. To accomplish this goal, the soybean breeder must select and develop soybean plants that have the traits that result in superior varieties.
The oil extracted from soybeans is widely used in food products, such as margarine, cooking oil, and salad dressings. Soybean oil is composed of saturated, monounsaturated, and polyunsaturated fatty acids, with a typical composition of 11% palmitic, 4% stearic, 25% oleic, 50% linoleic, and 9% linolenic fatty acid content (“Economic Implications of Modified Soybean Traits Summary Report,” Iowa Soybean Promotion Board & American Soybean Association Special Report 92S, May 1990). | {
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A standard rotary brush assembly has a flexible, annular and generally cylindrical collar generally centered on the axis and having a predetermined and generally uniform radial thickness, a predetermined inside diameter, and a predetermined axial length. A plurality of arrays of radially projecting bristles angularly equispaced about the collar define a plurality of axially throughgoing and angularly equispaced bristle-free zones. A holder for the brush is comprised of a pair of flange disks each formed with a circular groove of the same diameter as the brush collar, a central screw spindle extending between the disks, and axially projecting tongues radially outside the grooves and spaced to engage in the bristle-free zones of the brush. The axial ends of the collar are fitted in the grooves of disks with the tongues positioned in the bristle-free zones, and the screw is tightened to clamp the brush in place.
This assembly is structurally very stable so that when it is rotated the outer ends of the bristles can be counted on to lie on a cylinder centered on the rotation axis of the brush, and the tongues prevent the brush from coming loose even if stressed considerably.
While this arrangement is fairly effective, it is susceptible of improvement. | {
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The present invention relates generally to elevator control systems and, in particular, to an apparatus and method for controlling an elevator in an energy conservation mode of operation.
In the past, elevators were adjusted to their maximum performance parameters, thus providing the most service during heavy usage periods. Unfortunately, the elevators ran with this level of performance all the time, regardless of the building needs.
In the U.S. Pat. No. 3,891,064, there is shown an elevator system that automatically switches between rated maximum performance and a reduced performance according to traffic conditions. The system normally operates at the rated maximum velocity and acceleration mode. When the demand for elevator service falls below a predetermined level, the velocity and/or the acceleration is reduced. The system includes a plurality of "traffic sensors" each of which causes switching from the reduced performance mode to the rated maximum performance mode when a predetermined traffic condition is sensed. The "traffic sensors" can include a clock that controls the switching according to traffic history. | {
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The electrospinning technology is for manufacturing nanofibers. The principle of the electrospinning technology is to provide a driving force generated by an electrical field between a positive and a negative electrodes, so as to overcome surface tension and viscosity of a polymer solution. In addition, streams of polymer solution ejected from a nozzle are mutually repulsive because they carry the same charge; when the solvent evaporates, ultra-thin fibers are formed. The process is also called fiber electrospinning. Comparing with the fibers produced by the prior spinning technology in diameters of several micrometers (μm), the polymeric fibrils produced by the electrospinning technology can achieve a purpose of fiber thinning, due to mechanical and electrostatic forces during the electrospinning process. Moreover, the fabric spun by the electrospinning method enjoys the advantages of having a more favored in higher porosity, larger surface area, and smaller pore size than those of conventional fabrics.
In U.S. Pat. No. 6,616,435, an apparatus of a polymer web formed by an electrospinning process is disclosed. The apparatus comprises: a barrel storing at least one kind of polymer material in a liquid state; a pump pressurizing and supplying the polymer material in the liquid state stored in the barrel; a spinning part for injecting the polymer material in the liquid state supplied by the pump through at least one charged nozzle and manufacturing thin fibers; a high voltage generator providing an electric charge for charging the polymer material discharged through the at least one nozzle of the spinning part to have one polarity; and a collector for piling and transferring the thin fibers to form the polymer web. The electrospinning apparatus has an automatic production ability operated with a plane conveyer belt.
In U.S. Pat. No. 6,110,590, a silk nanofiber composite network produced by forming a solution of silk fiber and hexafluroisopropanol is disclosed. The silk solution has a concentration of about 0.2 to about 1.5 weight percent silk in hexafluroisopropanol, thereby forming a non-woven network of nanofibers having a diameter in the range of about 2 to about 2000 nanometers (nm) for medical use.
In U.S. Publication No. 2003/0211135, a method of producing a composite film fibrous web having diameters averaging less than 100 micrometers by moving nozzles along X-Y axes is disclosed. The resultant product can be applied in, for example, fuel cells and medical supplies.
In brief, the polymeric fibrils can be produced with various diameters by controlling the system parameters of the electrospinning apparatus such as, for example, molecular weight, viscosity, conductivity, surface tension of the polymer solution, controlling operation parameters such as potential of the discharging electrode, flow rate of the polymer solution, the distance between electrodes, and temperature and humidity in the operation environment. However, an uneven web is produced by reciprocating the above nozzle. Reference is made to FIG. 1, which depicts a track of a nozzle on the receiving carrier in the prior art. When the nozzle 101 ejects the polymeric fibrils in a reciprocating way, the receiving carrier goes in a direction 109 vertical to the moving direction of the nozzle. The resultant web is formed with dense polymeric fibrils distributed in a region M and thin polymeric fibrils distributed out of the region M. Reference is made to FIG. 2, which depicts another track of another nozzle on the receiving carrier in the prior art. When the nozzle 101 also ejects the polymeric fibrils in reciprocating way, the receiving carrier goes in a direction 109 vertical to the moving direction of the nozzle. The resultant web is formed with dense polymeric fibrils distributed in a region N and thin polymeric fibrils distributed out of the region N.
In addition to the problem of unevenness in the polymer web produced by the U.S. Pat. No. 6,616,435, there is further an issue of slow production rates for other technologies. For examples, a unit of equipment disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,110,590 is merely an experimental one in the laboratory without continuous production ability. Moreover, the equipment disclosed in U.S. Publication No. 2003/0211135 has a slow production rate for the purpose of uniform distribution. Furthermore, the web produced by such polymeric fibrils produced by the above methods cannot completely satisfy the requirements for thinner diameter, uniform distribution, and higher production rate.
Hence, there is an urgent need for an electrospinning apparatus and method of manufacturing polymeric fibrils, so as to resolve the problems of uneven distribution, slow production rate and so on. | {
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The present invention relates to gas generant compositions that upon combustion produce a relatively smaller amount of solids and a relatively abundant amount of gas. It is an ongoing challenge to reduce the amount of solids and increase the amount of gas thereby decreasing the filtration requirements for an inflator. As a result, the filter may be either reduced in size or eliminated altogether thereby reducing the weight and/or size of the inflator. Additionally, reduction of combustion solids provides relatively greater amounts of gaseous products per gram or unit of gas generating composition. Accordingly, less gas generant is required when greater mols of gas are produced per gram of gas generant. The result is typically a smaller and less expensive inflator due to reduced manufacturing complexity.
Yet another concern is that the compositions must exhibit burn rates that are satisfactory with regard to use in vehicle occupant protection systems. In particular, compositions containing phase stabilized ammonium nitrate may exhibit relatively lower burn rates requiring various measures to improve the burn rate. Accordingly, the development of energetic fuels is one ongoing research emphasis whereby the less aggressive burn characteristics of preferred oxidizers such as phase stabilized ammonium nitrate are accommodated and compensated. | {
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The bagel arrived in America at the turn of the century. In New York around 1910 the bagel "industry" had a Bagel Bakers Local #338. Apprentices spent months learning the trade. Workers were paid 19 cents a box which contained 64 bagels. Popularity of the bagel spread beyond ethnic neighborhoods. In the early 60's bagels sold for 7 cents each. Now, bagel sales are approaching one billion dollars a year and are being called the "teddy bear of foods". However, this "teddy bear" can bite. Slicing a bagel by hand can result in very serious cuts to the hand. This has created the need for a safe and easy way to slice bagels, especially in the home. Hence, there are a variety of apparatuses for slicing bagels. Yet, a need continues to exist for a bagel slicer that is simple in design, inexpensive to own, and safe and easy to use.
A prior art device for slicing bagels is found in Apparatus for Slicing a Food Article of Ricard and Cann, U.S. Pat. No. 5,431,078 issued Jul. 11, 1995. Ricard et al discloses a two part device. The bottom member holds the bagel and the top member contains a guillotine type knife. The top member slides down over the bottom member slicing the bagel. There is no provision to center the bagel in the bottom member. If the bagel doesn't fill the width of the bottom member, the bagel can be tipped off center with the cut not being parallel to the top and bottom of the bagel. The blade in the top member is fixed and is very sharp and needs frequent cleanings. This is due to the various food flavoring accents added to the bagel mix. These additives remain moist and sticky even after being cooked. Accordingly, one or both halves of the bagel can become stuck to the blade upon completion of the slicing cycle. The problem now becomes how to remove the bagel halves from the top member without getting cut. This is a flawed design because the probability of being cut is very real.
Additionally, the bagel Slicer by Milo M. Keasrue, U.S. Pat. No. 5,361,666 issued Nov. 8, 1994, illustrates a tool that has to be adjusted in order to slice a bagel into two pieces. Another adjustment is needed to go from two slices to three slices. Yet another adjustment is needed to go from three slices to slice a bagel into four pieces. This tool is complicated, cumbersome, heavy and expensive to own.
Other patents that offer a device for slicing bagels are as follows: U.S. Pat. No. 5,431,078; U.S. Pat. No. 5,361,666; U.S. Pat. No. 4,807,505; U.S. Pat. No. 4,747,331; and U.S. Pat. No. 4,546,686. These patents additionally disclose devices which are problematic in their use and/or expensive to manufacture or own. Accordingly, a bagel slicer is needed which is easy to use and inexpensive to own. The slicer should be able to accommodate different sized foodstuffs and still achieve a centered slice. Also, the device should offer the additional ability to perform multiple slices of the bagel or bun. | {
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Passenger cars have nowadays a number of safety restraint systems, such as seat belt pre-tensioners or airbags, as e.g. front and side airbags, which serve to cushion or limit the impact of a passenger with for example interior parts of passenger cars in case of an accident. Deceleration sensors in the passenger vehicle detect high deceleration values as they occur in case of an accident and send a trigger signal via a wire or cable to SRS devices. An explosive device, known as a squib, inflates the airbag or tightens the belt. The wires or cables from the deceleration sensor are connected to an electronic control unit and then to the squib by means of a so called squib connector. To this aim, the squib is usually provided with a socket or receptacle which contains two contact pins. The squib connector comprises a plug part or plug-connector corresponding to the socket, which plug part has two receptacles for the reception of the contact pins of the squib socket. To improve the connection between squib and plug connector, retainer inserts were developed, which are adapted to fit into the receptacle of standardized squibs and which facilitate and secure the connection between squib and plug connector. These retainer inserts are commonly provided with some kind of a shorting clip, which short circuits the contact pins of the squib before a plug-connector is connected to the squib and which retainer insert further provides mechanical fastening means for a secure mechanical connection of plug-connector with the squib receptacle. The retainer inserts are sometimes also referred to as shorting inserts.
The principle structure of an (airbag) squib is for example described in WO 2004/020933. The squib disclosed in this document comprises an outer can enclosing a suitable pyrotechnic charge and an igniter which is provided with two contact pins being electrically connected to an igniter wire which can activate the charge of the squib. The igniter further includes a retainer for securing the squib to the housing of e.g. an airbag inflator, which retainer further comprises a plastic insert, which is injection moulded around the pins of the squib and which serves to provide for a mechanical fastening with the corresponding (squib) plug connector. The retainer is further provided with a so called shorting clip, which is usually an electroconductive metallic spring part, which in the non-coupled condition electrically connects the two pins of the squib with each other, i.e. shorting the same. The shorting of the contact pins serves to prevent an unintended explosion of the pyrotechnic charge due to electrical potential differences occurring between the two contact pins, for example during transport or handling. The short circuit established by the shorting clip is lifted and opens upon correct coupling of the corresponding plug-connector into or with the retainer. Usually, a contacting member of a shorting clip is displaced by the plug part of the plug-connector so that the two contact pins are no longer electrically connected.
The shorting clips of the prior art in use today are not only intended to prevent an unintentional ignition of the charge of the squib but they also serve as a control or monitoring means of the correct coupling of the squib plug-connector with its counterpart, i.e. the squib receptacle respectively the retainer or insert mounted therein. Upon correct coupling of the plug-connector with its counterpart, the short circuit between the contact pins of the squib is automatically open as described above, and this can be detected by means of suitable electrical/electronic monitoring means, as it is well known to the skilled person.
On the one hand, the necessary provision of the above described shorting clips leads to a significant increase in production costs, since not only a separate part has to be provided and assembled but also since the provision of a shorting clip in a retainer or airbag receptacle limits the design freedom for squib connectors thereby further increasing the costs since it is very often not possible to use the optimum design for plug-connector and retainer due to the necessary regard for the shorting clip.
On the other hand, constant improvements were made for the squib making it more secure. In the latest developments, modern squibs are so reliable that a shorting clip is no longer absolutely necessary. Thanks to the improvements, an unintended ignition of the charge due to an electrical potential difference between the contact pins can be ruled out. Thus, for this new type of squibs, the shorting clips could be disposed off, thereby reducing the manufacturing costs for the squib connectors considerably. However, as was mentioned above, the shorting clip is not only a safety feature for an unintended ignition of explosive charge of the airbag or belt pre-tensioner system but it is also commonly used to monitor the correct coupling of the plug-connector with its counterpart. Without a shorting clip, this is no longer possible with the existing connector systems so that shorting clips are still necessary for their monitoring function, although the “shorting function” itself is no longer strictly necessary.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a connector for a safety restraint system which allows the electrical or electronic monitoring of the correct coupling of a (squib) plug-connector with its corresponding counterpart, like for example a squib receptacle or a retainer insert for a squib receptacle. It is a further object of the invention to provide a connector with such a monitoring function, which is cheaper to produce than the known connectors comprising shorting clips and which is of a more flexible construction.
These and other objects, which become apparent upon reading the following description, are solved by connectors according to claims 1 and 8. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to control systems for power trains provided in vehicles, and more particularly, to a system for controlling a power train provided in a vehicle and including an engine having an engine output adjusting device, such as a throttle valve, which is controlled through an electric actuator in accordance with a controlled variable on an accelerator accompanying with the engine and an automatic transmission which is coupled with the engine and in which speed change is automatically performed by means of oil pressure produced in an oil hydraulic control circuit for actuating a speed change mechanism and controlled to vary in accordance with the operating condition of the engine.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There has been proposed a throttle valve control system for controlling electrically a throttle valve in an engine provided in a vehicle to vary its opening degree in accordance with a controlled variable on an accelerator accompanying with the engine, as disclosed in, for example, the Japanese patent application published before examination under the publication number 59/10751. In such a throttle valve control system, a relation between the opening degree of the throttle valve and the controlled variable on the accelerator can be predetermined to be desirable. Therefore, with the throttle valve control system thus proposed previously, it has been put into practice to have a throttle valve operation optimal to the operating condition of the engine by varying a rate of variation in the opening degree of the throttle valve to the controlled variable on the accelerator in accordance with the operating condition of the vehicle engine, for example, in such a manner that the rate of variation in the opening degree of the throttle valve to the controlled variable on the accelerator is increased in response to a requirement of acceleration when the engine is operating with relatively small load or at relatively low speed, or by varying the rate of variation in the opening degree of the throttle valve to the controlled variable on the accelerator in accordance with a rate of change in the controlled variable on the accelerator. Further, it has been also put into practice to vary the predetermined relation between the opening degree of the throttle valve and the controlled variable on the accelerator in response to each of selected speeds in a transmission coupled with the engine to which the throttle valve control system is applied.
Meanwhile, there has been commonly used in vehicles an automatic transmission which is coupled with an engine provided in the vehicle and includes a torque converter, a power transmitting gear arrangement including a speed change mechanism having engaging friction elements, such as clutch and brake elements, operating with oil pressure, and a hydraulic pressure control device including an oil hydraulic control circuit for causing the speed change mechanism to perform speed change. In such an automatic transmission, generally, a speed change control according to a predetermined speed change characteristic is carried out in response to variations in engine load and in travelling speed of the vehicle and an operating oil pressure control in which operating oil pressure in the oil hydraulic control circuit is controlled in response to variations in the engine load so as to have a value appropriate to an engine output transmitted to the speed change mechanism in the power transmitting gear arrangement is also carried out to keep selected one or more of the engaging friction elements to be in engagement without shocks of great degree on the occasion of each speed change. For each of the speed change control and the operating oil pressure control, the engine load is represented by a control variable on an accelerator or an opening degree of a throttle valve.
In the case where the speed change control and the operating oil pressure control proposed previously as mentioned above are performed in the automatic transmission coupled with an engine to which the aforementioned throttle valve control system is applied for controlling electrically a throttle valve in the engine, the following problems arise.
In the engine having the throttle valve controlled electrically and coupled with the automatic transmission, the opening degree of the throttle valve is varied suddenly in response to a small variation in the controlled variable on the accelerator under a condition in which the engine operates with an increased rate of variation in the opening degree of the throttle valve to the controlled variable on the accelerator or the opening degree of the throttle valve is varied in response to a speed change operation in the automatic transmission under a condition in which a relation between the opening degree of the throttle valve and the controlled variable on the accelerator is varied in response to each of selected speeds in the automatic transmission. Therefore, it is feared that an undesirable hunting condition in speed change operation in which unnecessary speed changes are repeatedly carried out is brought about due to the variations in the opening degree of the throttle valve caused in such a manner as mentioned above under the speed change control performed in the automatic transmission. Further, the throttle valve is controlled by an electric actuator to have an opening degree corresponding to the controlled variable on the accelerator and therefore the engine output is not always in a fixed proportion to the controlled variable on the accelerator in the engine having the throttle valve controlled electrically. Therefore, it is also feared that the operating oil pressure in the oil hydraulic control circuit is not controlled to have a pressure value appropriate to the engine output under the operating oil pressure control performed in the automatic transmission. | {
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A number of different processes for oxygen delignification have been disclosed. U.S. Pat. No. 4,259,150 presents a system involving a multistage oxygen bleaching in which the pulp is, in each stage, firstly mixed to a lower consistency with O2, water and NaOH, followed by a thickening back to the consistency level which the pulp had up until the stage in question. The aim is to achieve an economical, chlorine-free bleaching with a high yield. At the same time, the kappa number can be lowered, by means of repeated stages, from 70 down to 15, or even to less than 15.
SE-C 467 582 presents an improved system for the oxygen bleaching of pulp of medium consistency. By means of the temperature control having been optimized, an oxygen bleaching takes place in a first delignification zone at low temperature, followed by a second delignification zone which is at a temperature which is 20-40 degrees higher. The aim was to obtain an improved yield and an improved viscosity, while retaining the same dwell time, in connection with industrial implementation.
Besides SE-C 467 582, other variants of oxygen delignification in two stages have also been patented. SE-C 505 147 presents a process in which the pulp is to have a high pulp concentration, in the range of 25-40%, in the first stage and a concentration of 8-16% in the second stage, at the same time as the temperature in the second stage is to be higher than, or the same as, the temperature in the first stage, in line with the temperature difference which is recommended in SE-C 467 582. The advantages of the solution in accordance with SE-C 505 147 are stated to be the possibility of admixing more oxygen in the first high-consistency stage without the risk of channel formation but where, at the same time, unused quantities of oxygen can be bled off after the first stage for further admixture in a second mixer prior to the second stage.
SE-C 505 141 presents yet another process which is an attempt to circumvent SE-C 467 582 since that for which a patent is sought is stated to be the fact that the temperature difference between the stages does not exceed 20°, i.e. the lowest suitable temperature difference patented in SE-C 467 582, but that a temperature difference should nevertheless be present. In addition to this, it is stated that a) the pressure should be higher in the first stage and b) that the dwell time is short in the first stage, i.e. of the order of size of 10-30 minutes, and c) the dwell time in the second stage is longer, i.e. of the order of size of 45-180 minutes.
A lecture entitled “Two-stage MC-oxygen delignification process and operating experience”, which was given by Shinichiro Kondo, from the Technical Div. Technical Dept. OJI PAPER Co. Ltd., at the 1992 Pan-Pacific Pulp & Paper Technology Conference ('99 PAN-PAC PPTC), September 8-10, Sheraton Grande Tokyo Bay Hotel & Towers, presents a successful installation which involves two-stage oxygen delignification and which was constructed in 1986 in a plant in Tomakomai. In this OJI PAPER plant in Tomakomai, the pulp was fed, at a pressure of 10 bar, to a first oxygen mixer (+steam), followed by an aftertreatment in a “preretention tube” (prereactor) involving a dwell time of 10 minutes in which the pulp pressure is reduced to a level of about 8-6 bar due to pipe losses, etc. After that the pulp was fed into a second oxygen mixer, followed by an aftertreatment in a reactor at a pressure of 5-2 bar and with a dwell time of 60 minutes. At this point it was stated that preference would have been given to having a “preretention tube” which would have given a dwell time of about 20 minutes but that it was not possible to achieve this due to lack of space. OJI PAPER stated that, by using this installation, they were successful in achieving an increase in kappa reduction for a lower cost in chemicals and also an improvement in pulp viscosity.
The greater part of the prior art has consequently been aimed at a higher pressure in the first reactor at a level of about 6(8)-10 bar. A pressure in the first reactor of up to 20 bar has even been discussed in some extreme applications. This entails the reactor spaces which are required for the first delignification zone having to be manufactured so as to withstand these high pressure levels, with the attendant requirement for substantial material thickness and/or good material qualities, resulting in an expensive installation.
In pulp suspensions used in industrial manufacturing processes, there are large quantities of readily oxidizable constituents/structures which react even under modest process conditions. It is therefore advantageous to add oxygen in a first stage in quantities which are such that this relatively readily oxidized part of the pulp is allowed to oxidize/react first of all. Severe problems arise if an attempt is made to compensate for this by adding too much oxygen, since there is the imminent problem of channelling (as mentioned in the said SE-C 505 147).
One aim of the invention is to avoid the disadvantages of the prior art and to obtain an oxygen delignification of increased selectivity.
The invention permits an optimal practical application of the theories regarding a first rapid phase and a second slower phase during the oxygen delignification process, where the optimal reaction conditions are different between the phases.
At the high hydroxide ion concentrations and high oxygen partial pressures which are conventionally employed in the first stage, the carbohydrates are attacked more than necessary, thereby impairing the quality of the pulp.
A lower oxygen partial pressure, and preferably a lower temperature as well, in the first stage than in the second stage decreases the rate of reaction for breaking down carbohydrates more than it decreases the rate of reaction for the delignification, thereby leading to an increased total selectivity on the pulp after the two stages.
Another aim is to allow the process installation to be simpler and cheaper, with it being possible for at least one pressure vessel in a first delignification zone to be manufactured using less robust material and/or a lower material quality which is suitable for a lower pressure class.
Yet another aim is to optimize the mixing process in each position such that only that quantity of oxygen is added which is consumed in the following delignification zone. This makes it possible to dispense with bleeding systems for surplus quantities of oxygen at the same time as it is possible to reduce the total consumption of oxygen, which in turn reduces the operating costs for the operator of the fibre line and consequently shortens the pay-off time.
Yet another aim is to increase, in an oxygen delignification system having a given total volume of the first and second stages, a so-called H factor by running the first stage for a short time at low temperature and the second stage for a longer time at a higher temperature. When, for example, carrying out conversions of existing single-vessel oxygen delignification stages, a simple new construction with a small prereactor, and a modest increase in the reaction temperature in the existing reactor, can increase the H factor and at the same improve the selectivity over the oxygen stages. | {
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Bone bed drilling is a time consuming task during implant surgery, in part because of the precision required to ensure a good fit between the implant and the bone surface. The surface of the bone bed to which an implant is attached needs to be smooth and flat, in order to minimize complications such as biofilm formation in interstices between the surface of the bone and the surface of the implant if the bone surface is uneven, or inadvertent relocation of the implant after surgery due to poor contact adhesion if the bone surface is not flat enough.
For an implant that is affixed to a patient's skull these problems are particularly acute since the surface of the skull is curved, yet the surface of an implant is flat. So if an implant is placed directly on to the surface of the skull, it can rock because it is flat relative to the curved section of skull. The surgeon therefore needs to plane away a flat surface of the bone to accommodate the implant in a rigid manner. Additionally, the surface of the recessed portion needs to be as smooth as possible so that the area of contact with the implant is maximized over the recessed region and the implant does not wobble due to unevenness of the surface, and there are no cavities between the bone surface and the adjacent implant surface.
In many types of implant such as auditory prostheses, the portion of the implant that is in direct contact with the bone is a receiver/stimulator unit: if this item does not have good contact with the bone at all points on its surface, it can shift its position after surgery, leading to a degradation or variability in its performance, and a continual need to recalibrate it. Furthermore, cavities, if present underneath the receiver/stimulator, can lead to biofilm formation and higher infection risks for the subject, in the post-surgical phase. Biofilm formation is encouraged when there is a pocket of air between the implant and the bone, in which bacteria can grow. Such bacteria can spread and make an increased area of infection, thereby having a harmful impact on the implant recipient. There can be a similar propensity for biofilm formation in any imperfections that may exist on the edges of the bone bed: it is important that the side walls of the drilled out area are perpendicular to the flat area which was drilled out and this may not be easy to gauge.
Other methods for reducing biofilm include coating the surface of the implant with an anti-bacterial substance, or a material such as a silicone that fills the voids when the implant is affixed, as well as by designing the implant so that it has smooth surfaces. These approaches, however, do not address the goodness of fit of the implant.
Some implants have used a hydroxyapatite cement to affix it but the substance expands on setting and so is less desirable when the implant must fit snugly in the bone bed. Other ways of fixing an implant are by using a titanium bridge, or a suture above the implant, but these methods do not necessarily work well for all types of implant and may not address the issue of biofilm formation.
Many implant kits are provided with a surgical kit containing various implant templates that can be used by surgeons to check the depth, shape, and flatness of the bone bed during drilling and prior to attachment of the implant. Some examples are produced by Cochlear, Limited (e.g., the CI24RE implant template). In many instances, more than one template is required for the same implant because, the same template cannot necessarily be used to define the perimeter of the area before any drilling is done as the template that is used to gauge the proper depth of the recessed area.
FIGS. 1A, 1B, 1C, and 1D show the actuator 101 of an exemplary acoustic implant, its fixation system 111, its position in situ on a patient's skull 103, and a template 121 to assist the surgeon in drilling a recessed area of bone in which to position fixation system 111, and the corresponding receiver/stimulator 141. In this example, fixation system 111 is used to hold actuator 101 in the mastoid (bone behind the recipient's ear), as shown in FIG. 1B, and as further described herein. The receiver/stimulator unit that communicates with actuator 101 is not shown in FIGS. 1A-1C.
However, while implant templates do help a surgeon to create a flat surface by trial and error, they do not make it clear to the surgeon where to flatten the bone, or improve the perpendicularity of the sides of the bone bed, during surgery. Therefore, during bone bed drilling, surgeons often struggle to create a flat surface, and may end up unnecessarily drilling away additional bone at the wrong spots.
In the absence of any other way in the art to address the foregoing problems, there is accordingly a need for a method and device for facilitating reliable placement of a bone implant, in order to improve the efficiency of the surgical process, as well as ensure a greater fidelity of the implant's attachment to the bone surface.
The discussion of the background herein is included to explain the context of the technology. This is not to be taken as an admission that any of the material referred to was published, known, or part of the common general knowledge as at the priority date of any of the claims found appended hereto.
Throughout the description and claims of the application the word “comprise” and variations thereof, such as “comprising” and “comprises”, is not intended to exclude other additives, components, integers or steps. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method and an arrangement using a detector surface and a light source for determination of the level of two or more measurement points, a light beam being produced along a first direction, the light beam being deflected through 90° with respect to the first direction to a second direction, with the second direction being rotated through a rotation angle corresponding to the position of the measurement point about an axis which is formed by the first direction.
2. Description of Related Art
A method and an arrangement of the generic type described above are known from Japanese patent publications JP 2000-46551 and JP 2000-213937, respectively, with the beam direction of a laser being steered accurately in a desired azimuth rotation direction. For this purpose, the beam of a laser diode which is emitted vertically upwards is deflected through 90° by means of a pentagonal prism. The pentagonal prism rotates the laser beam in a plane at right angles to the emission direction. An encoder with a round encoder plate is used in order to determine the respective rotation angle of this rotation, and the rotation angle is evaluated via an encoder sensor. In order to determine the position of a measurement point in this way, its height z above a horizontal reference plane (for example, the rotation plane of the laser beam) must be determined by means of an additional measurement method, using cylindrical coordinates, and its radial distance from a vertical reference axis (for example, the emission axis of the laser) must be determined by means of a further measurement method. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to the field of disc drive data storage devices, and more particularly, but not by way of limitation, to a method and apparatus for providing low velocity retraction of an actuator through application of an exponentially ramped voltage to a disc drive voice coil motor.
2. Discussion
Modern hard disc drives comprise one or more rigid discs that are coated with a magnetizable medium and mounted on the hub of a spindle motor for rotation at a constant high speed. Information is stored on the discs in a plurality of concentric circular tracks by an array of transducers ("heads") mounted for movement to an electronically controlled actuator mechanism.
Presently, the most commonly used type of actuator mechanism is the rotary voice coil actuator, which employs a voice coil motor. With this type of actuator, the heads used to write and read data are mounted via flexures at the ends a plurality of arms which project radially outward from a substantially cylindrical actuator body. The actuator body is journaled via ball bearing assemblies to rotate about a pivot shaft which is mounted to the disc drive housing at a position closely adjacent the outer extreme of the discs. The pivot shaft is parallel with the axis of rotation of the spindle motor and the discs and the heads move in a plane parallel with the surfaces of the discs.
The actuator voice coil motor includes a coil mounted on the side of the actuator body opposite the head arms so as to be immersed in the magnetic field of an array of permanent magnets. When controlled DC current is passed through the coil, a magnetic field is set up which interacts with the magnetic field of the permanent magnets and causes the coil to move relative to the permanent magnets in accordance with the well-known Lorentz relationship. As the coil moves relative to the permanent magnets, the actuator body pivots about the pivot shaft and the heads are moved across the disc surfaces.
Control of the movement of the heads is achieved with a closed loop servo system such as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,262,907 entitled HARD DISC DRIVE WITH IMPROVED SERVO SYSTEM, issued to Duffy, McKenzie, Heydari and Woods, assigned to the assignee of the present invention and incorporated herein by reference. In such a system, position or servo information is prerecorded on at least one surface of one of the discs. The servo system can be either a dedicated servo system, in which servo information is provided on a dedicated servo disc surface, or an embedded servo system, in which servo information is interleaved with user data on all the disc surfaces.
At such times that the disc drive is not in use, the heads are usually "parked", or moved to a position over a designated park zone which is generally at an inner radius of the discs. Heads are generally parked in response to a loss of power to the drive, or in response to a "sleep" command which is issued to conserve power, an important consideration for drives used in portable computers. In order to park the heads, a current is provided to the coil in order to move the actuator across the disc and over the park zone, where a latch is provided to secure the actuator. Typical latching arrangements are disclosed by U.S. Pat. No. 5,187,627 entitled MAGNETIC LATCH AND CRASH STOP, issued to Hickox and Stram, U.S. Pat. No. 5,224,000 entitled CRASH STOP AND MAGNETIC LATCH FOR A VOICE COIL ACTUATOR, issued to Casey and West, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,365,389 entitled CRASH STOP AND MAGNETIC LATCH, issued Nov. 15, 1994 to Jabbari and Tafreshi, all of these references being assigned to the assignee of the present invention and incorporated herein by reference.
It is generally desirable to park the heads quickly, as the power to park the heads at the time of a power loss is typically provided from the back EMF of the spindle motor; that is, after a loss of power, the spindle motor is used as a generator as it continues to spin due to inertia. As areal densities increase and the size of the discs continue to decrease, the amount of power available from the inertia of the spinning spindle motor after power down will continue to decrease, making expeditious parking of the heads an even more important consideration in the future. The general use of the spindle motor back EMF to provide power used during a disc drive shut down sequence is discussed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,679,102 entitled METHOD AND MEANS FOR PARKING READ/WRITE HEADS IN A DISC DRIVE USING THE BACK-EMF OF THE SPINDLE MOTOR TO OPERATE A STEPPER MOTOR, issued to Wevers, Krause and Battu, assigned to the assignee of the present invention and incorporated herein by reference.
Additionally, the heads are typically supported over the discs by an air-bearing surface generated by the rotation of the discs and this air-bearing surface will be lost once the rotational speed of the discs is sufficiently decreased. Typically, the heads are parked by applying a DC current pulse to the coil in order to move the actuator to the park position. The duration and magnitude of the current pulse are selected in order to ensure the heads are reliably parked from any position on the disc, including the outermost radius of the disc.
While it is desirable to park the heads quickly, attendant problems have been observed when the actuator is moved too rapidly during parking. Particularly, the application of a current pulse to the voice coil motor to park the heads can result in significant acceleration of the heads towards the park position, culminating in undesirable acoustic noise as the actuator contacts a limit stop or magnetic latch. Further, the sudden deceleration of the actuator upon contact with the limit stop can subject the heads to uncontrolled mechanical motion and vibration, which can damage the heads, the actuator arms and the disc media. With the advent of smaller, more complex head designs, such as MR and GMR heads, reducing mechanical motion and shock to the heads will continue to be desirable in the future.
Uncontrolled bias forces, if not compensated, can compound the problems associated with the parking of the heads. Aerodynamic forces on the heads as well as bias forces from a flex circuit connected to the actuator (to provide both data signal and drive signal paths) vary across the disc radius and may cause additional acceleration of the heads toward the park position, causing additional acoustic noise and head motion when the actuator is parked. Further, electrical and mechanical tolerances in the components used in the actuator and associated control circuitry can also result in variations in parking characteristics from drive to drive, which can require individual turning of drives during manufacturing to provide acceptable parking characteristics. | {
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Commercially available image display systems in the medical field utilize various techniques to present image data to a user. Specifically, image data produced within modalities such as Computed Tomography (CT), Magnetic Resonance (MR) and the like is displayed on a display terminal for review by a medical practitioner at a medical treatment site. This image data is used by the medical practitioner to determine the presence or absence of a disease, tissue damage, etc. Through visual comparisons with prior imaging studies, medical practitioners are able to make or improve diagnoses based on changes in a patient's imaging studies over time.
Currently, large volume imaging studies utilized by medical treatment sites, such as CT and MR, pose a significant diagnostic problem due to the large number of image data files that are created and stored for later review. A typical image dataset may easily contain over 2000 slices that translate into a similar number of image data files organized into multiple series. Further, Picture Archiving and Communication Systems (PACS) utilized by medical treatment sites have the ability to present image datasets from multiple modalities, spanning several years. Although the availability of imaging studies from multiple modalities is of benefit to medical practitioners, it is difficult to isolate only relevant prior studies. Further, the amount of data available requires that medical practitioners engage in a time-intensive exercise to filter through studies, series and images, to identify only those that are most relevant to the current diagnosis.
This filtering process is difficult, making an exhaustive comparison of current medical images with a patient's prior history impractical. Moreover, image data is often presented by date. However, medical practitioners are less interested in exact dates than in time periods, for example, the previous quarter or year. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to slide fasteners, and more particularly to slide fasteners having a reinforced separating end stop.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Numerous slide fasteners are known to the art such as the type having a separating end stop attached to a pair of stringer tapes provided with opposed interengaging elements operable by means of a slider. When edges of an article are joined by a slide fastener, the tensional stresses are more or less uniformily distributed along the entire length of the stringer tapes because of the large number of closely positioned interengaging elements. However, when the slide fastener is joined only by means of the separating end stop or additionally by means of only a limited number of interengaging elements adjacent the separating end stop, great tensional stresses are caused to occur along the ends of the stringer tapes in the area of the separating end stop which over a limited period of use causes wear or fraying of the material forming the stringer tapes.
Attempts by the prior art to resolve the recognized problem of wear or fraying of the material forming the stringer tapes in the area adjacent the end stops have been limited because of recognized requirements that the slider be permitted to operate over the end stops for disengagement, as well as the need to perserve esthetic quality of the fastener.
Although the prior art has recognized the need to reinforce stringer tapes in the area of wear adjacent the end stop members of a slide fastener, the requirements of functionality and esthetic appeal have presented obstacles which have limited commercial acceptance of proposed solutions to this problem of wear.
Accordingly, although great improvements have been made in the simplicity, effectiveness, and limited breakage of the slide and interengaging elements forming a slide fastener, the useful life thereof remains limited because of damage by tensional stresses in the area of the end stop portion of the stringer tapes.
One attempt to reinforce a slide fastener in the area of the end stop is that disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,872,551. Here, the end stop components are secured to the stringer tapes by means of tape reinforcing flaps which are laminated over the surface of opposite sides of the tapes. The reinforcing flaps comprise a grid effect formed of a framed border having rib elements disposed therein. Although effective reinforcing of the stringer tapes ends may be accomplished by this device, the reinforcing flaps are merely joined by a laminated member of limited thickness over the surface of the stringer tapes to the end stop members such that tensional forces, although limited somewhat, remain in the plane of the material forming the stringer tapes adjacent the end stop.
Another attempt to reinforce a slide fastener in the area of the end stop is that disclosed in British Specification No. 1,077,986 wherein reinforcement is achieved by means of gap ribs extending laterally of the taps in a zig-zag configuration joining to a reinforcing grid. Because of the tendency of the material forming the stringer tapes to return to a horizontal plane, gaps tend to appear along the side walls of the gap ribs resulting in poor adhesion with the stringer tape. Thus, although the gap ribs of this British Specification provide a somewhat stronger union between the reinforcement grid and stop end elements by reason of increased thickness, wear caused by the thicker ribs rubbing against unsecured portions of the stringer tapes tending to return to a normal plane presents a serious defect to this attempted solution of the problem.
It has now been found that by practice of the present invention, there is provided a simple, effective and esthetic solution to the problem of wear by tensional forces in the immediate area of stringer tapes adjacent the end stop elements. | {
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L-amino acids, especially L-lysine, are used in human medicine and in the pharmaceuticals industry, in the foodstuffs industry and, very especially, in the feeding of animals.
It is known that amino acids are produced by fermentation of strains of coryneform bacteria, especially Corynebacterium glutamicum. Because of their great importance, attempts are continuously being made to improve the production processes. Improvements to the processes may concern measures relating to the fermentation, such as, for example, stirring and oxygen supply, or the composition of the nutrient media, such as, for example, the sugar concentration during the fermentation, or working up to the product form by, for example, ion-exchange chromatography, or the intrinsic performance properties of the microorganism itself.
In order to improve the performance properties of such microorganisms, methods of mutagenesis, selection and mutant selection are employed. Such methods yield strains which are resistant to antimetabolites, such as, for example, the lysine analogue S-(2-aminoethyl)-cysteine, or are auxotrophic for metabolites that are important in terms of regulation, and which produce L-amino acids.
For a number of years, methods of recombinant DNA technology have also been used for improving the strain of L-amino acid-producing strains of Corynebacterium glutamicum, by amplifying individual amino acid biosynthesis genes and studying the effect on L-amino acid production. | {
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The present Invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Azalea, botanically known as Rhododendron hybrida, an evergreen greenhouse-forcing type Azalea, and hereinafter referred to by the name ‘Pearls’.
The new Azalea is a product of a planned breeding program conducted by the Inventor in Alva, Fla. The objective of the breeding program is to create new Azalea varieties having uniform plant habit, profuse and uniform flowering response, dark green foliage, good foliage retention during the cooling and forcing periods, resistance to Cylindrocladium and excellent postproduction longevity.
The new Azalea originated from a cross-pollination made by the Inventor in February, 1995, in Alva, Fla., of the Azalea cultivar Athena, disclosed in U.S. Plant Pat. No. 9,439, as the female, or seed, parent with the Azalea cultivar Solitaire, disclosed in U.S. Plant Pat. No. 3,171, as the male, or pollen, parent. The new Azalea was discovered and selected by the Inventor as a flowering plant within the progeny of the stated cross-pollination in a controlled environment in Alva, Fla. in October, 1997.
Asexual reproduction of the new Azalea by terminal cuttings taken in controlled environment in Alva, Fla. since February, 1998, has shown that the unique features of this new Azalea are stable and reproduced true to type in successive generations. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a semiconductor memory device, and more particularly, to a structure of one-transistor.one-capacitor type dynamic memory cells.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various structures have been proposed as one-transistor.one-capacitor type dynamic memory cells for providing memory cell arrays so as to achieve high integration density. FIG. 5 shows an SPT cell as one such example. In an arrangement shown in FIG. 5, reference numeral 51 is a P.sup.+ -type semiconductor substrate to which a ground potential Vss is applied. 52 a P-type epitaxial layer grown on the substrate 51, 53 an N-type well region provided in a part of a region of the epitaxial layer 52 and biased to a positive electric potential, and 54 an isolation region, respectively. A cell capacitor is provided as an insulated gate type capacitor (MOS capacitor) which includes a thin insulating film 55, formed on an inner surface of a trench extending to the substrate 51 through both the well region 53 and the epitaxial layer 52, and a P.sup.+ -type polysilicon layer 56 for a charge storage electrode filled in the trench. In this case, the substrate 51 acts as a capacitor plate electrode.
A cell transistor for charge transfer is provided on the surface portion of the well region 53 and comprised of P.sup.+ -type source and drain regions 57 and 58 formed in the well region 53 and a gate electrode 60 disposed through a gate insulating film 59 above a channel region defined between the source and drain regions. The upper surface of the drain region 58 is connected through a conductive film 61 to the polysilicon layer 56 in the trench. The gate electrode 60 is formed of, for example, silicides and serves as a part of a word line for the memory cell array. 60a is a word line for an adjacent row, 62 an interlevel insulator, and 63 a bit line which is in contact with the source region 57, respectively.
However, the dynamic memory cell has associated therewith a problem as described in more detail in the document "Parasitic Leakage in DRAM Trench Storage Capacitor Vertical Gated Diodes, W. P. Noble et al. IEDM 1987 Tech Digest, PP 340 to 343". That is, as shown in FIG. 6, since the insulating film 55 on the inner surface of the trench acts as a gate insulating film and the P.sup.+ -type polysilicon layer 56 for the charge storage electrode acts as a control gate, a leakage current may flow through a junction between the N-type well region 53 and the P.sup.+ -type substrate 51. In this case, the dependence of the junction leakage current associated with a voltage between the P.sup.+ -type polysilicon layer 56 for the storage electrode and the P.sup.+ -type substrate 51 will be obtained as shown in FIG. 7 when the ambient temperature and thickness of the insulating film 55 on the trench are used as parameters. From this it will be apparent that the junction leakage current is increased with a decrease in the thickness of the insulating film 55 on the inner surface of the trench.
However, the insulating film 55 on the inner surface of the trench should have decreased thickness in order to provide good memory cells and to obtain higher storage capacitance. In this case however the junction leakage current will be increased, thereby increasing the power consumption of the dynamic memory device.
As described above, the conventional dynamic memory cell involves the problem such that, even if the insulating film provided on the inner surface of the capacitor formation trench has reduced thickness so as to increase the storage capacitance of the memory cell, the junction leakage current between the well region and the substrate will be increased, thereby increasing the power consumption of the dynamic memory device. | {
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Existing techniques whereby a water-in-oil emulsion may be resolved into its constituent phases make use of chemical and physical means for achieving the resolution.
The need for an emulsion breaking operation may arise in connection with a wide variety of processes. For example, in the production of crude oil at the well-head, where saline formation water is present as fine stable droplets in the oil coming to the surface, it is necessary to break the emulsion in order to dehydrate the oil.
In other cases, it may be essential to recover the components of an emulsion after it has been deliberately created for a specific purpose. This occurs in processes using emulsion liquid membrane technology where, for instance, a very stable water-in-oil emulsion is used to treat an aqueous effluent feed stream to remove an impurity. The species to be removed from the aqueous feed stream transfers through the outer oil phase of the emulsion into the water droplets or internal phase of the emulsion. To encourage this mass transfer to occur it is necessary to have some appropriate chemical or physical driving force. A simple example of such a process is the extraction of ammonia from an effluent water into an emulsion of sulphuric acid in kerosene.
A crucial feature of the economics of processes that employ emulsion liquid membranes concerns the ability to re-use the oil phase repeatedly. Ecohomic viability depends on being able to break the used emulsion speedily to remove the spent internal phase in bulk and recycle the oil phase to make fresh emulsion for re-use.
In the oil industry, crude oil emulsions that are slow to resolve using a purely physical method such as gravity separation, can often be treated with chemical additives which serve to destabilise the emulsion. However, the latter course of action is not feasible for liquid membrane emulsions. Here the desire to recreate a stable emulsion using the separated oil phase mitigates against the use of chemical demulsifiers. In the case of liquid membrane emulsions it is therefore necessary to consider the use of physical methods alone to speed up the separation of an emulsion.
In general, the resolution of emulsions requires that the small droplets of the dispersed (internal) phase coalesce together, until they become large enough to be removed easily from the continuous phase. Where the densities of the two phases are different, the denser phase simply gravitates from the emulsion and, given enough time, the two phases can be separated sufficiently for each to be drawn off. The time required for this separation is reflected by the size of the settling tanks which are typically required. These may be very large and may contain a large inventory of expensive liquids. In addition, the phase separation step may be the slowest stage of a more extensive process and therefore limit the throughput of the overall process.
During the resolution of a water-in-oil emulsion, those droplets that have grown by coalescence must gravitate through the emulsion to reach the bulk interface between the separated water layer and the unseparated emulsion. The viscosity of the emulsion tends to be high, especially for liquid membrane emulsions. This hinders the passage of the water droplets and they can be very slow to reach the bulk interface.
One method that has proved useful specifically for enhancing the rate of separation of a water-in-oil emulsion is to subject the emulsion to an applied high voltage gradient. The electric field assists the process of phase separation by promoting coalescence between the water droplets in the emulsion. Several possible mechanisms for electrically aided coalescence have been identified [Waterman, L. C. (1965) Chem. Eng. Progress, vol 61, (10), 51], all of which rely upon the attraction of opposite charges on adjacent droplets to cause an increased incidence of collision followed by coalescence. The larger droplets produced by this process gravitate much more quickly to the bulk interface than their much smaller antecedents could do when under the same gravitational field.
Many different types of electric field have been shown to be effective for emulsion resolution, including: AC fields [Cottrell, F. G. (1911) U.S. Pat. No 987 114, March]; pulsed AC fields [Wolfe, K. M. (1944) U.S. Pat. No. 2,364,118]; DC fields [Siebert, F. M. and Brady, J. D. (1919) U.S. Pat. No. 1,290,369, January]; and pulsed DC fields [Stenzel, R. W. (1958) U.S. Pat. No. 2,855,356, October].
A particular feature of some oil field emulsions and most liquid membrane emulsions is that the water content of the emulsion may be 20% or more. Under such circumstances it is often impossible to apply the desired electric field by simply passing the emulsion between metal electrodes because the presence of a large number of aqueous phase droplets tends to cause an electrical short-circuit between the electrodes. This problem can be overcome by coating the high voltage electrode in a layer of insulation, so that those conduction paths that do develop only cause a localised diminution of the electric field rather than a complete collapse of the field throughout the inter-electrode region.
The potential difference that must be sacrificed when introducing a layer of insulation between the high voltage electrode and the emulsion may be minimised by operating under pulsed voltage conditions. At optimum frequency, pulsed DC fields have been shown to be particularly good for promoting coalescence when the high voltage electrode is coated with insulation [Bailes, P. J. and Larkai, S. K. L. (1986) U.S. Pat. No. 4,601,834, July]. Experimental evidence suggests that best performance is achieved when the emulsion to be treated flows in close proximity to the insulation coated electrode [Bailes, P. J. and Larkai, S. K. L., Proceedings of the International Solvent Extraction Conference 1990 (Kyoto) (Process Metallurgy, Vol 7b, p1411, publd. Elsevier Science 1992)]. It follows from this that the larger the electrode area in contact with the emulsion the better.
The present invention aims to provide a method and apparatus for separating the components of an emulsion, which can allow improved separation rates to be achieved. The invention also provides a novel method of effectively using insulated electrode surfaces. In practice, the new method works in an unexpected way causing another beneficial effect which acts synergistically to bring about a substantial improvement in the rate of emulsion resolution. | {
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In accordance with the prior art, a detector normally monitors an electrical control circuit so that if one circuit element opens (such as a pressure switch contact indicating high gas pressure) the process, machine, or whatever is controlled by the circuit, will shut-down. Often the first element that shuts the process down may not be known. For example, the gas pressure may have only been too high for a moment, quickly returning to normal, causing the gas switch to close and to operate normally. Thus, the operator may not be apprised of the problem causing shut-down. This has the disadvantages of causing unnecessary shut-downs and in causing unnecessary time and effort in locating the true cause of the shut-down.
In order to eliminate this problem early prior art fault detectors used relays to hold and lock out other fault inputs after detection of the first fault, insuring that only the first fault is displayed. More recent designs use solid state logic for this purpose, such as set-reset elements and "D" type flip-flop circuits.
It is therefore the principal object of this invention to provide an improved first fault detector and monitor which will hold and display the "first fault" to cause shut-down, until the monitor is reset.
More particular objects of the invention are to provide a method or apparatus for detecting a first fault employing a simplified circuit, and at a lower cost.
Assume that there is a series of N switches to be monitored by the "first fault" locator system of the present invention. The N switches to be monitored, may for example, be connected in series operating relation with a single source of power, or they may be energized from separate sources of power. Each monitored switch is connected in shunt across the terminals of a separate, electrically isolated input of the monitoring circuit. Thus, there are N isolated monitoring inputs to correspond to N switches being monitored.
In accordance with the present invention, a triggering optical signal means is connected across each of the isolated input circuits. Each of these triggering means is optically, but not electrically, coupled to a corresponding light responsive device for each circuit which, when optically triggered, becomes conducting at a triggering voltage V.sub.t whenever the triggering optical signal means in the respective circuit lights up indicating a detected fault in its corresponding monitored switch.
When the light responsive device becomes conducting in response to a detected fault, it energizes a display signal device for indicating the fault in the specific circuit, which may take the form of an optical signal means.
At the same time, the output of the conducting light responsive device is impressed on one of a plutality of stacked gating circuits causing an output signal to be generated from the gating circuits which then passes through an amplifying and voltage reversing circuit. The resulting negative voltage signal V.sub.n is impressed on the triggering electrode for each of the light responsive devices. This has the effect of disabling each light responsive device which is not yet conducting, thereby preventing it from being triggered to become conducting in response to an optical signal from its corresponding isolated input circuit. This occurs because the voltage across the light responsive device is less than the triggering voltage V.sub.t, which allows it to become conducting. However, the negative biasing voltage V.sub.n is ineffective to shut off the light responsive device in the "first fault" indicator, because the voltage thereacross is greater than V.sub.c, the minimum voltage which allows it to remain conducting. Hence, the optical signal device representing the first detected fault continues to stay lighted until a springbiased reset button is depressed to turn it off, cutting off the direct current operating voltage V.sub.dc to it and the remaining disabled light responsive device, permitting them to be reset.
In a specific circuit embodiment disclosed by way of illustration, the isolated input circuit connected across each of the switches to be monitored comprises a triggering light-emitting diode in parallel with rectifying means. The triggering light-emitting diode across each separate input is optically coupled (but electrically isolated) with respect to a light responsive device comprising a silicon controlled rectifier, individual to each of the separate monitoring circuit inputs. When the silicon controlled rectifier becomes conducting, it energizes a display light-emitting diode (LED). The anode of the light responsive silicon controlled rectifier in the individual input circuit is also connected to one input terminal of a series of stacked gates, the other input terminals of which are connected in similar relation to the anodes of the light responsive silicon controlled rectifier circuits in each of the remaining input monitoring circuits for each of the N switches to be monitored.
The output of the stacked gating circuits is connected through an inverting amplifier and applied to the gating electrode of the silicon controlled rectifier in each of the monitoring input circuits to impose a disabling bias thereon.
The circuit operates as follows:
Assume that one of the monitored switches opens. This puts the line voltage across the isolated input of the monitoring circuit corresponding to the open switch, causing the triggering light-emitting diode (LED) to light up, and through optical coupling, to turn on the current in the silicon controlled rectifier (SCR). This causes the display LED to light up on the indicator panel, indicating a fault, and at the same time causes a high on one leg to the input of the corresponding NAND gate, causing the output of the stacked gating circuits to go low. The output from the stacked gating circuits is imposed on the input of a reversing amplifier, which functions to impose a negative bias (e.g. -12 volts) on the gating electrode of the silicon controlled rectifiers (SCR) in each of the isolated monitoring circuits. This negative bias serves to lock out and prevent any one of the silicon controlled rectifiers, which has not been conducting, from turning on; but it does not turn off the current in the silicon controlled rectifier in the first fault responsive circuit, whereby that circuit remains operated, and continues to energize the signal display light indicating a first fault, which remains lighted on the front panel indicating in which circuit the first fault has occurred.
Once the fault has been corrected, a reset, spring-biased push button enables the positive twelve volts to be cut off, so that the silicon controlled rectifier in the `first fault` circuit ceases to conduct, turning off the signal lamp. Simultaneously, the lockout bias is removed from the silicon controlled rectifier in each of the remaining monitoring inputs, thereby setting up the circuit for reoperation.
In a modified embodiment, instead of a display signal lamp to each isolated input, the fault signals are decoded and fed into a single display device, such as a digital indicator.
It will be understood that one or many circuits may be simultaneously monitored using a method and apparatus in accordance with the present invention. Moreover, the monitoring system can be set up so that the monitored circuits may be powered from a single source, or from independent sources; and out-of-service contacts may also be included in those monitored.
Particular features of the first fault locating system of the present invention are that each of the input circuits is electrically isolated; it triggers and holds operated a display device, upon location of a "first fault"; and it locks out other inputs from subsequent fault occurrences.
Particular advantages of the present invention are its simplicity, and the lock-out feature which prevents turn on of all other light-responsive elements in the monitoring input circuits, except the "first fault" locating input, which remains conducting, and which cannot be turned off, except by actuation of the reset push button. Another advantage is that any desired number of inputs may be stacked.
These and other objects, features, and advantages will be better understood from a study of the detailed specification hereinafter with reference to the attached drawings. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Carboxylates, especially low molecular weight carboxylates, occur in the chemical industry during various reactions as by-products or main products. For example, methyl acetate is a typical by-product in the production of purified polyvinyl alcohol. Methyl acetate mixtures from polyvinyl alcohol plants, besides a small amount of low-boiling substances such as acetaldehyde, contain an azeotropic mixture of methyl acetate and methanol.
For chemical companies, where methyl acetate as a by-product occurs in relatively small quantities, methyl acetate is not an economically interesting product, since it cannot be profitably sold on the market. A better price can be obtained if methyl acetate is hydrolysed into acetic acid and methanol. The hydrolysis can be carried out either as a batch process or continuously, by using either a reactor in conjunction with conventional distillation or a single reactive distillation column.
The use of a reactor in conjunction with a distillation column for the hydrolysis of methyl acetate is described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,352,940. This type of hydrolysis of methyl acetate has several disadvantages: (a) since the reaction is an equilibrium reaction with a small equilibrium constant, the yield of reaction product is small, (b) because of the azeotropic mixture which is set up in the reaction mixture between methyl acetate/water, on the one hand, and methyl acetate/methanol, on the other, several distillation stages are needed after the reaction. This leads to high investment and running costs, (c) corrosion problems occur because homogeneous catalysts such as sulphuric and hydrochloric acid are used in the known conventional processes.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,113,015 discloses a process for obtaining acetic acid from methyl acetate, in which methyl acetate and water are brought into contact in the presence of catalyst packing in a distillation column. In this case, the methyl acetate is hydrolysed into acetic acid and methanol. The resulting reaction mixture is in this case partially separated at the same time in the separation column.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,770,770 likewise discloses a process for the hydrolysis of a methyl acetate mixture in a reactive distillation column. The hydrolysis of a methyl acetate flow, which contains more than 50% methyl acetate, takes place in a reaction zone in which ion exchange packing is present. The methyl acetate mixture is supplied from below to the ion exchange packing, and water from above onto the ion exchange packing. The unreacted methyl acetate and water vapour are collected and condensed in the upper part of the reaction zone, and are then recycled back to the reaction zone. At the same time, the base is collected and separated into the hydrolysis products and impurities. The impurities are then returned to the reaction zone.
Both aforementioned U.S. patents, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,113,015 and 5,770,770, teach the use of strongly acid ion exchangers as catalysts. In U.S. Pat. No. 5,770,770, it is proposed to put the ion exchange material in the form of Raschig rings, by adding a plastic as binder to the ion exchanger and pressing the mixture into appropriate shapes. In U.S. Pat. No. 5,113,015, the catalyst material is conserved in glass wool, and the mat formed therefrom is rolled up with a wire mesh between the layers, in order to promote circulation of the fluids. The catalyst packing material may be a compliant open-mesh substance, e.g. a metal cloth. Another usable material is a more rigid cellular monolith, which can be produced from steel, polymers or ceramic material. The catalyst packing material may, however, also be produced from corrugated metal sheets or corrugated plastic or ceramic plates.
The processes described above, which use only a single reactive distillation column, suffer from the fact that methyl acetate is only partially converted to methanol and acetic acid. The amount of methyl acetate in the product flow makes the use of at least one additional purification stage necessary, which leads to additional investment and running costs. A further problem is that the methyl acetate feed flow often contains metal ions, which poison the catalyst in the reactive distillation column. The replacement of the catalyst material in the distillation column by fresh material, however, is laborious and expensive. Furthermore, it is desirable for the hydrolysis process to be controlled independently of the methyl acetate concentration in the feed flow—in such a way that, as required by the operator e.g. of a polyvinyl alcohol plant, the acetic acid obtained has a specific water content or is virtually anhydrous.
The object of the present invention is therefore to provide an improved process for the hydrolysis of a carboxylate, especially methyl acetate, methyl formate and allyl acetate, by using a reactive distillation column. In particular, it is desirable to improve the conversion ratio of carboxylates into alcohol and carboxylic acid. A further object is to prevent poisoning of the catalyst used in the distillation column. Another object is to optimise the energy budget of the process. It is also intended to offer a process and a hydrolysis device, which allow great flexibility in terms of composition and quantity of the feed. The composition of the product flows is also intended to be controllable in a large range by the process. A further object is to improve the conversion ratio of methyl acetate into acetic acid and methanol. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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With improvement in the performance of information processing apparatus, in recent years the data rates of data signals transmitted from the inside and received from the outside of the apparatus have been increased. In a receiver circuit which receives a data signal, an amplitude level of the data signal is decided at a timing to a sampling clock and data recovery is performed on the basis of a decision result. When a data rate is high, a slight deviation of phase between a data signal and a sampling clock has an influence on data detection accuracy. Accordingly, a technique called tracking CDR (Clock and Data Recovery) for detecting such a phase deviation and synchronizing a phase of a sampling clock to a phase of a data signal is used.
A technique called baud rate tracking CDR is known as one of techniques for realizing the tracking CDR. With this technique 1-bit data is sampled once. A technique for calculating an autocorrelation function of a signal sequence obtained by sampling a data signal at a sampling rate which is equal to a transmission baud rate and controlling a sampling phase so as to maximize a calculated value is proposed as an example.
In addition, a technique called 2× tracking CDR is known. With this technique 1-bit data is sampled twice. For example, a technique for preparing a clock other than a data detection clock to detect an edge portion (zero-crossing point) of a data signal and detecting a deviation of phase between the data detection clock and the data signal on the basis of an amplitude level detected by the clock is proposed. The phase deviation is detected with the amplitude level at the zero-crossing point of the data signal as reference. This curbs the influence of variations in the amplitude of a data signal caused by the influence of transmission line loss, noise, or the like on detection accuracy. Accordingly, a phase deviation can be detected with greater accuracy. Japanese Laid-open Paten Publication No. 02-111130 Japanese Laid-open Paten Publication No. 2002-300142
With a receiver circuit in which the 2× tracking CDR is adopted, a special sampling circuit which samples a data signal by a clock other than a data detection clock is included. That is to say, a special sampling circuit for detecting an amplitude level at a zero-crossing point of a data signal is included, so circuit size increases. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Technical Field
This invention relates to the routing of telecommunications signals. More particularly it relates to a method of routing such signals to both fixed and mobile telecommunications mediums, such that similar services can be used in the same way by users on either medium, and to allow system operators to reduce costs by greater commonality of switching and other network-based facilities. The present invention is concerned with the routing of packet-based communications such as those used in the “Internet” using the so-called “Internet Protocol” (IP).
2. Description of Related Art
Present mobile medium systems are arranged such that a mobile user and associated systems collaborate at the interface with the network (typically the radio base station) to enable a mobile node to change from communicating with one base station to communicating with another, and to enable the network to update intelligence points of the new location. In cellular networks, these intelligence points are the Home and Visitor Location Registers (HLR and VLR), whilst in “Mobile IP” these locations are known as the Home and Foreign Agent. In both cases the “Visitor” Location Register or “Foreign” Agent maintains a record only of those users currently co-operating with base stations under their supervision, whilst their “Home” counterparts maintain a permanent record of their associated users, including a record of which VLR or Foreign Agent each one is currently working with. The address on an incoming message identifies the relevant HLR/Home Agent, to which reference is made to identify the appropriate VLR/Foreign Agent for more specific routing details. This allows minor changes in location to be effected within the VLR/Foreign Agent, locally to the user's current location without informing the HLR/Home Agent, which could be some distance away, thereby greatly reducing the signalling overhead.
The additional cost of mobility is the provision of this Home Agent/Foreign Agent interface, and especially with packet systems, the cost of tunnelling (forwarding messages from one address to another), address exhaustion (the inability to re-use an address from which forwarding is taking place) and triangular routing.
In a fixed medium system, IP routing is based on the distribution of IP address blocks or prefixes, with an associated metric or route cost, from potential destinations to potential senders so that they and intermediate routers can determine the best next hop (neighbour router) towards that destination. These routes are pre-computed for all destinations in the network so that senders can immediately send information when generated. Pre-computation of routes, and deployed routing exchange technology, is possible when the sources and destinations have a fixed location, and communication bandwidth is rich enough for exhaustive exchange of routes. As the proportion of roaming increases however, such models break down and a more dynamic routing approach is required.
A proposal referred to as “HAWAII” was published 19 Feb., 1999 as an Internet-draft entitled “IP Micro-Mobility Support Using HAWAII”, R. Ramjee, T. La Por, S. Thuel, K. Varadh, posted on the Internet Engineering Taskforce Internet (HTTP:) site at www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-rimjee-micro-mobility-hawaii-00.txt. HAWAII uses specialised path set up schemes which install host-based forwarding entries in specific routers when in a routing domain to support inter-domain to support intra-domain micro-mobility, and defaults to using “Mobile-IP” for inter-domain micro-mobility. In HAWAII, mobile hosts retain their network address while moving within the domain. The HAWAII architecture relies on a gateway router into a domain, referred to as the domain root router, to which default routes within the domain are directed. Each mobile host is assigned a home domain based on its permanent IP address. The path set up scheme updates a single routing path in a domain so that connectivity to the mobile host is possible both before and after handoff at the wireless link layer. Only routers located along a single routing path between the domain root router and the base station currently serving the mobile host have routing table entries for the mobile host's IP address. The remainder of the routers in the domain route any packets addressed to the mobile host upwards along default routes which rely on the tree-like nature of the routing domain, rooted at the domain root router, to provide an intersection with the downrouting towards the mobile host along the single routing path for which the routers have individual host entries for the mobile host's IP address.
In HAWAII, mobility between domains is supported by “Mobile IP” mechanisms. The home domain root router is designated as the Home Agent, and encapsulated IP packets are forwarded via the Foreign domain root router.
Drawbacks with the HAWAII proposals include the concentration of Mobile IP tunnels in few nodes in the core of the network, the domain root routers, such that failure of any of these nodes may result in large-scale failure of all Mobile IP state and associated sessions handled by the failing node. Furthermore, since all routing from outside the home domain into the home domain, and in the reverse direction, must occur via the home domain root router, failure of the home domain root router may also result in large-scale failure. | {
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The main object of the “ESD Association” Standard is to provide a test method, whereby a floor used to control static is evaluated.
As shown in FIG. 14, a conventional measuring equipment 200 is constructed of a resistance measurer 9 and two electrodes 91 for resistance value measurement. In order to measure resistance value of actual using, it is necessary to test an installed floor. However, conventional equipment has at least following disadvantages.
1. It is very hard to work for user. By measuring an installed floor the user has to sit or kneel to operate. Thus a team work of labors for turning around in operation is necessary.
2. It takes much time for measurement, since the user has to move electrodes to measure resistance value of each point individually.
3. It is very complicated for operation, since user needs first to move for putting electrodes and resistance measurer by himself, than makes measurement and record. Furthermore, it is possible that the equipment falls down by accidence.
In view of these disadvantages the inventor tried the continuous testing and improvement and developed the present invention. | {
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As disclosed in Patent Document 1, there has been a conventional valve timing control device comprising a drive-side rotational member (corresponding to a “shoe housing” in Patent Document 1), a driven-side rotational member (corresponding to a “vane rotor” in Patent Document 1), a fluid pressure chamber (corresponding to a “storing chamber” in Patent Document 1) defined by the drive-side rotational member and the driven-side rotational member, a partition (corresponding to a “vane” in Patent Document 1) provided in the driven-side rotational member for dividing the fluid pressure chamber into the retarded angle chamber and the advanced angle chamber, a fluid control mechanism (corresponding to an “oil pump”, “switching valve” and “drain” in Patent Document 1) for controlling feed/discharge of the working fluid relative to the fluid pressure chamber, and a locking mechanism (corresponding to a “restricting member” in Patent Document 1) for restricting the relative rotational phase of the driven-side rotational member relative to the drive-side rotational member to the predetermined phase between the most retarded angle phase and the most advanced angle phase.
According to the invention disclosed in Patent Document 1, the relative rotational phase can be reliably set to an optimum initial phase when the engine is started based on the operation of the locking mechanism. Thus, the intake timing and the ignition timing of the engine are optimized to provide a low-emission engine with reduced harmful combustion emissions, e.g., hydrocarbon (HC).
Further, while the engine is driving, a displacement force applied in the retarded angle direction and a displacement force applied in the advanced angle direction based on torque variations of the camshaft are usually exerted to the driven-side rotational member. The displacement force is exerted in the retarded angle direction on average, which causes the driven-side rotational member to displace in the retarded angle direction. Hereinafter, the average of both the displacement force applied in the retarded angle direction and the displacement force applied in the advanced angle direction based on the torque variations of the camshaft will be referred to as an “average displacement force applied in the retarded angle direction based on the torque variations of the camshaft.” The valve timing control device disclosed in Patent Document 1 is provided with an advanced angle member for adding torque to the driven-side rotational member in the advanced angle direction, thereby to allow the relative rotational phase to displace smoothly and quickly in the advanced angle direction regardless of the average displacement force applied in the retarded angle direction based on the torque variations of the camshaft. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Recently, it has been recognized that using a field programmable gate array (FPGA) to offload and accelerate DBMS (database management system) operations can offer performance and cost benefits. Inasmuch as DBMS queries vary with respect to variations of queries in the workloads, reconfiguring FPGA (or reconfiguring an initial bit string load to FPGA) for each query can prove to be expensive. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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There are many applications where it is desirable to have a fixed speed motor provide a variable speed output. For example, in ventilation systems, an ac synchronous motor is used to rotate an air mover, such as a fan. The energy efficiency of this system increases if the speed of the motor remains fixed while the speed delivered to the fan can be varied.
In the prior art, there are variable speed drives that mount onto the output shaft of the motor. Around the outer circumference of the drive are one or more sheaves. The sheaves receive belts that are coupled to a load. The drive permits a controlled amount of slip. At zero slip, the full rotary power of the motor output shaft is applied to rotate the sheaves. At full slip, the output shaft continues to rotate, but the sheaves remain stationary under a load. Thus, at zero slip, the fully rotary power of the motor is applied to the load, while at full slip, no rotary power is applied to the load.
In Albrecht et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,400,638, there is disclosed a shaft mounted eddy current drive. The amount of slip is controlled electrically using eddy currents. The output sheaves are mechanically coupled to poles of an electric coil. There are provided opposite, interdigitated poles. An armature provides a magnetic path between the opposite poles. The armature is mechanically coupled to the output shaft of the electric motor. As the motor shaft rotates, the armature also rotates at the same speed as the shaft. In order to rotate the sheaves, current is applied to the coil. This creates an electromagnetic coupling between the poles and the armature, wherein the armature causes the poles and the associated sheaves to rotate.
It is desired to improve upon the prior art drives. The slip rings of the Albrecht et al. drive have the same diameter as, and are located adjacent to, the sheaves. One disadvantage of the slip ring arrangement is the wear on brushes. The chief complaint among customers who buy the prior art drives is brush wear. The brushes must be frequently replaced, adding to the maintenance cost of the drives. The larger the circumference of the slip rings, the shorter the life of the brushes becomes because for each revolution of the motor, the brushes are in frictional contact with a long length of the slip rings.
Another disadvantage of the slip ring arrangement of Albrecht et al. is that as the drive is sized larger or smaller for respective larger or smaller load applications, the circumference of the slip rings change. Thus, the slip rings must be custom made for each size drive. It is desirable to make the slip rings a more uniform size, regardless of the size of the drive, in order to manufacture and repair the drives more efficiently.
Still another disadvantage of the slip ring arrangement of Albrecht et al. is the difficulty in protecting the slip rings and brushes from the environment. If the drive is used outside, it is subjected to moisture, which can reduce the life of the brushes. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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A number of optical methods have demonstrated microscopic resolutions beyond the diffraction limit. These methods, which all requiring fluorescent labeling, include Scanning Near-field Optical Microscopy (SNOM) (see I. Horsh et al. “A stand-alone scanning near-field optical microscope,” Photons and Local Probes, NATO ASI Series E:300:139 (1995)), Stimulated Emission Depletion (STED) (see S. Hell et al. “Breaking the diffraction resolution limit by stimulated-emission—stimulated-emission-depletion fluorescence microscopy,” Optics Letters. 19:495 (1995)) and Ground State Depletion (GSD) (see S. Hell et al. “Ground-State-Depletion fluorescence microscopy—a concept for breaking the diffraction resolution limit,” Applied Physics B. 60:780 (1994)) fluorescence microscopy, photo-activated localization microscopy (PALM) (see E. Betzig et al. “Imaging intracellular fluorescent proteins at nanometer resolution,” Science 313:1642 (2006)), stochastic optical reconstruction microscopy (STORM) (see M. Rust et al. “Sub-diffraction-limited imaging by stochastic optical reconstruction microscopy (STORM),” Nature Methods 3:783 (2006)), and structured illumination microscopy (SIM) (see B. Bailey et al. “Enhancement of Axial Resolution in Fluorescence Microscopy by Standing-Wave Excitation,” Nature 366:44 (1993); see M. Gustafsson “Surpassing the lateral resolution limit by a factor of two using structured illumination microscopy,” Journal of Microscopy 198:82 (2000); and see M. Gustafsson “Nonlinear structured illumination microscopy: Wide-field fluorescence imaging with theoretically unlimited resolution,” PNAS 102:13081 (2005)). In addition, it is possible to improve the position accuracy beyond the diffraction limit in linear fluorescence microscopy and two-photon microscopy (see W. Denk et al. “2-Photon Laser Scanning Fluorscence Microscopy,” Science 248:73 (1990)) by fitting the point spread function (see R. Thompson et al. “Precise nanometer localization analysis for individual fluorescent probes,” Biophysical Journal 82:2775 (2002)).
Optical coherence tomography, Spectral Domain OCT and Optical Frequency Domain Imaging include certain imaging techniques that measure the interference between a reference beam of light and a detected beam reflected back from a sample. A detailed system description of traditional time-domain OCT has been described in D. Huang et al., “Optical Coherence Tomography,” Science 254: 1178 (1991). Exemplary detailed descriptions for spectral-domain OCT and optical frequency domain interferometry systems are provided in U.S. patent application Ser. Nos. 10/501,276 and 10/577,562, respectively.
Another exemplary technique that can achieve resolution beyond the diffraction limit can be called self-interference fluorescence microscopy (SIFM). This exemplary technique is related to the work described in K. Drabe et al. “Localization of Spontaneous Emission in front of a mirror,” Optics Communications 73:91 (1989) and Swan et al. “Toward nanometer-scale resolution in fluorescence microscopy using spectral self-interference,” IEEE Quantum Electronics 9:294 (2003). It has been demonstrated that the position of a fluorophore located in front of a reflecting surface can be determined with nanometer resolution by analyzing the self-interference of the emitted fluorescence light with the reflection from the surface. The exemplary technique is related to Optical Coherence Phase Microscopy (OCPM), another technique derived from OCT (see C. Joo, et al. “Spectral-domain optical coherence phase microscopy for quantitative phase-contrast imaging,” Optics Letters 30:2131 (2005); and see C. Joo, et al. “Spectral Domain optical coherence phase and multiphoton microscopy,” Optics Letters 32:623 (2007)), where the phase of the interference between a sample and a reference arm is used to determine motion on a (sub) nanometer length scale.
In OCPM, an external light source is used, and the light is scattered by structures in tissue or within a cell. OCPM has demonstrated a phase sensitivity corresponding to 25 picometers. In SIFM, the light source is the fluorophore itself, which is excited by an excitation source. Fluorescent light emitted in different directions is captured and made to interfere with itself after passing through a spatial phase retarding optical element. The interference can be spectrally resolved in a spectrometer, generating an interference pattern with a periodicity corresponding to the path length differences experienced by the light traversing the phase retarding element. A Fourier transform of the spectrally resolved interference may generate a profile as in Spectral Domain Optical Coherence Tomography (SD-OCT), with a point spread function determined by the fluorescence bandwidth. By using the phase term of the transform, the fluorophore can be localized with a resolution far better than the diffraction limit. This exemplary approach generally makes use of a single microscope objective and a specially designed wave plate that collect the emitted light the epi-direction with a high numerical aperture and dividing the beam in 4 sections, each with different delays, for three-dimensional triangulation.
There may be a need to overcome certain deficiencies associated with the conventional arrangements and methods described above. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present application relates generally to managing software use, and more specifically to systems and methods to enable the monitoring and adjusting software usage under a software license.
2. Description of the Related Art
A common capability of digital product license systems is the ability to control how many devices are allowed to be used with each product license which is usually sold to an individual customer or company. For example U.S. Pat. No. 5,490,216 refers to a system where a license is given to an individual, but in turn that license is linked to a specific personal computer thereby limiting the copyright holders exposure to copyright abuse if the user decided to share their license with other unauthorized users.
A problem that has arisen over time is the fact that consumers of software have normal patterns of use that include the installation and use of digital products on multiple devices. For example a person may wish to buy software and use it on three computers at their home, a computer at work, a mobile computer and the computers at their holiday home and their parent's house. In addition to these uses, computers are also bought, sold and replaced so over time maybe two or three times this number of computers may be used by the user over time with a legitimate need to install and use the software on every computer.
Publishers of digital products have a dilemma in that they may want their customers to receive the normal freedom to use the software that they have purchased but they also do not want the software licenses to be freely shared amongst end users or even in worst case shared anonymously over the Internet resulting in massive piracy and copyright abuse of the product.
To solve this problem some publishers have set a relatively high device to license ratio in their control systems in the hope that customers will not exceed the maximum number of devices per license. An example of this is Apple iTunes which enables customers to play a purchased music file on up to a preset number (e.g., five) of devices (e.g., PCs) per license before being requested to buy an additional license. They have also implemented a system that allows customers to turn off the license rights of individual devices with regard to a specific music file license and therefore free up that device installation so that the music file can be used on one additional device.
While this method does go some way to appeasing the problem of a normal customers usage expectations, it does not take into consideration the normal attrition that occurs with the purchase and upgrade of personal computing devices or the like and places an expectation on the user to go through a number of involved steps to retain their rights to use the software. Accordingly, there is a need for an improved technique for allowing for a changing number of device installations on a per license basis over time. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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This invention relates to a continuous business form assembly, and more particularly, to continuous business form assembly of readily detached, easy opening mailer units or envelopes.
In the art of continuous business form assemblies, the automatic and manual handling of form assemblies and individual forms have presented many problems. Significant among such problems is automatic detachment of the individual forms from continuous form assemblies. The problem is especially acute with continuous form assemblies having perforation lines on the individual forms parallel to and adjacent the perforation lines intended for forms detachment. With certain automatic detachers or bursters, these forms are to be detached from each other, or burst, through tension and breaker knuckles. The knuckles are to perforate a select one or few of the perforations of a line, and the tension is to cause the perforation begun by the knuckles to continue along the line. With such forms and bursters, form registry with the breaker knuckles has been critical. Lack of registry has caused breakage of the perforation lines other than the lines intended for form detachment. This breakage has ruined up to one form for every fourteen forms being handled. In the past, attention to the problem has focused on machine modification, involving great expense and little success. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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It is known for a refrigerator to include a water dispenser. It is additionally known for a refrigerator to include a system by which water can be chilled within a chilled cavity of the refrigerator and transported through ambient conditions to a water dispenser positioned within a door of the refrigerator or inside the chilled cavity of the refrigerator. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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A rotary engine includes a rotary piston carried by a rotary shaft and extending into a combustion chamber. An air/fuel charge is sequentially introduced into each of a plurality of working chambers formed by the rotary piston as it rotates in the combustion chamber. Often, a technique known as charge cooling is employed wherein the air/fuel mixture is routed through engine structures prior to introduction thereof into the combustion chamber to cool the internal engine structures. In addition, the fuel may comprise a gasoline/oil mixture so that lubrication of engine components is accomplished.
Because the rotary piston is eccentrically mounted on the rotary shaft, some type of counterweight structure must also be carried by the rotary shaft on both sides of the piston so that vibration is kept to a minimum. Further, the rotary shaft is typically supported by one or more bearings located on both sides of the rotor structure so that bending moments which could further contribute to vibration are minimized.
A conventional rotary engine of the above type has several disadvantages. Because the rotary assembly includes multiple counterweights and bearings, assembly is complex and size, weight and overall cost are increased. Also, even though charge cooling is typically utilized, a separate cooling system may still be required, thereby resulting in the need for a coolant pump and separate flowpaths in the engine for the air/fuel mixture and the coolant. These structures further undesirably add to the size, weight and cost of the engine. Still further, some rotary engines do not utilize a gasoline/oil mixture but instead are fueled by straight gasoline and have a separate lubrication system for lubricating engine components. In this case engine size, weight, complexity and expense are even further increased. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The present invention is generally related to medical and/or robotic devices, systems, and methods. In an exemplary embodiment, the invention provides an indicator associated with one or more robotic manipulator assemblies for communication of a state of the manipulator assembly or other component of the robotic system, for identification of one or more particular manipulators, or the like. The indicator(s) can provide an additional user interface between the robotic system and, for example, a surgical assistant, system operator, or the like.
Minimally invasive medical techniques are intended to reduce the amount of extraneous tissue which is damaged during diagnostic or surgical procedures, thereby reducing patient recovery time, discomfort, and deleterious side effects. One effect of minimally invasive surgery, for example, may be reduced post-operative hospital recovery times. Because the average hospital stay for a standard surgery is typically significantly longer than the average stay for an analogous minimally invasive surgery, increased use of minimally invasive techniques could save millions of dollars in hospital costs each year. While many of the surgeries performed each year in the United States could potentially be performed in a minimally invasive manner, only a portion of the current surgeries use these advantageous techniques due to limitations in minimally invasive surgical instruments and the additional surgical training involved in mastering them.
Minimally invasive robotic surgical or telesurgical systems have been developed to increase a surgeon's dexterity and avoid some of the limitations on traditional minimally invasive techniques. In telesurgery, the surgeon uses some form of remote control, e.g., a servomechanism or the like, to manipulate surgical instrument movements, rather than directly holding and moving the instruments by hand. In telesurgery systems, the surgeon can be provided with an image of the surgical site at the surgical workstation. While viewing a two or three dimensional image of the surgical site on a display, the surgeon performs the surgical procedures on the patient by manipulating master control devices, which in turn control motion of the servomechanically operated instruments.
The servomechanism used for telesurgery will often accept input from two master controllers (one for each of the surgeon's hands) and may include two or more robotic arms or manipulators on each of which a surgical instrument is mounted. Operative communication between master controllers and associated robotic arm and instrument assemblies is typically achieved through a control system. The control system typically includes at least one processor which relays input commands from the master controllers to the associated robotic arm and instrument assemblies and back from the instrument and arm assemblies to the associated master controllers in the case of, e.g., force feedback or the like. One example of a robotic surgical system is the DA VINCI® system available from Intuitive Surgical, Inc. of Mountain View, Calif.
The roles and interaction among the persons making up a telesurgical team may differ from those of conventional surgery. As telesurgery is often performed in an internal surgical site, at least some of those working under the direction of the lead surgeon (or other robotic system operator) may not have direct access to or direct visualization of the ongoing tissue manipulations. For example, surgical assistants within the operating room may remove a first surgical instrument (such as an electrosurgical scalpel) from a manipulator and replace it with a different surgical instrument (such as a needle holder), as a surgeon may desire the use of different surgical instruments during different phases of a surgical procedure. Similarly, the assistant may reposition a surgical instrument during a procedure, so that rather than approaching the procedure from a first minimally invasive access site, the instrument is advanced toward the internal surgical site from a second, different access site. More complex robotic systems (and team interactions) may also be used. For example, as surgery is often performed with more than two tools, input devices may be provided for one or more additional surgeons, with each additional surgeon robotically controlling (for example) at least one surgical instrument.
While the new telesurgical systems, devices and methods have proven highly effective and advantageous, still further improvements would be desirable. In general, it would be desirable to provide improved robotic and/or surgical devices, systems and methods, particularly for performing telesurgical procedures. It may also be desirable to provide improved techniques for communication among the members of a telesurgical team, and for interfacing with the telesurgical apparatus so as to more fully take advantage of the capabilities of telesurgery to provide enhanced patient outcomes with improved efficiencies. It may be particularly beneficial to avoid unnecessary interruptions and distractions of a surgeon or other system operator, and to avoid delays and/or mistakes in the coordinated activities of a telesurgical team. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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This invention relates to garage door actuation systems and particularly providing temporary access permission for some user or users while maintaining near-permanent access permission for other users.
In modern society, homeowners frequently have products delivered to their homes or admit workers to their homes to perform prearranged tasks. This usually involves the inconvenience of scheduling a time of arrival by the outsiders and the scheduling of homeowner time to meet and admit them. The some cases, the keys to the house may be given to the outsiders, however, given the ease of key copying, lending keys is not a situation undertaken lightly.
The garage door of many homes is controlled by a garage door opening apparatus which protects from unwanted uses by means of electronically transmitted and received access codes. The access codes and their use provide sufficient security that for many homeowners the garage door is one of the primary means of entering and exiting the house. Since the access codes of many garage door opening apparatuses are changeable, house access could be provided to outsiders by giving them an access code transmitter or access to a keypad type access code sender. After the outsiders no longer have a need to access the house, the garage door actuating apparatus could then be reprogrammed to new codes for continued high security. Although the reprogramming of existing garage door opening apparatus may provide a partial solution to the outside worker access problem, the reprogramming after the outsider use takes time and in some cases many never be done. Also, during a period of reprogrammed use it is possible that other regular users will be denied access and/or they may have to reprogram their access code transmitters.
A need exists for a door security system which provides access to outsiders for a limited period, does not limit access to regular users and which automatically removes the limited access by outsiders with little or no service inconvenience to regular users. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to eyeglasses, and in particular, eyeglasses having reversible folding temple members.
2. Related Art
Eyeglasses have been ubiquitous for centuries. Many types of eyeglasses exist, including corrective or prescription glasses, safety and UV protective glasses, sunglasses, reading glasses, 3D glasses, and the like. Eyeglasses generally comprise a frame bearing a set of lenses, a pair of arm members, commonly referred to as temples, designed to hook over the wearer's ears, and a corresponding pair of hinges that connect the temples to the frame. The hinges allow the temples to fold inward in a closing motion from an extended operative or open position to a folded non-operative or closed position, or alternatively, swing outward in an opening motion from the closed position to the open position. In the open position, the temples are approximately parallel to one another to engage the ears of the user when the eyeglasses are being worn. In the closed position, the temples are folded, one over the other, so that they generally overlie the rear faces of the eyeglass lenses.
Generally, the hinges are mounted to the eyeglass frame at opposite ends of the frame and include a screw that secures the hinge to one end of the temples. The screw defines an axis of rotation that extends substantially vertically when the eyeglasses are being worn. The axis of rotation is generally parallel to the plane of the lenses. As the temples of the eyeglasses are repeatedly opened and closed during use, the hinge screws have a tendency to loosen and or fall out completely and, too often, the hinge screws are lost. In addition, the temples of traditional eyeglasses often break at the hinges if the temples are overextended (i.e., pivoted outward beyond 90°) or the eyeglasses are dropped or crushed in an eyeglass case during storage.
Prior attempts have been made to address the drawbacks of conventional eyeglasses discussed above. These attempts include the eyeglass hinge assemblies disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,402,552, 6,530,660, and 6,768,594. However, these prior attempts do not adequately solve the problems discussed above.
Thus, a need exists for an eyeglass assembly that effectively solves the problems associated with conventional eyeglass hinge assemblies and, in addition, enables the eyeglasses to be more compact when folded and even allows the temple members to be easily detached from the eyeglass frame during storage or repair. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates generally to electronic elements, and particularly in one exemplary aspect to an improved design and method of manufacturing miniature electronic connectors.
2. Description of Related Technology
Connectors, such as for example those that interconnect two electrical circuits (hereinafter referred to generally as an “interconnect connector”) are well known in the electronics industry. Such connectors are adapted to receive one or more electrical signals from a first circuit, and communicate those signals (whether over a short or long distance) to a second circuit. So-called printed circuit board interconnect connectors typically interface two or more printed circuit board substrates together or otherwise connect an electronic device with a printed circuit board. For example, Teledyne Interconnect Devices Clip-On LCD Connector for LCD Displays is an interconnect connector which connects an LCD display with a printed circuit board substrate.
Many different considerations are involved with producing an effective and economically viable interconnect connector design. Such considerations include, for example: (i) volume and “footprint” available for the connector; (ii) the cost and complexity associated with assembling and manufacturing the connector; (iii) the ability to accommodate various electrical components and signal conditioning configurations; (iv) the electrical and noise performance of the device; (v) the reliability of the device; (vi) the ability to modify the design to accommodate complementary technologies; (vii) compatibility with existing terminal and “pin out” standards and applications; and (viii) the potential for maintenance or replacement of defective components.
Of particular concern is the miniaturization of electronic devices as technologies converge, and more and more functionality is expected out of a user device. For example, devices such as the now ubiquitous Apple iPhone™ have converged a variety of wireless technologies (i.e. Bluetooth™, Wi-Fi, Quad band GSM, and GPRS/EDGE), along with a built-in camera and touch screen with a virtual keyboard, into a small handheld device. With the increasing number of features expected to be filled by a portable device, interconnect connectors are expected to decrease in size as well so as to permit the ability for electronic devices to become more “feature rich” without making them larger.
Many prior art interconnect connectors and their associated manufacturing processes have sought to provide a miniaturized design. However, despite the foregoing variety of design configurations and manufacturing techniques, such prior art interconnect manufacturing processes are currently approaching their design limitations in terms of, inter alia, size and material properties. For example, in the context of interconnect connectors which utilize post-insertion techniques for their manufacture, the size of the terminal pins utilized in these connectors are becoming increasing fragile and susceptible to damage during product manufacture. For interconnect connectors which utilize well known insert-molding techniques, the thickness of the polymer base material between conductive pins is reaching its theoretical limitations, thereby potentially leaving voids in the header during the injection molding process.
In addition to interconnect connector miniaturization, interconnect connectors are increasingly being used in data networking applications, whether for computers or other electronic devices (such as routers, gateways, hubs, switching centers, digital set-top boxes, mobile handsets, etc.) which demand ever-increasing data rates. Increased data rate requirements, such as those mandated under connection technologies such as “PCI Express”, “InfiniBand”, “Serial SCSI”, “Express Card”, “IEEE 1394”, “Display Port”, and “Back plane” are expected to boost transmission speeds past 10 Gbps and beyond. Unfortunately, increased interconnect connector miniaturization coupled with increasing data rate requirements means that the parasitics associated with these interconnect connector designs will become increasingly problematic for electronic designers.
Accordingly, improved miniaturized interconnect connector apparatus and methods of manufacture are needed which address these issues, i.e.: (1) connector miniaturization; (2) increased data transmission speeds; and (3) cost. Such improved apparatus would decrease the size of the connector by minimizing spacing (“pitch”) between terminal pins, while at the same time offering improved electrical performance at high data transmission speeds. Ideally, such improved apparatus and methods would provide precise control of the interconnect connector dimensions so as to provide consistent electrical performance amongst and between devices, and also be able to be produced in a cost-effective manner. | {
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(a) Field
A method of forming a micropattern structure, a method of forming a nanopattern, and a method of manufacturing a display panel for a liquid crystal display, and more particularly, to a method of forming a micropattern structure, in which protrusions and depressions are not formed in a material filling an inside of the micropattern structure, a method of forming a nanopattern, and a method of manufacturing a display panel for a liquid crystal display are provided.
(b) Description of the Related Art
A micropattern structure is a structure that includes a micropattern, for example, a trench of about 1 μm. To fill a micropattern structure with a filling material, the filling material is typically applied along an upper portion of such a micropattern. However, frequently the filling material partially remains on the upper portion of the trench micropattern, and significant protrusions and depressions (meniscus) are formed in the filling material that is filled into the trench. Thus, the filling material is not filled into the micropattern such that it is level across the top surface of the filling material on the micropattern.
In order to fill the filling material into the structure so that it is level across the top surface of the filling material on the micropattern, after the filling material is applied in a thickness that is larger than a depth of the trench, the filling material may be etched to have the thickness that is the same as the depth of the trench. In this case, the filling material may have a level top surface, but there is a problem in that the thickness of the filling material is always the same as the depth of the trench. That is, the filling material cannot be filled to a desired thickness in the micropattern structure and also be level within the structure.
Moreover, the filling material that fills the inside of the micropattern structure may be degenerated by an etching process, and there may occur a problem in a post-process by the degeneration.
The above information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the disclosure and therefore it may contain information that does not form the prior art that is already known to a person of ordinary skill in the art. | {
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The present invention relates to drill bits, and more particularly to rock drill bits used in oil and gas drilling, exploration, geothermal drilling, horizontal drilling, and water and mineral drilling.
One drill bit disclosed in the prior art is U.S. Pat. No. 3,771,612 which is herein incorporated by reference for all that it contains, discloses a replaceable wear-resistant element assembly having a wear-resistant element and a mounting device for releasably securing the element in the recess of a supporting body. The mounting device is constructed of a one-piece goblet shaped unit having a sleeve portion for receiving the element therein and a stem portion for supporting the element. The stem and sleeve portions are interconnected by a shearable web portion which will fracture when an axial force of sufficient magnitude is applied to the sleeve to cause the sleeve to move downward about the stem to release the element. | {
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With recent developments in digital technology, electronic devices available for communication and personal data processing on the move, such as mobile communication terminals, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), electronic organizers, smart phones, and tablet Personal Computers (PCs), are being diversely released. Such electronic devices do not stay in their own traditional specific areas and attain a mobile convergence stage in which they embrace the functional areas of other terminals.
An electronic device provides a screen corresponding to function performance in a window type. The electronic device may display each window in correspondence to a plurality of function performances.
However, an existing electronic device is being designed to output a plurality of windows at a predefined position on a display unit. Accordingly, in an environment where the windows operate, a user inconveniently has to adjust a size and position of each window in order to confirm proper information.
The above information is presented as background information only to assist with an understanding of the present disclosure. No determination has been made, and no assertion is made, as to whether any of the above might be applicable as prior art with regard to the present disclosure. | {
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This invention relates generally to devices for making pickles and, more particularly, to a rotary pickles making device in which a pickling casing is rotated to agitate a pickling bed of rice-bran paste containing foodstuffs to be pickled.
A pickles making device as described above is useful as it allows a pickling bed to be formed in the pickling casing with rice bran fermented therein with a proper amount of salt and water admixed, and such foodstuffs as vegetables pickled to be embedded in the bed and affected by a fermentation of the paste to be seasoned to a traditional Japanese pickles flavor and taste. | {
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The present invention relates generally to the field of voltage controlled oscillators, and specifically to a method of automatically tuning a voltage controlled oscillator over a wide frequency range.
Wireless radio communications systems transmit voice and other data between fixed transceivers and mobile radio communications terminals via the propagation of radio frequency (RF) electromagnetic waves. Essential to the functionality of such a wireless communication system is the stable and accurate generation of oscillating electrical signals. One circuit widely used to generate such oscillating signals is a phase-lock loop (PLL). A PLL is an electrical circuit that generates an oscillating output signal that has a constant phase relationship with an oscillating input signal. By utilizing a highly stable and accurate source, such as a crystal oscillator, to generate the oscillating input signal, and various frequency multipliers and dividers, a stable and accurate oscillating output signal can be generated across a range of frequencies.
A critical component of a typical PLL is a Voltage Controlled Oscillator (VCO). The VCO generates an oscillating signal at its output, the frequency of which is responsive to a voltage level applied at its input. In the PLL, the voltage input, referred to herein as the tuning voltage, is a function of the phase/frequency error between the output of the VCO and the desired oscillating signal. The VCO thus generates an oscillating signal at a frequency that varies over a finite range, corresponding to variations in the tuning voltage over a corresponding finite range. The specific parameters of this voltage/frequency relationship depend upon the design of the VCO, the values of electrical components that comprise the VCO, ambient temperature, and other effects as are widely known in the electronics arts. Ideally, if plotted on a voltage/frequency axis, the relationship would define a generally linear curve with positive slope, i.e., an increase or decrease in the tuning voltage causes a corresponding increase or decrease in the frequency of the oscillating signal generated by the VCO. Such a voltage/frequency curve is referred to herein as an operating curve of the VCO.
To expand the frequency range of a VCO, it is known to selectively couple frequency altering components, such as for example capacitors, varactors, FET transistors, and the like, to the resonant circuit in the VCO. This alters the range of frequencies generated in response to the tuning voltage, in effect establishing a new operating curve for the VCO. For example, it is known to couple various capacitors to a VCO via a programmable switching matrix such that, by selectively configuring the switches, a plurality of overlapping frequency ranges for the VCO may be selected. This ensures that the VCO may be calibrated to compensate for deviations in operating its frequency range due to manufacturing process variations or other parasitic effects, by choosing a VCO operating curve to encompass the desired range of VCO operation. This calibration, also known as VCO trimming, generally occurs in the factory upon manufacture of the integrated circuit containing the VCO, such as for example, by burning fuses or by programming a particular value in a register, the contents of which control the switches connecting the transistors to the VCO oscillator.
Factory tuning of a VCO to a particular operating curve is a time-consuming, and thus costly, part of the manufacturing process. Additionally, once thus tuned, the VCO is limited to a single, finite range of operation, as it is restricted to a single operating curve.
The present invention entails a self-tuning voltage controlled oscillator circuit. The VCO produces an oscillating signal at its output, the frequency of which is responsive to a tuning voltage its input. At least one frequency altering device is selectively coupled to the VCO and is operative to alter the relationship of the tuning voltage to the VCO output frequency, thereby establishing at least two operating curves describing the relationship of the VCO tuning voltage to the VCO output frequency. The VCO is switched between the operating curves by a control circuit. In one aspect of the invention, the control circuit monitors the tuning voltage and generates outputs operative to selectively couple the frequency altering device(s) to the VCO based only on the value of the tuning voltage. In another aspect, the control circuit receives a plurality of reference voltages establishing a plurality of switching thresholds and outputs switching signals based on a comparison of the VCO tuning voltage to the plurality of switching thresholds, and on its previous outputs. | {
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Water is essential to human, animal and plant life. Humans require, on average, 2 to 5 liters of water a day to sustain life. Water is also needed for agriculture, to provide food for humans and animals.
Despite the great need for water, just 3% of the global water supply is fresh water that can be used by humans for consumption and for agriculture. Further, about 69% of the world's fresh water is locked in glaciers and ice caps and almost all of the rest is ground water. Lakes and rivers, rainwater, dew, fog, condensation and evaporation are additional sources of fresh water. Only about 0.3% of fresh water is contained in lakes and rivers, which supplies most of the water humans use.
Transporting fresh water from lakes and rivers to where water is needed typically involves the installation of piping and the use of pumps, or other water distribution methods, all of which require energy and incur costs.
In desert regions, fresh water is scarce. The average amount of precipitation is less than 25 centimeters a year and evaporation exceeds precipitation. At present, approximately one-sixth of the land on earth is desert and desertification of marginal rangeland or cropland through extended drought, overgrazing or climate change continues at a rate of several hundred thousand square kilometers to millions of square kilometers per year. Yet about half of the deserts of the world get enough rainfall to sustain at least light livestock grazing or agriculture which if managed suitably could significantly increase the world's food supply.
It would be desirable to collect water more proximate to where water is needed so as to reduce energy consumption and costs associated with transporting water and it would also be desirable to increase the water supply in areas where fresh water is scarce. Accordingly, there remains a need for improvements in the art. | {
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The present invention relates to a tire pressure monitoring system and a method for monitoring air pressure within a pneumatic tire of a vehicle. More particularly, the present invention relates to a tire pressure monitoring system that includes a tire pressure gauge for use in adjusting the air pressure within a tire and a method of using the system.
Tire condition monitoring systems, and more particularly tire pressure monitoring systems, are becoming increasingly more popular. Such monitoring systems alert a vehicle operator when a tire condition falls outside of a predetermined range. For example, when monitoring a tire pressure with a tire pressure monitoring system and where the desired tire pressure range is 32-38 psi, the system will alert the driver of a low air pressure condition in response to the air pressure within the tire dropping below 32 psi.
Tire condition monitoring systems assist vehicle operators in maintaining proper inflation pressure within their vehicle tires. Proper inflation pressure results in reduced tire wear, increased vehicle fuel efficiency, and many other positive attributes. Additionally, many vehicle suspension systems are designed for use with tires meeting particular specifications. One of the tire specifications is the tire inflation pressure. Thus, proper inflation pressure may result in a more comfortable and sometimes a safer vehicle ride.
Known tire condition monitoring systems include a tire based device for sensing a tire condition, such as air pressure within a tire. The device transmits signals indicative of either the actual air pressure within the tire or an alert condition when the air pressure within the tire is outside of the predetermined range. A vehicle based controller receives the transmitted signals. A display or other indicator is operatively connected to the vehicle based controller for alerting the.vehicle operator when an alert condition arises.
Copending patent application Ser. No. 09/687,709, filed Oct. 12, 2000 and assigned to the assignee of the present invention discloses a tire condition monitoring systems having an associated antenna wired into each wheel well of the vehicle. Each antenna is operable to send a low frequency signal to an associated tire based device to initiate tire condition monitoring. The tire based device responds to the low frequency signal with a radio frequency signal indicating a sensed tire condition and a tire identification code. The location of each tire on the vehicle is determined by matching the known location of the antenna sending the low frequency signal with the identification code from the tire based device responding to the low frequency signal.
When a tire condition monitoring system indicates an alert condition, such as a low pressure condition, the vehicle operator should take appropriate remedial actions, such as adding air to the appropriate tire to bring the pressure within the desired range. Unfortunately, many vehicle operators do not carry air pressure gauges in their vehicles and many air pressure gauges that are supplied at service stations are inaccurate. Thus, a need exists for an accurate and reliable air pressure measuring system and method for indicating that the air pressure within the tire has come within the desired pressure range during the filling process by the vehicle operator or service technician.
The present invention relates to a tire inflation pressure monitoring system for monitoring air pressure within a tire. The tire pressure monitoring system comprises a tire based unit for sensing air pressure within the tire and for transmitting a pressure signal indicative thereof. The system also comprises a vehicle based unit for receiving the pressure signal and for comparing the pressure signal to a predefined pressure range. The vehicle based unit is operable in one of (i) a normal operating mode and (ii) a pressure gauge operating mode. The vehicle based unit when operating in the normal operating mode outputs an alert signal in response to the air pressure within the tire being outside of the predefined pressure range. The vehicle based unit when operating in the pressure gauge operating mode outputs an in-range signal in response to the air pressure within the tire being within the predetermined pressure range. The system also comprises a switch and at least one indicator. The switch, when actuated, changes the operating mode of the vehicle based unit. The at least one indicator is operatively connected to the vehicle based unit and becomes energized in response to receipt of the alert signal when the vehicle based unit is in the normal operating mode and becomes energized in response to the in-range signal when the vehicle based unit is in the pressure gauge operating mode.
In another aspect, the present invention relates to a method of monitoring air pressure in a pneumatic tire. During the method, an operating mode for a vehicle based unit of a tire pressure monitoring system is ascertained. The vehicle based unit has a normal operating mode and a pressure gauge operating mode. The air pressure within the tire is sensed with a tire based unit and the tire based unit provides a pressure signal indicative of the pressure within the tire to the vehicle based unit. The pressure signal is compared to a predetermined pressure range. An alert signal is output to an indicator in response to the vehicle based unit being in the normal operating mode and the air pressure being outside the predetermined pressure range. An in-range signal is output to the indicator in response to the vehicle based unit being in the pressure gauge operating mode and the pressure signal being within the predetermined pressure range. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an image processing apparatus, image processing method, an image pickup apparatus, a computer program and a recording medium adapted to eliminate noises, while storing edges of images.
2. Description of the Related Art
When an image is picked up by a camera, the color tone of the image depends on lighting to a large extent. For example, the picked up image of a subject bears an orangey color tone when the subject is irradiated with candle light but bears a bluish color tone when it is irradiated with moon light. Images of a subject may be picked up with completely different color tones on the same site depending on lighting.
When picking up an image, it is possible to correctly reproduce the original color tone by utilizing natural light without using lighting equipment such as a flash bulb. However, the picked up image contains noises to a considerable extent when the subject is shot indoors or at night because of insufficient exposure to light. When, on the other hand, flash light is used for imaging, the edges of the objects and other details in the picked up image appear clearly but the color tone of the image may not be accurate and/or shades and high lights that do not actually exist may also appear.
An image processing apparatus as illustrated in FIG. 1 of the accompanying drawings has been proposed to dissolve the above-identified problem. Referring to FIG. 1, the image processing apparatus 11 includes a pair of low pass filters 12, 13, a high pass filter 14, a pair of image synthesizing sections 15, 17 and a single shadow extracting section 16.
The low pass filter 13 is a cross bilateral filter that detects edges from an image picked up by using flash light (to be referred to as flash image hereinafter) and remove noises from an image picked up without using flash light (to be referred to as natural light image hereinafter). The high pass filter 14 extracts edges of objects in the picked up image. For extracting edges, the image processing apparatus executes a process of dividing each pixel value in the natural light image by the corresponding one of the flash image.
The image synthesizing section 15 synthetically combines the natural light image from which noises are removed by the low pass filter 13 and the flash image from which edges are extracted by the high pass filter 14 to generate a synthetic image Comp. For synthesizing an image, the image processing apparatus executes a process of multiplying each pixel value of the low pass filter 13 by the corresponding one of the output image of the high pass filter 14. The synthetic image Comp provides the advantages of the flash image and those of the natural light image so that its color tone is accurate and it contains fewer noises.
The low pass filter 12 removes noises from the natural light image. A bilateral filter is used for the low pass filter 12. A bilateral filter can detect edges and remove noises from a single image.
The shadow extracting section 16 extracts differences between the two images including the flash image and the natural light image and evaluates the probability by which the flash image is changed from the natural light image by high lights and shadows. The image synthesizing section 17 carries out an operation of weighted addition of the output image from the low pass filter 12 and the output image Comp of the image synthesizing section 15 according to the outcome of the evaluation of the shadow extracting section 16. More specifically, the image synthesizing section 17 raises the weight of the image in a part thereof where shadows and high lights may highly probably have been produced by flash light and reduces the weight of the image in a part hereof where they may probably have not been produced. On the other hand, the image synthesizing section 17 removes unnecessary shadows and high lights from the synthetic image Comp and generates an output image Out.
As described above, the known image processing apparatus 11 can obtain an image where edges in a flash image and the color tone of a corresponding natural light image are optimally blended by generating two images including an image where edges are synthesized from a flash image and an image from which noises are removed without referring to the edges of the flash image, raising the coefficient of the output image of the high pass filter 12 for pixels where shadows and high lights may highly probably have been produced by flash light and reducing the coefficient of the output image Comp of the image synthesizing section 17 for pixels where shadows and high lights may probably have not been produced (see, for example, Non-Patent Document 1: Georg Petschnigg et al, Digital Photography with Flash and No-Flash Image pairs, acm Transaction on Graphics, Vol. 23, Number 3, pp. 664-672, August 2004). | {
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The present invention relates to the field of catalyst reactors containing numerous reactor tubes within a vessel. For a general description of such an environment and related technologies see U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,228,484, and 5,222, 533 and the patents discussed therein. U.S. Pat. No. 5,228,484, in particular discloses a reel system for breaking up and removing catalyst by a vacuum. This reel system is implemented by placing the drum outside the reactor vessel. The lance and nozzle are then run by a hose through a manway into the reactor vessel to a worker. There is also a line running to a control box for each worker. The workers inside the vessel normally sit on a plastic bucket when performing catalyst unloading operations within the vessel. As there may be several workers within the vessel unloading the catalyst from the tubes, there are numerous hoses and lines running into the reactor. If the hoses and/or lines become tangled the workers inside the vessel need to communicate the circumstances to workers located outside the vessel.
The control boxes used in the prior systems received a 110 volt power supply. For purposes of safety, it may not be desirable to have a 110 volt power supply located within a reactor vessel.
The reactor vessels have an opening or manway which can be of different sizes. However the opening is round. The manway may be at the top or on the side of the reactor vessel above the tube sheet. The largest manway to a reactor vessel of which the applicant is aware has a diameter of approximately thirty-six inches, and the manways to tubular reactor vessels have an opening ranging from a twenty to a thirty-six inch diameter. In some instances the reactor vessel has a flanged, removeable head around the perimeter of the reactor vessel itself (in which case the head of the vessel is removed to form the manway).
The prior reel systems have been made with a square outer casing which further suggests that such reel systems were not designed for implementation within the reactor vessel. Moreover, after the hose is reeled into a square or large casing, the stiffness of the hose (e.g. a plastic hose) causes the hose to spring back and expand away from the reel. In a square casing there is more room for the hose to spring back which leads to tangling of the hose on the reel.
The present system, apparatus and methodology increase the efficiency of catalyst unloading operations in tubular reactor vessels by reducing worker fatigue, tripping hazards, electrical hazards and loss of operational time due to tangling of hoses.
A system is disclosed for removing catalyst from a tubular reactor vessel. A power box with a 110 volt to a 12 volt DC transformer is mounted outside the vessel and connected to a 110 volt power supply. An air manifold, also mounted outside the vessel, is connected to a high-pressure air supply and connects to several valves with a separate connection to the power box. Several workstations are placed on the tube sheet within the vessel. The workstation has a frame, a drum and reel assembly mounted on the frame along with a 12 volt DC motor. An air lance hose passes into the drum and reel assembly and, at the other end, connects to an air lance and vacuum assembly. A high pressure air hose connects the drum and reel assembly to one of the valves located outside of the vessel. A controller connects to the 12 volt DC motor to power the drum and reel assembly. The controller is also connected to the power box located outside the vessel and to a foot control. A padded swiveling seat is mounted on the drum and reel assembly. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a method of producing a tubular container integrally with a neck section from a thinly walled tube of thermoplastic resin. It also relates to an apparatus for producing such a container.
2. Background of the Invention
A method of producing a tubular container having a neck section from a parison by blow molding is known. However, the known method has a drawback that the shoulder section of the molded container shows a thick shoulder section because this section is stretched with a low stretch ratio. The wall thickness of the parison has to be finely regulated to overcome this drawback but the operation of such fine regulation is difficult. If the wall thickness of the parison is finely regulated, there arises an additional problem of the difficulty with which a blow nozzle can be introduced into the parison through the neck section when the neck section has a small diameter. Still additionally, there is also a problem that the parting line of the mold halves are transferred to the surface of the blow molded container when the mold is opened. When the parting line is transferred to the surface of the tubular container, it is hardly adapted to printing.
A known method of producing a tubular container proposed to overcome the above identified drawbacks comprises steps introducing a heater into a thinly walled tube and causing hot air to hit the inner wall surface of the thinly walled tube and soften the front end of the thinly walled tube, thereafter discharging hot air through the front end of the thinly walled and heated tube to the outside to make the front end show a conical profile and then forming a neck section by applying a compression molding means from the inside of the thinly walled tube.
However, with this known method, the thinly walled and heated tube is outwardly expanded to deform its appearance when hot air is discharged from the inside of the tube because no measures are taken to prevent such deformation of the thinly walled tube and hot air is made to flow toward the inner wall surface of the tube and away from the neck forming section.
With this known technique, therefore, the producing efficiency is reduced particularly when the thinly walled tube is externally heat treated to gather resin to the front end of the thinly walled tube in order to produce a neck section there because the front end of the thinly walled tube can be introduced into an external heater only with difficulty. Additionally, unnecessary portions of the thinly walled tube can be heated and deformed because the area of the outer wall surface of the thinly walled tube to which hot air is discharged is not accurately defined. The net result will be a tubular container having a disproportionately thick shoulder section due to the large volume of softened resin gathered to produce the neck section or a deformed container having poor commercial value. Another problem is that the neck section cannot be produced after the surface of the tubular container is subjected to a printing process if the thinly walled tube has been deformed. | {
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The present invention relates to a steering control apparatus for a vehicle, and particularly relates to a steering control apparatus capable of restraining deflection of the vehicle, when the vehicle is turning, with an anti-skid control or traction control being performed on a μ-split road surface.
In Japanese Patent Laid-open Publication No. 2004-532153, which corresponds to US Publication No. 20050189163A1, with respect to a stability compensation system for stabilizing a vehicle, it is proposed to provide the system which is capable of stabilizing the vehicle by adjusting a steering wheel, when a split μ (may be called as a μ-split) braking operation is performed to cause unbalanced braking torque, thereby to deteriorate the vehicle stability. It is described in the US Publication that there is provided a vehicle stability compensation system which is arranged to adjust dynamically the self-centering position and the steering feel of the steering system during split μ braking operation, the adjustment being based on at least one operational variable representing a corrective steer angle for the vehicle which is added to the main EAS assistance torque via a driver feedback controller whereby to maintain the vehicle stable and controllable.
Then, it is described that one possible operational variable representing a corrective steer angle is the braking yaw moment. This can be established, for example by generating and subtracting from each other, estimates of the brake pressures at the front left and front right wheels, multiplying the difference by a constant to give the difference in brake forces for the front wheels, and dividing the result by the track width of the vehicle. The braking yaw moment is multiplied by a gain to give the corrective steer angle. A second possible operational variable representing a corrective steer angle is yaw oscillation. This can be established, for example, by inverting a yaw rate signal, multiplying this by a gain and using the result as a feedback signal providing yaw oscillation correction. And, it is described that a vehicle model is driven by inputs of steering angle (at the road wheels), yaw moment disturbance input and vehicle speed.
Furthermore, Japanese Patent No. 2676726 discloses a pressure estimation in case of an anti-skid control, as will be described later, and Japanese Patent No. 3443951 discloses a pressure estimation in case of an traction control, as will be described later.
However, according to the invention as disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-open Publication No. 2004-532153, it relates to the stability compensation system for stabilizing the vehicle, when the anti-skid control is performed on the so-called μ-split road surface, with different coefficients of friction being provided at the right and left front wheels, and the control prevails completely, as long as the vehicle driver is following the control. Then, it is so constituted that the corrective steer angle is obtained on the basis of a difference in braking pressure between the right and left front wheels, or an error between an estimated yaw rate (may be called as desired yaw rate) based on a vehicle speed and steering angle, and an actual yaw rate, and that an assist torque for an electric assist steering system (may be called as electric power steering system) is controlled on the basis of the corrective steer angle.
With respect to the electric power steering system, the steering wheel and steered wheels are mechanically connected with each other, to provide one to one relationship through a steering gear ratio. According to the system with the control prevailing completely as disclosed in the aforementioned Publication No. 2004-532153, it is possible to calculate the desired yaw rate based on the vehicle speed and steering angle, even in the case where the μ-split road surface exists in the turning course of the vehicle. However, according to such an assist system that the steering maneuver of the vehicle driver prevails, and that is aimed to assist the maneuver of the vehicle driver with the steering torque, it is difficult to be determined whether the steering angle of the steering wheel is resulted from the intention of the vehicle driver, i.e., the maneuver of the vehicle driver, or the one resulted from the control. Therefore, it may be caused that the desired yaw rate based on the vehicle speed and steering angle can not be determined. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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It is common practice to make water tanks, or towers, from sheet steel plates. However, to construct a very tall tower where there are significant hydraulic pressures in the lower part of the tower, it has been the usual case to make the tower double-skinned at the bottom. Hitherto it has been practicable to make a double-skinned tower only if the tower is of welded construction. Welding is very expensive however since skilled operators are required, and the need to stress-relieve the welds poses further limitations.
One of the problems with bolting plates together is that the ends of the bolts protrude. The tower constructor cannot simply bolt a set of plates to encircle an existing set: the plates must be interleaved together if he wishes to provide an effective double-skinning arrangement by bolting.
An advantage of bolting is that the plates can be pre-finished. Glass-coating the steel is a very effective protection for water storage tanks: the glass coating is applied to both sides of the plates and provides a very hard inert barrier (about 0.008 inches thick) of silica glass, which is chemically and mechanically bonded to the steel.
Another problem though with bolting is that not all the edges of the plates can be overlapped and bolted tightly together. Not, at least, if the overlapping is to occupy only a margin at the edge of the plates, and also not if a gap or space between the plates is to be avoided. A further problem is that where the edges of the plates are in abutment, a potential leakpath arises, which must be accounted for. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of encoding pictorial imagery for reproduction on display or printing systems, and more particularly, to method and apparatus for digital gray scale halftoning of images.
2. Description Relative to the Prior Art
In the area of digital printing (the term "printing" is used to encompass both printing and displaying throughout), gray level has been achieved in a number of different manners. The representation of the intensity, i.e., the gray level, of a color by binary displays and printers has been the object of a variety of algorithms. Binary displays and printers are capable of making a mark, usually in the form of a dot, of a given, uniform size and a specified resolution in marks per unit lengths, typically dots per inch. It has been common to place the marks according to a variety of geometrical patterns such that a group of marks when seen by the eye gives a rendition of an intermediate color tone between the color of the background (usually white paper stock) and total coverage, or solid density.
Continuous tone images contain an apparent continuum of gray levels. As an approximation to continuous tone images, pictorial imagery has been represented via binary halftone technologies. In order to record or display a halftone image with a scanning system, one cell or super pixel of the recording or display surface consists of a jxk matrix of sub-elements where j and k are positive integers. A halftone image is reproduced by printing the respective sub-elements or leaving them blank, in other words, by suitably distributing the printed marks. Each sub-element, or dot is the same size.
A different method of producing gray levels is provided by gray level printing. In such a method, each pixel has the capability to be rendered in one of several different dot sizes. The dot size for a grey level pixel is represented by a grey level output pixel value which is used to determine an exposure time for recording that pixel by say an LED recording element corresponding to that pixel. The longer the exposure time, the more toner is attracted to that particular pixel. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,680,645 for a method of rendering gray scale images with variable dot sizes.
In gray scale rendering techniques, the proper dot growth patterns are constructed within a template to optimize and stabilize the electrophotographic process. However, this produces screens of fixed frequencies because of the template or cell characteristic. For a given resolution, finer screens can be produced, but at the expense of rendering levels. The present invention seeks to avoid the shortcoming of the template approach through an error-diffusion technique.
Error-diffusion has been used extensively in certain reproduction methods to produce images with acceptable quality. This technique is very good at reproducing the fine details of images. However, the dots produced by error-diffusion are generally too small to be reproduced sufficiently accurately by most marking devices, in particular, electrophotographic marking devices. This shortcoming causes unstable tone scale variation in the picture. This shortcoming and the "wormy" patterns are characteristic of the images produced by error diffusion.
A method has been described which applies the error diffusion technique to binary halftoning. In this method, described in U.S. Pat. 5,055,942, to Levien, the size of superpixels are varied by varying the number of dots within a variable sized unscreened superpixel. Thus, instead of varying the sizes of the individual dots as in gray scale halftoning, Levien provides for binary halftoning in which either a dot is printed or not, and provides gray scale by varying the number of dots in the plurality of dots. The algorithm Levien uses in his error diffusion technique is based upon this binary halftoning, such that each dot represents either a zero or a one. The limitation to binary values of the individual dots produces a less accurate reproduction than a method allowing multiple bit (and dot sizes) for each dot. | {
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Implements, such as lawn mowers and snow blowers, are typically powered by a prime mover, such as an internal combustion engine. The engine also includes a transmission driving ground engaging drive wheels that propel the implement in a forward and reverse direction. Changing direction or speed of the implement requires bringing the implement to a complete halt and operating a gear lever to change the ratio of the transmission, such that the implement moves in a different direction or at a different ground speed.
When the path of the implement encounters numerous obstacles, the operator must change the speed and/or direction of the implement numerous times severely impacting the operator efficiency. Moreover, the transmission typically has a fixed number of selectable gear ratios which limits the available ground speeds the implement can achieve. As a result, the operator cannot always tailor the ground speed of the implement to a desired ground speed appropriate for the operating conditions. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Many students have to complete homework associated with different topics, for example, reading, math, science, language, and the like. The completion of homework helps to ensure that the student understands the topic being taught. Additionally, an instructor may use the results of homework assignments to identify deficiencies or problems in his or her teaching style. For example, if all the students have poor homework results on a particular topic, the instructor may decide to spend more time teaching that topic. However, when homework is not completed, the instructor may not know if the students are learning the topics as expected. Additionally, when homework is not being completed, it is difficult to know whether the student chose not to complete the homework or whether the student is overwhelmed with too much homework. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
Aspects of the present invention relate to image processing and information manipulation. More specifically, aspects of the present invention relate to receiving and handling electronic ink information.
2. Description of Related Art
Typical computer systems, especially computer systems using graphical user interface (GUI) systems such as Microsoft WINDOWS, are optimized for accepting user input from one or more discrete input devices such as a keyboard for entering text, and a pointing device such as a mouse with one or more buttons for driving the user interface.
The ubiquitous keyboard and mouse interface provides for fast creation and modification of documents, spreadsheets, database fields, drawings, photos and the like. However, there is a significant gap in the flexibility provided by the keyboard and mouse interface as compared with the non-computer (i.e., standard) pen and paper. With the standard pen and paper, a user edits a document, writes notes in a margin, and draws pictures and other shapes and the like. In some instances, a user may prefer to use a pen to mark-up a document rather than review the document on-screen because of the ability to freely make notes outside of the confines of the keyboard and mouse interface.
When a user writes with a pen, he expects ink to flow from the pen tip. In the electronic ink realm, a similar goal exists. One issue that impedes electronic ink from flowing from a pen or stylus is how the electronic ink is handled.
Previous approaches have attempted to handle all aspects of inking at the same time. Once ink information exists, previous approaches have attempted to render the ink, look for gestures, combine the ink information with other ink information, recognize the ink, and smooth the appearance of the ink, among other processes. These processes have caused delays in displaying ink to a user, thereby making the user wait to enter more ink and, more importantly, reduce or eliminate the illusion that ink is flowing from the tip of the electronic stylus. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to improvements in a structure or arrangement of an automotive vehicle in connection with a suspension, and more particularly to a vehicle structure by which a parking brake cable is prevented from interfering with an attachment of a vehicle lifting device or jack during a vehicle raising operation.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Automotive vehicles are equipped with a parking brake including a parking brake cable which is disposed under the floor of a vehicle body and extends to the central support section of a rear road wheel. The parking brake cable passes by a trailing arm of a rear suspension. It is assumed that the parking brake is located outboard of the trailing arm.
However, drawbacks have been encountered in such a conventional vehicle arrangement in which the parking brake cable is disposed outboard of the trailing arm. That is, when the vehicle body is raised by a lifting device or jack for the purpose of vehicle maintenance and repair, an attachment of the lifting device is first brought into contact with a jack-up point at the lower end of a side sill located near and outboard of the trailing arm, followed by raising the whole vehicle by the lifting device. At this time, if the attachment of the lifting device is unintentionally slightly shifted inboard with the attachment comes into interference with the parking brake cable. As a result, there is the possibility that the parking brake cable will be placed between the attachment and the trailing arm at a position where the trailing arm is securely supported. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Technical Field
The invention relates to data communications networks. More particularly, the invention relates to an improved method and apparatus for managing the allocation of data capacity of a network composed of one or more physically shared network segments interconnected by packet routing devices. The invention manages the allocation of network capacity among devices attached to the various segments, where each shared network segment relies on collision avoidance and detection for managing on-demand network access within a baseband channel.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The seminal teaching for on-demand access to physically shared networks is described in R. Metcalfe, D. Boggs, C. Thacker, B. Lampson, Multipoint data communication system with collision detection, U.S. Pat. No. 4,063,220 (Dec. 13, 1977). The Metcalfe et al patent is presently referenced in 186 other patents. Examples of such networks are traditional Ethernet, IEEE Standard 802.3 for coaxial cable, and IEEE Standard 802.11 for local area wireless networking. Additionally, new technologies are being developed which provide Ethernet-like characteristics on other physical mediums, such as Category 1 or 2 unshielded twisted pairs or AC power lines.
A feature of most emerging shared-capacity technologies is that the achievable transmission rate between nodes on the network varies based on such factors as the node itself, topology of the network, and electrical noise. Such networking is often called rate-adaptive networking because each node adapts its basic transmission parameters to achieve the best rate to some other node. Unlike previous shared-capacity networks, it is not possible to describe the maximum bandwidth of the network, or to predict a priori the achievable data rate between any two nodes. This situation is becoming increasingly common with the interconnection of shared networks having different transmission speeds. For example, the family of IEEE 802 standard networks is designed for interconnection, yet the speed of each shared segment may range from a few magabits per second to gigabits per second.
As used herein, the generic term “ethernet” refers to any similar physically shared network segment. Fundamental characteristics of an ethernet are: A number of nodes, each free to choose to transmit at any time; An access-checking scheme, termed Carrier Sense Multiple Access (CSMA), in which a node checks if the shared network is in use before transmitting; Collision Detection (CD), in which a node monitors the shared network as it is transmitting, to detect if another node began transmitting simultaneously, thus garbling the data; and A random back-off algorithm which attempts to de-synchronize nodes which have sent colliding packets by having each node wait a (short) random amount of time before retrying the transmission.
As used herein, the generic term “streaming media” refers to long-term, continues flows of digital information that must achieve a constant data rate measured over short periods. For example, consider a network device accepting network packets containing compressed audio data, and using that data to produce the corresponding audio signals that drive a speaker. The device has a packet buffer of some fixed size, and it is the responsibility of the sending device to insure that packets are delivered in a timely way such that the buffer never becomes empty, and that there is always room in the buffer for the next packet sent. This means that each packet in the stream must be sent at a constant interval, said interval being based on the transmission speed, buffer size, and rate at which the audio data are consumed. This interval may vary over short periods depending on the size of the receiving buffer. Larger buffers can smooth the effects of contention for the shared network as long as sufficient network bandwidth is available to sustain the long-term average delivery rate. For example, consider current streaming audio products that use the Internet for data transmission, such as Real Audio, or Windows Media Player. These work correctly as long as sufficient bandwidth and buffer capacity is available to hide any packet transmission delays in the network.
Large buffers are expensive in many ways, so it is desirable to use methods of transmitting streaming media that minimize the required receiving buffer size. For example, if the audio device described earlier is two-way, the use of large buffers results in a time-shift between the incoming and outgoing streams which is easily detectable and aurally annoying. The physical cost and implementation of large buffers can become significant for inexpensive devices, such as portable phones.
As used herein, the generic term “on-demand” refers to other digital information flows on the network. For example, data fetched by an Internet Web browser is usually formatted as packets of TCP data, but there is no time-sensitivity to how the packets actually flow through the network. Buffers for such traffic are assumed to be large and carefully managed in software. Ideally, it is desirable to mix streaming media and on-demand traffic arbitrarily on the network to achieve the most efficient use of the network bandwidth. However, the two types of traffic place conflicting requirements on the underlying network.
There have been many attempts in the past to design methods and apparatus to balance the requirements of these two types of traffic. The simplest of these networks is one in which the available network bandwidth is permanently divided between streaming media and on-demand traffic. Such networks are sometimes referred to as “isochronous” networks. A central bandwidth allocation manager schedules the bandwidth among competing devices. One flaw with such systems is that the bandwidth division is fixed, limiting both on-demand performance and the maximum streaming bandwidth that can be supported. The result is inefficient utilization of the network bandwidth and limited performance. Another limitation of such networks is that the failure of the bandwidth manager leads to failure of the entire network.
A great deal of work has gone into the creation of mixed-traffic management streams on token-ring networks. Much of this work has been codified by IEEE Standard 802.5. Physical or logical token-passing methods are used for managing access to the shared network. J. Bell, Method of Simultaneously Transmitting Isochronous and Nonisochronous Data On A Local Area Network, U.S. Pat. No. 4,587,650 (6 May 1986) discloses a general description of how this traffic management is handled on a token-ring network.
Token passing schemes have weaknesses that preclude their use in many environments. These include: a requirement that all nodes support the same bandwidth; that each node implement recovery schemes to reconstruct capacity allocations and prioritization if any node fails; and that each node provide automated network bypass in case it fails, increasing the cost of a node and lowering its reliability. Additionally, passing the tokens and data through intermediate, non-transmitting nodes adds latency and decreases capacity. Token-ring networks have fallen into technical disfavor versus ethernet networks in many applications for these reasons.
Another set of attempts to address these problems involve the use of slotted protocols, where the bandwidth of the shared media is explicitly subdivided into equal-length slots, creating a TDMA (Time-Domain Multiple Access) network. K. Crisler, M. Needham, Method for Multi-Purpose Utilization of Resource in a Communication System, U.S. Pat. No. 5,295,140 (15 Mar. 1994) and K. Sardana, Adaptive Hybrid Multiple Access Protocols, U.S. Pat. No. 5,012,469 (30 Apr. 1991) contain a good overview of these methods, which may be generally referred to as reservation protocols. In these methods, it is assumed that each node has sufficient capability to participate in a contention-based reservation protocol, resulting in long-term assignment of shared network capacity to particular nodes. A general feature of these methods is the complexity of the reservation protocol, which increases the cost to implement any given node and reduces the node's reliability. Additionally, these protocols require each node to advertise its desire for the resources of the network continuously to maintain the reservation. This is done to allow quick recovery from failed nodes, but it consumes additional network bandwidth that might be more gainfully used and increases node cost. Finally, the overall capacity of the network is lowered because it is not always possible to fill each fixed-size slot to capacity.
Other schemes have been proposed for managing bandwidth allocation which involve significant differences from the basic operation of an ethernet network. These schemes are not considered here because they involve proprietary techniques, specialized architectures, or hardware that is not commercially viable. A primary example are allocation techniques developed for Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) networks, where each node has a dedicated path to a central controller.
It would be desirable to create a facility for managing any ethernet network to handle both streaming media and on-demand traffic, while achieving maximum possible efficiency and performance of the network. Many current efforts in this field center on extensions to the Internet Protocol (IP) to allow dynamic provisioning of bandwidth. These extensions, collectively named RSVP (Reservation Protocol), are designed to operate in a complex, heavily routed infrastructure where there is no a priori knowledge of the network configuration or available bandwidth, and where it is not possible to rely on a central controller. This leads to undesirable features in a simpler environment, such as a single shared network segment: large code size, slow setup and teardown of streams, and a requirement that every device support RSVP and all related protocols.
The chief flaw of RSVP in a single shared network environment is that it is a peer-to-peer protocol, and assumes intermediate routers are simply allocating and deallocating bandwidth within their backplane and at the network ports, such that notions of total available bandwidth and managed reservations are disallowed. In an environment where the devices share a physical network and the bandwidth between any two devices is arbitrary, the lack of such knowledge leads to conflicts between devices. This is a key issue, one as yet unresolved by any standard protocol specification.
It would be desirable to provide a method and apparatus that addresses the weaknesses of prior art in this field (as described above) within any interconnected set of ethernet networks where there is varying physical bandwidth between nodes on the network. | {
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Since a technology that detects an upper body of a human can be applied to various fields such as security surveillance, an intelligent robot, and entertainment which utilizes face recognition, person tracking, and gesture recognition, aggressive research and studying is required.
Therefore, various methods regarding the upper body detecting technology have been studied, and are still being studied.
However, the conventional upper body detecting technologies have some problems such as a high misdetection rate and a low correct detecting rate. Further, it takes a long time to detect an upper body. Therefore, it is difficult to commercialize the conventional upper body detecting technology. Subsequently, the industries need to develop an upper body detecting technology which can be commercialized for the actual application. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Halo active aromatic sulfonamide compounds have enhanced biocidal properties and minimal side effects. They can be used to arrest or kill the growth of living organisms, particularly microorganisms, and may also be used as a fungicide or pesticide. In U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,296,841; 6,743,420; and 6,667,030, the use of Chloramine-T (the sodium salt of N-chloro-p-toluenesulfonamide) as an odor control agent is also described.
In use, the halo active aromatic sulfonamide compound is generally dissolved in a medium in which it is soluble. The medium can be a gaseous, solvent, solid formulation, or aqueous medium, and the sulfonamide compound becomes an integral part of the medium such that it cannot easily be separated from the medium. The resulting solution is brought into contact with another medium (which can again be a solid, solvent, water, or gas) affected by microorganisms. This contact is usually affected by spraying, washing, dipping, and/or mixing in such a manner as to contact the affected area, surface, or substrate with an aqueous formulation of the desired sulfonamide compound or a blended mixture of same. Because the sulfonamide compound cannot easily be separated from the medium, it is generally discarded after use. The opportunity to regenerate and/or reuse the sulfonamide compound is thus lost.
It would be desirable to provide a halo active aromatic sulfonamide compound which can be separated from the medium in which it is normally dissolved after it has performed its function. It would also be desirable if the halo active aromatic sulfonamide compound could be regenerated and/or reused. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The present invention relates to microlithography and more particularly to a unitary flexure stage permitting essentially lossless small angle relative rotation.
In the manufacture of semiconductor integrated circuits, circuit features are formed by making successive microlithographic exposures on resists coated on the surface of a semiconductor wafer. As is understood, it is essential to the manufacturing process that successive exposures be precisely aligned with each other. To achieve this alignment, it is necessary to provide both translational and rotational freedom of movement of the wafer relative to the projected image. The projected image is typically determined by a reticle held in a step and repeat microlithographic projector. In order to permit a servo system to accurately position the wafer for the last or fine adjustment process, it is important that freedom of movement be provided by means of a system of mounting or support which does not introduce loss or mechanical hysteresis and which does not introduce spurious or unstable forces which would disrupt the accuracy of the servo system.
The present invention is particularly concerned with the provision of a stage which permits essentially lossless small angle relative rotation of a central portion of a stage with respect to an outer or annular portion.
Among the several objects of the present invention may be noted the provision of a stage permitting essentially lossless small angle relative rotation; the provision of such a stage which does not introduce unstable or reversing forces; the provision of such a stage which does not exhibit hystersis; the provision of such a stage which facilitates highly accurate positioning; the provision of such a stage which is highly reliable and which is of relatively simple and inexpensive construction. Other objects and features will be in part apparent and in part pointed out hereinafter. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Memory devices are typically provided as internal, semiconductor, integrated circuits in computers or other electronic devices. There are many different types of memory including random-access memory (RAM), read only memory (ROM), dynamic random access memory (DRAM), synchronous dynamic random access memory (SDRAM), and flash memory.
Flash memory devices have developed into a popular source of non-volatile memory for a wide range of electronic applications. Non-volatile memory is memory that can retain its stored data values for some extended period without the application of power. Common uses for flash memory and other non-volatile memory include personal computers, personal digital assistants (PDAs), digital cameras, digital media players, digital recorders, games, appliances, vehicles, wireless devices, mobile telephones and removable memory modules, and the uses for non-volatile memory continue to expand.
Flash memory devices typically use a one-transistor memory cell that allows for high memory densities, high reliability, and low power consumption. Storing data in a flash memory cell can be accomplished by changing the threshold voltage of the cell, through programming (e.g., “writing”) a charge storage node (e.g., a floating gate or trapping layers or other physical phenomena). By defining two or more ranges of threshold voltages to correspond to individual data values, one or more bits of information may be stored on each cell. Memory cells storing one bit of data by utilizing two threshold voltage ranges are typically referred to as Single Level Cell (SLC) memory cells. Memory cells storing more than one bit of data per cell by utilizing more than two possible threshold voltage ranges are typically referred to as Multilevel Cell (MLC) memory cells.
Flash memory typically utilizes one of two basic architectures known as NOR flash and NAND flash. The designation is derived from the logic used to read the devices. In NOR flash architecture, a column of memory cells are coupled in parallel with each memory cell coupled to a transfer line, often referred to as a bit line. In NAND flash architecture, a column (e.g., NAND string) of memory cells are coupled in series with only the first memory cell of the column coupled to a bit line.
In both NOR and NAND configurations, memory cells are typically arranged into arrays of rows and columns. The control gates of memory cells of a given row share the same control signal, which is often referred to as a word line. Programming of flash memory cells is accomplished by applying a high programming voltage to the word lines of the memory array in order to shift the threshold voltages of the memory cells. Because the memory cells of a given row are coupled to a common word line, each memory cell is therefore subjected to the high programming voltage applied to the word line. During a programming operation, some memory cells coupled to a given word line may reach their assigned threshold voltage before other memory cells coupled to the same word line reach their assigned threshold voltages. This condition is especially likely to occur in MLC memory. This can cause what is known in the art as program disturb issues which occur when memory cells continue to experience the effects of additional programming pulses after reaching their intended programming or voltage threshold level.
For the reasons stated above, and for other reasons that will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon reading and understanding the present specification, there is a need in the art for alternatives to existing programming schemes for flash memory devices. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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(i) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an ink for a ball point pen and a type of a ball point pen for directly reserving the ink in a ink tank or tube (thereinafter refered to as "the direct ink reserving type ball point pen").
(ii) Description of the Related Art
A ball point pen is constituted of a pen point comprising a ball and a tip holder, an ink reserving tube, a penholder and the like. According to this ball point pen, the ball of the pen point is rotated to transfer or sink an ink to or into a recording medium such as a paper, and particularly by the transfer, written traces drawn lines can be made. At this time, the excessive ink which has not been transferred or sunk adheres to the outer periphery of the tip holder, so that there occurs the so-called blobbing phenomenon that the ink drops at the start of writing or during writing, with the result that the sharp lines cannot be drawn sometimes.
In order to solve this problem, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open Sho No. 5-40192 has disclosed a method in which the outer periphery of the chip holder is also coated with a water-repellent or an oil-repellent material so as to inhibit the ink from adhering to the outer periphery of the chip holder.
However, the resultant coating material is peeled off by friction with a writing material such as a paper during writing, so that there is a tendency that the blobbing phenomenon gradually begins to occur.
This principle is that the critical surface tension on the outer periphery of the chip holder is decreased so as to be lower than the surface tension of the ink, thereby controlling the wetness of the ink. However, since a ink originally has the low surface tension, the surface of a high-energy material such as a metal is wetted with the ink inconveniently. Then, the non-aqueous ink is easier to wet the metal than an aqueous ink.
Even if the above-mentioned coating is given on the surface of a low-energy material, there is only a slight difference between the critical surface tension of the outer periphery of the chip holder and the surface tension of the ink, and hence an oil-repellent effect is too poor to sufficiently prevent the blobbing.
Furthermore, in the usual non-aqueous ball point pen, the wear of the tip by the rotation of the ball is relatively low, because the ink has a viscosity of thousands to millions cps. However, if the viscosity of the ink is less than thousands cps, the improvement of lubrication by viscus properties cannot be expected, so that the tip is extremely worn, with the result that the starving of written lines or writing impossibility takes place.
In the conventional non-aqueous ball point pen, the ink contains a solvent having a low vapor pressure as a main component, and therefore, even if a cap is removed and a pen point is exposed to air, the starving or writing impossibility scarcely occurs. However, since the ink has a high viscosity of thousands to about one million mPa.cndot.s, a high writing pressure is required, so that writing feeling is heavy. In consequence, the fingers, arm and shoulder of a writer are easily tired by the writing for a long period of time. On the other hand, in an aqueous ball point pen, the ink has a low viscosity, and therefore the writing feeling is light, but the main solvent is water which easily vaporizes. Therefore, if the cap is removed and the pen point is exposed to air, the starving or writing impossibility occurs inconveniently.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-open Hei No. 1-299880 has disclosed a non-aqueous ink for a ball point pen in which the surface tension of an organic solvent is regulated and which has an ink viscosity of 50 to 2000 cP (25.degree. C.) and simultaneously possesses the characteristics of the non-aqueous ink and the aqueous ink, but this kind of ink is not always satisfactory. In recent years, some aqueous inks having a middle viscosity are on the market as inks having many advantageous features from the viewpoints of quality and economy, but these inks are poorer, than the non-aqueous ink, in a cap-off performance that the writing impossibility scarcely occurs even when the cap is removed. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field
The disclosure relates to a pattern structure, and more particularly to a pattern structure and a method of manufacturing the pattern structure.
2. Description of the Related Art
A nano- or micro-sized pattern may be formed at low costs and via a simple process using an imprint technology. Thus, extensive research has been performed in this regard. In general, a master, on which a pattern of a predetermined size is formed, a stamp and imprint resin for transferring the pattern are used to perform an imprint process. Recently, as demands for transferring a pattern of a uniform and large size have increased, efforts to realize a large-size imprint process have been undertaken. A technology to manufacture a defect-free master or stamp may be used to transfer a uniform and large-sized pattern.
A thin film transistor-liquid crystal display (“TFT-LCD”) typically includes a polarizer. For example, a polyvinyl alcohol (“PVA”) polarizer that is an absorptive polarizer has been widely used as the polarizer. The PVA polarizer is disposed on each of an upper glass and a lower glass of a display panel in the TFT-LCD and transmits or blocks incoming light from a back light unit (“BLU”), thereby performing a core role in driving the display panel. Recently, a metal wire grid polarizer (“WGP”) that is a reflective polarizer characteristically reflects S-polarized waves and transmits P-polarized waves is also used as the polarizer, instead of the absorptive polarizer that absorbs S-polarized waves and transmits P-polarized waves. Accordingly, when such a metal WGP is applied to a TFT-LCD, the S-polarized waves reflected from a surface of the metal WGP are recycled, thereby improving brightness of the TFT-LCD and reducing the costs for a light source. Recently, as the size of a display panel has been gradually increased, the size of metal WGP has been increased. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Many speech recognition systems operate by comparing acoustic models of known words, or parts of words, against acoustic descriptions of speech to be recognized. They recognize the speech by identifying with it those words, or parts of words, whose models compare most closely with its description. In many such systems, digital signal processing converts the analog signal of an utterance to be recognized into a sequence of frames. Each such frame is a group of parameters associated with the analog signal during a brief period of time. Commonly the parameters represent the amplitude of the speech at each of a plurality of frequency bands. Such speech recognition systems commonly compare the sequence of frames produced by the utterance against a sequence of acoustic models, each of which has a model of the parameter values of frames associated with a given speech sound.
An example of such a speech recognition system is given in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 797,249, filed by Baker et. al. on November 12th, 1985, for "Speech Recognition Apparatus and Method" (hereinafter referred to as "application Ser. No. 797,249"). Application Ser. No. 797,249 is assigned to the assignee of the present application and is incorporated herein by reference. It discloses a system in which each vocabulary word is represented by a sequence of statistical node models. Each such node model is a multidimensional probability distribution, each dimension of which represents the probability distribution for the values of a given frame parameter if its associated frame belongs to the class of sounds represented by the node model. Each dimension of the probability distribution is represented by two statistics, an estimated expected value, or mu, and an estimated absolute deviation, or sigma.
A method for deriving statistical models of the basic type discussed in application Ser. No. 797,249 is disclosed in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 862,275, filed by Gillick et al. on May 12th, 1986, for "A Method For Representing Word Models For Use In Speech Recognition" (hereinafter referred to as "application Ser. No. 862,275"). Application Ser. No. 862,275 is assigned to assignee of the present application, and is incorporated herein by reference. It discloses how to divide multiple utterances of the same word into corresponding groups of frames, called nodes, which represent corresponding sounds in the different utterances of the word, and to derive a statistical model of the type described above for each such node. In addition application Ser. No. 862,275 discloses how to divide the nodes from many words into groups of nodes with similar statistical acoustic models, and how to calculate a statistical acoustic model for each such cluster. The model for a given cluster is then used in place of the individual node models from different words which have been grouped into that cluster, greatly reducing the number of models which have to be stored. The use of such clusters also greatly reduces the number of words a new user has to speak in order to train up a large vocabulary speech recognition system, since the user is only required to speak enough words to train a model for each cluster, rather than being required to separately speak, and train up a model for, each word in the recognition system's vocabulary.
Although the methods of deriving and using statistical node and cluster models described in application Ser. Nos. 797,249 and 862,275 work well, it is still desirable to improve their performance. One problem with such statistical models is that the mu's and sigma's used for their parameters are only estimates. The estimated mu and estimated sigma for a given parameter of such a model are derived from a finite number of samples of the frames associated with the node or cluster which the models represent. The mu of a given parameter is the mean of that parameter over all frames used to calculate the model, and the sigma is the absolute deviation of that parameter over all such frames.
In order for such estimates to be accurate, they should be based on a very large sampling of acoustic data. Unfortunately, it is often undesirably expensive or undesirably inconvenient to obtain a large enough sampling of the speech sounds associated with the model to make its mu's and sigma's as accurate as desirable. It would normally take many thousands of utterances of each node or cluster to derive truly accurate statistics for its model. But the requirement of so many training utterances would make the initial use of speech recognition systems much more difficult. For this reason such systems normally operated with models derived from insufficient data, causing the performance of such systems to suffer.
The statistical inaccuracy of acoustic models has other undesirable effects. For example, when acoustic models of nodes, that is, successive parts of individual words, are divided into clusters of the nodes with similar acoustic models, as described in application Ser. No. 862,275, inaccuracies in the statistics of node models due to insufficient sampling data increases the chance that individual nodes will be put into the wrong clusters, or will be put into separate clusters all by themselves when they should not be. This makes the clustering process less accurate and less efficient.
Such statistical inaccuracies can also causes problems when cluster models of the type described in application Ser. No. 862,275, which are derived by having an end user speak each cluster in a small number of words, are used to recognize the sound represented by that cluster in a much larger number of words. This results both from the small number of frames from which each cluster is derived and from the fact that speech sounds are often varied by the context in which they are said, and thus that the statistics of a cluster model tend to be less accurate when they are derived from utterances of a small number of words than when they are derived from utterances of all the words in which the cluster is used. | {
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In recent years, the development of liquid crystal display elements is remarkable, and these display elements are mostly directed to the application of nematic liquid crystals. On the other hand, liquid crystal displays of different driving modes, utilizing characteristics of other liquid crystal phases have also been intensively researched for practical use, and as one of these devices, there is a thermal writing projection device utilizing a thermooptical effect of a smectic A phase. The mode of such a device can provide a display of a far larger area and a far higher capacity in the number of figures, as compared with a conventional TN mode (twisted nematic mode).
Characteristics required for the liquid crystal materials used in this field include the following:
(1) a wide smectic A phase range (preferably, a smectic A phase range down to 0.degree. to -20.degree. C.),
(2) an extremely narrow nematic phase range,
(3) a high birefringence index,
(4) a small specific heat and a low phase transition energy; and
(5) a large dielectric anisotropy value.
Of these requirements, the items (1), (2) and (3) are considered to be important for improving the quality level of display such as contrast on a projected screen. As to liquid crystal materials having the above-mentioned characteristics, no single compound has yet been found, and hence mixtures of various liquid crystal compounds have now been investigated. Examples of these liquid crystal compounds can be represented by the following general formulae: ##STR5##
Furthermore, examples of compositions of these compounds are set forth in Table 1.
TABLE 1 ______________________________________ Compo- mp SN NI NR sition Compounds (.degree.C.) (.degree.C.) (.degree.C.) (.degree.C.) ______________________________________ a I.sub.8, I.sub.10, I.sub.15 24 73.5 74 0.5 b II.sub.8, II.sub.10 12 37 42 5 c II.sub.8, II.sub.10, V.sub.8 6 53 56 3 d II.sub.8, II.sub.10, IV.sub.9 8 41.5 47 5.5 e II.sub.8, III.sub.10, IV.sub.9 -30 46.8 51.0 3.2 f II.sub.8, II.sub.10, III.sub.10 -32.7 54.7 57.3 2.6 III.sub.12, IV.sub.9, VI.sub.8 ______________________________________
In Table 1, the respective abbreviations have the following meanings:
mp: Melting point (.degree.C.) PA1 SN: Smectic/nematic transition point (.degree.C.) PA1 NI: Nematic/isotropic transition point (.degree.C.) PA1 NR: Nematic range (.degree.C.) PA1 [=NI point (.degree.C.)--SN point (.degree.C.)]
In the column labelled "Compound" in the table, for example, I.sub.8 means the compound of n=8 of Formula (I), mentioned above.
With regard to the composition a, the nematic range is as extremely narrow as 0.5.degree. C., but the melting point is as high as 24.degree. C., which is in the vicinity of room temperature. Therefore, this composition is difficult for practical use, though it seems to be usable in experiments. On the other hand, with regard to the compositions e and f, the melting points are as low as -30.degree. C. and -32.7.degree. C., respectively, but the nematic ranges are as wide as 3.2.degree. C. and 2.6.degree. C., respectively. Thus these compositions are not always satisfactory.
The nematic range is a factor which has an influence on the writing rate and the display contrast of the display elements, and when the nematic range is wide, the writing rate is low and the contrast also is inferior. That is, when thermal writing is carried out within a wide nematic range, a long cooling time is required in the nematic phase in the step of forming an opaque smectic phase from an isotropic liquid via a nematic phase, which constitutes a factor of retarding the writing rate. Furthermore, when the nematic phase state remains for a long period of time, the liquid crystal is oriented by a substrate subjected to an orientation treatment (vertical orientation or homogeneous orientation), so that no scattered smectic A phase can be obtained, which constitutes a factor in deteriorating the contrast.
With regard to the melting point, if it is 0.degree. C. or lower, the compositions are considered to be suitable for typical uses. Because the thermal writing type liquid crystal device is used indoors, it can be considered that the device is usually not used in an environment of 0.degree. C. or lower.
In addition to the above-mentioned compositions, the other thermal writing liquid crystal compositions are disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open Publication Nos. 144383/1985, 252686/1985, 268790/1986, etc. but compositions having a nematic range of 2.degree. C. or lower and at the same time a melting point of 0.degree. C. or lower have not yet been found.
The object of the present invention is to provide a liquid crystal composition for thermal writing liquid crystal device elements, and a liquid crystal display element using the composition, and more specifically, a liquid crystal composition having characteristics of an extremely narrow nematic range and a low-melting phase transition point, and a thermal writing liquid crystal device element using the composition. | {
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Expanding a seed set of web pages into a larger group of web pages is a common procedure performed in link-based analysis of websites. Although the seed expansion problem has been addressed by numerous researchers as an intermediate step of various graph-analytic analyses on the web, unfortunately existing techniques fail to provide any measure of the character of a web page or the character of the expanded group of web pages. For instance, the HITS algorithm, well-known in the field, used a search engine to generate a seed set, and then performed a fixed-depth neighborhood expansion in order to generate a larger set of pages upon which the HITS algorithm was employed. The general technique of the HITS algorithm has seen broad adoption, and is now a common technique for local link-based analysis. Variants of this technique have been employed in community finding, in finding similar pages, in pagerank, in trustrank, and in classification of web pages. More sophisticated expansions have been applied in the context of community discovery.
However, without any way to measure the character of a web page that may be included by expansion of the seed set into a group of web pages, it may be difficult to automatically understand the character of the group of web pages resulting from the expansion of the seed set. In the absence of such context, meaningful characterizations of groups of web pages may continue to elude automatic discovery. What is needed is a way to characterize the relationship of a web page to a group of web pages and to measure the strength of the characterization. Such a system and method should be able to provide a context for understanding the meaning of such a measure characterizing the web page. | {
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The present disclosure relates to a toner and a method of manufacturing the toner, and in particular relates to a capsule toner and a method of manufacturing the capsule toner.
A commonly known toner for example contains hydrophobic silica particles that have undergone treatment using a quaternary ammonium salt-based compound and that have a hydrophobicity of at least 80%. | {
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In the recent years, hybrid vehicles have gained traction given to their merits of reducing exhaust gas emissions and improving the vehicles' fuel efficiency. These vehicles thereby help at reducing the carbon foot print by vehicles.
A variety of transmissions have been designed specifically for the hybrid vehicles, with the aim to make the vehicle more efficient for fuel consumption and performance. However, a majority of the typical transmission systems are developed for a niche segment of high-end buyers.
A typical transmission system for a hybrid vehicle comprises an internal combustion engine (ICE) and an electric motor/generator. These transmission systems use similar technology as the ICE driven cars, in which the transmission takes a single input and provides output to the wheels. These vehicles are also commonly known as mild hybrids since the electric motor is of a small capacity. The motor is placed between the engine and the transmission being adapted to add its torque to that of the engine. The combined torque is transmitted to the wheels from the transmission through a differential.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,943,918 discloses one such hybrid powertrain system. The system comprises an internal combustion engine, a transmission including a transmission drive shaft coupled to the internal combustion engine and a transmission driven shaft driven at a plurality of gear ratios, and an electric motor/generator engaged with the transmission drive shaft for synchronizing rotation of the drive shaft with the driven shaft during the shifting of the transmission.
These transmission systems require that the ICE and the electric motor run at the same RPM. This is a compromising design since both the ICE and the electric motor generate their maximum torques at different RPM's. Thus, in this working either the engine or the electric motor can achieve the maximum torque.
Also, the brake energy regeneration is not achieved over a wide range of speeds resulting in limited recharging of the batteries when brakes are applied. The same limitation occurs when the batteries need to be charged while cruising on the ICE. Since, the ICE and the electric motor are running at the same RPM, the speed of the electric motor also drops to lower RPM when the transmission is engaged at higher gears, thereby reducing the efficiency of recharging the batteries. Hence, the said arrangement provides less flexibility in operation.
Another type of transmission system, known as the e-CVT transmission has been developed for full-hybrid or plug-in hybrid vehicles. The said transmission system comprises an ICE and two electric motors. The electric motors are of a higher capacity to drive the car at longer distances. These transmission systems use a power split device, such as a planetary gear set, which is connected to the ICE and the electric motors.
U.S. Patent Application No. 20140378259 discloses one such transmission system for a hybrid electric vehicle. The transmission system comprises an input shaft connected to an engine; first and second motors/generators on a transmission housing; a first planetary gear set on the input shaft having one rotation element connected to the transmission housing, another rotation element connected to the first motor/generator, and the third rotation element connected to the input shaft; and a second planetary gear set on the input shaft having one rotation element connected to the transmission housing, another rotation element is connected to the second motor/generator, and the third rotation element connected to an output gear.
The electric motors are controlled by use of power electronics for generating different torques for driving the vehicle. In such transmissions generally the ICE kicks in at higher speeds irrespective of the actual power needed.
Further, in this case the ICE and the electric motor have to work in tandem, and the transmission cannot be handled by the electric motor or the ICE alone. Further, in the said arrangement two electric motors are to be provided for the transmission to function. Another limitation of these transmissions is the mode used to regenerate the braking energy. The brake energy regeneration is possible only within a small range of vehicle speed. Also, it is not feasible to turn on the ICE for achieving the brake energy regeneration over a broader speed range.
Similar limitations are present in the typical transmission systems used in electric vehicles. Also, the complexities present in both these designs hinder large scale manufacturing, thereby increasing the cost of manufacturing. To be able to fully exploit the advantages of the technology of hybrid vehicles and electric vehicles, it is required to develop a transmission system which overcomes the afore-mentioned drawbacks of the known transmission systems, and which is compatible with a variety of vehicles, including hybrid vehicles and electric vehicles. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image generating system for generating an image as seen from a virtual camera in an object space and an information storage medium used in this image generating system.
2. Prior Art
There is known an image generating system which generates images of objects as seen from a virtual camera when the objects are arranged within a virtual three-dimensional space or an object space. Such a system is very popular because of providing a so-called virtual reality.
With such image generating system used in a soccer simulation game, for example, a player enjoys controlling a game character on a screen who passes a ball or kicks a goal. By using this image generating system, the player feels as if he/she were actually playing soccer.
In the conventional soccer simulation games, a game character which is controllable by a player is not fixed, and may be a game character that keeps a ball, for example. More particularly, when the player controls a first game character and then passes a ball to a second game character, the player's game character is changed from the first game character to the second game character. For such a reason, the virtual camera does not follow one fixed character.
However, such a soccer simulation game according to the prior art has the following problems.
First of all, the player must do a complicated control since a game character controlled by the player is frequently changed from one to another during the game play. Game beginners tend to avoid such a complicated game.
Second, the player cannot easily feel strong affection for his or her game character or enthusiasm about the game. In such a type of simulation games, game characters are often modeled on actual star players. However, if there is a game character modeled on the player's favorite soccer star, the player cannot always control the game character in a conventional simulation game in which the player's controllable game character is frequently changed. Thus it is difficult to feel strong affection for the player's game character and enthusiasm about the game.
Thus, the conventional soccer simulation games are disadvantageous in that the player's game character is frequently changed and that the virtual camera does not follow one fixed player's game character.
Therefore, the inventor has developed a soccer simulation game of such a type that the player's game character is fixed to a particular one and that the virtual camera follows that fixed character. In such a soccer simulation game wherein the virtual camera follows one fixed player's game character, it is desirable that an image preferable for the game play can be generated in real time when the positional relationship between the player's game character and the ball is varied. | {
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The invention is generally in the field of a stable support stand capable of providing medical support to a patient and is optionally mobile and readily maneuverable by a patient to whom a medical device is connected. Disclosed herein are aspects related to a convenient and reliable systems for intravenous fluid supply systems that are capable of folding into a compact storage configuration, and can provide patient mobility assistance, such as a combination walker and infusion management system (“IMS”). In particular, the IMS is a radical improvement and departure over traditional intravenous (“IV”) poles currently in use.
It is important for patient rehabilitation and recovery that a patient be able to walk, even when connected to a medical component, after a medical procedure (see U.S. Pat. No. 4,332,378). A walking patient, however, presents special safety problems in terms of ensuring the supporting pole is stable and does not tip or hinder the patient or caregiver when it is moving with the patient. This safety concern is not adequately addressed by current IV poles that have a vertical pole connected to a wheeled base. The IMS provided herein is designed to ensure medical components (including relatively heavy components) are easily attached to the IMS, and the IMS is extremely stable, maneuverable, and optionally capable of providing reliable physical support to a walking or moving patient. In addition, an IMS of the present invention is capable of folding into an extremely compact configuration when not in use.
Although the medical products and healthcare industries have undergone rapid development, the basic IV pole has remained relatively unchanged for most of the last century. They remain rigid, heavy, difficult to roll, unwieldy, ugly, easily tipped and nearly impossible to conveniently store when not in use. The IV poles known in the art generally require two-handed manipulation to appropriately configure the pole height to a specific patient and oftentimes the pole does not reliably lock at a certain height. The wheels of the poles often stop rolling or catch (such as on a rug or uneven surface transition between rooms), increasing the risk of pole-tipping, potentially causing serious injury and damage to valuable attached medication and equipment.
Another major drawback to the IV poles currently used is that they are very difficult to store. Generally, when not in use they are clustered together in a storeroom (or an unused patient room converted to a storage room), or at the end of a hall. This clustering results in a jumble of devices that may be difficult to access when a pole is needed, as well as occupying valuable hospital space that could be better utilized. This is not a simple problem because a typical hospital likely owns hundreds of IV poles. Even in smaller settings, such as doctors' offices, the presence of only a couple of IV poles can present serious storage issues.
Wheeled pole support systems used in clinical settings are generally known in the art (e.g., see U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,056,249, 4,744,536, 4,892,279, 4,725,027, 6,619,599, 5,772,162, 5,458,305, 4,905,944, U.S. Pub. No. 2005/0139736). One common limitation of each of those pole systems is that the central vertical pole configuration in combination with the conventional base structure is inherently unstable and ill-suited for holding heavy medical components. Components are generally connected to the IV pole by clamping or connecting them to the central vertical pole. This configuration is more prone to tipping because the center of gravity inherently shifts toward the perimeter of the base as equipment and accessories are added. In addition, the long lever arm and the height of suspended components result in a large lever arm which acts to exacerbate the inherent instability of the system, especially in view of how such systems are maneuvered. Accordingly, the configuration of the IV poles known in the art is prone to tipping, especially for a moving system whose wheels have a tendency to catch on surface disturbances.
IV poles currently used are also extremely ineffective walkers and do not provide any mobility assistance to a user. To walk with an IV pole, the patient grips the central pole with one hand, and cannot rely on the pole for support because the pole can easily and rapidly roll in an unwanted or unpredicted direction. This reflects the fact that a force-couple is created by having to maneuver the IV pole with only one hand, where the pole is generally located beside the user, and in a direction that is not inline with the direction of motion of the user. Therefore, the inertia of the IV pole is not inline with the direction of motion of the user. This creates the aforementioned force couple. Accordingly, the user must exert additional force/effort to move the IV pole and has a reduced ability to correct the IV pole in the event it tips or begins to tip. This problem increases as the mass or weight of the IV pole increases, such as by the connection of medically-needed components such as infusion pumps, for example. In addition, the base configuration that contains the wheels can interfere with patient walking and are easily caught on cracks (e.g., elevators) or other disturbance, further increasing instability.
Ambulatory patient support stands are generally known in the art (U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,969,031, 4,332,378). Those stands, however, still suffer from being inherently unsteady and unwieldy in that the wheeled base remains attached to a central pole and the patient still relies on the central pole for support. Accordingly, those systems remain unstable, unable to hold multiple heavy components, and do not easily fold for storage or deploy for use.
The fact that IV poles are inherently terribly designed for providing walking support is recognized in U.S. Pat. No. 5,704,577 where a walker-IV stand coupler is disclosed for connecting a traditional four-wheeled walker with an IV pole. That system, however, is unwieldy and complicated, requiring three different components that occupy a significant amount of space.
Walkers known in the art (U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,479,953, 5,411,044) have been adapted to receive an IV pole and/or IV solution bags. Those walkers, however, are relatively bulky four-wheeled systems that are not easily stored and do not have the capability and features of the present invention. Other walkers that may be collapsible for storage (e.g, U.S. Pat. No. 4,251,044) are not able to hold multiple heavy components, do not provide reliable physical support for an ambulating patient and/or are relatively difficult for a patient to maneuver.
Portable IV stands for field-use (U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,807,837, 6,983,915) and other types of stands having special caster wheel mechanisms (U.S. Pub. No. 2003/0178538, U.S. Pat. No. 2,794,612 for tripod with caster wheel mechanisms) are known in the art. Those stands, however, do not address the need for stable, easily deployable patient mobility assistance systems and infusion stands provided herein. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a mobile phone and, in particular to a wireless audio delivery system and method for a mobile phone that enable distribution of an audio signal to multiple headsets through short range wireless communication channels.
2. Description of the Related Art
A mobile phone is one of the most quickly developing electronic devices, backed up by its portability and convenience. Recently released mobile phones support various multimedia functions such as Moving Picture Experts Group Layer-3 (MP3), Digital Multimedia Broadcasting (DMB), motion picture playback, camera, and data management functions, for example.
Typically, multimedia content contains audio data, which is or output through a speaker of the mobile phone. However, speaker output may be noisy to other people and even intrude on the privacy of others. For this reason, earphones or headsets have been used to prevent other people from hearing the sound either for privacy or to prevent disturbance.
Sometimes it is required to share the sound output from an audio source with specific people. In this case the other people may listen to the sound using a pair of earpieces separately or interconnect a dual output jack for enabling two earphones to listen to the output. However, the earpiece and output jack sharing methods limit the number of listeners and restrict movements of the listeners since the earphones and headsets are connected through relatively short cords, whereby it is difficult to share listening sound output from the single source. | {
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There have been many applications with respect to a mechanism for opening and closing a slide door of a doorway by using a load displacement caused by a load of stepping-on of a human body as a source of power without using additional source of power such as electric motor.
For example, Japanese Laid Open Utility Number HOG-37482 discloses a method (incline method) that uses an amount of displacement caused by a stepping on to appropriately incline a guide rail positioned on an upper or a lower portion of a slide door by a link mechanism toward a desired moving direction, and thereby slidably moving the slide door along the incline.
However, the incline method noted above has a drawback in that a responsive and quick movement is difficult since it depends solely on the natural movement along the incline caused by the own weight of the slide door, and frequent entering and exiting is burdensome.
Moreover, it has a drawback in that when dust etc. is accumulated at the guide rail due to long use, this method is easily affected adversely. In addition, it has a drawback that when the application force transmission mechanism configured as noted above is impaired, opening and closing manually becomes impossible or very difficult. Patent Document 1: Japanese Laid Open Utility Publication Number H06-37482 | {
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1,5-Dideoxy-1,5-imino-D-glucitol(deoxynojirimycin) and derivatives thereof are known antihyperglycemic agents and antiviral compounds. These compounds and methods for their preparation and uses are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,849,430--Fleet et al, Method of Inhibiting Virus; 4,182,767--Murai et al, Antihyperglycemic N-Alkyl-3,4,5-trihydroxy-2-piperidine Methanol; 4,639,436--Junge, et al, Antidiabetic 3,4,5-Trihydroxypiperidines; 4,220,782--Stoltefuss, Preparation of 1-Desoxynojirimycin and N-Substituted Derivatives; and 4,429,117 - Koebernick et al, Process for the Production of Known and New 6-Amino-6-desoxy-2,3-O-isopropylidene-.alpha.-L-sorbofuranose Derivatives, and Intermediate Products of the Process.
Acquired immune deficiency syndrome, (AIDS), is a serious disease. As a consequence, a great effort is being made to develop drugs and vaccines to combat AIDS. The AIDS virus, first identified in 1983 has been described by several names and is currently referred to as human immunodeficiency virus (HIV). Two distinct AIDS viruses, HIV-1 and HIV-2, have been described. HIV-1 is the virus originally identified in 1983 by Montagnier and co-workers at the Pasteur Institute in Paris [Ann. Virol. Inst. Pasteur 135 E, 119-134 (1984)], while HIV-2 was more recently isolated by Montagnier and his co-workers in 1986 [Nature 326, 662-669 (1987)]. As used herein, HIV is meant to refer to these viruses in a generic sense.
Development of an AIDS vaccine is hampered by lack of understanding of mechanisms of protective immunity against HIV, the magnitude of genetic variation of the virus, and the lack of effective animal models for HIV infection. See, for example, Koff and Hoth, Science 241, 426-432 (1988).
The first drug to be approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for treatment of AIDS was zidovudine, better known under its former name, azidothymidine (AZT). Chemically, this drug is 3'-azido-3'deoxythymidine. This drug was originally selected as a potential weapon against AIDS because it was shown to inhibit replication of the virus in vitro. Such in vitro tests are useful and virtually the only practical method of initially screening and testing potential anti-AIDS drugs. A serious drawback of AZT, however, is its toxic side-effects. Thus, the search for better anti-AIDS drugs continues.
The HIV inhibitory activity of 1,5-dideoxy-1,5-imino-D-glucitol (deoxynojirimycin) and its N-methyl derivative is disclosed in PCT Inter. Appln. 87/03903, published Jul. 2, 1987. The substantially more effective anti-HIV activity of the N-butyl derivative of deoxynojirimycin is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,849,430.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,220,782 describes a process for producing 1-deoxy-nojirimycin and its N-substituted derivatives, using two different starting materials, one of which is N-substituted 6-amino-2,3-O-isopropylidene-6-deoxy-.alpha.-L-sorbofuranose. The starting material is deblocked by treatment with a strong mineral acid which yields an ammonium salt. The salt is isolated and then hydrogenated. | {
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Document EP-A-0 445 002 discloses an installation which includes a conveyor on which trays to be tested are disposed. Prior to sealing the trays, a small quantity of helium is inserted into each one of them. A hood is situated above the conveyor, which hood is connected to an extractor fan via a pipe. The hood can be moved vertically by means of actuators. When the presence of a tray is detected, the hood is lowered, and means secured to the hood exert a certain amount of pressure on the sealed tray. A sniffer probe connected to a helium leak detector is situated at the mouth of the pipe connecting the hood to the fan. If the air flow extracted by the fan contains helium, that indicates that there is a leak in the tray, and control apparatus actuates tray-removal means. Preferably, so as to detect any sealing defects in the bottom of the tray, the conveyor belt is perforated TO enable any gas leaking from the bottom to be entrained by the air flow caused by the fan.
That sniffer system, which operates at a pressure that is very close to atmospheric pressure, requires a certain amount of mechanical pressure to be exerted on the tray so that, in the event that the package is split, a leakage flow is created that is entrained by the air flow. Therefore, that method cannot be used on rigid packages.
When the packages contain fragile foodstuffs, such mechanical pressure exerted on the package may damage the food.
As stated above, the belt must be perforated so as to make it possible to detect any leaks in the bottom, but it may not be enough merely to provide a perforated belt. In the same way, the mechanical pressure, which is exerted by a plate, may prevent a leak from being detected, if the leak is situated in the top of the package under the pressure plate.
The sensitivity of that method is low. The tracer gas driving pressure created in the package by the mechanical means used is not properly controlled. The uniformity of the helium in the air flow created by the fan is not very good. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a Web page viewing apparatus, and in particular, to a Web page viewing apparatus with which a viewer can view Web pages with high operability without being affected by a communication failure on the Internet.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, inspection of information via the Internet has become popular. For example, a user instruction, a maintenance manual, and the like for a machine sold by a company appear on a Web page of the company such that service persons of service dealers for the machine or maintenance personnel of customers can perform maintenance for the machine reading the user instruction, the maintenance manual, and the like. In addition, a parts list of a sold machine also appears on a Web page such that service dealers or customers can place an order for parts necessary for maintenance and improvement (for example, see JP-A-2002-24225). In provision of information using such a Web page, contents appearing on the Web page are often updated, and a person viewing the Web page is required to always access the Web page to obtain latest information in order to have the latest information displayed on the Web page.
However, a viewing apparatus in accordance with a conventional Web page viewing technique has problems as described below.
The viewing apparatus cannot read image information from a Web page server (hereinafter simply referred to as Web server) temporarily according to circumstances in locations where a communication failure on the Internet occurs such as the inside of a building, an underground floor, a space between buildings, and a mountain valley. In such a case, for example, when a person is repairing a machine while reading materials such as a user instruction, a maintenance manual, and a parts manual on a Web page, since the person cannot view the materials at will, the person cannot have an arbitrary page necessary for the repair displayed on the Web page. As a result, longer time is required for the repair.
On the other hand, usually, a personal computer is often used as a terminal for Web page viewing. In that case, a viewer inputs data with a so-called WWW browser in order to read character information and image information of a Web page from a Web server. In general, when the viewer views the Web page using this WWW browser, screen information (including character information and image information) at the time of the viewing is automatically stored in a predetermined temporary memory in the personal computer for each screen in an order of viewing. Thereafter, when the viewer performs a “return” operation, the image information stored in the temporary memory is read out and displayed on the Web page in an order opposite to the order of viewing.
Therefore, when the viewer views the Web page using the conventional WWW browser as described above, in general, even if data (image information) cannot be read from a Web server according to circumstances, the image information stored in the temporary memory can be displayed. Thus, the viewer can have image information viewed once displayed on the Web page again. However, the image information can only be displayed in the order opposite to the order of viewing, and the temporary memory has a limited capacity and adopts a storage system in which, when a storage capacity is fully used, data stored earlier is deleted every time data is stored (first-in first-out). Consequently, in the case of an image including systematically described contents like materials such as a user instruction, a maintenance manual, and a parts manual, there is a problem in that it is difficult to directly designate a page of the materials, which the viewer desires to view, and have the image displayed on the Web page, and operability is low.
When the viewer designates image information, which the viewer desired to save, and stores the image information in the personal computer in a form of a file but cannot read data from the Web server due to a communication failure on the Internet, the viewer can also have the image information, which is saved in the form of a file, displayed on the web page offline. However, even in this case, the viewer has to judge which of the image information saved in the form of a file and latest image information on the Web page (data on the server) is new and old, that is, the viewer has to compare dates of update of the image information saved in the form of a file and the latest image information on the Web page. Therefore, the image information saved in the form of a file cannot be matched with the image information on the Web page. Consequently, the viewer needs to read the latest information from the Web page every time the viewer views the Web page. Thus, there is also a problem in that operability is low because an operation for reading the latest information is troublesome, and when a data capacity of the image information at that point is large, it takes time to download the image information. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Although the present invention will be described with particular reference to implantable cardioverters-defibrillators, it is to be appreciated that the invention has applications with respect to high density electronic component packaging for many other applications that require ultra-high density and high reliability in a small package.
Modern ICD's, for example, are designed to be implanted into the human body to provide pacing stimulation pulses and high voltage shocks to the heart. Such ICD's typically include a hermetically sealed housing which contains electronic circuitry for generating the needed therapy, high voltage capacitors, and a power source. Signals into and out of the circuitry are coupled through the housing by means of feedthrough terminals which, in turn, are coupled to implantable stimulation leads.
Modern ICD's have reached a high level of sophistication relative to their ability to improve the quality of life. Current research is focused on developing “smart” units capable of providing rate responsive pacing, in addition to, electrogram storage, enhanced diagnostics and four-chamber stimulation. The electronics typically include a microprocessor, memory chips such as RAM and ROM devices, and other associated active analog and digital components, together with numerous passive components, such as capacitors and resistors. It has been common in packaging such electronic circuitry to mount the assorted active and passive components onto a rigid microelectronic substrate or printed circuit board. As efforts proceed to design these advanced biomedical devices, a constant goal of reduced product size is continuously challenged by increases in circuit complexity.
There are several key factors which dictate technology selection for packaging the electronic circuitry for implantable biomedical products. The most important prerequisite is high reliability. Pacemaker electronics are designed and tested for 99 percent survival at a 90 percent confidence level for the projected product life, which is estimated to last a minimum of five years or longer from the date of implantation. Electrical performance must also be optimized for both the particular application desired and the overall power consumption.
Reduction in ICD size translates to a smaller incision in the patient and a lighter device, in general. Battery area accounts for roughly 20% of the total ICD size, the high voltage capacitors comprise about 20%, the connector top comprises about 10%, and the electronic circuitry package comprises the remaining 50%. The electronic package is the only area, at the present time, which has the flexibility to be designed to maximize component density. Consequently, double-sided multi-layer microelectronic substrate designs are quite typical.
Typical substrate technologies which meet the above criteria to varying degrees are printed circuit boards, conventional thick film substrates, and high temperature cofired ceramic substrates. However, each of these technologies possess limitations in meeting the design objectives for today's sophisticated ICD.
Printed circuit board approaches are clearly limited in packaging density when compared to thick film or cofired substrate designs.
While conventional thick film substrates have a high reliability rate, it affords only modest packaging density, suffers from poor layer to layer dielectric isolation (resulting in a higher incidence of crosstalk between conductors), and surface planarity may suffer in multilayer designs.
Conventional high density electronic circuits are customarily based on rigid ceramic substrates. So as to increase the packaging density of the components, their size can be reduced and bonding can be performed in as space-saving a manner as possible. The disadvantage of these cofired ceramic packages is that they are limited by high conductor trace resistance and poor dimensional control.
Current ICD packaging designs have several additional shortcomings that prevent them from significantly reducing their weight, volume, density and interconnectivity with other parts of the assembly that future ICDs will demand.
First, the high voltage requirements of an ICD necessitate that the interconnect substrate have a high dielectric strength. Suitable materials typically used are low-temp or high-temp co-fired ceramics. These ceramic substrates are composed of several layers, each typically 6 mils thick, and fairly heavy compared to other laminate technologies (for example, polyimide flex circuits, PCBs, and the like). Ceramic design rules require a routing density limited to 4 mil lines and spaces. Thus, the more complex the circuit design is, the more layers that are required for interconnect, and consequently the heavier the overall device that will result.
Secondly, ceramics require tungsten conductors deposited on each layer. The exposed conductors are plated with a layer of nickel followed by a layer of gold because gold does not attach directly to tungsten. It is to the last layer of gold that components are attached and electrically connected with wire bonds. Tungsten, which has an electrical resistivity three times that of copper, requires the high voltage charging components and outputs that carry high currents to be constructed from copper conductor on a PCB or a polyimide flex. Therefore, the use of a ceramic hybrid substrate necessitates the use of additional interconnect mechanisms to connect the ceramic hybrids to PCBs and to the outputs of the device.
These interconnect techniques increase the cost and volume of the ICD. They also reduce the ease of manufacturing and increase the complexity of the ICD, and ultimately result in a thicker and heavier device thereby reducing patient comfort.
Another interconnect material currently in use in implantable devices is “flexible polyimide”, or “flex”, circuits. Historically, flex circuits have been used in pacemakers and ICD's for flexible interconnection between a main hybrid substrate and the connections needed at various angles to the device feedthroughs, telemetry coils and battery connections, etc. Current assembly technology for complex multi-chip modules, such as for an ICD, on flexible polyimide substrates has been limited to surface-mounting of passive components or “flip-chips”, (i.e., IC's that are mounted with their active side facing the substrate and attached using solder bumps).
However, surface-mounting of flip-chips is not compatible with the current commonly-used diodes, power transistors and integrated circuit (IC) chip set, because they require connections to the top and back of the die using wire bonds. Thus, in order to meet the current IC chip set and interconnect density, the optimum ICD substrate must be capable of wire bond attachment, partly because chip-and-wire mounting of components offers a very high packaging density versus conventional surface mounted components, and partly because of the availability and ease of manufacture of face-up bonded chip devices. “Chip-and-wire” may be defined as hybrid technology employing exclusively face-up-bonded chip devices, interconnected to the substrate conventionally by “flying” wires, that is, wire bonds.
It was in this context that the inventors investigated, “flexible polyimide”, or “flex”, circuits for its suitability as a primary substrate for mounting chip-and-wire integrated circuits for extremely complex multi-chip VLSI circuits. Flexible polyimide exhibits several advantages that make it attractive for an ICD substrate.
More specifically, flexible polyimide as a primary substrate has a reduced thickness and weight. The substrate can be made from ˜3 mil layers, which translates to a 50% reduction in thickness and 500% lighter assembly, and it has a higher routing density, typically, capable of 2 mil lines and spaces (twice the density of ceramics).
A flexible polyimide substrate further has a lower conductor resistance since it uses copper conductors (1.67×106 ohms-cm) compared to tungsten (5.5×106 ohms-cm). The use of flexible substrates eliminate the need for additional PCB's or other polyimide flexible interconnection for interfacing with the high voltage charging components and outputs that carry high currents.
And finally, a flexible polyimide substrate is capable of integrating other interconnections. That is, a flexible polyimide substrate integrates the functionality of a conventional rigid hybrid circuit with a conventional flex circuit to thereby interconnect the feedthroughs, battery, telemetry coil, transformers, etc. into a single component.
Unfortunately, the problem with flexible polyimide is that it tends to move during wire bonding, thereby dissipating the energy, which tends to weaken the wire bond at the wire bond pad. The conventional fixture for holding substrates during wire bonding has multiple vacuum holes that when bonding one or two bonds, can be located away from the wire bond pad, but when bonding numerous of wire bonds in close proximity of each other, as is typical in an ICD design, the vacuum holes create a very non-uniform surface that provides more opportunity to let the flexible substrate move and dissipate the energy. Because the requirements for a typical ICD includes several VLSI integrated circuits (e.g., three or more of micro-processors, RAM, ROM, I/O chips, high voltage converters, etc.) and literally hundreds of wire bonds in close proximity to one another, it is necessary to have a technique and/or substrate construction that ensures that all the wire bonds are reliable without the need to test each one.
Additionally, the final assembly must be protected from handling damage and moisture that might result in the hermetically sealed housing.
What is required is a system that affords all the advantages of the flexible polyimide with an interconnect scheme that has the interconnect density and manufacturing flexibility of wire bonding approaches. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Digital broadcasting services using broadcast satellites and communication satellites have now started, and demand for digital recording and playback devices enabling time-shift viewing of digital broadcasts is growing. Existing digital recording and playback systems such as taught in Japanese Unexamined Patent Appl. Pub. 2001-218143 filter and extract the desired program from the broadcast stream for recording. Referred to as simply a “digital recorder” below, this conventional digital recording and playback device is described next.
FIG. 8 is a block diagram showing a conventional digital broadcast reception system having a recording/playback function as taught in Japanese Unexamined Patent Appl. Pub. 2001-218143.
As shown in FIG. 8, the output of the reception demodulator 101 is connected to the input to packet filter 102, one input to the selector switch 105, and the input to the data table extractor 106. The output of the packet filter 102 is connected to the input to the data table substitution unit 103. The output of the data table substitution unit 103 is connected to the input to the recording/playback device 104. The output of the recording/playback device 104 is connected to the other input to the selector switch 105. The output of the data table extractor 106 is connected to an input to the control microprocessor 108. The outputs of the control microprocessor 108 are connected to the reception demodulator 101, packet filter 102, data table generator 107, recording/playback device 104, demultiplexer 110, and AV decoder 111. The output of the data table generator 107 is connected to the input to the data table substitution unit 103. The output of the selector switch 105 is connected to the input to the demultiplexer 110. The output of the demultiplexer 110 is connected to the input to the AV decoder 111. The output of the AV decoder 111 is connected to the input to the monitor 112. The output of the user interface 109 is connected to an input to the control microprocessor 108.
Operation of this conventional digital broadcast reception system with a recording/playback function is described next.
The control microprocessor 108 first sets the selector switch 105 to the reception demodulator 101 side. The reception demodulator 101 demodulates the received digital broadcast signal, and outputs an MPEG-TS (MPEG transport stream) packet stream. This packet stream contains packets for carrying program video data and audio data (“AV transport packets” below), and packets for carrying data tables (“data table transport packets” below). The demultiplexer 110 and AV decoder 111 process the packet stream as instructed by the control microprocessor 108, and construct an electronic program guide (EPG) transmitted from the broadcast station at that time into a format that can be processed by the control microprocessor 108. The electronic program guide can then be presented to the user as graphical information displayed on the monitor 112, or through the user interface 109.
The user then refers to the presented program guide and selects the program desired for recording from among the multiple program options. The selected program is not limited to programs currently being broadcast, and could be a program scheduled for future broadcasting. When a program scheduled for future broadcasting is to be recorded and the control microprocessor 108 knows what the current time is, the control microprocessor 108 executes an operation such as described below when the scheduled broadcasting time comes.
This program recording operation is described next. Using the user interface 109, the user tells the control microprocessor 108 what program to record by, for example, specifying the program number. These program numbers are one of the fields in the program guide data table, which includes program broadcast times and the program matrix, and the control microprocessor 108 can therefore use the program_number to identify a unique program.
The packet stream output from the reception demodulator 101 at this time is input to the packet filter 102 and data table extractor 106. The data table extractor 106 extracts and inputs the data tables from the input packet stream to the control microprocessor 108. The control microprocessor 108 determines if the program to record is currently being broadcast based on the input data table. This specific operation is described next.
First, the control microprocessor 108 references the event information section of the Event Information Table (EIT) containing detailed information about each program to find the program_number and identify the program. The control microprocessor 108 then reads the running_status value for that program in the Event Information Table, and thus determines if the recording program is currently being broadcast. If the recording program selected by the user is a program scheduled for future broadcasting, then several seconds to several minutes before the program is to start the control microprocessor 108 confirms whether the selected program will be broadcast as scheduled to both ensure that the program will be recorded from the beginning and prevent recording errors.
If transmission of the scheduled recording program is confirmed, the control microprocessor 108 sends the PID value of the packets to be passed to the packet filter 102. This PID value is the PID of the packets carrying video data for the recording program, the PID of the packets carrying the audio data for the recording program, the PID of the packets carrying other program related information as instructed, and the PID of the packets carrying the PSI (Program Specific Information) table containing information about the packets belonging to each program contained in the stream. Packets (such as null packets) identified as not needing recording do not need to pass the packet filter 102, and the PID for those packets is therefore not passed by the control microprocessor 108 to the packet filter 102. If the recording capacity of the recording medium used by the recording/playback device 104 is sufficient, the packet filter 102 could also be told to pass video data and other information relating to programs other than the recording program. If the video data carrier packets contain multiple hierarchically coded video packets, this will be indicated in the PMT (Program Map Table), and the control microprocessor 108 can therefore determine whether to control multiple video streams as instructed by the user.
The filtering operation of the packet filter 102 results in dropped packets in the packet stream. The content of the PSI table when it is output from the reception demodulator 101 therefore does not match the new packet stream output from the packet filter 102. The data table generator 107 therefore generates a new PSI table corresponding to the new packet stream as instructed by the control microprocessor 108. Multiple programs are contained in the packet stream from the reception demodulator 101, and this applies to when only one of those programs is to be recorded.
It should be noted that the Network Information Table (NIT) is optional according to the MPEG standard, and it is therefore not always necessary to pass and record the Network Information Table through the packet filter 102. Even if the Network Information Table is filtered by the packet filter 102, the lack of the Network Information Table has little effect on other devices. However, the data table generator 107 could include the program_number 0, that is, the Network Information Table, in the recording program information, and the Network Information Table could be inserted to the packet stream by the data table substitution unit 103. This affords compatibility with digital information processes that require the Network Information Table.
The new PSI table generated by the data table generator 107 is input to the data table substitution unit 103, and thereby substituted for the PSI table contained in the packet stream that passed the packet filter 102. This assures that the PSI table matches the packet stream output from the packet filter 102. In addition, data for descriptors relating to programs other than the recording program is deleted from the new Program Association Table (PAT), and the total amount of data in the packet stream is therefore compressed. The number of packet is also reduced as a result deleting descriptor data.
The transport packets contain a continuity_counter that increment one in each of plural packets having the same PID value. When packet dropping occurs as noted above, this continuity_counter is controlled by the data table generator 107 so that the appropriate value is assigned to each packet.
The new packet stream thus generated is sent to the recording/playback device 104 and recorded to a data storage medium in the recording/playback device 104. A separate index area is provided from the area for continuously recording the stream, and the recorded program can be played back by recording where the program was recorded to the recording medium (i.e., the address information) in this index area.
If the recording medium is a fixed disk medium or semiconductor memory, this index area can be anywhere outside the continuous recording area to which the program data is recorded. If the recording medium is a tape medium, the index area is any area (such as the beginning of the tape) outside the contiguous program data storage area, including an electronic memory device built in to the tape cassette of a digital video cassette. Furthermore, if a tape medium is used, random access performance can be improved with the tape by repeatedly recording the program address information between program data segments using a data format that can be easily distinguished from the transport packets carrying the program data.
Because this recording operation is done without using the signal lines connecting the reception demodulator 101, selector switch 105, and demultiplexer 110, the desired programs can be recorded while the user is viewing a different program. In order to process multiple programs received over different channels, however, the reception demodulator 101 must be able to process multiple streams received through multiple transponders. As a result, the reception demodulator 101 must therefore have a multichannel reception capability and a distribution function for distributing the multiple transponder streams to the data table extractor 106 and demultiplexer 110 sides.
The operation for playing the recorded program back is described next. When a program is recorded as instructed by the user, the control microprocessor 108 updates the list of recorded programs graphically displayed on the monitor 112, for example. The user can then view this list to select the recorded program for playback.
The user then uses the user interface 109 to tell the control microprocessor 108 which program to play back. The control microprocessor 108 then refers to the program data address information written to the index area, and starts to read the desired program data from the storage medium of the recording/playback device 104. The control microprocessor 108 also switches the selector switch 105 to the recording/playback device 104 side. The playback stream read from the storage medium thus passes the selector switch 105 and is sent to the demultiplexer 110 and AV decoder 111. The control microprocessor 108 controls the demultiplexer 110 and AV decoder 111 to present the reproduced program on the monitor 112.
The digital information passed to the demultiplexer 110 during program playback includes such program information as the PSI table and the video and audio data, but does not include the electronic program guide and other related information. When compatibility with other systems that process this related information with the program information during normal digital broadcast reception is considered, the control microprocessor 108 stops processing this related information other than the program information during playback of a recorded program so that dropping this related information does not create a problem with system operation.
By thus providing a mechanism for replacing the PSI table, this conventional digital broadcast reception system can record only the desired programs to a recording/playback device while maintaining full MPEG compatibility, and the recording efficiency of the recording/playback device 104 can thus be maintained as more fully described in Japanese Unexamined Patent Appl. Pub. 2001-218143.
While the prior art thus increases the recording efficiency by replacing only the packets for data table transfer, and reconstructing and recording the desired program from a broadcast packet stream containing multiple programs to a recording/playback drive, the AV data packets that predominately control the recording efficiency are simply recycled directly from the original packet stream.
Digital broadcasts also carry program rating data inserted to the broadcast packet stream so that a parental control system enabling program viewing to be controlled according to the viewer's age, or more specifically the program ratings. This rating system works in conjunction with the receiver. It is therefore desirable for this parent control system to also work when playing back programs recorded from such a broadcast. However, decoding digital broadcasts and then re-encoding the program for digital recording often loses detailed program information, including this parental control information, contained in the original digital broadcast. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Network protocols and equipment are continuously being evolved to keep pace with ever increasing demands. Problems exist, however, which limit the ability of a host to always offer the fastest, most effective service possible. For example, a host that wishes to deliver content, such as a web page, video stream or other type of information, may be using outdated equipment or software that does not keep pace with new developments, and this may constrain information delivery.
What is needed is a way to enable a host or other Internet equipment or service provider to offer better service. Ideally, such a solution would permit any distributor of information the ability to easily deploy specific protocols or equipment without having to invest in new equipment or software, or substantially altering the information to be delivered or its associated structure. The present invention addresses these needs and provides further, related advantages. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
This invention relates to a connector used for connecting a wire harness of an automobile, and more particularly to a connector having a terminal retainer at a rear portion thereof.
In FIG. 9, a connector housing a has terminal receiving chambers b each of which has a guide notch c in each of upper and lower walls thereof, the guide notch extending from a rear end of the terminal receiving chamber to an intermediate portion thereof. Retaining projections d are formed on the side walls of the connector housing, respectively. A terminal retainer e is adapted to be attached to the connector housing a, and terminal retaining projections k for projecting into the terminal receiving chambers b through the guide notches c are formed on inner surfaces of flexible plate portions f. The terminal retainer has flexible retaining pieces h engaged with the projections d, respectively.
FIG. 10 shows the condition of use, and the terminal retaining projection k is engaged with a metal terminal i inserted in the terminal receiving chamber b to thereby prevent rearward withdrawal of the metal terminal.
In the above construction, when it is required to withdraw the metal terminal i, the flexible plate portion f is displaced outwardly by the use of a jig or the like to bring the terminal retaining projection k out of the path of movement of the metal terminal i, and in this condition the withdrawal is carried out.
In the above conventional art, when the metal terminal i is to be withdrawn, the flexible plate portion f is liable to be excessively displaced by the jig or the like, and therefore it is quite possible that the flexible plate portion may be damaged. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to communication transceiver clock and data recovery, and, in particular, to tracking data in the presence of signal noise.
2. Description of the Related Art
In many data communication applications, serializer and de-serializer (SerDes) devices facilitate the transmission between two points of parallel data across a serial link. Data at one point is converted from parallel data to serial data and transmitted through a communications channel to the second point where it received and converted from serial data to parallel data.
At high data rates frequency-dependent signal loss from the communications channel (the signal path between the two end points of a serial link), as well as signal dispersion and distortion, can occur. As such, the communications channel, whether wired, optical, or wireless, acts as a filter and might be modeled in the frequency domain with a transfer function. Correction for frequency dependent losses of the communications channel, and other forms of signal degradation, often requires signal equalization at a receiver of the signal. Equalization through use of one or more equalizers compensates for the signal degradation to improve communication quality. Equalization may also be employed at the transmit side to pre-condition the signal. Equalization, a form of filtering, generally requires some estimate of the transfer function of the channel to set its filter parameters. However, in many cases, the specific frequency-dependent signal degradation characteristics of a communications channel are unknown, and often vary with time. In such cases, an equalizer with adaptive setting of parameters providing sufficient adjustable range might be employed to mitigate the signal degradation of the signal transmitted through the communications channel. An automatic adaptation process is often employed to adjust the equalizer's response. Equalization might be through a front end equalizer, a feedback equalizer (such as a decision feedback equalizer (DFE)), or some combination of both.
Further, SerDes devices are challenged by operation with very high insertion loss. Some insertion loss may be recovered through an analog front-end equalizer, sometimes in combination with a mixed mode DFE, but, even so, the receiver still operates with very low noise/jitter margin when equalized to a normal operating mode (in contrast to start-up or training modes). When the receiver has no margin at all, the receiver is inoperable, and the receiver must retrain to the input signal. Upon retraining, the receiver determines if the input data is a spectrally rich data stream (i.e., nearly random in contrast to fixed patterns). Once a spectrally rich data stream is present, the equalizer might implement an automatic adaptation process to adjust equalizer coefficients and, thus, the equalizer's response. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Diodes are often desired to have low losses and also a sufficient dynamic robustness and high robustness against cosmic radiation, respectively. For dynamic reasons, in particular to ensure low switching losses and low reverse current peaks, a low efficiency of an anode emitter of the diode, i.e. a low doping of the anode region, is often required to reduce flooding of an adjoining weakly doped semiconductor region with charge carriers. During fast commutating the diode, i.e. during fast switching off or switching the diode from forward to reverse current direction, and/or due to cosmic radiation a high density current of holes may flow towards the anode region. The positive charge of the holes may at least partially compensate the doping charge of the anode region. Accordingly, the space charge region may extend deep into the anode region. In case the space charge region reaches an anode metallization in electric contact with the anode region, a breakdown may occur which in consequence may lead to the destruction of the diode. Highly and/or deeply doped anode regions are often desired to avoid breakdown of diodes. However, highly and/or deeply doped anode regions tend to increase switching losses and reverse current peaks. Furthermore, other known measures to reduce switching losses and reverse current peaks of diodes are often accompanied by undesired side effects. For example, the charge carrier life time in the anode region and/or in the semiconductor material below the anode region may be reduced by irradiation or ion implantation using protons, helium, or argon, for example. However, an increased reverse current, which is particularly unfavorable for high voltage diodes, is observed in this case.
Accordingly, there is a need to provide a diode with improved trade-off between dynamic properties and robustness during fast commutation and against cosmic radiation, respectively. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to location-based applications for mobile devices and, more specifically, to a digital punch card for a mobile device based on one or more security conditions.
2. Description of the Related Art
A primary goal of many consumer-based businesses, such as cafés, restaurants, dry cleaners, and clothing stores, is to attract and retain repeat customers. In order to achieve this goal, these businesses oftentimes offer “promotional punch cards” to their customers. For example, a café could offer a “buy 10 coffees get one free” promotion. In order to implement this promotion, the café would give a customer a punch card, typically the size of a business card, and mark the punch card every time the customer buys a cup of coffee. After the customer receives 10 marks on the punch card, she would present the card to the salesperson at the café, who would give her a free coffee.
While punch cards are convenient to the degree they increase customer loyalty and allow customers to save money, customers often misplace or damage their punch cards. As a result, customers are frequently unable to take full advantage of their punch cards, thereby undermining the business purposes underlying the use of punch cards.
To address the problems with conventional punch cards and to leverage the ubiquity of mobile devices, several mobile phone-based punch card applications have been developed. These mobile phone-based punch cards typically operate by scanning a barcode with a camera of the phone, with each scan of the barcode being equivalent to a mark on the punch card. One drawback of this approach is that mobile phone-based punch card applications rely heavily on customer honesty. For example, a customer could easily cheat such an application by scanning a copy of the barcode multiple times or reporting that she is at a false location. In other words, a dishonest customer could easily falsify her use of a digital punch card without actually purchasing any items from the business promoting the punch card, again undermining the business purposes underlying the use of the punch card.
Other mobile phone applications allow a user to “check in” to a location by typing a location name into the phone and broadcasting to her friends on a social networking website that she is at the location. However, such applications also are not very useful as a replacement for physical punch cards because a mobile phone user can easily falsify the location from where she is broadcasting, thereby undermining the business purposes underlying the use of punch cards due to the easy falsification.
As the foregoing illustrates, what is needed in the art is a more secure technique for implementing digital punch cards. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Patent Document FR 2 741 706 describes such a device which comprises a section member welded along a generator line of the vertical supporting tube and a machined piece forming a cradle for the horizontal tube, the machined piece being welded to the horizontal tube and being fixed by dovetail assembly means to the section member welded to the vertical tube.
Such a device uses a molded supporting piece that is of complex shape and that can crack. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
While there seems to be a general perception that any given heat exchanger structure may be utilized interchangeably for any of a variety of heat exchange operations, for example, as an oil cooler, as a radiator, as a condenser, as an evaporator, etc., this is frequently not the case, particularly where one of the heat exchange fluids is undergoing a phase change during the heat exchange operation as, for example, from liquid to vapor or the reverse. Simply stated, the change of phase, in many instances, considerably alters the mechanics of the heat exchange operation; and this is particularly true in the case of evaporators used in refrigeration systems.
In such a system, one heat exchange fluid will be directed toward the evaporator principally in the liquid phase. In some instances, it may be entirely in the liquid phase while in others, it may be in a mixed phase of both liquid and vapor. In any event, the refrigerant is passed through an expansion valve or a capillary into a low pressure area which includes the evaporator itself. The refrigerant downstream of the expansion valve or capillary will initially be in the mixed phase. That is, made up of both refrigerant liquid and refrigerant vapor.
Because the refrigerant is flowing within the system, it will have kinetic energy which in turn will be related to its mass. And, of course, for a given volume of refrigerant in the liquid phase versus the same volume of refrigerant in the vapor phase, the kinetic energy, and thus momentum, will be substantially greater because of the much higher density of the liquid phase material.
As a consequence, as the mixed phase refrigerant enters a manifold or a header in the evaporator which is provided for distributing refrigerant to several different flow paths through the evaporator as is typical, the momentum of the liquid phase component of the incoming refrigerant often tends to cause the refrigerant to flow rapidly down a large portion or even all of the length of the manifold to essentially pool or puddle at one end thereof. Consequently, flow paths connected to the manifold near the inlet frequently receive principally vapor phase refrigerant while those more remote from the inlet receive principally liquid phase refrigerant. Since vapor phase refrigerant has already absorbed the latent heat of vaporization, those flow paths conducting a principally vapor phase refrigerant cannot absorb all of the heat that they are capable of absorbing whereas those receiving principally liquid phase refrigerant, because of thermal conductivity constraints in the evaporator design, cannot absorb all of the heat that the liquid phase refrigerant flowing therethrough is capable of absorbing.
The same factors influence vaporization in each pass of a multiple pass evaporator. Additionally, outlet resistance may also cause a maldistribution of refrigerant among the flow paths.
The obvious result is poor efficiency of operation of the evaporator.
The present invention is directed to overcoming one or more of the above problems. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
As is well-known in the art, arithmetic logic units often perform data processing in a floating point format. Floating point units can be used to perform high precision arithmetic calculations on real, integer, and BCD integers. Moreover, floating point units can be used to perform conversion of numbers between floating point and integer formats.
According to IEEE standard 754, floating point numbers are divided into three sections or fields: a sign field, an exponent field, and a significand or mantissa field. Each field has a finite number of bits, e.g., a mantissa field in an extended precision format has 64 bits. During arithmetic operations that produce a result with a number of bits greater than the number of bits in the field, it is necessary to round the result to fit within the field.
Conventionally, in a floating point unit addition and subtraction operations are performed serially with the rounding operation. Typically, the mantissa of the operands are first normalized, a carry propagate add derives an unrounded result, and a rounding unit inspects the unrounded result and other bits, such as the sticky bit and rounding bit, to determine if it is necessary to round up or round down to obtain the final result. The unrounded result from the carry propagate adder is then incremented if the rounding unit indicates that is necessary. Each of the operations performed by the floating point unit to obtain the final result requires a finite amount of time. Because the steps are performed serially, the process is slow. Moreover, the use of a carry propagate adder is costly because it requires a large amount of area on the chip.
Thus, there is need for a floating point unit that performs arithmetic operations, such as addition and subtraction, in a non-serial manner to obtain a final result in an efficient manner. Further, there is a need for a floating point unit that performs arithmetic operations while avoiding the use of a carry propagate adder. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an optical pickup device and an optical disc drive, and more particularly to those using a laser array in which two light sources with center wavelengths of 650 nm and 780 nm are formed on a common semiconductor substrate for the purpose of simplifying data recording/reading system for both DVD (digital versatile disc) and CD (compact disc) or CD-R (compact disc-recordable).
2. Related Background Art
Today, DVD systems have been brought into practice and are being spread as optical disc systems that can record massive data more than seven times than that of CD or CD-R (hereinafter called xe2x80x9cCDsxe2x80x9d). On the other hand, CD systems have been widely spread as optical disc systems. Therefore, in order to promote diffusion of DVD systems, it is desirable to provide DVD systems with compatibility with CD systems so that they can reproduce data not only from DVDs but also from CDs.
For reading of data from CDs, semiconductor lasers (laser diodes: LDs) for the wavelength around 780 nm are used. DVD systems, however, use LDs for the center wavelength 650 nm to realize the recording density about seven times of CDs. On the other hand, since the recording medium of CDs (particularly CD-R) is a pigment system material, sufficient sensitivity is not expected with LDs with the center wavelength 650 nm, and for providing DVD system with compatibility with CD systems, they are required to have a two-light-source optical pickup device for two center wavelengths 650 nm and 780 nm.
FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram schematically showing configuration of a conventional optical pickup device having two independent light sources.
The conventional pickup device with two independent light sources shown in FIG. 1 includes a first optical integrated unit 101 for detection by emitting light with the center wavelength 650 nm, a second optical integrated unit 102 for detection by emitting light with the center wavelength of 780 nm, a dichroic filter 103 that transmits light whose center wavelength is 650 nm and reflects light whose center wavelength is 780 nm, a collimator lens 104 that collimates transmitted beams which are beams from the first optical integrated unit 101 and the second optical integrated unit 102 into parallel beams, a folding mirror 105 that change the direction of beams from the parallel direction to the vertical direction relative to an optical disc, a wavelength-selective iris 106 for adjusting the numerical aperture (NA) in accordance with the wavelength of light, and an objective lens 107 focalizing beams with center wavelengths of 650 nm and 780 nm which have been aligned in parallel by the collimator lens 104 onto optical discs. The first optical integrated unit 101 as the light source of light whose center wavelength is 650 nm and the second optical integrated unit 102 as the light source of light whose center wavelength is 780 nm are provided independently from each other.
Beams having the center wavelength 650 nm from the first optical integrated unit 101 pass through the dichroic filter 103 while spreading the beam diameter, and they are collimated into parallel beams when they pass through the collimator lens 104.
Thereafter, they are reflected by the folding mirror 105 to the vertical direction relative to the DVD 109, introduced into the objective lens 107 under adjustment of the numerical aperture by the wavelength-selective iris 106, focused onto the DVD 109 by the objective lens 107,and reflected by the DVD 109. Reflected beams from the DVD 109 contain data about the presence or absence of any record pits on the DVD 109, then return along the path of the emitted light in the opposite direction, and are detected by the first optical integrated unit 101.
On the other hand, the beams from the second optical integrated unit 102 having the center wavelength 780 nm are reflected by the dichroic filter 103 while spreading outward to impinge on the collimator lens 104, and are aligned into parallel beams when they pass through the collimator lens 104. Then, they are reflected into the vertical direction relative to the CD 108 by the folding mirror 105, then introduced into the objective lens 107 after being adjusted in numerical aperture by the wavelength-selective iris 106, focused onto the CD 108 by the objective lens 107 and reflected from the CD 108. Reflected beams from the CD 108 contain data about the presence or absence of any record pits on the CD 108, return along the path of the emitted light in the opposite direction, and are detected by the second optical integrated unit 102.
Since the CD 108 and the DVD 109 are different in spot size by the objective lens 107, the effective numerical aperture is usually adjusted by the wavelength-selective iris 106, for example, in accordance with the wavelength of light.
However, the conventional optical pickup device having two independent light sources requires complicated positional adjustment of two light sources to align their optical axes, and the use of two independent light sources makes it difficult to decrease the size of the device.
For the purpose of overcoming these two problems in the optical pickup device having two light sources, a double-source built-in semiconductor laser array having two light sources for center wavelengths of 650 nm and 780 nm on a common semiconductor substrate was developed to simplify the optical system (Japanese Patent Application No. hei 10-181068).
FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view showing configuration of the double-source built-in semiconductor laser array.
The semiconductor laser array shown in FIG. 2 includes double heterostructures having different parameters, which are formed on different locations of a common semiconductor substrate, by substantially commonly designing upper parts of cladding layers of the double heterostructures in respective regions to integrate resonant elements which generate the light with the center wavelength 650 nm and the light with the center wavelength of 780 nm, respectively. Thus, this semiconductor laser array includes a laser element portion 240 for the oscillation wavelength of 780 nm and a laser element portion 241 for the oscillation wavelength of 650 nm.
In the laser element portions 240 and 241, sequentially stacked on a common gallium-arsenic GaAs substrate 21 are: n-type (n-) GaAs buffer layer 211, 221; n-In0.5(Ga0.3Al0.7)0.5P first cladding layers 212, 222; In0.5(Ga0.5Al0.5)0.5P optical guide layer 213, 223; multi-quantum well (MQW) active layers 214, 224; In0.5(Ga0.5Al0.5)0.5P optical guide layers 215, 225; p-In0.5(Ga0.3Al0.7)0.5P second cladding layers 216, 226; p-In0.5Ga0.5P etching stop layers 217, 227; p-In0.5(Ga0.3Al0.7)0.5P third cladding layers 218, 228; p-In0.5Ga0.5P cap layers 219, 229; n-GaAs current blocking layer 231; and p-GaAs buried layer 232.
In the laser element portion 240 for the oscillation wavelength 780 nm, the active layer 214 has a MQW structure including Ga0.9Al0.1As well layers and Ga0.65Al0.35As barrier layers. In the laser element portion 241 for the oscillation wavelength 650 nm, the active layer 224 has a MQW structure including In0.5Ga0.5As well layers and In0.5(Ga0.5Al0.5)0.5P barrier layers.
In the structure of the semiconductor laser array configuration shown in FIG. 2, by combination of the third cladding layers 218, 228 having a convex stripe configuration and the GaAs current blocking layer 231, steps of refractive indices are formed in the horizontal direction, and both laser element portions 240, 241 form refractive index-guided lasers. The GaAs current blocking layer 231 also functions to confine the current within the ridge stripe portion in each laser element portion. These element portions 240, 241 are electrically isolated by a separation groove 236, and they are independently driven via electrodes 233, 234. A minus-side electrode 235 can be formed on the bottom surface of the substrate 210 to be commonly used by both element portions. The laser element portion 240 for the oscillation wavelength 780 nm is used with CDs whereas the laser element portion 241 for the oscillation wavelength 650 nm is used with DVDs.
FIG. 3A is an explanatory diagram schematically showing configuration of a conventional double-source optical pickup device using a double-source integrated unit having a double-source built-in laser array, and FIG. 3B is an explanatory diagram schematically showing configuration of the double-source optical integrated unit.
The conventional double-source optical pickup device shown in FIG. 3A includes a double-source optical integrated unit 110 for emitting light with the center wavelength 650 nm and that of 780 nm, a collimator lens 104 that collimates transmitted beams which are beams from the double-source optical integrated unit 110 into parallel beams, a folding mirror 105 that change the direction of beams from the parallel direction to the vertical direction relative to an optical disc, a wavelength-selective iris 106 for adjusting the numerical aperture in accordance with the wavelength of light, and an objective lens 107 focalizing beams with center wavelengths of 650 nm and 780 nm which have been aligned in parallel by the collimator lens 104 onto optical discs.
Beams having the center wavelength 650 nm or 780 nm from the double-source optical integrated unit 110 are collimated into parallel beams when they pass through the collimator lens 104. Thereafter, they are reflected by the folding mirror 105 to the vertical direction relative to the DVD 109 or the CD 108, introduced into the objective lens 107 under adjustment of the numerical aperture by the wavelength-selective iris 106, focused onto the DVD 109 or the CD 108 by the objective lens 107, and reflected by the DVD 109 or the CD 108. Reflected beams from the DVD 109 or the CD 108 contain data about the presence or absence of any record pits on the DVD 109 or the CD 108, then return along the path of the emitted light in the opposite direction, and are detected by the double-source optical integrated unit 110. The light with the center wavelength 780 nm is used for the CD 108 whereas the light with the center wavelength 650 nm is used for the DVD 109.
The double-source optical integrated unit 110 shown in FIG. 3B includes a double-source built-in semiconductor laser array 111 in which two light sources are built on a common semiconductor substrate, an optical device 112 that directly transmits emitted light from the semiconductor laser array 111 but diffracts reflected light from an optical disc, and a photodiode (PD) for detection of signals and errors.
The semiconductor laser array 111 emits two kinds of light having the center wavelengths of 650 nm and 780 nm. Although the emitted light from the semiconductor laser array 111 directly pass through the optical device 112, reflected light from DVD or CD is diffracted to the position of the detection PD 113, and detected by the detection PD 113. The optical device 112 may be a hologram element, for example. A hologram element used as the optical device 112 may be provided integrally with the optical integrated unit 110 as shown in FIG. 3B, or may be provided separately from the optical integrated unit 110. It may be located between the collimator lens 104 and the folding mirror 105, between the folding mirror 105 and the iris 106, or between the iris 106 and the objective lens 107, for example.
When the hologram element is provided integrally with the optical integrated unit 110 as shown in FIG. 3B, it directly transmits emitted light from the semiconductor laser array 111, but diffracts diffracted light of a predetermined order in the reflected light from DVD or CD onto the position of the detecting PD 113, and converges it with the aid of the collimator lens 104. Usable as the hologram element is a micro diffraction grating having a transfer function so designed that light entering into a predetermined position on its surface be diffracted to a predetermined position on the detecting PD 113, and its pitch may be inconstant.
The detecting PD 113 has a plurality of divisional photo-detecting regions, and can detect focusing errors and tracking errors. In the illustrated example, both of 780 nm laser light and 650 nm laser light are detected by the common detecting PD 113.
In the illustrated optical system, since two laser emission points of the semiconductor laser array 111 are very close with the distance from 5 xcexcm to 500 xcexcm, two optical axes approximately overlap, and they can be regarded as a single common optical axis. That is, although there are two optical axes in the optical system shown in FIG. 1, the optical system shown in FIG. 3 aligns them into one common optical axis, configuration of the optical system is much more simplified.
As reviewed above, development and employment of a double-source optical integrated unit having a double-source built-in semiconductor laser array has made it possible to construct CD-compatible DVD optical pickup device and optical disc drive which are small in size and easy to adjust the optical system.
However, DVD and CD are different in thickness of the disc substrate, there was the problem that conventional devices could not sufficiently compensate the disc tilt property, defocusing property, jittering property and tracking property deteriorated by wavefront aberration (including spherical aberration) caused by the difference in thickness of the disc substrate. Normally, aberration optimization is effected for DVD with a strict specification. Therefore, wavefront aberration of CD during reading sometimes amounts to 0.5xcex (xcex is the wavelength), and may largely surpass 0.07 xcex rms which is considered the normally acceptable limit.
FIGS. 4A and 4B are explanatory diagrams schematically showing configurations of converged light onto DVD (FIG. 4A) and CD (FIG. 4B).
As shown in FIG. 4A, in DVD optimized in aberration, the focal point of the laser light is focused onto a disc signal surface 114. However, as shown in FIG. 4B, in CD with a thicker disc substrate than that of DVD, a large aberration is produced, and the focal point of the laser light is not focused to a point on the disc signal surface 114.
FIG. 5 is a graph which shows a relation between thickness of the disc substrate and wavefront aberration of an objective lens having the numerical aperture of 0.6 so designed to have no aberration when the wavelength of light is 635 nm and thickness of the disc substrate is 0.6 mm.
In case of the graph shown in FIG. 5, in DVD whose disc substrate is 0.6 mm thick, wave aberration is zero. However, in CD whose disc substrate is 1.2 mm thick, wave aberration is as large as 0.6xcex (xcex is the wavelength).
Such a large wavefront aberration causes focusing errors and tracking errors, and deteriorates qualities of CD-compatible DVD optical pickup devices and optical disc driving devices.
Heretofore, there were the following two techniques for correcting the wave aberration.
FIG. 6 is an explanatory diagram schematically showing configuration of a double-source built-in optical pickup device having a first wavefront aberration correcting device for the CD wavelength.
The double-source optical pickup device shown in FIG. 6 includes a double-source built-in semiconductor laser 117 for emitting light with the center wavelength 650 nm and that of 780 nm, a half mirror 103 which transmit about a half of the incident light and reflecting the other half, a collimator lens 104 that collimates transmitted beams which are emitted light from the double-source built-in semiconductor laser 117 into parallel beams, a special objective lens 118 which focuses light with the center wavelength 780 nm aligned into parallel beams by the collimator lens 104 onto the CD 108 and focusing light with the center wavelength of 650 nm onto the DVD 109, and a signal/error detecting PD 113 for detecting light with the center wavelength 650 nm and light with the center wavelength 780 nm which-are reflected light from the CD 108 and the DVD 109. The special objective lens 118 has a special shape for converging light entering into a central portion onto the CD 108 and light entering into the peripheral portion onto the DVD 109. The beams entering into the special objective lens 118, both with the center wavelength 650 nm or with the center wavelength 780 nm, are parallel beams. Although not shown for simplicity, a folding mirror for reflecting beams from the parallel direction to the vertical direction relative to the optical disc is interposed between the collimator lens 104 and the special objective lens 118. That is, the direction of the transmitted light from the collimator lens 104 and the direction of the transmitted light from the special objective lens 118 are normal to each other.
Light with the center wavelength 650 nm emitted from the LD 117 are aligned into parallel beams as a result of reflection by the half mirror 103 and transmission through the collimator lens 104. Then, it is reflected to the vertical direction relative to the DVD 109 by the folding mirror, and enters into the special objective lens 118. Part of the light with the center wavelength 650 nm entering into the special objective lens 118, which enters into the peripheral portion of the special objective lens 118, is focused onto the DVD 109, and reflected thereby. Although the light focused onto the DVD 109 is about a half of the light with the center wavelength 650 nm entering into the special objective lens 118, it is sufficient for getting recorded data from the DVD 109. Reflected light reflected by the DVD 109 contains data about the presence or absence of recording pits on the DVD 109. It returns along the path of the emitted light in the opposite direction, and after passing through the half mirror 113, it is detected by the detecting PD.
On the other hand, light with the center wavelength 780 nm emitted from the LD 117 is aligned into parallel beams as a result of reflection by the half mirror 103 and transmission through the collimator lens 104. Then, it is reflected to the vertical direction relative to the CD 108 by the folding mirror, and enters into the special objective lens 118. Part of the light with the center wavelength 780 nm entering into the special objective lens 118, which enters into the central portion of the special objective lens 118, is focused onto the CD 108, and reflected thereby. Although the light focused onto the CD 108 is about a half of the light with the center wavelength 780 nm entering into the special objective lens 118, it is sufficient for getting recorded data from the CD 108. Reflected light reflected by the CD 108 contains data about the presence or absence of recording pits on the CD 108. It returns along the path of the emitted light in the opposite direction, and after passing through the half mirror 113, it is detected by the detecting PD.
As explained above, the first wavefront aberration correcting device minimizes wavefront aberration for both the DVD 109 and the CD 108 by using the special objective lens 118 whose central portion and peripheral portion are different in focal distance.
FIGS. 7A through 7C are explanatory diagrams schematically showing configuration of a second wavefront aberration correcting device for the CD wavelength.
The second wavefront aberration correcting device uses ordinary elements as respective components of the optical pickup device, such as the wavelength-selective iris 106 and the objective lens 107, but it is configured to spread out the incident light to the objective lens 107 only when it is the light with the center wavelength 780 nm. That is, since aberration of DVD is already optimized, as shown in FIG. 7A, by introducing the light with the center wavelength 650 nm is introduced as parallel into the objective lens 107, it can be focused onto the DVD 109.
On the other hand, if the light with the center wavelength 780 nm is introduced as parallel beams into the objective lens 107, larger wavefront aberration is produced due to the thickness of the disc substrate of the CD 108, and the focal point of the laser light is not focused to a point on the disc signal surface 114 as shown in FIG. 7B. Therefore, in case of the light with the center wavelength 780 nm, by introducing it as spread light into the objective lens 107, wavefront aberration can be minimized, and the focal point of the laser light can be focused onto the CD 108 as shown in FIG. 7C.
However, in case of the first wavefront aberration correcting device, it is necessary to shape the objective lens into a complicated, special form, and there are a lot of difficulties for actual mass production and practical use, when selection of materials, preparation of an accurate mass-production mold, manufacturing cost for mass-production, and so on, are taken into account.
Additionally, regarding the second wavefront aberration correcting device, it is easy to bring it into practical use when using two independent light sources. However, when a double-source built-in semiconductor laser array including two light sources formed on a common semiconductor substrate is used, since positions of two light sources in the optical axis direction overlap with each other, light only from one of the light sources cannot be introduced as spread light into the objective lens by using ordinary elements as respective components of the optical pickup device.
It is therefore an object of the invention to provide an optical pickup device and an optical disc device having two built-in light sources, which include a wavefront aberration correcting device having a relatively simple structure and capable of minimizing wavefront aberration during reproduction of data not only for DVD but also for CD.
According to the invention, there is provided the optical pickup device including a double-source built-in semiconductor laser for emitting light of a first wavelength and light of a second wavelength, a first divergence modifying device for modifying the diverging rate of emitted light from the double-source built-in semiconductor laser to a first diverging rate, a second divergence modifying device for modifying the diverging rate of a part of transmitted light through the first divergence modifying device to a second diverging rate, and an objective lens which focuses the light with the first wavelength modified to the first diverging rate by the first divergence modifying device onto a first optical disc, and focuses the light with the second wavelength modified to the second diverging rate by the first and second divergence modifying devices onto a second optical disc. Thereby, the optical pickup device according to the invention can minimize wavefront aberrations of first and second optical discs which generate different wavefront aberration due to a difference in thickness between their disc substrates, and can focalize focal points of laser light on disc signal surfaces of respective optical discs.
In the typical configuration, the first divergence modifying device may be a converging device for converging emitted light from the double-source built-in semiconductor laser into parallel beams, the second divergence modifying device may be a spreading device for changing the part of the transmitted light through the converging device into spread beams, the objective lens focalizing the light of the first wavelength modified into parallel beams by the converging device onto the first optical disc and focalizing the light of the second wavelength modified into spread beams by the converging device and the spreading device onto the second optical disc.
According to the invention, there is provided the whole configuration of the optical pickup device including a double-source built-in semiconductor laser for emitting light of a first wavelength and light of a second wavelength, a first divergence modifying device for modifying the diverging rate of emitted light from the double-source built-in semiconductor laser to a first diverging rate, a second divergence modifying device for modifying the diverging rate of a part of transmitted light through the first divergence modifying device to a second diverging rate, an objective lens which focuses the light with the first wavelength modified to the first diverging rate by the first divergence modifying device onto a first optical disc, and focuses the light with the second wavelength modified to the second diverging rate by the first and second divergence modifying devices onto a second optical disc, a reflected light separating device which separates reflected beams from the first and second optical discs away from the path of the emitted light from the double-source built-in semiconductor laser, and a detecting device which detects reflected beams from the first and second optical discs separated by the reflected light separating device.
According to the invention, there is provided the typical whole configuration of the optical pickup device including a double-source built-in semiconductor laser for emitting light of a first wavelength and light of a second wavelength, a converging device for converging emitted light from the double-source built-in semiconductor laser into parallel beams, a spreading device for changing the part of the transmitted light through the converging device into spread beams, an objective lens which focuses focusing the light of the first wavelength modified into parallel beams by the converging device onto the first optical disc and focuses the light of the second wavelength modified into spread beams by the converging device and the spreading device onto the second optical disc, a reflected light separating device which separates reflected beams from the first and second optical discs away from the path of the emitted light from the double-source built-in semiconductor laser, and a detecting device which detects reflected beams from the first and second optical discs separated by the reflected light separating device.
With the configuration of the optical pickup device according to the invention, it is possible to provide an optical pickup device having two built-in light sources, which includes a wavefront aberration correcting device having a relatively simple structure and capable of minimizing wavefront aberration during reproduction of data not only for DVD but also for CD.
More concrete configuration of the optical pickup device according to the invention will be explained later.
According to the invention, there is provided the optical disc device including the optical pickup device according to the invention, and an optical disc device for rotatory driving the optical disc. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
A virtual machine is a software implementation of a computer that includes its own guest operating system to execute one or more applications and processes. A host computing system allocates a certain amount of its resources to each of the virtual machines, and multiplexes the underlying hardware platform among the virtual machines. Each virtual machine is then able to use the allocated resources, such as processing cycles, memory, and the like to execute its own guest operating system and applications. The software layer providing the virtualization is commonly referred to as a hypervisor, which abstracts the underlying hardware of the host computer and provides the abstracted hardware to each of the individual virtual machines.
During execution of the virtual machines on the host computing systems, virtual machines may require a handoff from a first hypervisor to a second hypervisor to provide the proper operations. This handoff requirement may occur as a result of updates to a host computing system, updates to a hypervisor on a host computing system, a new host computing system becoming available for the virtual machine, or any other reason.
In some implementations, virtual machines may be distributed across multiple host computing systems and hypervisors to provide various data services. These virtual machines, sometimes referred to as virtual network elements, forward data packets for the data services, wherein the different data services are associated with a particular subset of virtual network elements. For example, a first set of virtual network elements may be associated with a first data service, while a second set of virtual network elements are associated with a second data service. These network elements include, but are not limited to, a: Mobility Management Entity (MME), Service Gateway (S-GW), Packet Data Network Gateway (P-GW), Policy Charging and Rules Function (PCRF), Home Subscriber System (HSS), Baseband Processing Unit (BBU), Radio Resource Control (RRC) processor, Radio Link Control (RLC) processor, Packet Data Convergence Protocol (PDCP) processor, Media Access Control (MAC) processor, Residential Gateway (R-GW), Set-Top Box (STB), Dynamic Host Control Protocol (DHCP) server, Network Address Translation (NAT) firewall, Border Controller (BC), Load Balancer (LB), media server, and network accelerator.
Overview
Examples described herein provide enhancements to the handoff process for a virtual machine from a first hypervisor to a second hypervisor. In one implementation, a method of transitioning a virtual machine from a first hypervisor to a second hypervisor includes identifying a request to transition the virtual machine from the first hypervisor to the second hypervisor. The method further provides determining security trust requirements for the virtual machine and exchanging trust information between the first hypervisor and the second hypervisor. The method also provides determining whether the second hypervisor is capable of supporting the virtual machine based on the trust information and the security trust requirements for the virtual machine and, if the second hypervisor is capable of supporting the virtual machine, initiating a handoff of the virtual machine from the first hypervisor to the second hypervisor. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a picture image storing method and device for storing picture image information in a large-capacity memory device. The picture information is compressed through the processing of its redundancy from the viewpoint of information theory.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
In recent years, along with the ever-increasing use of personal computer systems and word processors, the type and quantity of picture image information produced by copying and other similar processes has increased dramatically. Copying machines are now required to not only attain higher picture quality, but to also perform functions in addition to merely producing a prescribed number of copies of an original document or producing enlarged-scale or reduced-scale copies of the original document.
The various additional functions now required of copying machines will be described. An electronic recirculating document handler (RDH) electronically performs the operation of producing an arbitrarily selected number of properly sorted copies of a number of sheets in an original document. A book-binding function produces properly bound copies with the picture images of an original document edited and copied on them. In the book-binding function, two pages of the original are copied onto a single page, and the copied pages are put together, stapled in the center, folded into halves, and bound into a booklet with the copied sheets arranged as in the original document. Additionally, the functions required of copying machines include communicating picture images. Copy machines do the work of facsimile machines, and computer printers.
Digital copying machines can perform the functions required of a new copy machine. Specifically, the digital copying machine transports the individual sheets of an original document, in their regular sequential order, to the area over the platen of the copying machine by an automatic transporting process with an automatic document feeder (ADF). The original document is set, and then a scanner reads the picture images on the original document. The picture images are converted into digital signals, and temporarily stored. The copying machine then reads out the stored picture image information and prints the copies with an image output terminal (hereinafter called "IOT").
The digital copying machine also communicates picture images, and performs as a facsimile machine and a computer printer. The digital copying machine receives, in parallel through an input interface and a multiplexer, picture image information over a telephone line from a facsimile machine, a host computer, or a personal computer system in addition to the picture image information from the scanner.
The digital copying machine stores the picture image information received through the input interface from a facsimile machine, a host computer, or a personal computer system. The copying machine records the picture images at the IOT after reading the stored picture image information out of the storage device.
The digital copying machine employs a picture image storage device, which stores the picture image information in a compressed state. The data compression is achieved by reducing information redundancy, as viewed from the standpoint of information theory. Because of data compression, a larger amount of picture image information may be stored.
As shown in FIG. 15, a compressing device 101 in the picture image storing device compresses the picture image information from a scanner 100. A large-capacity storage device 102, which is composed preferably of a hard disk, stores the compressed information.
The image information transfer rate between the scanner 100 and the compressing device 101 is on the order of approximately 1 mega byte per second, which is faster than the transfer rate of the storage device 102. Therefore, if the picture image information compressed by the compressing device 101 is transferred unchanged to the storage device 102, it will not be possible to store the compressed picture image information in the storage device 102. For this reason, a page buffer, which temporarily stores the picture image information by the page, is provided between the compressing device 101 and the storage device 102. The picture image information, transferred from the compressing device 101, is stored in page units in the page buffer 103. Then, the picture image information stored temporarily in the page buffer 103 is transferred to the storage device 102 at the transfer rate of the storage device 102.
After all the picture image information of an original document is stored in the storage device 102, the picture image information stored in the storage device 102 is read out in page units at a prescribed timing. The picture image information read out of the storage device 102 is written to the page buffer 103. When all the picture image information for one page is stored in the page buffer 103, the picture image information is decoded in its regular sequence by an extending device 104, and output to the IOT 105.
The picture image storing device stores picture image information from the original document in the storage device 102 by reducing the amount of picture image information. The picture image information is encoded in the state with its redundancy as viewed from the standpoint of information theory, and compressed by means of the compressing device 101. A known encoding process generally called "the Block Truncation Coding Process" is disclosed in Japanese Laid Open Patent No. 69505-1981 (JP 69505), the contents of which are herein incorporated by reference.
The encoding process of JP 69505 encodes the picture image information of an original document, read and converted into digital signals by a scanner, by first dividing the digital signals into blocks of L.times.L pixels. When the density of the individual pixels in a block is taken as a.sub.ij for each pixel, the average picture image density pO in the block may be expressed as: pO=.SIGMA.a.sub.ij / L.sup.2. The individual pixels within the block are divided between those pixels having a density higher than the average picture image density pO and those pixels having a density lower than the average picture image density pO.
The average density of the pixels having a density lower than the average picture image density pO can be expressed as p1 by the equation p1=.SIGMA.a.sub.ij /Nl, where Nl is the number of pixels having a density lower than pO and .SIGMA. is set for a.sub.ij .ltoreq.pO. The number Nl of the pixels having a density lower than the average picture image density pO can be expressed by the equation Nl=.SIGMA..PHI..sub.ij, where .PHI. is a variable that assumes the value 1 when the density of a.sub.ij .ltoreq.pO and assumes the value 0 when the density of a.sub.ij >pO.
The average density of the pixels having a density higher than the average picture image density pO can be expressed as p2 by the equation p2=.SIGMA.a.sub.ij /N2, where N2 is the number of pixels having a density higher than pO and .SIGMA. is set for a.sub.ij >pO. The number N2 of pixels having a density higher than the average picture image density pO can be expressed by the equation N2=.SIGMA..PHI..sub.ij, where .PHI..sub.ij is a variable that assumes the value 0 when a.sub.ij .ltoreq.pO and assumes the value 1 when a.sub.ij >pO.
Integral numbers m and n are respectively smaller than the number of pixels L.sup.2 in the block, and the number of chromatic grades in the density of the individual pixels. The integral number m is a parameter for deciding the magnitude of the absolute value of p1-p2 which expresses the difference between the average picture image density values p1 and p2. The integral number n is a parameter for deciding the magnitude of the numbers of pixels Nl and N2.
When p1-p2<m or nl<n or n2<n is true, the distribution of density within the block is considered uniform, and, with all the values of .PHI..sub.ij taken as 0, only the average picture image density pO is used to represent the picture images within the block. As the result of this operation, the picture images within the block can be expressed by .PHI..sub.ij, which is used as the resolution information composed entirely of the value 0 in all cases, and the average picture image density pO is used as the chromatic gradation information.
However, when p1-p2.gtoreq.m and nl.gtoreq.n and n2.gtoreq.n holds true, the distribution of density within the block is considered not uniform, and .PHI..sub.ij is used as the resolution information, while the average density values p1 and p2 are used as the chromatic gradation information. The number p1 is designated as the chromatic gradation information for the pixels which have the value 0 for the .PHI..sub.ij, namely, a density value equal to or less than the average image density pO. The number `is designated as the chromatic gradation information for the pixels which have the value 1 for the .PHI..sub.ij, namely, a density value higher than the average picture image density. The picture image information within the block is expressed in terms of an .PHI..sub.ij which has the values of 0 or 1 as the resolution information and the average density values p1 and p2 as the chromatic gradation information.
The picture image information from the original document is processed for compression by encoding the picture image information within a block. The block is expressed, by an existing binary value encoding process, with the resolution information .PHI..sub.ij being put together for several lines. The length of the consecutive blocks having the same information are encoded by an existing run length encoding process.
The parameter m is a deciding value for the removal of isolated noises in the picture images, and the parameter n is a deciding value for the removal of delicate fluctuations in the density within a block. Thus, the parameters m and n are directly proportional to the uniformity of the picture images within the block.
The electronic recirculating document handler function produces an arbitrarily selected number of properly sorted copies of a number of sheets of an original document. In order to realize the electronic recirculating document handler function with picture image storing device operating by a picture image coding process, the picture image information on a plurality of sheets of the original document, are stored in regular sequence and stored in a compressed state in the storage device 102 by way of the page buffer 103. The compressed picture image information is read out in page units, in regular sequence and decoded in regular sequence by the extending device 104. The decoded picture image information is recorded in the regular sequence of the pages by the IOT 105. The device can produce an arbitrarily decided number of properly sorted copies of a number of sheets the original document by repeating the operations of reading the picture image information of the original document out of the IOT 105 and recording the picture image information with the IOT 105 a number of times corresponding to the number of copies desired.
The known copying machine described above has the following disadvantages.
The picture image storing device 102 temporarily stores picture image information after the picture image information is compressed by the picture image encoding process performed by the compressing device 101. The storage device 102 has a limited memory capacity. Therefore, in the realization of the electronic recirculating document handler function, the remaining capacity of the storage device 102 may be reduced to zero when an attempt is made, while the storage device 102 has a small memory capacity left, to store the compressed picture image information read an original document. Additional picture image information may not be stored in the storage device 102. Any attempt to store additional picture image information into the storage device 102 will result in defects by page units in some part of a series of sheets of the original document. Therefore, reading original documents with the scanner 100 is discontinued until the required memory capacity becomes available in the storage device 102.
The reading operation of an original document is resumed when a margin of memory capacity appears in the storage device 102. When the operation for reading an original document is resumed, the original document on which the reading operation was interrupted is set in the automatic document feeder, and is read after specifying the read operation again. Therefore, the operation may become complicated, depending on the memory capacity remaining in the storage device 102.
The disadvantage described above can be overcome by determining in advance, whether there remains sufficient memory capacity in the storage device 102 for storing, in the compressed state, the total picture image information.
The picture image storing device can readily find the memory capacity remaining in the storage device 102 if the picture image storing device controls the residual memory capacity of the storage device 102. The amount of information on the original document before the compressing process is performed can be determined based upon the resolution when the original document is read by the scanner 100 and the size of the original document. The amount of information after compressing the picture image information will vary among individual original documents as the compression efficiency achieved for each document will vary. Hence, it is not possible to determine in advance the amount of compressed information in any given original document.
The known picture image encoding process discriminates the picture image information, within a given block, on the basis of the parameters m and n. The picture image information within a given block is expressed in terms of the resolution information .PHI..sub.ij and the chromatic gradation information pO, p1, and p2. The picture image information, with the values of .PHI..sub.ij, namely, the resolution information put together for several lines, is encoded by an already known binary value encoding process, and the length in which the blocks having the same information occur in succession is encoded by a known process of run length encoding. Thus, depending on the characteristics of the picture image information within the block discriminated by the parameters m and n, the amount of information in the resolution information .PHI..sub.ij varies, and the chromatic gradation information pO, p1, and p2, which express the picture image information in a given block is different. Moreover, the resolution information .PHI..sub.ij is encoded by a known binary value encoding process and then encoded further by the run length encoding process. Therefore, the amount of encoded picture image information varies depending on the contents of the individual original documents, and determining the amount of the information in any compressed state original document is consequently not possible.
The known picture image encoding process can only express the pixels within a given block in terms of the three chromatic grades in the chromatic gradation information pO, p1, and p2. If an attempt is made at increasing the block size L for the purpose of improving the encoding efficiency, the quality of picture images will deteriorate considerably because the picture image information in a larger area can only be expressed in the three chromatic grades.
In the known picture image encoding process, the resolution information .PHI..sub.ij is allocated uniformly to all the individual pixels in the block, regardless of the characteristics of the picture image information. The uniform resolution allocation increases the redundancy of information.
As described so far, the known picture image storing device cannot determine in advance the amount of information resulting from the compressed picture image information of the original document, and the device, therefore, offers no means of deciding in advance whether or not there remains sufficient memory capacity in the storage device 102 for the storage of the compressed picture image information. Consequently, the operations for the reading of an original document into the system will be complicated. In addition, the quality of the picture images will deteriorate considerably if an attempt is made to increase the block size L for the purpose of improving the encoding efficiency, and the amount information in the block after it is compressed will be redundant.
To overcoming the above disadvantages, the picture image information of an original document may be stored without compression in the storage device 102. Direct storage requires a change in the basic design concept of the picture image storing device. The amount of information in the original document can be found on the basis of the resolution the original document and the size of and number of sheets in the original document. Hence, by comparing the amount of the information in the original document with the memory capacity remaining in the storage device 102, it will be possible to determine in advance whether or not the picture image information of the original document intended for the reading operation can be stored in the storage device 102.
However, the process just described will be required to process an enormous amount of data. A single sheet in an original document in A4 size entered at a resolution of 400 dpi has as much as two mega bytes of information. Therefore, the number of sheets in an original document which can be stored in the storage device 102 will be reduced drastically because of the enormous amount of information to be stored. The non-compression process will not be capable of achieving any practically feasible level of performance in the electronic recirculating document handler function, the book-binding function, and so forth which are required of digital copying machines. On the other hand, if a copying machine were provided with a storage device 102 having a memory capacity sufficiently large to store the picture image information of a large number of sheets in a original document without data compression, the storage device 102 would be very large, and considerable cost increase would be incurred.
In order to store compressed picture image information and determine in advance whether it is possible to store the compressed picture image information in the storage device 102, a new process which measures the ratio of compression in advance of the reading of the original document is performed. An estimated average ratio of compression per original document estimated in advance by a statistical process may also be used.
Specifically, the device which measures the ratio of compression performs a prescanning operation in advance of the regular reading operation. The ratio of compression is thereby measured in advance for the picture image information of the original document. On the basis of the ratio of compression, whether or not there remains sufficient memory capacity in the storage device 102 for the storage of the compressed picture image information is determined.
The prescanning operation must be performed ahead of the reading operation and it is therefore necessary to perform the additional sequential operations and their control for the prescan. Consequently, controlling the copying operations will be more complicated, and the number of copies produced in a unit duration of time decreases in proportion to the time necessary for the prescanning operation and the arithmetic operations incidentally required. In order to prevent a decrease in the number of copies which can be produced in a unit of time, the duration of time spent for the back scan operation is allocated to the prescan. However, the device will not be able to perform any concurrent picture image processing of a number of picture images input from other input devices such as a facsimile machine in the course of the back scan operation.
The other known solution is to provide device which estimates the ratio of compression for an original document in advance by a statistical process. The average ratio of compression estimated for an original document is applied to a process for determining the amount of information, after compression. On the basis of the amount of information thus obtained, whether or not there remains memory capacity in the storage device 102 sufficient for the storage of the compressed picture image information is determined.
The ratio of compression for the original document is only an average ratio of compression estimated by a statistical method. As the applied ratio of compression is different from the actual ratio of compression for the original document, the probability remains that the amount of compressed information actually read from the original document will be in excess of the memory capacity remaining in the storage device 102. The information to be stored may be excessive even if a safety factor is added to the estimated average ratio of compression. In such a case, the picture image information read from the original document will not be stored in the storage device 102, and, consequently, the problem mentioned above will remain unsolved and pending. This probability is associated with the fact that the amount of compressed information increases as the ratio of compression is reduced to a ratio of compression much lower than the average ratio of compression. If picture images in halftone, such as photographs, are included in an original document which is mainly composed of characters when the chromatic gradation information is being processed by an error diffusing method, the estimated compression ratio will be in error.
Furthermore, the device, which operates with the picture image encoding process described above, still suffers from a considerable deterioration in the quality of the picture images and redundancy in the amount of compressed information, if the block size L is enlarged for the purpose of improving the encoding efficiency. | {
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In many computing systems, software modules may be executed “in-place”, otherwise known as XIP, for reasons of speed and memory conservation. Most types of embedded devices do not have secondary storage such as a hard disk. Therefore, software modules may be stored in non-volatile primary memory such as read-only memory (ROM) or flash memory. In classical environments such as non XIP-enabled embedded environments, a software module may be copied from a storage location to system random-access memory (RAM) before being executed. In XIP enabled environments, software modules may be executed directly from where they are stored if certain conditions are met.
With XIP technology, software modules typically may be stored in primary memory such as ROM or flash memory. These types of memories may be directly accessible by an execution unit of a central processing unit (CPU) or processor. Another requirement may be that the software modules have fully resolved memory references. Executing a software module in an XIP mode may lead to improved performance when launching the module. Another aspect of XIP is that the device may utilize less RAM space since software modules may be executed directly from ROM or flash memory.
When a software module is configured for XIP, the module may be required to be stored in a “ready to run” state. As a result, typical schemes of storing software modules as a compressed image in ROM or flash memory are generally not suitable for XIP. In general, modules configured for XIP may take up more space in ROM or flash than non-XIP modules that are compressed for storage. As a result, there is a memory size related conflict between XIP and non-XIP schemes. Whereas in non-XIP schemes, compressing the stored module may conserver read-only memory (ROM) or flash memory, the non-XIP schemes may require more RAM to execute the modules as a result. On the other hand, in an XIP scheme, using XIP reduces the need for RAM, however relatively larger ROM or flash memory may be required since software modules need to be stored in a non-compressed mode.
For the above reasons, in a typical device capable of supporting an XIP mode, some software modules are XIP enabled, and other modules are non-XIP enabled. The decision whether a module is XIP or non-XIP typically may be made at the device build-time. After the device is built and deployed, the software modules generally cannot be switched between XIP and non-XIP modes.
It will be appreciated that for simplicity and clarity of illustration, elements illustrated in the figures have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements are exaggerated relative to other elements for clarity. Further, where considered appropriate, reference numerals have been repeated among the figures to indicate corresponding or analogous elements. | {
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The invention relates to a flexible surface electrode for carrying current to and from the skin of a human body and in the form of an insulated carrier which is covered with at least one electrically conductive foil which extends into a tongue projecting from the surface electrode, wherein the tongue is bent around a stiffening plate-like shaped portion in such a way that the electrically conductive foils face outwardly. The invention further relates to a plug connector for use with such a surface electrode.
With regard to surface electrodes as are used in particular as neutral electrodes in surgery, there is a wish for a connection, which can be made quickly but which is nonetheless secure, to the plug connector which is associated with the electrode. It has been found to be disadvantageous for the contact tongue of the surface electrode to be just as flexible as the electrode itself as it bends easily upon being inserted into a contact sleeve or upon being connected to a connecting clamp of the connector (DE-A-37 39 516).
DE-A-35 44 483 discloses a flexible surface electrode in which the conductive surface of the tongue is bent around an end edge of a shaped portion and thereby stiffened. However, contact with the tongue does not occur in the region of the end edge but in the end region of the tongue which extends parallel to the sleeve. In such arrangement, the conductive portion of the tongue is brought into force-locking contact by means of a spring-loaded pressure member with conductive layers provided on the wall of the sleeve. The spring-loaded pressure member quite considerably increases the structural height of the plug connector. In addition, the plug connector disclosed in DE-A-35 44 483 suffers from the disadvantage that the limit position of the tongue in the sleeve is not defined with sufficient degree of accuracy. Electrical contact still is made when the tongue is partially pulled out. That means that the conductive part of the surface of the tongue can come into contact directly with the skin of the patient. However, only a part of the electrode, the electrical resistance of which is substantially higher than that of the contact surfaces of the tongue is suitable for making contact with the skin. | {
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In humans, skin color arises from a complex series of cellular processes that are carried out within a group of cells known as melanocytes. Melanocytes are located in the lower part of the epidermis and their function is to synthesize a pigment, melanin, which protects the body from the damaging effects of ultraviolet radiation.
The mechanism by which skin pigmentation is formed, melanogenesis, involves the following main steps: Tyrosine→L-Dopa→Dopaquinone Dopachrome→Melanin. The first two reactions in this series are catalyzed by the enzyme, tyrosinase. The activity of tyrosinase is promoted by the action of α-melanocyte stimulating hormone and UV rays.
Typically, melanogenesis leads to a darker skin tone (i.e. a tan). However, melanogenesis can lead to undesirable pigmentation patterns as well. Examples of such undesirable pigmentation include age spots, liver spots, melasma, hyperpigmentation, etc. This has lead to research to find compounds that will inhibit melanogenesis. One of the targets of this research is tyrosinase, the enzyme which catalyses the initial steps in the generation of melanin.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,132,740 discloses a class of tyrosinase inhibitors. These compounds are 4-cycloalkyl resorcinols. One compound disclosed in the '740 patent is 4-cyclopentyl resorcinol. Example 2 of the '740 patent illustrates the preparation of amorphous 4-cyclopentyl resorcinol. While this compound is a potent tyrosinase inhibitor, it may not be readily produced in the quantities required to support clinical development. The synthesis of example 2 generates substantial quantities of various positional isomers of 4-cyclopentyl resorcinol. Examples of such isomers include 2-cyclopentyl resorcinol, 4,6-dicyclopentyl resorcinol, 2,4-dicyclopentylresorcinol, etc. It is difficult to separate the 4-cyclopentyl resorcinol from its positional isomers.
Crystalline forms of 4-cyclopentyl resorcinol may be readily separated from the positional isomers that are generated in its synthesis. These crystalline forms of anhydrous 4-cyclopentyl resorcinol are typically more amendable to handling and formulating at clinical or industrial scale than are amorphous forms. Other advantages of crystalline forms of 4-cyclopentyl resorcinol will be readily apparent to those skilled in the art. | {
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The majority of medium and large data centres use a Fibre Channel (FC) based storage area network (SAN) to attach host servers to storage controllers. One of the common trends seen in most of the data centres is that with an increase in work load, the demand to increase SAN bandwidth also rises. For example data centres that have deployed a 2 Gb/s or 4 Gb/s FC SAN infrastructure a few years ago are likely to now need additional bandwidth and will be looking to upgrade their SAN.
There are a variety of ways in which a SAN can be upgraded.
1. Add more ports between host servers and the SAN and between the storage controller and the SAN and use multi-pathing technology to spread the I/O workload across the alternative paths (load balancing).
2. Replace the existing FC SAN with the latest (8 Gb/s FC) technology to increase the performance of the SAN without increasing the number of ports.
3. Replace the existing FC SAN with a 1 Gb/s or 10 Gb/s Ethernet SAN and use either FC over Ethernet (FCoE) or the iSCSI protocol.
4. Keep the existing FC SAN and use option 2 or 3 to create an additional SAN. Use multi-pathing technology to spread the I/O workload across the existing SAN and the new SAN.
FC is currently the predominate technology used for constructing SANs. It is a mature technology that offers very good performance (in terms of bandwidth, in terms of I/O operations per second (IOPs), and in terms of latency) with relatively low overheads in both the storage controller and the host server. The main drawback of FC is that it is expensive.
Internet Small Computer System Interface (iSCSI) is emerging as one of the acceptable SAN technologies in modern day data centres. Most of the storage controllers and host servers now support iSCSI. Using 1 Gb/s Ethernet to create an iSCSI SAN is a very cheap way of connecting host servers to storage controllers. However, iSCSI is much more CPU intensive (even with iSCSI offload hardware) than FC which means that IOPs performance will usually be lower than the equivalent that can be obtained using a FC SAN. Where iSCSI performs well is with high bandwidth workloads where a small number of larger I/O requests is able to saturate the iSCSI link bandwidth without significant CPU overheads.
Using 10 Gb/s Ethernet to create a 10 Gb/s iSCSI SAN is also possible, however the cost of 10 Gb/s Ethernet hardware is more comparable to that of a FC SAN, although it may be possible to share the hardware in the host servers for other networking.
Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) is a relatively new technology that allows FC frames to be transported over a 10 Gb/s Ethernet network. It offers the same performance characteristics as FC. The main drawback of FCoE is that it is expensive, it currently requires specialist Ethernet switches and the technology is still maturing.
There are many multi-pathing solutions available and most modern operating systems now include multi-pathing drivers as part of the base operating system. Many of the multi-pathing drivers support both FC and iSCSI based I/O to the same storage Logical Units (LU)s. The simplest multi-pathing drivers just implement redundancy by issuing all I/O requests across one path and only switching to use an alternative path when I/O requests fail. More sophisticated multi-pathing drivers implement load-balancing schemes to attempt to spread I/O requests across the multi-paths and hence achieve better performance.
The load balancing algorithms are typically very simple, for example:
1. Preferred path. All I/O requests to a given LU will be routed via the same path, different LUs will be assigned different paths so that so long as I/O requests are submitted to multiple LUs in parallel the workload will be spread across the available paths.
2. Round-robin I/O requests across all available paths. So if there are two paths across a SAN to a particular storage LU the multi-pathing driver will submit the first I/O request via one path, the second I/O request via the second path, the third I/O via the first path, etc.
3. Queue depth based path selection. The path with the least number of active I/O requests will be chosen when starting a new I/O request. Hence if there are two paths and one path has 5 active I/O requests while the other has 3 active I/O requests then the second path will be chosen when starting a new I/O request.
Using a multi-pathing driver with paths across SANs with different performance characteristics (for example, a mixture of FC and iSCSI paths to the same storage LU) has the problem that current multi-pathing drivers do not differentiate between the performance characteristics of the different paths and therefore performance is likely to be reduced to that of the slowest path.
Therefore, there is a need in the art to address the aforementioned problem. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a damper and its method of fabrication, and more particularly, to a damper having a locally coated material fabricated by a printing technique.
2. The Prior Arts
Typical component parts of a loudspeaker include a diaphragm, a voice coil, and a damper placed between the diaphragm and the voice coil. The damper can keep the voice coil at a correct position in the magnetic gap, ensure that the vibrating system reciprocates axially upon the application of a force on the voice coil, cooperate with the voice coil and the diaphragm to determine the resonance efficiency of the loudspeaker, and prevent dust in the magnetic gap.
For fabricating the damper, a roll of a fiber fabric is usually soaked in a resin bath, baked, cut and severed to form an entire damper. The fiber fabric after being baked has an increased stiffness owing to the prior resin bath. Unfortunately, the damper fabricated according to the aforementioned method may have an excessive stiffness and lack flexibility, which may create noise and affect the reproduction of bass sound.
Taiwan Patent No. M396605 and Taiwan Patent Application Publication No. 201129125 describe dampers and its manufacture method. According to these prior disclosures, a coating material is applied on a predetermined coating region of the damper, whereby the region of the formed damper having the coating material can be softened compared to other regions having no coating material. This can address the excessive stiffness problem in the fabrication of the damper.
In the aforementioned prior art method, the fiber fabric is extended in the warp direction, and the ability of the fiber fabric to extend and elastically retract is usually better in the weft direction than in the warp direction. As a result, the predetermined coating region can have more inward wrinkles in the weft direction than in the warp direction, resulting in an irregular distribution of the coating material on the surface of the damper. For example, the predetermined coating region may initially have a circular shape, which may become an oval shape after baking of the fiber fabric applied with the coating material. The region of the damper softened by the coating material thus may become significantly irregular and greatly differ from the initial circular shape, which may subject to even more noise and adversely affect the sound quality of the loudspeaker.
Moreover, the inward wrinkles formed on the predetermined coating region of the fiber fabric in the weft direction may differ among different dampers, so that the softened region may be inconsistent between different dampers. As a result, the resonance efficiency of each loudspeaker determined by the damper, the voice coil and the diaphragm may not be similar. In other words, the sound quality of the manufactured loudspeakers may be inconsistent owing to the aforementioned problem. | {
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The present invention relates generally to an electromagnetic relay in which a circuit is turned on and off or switched by the movement of electric contact points interlocking with an armature moved by attraction of an electromagnet. | {
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This invention relates to electrical connector assemblies and, more particularly, to an electrical connector assembly that has an indicator light pipe assembly associated therewith.
Electrical connectors adapted for mounting to printed circuit boards are known in the art and are commonly used for connection between two electrical communication devices. In order to ensure that a proper connection has been made and therefore a link is created between the electrical communication devices, indicators may be incorporated into circuits on the printed circuit board. These indicators are typically light emitting diodes (LEDs) which are turned on when a circuit is completed between the mating connectors and the communication devices. Additionally LEDs can be mounted on the printed circuit board to indicate a number of other conditions including the passage of communications signals between the two communication devices, indication of power, or indication that an error in transmitting the signals has occurred.
In an effort to miniaturize printed circuit boards and save board real estate, light pipe assemblies for transmitting light emitted by the LED's have been integrated into connector assemblies. One example of such a connector assembly is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,876,239 to Morin et al. which teaches a modular jack receptacle connector having a light pipe for transmitting light signals from an input face of the light pipe through an output face of the pipe extending along a mating face of the modular jack receptacle.
A problem arises with these connectors in that the tooling used to produce the connector housing may require modification to enable incorporation of the light pipes into the connector housing. Another problem is that incorporation of the light pipes into the connector assembly tends to increase the footprint of the connector, thereby increasing the printed circuit board “real estate” occupied by the connector.
The present invention is therefore directed to a light pipe assembly that overcomes the aforementioned disadvantages and which fits either alongside a stacked connector assembly or first within the space between two connector engagement areas of a connector component and further extends forwardly from the connector component in a space between two bays associated with the connector component which receive electronic modules therein. | {
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1. Technical Field
Embodiments of the present invention relate to an electronic system. More particularly, embodiments of the present invention relate to a portable electronic system, an accessory for an electronic device and a method for activating an application of the electronic device.
2. Description of Related Art
Nowadays the smart phone is becoming so indispensable in our daily life because it performs as a portable computer, which enables the user to browse the Internet or activate applications with a wide variety of functions.
However, if the user would like to activate an application, he or she may have to touch the screen, and select the icon corresponding to the application, which is considered inconvenient to the user in the operation of the smart phone. | {
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For the past several years, extensive research has been devoted to the development of metal-ceramic composites such as aluminum reinforced with carbon, boron, silicon carbide, silica, or alumina fibers, whiskers, or particles. Metal-ceramic composites with excellent high temperature yield strengths and creep resistance have been fabricated by the dispersion of very fine (less than 0.1 micron) oxide or carbide particles throughout the metal or alloy matrix.
Prior art techniques for the production of metal-ceramic composites may be broadly categorized as powder metallurgical approaches, molten metal techniques and internal oxidation processes. The powder metallurgical type production of such dispersion-strengthened composites would ideally be accomplished by mechanically mixing metal powders of approximately 5 micron diameter or less with the oxide or carbide powder (preferably 0.01 micron to 0.1 micron). High speed blending techniques or conventional procedures such as ball milling may be used to mix the powder. Standard powder metallurgy techniques are then employed to form the final composite. Conventionally, however, the ceramic component is large, i.e. greater than 1 micron, due to a lack of availability, and high cost, of very small particle size materials since their production is energy intensive, time consuming and costly in capital equipment. Furthermore production of very small particles inevitably leads to contamination of the particles with oxides, nitrides and materials from the attritor such as steel. The presence of these contaminants inhibits particle to metal bonding which in turn compromises the mechanical properties of the resultant composite. Further, in many cases where the particulate materials are available in the desired size, they are extremely hazardous due to their pyrophoric nature.
Alternatively, molten metal infiltration of a continuous ceramic skeleton has been used to produce composites. In most cases elaborate particle coating techniques have been developed to protect ceramic particles from molten metal during molten metal infiltration and to improve bonding between the metal and ceramic. Techniques such as this have resulted in the formation of silicon carbide-aluminum composites, frequently referred to as SiC/Al, or SiC aluminum. This approach is only suitable for large particulate ceramics (e.g. greater than 1 micron). The ceramic material, such as silicon carbide, is pressed to form a compact, and liquid metal is forced into the packed bed to fill the interstices. Such a technique is illustrated in U.S. Pat. No. 4,444,603, of Yamatsuta et al, issued Apr. 24, 1984. Because of the necessity for coating techniques and molten metal handling equipment capable of generating extremely high pressures, molten metal infiltration has not been a practical process for making metal-ceramic composites, particularly for making composites of submicron particles where press size and pressures needed would be extremely large.
As mentioned previously, the presence of oxygen in ball-milled powders used in the prior art metallurgy techniques, or in molten metal infiltration, can result in oxide formation at the interface of the ceramic and the metal. The presence of such oxides may inhibit interfacial binding between the ceramic phase and the matrix, thus adversely effecting ductility of the composite. Such weakened interfacial contact may also result in reduced strength, loss of elongation, and facilitated crack propagation.
Internal oxidation of a metal containing a more reactive component has also been used to produce dispersion strengthened metals, such as internally oxidized aluminum in copper. For example, when a copper alloy containing about 3 percent aluminum is placed in an oxidizing atmosphere, oxygen may diffuse through the copper matrix to react with the aluminum, precipitating alumina. This technique, although limited to relatively few systems since the two metals must have a wide difference in chemical reactivity, has offered a feasible method for dispersion hardening. In addition, the highest possible level of dispersoids formed in the resultant dispersion strengthened metal is generally insufficient to impart significant changes in properties such as modulus, hardness and the like.
Because of the above-noted difficulties with conventional processes, the preparation of metal-ceramic composites with submicron ceramic dispersoids for commercial applications has not been economically feasible nor practical.
In recent years, numerous ceramics have been formed using a process referred to as self-propagating high-temperature synthesis (SHS), which involves an exothermic, self-sustaining reaction which propagates through a mixture of compressed powders. Generally the SHS process is ignited by electrical impulse, laser, thermite, spark, etc. The SHS process involves mixing and compacting powders of the constituent elements, and igniting the green compact with a suitable heat source. On ignition, sufficient heat is released to support a self-sustaining reaction, which permits the use of sudden, low power initiation of high temperatures, rather than bulk heating over long times at lower temperatures. Exemplary of these techniques are the patents of Merzhanov et al. In U.S. Pat. No. 3,726,643, there is taught a method for producing high-melting refractory inorganic compounds by mixing at least one metal selected from groups IV, V, and VI of the Periodic System with a non-metal such as carbon, boron, silicon, sulfur, or liquid nitrogen, and heating the surface of the mixture to produce a local temperature adequate to initiate a combustion process. In U.S. Pat. No. 4,161,512, a process is taught for preparing titanium carbide by ignition of a mixture consisting of 80-88 percent titanium and 20-12 percent carbon, resulting in an exothermic reaction of the mixture under conditions of layer-by-layer combustion. These references deal with the preparation of ceramic materials, in the absence of a second non-reactive metallic phase.
Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 4,431,448 teaches preparation of a hard alloy by intermixing powders of titanium, boron, carbon, and a Group I-B binder metal, such as copper or silver, compression of the mixture, local ignition thereof to initiate the exothermic reaction of titanium with boron and carbon, and propagation of the reaction, resulting in an alloy comprising titanium diboride, titanium carbide, and the binder metal. This reference, however, is limited to the use of Group I-B metals such as copper and silver, as binders, and requires local ignition. As is set forth in the patent, products made by this method have low density, requiring subsequent compression and compaction.
It has been recognized for a considerable period of time that certain types of exothermic reactions can be used in forming welds. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 1,872,254 to deGolyer discloses that refractory metals and alloys or metals and alloys having high thermal conductivity can be welded by means of utilizing the exothermic values of the reaction of certain intermediate compounds containing boron, such as borides or chemical compounds of boron with metal, with metallic oxides in conjunction with heat supplied by an electric arc, oxyacetylene flame or mechanical means. The heat supplied to the weld area aids in melting the metal being welded and and metal being added, and also raises the temperature of the metal oxide and boride to a point at which the boride will act to reduce the oxide.
This patent further discloses that when, it is desirable to use a boride which is substantially insoluble in the metal welded, the weld metal, or both, intermetallic compounds of boron with barium, calcium, lithium, silicon and magnesium are particularly valuable. When a boride is employed which is not soluble in either the welded metal or the weld metal, no residual metallic impurities can result from the use of the intermetallic boron compound, and consequently the composition and character of the metals entering into the weld will not be altered.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,415,697 to Bredzs et al discloses the fluxless brazing of aluminum and aluminum alloys by employing an unreacted mixture of a particulate aluminum alloy of a first element and a particulate component containing a second element. The first and second elements are capable of reacting exothermically to form a high-melting intermetallic compound when the mixture is heated to the molten state. In brazing operations, wherein the surfaces to be joined are not subjected to melting, the mixture is placed in contact with the aluminum surfaces to be joined and is heated to melt the mixture and produce an exothermic reaction. The filler metal thus formed is permitted to solidify to form a brazed joint. This reference is limited to brazing, as opposed to welding, however, and does not teach the formation of ceramic materials.
In U.S. Pat. No. 3,890,168 to Shumway, there is disclosed an apparatus, process and composition for producing a weldable joint between ferrous parts. In the process, the opposing wall surfaces of the parts to be joined are supported so as to define a gap therebetween and a solid weld element is nested in the gap. The weld element includes a suitable ignitable or pyro composition adapted to substantially instantaneously ignite to produce molten ferrous weld material and to heat opposing wall surfaces so as to receive and fuse with the molten weld material. The weld element, in one embodiment, was in the form of a rod having a core of flux material, the rod being composed of suitable exothermic reactants, slag control materials, ferrous weld material sources and alloying agents. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is generally directed to computing operations performed in computer systems. More particularly, the present invention is directed to a processing unit, such as a graphics-processing unit (GPU), that performs computing operations and applications thereof.
2. Background
A GPU is a complex integrated circuit that is adapted to perform data-parallel computing tasks, such as graphics-processing tasks. A GPU may, for example, execute graphics-processing tasks required by an end-user application, such as a video-game application. The GPU may be a discrete (i.e., separate) device and/or package or may be included in the same device and/or package as another processor (e.g., a central processing unit (CPU)). For example, GPUs are frequently integrated into routing or bridge devices such as, for example, Northbridge devices.
There are several layers of software between the end-user application and the GPU. The end-user application communicates with an application-programming interface (API). An API allows the end-user application to output graphics data and commands in a standardized format, rather than in a format that is dependent on the GPU. Several types of APIs are commercially available, including DirectX® developed by Microsoft Corporation of Redmond, Wash. and OpenGL® promulgated by the Khronos Group. The API communicates with a driver. The driver translates standard code received from the API into a native format of instructions understood by the GPU. The driver is typically written by the manufacturer of the GPU. The GPU then executes the instructions from the driver.
A graphics-processing task performed by a GPU typically involves complex mathematical computations, such as matrix and vector operations. To perform a single graphics-processing task, a GPU may execute a plurality of different threads (sequence of instructions). Each thread may comprise a shader program, such as a geometry shader, a pixel shader, a vertex shader, or the like. Each thread (e.g., shader program) is typically associated with a set of state data (such as texture handles, shader constants, transform matrices, or the like) that is locally stored in data-storage units of the GPU. The locally stored state data is called a context.
To efficiently execute the various threads (e.g., shader programs) of a single graphics-processing task, the GPU includes an array of processing elements, called a shader core. The array of processing elements is organized into single-instruction, multiple-data (SIMD) devices. Multiple threads (e.g., shader programs) may be issued to the shader core at the same time, with the data needed to execute each thread (e.g., shader program) being distributed in parallel to different processing elements of the shader core. The different processing elements may then perform operations on the data in parallel. In this way, a GPU can perform the complex mathematical computations required for a graphics-processing task more quickly than a typical central-processing unit (CPU). As a result, if a computing system includes a GPU, graphics-processing tasks (and other types of data-parallel processing tasks) are typically passed to the GPU, rather than the CPU.
To pass tasks to the GPU, an operating-system (OS) scheduler stores the tasks in a command buffer. A conventional GPU processes one command buffer at a time. The OS scheduler serially places tasks in the command buffer, and the GPU typically processes the tasks in the order in which they are placed in the command buffer. In some instances, however, the GPU may process tasks out of the order in which they were placed in the command buffer. For example, the GPU may interrupt the execution of a first task to execute a more-important (e.g., low-latency) task that was placed in the command buffer after the first task.
To perform the more-important (e.g., low-latency) task before the first task has finished completing in the shader core of the GPU, a conventional GPU performs a context switch. That is, the state data associated with the threads of the first task are swapped into back-up storage units maintained by the conventional GPU, and new state data associated with the threads (e.g., shader programs) of the more-important (e.g., low-latency) task are retrieved and placed in the data-storage units of the shader core. The shader core then executes the threads (e.g., shader programs) of the more-important (e.g., low-latency) task based on the new state data in the data-storage units. After the more-important (e.g., low-latency) task finishes executing, the state data associated with the threads of the more-important (e.g., low-latency) task are flushed from the data-storage units, and the state data from the threads of the first task are swapped back into the data-storage units of the shader core. Then, the shader core can resume executing the threads of the first task.
Although context switching allows a GPU to process tasks out of the order in which they were placed in the command buffer, context switching is problematic for several reasons. As an initial matter, a substantial amount of time is required to perform a context switch, thereby limiting the performance of the GPU. Also, context switching requires additional local memory (e.g., back-up storage units) to store the context that is being switched. The additional local memory takes up precious chip area, resulting in a larger GPU.
In addition to requiring a substantial amount of time and area, context switching makes the GPU ineffective at processing low-latency, high-priority tasks. To prepare the shader core for executing a low-latency, high-priority task, a conventional GPU must perform a context switch. The time associated with the context switch (e.g., hundreds of clock cycles) makes the effective time for executing the low-latency, high-priority task relatively long, even though the actual time for executing the low-latency, high-priority task may be relatively short (e.g., tens of clock cycles).
Given the foregoing, what is needed is a processing unit that can efficiently process important (e.g., low-latency) tasks without context switching. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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In the United States alone there are more than 4.5 million hotel rooms available to travelers. Currently, these hotel rooms have an industry-wide occupancy rate of just over 60%, with the occupancy rates of various geographic areas and individual hotels varying wildly. This occupancy rate often drastically affects the bottom line of a hotel or hotel chain. To increase their occupancy rate, and thus their profitability, hotels make every attempt to please their guests in order to encourage them to return. In order to please their guests, and lure new ones, hotels have continuously added amenities, such as on-site spas, restaurants, fitness centers, and in-room coffee machines or mini-bars.
In addition to these additional amenities, hotels have adopted a variety of different check-in procedures to minimize the time required for a guest to check-in. These procedures include adopting electronic key cards as opposed to mechanical keys, which enhances guest security and allows the hotel to change to a new room key, alleviating the need for the guest to return the keys to the front desk at check-out. However, even these procedures still present a distracting delay to a hotel's most valuable customers, business travelers. To increase loyalty amongst these frequent travelers, among others, most major hotel chains have invested tremendous assets in developing rewards programs, such as the Hilton HHonors® Program. The goal of these programs is to allow hotel chains to better understand the needs of travelers and make their stay as streamlined as possible. For instance, some hotels provide express check-in for a select set of their guests, while others provide check-in/check-out over the Internet or via a computer kiosk located in the hotel lobby. While these advances have certainly increased the occupancy rates of the various major hotel chains, they have not yet solved the problem of fully automating the guest check-in/check-out process, thereby allowing a guest to arrive at their hotel and enter their room without any additional time-consuming steps. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Technical Field
The invention relates to filatures.
2. Related Art
Please refer to FIGS. 1-4, which show a typical yarn cylinder. The yarn cylinder is made of plastic and is formed with a groove 1. The groove 1 is of a C-shape with about 350 degrees. Two ends of the groove 1 are separately formed with two guiding slants 11. The groove 1 is formed with four sections of teeth 30, 40, 50, 60 to define four segments 3, 4, 5, 6. Directions of two adjacent sections of teeth 30, 40, 50, 60 are different from each other.
A division line 300, 400, 500, 600 is defined between every two adjacent sections of teeth 30, 40, 50, 60. Directions of two adjacent sections of teeth 30, 40, 50, 60 meet at an angle. However, the groove 1 with the guiding slants 11 is too narrow, so yarn is not easy to enter the groove 1. And the guiding slants 11 do not have enough holding ability. | {
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As information technology is developed rapidly and a desire for the communication of a human being is increased, mobile communication devices such as a portable device are necessities of a contemporary man. However, the effect of the electromagnetic wave generated by the device to a human body has been an important issue as the use of the portable device is increased. At present, a relation between the electromagnetic wave in a frequency bandwidth used in a cellular phone and the effect of the electromagnetic wave to the human body has not been disclosed clearly. However, it has been being reported that the electromagnetic can affect various diseases such as a leukemia, an encephaloma, a headache, a decreased visual acuity, a brain wave disorder when the electromagnetic wave is accumulated in the human body, the damage of the reproduction ability of a man, etc.
In addition, a malfunction between information communication devices due to undesirable electromagnetic wave is constantly reported. This is an electromagnetic interference/electromagnetic compatibility (EMI/EMC) problem. Thus, the measurement method and the acceptable standard of the unwanted frequency of an electrical and an electronic communication device are prescribed in order to prevent interference between the devices due to the unwanted frequency. Moreover, the EMC should be considered at the stage of design and manufacture to satisfy the method and the standard and the EMC test should be satisfied for selling a product.
An electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber as an experiment facility for measuring the EMI and a radiation tolerance has been reported as the experiment result of a national institute standards and technology (NIST) and an international special committee on Radio interference (CISPR) prescribed specifications for the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber in a IEC 61000-4-21.
The electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber is a measuring chamber of which all inner walls do not absorb the electromagnetic wave so that the electromagnetic wave has optimal reverberation time and diffusivity in the chamber in contrast to an anechoic chamber. Thus, the electromagnetic wave anechoic chamber should absorb electromagnetic wave fully by using an electromagnetic wave absorber installed on the all inner walls of the electromagnetic wave anechoic chamber. However, the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber does not need the absorber because the all inner walls of the chamber should reflect the electromagnetic wave fully. Instead, the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber is generally manufactured by installing a metal wall on the inner wall thereof.
The conventional electromagnetic anechoic chamber provides a non-reflection environment and thus can evaluate performance of a target device without being affected by a peripheral communication environment. However, this cannot accurately evaluate the performance of the target device in the real environment. This is because, in the real environment, various communication services are provided, and the target device is used in a multi-reflection environment due to various reflectors. For that reason, there is required a technique capable of measuring and evaluating the target device in a facility close to the real environment. As for a method for creating a multi-reflection environment in the conventional large electromagnetic anechoic chamber, there was suggested a technique for performing measurement and evaluation by adding an apparatus capable of generating various channel sources. However, such apparatus requires a considerably high cost, and a large facility such as an electromagnetic wave anechoic chamber is still required. Therefore, there is required a measurement apparatus capable of solving a high-price software-based device in a hardware manner and realizing it in a small size and at a low cost. Accordingly, an electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber is proposed in IEC 61000-4-21 standard. The electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber can be manufactured in a considerably smaller size compared to the electromagnetic anechoic chamber, and does not require an additional high-price apparatus. In addition, the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber can provide a measurement environment similar to the real environment where the target device is used.
The electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber obtains the uniformity of the electric field by using a stirrer in order to lower lowest usable high frequency (LUF). The uniformity of the electric field can be determined by a total number of modes which can be generated in the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber, Q-factor of the medium used for manufacturing the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber and the efficiency of the stirrer, etc.
Meanwhile, a technology improving the performance of the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber by using the electromagnetic wave absorber has been reported.
Meanwhile, there is recently proposed a technique for improving the performance of the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber by using a material based electromagnetic wave absorber other than an element for determining the performance of the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber.
This technique can emulate various reflection environments by controlling reflection characteristics of the electromagnetic wave in the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber by using the electromagnetic wave absorber installed in a certain space in the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber.
FIG. 1 shows an outer shape of a conventional electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber and FIG. 2 depicts an inner shape of a conventional electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber.
As shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber can be manufactured in the shape of a polyhedron. The electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber has the shape of a cube generally. All the inner wall of the chamber consists of a metal conductor for the total reflection of the electromagnetic wave, and the stirrer and a pyramidal electromagnetic wave absorber are installed in the intended space for controlling the reflection characteristic of the inside of the chamber. The pyramidal electromagnetic wave absorber improves the reflection characteristic of the inside of the chamber so that more uniform electrical field distribution can be obtained. The position, size and electromagnetic field absorption rate of the pyramidal electromagnetic wave absorber affects the total performance of the chamber.
However, the conventional pyramidal electromagnetic wave absorber is not suitable for a device to be tested since the size of the conventional pyramidal electromagnetic wave absorber is so large that the inside space of the chamber can be small. In this case, since the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber should be manufactured to be larger, there exist problems that the manufacture cost of the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber is raised and an installation space for the chamber should be larger.
In addition, since the conventional pyramidal electromagnetic wave absorber is manufactured by using a material having absorption characteristic and is developed by a trial and error method, there exist considerable problems that the manufacturing process of the absorber is complicated and it is difficult to adjust the absorption characteristic and an absorption frequency bandwidth.
Meanwhile, as the additional examples of the conventional electromagnetic wave absorber, there is a 4/λ type wave absorber or a flat-plate type resonant absorber such as a Salisbury screen.
The construction of the resonant absorber is simple since the resonant absorber consists of a resistive film, a dielectric spacer and a metal conductor ground surface. Thus, the resonant absorber can be manufactured easily and the absorption performance thereof can be easily adjusted. In addition, when the resonant absorber is manufactured in a multilayer form, a multiple bandwidth absorption characteristic can be obtained.
However, the conventional resonant absorber has a problem that the thickness of the dielectric spacer needs to be equal to or larger than 4/λ from the metal conductor ground surface.
Meanwhile, various reflection environments can be created in accordance with the installation position and the area of the electromagnetic wave absorber, so that the electromagnetic wave absorber of a desired size needs to be easily attached to and detached from any wall. In other word, since all inner walls of the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber are made of metal conductors, the electromagnetic wave absorber needs to be easily installed at a desired location such that additional options can be added while maintaining the performance of the reverberation chamber.
However, the material based absorber is not easily attached to the wall of the electromagnetic wave reverberation chamber, and it is difficult to install the material based absorber having a desired area. Further, the absorption performance of the material based absorber is changed in accordance with temperature and humidity. Hence, the material based absorber is highly sensitive to the environment variation and may be harmful to human. | {
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This invention relates to an improved flexible dummy bar used in continuous casting equipment. Examples of dummy bars and their use are disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,442,322 issued May 6, 1969 to Lemper and U.S. Pat. No. 3,581,808 issued June 1, 1971 to Vertesi and Phillips.
In the conventional continuous casting process for producing continuous strand or slab from steel and the like, molten metal is poured into the open top of a mold which also has an open bottom. The metal solidifies against the cooled interior walls of the mold to form a solidified skin surrounding a molton core. The solidifying strand emerges from the lower end of the mold and is guided away from the mold. From the time the strand leaves the mold, cooling continues so that the core ultimately solidifies. Then, the strand is cut to lengths for further processing.
The conventional process involves gravity pouring the molten metal downwardly into the open upper end of the mold, withdrawing the partially solidified strand downwardly, and gradually curving the strand along an arc until it continues in a horizontal direction for cutting. The movement of the strand along the arc involves guiding the strand with appropriate rollers. The above mentioned patents illustrate the strand movement and the general procedure involved.
When the casting operation begins, the lower end of the mold must be temporarily plugged to prevent the molten metal from simply running through it. That is, the molten metal must be retained within the mold for a sufficient period of time to begin the solidification. Thereafter, the plug can be removed.
Conventionally, the types of plugs used are positioned within the mold and held in place by a "dummy bar". This is an elongated strip having an end fastened to the mold plug. The strip extends between the rollers used to guide and pull the strand which exists from the mold. An endwise pulling force on the dummy bar withdraws the plug from the mold and moves the plug along the arcuate path. Since, the lead end of the strand interlocks with the plug, the strand follows the plug and dummy bar movement along the arcuate path.
In general, prior dummy bars comprise an elongated strip that can be bent into an arcuate curve while the dummy bar is pulled longitudinally for pulling and guiding the plug with the attached lead end of the cast strand. Such strips are formed of interconnected sections. Thus, because of manufacturing tolerances, looseness of connection means, etc., there is an inherent, limited, relative movement between bar sections. This presents a problem.
Ordinarily, the plug is held within the mold by a generally vertically arranged portion of the dummy bar. Consequently, that portion of the dummy bar acts like a support column upon which the plug rests. Hence, the weight of the plug, along with the weight of the incoming molten metal, comprises the dummy bar downwards. This presses the dummy bar sections rigidly together to eliminate looseness at connections. However, when the dummy bar is pulled longitudinally, the usual tolerances or spaces between the sections and their connections cause a momentary expansion or elongation of the dummy bar until the dummy bar sections stabilize in their longitudinal movement. The effect is similar to a railroad engine pulling a train from a stationary start.
The rapid momentary elongation of the dummy bar permits the plug to suddenly drop down a short distance. That drop can cause rupturing of the still thin, solidifying skin on the strand to produce a "breakout" or release of the molten core through the solidified skin.
Consequently, it is desired to have a dummy bar which does not change length when pulled despite having the usual tolerances or looseness inherent in manufacturing a large, elongated, multiple part device of this kind. The invention herein relates to such an improvement in dummy bar construction, i.e., one wherein the bar is flexible to a limited degree for guiding the plug and strand around a curve, but nevertheless, which does not change length or become loose in endwise movement in either direction. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to navigation systems.
2. Related Art
Navigation systems are electronic systems that can assist in navigation. Navigation systems may be embedded and/or attached to a vehicle or vessel, or may be located remotely with respect to a vehicle or vessel, for example. Navigation systems have become widespread and can even be found in handheld mobile devices, such as smartphones. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to fluorescent dyes and, more specifically, energy transfer fluorescent dyes and their use.
2. Description of Related Art
A variety of fluorescent dyes have been developed for labeling and detecting components in a sample. In general, fluorescent dyes preferably have a high quantum yield and a large extinction coefficient so that the dye may be used to detect small quantities of the component being detected. Fluorescent dyes also preferably have a large Stokes shift (i.e., the difference between the wavelength at which the dye has maximum absorbance and the wavelength at which the dye has maximum emission) so that the fluorescent emission is readily distinguished from the light source used to excite the dye.
One class of fluorescent dyes which has been developed is energy transfer fluorescent dyes. In general, energy transfer fluorescent dyes include a donor fluorophore and an acceptor fluorophore. In these dyes, when the donor and acceptor fluorophores are positioned in proximity with each other and with the proper orientation relative to each other, the energy emission from the donor fluorophore is absorbed by the acceptor fluorophore and causes the acceptor fluorophore to fluoresce. It is therefore important that the excited donor fluorophore be able to efficiently absorb the excitation energy of the donor fluorophore and efficiently transfer the energy to the acceptor fluorophore.
A variety of energy transfer fluorescent dyes have been described in the literature. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,996,143 and WO 95/21266 describe energy transfer fluorescent dyes where the donor and acceptor fluorophores are linked by an oligonucleotide chain. Lee, et al., Nucleic Acids Research 20:10 2471–2483 (1992) describes an energy transfer fluorescent dye which includes 5-carboxy rhodamine linked to 4′-aminomethyl-5-carboxy fluorescein by the 4′-aminomethyl substituent on fluorescein.
Several diagnostic and analytical assays have been developed which involve the detection of multiple components in a sample using fluorescent dyes, e.g. flow cytometry (Lanier, et al., J. Immunol. 132 151–156 (1984)); chromosome analysis (Gray, et al., Chromosoma 73 9–27 (1979)); and DNA sequencing. For these assays, it is desirable to simultaneously employ a set of two or more spectrally resolvable fluorescent dyes so that more than one target substance can be detected in the sample at the same time. Simultaneous detection of multiple components in a sample using multiple dyes reduces the time required to serially detect individual components in a sample. In the case of multi-loci DNA probe assays, the use of multiple spectrally resolvable fluorescent dyes reduces the number of reaction tubes that are needed, thereby simplifying the experimental protocols and facilitating the manufacturing of application-specific kits. In the case of automated DNA sequencing, the use of multiple spectrally resolvable fluorescent dyes allows for the analysis of all four bases in a single lane thereby increasing throughput over single-color methods and eliminating uncertainties associated with inter-lane electrophoretic mobility variations. Connell, et al., Biotechniques 5 342–348 (1987); Prober, et al., Science 238 336–341 (1987), Smith, et al., Nature 321 674–679 (1986); and Ansorge, et al., Nucleic Acids Research 15 4593–4602 (1989).
There are several difficulties associated with obtaining a set of fluorescent dyes for simultaneously detecting multiple target substances in a sample, particularly for analyses requiring an electrophoretic separation and treatment with enzymes, e.g., DNA sequencing. For example, each dye in the set must be spectrally resolvable from the other dyes. It is difficult to find a collection of dyes whose emission spectra are spectrally resolved, since the typical emission band half-width for organic fluorescent dyes is about 40–80 nanometers (nm) and the width of the available spectrum is limited by the excitation light source. As used herein the term “spectral resolution” in reference to a set of dyes means that the fluorescent emission bands of the dyes are sufficiently distinct, i.e., sufficiently non-overlapping, that reagents to which the respective dyes are attached, e.g. polynucleotides, can be distinguished on the basis of the fluorescent signal generated by the respective dyes using standard photodetection systems, e.g. employing a system of band pass filters and photomultiplier tubes, charged-coupled devices and spectrographs, or the like, as exemplified by the systems described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,230,558, 4,811,218, or in Wheeless et al, pgs. 21–76, in Flow Cytometry: Instrumentation and Data Analysis (Academic Press, New York, 1985).
The fluorescent signal of each of the dyes must also be sufficiently strong so that each component can be detected with sufficient sensitivity. For example, in the case of DNA sequencing, increased sample loading can not compensate for low fluorescence efficiencies, Pringle et al., DNA Core Facilities Newsletter, 1 15–21 (1988). The fluorescent signal generated by a dye is generally greatest when the dye is excited at its absorbance maximum. It is therefore preferred that each dye be excited at about its absorbance maximum.
A further difficulty associated with the use of a set of dyes is that the dyes generally do not have the same absorbance maximum. When a set of dyes are used which do not have the same absorbance maximum, a trade off is created between the higher cost associated with providing multiple light sources to excite each dye at its absorbance maximum, and the lower sensitivity arising from each dye not being excited at its absorbance maximum.
In addition to the above difficulties, the charge, molecular size, and conformation of the dyes must not adversely affect the electrophoretic mobilities of the fragments. The fluorescent dyes must also be compatible with the chemistry used to create or manipulate the fragments, e.g., DNA synthesis solvents and reagents, buffers, polymerase enzymes, ligase enzymes, and the like.
Because of the multiple constraints on developing a set of dyes for multicolor applications, particularly in the area of four color DNA sequencing, only a few sets of fluorescent dyes have been developed. Connell, et al., Biotechniques 5 342–348 (1987); Prober, et al., Science 238 336–341 (1987); and Smith, et al., Nature 321 674–679 (1986).
One class of fluorescent dyes that has been found to be useful in multicolor applications are rhodamine dyes, e.g., tetramethylrhodamine (TAMRA), rhodamine X (ROX), rhodamine 6G (R6G), rhodamine 110 (R110), and the like. U.S. Pat. No. 5,366,860. Rhodamine dyes are particularly attractive relative to fluorescein dyes because (1) rhodamines are typically more photostable than fluoresceins, (2) rhodamine-labeled dideoxynucleotides are better substrates for thermostable polymerase enzymes, and (3) the emission spectra of rhodamine dyes is significantly to the red (higher wavelength) of fluoresceins.
One drawback associated with currently available rhodamine dyes, particularly in the context of multiplex detection methods, is the relatively broad emission spectrum of the rhodamine dyes. This broad emission spectrum limits spectral resolution between spectrally neighboring dyes, making the multicomponent analysis of such dye combinations difficult. A second drawback associated with currently available rhodamine dyes is that their absorption spectrum does not match the wavelength of currently available solid state frequency-doubled green diode lasers, e.g., neodymium solid-state YAG lasers, which have an emission line at approximately 532 nm. It is highly advantageous to use such lasers because of their compact size, long useful life, and efficient use of power.
Energy transfer fluorescent dyes possess several features which make them attractive for use in the simultaneous detection of multiple target substances in a sample, such as in DNA sequencing. For example, a single donor fluorophore can be used in a set of energy transfer fluorescent dyes so that each dye has strong absorption at a common wavelength. Then, by varying the acceptor fluorophore in the energy transfer dye, a series of energy transfer dyes having spectrally resolvable fluorescence emissions can be generated.
Energy transfer fluorescent dyes also provide a larger effective Stokes shift than non-energy transfer fluorescent dyes. This is because the Stokes shift for an energy transfer fluorescent dye is based on the difference between the wavelength at which the donor fluorophore maximally absorbs light and the wavelength at which the acceptor fluorophore maximally emits light. In general, a need exists for fluorescent dyes having larger Stokes shifts.
The sensitivity of any assay using a fluorescent dye is dependent on the strength of the fluorescent signal generated by the fluorescent dye. A need therefore exists for fluorescent dyes which have a strong fluorescence signal. With regard to energy transfer fluorescent dyes, the fluorescence signal strength of these dyes is dependent on how efficiently the acceptor fluorophore absorbs the energy emission of the donor fluorophore. This, in turn, depends on a variety of variables, including the proximity of the donor fluorophore to the acceptor fluorophore and the orientation of the donor fluorophore relative to the acceptor fluorophore. A need therefore exists for energy transfer fluorescent dyes in which the orientation between the donor and acceptor fluorophore is such that energy is efficiently transferred between the donor and acceptor fluorophore. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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