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The semiconductor integrated circuit (IC) industry has experienced rapid growth in the past several decades. Technological advances in semiconductor materials and design have produced increasingly smaller and more complex circuits. These material and design advances have been made possible as the technologies related to processing and manufacturing have also undergone technical advances. As a size of the smallest component has decreased, numerous challenges have risen. For example, interconnects of conductive lines and associated dielectric materials that facilitate wiring between the transistors and other devices play a more and more important role in IC performance improvement. It is desired that metallization for interconnection structures be robust, and improvements in this area are needed.

A photosensitive resin composition comprising, as a carrier resin component, an elastomer such as a chlorinated rubber, a styrene-butadiene block copolymer, a polyurethane or the like and containing an ethylenic unsaturated compound and a photo-polymerization initiator is useful as a printing plate material for flexography due to the characteristics of the elastomer. Many such compositions have been proposed, for example, in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,948,611, 3,024,180, Japanese Patent Publication No. 51-43374, etc. Such solid, photosensitive resin plate materials need to be developed with halogenated hydrocarbons and therefore have problems as causing health injury, environmental pollution, etc. Therefore, the development of solid, photosensitive resin materials for flexographic printing plates is desired. Various proposals for providing solid, photosensitive resin compositions which are developable with water to give printing plates for flexography have been made, for example, in Japanese Patent Publication No. 62-42259, Japanese Patent Laid-Open Application Nos. 61-22339, 63-186232, 5-160451. However, it is hard for the materials proposed in these to wholly satisfy the raw plate strength and the water developability of printing plate precursors, the flexibility suitable for flexographic printing plates and even the compatibility with aqueous ink which is essentially used in flexography. Therefore, those which are satisfactory for practical use have not yet been obtained. In particular, solid, photosensitive resin materials for flexographic printing plates which can be developed substantially with only neutral water by practical development have not heretofore been obtained. The present invention has been made in consideration of various drawbacks in such prior art techniques, and its object is to provide photosensitive resin compositions for flexographic printing plates which have high-degree image reproducibility and flexibility suitable for flexography and which have good water developability and good compatibility with aqueous ink.

Passenger seat assemblies in motor vehicles are often designed with a backrest portion which folds or collapses to a generally horizontal non-use position for increased cargo carrying capacity. Usually these backrest portions are either freely pivotal between their vertical use position and horizontal folded position with an inertial latch provided in the event of sudden deceleration, or in the alternative are locked in the vertical use position with a manual latch requiring deliberate manipulation to release to the non-use position. The former option is considered more convenient and is usually less costly to manufacture. Inertial latches as used in motor vehicle seating applications are well known in the art. Examples of such may be had in U.S. Pat. No. 4,318,569 to Bilenchi et al., issued Mar. 9, 1982, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,100,202 to Hughes, issued Mar. 31, 1992.

Antibodies are proteins used by the immune system to neutralize foreign substances including bacteria, viruses, fungus, and animal dander, to name a few examples. Immunoglobulin (IgG) is the most common type of antibody found in circulation. An antibody can recognize and bind to a unique molecule of a specific foreign substance, called an antigen. Depending on the antigen, this binding may directly neutralize the foreign substance (for example, by impeding a biological process essential for its invasion and survival) or may tag the antigen so that other parts of the immune system destroy the foreign substance. Antibodies are present in a biological fluid called serum that is typically obtained from blood. In blood, plasma is the liquid component that holds the blood cells in whole blood in suspension, and the serum is the component of plasma that is devoid of clotting factors. Serum includes other proteins not used in blood clotting, electrolytes, antibodies, antigens, hormones, and any exogenous substances (e.g., drugs and microorganisms). To obtain serum samples, blood is typically allowed to clot, and centrifuged to remove cellular components, yielding serum. Seroprotection, the protection obtained from vaccination, can be estimated by analyzing samples of patient serum to determine whether protective levels of antibodies, such as immunoglobulins, are present in the serum. For many vaccines the amount of antibodies induced has a positive correlation with the likelihood of clinical protection from disease. Accordingly, mean antibody level is often used as a measure of vaccine efficacy, and seroprotection can be considered as an identified threshold level of antibody level that is correlated with protection from disease.

The present invention relates to point-to-point video data sessions between parties on computer systems. More specifically, the present invention relates to a method and apparatus for coordinating the point-to-point data sessions from an existing voice telephone call between the parties. Data sessions between parties on computer systems, such as video conferencing, have become widely popular. Video conferencing allows two or more parties at remote sites to conduct a conference using a computer network to transmit audio, video, and other data. Each party utilizes a video camera, microphone, and speaker mounted on their computer. As one party speaks into the microphone and is positioned in front of the video camera, the party""s voice and image is carried over the network and delivered to the other party""s computer system. Several types of computer networking techniques are available to support data sessions such as video conferencing. One computer network technique involves transmitting the audio, video, and other data of the video conference session via the Internet. Although Internet communication has become increasingly popular among businesses and provides a relatively inexpensive alternative to transmitting data from one location to another, Internet access is still not available to everyone and bandwidth on the Internet is not always guaranteed. A second computer network technique available to support data sessions involves transmitting data over a general switched telephone network (POTS). Although transmitting data point-to-point over a general switched telephone network provides less bandwidth compared to transmitting data over the Internet, the bandwidth is guaranteed. In the past, in order to conduct a data session over a general switched telephone network, two telephone calls were typically required to establish the data session for parties using data modems. A first telephone call would be a voice call used to communicate the desire to conduct a data session. The second telephone call would be a call made by the data modems to establish the data session. Because data modems do not possess voice modem capabilities, the two telephone calls were required even though both calls were made on the same telephone lines. This proved to be inconvenient and time consuming. A method for coordinating a point-to-point data session is disclosed. Messages are generated to a party at a first end of an existing voice telephone call. The messages instruct the party of what to do with a telephone. Instructions are transmitted to a modem at the first end to allow the modem to support the point-to-point data session on the existing voice telephone call.

The present invention relates to wireless communication systems, interrogators and methods of communicating within a wireless communication system. Electronic identification systems typically comprise two devices which are configured to communicate with one another. Preferred configurations of the electronic identification systems are operable to provide such communications via a wireless medium. One such configuration is described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/705,043, filed Aug. 29, 1996, assigned to the assignee of the present application, and incorporated herein by reference. This application discloses the use of a radio frequency (RF) communication system including communication devices. The disclosed communication devices include an interrogator and a remote transponder, such as a tag or card. Another example of a wireless communication system including a backscatter system is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,649,296 to MacLellan et al. which is also incorporated herein by reference. Such communication systems can be used in various applications such as identification applications. The interrogator is configured to output a polling or interrogation signal which may comprise a radio frequency signal including a predefined interrogation code using which the interrogator may address remote transponders. The remote transponders of such a communication system are operable to transmit an identification signal responsive to receiving an appropriate polling or interrogation signal. More specifically, the appropriate transponders are configured to recognize the predefined code. The transponders receiving the code can subsequently output a particular identification signal which is associated with the transmitting transponder. Following transmission of the polling signal, the interrogator is configured to receive the identification signals enabling detection of the presence of corresponding transponders. Such communication systems are useable in identification applications such as inventory or other object monitoring. For example, a remote identification device can be attached to an object of interest. Responsive to receiving the appropriate polling signal, the identification device is equipped to output an identification signal. Generating the identification signal identifies the presence or location of the identification device and the article or object attached thereto. It may be desired to communicate with remote communication devices located at greater distances in particular applications. Such areas may exceed the range of the communication system. Typical conventional arrangements require the utilization of numerous interrogators for communication with the remote communication devices in such spaced areas. Alternatively, the movement of a single interrogator from one area to another is required. The present invention provides wireless communication systems, interrogators and methods of communicating within a wireless communication system. According to one aspect of the present invention, a wireless communication system comprises at least one remote communication device configured to communicate a return link wireless signal. The return link wireless signal comprises a radio frequency signal in certain aspects of the invention. The wireless communication system in some embodiments includes an interrogator having a communication station, communication circuitry and a housing. The communication station is configured to receive the return link wireless signal and to generate a return link communication signal corresponding to the return link wireless signal. The communication circuitry is provided to couple with the communication station and to communicate the return link communication signal. The housing is remotely located with respect to the communication station and includes circuitry configured to receive the return link communication signal from the communication circuitry and to process the return link communication signal. In one configuration, the housing includes automatic gain control circuitry configured to adjust the power level of the return link communication signals. Amplifiers can be provided within one or both of the interrogator housing and the communication station to increase the power level of the return link communication signals. Plural communication stations and plural communication circuits are coupled with a single interrogator housing in some embodiments.

Heat exchangers are used in the vast majority of motor vehicles that are powered by an internal combustion engine. Heat exchangers may be used for engine cooling and for internal climate control. Most heat exchangers include a header and a tank at each end of the header. It has become common practice to manufacture the tank from a plastic material and the header from a heat conductive metal material such as aluminum. The plastic tank is mechanically joined to the header. It is vital that the junction between the tank and header be leak-free and durable in spite of the corrosive fluid that flows through the heat exchanger. With reference to FIG. 1, a junction 11 of heat exchanger 10 known in the prior art is now illustrated. It is now common practice to provide a channel 12 in the header 14 and a foot 16 at the lower end of the tank 18 of heat exchanger 10. The tank foot 16 is sized to be received in the channel with a sealing gasket 20 interposed between the tank and header. The channel 12 has an outer flange 22 with a plurality of tabs 24 that are clinched about the foot to retain the foot within the channel. Several disadvantages exist with the present tank and header junction 11 constructions. Firstly, the tab 24 is bent from the outer flange 22 to bend about a corner 26 of the foot 16. The clinching operation of the tabs uses the corner 26 of foot 16 as a fulcrum resulting in stress exerted on the plastic tank foot 16. Excess stress can result in cracks in the foot ruining the integrity of the tank. Furthermore, the clinch process is sensitive to the tab height variations due to manufacturing tolerances. The applied clinching force is applied as close to the top 25 of the header tabs 24 as possible to provide maximum mechanical advantage. The applied clinching force may then, depending on the height of the tabs, exert different levels of stress on the foot corner 26 that is used as a fulcrum. The tab height must be limited to decrease the stress exerted on the fulcrum point 26. Due to manufacturing tolerances, one tab may be shorter than others. Because of the short height of the tabs, the applied force to effectively bend the shorter tab must be significantly higher than for the other tabs due to the short tab heights. Consequently, the force used to bend all the tabs is the force needed to bend the shortest tab is undesirable in that it may stress the foot of the tank. In addition, the tank foot is provided with a chamfer 28 along its side wall 30 for ease of installation of the tank into the header channel. The chamfer provides a pocket 32 into which the sealing gasket 20 may be squeezed and displaced around a bottom corner 34 of the foot during the clinching operation. The resulting high compression of the sealing gasket may damage the gasket or render an inadequate seal. The above problems are cumulative. Consequently, most leakage and warranty problems in heat exchangers of the above described construction occur in the junction between the tank and header. What is needed is a junction construction for a heat exchanger that is easily assembled with a minimum amount of stress exerted on the tank foot during assembly and that eliminates the above described problems. What is also needed is a method for assembling a heat exchanger that provides for a reliable and securely sealed junction.

1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a semiconductor manufacturing process and in particular to a method of modifying conductive wiring. 2. Description of the Related Art As the number of devices that may be included on a single semiconductor chip increases, the size of the device is reduced and the thickness of the photoresist layer is also reduced. Otherwise, light cannot reach the bottom of the thick photoresist layer during photolithography, such that the desired patterns cannot be precisely transferred on to the semiconductor substrate. Thus, a hard mask comprised of poly-silicon is proposed to replace the photoresist layer. The thickness of the hard mask can be greatly reduced for new generation manufacturing processes, to as little as 0.11 μm or less. However, it is difficult to remove the poly-silicon hard mask in the plug formation process. Conventionally, a barrier comprising TiN/Ti is usually formed between the semiconductor substrate and the poly-silicon hard mask. In order to enhance the conductivity between the barrier and the substrate, a thermal treatment is usually performed, wherein the TiN/Ti barrier and the silicon substrate react with each other to form a highly conductive silicide. There is however, also a silicide formed between the poly-silicon hard mask and the TiN/Ti barrier. As a result, the silicide between the poly-silicon hard mask and the TiN/Ti barrier is difficult to remove by chemical mechanical polishing.

In a network environment, devices are in data communication with other devices that may be physically distributed anywhere in the world. One of the technical challenges that occurs in a network environment deals with authenticating users and user devices to protect the system and network from data leakage, unauthorized access, and/or other malicious activities. For example, bad actors may attempt to perform malicious activities over the network such as data exfiltration or fraud. Conventional systems use a fixed predetermined set of authentication rules for authenticating users. The number of authentication rules and type of authentication rules are fixed and set by the authenticating device. Modern networks include a wide variety of network devices with different types of functionality. Some devices may limit a user's ability to perform certain types of actions that may be necessary for satisfying one or more authentication rules. For example, an authentication rule may require some kind of biometric test, but the user's device may not have the ability to perform any kind of biometric test. Using a rigid set of authentication rules limits conventional systems and does not provide the flexibility to support a wide variety of devices with different types of functionality. Thus, it is desirable to provide a solution that offers flexible authentication that supports a variety of devices to provide increased network security.

The present disclosure relates to the field of computers, and specifically to the use of computers when used in cascading operations. Still more particularly, the present disclosure relates to the prevention of cascade failures in cascading operations in complex stream computer systems. A complex stream computer utilizes software and hardware components that interact with one another, such that a downstream component is reliant on an output from an upstream component in the complex stream computer. Such operations are known as cascading operations, since outputs of upstream operations directly impact downstream operations. This impact causes an upstream failure/fault/error to cascade through the complex stream computer, such that the actual internal cause for a final output error (i.e., a cascading failure in the stream computer) is difficult, if not impossible, to ascertain.

1. Field of the Inventions The present inventions generally pertain to the field of training for hand-to-hand fighting or combat, and more particularly to more lifelike training devices and methods for combat and hand-to-hand fighting instruction in comparison to traditional sparring devices and methods. 2. Description of the Related Art It is well-known in boxing and mixed-martial-arts (MMA) fighting circles to train for fights by sparring with a trained instructor who holds and moves hand pads for the fighter to strike. A trained instructor, however, is not always available to the fighter. The quality of training in this manner is diminished when the person holding and moving the hand pads is not a trained, experienced instructor. As such, there has developed a need for a training device and method that can be used by an inexperienced instructor or sparring partner that will still give the fighter a quality and more life-like training session. As explained below, the present inventions solve this need in the art.

The present invention relates to testing non-core memory management units (MMUs). Typically, processing cores include at least one MMU (referred to herein as core MMUs) for performing virtual to physical address translations. For example, the processing core may assign blocks of virtual memory to different processes executing on the processor (e.g., operating systems or user applications). Each of the virtual addresses corresponds to a physical memory address in memory. The mappings between the virtual and physical addresses are stored in a page table as page table entries. The page table is typically stored in main memory. When a process sends a request to a processing core to read data from, or write data to, a particular virtual address, the MMU queries the page table (or a translation lookaside buffer) to identify the corresponding physical address. The processing core then uses the physical address to perform the read or write requested by the process.

The present invention relates to separator spacers for hermetically sealed double glazed window units, and particularly provides an improved corner piece for connecting the ends of adjacent spacers. Spacers for separating the glass panels of a hermetically sealed doubled glazed unit are generally formed from a strip of metal which is roll formed into a tube. The tubular spacer extends around the glazing unit between the outer margins of the glass panels, sealant material being used between the glass and the sides of the spacer. In order to prevent any condensation of moisture between the glass panels which would interfere with visibility, the spacer tube contains a desiccant which absorbs any such moisture. In order for the desiccant to be effective, air passages must be provided between the inside of the spacer and the space between the glass panels, however any such air passages must be small enough to prevent the desiccant from falling from the inside of the spacer into the space between the glass panels. In some previously known spacers, the edges of the strip of metal have been formed with inturned flanges merely butted together. With such constructions, however, the spacer tends to deform and spread at the junction between the flanges when the spacer is cut, leading to poor sealing between the glass panels and also opening up of the joint between the edges of the strip so that desiccant can fall from the spacer. In other known spacers, the edges of the strip have been locked together by means of a roll formed seal. Such seals, as now known, prevent distortion of the spacer when cut, but have two draw-backs, namely that it is necessary to form some kind of air passages between the inside and the outside of the spacer (requiring a separate operation), so that the desicant can be effective as described, and furthermore the joints as produced have been on the outside of the spacer and present a somewhat unattractive appearance since they are visible when looking through the glass panels of the unit. My Canadian Pat. No. 1,008,307 issued Apr. 12, 1977 provides a method whereby a metal strip can be formed economically into a spacer for double glazed window units, the spacer being formed with a joint which prevents distortion during cutting, which does not detract from the appearance of the spacer, and in which air passages are provided without any separate forming operations. The aforesaid patent also describes a spacer for hermetically sealed double glazed window units formed from a metal strip and having a joint between the edges of the strip, in which the joint includes one edge portion of the strip bent to form an outwardly facing groove and another edge portion of the strip bent to form an inwardly extending lip, which lip is of lesser width than the depth of the groove.

In the year 2005, there were over 750 police pursuits in the city of Los Angeles alone. In the state of California, in that same year, there were over 7,000 police pursuits. No less than three deaths, in the city of Los Angeles alone, can be attributed to those who would run from the police, recklessly endangering the lives and property of American citizens. Unfortunately, law enforcement officials have very limited resources in dealing with this problem. Solutions given to agencies thus far are only effective given a very specific set of circumstances. In addition, presently, agencies across the United States have begun to tie the hands of Law Enforcement personnel by instituting “no pursuit” policies. Although “no pursuit” policies may be the safest alternative, this is only true due to the fact that a means by which to deal with the problem does not exist. Every single United States citizen pays for the rise in police pursuit. Studies show that damage from crashes associated with police pursuit is rarely limited to less than five figures. When you consider the fact that the acting vehicle, the police vehicles, and often times bystander vehicles, are damaged, it is not hard to understand why damage can run in excess of $100,000 per incident. This cost is passed on to citizens through higher insurance rates. Tragedy often times follows high-speed pursuit. The fact is, that innocent people die every year. Mothers and fathers, children and elderly, all walks of life, all across America, people are dying because a tool does not exist that allows police to stop a high-speed pursuit, before it begins. No solution presently exists that allows the police, from within the safety of their vehicle, to disable a fleeing vehicle, and stop a pursuit. Devices presently in use include U.S. Pat. No. 5,820,293 in which a device is thrown, by hand, across the roadway into the path of an oncoming pursued vehicle in order to deflate the tires. U.S. Pat. No. 5,775,832 describes a device that is used in the same manner as the previously listed device but differs in that the device itself is wider upon deployment and has a different type of spike. Although presently not in use, U.S. Pat. No. 6,623,205 describes a mobile device which when deployed is said to disable vehicle tires. Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 5,839,849 describes a device meant to be used from within a police vehicle at speed. Devices described on television programs and magazines have included electronic remote controlled vehicles, which are said to have the ability to shut down a vehicle's computer, thus disabling said vehicle when remote controlled vehicle is driven under vehicle pursued. Scientific magazines have suggested that electromagnetic pulse may be used in the future. Groen, U.S. Pat. No. 5,820,293 describes a device in which the police must know where the fleeing suspect is going and get there ahead of them, get out of the car and deploy said device across the roadway by hand. Similarly, Kilgrew U.S. Pat. No. 5,775,832 describes a device which must be deployed by hand across the roadway. These devices unfortunately, put the police officer in harm's way as they make it necessary for the police to exit their vehicle and stand next to the road to deploy their device. Devices such as U.S. Pat. No. 6,623,205 fail to deal with the fact that pursuits take place on every type of roadway, and that any uneven surface would damage the device described to the point it would be rendered useless and therefore necessitate costly repairs. Lowrie, U.S. Pat. No. 6,527,475 describes a device that necessitates police pulling in front of the pursued vehicle to deploy the device. Police are unwilling to do this, given the possibility that the suspect may have a weapon. Being in front of a suspect with a weapon is too dangerous for the police to even consider this course of action. The tethering of the described device provides for rapid deceleration of said device and therefore must be timed perfectly in order to be effective. In addition, the best possible use of the aforementioned device is its use when the police car is not moving. It is therefore an object of the invention to provide a completely mobile means for vehicle disablement. It is another object of the invention to provide for safe deployment of a vehicle disablement device by allowing deployment from within the police or operator vehicle. It is another object of the invention to provide a vehicle disablement device that automatically retracts. It is another object of the invention to provide a means for multiple deployments. It is another object of the invention to provide a device that does not decelerate upon deployment. It is another object of the invention to provide an engineered weak point and flexible joint by which the spike strip is attached to the device so as to prevent damage. It is another object of the invention to provide a means for quick spike strip replacement without the aid of tools. It is another object of the invention to provide a device that can be used in the blind spot of the pursued vehicle increasing officer safety. It is another object of the invention to provide a device which can be deployed during a traffic stop to prevent suspect vehicle from leaving the scene. It is another object of the invention to provide a maintained switch enabling deployment of device without operator maintaining pressure on deployment switch. It is another object of the invention to provide an on-board tool for vehicle disablement. It is another object of the invention to provide for left and right side deployment.

Traditionally, in a computer file system, a file is the basic unit of data storage. Typically, a file in a file system has the following characteristics. It is a single sequence of bytes. It has a finite length and is stored typically in a non-volatile storage medium. It is created in a directory and has a name that it can be referred to by in file operations, possibly in combination with its path. Additionally, a file system may associate other information with a file, such as permission bits or other file attributes; timestamps for file creation, last revision, and last access etc. Specific applications can also store domain-specific properties in the byte stream of the file. For example, files that are used by a word processing application and hence considered as ‘documents’ may store properties like the Title and Author of the document. These properties are stored within the byte stream of the file in a format that is specific to the application creating the file. The properties are not structured as objects, nor do they have standardized names. The byte streams are unstructured values. Additionally, conventional computer file systems have provided limited file organization techniques available to users. For example, existing applications have largely adopted a tree structure folder format for organizing and displaying various types of files. Though some relationships between folders, subfolders, and files can be viewed, such relationships are limited in scope and are primarily dependent upon explicit user input. For example, files can be related according to their common folder or subfolder as denoted by the user.

An outside handle device in which a handle assembly including a handle main body having a grip portion is secured, by means of a pair of bolts, to a base member disposed inside an outer panel of a door to thus assemble it onto the door is known from Patent Document 1.

Today, credit card usage is virtually a part of a customer's daily life because customers recognize the many advantages of obtaining credit cards. For example, credit cards are safer to carry than money, and they can help a customer to establish a good credit rating. Additionally, they can serve as a source of convenience should the customer need to make an unexpected purchase for which they may not have the cash immediately available. As a result of this growing trend, the credit card industry is a booming and profitable industry; thus, customers are constantly inundated with many different credit card offers. For example, customers are offered department store credit cards, gasoline product cards (oil companies), telephone calling cards, VISA® credit cards, MASTERCARD® credit cards, AMERICAN EXPRESS® credit cards, debit cards, and/or the like. One of the most appealing features of a credit card purchase is that it allows customers to buy now and pay later. Another advantage is that transaction cards permit customers to establish direct relationship with specific types of business, for example, a telephone calling card or a gasoline product payment card. With a gasoline product card, a cardholder has the convenience of purchasing gasoline products from a specific oil company, without conducting a cash transaction, and receiving one itemized bill at the end of the billing period. The itemized billing statement is beneficial for providing businesses or entrepreneurs with a detail summary, at the end of the month or year, of the amount of gasoline which was purchased during the time period and an easy method to calculate business-related mileage driven during the time period. Another enticement of credit card usage is that some credit card issuers offer to their customers “reward points or reward offers” as an incentive to increase the amount of the customer's purchases or to increase the frequency in which the customer transacts purchases with their credit card. While customers realize the benefits of obtaining several different types of credit cards and establishing several different types of relationships with different types of industries, customers can sometimes be overwhelmed by the sheer volume of credit cards that they need to carry in order to perform daily activities. Although VISA® and MASTERCARD® are widely accepted, no one card has been accepted universally. Regardless of the fact that VISA® and MASTERCARD® can be used to perform other types of transactions, the usage of a VISA® or MASTERCARD® for the purchase of gasoline or a telephone call usually does not allow the customer to establish a direct relationship with the individual companies enacting the transaction. Furthermore, using VISA® and/or MASTERCARD® to make a purchase can be more expensive for a merchant because this transaction is treated as a purchase on the VISA® or MASTERCARD® credit card account for which the merchant often pays a transaction fee. Similarly, customers may incur additional expenses when using VISA® and/or MASTERCARD® to perform different types of transactions. For instance, when a customer uses her VISA® credit card to make a telephone call, the telephone company determines the amount of the telephone call and bills the amount directly to the customer's VISA® account. The amount is then entered as a purchase onto the customer's VISA® account and if the customer fails to pay the entire balance by the next billing cycle, the customer also incurs an additional charge based on the current interest rate associated with the account until the entire VISA® account is paid in full. Therefore, a need still exists for a cost-effective method which provides a customer the convenience of using one card which can be easily activated to perform different functions, establish different relationships with different industries (e.g., a phone card, a gas card, a catalog purchasing card, or a dining card) and offer rebate incentives. Traditionally, the procedure for obtaining a credit card normally requires several steps which can delay the customer's receipt of a functioning credit card for approximately 26–50 days. The normal credit card issuance process begins when the prospective customer receives direct marketing material in the mail or at a merchant's location. Within the next 7–14 days, the prospective customer reads the approximately 500–800 word application, completes the application and returns the application to the credit card issuer through the mail system. Once mailed, it takes another 3–4 days for the paper application to travel through the postal system. The credit card issuer receives the paper application, and over the next 10–20 days, the credit card issuer processes the application to determine whether to accept or decline the customer's application. Thereafter, the customer receives a written response within 5 to 7 days as to whether their application is accepted or declined. If the application is accepted, a functioning credit card often will be included in the written response. After 1 to 5 days, the customer will read the 800–1500 word credit card agreement and then will activate the credit card telephonically before it can be used. However, not all credit card issuers take the additional measure of requiring telephonic activation; some may use a less secure method of mailing active cards.

In the design of linear integrated MOS (Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor) circuits, it is often desirable to have an electrical resistance load ("attenuator") element which is linear, that is, where the current through the load is linearly proportional to the voltage across the load over a reasonably wide operating range of voltage. Such a load is particularly useful in connection with such circuits as operational amplifiers and signal filters. However, a straightforward implementation of such a load in the form of a long, resistive path of polycrystalline silicon consumes an inordinately large amount of semiconductor silicon wafer area, typically of the order of several thousand squares of the minimum feature size of the integrated circuit fabrication technique being used; or else such an implementation consumes an unreasonably large amount of power for reasonable voltage drops across such a load. On the other hand, the use of the source to drain resistance of an insulated gate metal-oxide-semiconductor field effect transistor (IGFET or MOSFET) as a load enables more compact implementation of such a load but only at the expense of nonlinearity over desired operating parameters. It is a known characteristic of a MOSFET that, for somewhat smaller operating signal ranges than desired in linear integrated circuits, this type of transistor can serve as a linear load when operated in the linear region of the "triode region," that is, when the drain to source voltage V.sub.D is well below the "effective gate voltage" V.sub.GE, specifically EQU V.sub.D <<V.sub.GE =V.sub.G -V.sub.TO ( 1) that is, the drain to source voltage should be kept well below the applied gate to source voltage V.sub.G less the threshold voltage V.sub.TO. An ideal (perfectly linear) resistor attenuator in a voltage divider configuration (FIG. 1) includes a pair of ideal resistors R.sub.1 and R.sub.2 whose ratio (R.sub.1 /R.sub.2) is selected in accordance with the desired output voltage ##EQU1## where V.sub.IN is the input signal voltage and V.sub.REF is a reference voltage, typically a steady DC voltage. A simple and direct implementation of this ideal resistor attenuator configuration with MOS transistors is illustrated in FIG. 2, using a pair of MOSFETs M.sub.1 and M.sub.2 having transconductances .beta..sub.1 and .beta..sub.2, respectively, where .beta. is proportional to the ratio of the width W to the length L of the transistor channel, as known in the art. The gate electrodes of M.sub.1 and M.sub.2 are connected to a high enough (for N-channel devices) supply voltage V.sub.DD so that operation takes place in both the transistors M.sub.1 and M.sub.2 in the linear portions of their triode regions. However, such an implementation as shown in FIG. 2 suffers from the disadvantage that the input signals must be restricted to an undesirably small range (typically.+-.2 volts for V.sub.DD =20 volts) in order to maintain linearity during operation. This problem of large signal nonlinearity arises from the quadratic term in V.sub.D in the MOSFET drain current relationship in the triode region: EQU I.sub.A =-.beta.[(V.sub.G -V.sub.TO -V.sub.S)(V.sub.D -V.sub.S) -1/2 (V.sub.D -V.sub.S).sup.2 ] (3) This quadratic term (.beta.V.sub.D.sup.2 /2) becomes appreciable when V.sub.D is not kept well below (V.sub.G -V.sub.TO), that is, when the input signals are large enough to take the operation of the MOSFET out of the linear portion of the triode region. Hence, V.sub.OUT will not be linear in the input signal voltage V.sub.IN for such large signals. For larger signals, which take the operation out of the linear portion of the triode region, a different approach must thus be taken in order to preserve linearity. One such approach (FIG. 3) uses operation in the saturation regions of the enhancement mode MOS transistors, M.sub.1 and M.sub.2, in which the gate electrode of each such transistor is shorted to its drain by direct ohmic connection. Although the source-drain current now follows a square-law, the attenuator operation is still basically linear, since both transistors have the same type of functional dependence of current on voltage: EQU I.sub.D =-.beta..sub.1 (V.sub.G1 -V.sub.S1 -V.sub.TO)2/2=-.beta..sub.2 (V.sub.G2 -V.sub.S2 -V.sub.TO)2/2 (4) Accordingly, defining each .beta.=2.alpha..sup.2, it follows that: EQU .alpha..sub.1 (V.sub.G1 -V.sub.S1)=.alpha..sub.2 (V.sub.G2 -V.sub.S1)+(.alpha..sub.1 -.alpha..sub.2)V.sub.TO ( 5) Since, in the circuit of FIG. 3, V.sub.G1 is the same as V.sub.OUT and V.sub.G2 is the same as V.sub.IN, it is seen that the circuit in FIG. 3 provides a linear attenuator in the voltage divider configuration. However, this circuit becomes highly nonlinear if and when the input signal V.sub.IN swings below the (DC) reference voltage V.sub.REF or even as low as to within two thresholds of V.sub.REF, because then both transistors M.sub.1 and M.sub.2 are turned "off," the functions of drains and sources being reversed. Therefore, the circuit of FIG. 3 undesirably limits the input signal range for linear operation to values of V.sub.IN greater than at least V.sub.REF +2 V.sub.TO. It would therefore be desirable to have an MOS circuit which provides linear attenuation over a wider range than those of the prior art. By "linear" is meant that the total harmonic distortion for sinusoidal signals of a few volts RMS should be more than about 30 dB below the fundamental.

The present invention is directed to oxymethylene homopolymers and copolymers. More specifically, the present disclosure pertains to polyoxymethylene compositions which posses thermal stability and resistance to mold and die deposits. The prior art has been extensively developed in the field of oxymethylene homopolymers and copolymers which are thermally stable and which are present in compositions that contain additives such as polyamides or superpolyamides. In Alsup et al. U.S. Pat. No. 2,993,025 issued July 18, 1961, high thermal stability is provided into a polyoxymethylene composition by incorporation of 0.001% to 50% by weight of a superpolyamide such as nylons in which is present the carbonamide linkage ##EQU1## with R defining hydrogen, alkyl or alkoxy. The superpolyamide has a preferred degree of polymerization of about 100 to 200 and upon hydrolysis yields monomeric compounds of (1) mixtures of dicarboxylic acids and diamines and/or (2) omegaaminomonocarboxylic acids. In Herman et al. U.S. Pat. No. 3,131,165 issued Apr. 28, 1964, is found a teaching of stabilizing formaldehyde polymers with primary and secondary amides of polybasic acids including oxalic acid diamide and compounds of the formula R(CONHR.sub.1).sub.n with R representing a polyvalent alkyl, cycloalkyl, aryl, aralkyl or a heterocyclic radical and the substitution products of these radicals, R.sub.1 is a hydrogen atom or an alkyl or cycloalkyl radical having a molecular weight of up to 500, or the substitution products of these radicals, and n represents a whole number of at least 2 and preferably 2 to 4. In Fourcade et al., U.S. Pat. No. 3,306,953 issued Feb. 28, 1967, is disclosed stabilization of polyoxymethylene by addition of a 0.5 to 2.0% by weight of a polyamide obtained by the condensation of a dimer or trimer of an unsaturated fatty acid containing at least 10 carbon atoms with at least a stoichiometric quantity of a diamine or a triamine. In O'Brien et al. U.S. Pat. No. 3,444,265 issued May 13, 1969, is disclosed an oxymethylene copolymer composition with improved high temperature stability by incorporation of a thermoplastic linear polycarbonamide and a solid fusible diphenylamine-acetone condensation product. Within the disclosure of the types of linear polyamides which are suitable are those having a molecular weight above 1000 although only nylon is demonstrated. In British Patent Specification No. 1,346,026 published Feb. 6, 1974, is set forth formation of a polyacetal composition having high resistance to thermal decomposition and discoloration at high temperatures. Disclosed in the composition is a polyamide which is a polycondensation product of (A) H.sub.2 NRNH.sub.2 where R is an aliphatic, alicyclic, or aromatic hydrocarbon group or groups of hydrocarbons combined by oxygen or sulfur atoms; (B) XOCCH.sub.2 COX where X are hydroxyl groups, halogen atoms or lower alkoxy groups and (C) YCH.sub.2 COX where X is as previously defined and Y is a cyano or carbamoyl group. The ratio of components (A), (B), (C) is not limited but it is preferable that each of (A) and (B) is in an amount of 1 to 30 moles with respect to 1 mole of (C). Molecular weights of the order of 300 to 100,000 and preferably 450 to 5,000 are disclosed in relationship to the polyamide.

Media providers such as broadband, satellite, and cable companies provide access to many media channels. Users generally are able to control access to such channels through a content processing device such as a set top box (STB) that allows users to select channels for viewing. Further, access to media channels may be controlled by mechanisms such as user profiles that are downloaded to a content processing device when a particular user is identified. For example, an STB may transmit an identifier to a remote server to obtain a profile used to determine programming channels that may be made available through the STB. To take another example, a child may be required to enter a user identifier or the like using a remote control associated with an STB. This user identifier may then be associated with a user profile that specifies particular media channels that the child may access, and/or times when the child may access these media channels. However, establishing and modifying a profile that governs a user's access to media channels generally requires direct access to the STB, e.g., accessing a menu or the like that is provided by the STB and displayed on a media playback device such as a television, and providing input to establish or modify the profile. Users presently lack mechanisms for remotely modifying their own or other users' profiles that govern access to media channels. Further, users responsible for profiles of other users presently lack mechanisms for allowing such profiles to be modified in response to conditions or events that may arise. For example, a parent may wish to allow a child's profile to be modified if the child satisfies certain conditions such as performing chores. However, at present, a user profile governing access to media channels can generally only be modified by accessing an STB and providing manual inputs, as described above.

The present invention relates to a system for monitoring foreign matter (foreign particles) where its base system collectively receives and processes foreign matter detection signals from foreign matter monitoring optical heads mounted in many process processing apparatuses (many process processing apparatuses) forming a manufacture line of semiconductors or the like, a process processing apparatus and an electronic transaction method (a method of electronic commerce) using the system for monitoring foreign matter. There are known conventional techniques concerning foreign matter monitoring systems as disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Nos. 5-218163 (corresponding to U.S. Pat. No. 5,463,459) (Prior Art 1), 6-258239 (Prior Art 2), 8-250385 (corresponding to U.S. application Ser. No. 08/617,270) (Prior Art 3), 8-250569 (corresponding to U.S. application Ser. No. 08/617,270) (Prior Art 4). In Prior Arts 1 and 2, an inline foreign matter monitor system is described. In this case, compact foreign matter monitors are set up in the inlets/outlets of process processing apparatuses or in transport areas between process processing apparatuses in a volume production semiconductor manufacture process line and a foreign matter control system takes in foreign matter data from the compact foreign matter monitors to provide foreign matter control on a single wafer basis. In Prior Arts 3 and 4, an on-machine foreign matter monitor system is described. In this system, a process processing apparatus has a foreign matter monitor mounted therein to measure foreign matters sticking to works before and after they are processed therein so that foreign matters sticking to works are under control on an each lot or work basis and, based on the result of measurement, it is determined whether works supplied into the process processing apparatus should be stopped or not. Technique disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 8-145900 (Prior Art 5) is known as a conventional technique for compact foreign matter monitors. According to Prior Art 5, compact foreign matter monitors are placed where they are accessible by the arms of robots which are fixed between a vacuum process room and a loader and between a vacuum process room and an unloader. In addition, a vacuum process apparatus is described in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 5-259259 (Prior Art 6). A vacuum process apparatus according to this prior art has a load lock room to relay a workpiece, a process room to process a workpiece, an inspection room having a foreign matter monitor installed therein and a platform having transport means to transfer a workpiece among the load lock room, process room and inspection room. In Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 6-275688 (Prior Art 7), failure analysis technique is described. According to this prior art for semiconductor wafers and the like, a foreign matter inspection apparatus, an appearance inspection apparatus and a probing inspection apparatus are connected to an appearance failure analysis apparatus via each analysis station and a product design support system and a data input terminal are connected to the appearance failure analysis apparatus. To clarify a causal relationship, the apparatus failure analysis apparatus compares the fail bit data acquired from the probing inspection apparatus with the appearance defect information acquired from the appearance inspection apparatus.

Current treatments used to treat various types of cancer tend to work by poisoning or killing the cancerous cell. Unfortunately, treatments that are toxic to cancer cells typically tend to be toxic to healthy cells as well. Moreover, the heterogenous nature of tumours is one of the primary reasons that effective treatments for cancer remain elusive. Current mainstream therapies such as chemotherapy and radiotherapy tend to be used within a narrow therapeutic window of toxicity. These types of therapies are considered blunt tools that have limited applicability due to the varying types of tumour cells and the limited window in which these treatments can be administered. Modern anticancer therapies currently being developed attempt to selectively target tumour cells while being less toxic to healthy cells, thereby being more likely to leave healthy cells unaffected. Oncolytic viral therapy is one approach that aims to exploit cellular differences between tumour cells and normal cells. This therapy uses replication-competent, tumour-selective viral vectors as anti-cancer agents. The oncolytic virus either specifically targets cancer cells for infection, or is more suited for efficient replication in cancer cells versus healthy cells. These replication-competent, oncolytic viruses are either naturally occurring or genetically engineered to be a highly selective and highly potent means of targeting the heterogeneous tumour population. Since the replication selective oncolytic virus does not replicate efficiently in normal cells, toxicity to the patient should be low, particularly in comparison to traditional therapies such as radiation or chemotherapy. Numerous studies have reported oncolytic activity for various virus strains, with the most promising oncolytic viruses being a naturally occurring or genetically modified version of adenovirus, herpes simplex virus 1 (“HSV1”), Reovirus, Vaccinia Virus, Vesicular Stomatitis Virus (“VSV”) or Poliovirus. Modified oncolytic viruses currently under investigation as anticancer agents include HSV, adenovirus, Newcastle disease virus (“NDV”), Reovirus and Vaccinia virus, measles, VSV and poliovirus. Various oncolytic viruses are in Phase I and Phase II clinical trials with some showing sustained efficacy. However, it is unknown which viruses will best fulfill the oncolytic goals of sustained replication, specificity and potent lytic activity. A completely efficient candidate for an oncolytic viral vector would be one that has a short lifecycle, forms mature virions quickly, spreads efficiently from cell to cell and has a large genome ready for insertions. As well, evidence suggests that inhibiting the early innate immune response and slowing the development of Th1 responses are important for the efficacy of oncolytic therapy. It is clear that human viruses are highly immunogenic, as measured by the high level of antibody and T cell responses that are observed in the normal population for many of the viruses being considered for the development of oncolytic viruses. Clinical work has shown that current oncolytic viruses are indeed safe, but are not potent enough as monotherapies to be completely clinically effective. As insufficient or inefficient infection of tumour cells is usually observed, the current movement is to arm candidate viruses by genetically engineering them to express therapeutic transgene to increase their efficiency. Most of the above-mentioned oncolytic viruses are also being tested in combination with other common oncolytic therapies. Adenovirus can be easily genetically manipulated and has well-known associated viral protein function. In addition, it is associated with a fairly mild disease. The ONYX-015 human adenovirus (Onyx Pharmaceuticals Inc.) is a one of the most extensively tested oncolytic viruses that has been optimized for clinical use. It is believed to replicate preferentially in p53-negative tumours and shows potential in clinical trials with head and neck cancer patients. However, reports show that ONYX-015 has only produced an objective clinical response in 14% of treated patients (Nemunaitis J, Khuri F, Ganly I, Arseneau J, Posner M, Vokes E, Kuhn J, McCarty T, Landers S, Blackburn A, Romel L, Randlev B, Kaye S, Kirn D. J. Clin. Oncol. 2001 Jan. 15; 19(2):289-98). WO96/03997 and WO97/26904 describe a mutant oncolytic HSV that inhibits tumour cell growth and is specific to neuronal cells. Further advantages are that the HSV can be genetically modified with ease and drugs exist to shut off any unwanted viral replication. However, the application of such a common human pathogen is limited, as it is likely that the general population has been exposed and acquired an immune response to this virus, which would attenuate the lytic effect of the virus. HSV can also cause serious side effects or a potentially fatal disease. Reovirus type III is associated with relatively mild diseases and its viral gene function is fairly well understood. Reovirus type III is currently being developed by Oncolytic Biotech as a cancer therapeutic which exhibits enhanced replication properties in cells expressing mutant ras oncogen and preferentially grows in PKR−/− cells (Strong J. E. and P. W. Lee, J. Virology, 1996. 70:612-616). However, Reovirus is difficult to genetically manipulate and its viral replication cannot be easily shut off. VSV is associated with relatively mild diseases and also has well-known viral gene function. WO99/04026 discloses the use of VSV as a vector in gene therapy for the expression of wide treatment of a variety of disorders. However, VSV suffers from the same problems as the Reovirus in that it is difficult to genetically manipulate and its viral replication cannot be easily shut off. Vaccina virus and Poliovirus are other candidate oncolytic viruses described in the art but have been associated with a serious or potentially fatal disease. U.S. Pat. No. 4,806,347 discloses the use of gamma interferon and a fragment of IFNγ against human tumour cells. WO99/18799 discloses a method of treating disease in a mammal in which the diseased cells have defects in an interferon-mediated antiviral response, comprising administering to the mammal a therapeutically effective amount of an interferon-sensitive, replication competent clonal virus. It specifically discloses that VSV particles have toxic activity against tumour cells but that alleviation of cytotoxicity in normal cells by VSV occurs in the presence of interferon. WO99/18799 also discloses that NDV-induced sensitivity was observed with the interferon-treated tumour cells but that adding interferon to normal cells makes these cells resistant to NDV. This method aims to make cells sensitive to interferon by infecting them with interferon sensitive viruses.

Vibration-inducing motors and mechanisms have been used for many years in a wide variety of different consumer appliances, toys, and other devices and systems. Examples include vibration signals generated by pagers, vibration-driven appliances, such as hair-trimming appliances, electric toothbrushes, electric toy football games, and many other appliances, devices, and systems. The most common electromechanical system used for generating vibrations is an intentionally unbalanced electric motor. FIGS. 1A-B illustrate an unbalanced electric motor typically used for generating vibrations in a wide variety of different devices. As shown in FIG. 1A, a small, relatively low-power electric motor 102 rotates a cylindrical shaft 104 onto which a weight 106 is asymmetrically or mounted. FIG. 1B shows the weight asymmetrically mounted to the shaft, looking down at the weight and shaft in the direction of the axis of the shaft. As shown in FIG. 1B, the weight 106 is mounted off-center on the electric-motor shaft 104. FIGS. 2A-B illustrate the vibrational motion produced by the unbalanced electric motor shown in FIGS. 1A-B. As shown in FIGS. 2A-B, the asymmetrically-mounted weight creates an elliptical oscillation of the end of the shaft, normal to the shaft axis, when the shaft is rotated at relatively high speed by the electric motor. FIG. 2A shows displacement of the weight and shaft from the stationary shaft axis as the shaft is rotated, looking down on the weight and shaft along the shaft axis, as in FIG. 1B. In FIG. 2A, a small mark 202 is provided at the periphery of the disk-shaped end the of electric-motor shaft to illustrate rotation of the shaft. When the shaft rotates at high speed, a point 204 on the edge of the weight traces an ellipsoid 206 and the center of the shaft 208 traces a narrower and smaller ellipsoid 210. Were the shaft balanced, the center of the shaft would remain at a position 212 in the center of the diagram during rotation, but the presence of the asymmetrically-mounted weight attached to the shaft, as well as other geometric and weight-distribution characteristics of the electric motor, shaft, and unbalanced weight together create forces that move the end of the shaft along the elliptical path 210 when the shaft is rotated at relatively high speed. The movement can be characterized, as shown in FIG. 2B, by a major axis 220 and minor axis 222. of vibration, with the direction of the major axis of vibration equal to the direction of the major axis of the ellipsoids, shown in FIG. 2A, and the length of the major axis corresponding to the amplitude of vibration in this direction. In many applications, in which a linear oscillation is desired, designers seek to force the major-axis-amplitude/minor-axis-amplitude ratio to be as large as possible, but, because the vibration is produced by a rotational force, it is generally not possible to achieve linear oscillation. In many cases, the path traced by the shaft center may be close to circular. The frequency of vibration of the unbalanced electric motor is equal to the rotational frequency of the electric-motor shaft, and is therefore constrained by the rate at which the motor can rotate the shaft. At low rotational speeds, little vibration is produced. While effective in producing vibrations, there are many problems associated with the unbalanced-electric-motor vibration-generating units, such as that shown in FIG. 1A, commonly used in the various devices, systems, and applications discussed above. First, unbalancing the shaft of an electric motor not only produces useful vibrations that can be harnessed for various applications, but also produces destructive, unbalanced forces within the motor that contribute to rapid deterioration of motor parts. Enormous care and effort is undertaken to precisely balance rotating parts of motors, vehicles, and other types of machinery, and the consequences of unbalanced rotating parts are well known to anyone, familiar with automobiles, machine tools, and other such devices and systems. The useful lifetimes of many devices and appliances, particularly hand-held devices and appliances, that employ unbalanced electric motors for generating vibrations may range from a few tens of hours to a few thousands of hours of use, after which the vibrational amplitude produced by the devices declines precipitously as the electric motor and other parts deteriorate. A second problem with unbalanced electric motors is that they are relatively inefficient at producing vibrational motion. A far greater amount of power is consumed by an unbalanced electrical motor to produce a given vibrational force than the theoretical minimum power required to produce the given vibrational force. As a result, many hand-held devices that employ unbalanced electric motors for generating vibrations quickly consume batteries during use. A third problem with unbalanced electric motors, discussed above, is that they generally produce elliptical vibrational modes. Although such modes may be useful in particular applications, many applications can better use a linear oscillation, with greater directional concentration of vibrational forces. Linear oscillation cannot generally be produced by unbalanced electric motors. A fourth, and perhaps most fundamental, problem associated with using unbalanced electric motors to generate vibrations is that only a very limited portion of the total vibrational-force/frequency space is accessible to unbalanced electric motors. FIG. 3 shows a graph of vibrational force with respect to frequency for various types of unbalanced electric motors. The graph is shown as a continuous hypothetical curve, although, of course, actual data would be discrete. As shown in FIG. 3, for relatively low-power electric motors used in hand-held appliances, only a fairly narrow range of frequencies centered about 80 Hz (302 in FIG. 3) generate a significant vibrational force. Moreover, the vibrational force is relatively modest. The bulk of energy consumed by an unbalanced electric motor is used to spin the shaft and unbalanced weight and to overcome frictional and inertial forces within the motor. Only a relatively small portion of the consumed energy is translated into desired vibrational forces. Because of the above-discussed disadvantages with the commonly employed unbalanced-electric-motor vibration-generation units, designers, manufacturers, and, ultimately, users of a wide variety of different vibration-based devices, appliances, and systems continue to seek more efficient and capable vibration-generating units for incorporation into many consumer appliances, devices, and systems.

Field The present invention refers to a composition, comprising hemoglobin or myoglobin, wherein in at least 40% of said hemoglobin or myoglobin the oxygen binding site is charged by a non-O2 ligand, and at least one further ingredient, a method for preparing said composition and the use of hemoglobin or myoglobin charged with a non-oxygen ligand for external treatment of wounds. Description of the Related Technology Different methods are used for treating wounds, depending on their status. First, a wound that is still open preferably should be disinfected and thereby protected against negative external influences. This can be done by means of suitable disinfectant solutions or spray-on bandages or also by applying iodine solution. Actual wound healing must then take place from inside. This means that the blood vessels still in place must supply the destroyed tissue with sufficient amounts of substrates, so that the tissue repair mechanism can start. Wounds can be caused by various factors, like e.g. injuries or also after operations or traumatic events. On the other hand, it is known that wound formation, particularly also chronic wounds, can also be provoked by diseases, in which degeneration and/or constriction of large and/or small blood vessels occurs. This may be the result e.g. in the case of older patients, of extended stays in bed (decubitus) or of diabetes mellitus which may lead to degeneration and arteriosclerosis (P. Carpenter, A. Franco, Atlas der Kapillaroskopie [Atlas of Capillaroscopy], 1983, Abbott, Max-Planck-Inst. 2, D-Wiesbaden) of the large and small blood vessels (macroangiopathy and microangiopathy of the arteries). It was also shown that an oxygen deficiency (hypoxia) is present in the wound area. 40 mmHg is considered to be a critical value (C. D. Müller et al., Hartmann Wund [Wound] Forum 1 (1999), 17-25). The blood flows to the tissues, including the skin, through the arteries and supplies the cells with substrates required for life. Any degeneration of the blood vessels results in a deficient supply of substrates to the cells, leading to their death. The substrates must pass the last, seemingly insignificant gap of approximately 20 μm from the smallest blood vessels (capillaries) to the cells by diffusion; in this connection, oxygen plays a special role, because it is difficult for the organism to handle this substrate. There are three main problems involved: (1) It is true that oxygen is absolutely essential for life (a human being is brain-dead after only approximately five minutes if his/her brain does not receive oxygen), but at the same time, oxygen is highly toxic (a newborn that receives respiration treatment with pure oxygen will die-after only a few days). (2) Oxygen has very little solubility in an aqueous medium. This results, according to FICK's first law, in a lower diffusion rate of oxygen. In addition, there is a fundamental law of diffusion, namely SMOLUCHOWSKI's and EINSTEIN's law, that states that the diffusion speed (of oxygen) decreases with an increasing diffusion distance. Now the diffusion constant of oxygen is so low that the diffusion speed at a diffusion distance of as little as 20 μm is only 5% of the initial value. A water layer of e.g. 50 μm represents nearly complete oxygen insulation for the cells. Oxygen is transported along the long paths in the organism from the lungs to the tips of the toes with the bloodstream, bound to hemoglobin, and only in this way is able to overcome the long distances in a manner that is suitable for the organism. (3) For oxygen, in contrast to glucose, for example, there is no storage area in the body, therefore this substrate must be available to the cells at all times and quickly, in a sufficient amount; oxygen is a so-called immediate substrate necessary for life. An intact organism has solved these problems by using several mechanisms. The toxic effects of oxygen are avoided in that the latter binds during transport to hemoglobin and thereby remains harmless. At the same time, the free oxygen is diluted and thereby further loses its harmful oxidative potential. Nevertheless, it is instantaneously available in a sufficient amount, because the binding to hemoglobin is reversible. The problem of the low diffusive range is solved in that the organism has developed a very finely branched blood vessel network (capillary network), which ensures that on the average, every cell is at a distance of at most 25 μm from a capillary; in this way, the diffusion path of oxygen in the organism remains below the critical length of 50 μm. In addition, a cell can be diffusively supplied with oxygen from several sides; this represents a safety mechanism. The immediate availability, in accordance with the demand (oxygen is not allowed to be available in excess, otherwise it would have a harmful effect) is achieved, in the organism, by means of vascular regulation of the blood vessel flow, which controls perfusion and thereby optimizes the supply of oxygen. If there is an open wound surface, the oxygen supply to the cells is interrupted. The oxygen supply from air outside is poor because an aqueous liquid film is laying on the (tissue) cell layer, which film, as explained, forms a diffusive oxygen barrier. Fresh wounds in normal tissue can heal in a few days, if the oxygen supply from underneath, in other words from the inside, is sufficient. However, it was shown in animal experiments that even fresh wounds heal better if the oxygen concentration of the surrounding air is increased (M. P. Pai et al., Sug. Gyn. Obstet. 135 (1972), 756-758). Older, particularly chronic wounds are known to heal very slowly, if at all, due to their oxygen deficiency. To heal chronic wounds better, as well, so-called hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBO) has been used. In this treatment, patients are placed in pressurized chambers, where they are subjected to an excess pressure of pure oxygen of about 3 bars for a certain period of time (C. D. Müller et al., Hartmann Wund Forum 1 (1999), 17-25). In fact, wound healing may be increased by this method. However, the effect decreases with the number of treatments. U.S. Pat. No. 2,527,210 describes a hemoglobin solution that can allegedly be used for the treatment of wounds, both intravenously and topically, for example by spraying. In this description, the hemoglobin is obtained from fresh erythrocytes that are subjected to freezing shock after centrifugation and drawing off the blood plasma fraction. This results in cell lysis, and hemoglobin is released. The broken cell walls are also present in the product. This formulation is a concentrated cell detritus (cell fragments). In this way, an antiseptic cover effect such as otherwise achieved with iodine solution, after having added 5% sodium sulfide, is supposed. In other words, the wound is merely closed. Oxygen transport is not mentioned there. WO 97/15313 describes the therapeutic use of hemoglobin for improving wound healing. For this purpose, hemoglobin free of stroma and pyrogens is intravenously administered to the patients, particularly after operations and traumatic events to increase the blood pressure. In particular, a hemoglobin cross-linked with diaspirin is used for this purpose. WO 2003/077941 teaches the treatment of open wounds with a hemoglobin solution comprising isolated and optionally crosslinked hemoglobin. The solutions were freshly prepared with hemoglobin from pig blood and applied to chronic wounds. During the preparation and storage of oxygen carriers on basis of hemoglobin or myoglobin they can lose their functionality partially or completely. To prevent this it is desirable to stabilize the oxygen carriers that they remain usable and able to transport oxygen. Generally, there are different approaches to the preparation of artificial oxygen carriers; one of them is the preparation of suitable solutions of native or chemically modified hemoglobins (see “Issues from Vth International Symposium on Blood Substitutes, San Diego, Calif., USA, March 1993”, Artificial Cells, Blood Substitutes, and Immobilization Biotechnology 22 (1994), vol. 2-vol. 4). One problem in the handling of such pharmaceutical preparations as artificial oxygen carriers is their increasing inactivation by spontaneous oxidation to methemoglobin which is no longer able to transport oxygen. This occurs usually during preparation by the producer and the subsequent storage. Several approaches for solving this problem are described. Either it is tried to minimize the degree of oxidation of hemoglobin, or to reduce the oxidized hemoglobin back again. One possibility for prevention of spontaneous oxidation is deoxygenating the hemoglobin (i.e., entirely removing oxygen from the preparation), since desoxyhemoglobin oxidizes much more slowly to methemoglobin than oxyhemoglobin. Further it is possible to minimize the amount of oxidation by storage and/or preparation at the lowest possible temperature (for aqueous solutions, at about 4° C.). Additionally, the rate of oxidation of hemoglobin depends on the hydrogen ion concentration, i.e., the pH. For example, for native human hemoglobin there is a minimum in the interval between pH 7.5 and 9.5. Also, the addition of certain alcohols can diminish the oxidation of hemoglobin. Some of them work even in low concentration. One problem is the toxicity of these alcohols. Certain metal ions (Cu2+, Fe3+ etc.) catalyze the spontaneous oxidation of hemoglobin. They can be rendered ineffective by complexing with EDTA (ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid), although EDTA itself promotes the spontaneous oxidation of hemoglobin. Protection of artificial oxygen carriers against oxidation may further be achieved by the addition of reducing substances. Under certain circumstances they even result in a reactivation of oxidized hemoglobin. EP 0 857 733 describes that hemoglobin may be stabilized by binding a ligand, in particular carbon monoxide, to the oxygen binding site. It was found that such a carbonylhemoglobin can be applied to an organism without de-ligandation and is suitable as an oxygen carrier inside of the blood stream.

Male sterilization is generally accomplished by vasectomy in which the ducts that carry sperm out of the testes (i.e., the vas deferens) are surgically interrupted by ligation and/or by cauterization, thereby stopping the flow of sperm from the testicle to the prostate gland. This procedure requires surgical opening of the scrotum. Ideally, a vasectomy is an outpatient procedure that is desirably completed with mild discomfort for the patient. The patient should then be capable of resuming his normal activities within a reasonable time frame. The majority of cases have this degree of successful results and limited aftereffects. In a significant number of instances, however, prolonged exploration and manipulation accompanied by excessive discomfort both intraoperatively and postoperatively can make the results less than desirable. Complications can arise at least in part because scrotal tissue is highly elastic. Whereas a small amount of bleeding is quickly stopped by the tension that develops in non-elastic tissue, elastic tissue offers little pressure to slow the loss of blood and fluid. Thus, even the slightest amount of persistent bleeding can cause tremendously large hematomas. As a result, and in addition to causing discomfort, the healing process is slowed because of the prolonged time required to reabsorb these fluids and cells, increasing the opportunity for bacterial colonization. In addition, another concern for the surgeon is the elusiveness of the vas deferens. This structure cannot be seen until the later stages of the procedure and must be identified by palpation. Once identified and delivered into the operative field, it must be held in place by some means of fixation. Even a momentary release of the vas allows it to immediately return to within the spermatic cord, from which it must again be extricated. Furthermore, the injection of a local anesthetic into the scrotal skin and the area surrounding the vas makes palpation of the structure difficult. Loss of fixation of the vas can result in the need for increased dissection, and manipulation can cause increased bleeding and swelling. Even the most experienced vasectomy surgeons occasionally encounter these problems. As a result, it would be desirable for a system and method for performing a vasectomy to alleviate these complications. Specifically, it would be desirable for a system and method that allows a medical professional to securely and controllably holding the vas in place and to sterilize a male patient without incising the wall of the patient's scrotum.

Ski bindings are commonly displayed on the premises of manufacturers thereof, and are exhibited in the establishments of dealers supplied with the bindings by such manufacturers. It has been found, however, that the devices for holding and displaying such ski bindings which have previously employed by the vendors thereof, do not satisfy the needs of those engaged in distribution and sale of the bindings. In this regard, more stylishly colored skiing outfits have been popularized in recent times, and as a consequence, ski bindings are being offered in a variety of colors and color combinations designed to complement the ski outfits. As a consequence, and to assist in the selection of bindings having compatible colors, potential buyers prefer to observe the bindings in their position of use on their own, or prospectively selected skis. However, until the discovery of the present invention, this has not been possible with previously known binding display devices.

The present invention relates to a method and a device for stacking flat mailings, the mailings including differences with respect to their format (length, height), their thickness, and their stiffness. Flexible and stiff mailings in large and small formats (e.g.: DIN B4 and small postcards) should be capable of being processed both separately and in a mixture. The mailings of different length, height, thickness and stiffness are transported as individual mailings with a minimum spacing in covering belts and, for the purpose of further processing or for storage, should be aligned in the stack exactly on two edges (front and lower edge). A method and a device for stacking flat mailings is disclosed in DE 27 14 520 A1, wherein an underfloor belt and a stack support detachably connected to the latter being moved away from the stacking point as the stack grows, and the mailings transported to a stacking point by a covering belt system being moved to a stop by means of stacking belts and a stacking roll, forming a stack. A solution was known in which a mechanical limit switch is located directly in front of the stacking roll underneath the stacking belt, projecting geometrically into the stream of letters, and is thus pressed when a mailing moves past it. This limit switch outputs the signal to a driven underfloor belt to move the underfloor belt as long as the switch is pressed. Since the switch is arranged underneath the belt, it is able to detect only the lower region of a mailing. Depending on the skewed position of a mailing, the switch is not touched at all and thus does not output any movement signal to the underfloor belt and, in the other case, the mailing presses permanently on the switch, the underfloor belt moves, together with the mailing, away from the stacking roll, until the switch has reached its initial position again. This type of switch reacts only to a defined stacking force. It is not able to react to the individually detected specifically different mailings. Thus, for all the different types of mailing, there is only a single stacking force within the stack, which is not optimal for all types of mailing. JP 08 259 080 AA discloses the fact that, during stacking, an exact alignment can be achieved if the stack is moved away from the stacking point on the basis of the thickness of the objects, and the speed of this movement is corrected on the basis of stacking forces measured at a plurality of points at the stacking point. JP 08 113 410 AA also teaches controlling this movement on the basis of the thickness and of the stacking force. The goods to be stacked in this case exhibit great differences with regard to their size, thickness and condition. Furthermore, devices for intermediately stacking mailings were known in which the control for moving a stack support is carried out on the basis of a force measurement (DE 1 235 818 A, DE 195 47 292 A) or on the basis of a force and thickness measurement in the case of mailings with relatively small size and thickness differences (U.S. Pat. No. 3,918,704 A).

As the value and use of information continues to increase, individuals and businesses seek additional ways to process and store information. One option for processing and storing information is an information handling system. An information handling system generally processes, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data for business, personal, educational, governmental, or other purposes thereby allowing users to take advantage of the value of the information. Because technology and information handling needs and requirements vary between different users and/or applications, information handling systems may also vary regarding what information is handled, how the information is handled, how much information is processed, stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the information may be processed, stored, or communicated. The variations in information handling systems allow for information handling systems to be general or configured for a specific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing, airline reservations, enterprise data storage, or global communications. In addition, information handling systems may include a variety of hardware and software components that may be configured to process, store, and communicate information and may include one or more computer systems, data storage systems, and networking systems. One type of information handling system is commonly referred to as a server or server system. As suggested by its name, a server system might be described as an information handling system that provides a service to one or more other information handling systems. Server systems include, as examples, application servers dedicated to running specified software applications, database servers that provide database services, file servers that provide file services, web servers that communicate with HTTP (Hypertext transfer protocol) clients to receive and respond to HTTP requests, and numerous other types of servers. Another type of information handling system is commonly referred to as a personal computer, such as a laptop or desktop computer. FIG. 1 shows one example of a prior art information handling system 1 that may be referred to as a desktop computer. Information handling system 1 includes a host 10, a monitor 20, a keyboard 30, and a mouse 32. Information handling system 1 may include any components, devices, and/or peripherals configured to facilitate or support the operation of information handling system 1. Host 10 may be a server, a laptop, and/or any other type of information handling system. Host 10 includes processing resources, e.g., one or more central processing units (CPUs) and storage resources that are accessible to the processing resources. Storage resources may include volatile storage or memory and/or persistent storage, e.g., disk storage, flash memory or other type of erasable read only memory (ROM), and the like. Host 10 may also include various other peripheral or I/O devices known in the field of data processing system design. CPUs and/or other electronic components generate heat as a byproduct of operation. Electronics designers and users may find that using one or more cooling systems associated with an electronics component increases operating speeds and/or efficiency of the components so cooled. Some benefits of increased operating speeds may include, for example, an increase in how quickly and/or efficiently information may be processed, stored, and/or communicated. FIG. 2 depicts a prior art cooling system 2 configured for use with a CPU or processor 40. Cooling system 2 includes a heat sink 50, a fan 60, and a controller 70. Cooling system 2 as shown is a common design used to facilitate heat transfer away from processor 40. In the example shown, heat sink 50 includes a mass with a large heat capacity in comparison to that of processor 40. The large heat capacity facilitates rapid heat transfer from processor 40 into heat sink 50. Heat sink 50 also includes one or more fins 52. Fins 52 create a large surface area which increases the heat transfer from heat sink 50 to the surrounding air. In addition, fan 60 is configured to increase the flow of air across heat sink 50 and fins 52. Increased flow of air, or some other coolant, results in increased heat convection away from heat sink 50 and fins 52. Persons having ordinary skill in the art will recognize that heat sink performance may be improved with a variety of methods, such as increasing the thermal conductivity of heat sink 50, increasing the surface area of heat sink 50 and/or fins 52, and/or by increasing the flow rate of the coolant across heat sink 50 and fins 52. Controller 70 is a component or device configured to control the operation of fan 60 based on the actual temperature of processor 40. In the example shown, controller 70 receives a signal correlating to the temperature of processor 40 as measured by a temperature probe 42. Temperature probe 42 may be a thermocouple or another sensor configured to measure the temperature of processor 40 and communicate the measurement to controller 70. Fan 60 includes a motor 62 configured to rotate fan 60. Controller 70 is configured to provide power to motor 62 (e.g., by controlling a power supply coupled to motor 62). Controller 70 may also be configured to control the speed of rotation of fan 60. In this example, controller 70 may increase the speed of fan 60 in response to an increased temperature measurement provided by temperature probe 42. Increasing the speed of fan 60 increases the flow rate of air forced across heat sink 50 and fins 52. In this manner, controller 70 is configured to increase the heat transfer away from processor 40 if the temperature of processor 40 increases. Typically, processor temperatures are controlled with respect to a specified thermal profile promulgated by the designer of the processor. A thermal profile defines the operating thermal limits of a processor. The purpose of a thermal profile is to ensure optimal operating conditions as well as the long-term reliability of a processor. For example, INTEL propounds up to two different thermal specifications for its processors, including one profile identified as minimizing the chances of processor throttling and one allowing an increased chance of processor throttling in exchange for decreased cooling requirements. Both specifications meet the requirements to support Intel reliability requirements. Typical information handling systems are configured during fabrication to operate their processors within temperatures defined by these or similar thermal profiles. “Processor throttling” refers to a phenomenon sometimes observed when processors operate at increased temperature. Specifically, transistor performance may be slowed at certain raised temperatures because the speed of switch operation is reduced. In addition, prolonged exposure to increased temperature may result in an increased failure rate. Many information handling systems include governors configured to measure throttling effects based on feedback from the processors. The thermal profiles discussed above may include an upper temperature limit calculated to reduce and/or eliminate the chance that a processor will suffer processor throttling. FIG. 3 is a graphical representation of two thermal profiles related to processors such as processor 40 described in relation to FIG. 2. FIG. 3 is a graph of the temperature at the center of a processor (TCASE) versus the power dissipation requirement (Power). The power dissipation requirement defines the amount of power that must be removed from a processor to operate within a given thermal profile. Along the y-axis (TCASE), FIG. 3 depicts a dotted line labeled Tcontrol. As long as TCASE remains at or below Tcontrol, the required power dissipation from the processor is not specified with respect to a thermal profile. When TCASE exceeds Tcontrol, processor 40 is operating within a thermal profile regime. Line A represents a high-reliability temperature profile (Profile A) in which the required power dissipation increases rapidly as TCASE increases. Line B represents a more aggressive thermal profile (Profile B), in which TCASE is allowed to increase more dramatically than the profile represented by Line A. As shown on the y-axis (TCASE), the maximum temperature allowed under Profile A is lower than the maximum temperature allowed under Profile B. Under either profile, the thermal design power (TDP) is a target maximum power dissipation value or requirement for processor 40. Current information handling systems are designed to control any cooling systems, and therefore processor temperature, based on a thermal profile selected at the time the information handling system is fabricated. In exchange for reliability and/or high performance, operation of a cooling system presents its own costs in power consumption, noise, manufacturing complexity, failure modes and/or additional negative consequences. Designers, manufacturers, purchasers and users of information handling systems, CPUs, integrated circuits, microprocessors, and/or any other electronics components may be well served by techniques and apparatus that provide increased performance without the typically attendant negative consequences. Under the current regime, restricting the processor temperature to TCASE,Max instead of a true temperature maximum may reduce the power consumption and cost resulting from a cooling system, but sacrifices some potential performance increase. Power consumption has become an increasingly important aspect or feature of a server system and other information handling system platforms. In any information handling system, cooling systems consume power. It is anticipated that this power consumption will increase as the speed and efficiency of electronics components increases. While the purchase price and installation cost of a system including a cooling system may be a one time financial impact, the total cost of ownership may be greatly affected by the ongoing cost of energy consumed by the system. Any system or method for reducing the power consumption of cooling systems may offer an improvement in the overall performance of information handling systems.

In general, a battery indicates both non-rechargeable primary cells and rechargeable secondary cells (also called rechargeable batteries). Batteries are classified on the basis of the underlying chemical redox reaction, the materials used, the electrical values (for example voltage or capacitance) or the geometric or structural design. Examples include alkaline-manganese batteries, zinc-carbon batteries or lithium batteries. A distinction is also drawn between winding cells and stacked batteries in batteries, depending on their inner construction. In the case of a winding cell, the electrode and separator layers which are arranged one above the other are wound up in a spiral manner and installed, for example, in a round battery with a cylindrical housing. In the case of a stacked battery however, a plurality of electrode and separator layers are alternately stacked one above the other. FIG. 1 shows, by way of example, a stacked battery. As shown in FIG. 1, an anode 10 and a cathode 20 are alternately arranged in the battery, wherein a separator 30 is arranged between the anode 10 and the cathode 20 in each case in order to physically and electrically separate the two electrodes. However, the separator 30 has to be permeable to ions which cause the conversion of the stored chemical energy into electrical energy. Microporous plastics or nonwovens which are composed of glass fiber or polyethylene are usually used for separators 30. The anodes 10 are connected to one another in their arrester regions 40, as are the cathodes 20, with the result that all electrodes of the same kind in a battery are interconnected. A connection lug 50 (see FIG. 2B) for the cathodes 20 and the anodes 10 is mounted in the arrester regions 40 in each case, said connection lug being connected to a corresponding outer voltage pole of the battery. FIG. 2A shows a plan view of a cathode 20 with an arrester region 40. The cathodes 20 are connected to one another in the arrester regions 40 of the cathodes 20 which are arranged one above the other. As shown in FIG. 2B, the connection lug 50 is mounted on the arrester regions 40 which are connected to one another, said connection lug being in contact with the negative pole of the battery after the battery is assembled. Battery electrodes are usually prefabricated as bulk or rolled material from which a desired electrode shape is cut out during production of a battery. As shown in FIG. 3, the electrode material comprises a collector substrate 60 which is provided with a coating film 70. In this case, the electrode material has one or more uncoated arrester regions 40 which are required later in the assembled state in order to discharge voltage or current to the outside. A plurality of electrodes of the same kind are connected to one another at, and a metal connection lug 50 is mounted on, the arrester regions 40. When the collector substrate 60 is coated on both sides, arrester regions 40 are therefore also formed on both sides. In this case, the arrester regions do not necessarily have to be formed opposite one another but can be offset in relation to one another, as shown in FIG. 3. FIGS. 4A and 4B show methods for producing an electrode material by means of a slot die system 300. An ink-like coating film 70 is applied on the strip-like collector substrate 60. This application process can be performed either by discontinuous, intermittent coating, wherein an uncoated arrester region 40 is formed by regular interruption in the coating as shown in FIG. 4A, or by continuous coating, as shown in FIG. 4B. However, forming relatively complex arrester regions using these methods is very complicated. Therefore, masking steps are occasionally used. As an alternative, arrester regions 40 can be exposed on a collector substrate 60 by brushing or similar methods. After coating, the electrode material is calendered in order to compress the coating film and to eliminate cavities which are produced when the coating film 70 is drying. The finished electrode material can then be rolled up and stored until further processing. A desired shape, which is different depending on the type of battery or shape of the battery, is cut out or stamped out of the electrode material in order to produce a battery. When the battery electrode is cut out, it is additionally necessary to ensure that an arrester region 40 must be present. An example of a rectangular electrode shape with an arrester region 40 is shown in FIG. 2A. FIG. 5 shows a flowchart which is used to illustrate the production process of a battery, for example a winding cell or a stacked battery. First, the collector substrate 60 is coated with the coating film 70, for example using an intermittent method (S10), wherein a plurality of uncoated arrester regions 40 are formed by interruption or discontinuation when applying the ink-like coating. The electrode material is then calendered (S20). A desired electrode shape can then be cut out or stamped out of the electrode material (S30), wherein the stamped-out shape has to have an arrester region 40. These steps are performed both when producing the anode 10 and when producing the cathode 20. Next, the stamped-out electrodes are arranged one above the other (S40) such that an anode 10 and a cathode 20 with a separator 30 therebetween are arranged alternately in succession (see FIG. 1). In this case, the arrester regions 40 of the cathodes 20 and the arrester regions 40 of the anodes 10 are in each case arranged one above the other and are connected to one another. A connection lug 50 is then mounted on said arrester regions (S50). In this case, the number of anodes 10 and cathodes 20 which are arranged one above the other can vary depending on the type and property of the battery. After the electrode arrangement is complete, the electrode arrangement is inserted into a housing and the connection lugs 50 are connected to the outer voltage poles of the housing (S60). In the case of a winding cell, the electrode arrangement is also wound up in a spiral manner and inserted into the housing in this state. After the electrolyte is introduced (S70), the cell is then sealed (S80) and finally formed (S90). However, the following problems are encountered in the conventional methods for producing battery electrodes. For example, the production of uncoated arrester regions by masking steps or brushing away the coating is very complex and expensive. In the alternative production method by intermittent or continuous coating with the aid of a slot die system however, the possible shapes and arrangements of the arrester regions on the electrode material are greatly restricted. In view of the various fields of use of batteries, in particular in design products such as mobile telephones, laptops or cars, however, flexibility in respect of the configuration of the battery electrodes is increasingly required. In this case, the trend toward relatively small devices poses a particular challenge to battery production. Firstly, batteries with relatively small dimensions therefore have to be developed, and secondly complex shapes are often required in order to make the most efficient use of the interior of a device as possible. Furthermore, it is difficult to produce regular and clean edge regions between the coating region and the arrester region in the case of an intermittent coating method. Furthermore, it is difficult and expensive to realize a variety of shapes of the electrodes with the conventional methods. For reasons of cost, a rolled material is usually used as the electrode material, possible positions of the uncoated arrester region 40 in relation to the coating film 70 being fixedly defined in said rolled material. As a result however, the degree of freedom of design for the electrode shape is severely restricted because each electrode has to have an arrester region 40. In addition, a large amount of excess electrode material which has to be disposed of is produced when the desired electrode shape together with the arrester region 40 is cut out. If, for example, small electrodes are cut out such that they contain an arrester region 40, regions of the coated substrate which is situated between successive arrester regions 40 can no longer be used when there is a large distance between said successive arrester regions. As a result, material consumption is increased and the production method is more expensive. Furthermore, a dedicated stamping die for stamping out the desired shape has to be created for each desired electrode shape. However, these stamping dies are very expensive on account of the high demands made on cutting quality. In the conventional production methods, the arrester region 40 is formed beforehand by a coated electrode region in order to mount the connection lug 50 on said arrester region and to connect electrodes of the same kind to one another. However, this leads to unutilized space in the battery which is not filled with active electrode material. As a result, the size of the battery is unnecessarily increased and/or an outer shape of the battery is fixed. Furthermore, the arrester regions 40 can be easily contaminated in the conventional production methods or else during storage. Impurities can reach the arrester regions 40 in the case of a calendering process in particular. This has an adverse effect on the quality of an electrical contact between electrodes of the same kind and between the electrodes and an associated connection lug 50. Since the arrester regions 40 are additionally formed before the calendering process during production of the electrode material, calendering is made more difficult on account of the non-uniformly thick structure. In addition, the arrester region 40 which is formed by conventional methods may be poorly defined, wherein particularly an edge region of the arrester region 40 can be formed in an inaccurate and non-uniform manner.

1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a display, or in particular to a display comprising a shift register circuit.

The present invention relates in general to computer databases, and more specifically, to writing or importing data into a database through distributed memory management.

Panels are typically installed over the ceilings and walls of rooms to provide an aesthetically pleasing appearance. Panel materials for such a finished appearance, e.g., wood or metal, do not typically improve room acoustics because the materials are substantially non-sound-absorbing. Such panels have been made more acoustically transparent or sound absorbing by providing holes through the panels, e.g., by providing edge-to-edge grooves on both faces of the panel, thus creating holes at the intersections of the grooves. Another method has been to bore holes through the panels or to bore holes on one face and provide edge-to-edge grooves on the opposite face. When such panels are installed, the back face of the panel is covered edge-to-edge by an expanse of an acoustically absorptive material.

This invention relates to ultrashort optical pulse modulating equipment which permits high multiplexing of optical pulses and, more particularly, to ultrashort optical pulse modulating equipment which affords reduction of optical power loss and of the number of optical components involved. A high-speed optical cell (packet) switch (Optical ATM: Optical Asynchronous Transfer Mode) is now receiving attention as a large-capacity optical switch system of the next generation. FIG. 1 shows an optical signal multiplexer for use in such a high-speed optical cell switch. In FIG. 1 ultrashort optical pulse modulating equipments 21.sub.1 through 21.sub.N yield at regular intervals optical packet signals P.sub.11, P.sub.12, . . . ; P.sub.21, P.sub.22, . . . ; . . . ; P.sub.N1, P.sub.N2, . . . , respectively. The optical packet signals are each composed of a string of a predetermined number of bits, for example, m information bits or optical pulses. The optical packet signals are applied to, for instance, optical fiber delay lines 22.sub.1 through 22.sub.N, respectively, by which they are delayed relative to one another for a fixed time Td a little longer than the packet length as shown at rows A to D in FIG. 2. The optical packet signals of the respective channels, output from the optical fiber delay lines 22.sub.1 to 22.sub.N, are multiplexed by an optical coupler 23, from which are provided such multiplexed optical packet signals P.sub.11, P.sub.21, . . . , P.sub.N1 , P.sub.12, P.sub.22, . . . as shown at row E in FIG. 2. The ultrashort optical pulse modulating equipments 21.sub.1 through 21.sub.N each converts an input electrical signal into an optical packet signal. It is desired, for large-capacity optical switching, that the optical pulse interval in each packet be minimized (about the same as the optical pulse width, for example) to reduce the packet length to thereby increase the number of multiplexing channels. To meet this requirement, there has been proposed such optical pulse modulating equipment as shown in FIG. 3, which produces a modulated optical pulse train of a very short pulse interval. A pulse generator 10, which is supplied with an input electrical signal S composed of information bits of a period T as shown at row A in FIG. 4, regenerates clock signals from the information bits and generates drive pulses Dp of a period mT in synchronism with the clock signals as depicted at row B in FIG. 4. A laser 11 is driven by the drive pulses Dp to generate optical pulses Lp (the same as those shown at row B in FIG. 4), which are applied to an optical splitter 12. The optical splitter 12 splits each optical pulse into channels of the same number m as the bits of each packet, through which the optical pulses are applied to external modulators 13.sub.1 to 13.sub.m, respectively. On the other hand, the information bits of the input electrical signal S are sequentially applied to a shift register 16 having shift stages of the same number as the bits of one packet (i.e. m stages). Upon each application of the information bits of one packet to the shift register 16, outputs of its respective stages are simultaneously provided as modulation signals to the corresponding external modulators 13.sub.1 to 13.sub.m in synchronism with the optical pulses Lp. The external modulators 13.sub.1 through 13.sub.m are each formed by an optical switch, for instance, which modulates the optical pulse in accordance with the modulation signal by passing therethrough or cutting off the optical pulse, depending on whether the modulation signal is high-level or low-level. Assuming, for the sake of brevity, that the modulation signals applied to the external modulators 13.sub.1 through 13.sub.m are all high-level, the modulated optical pulses (all high-level) are applied to optical fiber delay lines 14.sub.1 through 14.sub.m of the respective channels, by which they are sequentially delayed for a time .tau. relative to one another as shown at rows C to F in FIG. 4. The optical pulses thus delayed are multiplexed by an optical coupler 15 into a string of m optical pulses of a constant period .tau. as depicted at row G in FIG. 4. The delay time .tau. is set to, for example, about twice the width of each ultrashort optical pulse Lp. Letting the length of the shortest optical fiber delay line 14.sub.1 be represented by L, the lengths of the optical fiber delay lines 14.sub.1 to 14.sub.m for providing such a relative delay .tau. are L, .tau..multidot.C/n.sub.f, 2.tau..multidot.C/n.sub.f +L, . . . , (m-1).tau..multidot.C/n.sub.f +L, respectively, where C is the velocity of light in a vacuum and n.sub.f is the refractive index of the fiber core. As will be appreciated from comparison of rows A and G in FIG. 4, the train of pulses of the input electrical signal S, which are of the period T, is converted by the optical pulse modulating equipment of FIG. 3 into the train of optical pulses of the period .tau., whereby it is output as an optical packet signal of a packet length m.tau. compressed from the packet length mT of the input electrical signal S. The optical packet signal thus compressed is multiplexed with optical packet signals from other optical pulse modulating equipment as referred to previously in respect of FIGS. 1 and 2. Incidentally, in the optical pulse modulating equipment shown in FIG. 3, since the output optical pulses from the laser 11 are split by the optical splitter 12 into m channels, the power of the optical pulse in each channel is reduced to 1/m the input optical pulse, and consequently, the power level of each optical pulse of the optical pulse string output from the optical coupler 15 is also reduced to 1/m or less. A similar loss also occurs in the optical coupler 15. Moreover, assuming that the number m of bits of each optical packet is m=2.sup.9 =512, it will be necessary to employ 512 external modulators 13.sub.1 to 13.sub.m and 512 optical fiber delay lines 14.sub.1 to 14.sub.m, and consequently, the number of components used is very large, resulting in the optical pulse modulating equipment inevitably becoming bulky. In the case of m=2.sup.9, the optical splitter 12 calls for a tree structure involving 2.sup.9 -1=511 optical splitters (hereinafter referred to as 1:2 optical splitters) each of which splits input light into two, and the optical coupler 15 also calls for a similar tree structure. Letting m=2.sup.n, where n is a positive integer, the number of optical elements needed for forming the optical splitter 12 and the optical coupler 15 is 2.times.(2.sup.n -1)=2.sup.n+1 -2. The larger the numbers of 1:2 optical splitters and 2:1 optical couplers, the more the loss of optical power. Hence, such a large number of optical elements used is not preferable.

Certain applications require various sets of data for testing purposes. While real user data can be used for testing, such data changes slowly and infrequently. As such, non-user data can be generated and used for testing. Conventionally, testing data is generated by hashing and/or cryptography techniques. However, generating testing data by hashing and/or cryptography techniques may be slow and inefficient. Furthermore, in conventional systems, a master copy of a data stream is needed to verify another copy of the data stream. The master copy of the data stream can be compared to the other copy of the data stream to determine whether the values of the data stream to be verified match those of the master copy. However, it may not be feasible and/or too costly to maintain a master copy of each data stream that is to be verified. In some conventional systems, data is automatically compressed before it is sent across a network to potentially reduce the amount of data to be sent over the network. However, it may not be desirable to compress data in certain testing environments in which it is desired to maintain the original size of the data.

This invention seeks to satisfy a recognized need for a newspaper and magazine vending machine of greater simplicity and durability, which is not sensitive to variations in the thickness of the articles being dispensed, such as daily and Sunday newspapers. The invention also seeks to eliminate pilferage of newspapers by dishonest customers, as sometimes occurs with the honor system or with machines based on a semi-honor system, where opening of the vending machine door after inserting proper coins allows more than one newspaper to be lifted out. A further object of the invention is to provide a newspaper vending machine which is reliable and practical, relatively inexpensive to manufacture, rugged and durable, and whose vending mechanism can be installed in new or existing vending machine cabinets. Other features and advantages of the invention will become apparent during the course of the following detailed description.

(a) Field of the Invention The present invention relates to vacuum cleaners, and particularly to a waste recycle vacuum cleaner for generating power, wherein waste gas from the vacuum cleaner is recycled as a dynamic power to drive a driving device and to dissipate the heat of the motor. (b) Description of the Prior Art In the prior art, a vacuum cleaner 10 has a dust collecting chamber. A filter and filter frame is installed between the motor fan and the dust collecting chamber so that dirt or dusts can be filtered and then collect in the chamber, but the waste gas is exhausted out directly. Thereby, in the prior art, the designers concerns the absorbing force of the motor, exhausting direction of waste gas and reduction of noise, but the recycle of waste gas is not considered as an improved item.

Digital radio, or digital audio broadcasting (DAB), is a method for transmitting digital quality audio signals to digital radio receivers. In-Band On-Channel (IBOC) transmission is a broadcasting technology characterized by the transmission of digital signals in the existing AM and FM spectrum and according to existing station assignments. A digital radio transmission scheme that uses IBOC transmission can be expected to deliver compact disc quality sound at the existing FM radio dial positions. Similarly, a digital radio system that uses IBOC transmission for AM radio can be expected to deliver FM quality sound. IBOC digital radio transmission involves generating a digitally modulated signal that will exist on the same frequency as an existing analog station. Several digital modulation schemes are available. For example, audio sub-band digital coding techniques can be used to compress the digital content of the signal to fit within the frequency mask of each station frequency. Audio coding algorithms or schemes can also be based on acoustic measurements as a method for identifying those portions of the audio transmission that are inaudible to the is human ear and need not be transmitted As a result, the coding algorithms can sample the signal and delete the inaudible portion, thereby permitting significant audio compression and conservation of bandwidth without degrading audio quality. Because of the data compression of the coding algorithms, the compressed signal can occupy the available bandwidth of the AM and FM spectrums. In this manner, the available bandwidth can be used as a data channel. A plot of a frequency mask as a function of power (dB) versus frequency (Hz) is wider at the bottom than it is at the top. Because a digital signal can be transmitted at lower power than an analog signal, the digital signal can occupy the wider, bottom part of the frequency mask without interfering with adjacent stations or signals. For example, the FM IBOC digital radio signal can occupy the sidelobes of the FM mask and the analog FM signal can occupy the frequency space between these sidelobes. In the case of AM radio, the AM IBOC signal can employ frequency separation and quadrature modulation to avoid interference with the analog AM signal. Advantages of digital transmission for audio include better improved quality, less noise, and, a wider dynamic range, as compared with existing AM and FM radio. In addition to improved audio quality, IBOC digital audio broadcasting also provides for the transmission of data. Although FM subcarriers are now used to deliver data for many applications, IBOC digital audio broadcasting subsystems can accommodate larger amounts of data with greater reliability. Furthermore, prior to IBOC digital audio broadcasting, there has been no such capability in the AM band. Since the data may be audio or video, potential applications for data include station data such as call sign, format, artists and song titles, as well as music videos, images, news, financial and stock market data, paging, e-mail, dispatching, computer communications, and networking However, digital radio still possesses some of the shortcomings of traditional AM/FM radio. The user of a digital radio receiver can listen to or view the content of a digital radio transmission only at the time the content is being broadcast and only in the location where the user has physically placed the digital radio receiver. Not only is the user of a digital radio receiver limited in terms of the location in which he may listen to or view digital radio content, but he may only hear or view a portion of the available content depending on the time when he tunes his receiver to the selected channel. These shortcomings can be addressed by exploiting the advantages presented by digital radio's use of a digital, rather than analog, signal, namely, the ease of transmitting and storing digital information or content. With the development of digital transmission and storage of music, video and other content, the owners of such content have become increasingly concerned with copyright infringement for several reasons. In a digital environment, content can be transmitted in digital quality from one entity to the next without any degradation in quality. Therefore, a need has arisen for a system which exploits the advantages of digital radio in conjunction with digital storage devices, while providing adequate protection for the copyright interests of digital radio content providers.

1. Field of the Invention The present invention concerns a method for generation of an angiographic image using magnetic resonance technology in which the contrast of vessel structures is intensified by a contrast agent. The invention also concerns a magnetic resonance apparatus for implementing such a method. 2. Description of the Prior Art Magnetic resonance technology has been increasingly used for generation of angiographic images since, relative to other medical imaging methods (such as, for example, radioscopy with x-rays or computed tomography) it exhibits, among other things, the advantage that patient and medical personnel are subject to no radiation exposure. Magnetic resonance (MR) technology is a known technique with which images of the inside of an examination subject can be generated. The examination subject is positioned in a comparably strong, static, homogeneous basic magnetic field (field strength of 0.2 Tesla to 7 Tesla and more) in an MR apparatus so that the nuclear spins in the object become oriented along the basic magnetic field. To excite nuclear magnetic resonances, radio-frequency excitation pulses are radiated into the examination subject, the excited nuclear magnetic resonances are measured and MR images are reconstructed based on these nuclear magnetic resonances. For spatial coding of the measurement data, rapidly-switched gradient fields are superimposed on the basic magnetic field. The acquired measurement data are digitized and stored as complex number values in a k-space matrix. An MR image can be reconstructed by a multi-dimensional Fourier transformation from the k-space matrix populated with such data values. Since MR enables a soft tissue contrast that can be adjusted in many ways, it is also used in angiography since the imaged contrast can be selected such that vessel structures can be made differentiable from surrounding tissue. In order to increase the diagnostic significance of MR angiogram, a contrast agent (for example based on gadolinium) is often used. The contrast agent is injected into a vessel system of a patient so that it highlights the vessel system relative to surrounding tissue after subsequent propagation. The propagation speed of the contrast agent depends on the vessel system to be examined and on the pathologies present therein. When the contrast agent diffuses, it is primarily located in arterial vessels during a first phase (known as the arterial phase) while venous vessels are not yet filled with the contrast agent. Only in a second phase (known as the equilibrium phase) has the contrast agent distributed enough so that it is located both in the arteries and in the veins of the vessel system. The arterial phase typically lasts some seconds until it is replaced by the equilibrium phase. An angiography image in which both the arterial portion and the venous portion of the vessel system are imaged in a comparable manner is typically hard for a user to assess with regard to detecting pathologies, since the superimposition of arterial and venous structures often makes the pathologies to be detected unrecognizable. In the production of an angiogram it is therefore typically insured to that either purely arterial images or purely venous images are generated. Given the generation of an angiogram by contrast agent-supported MR technology, a further problem occurs in the representation of the arterial phase. Since the MR technique requires relatively long image data acquisition times that can exceed the duration of the arterial phase of the contrast agent passage, it is often not possible to be able to complete the acquisition of the measurement data within the arterial phase, such that various methods exist that divide the measurement data to be acquired in different ways. U.S. Pat. No. 6,556,856 discloses a method for generation of a time-resolved MR angiogram in which a time-resolved series of MR images with low resolution is acquired during the arterial phase and high-resolution MR images are acquired in the subsequent equilibrium phase. Low resolution and high resolution MR images are combined after subsequent segmentation of the low resolution temporal series of MR images and the high resolution MR images. The segmentation of the low resolution MR images ensues by a comparison of the temporal intensity curve of individual voxels of the low resolution series of MR images relative to their contrast ratio, using reference curves whose determination in turn requires a manual intervention of a user. In total the method requires both a manual intervention by a user and elaborate post-processing steps after an acquisition of the measurement data. The need therefore exists to further improve contrast agent-supported MR angiography methods.

The process of supercritical solvent extraction of carbonaceous materials such as oil shale, tar sand, coal and the like is well known and has received considerable attention in the literature. A major problem in the development of the process is the mechanical feeding of extractable materials, particularly extractable solid materials continuously into a high pressure extraction zone and after extraction the removal of the remaining solids from a high pressure zone.

1. Field This application generally is directed to multimedia data processing, and more particularly, to encoding video using post-decoder processing techniques. 2. Background There is an ever-increasing demand for transmitting high-resolution multimedia data to display devices, for example, cell phones, computers, and PDA's. High-resolution, a term used herein to indicate a resolution required to see certain desired details and features, is needed for optimum viewing of certain multimedia data, for example, sports, videos, television broadcast feeds, and other such images. Providing high-resolution multimedia data generally requires increasing the amount of data sent to a display device, a process that requires more communication resources and transmission bandwidth. Spatial scalability is a typical method used to enhance resolution where high resolution information, particularly high frequency data, is encoded and transmitted as an enhancement layer to a base layer of lower resolution data. However, spatial scalability is inefficient since such data has noise-like statistical characteristics and has poor coding efficiency. Additionally spatial scalability is highly restrictive since the up-sampling resolution is pre-determined at the time the enhancement layer is created/encoded. Accordingly, other methods are needed to overcome the deficiencies of spatial scalability and other resolution enhancement methods known in the art.

1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to fluidic mixing devices and more particularly to an elongate mixing device used in conjunction with a fluid dispensing gun. In many manufacturing processes it is necessary to completely mix and blend particulate solids, liquids or gases. However, a problem is presented when it is desired to mix materials having different viscosities, especially those materials having high viscosities which diffuse slowly. For instance, in the wood products industry and more particularly in plywood manufacturing, it is necessary to fill knotholes or other imperfections in plywood panels with a mix of resin and catalyst. It is imperative that the resin and catalyst be completely mixed before being used as a knothole or wood defect filler. Furthermore, it is necessary in the plywood manufacturing industry to use a mixing device which may be readily disassembled and cleaned due to the fact that resin and catalyst set up or harden very quickly. If a mixing device is not flushed with a solvent after discharge of the resin and catalyst, residue may harden and prevent further discharge through the device. Thus, it becomes necessary that the fluidic mixer must be constructed of components easily disassembled. 2. Description of the Prior Art A static mixing device is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,865,352. A mixing tube for mixing a plurality of fluids during their passage through the tube contains a hollow tube packed with shaped pieces, each of the pieces having a disk having at least one projection perpendicularly attached thereto. It is necessary that a plurality of shaped pieces be packed into the tube and it is readily apparent that some difficulty would be experienced in removing the shaped pieces if they became lodged within the tube due to hardening of mixed mterials. Also, it is apparent that a shaped piece could possibly work its way to an outlet nozzle of the tube to inadvertently plug up the nozzle. It is to be appreciated that applicant's invention utilizes a one-piece spiral rod which may be readily removed from a tube and which further will not impede flow through a discharge nozzle. While not describing a mixing device per se, U.S. Pat. No. 2,020,194 discloses an arrangement for producing a helical flow of flue gases within a tube by providing an extended helical guide member within a pipe. The height of the helical guide member may be smaller than the radius of the pipe cross-sectional area and permits a flue gas traveling down the pipe to move somewhat in a whirl. However, it is to be noted that such a helical device would not adequately mix fluidic components because the helix is wound in a manner to provide an open region extending the length of the tube substantially in the middle of the helix. Thus, it becomes apparent that if fluidic components were introduced into one end of the tube, portions of the components could travel down the open region extending along the length of the tube and not be subjected to mixing agitation. A static type foam mixing head to provide a polyurethane foam is set forth in U.S. Pat. No. 3,361,412. Here, a body member having a central chamber is provided in which a series of baffle structures permit expansion of foam before the foam issues from the outlet of the tube. It is to be noted that the baffle structures are generally circular in cross section and do not premit for passage of fluidic components along their outer peripheries between the inside diameter of the tube. Further examples of mixing devices are described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,286,992 and 3,664,638. Both of these mixing devices employ a tube in which are disposed a plurality of serially arranged curved elements, each constructed of a thin flat sheet having a width approximately equaling the inner diameter of the tube and each having a length preferably 1.25 to several times its width. Each of the curved elements is twisted so that its upstream and downstream edges are substantially flat and arc at a substantial angle to each other.

Single-site catalysts are known. They can be divided into metallocenes and non-metallocenes. Metallocene single-site catalysts are transition metal compounds that contain cyclopentadienyl (Cp) or Cp derivative ligands. Non-metallocene single-site catalysts contain ligands other than Cp but have similar catalytic characteristics to the metallocenes. The non-metallocene single-site catalysts often contain heteroatomic ligands, e.g., boraary, pyrrolyl, azaborolinyl, indenoindolyl and quinolinyl. Aluminoxane compounds are activators for single-site catalysts. There are many ways to make aluminoxane compounds. For instance, aluminoxanes can be produced by contacting a trialkylaluminum compound with water. See U.S. Pat. No. 5,041,585. Commonly used aluminoxane is methyl aluminoxane (MAO) or its derivatives. Methods for modifying aluminoxanes are known. For instance, U.S. Pat. No. 6,340,771 teaches modifying MAO with sugar to make “sweet” MAO. Also, U.S. Pat. No. 5,543,377 teaches modifying aluminoxane compounds with ketoalcohols and β-diketones. Single-site catalysts produce polyolefin having narrow molecular weight distribution. The uniformity of molecular weight distribution of single-site polyolefin, although improving tensile strength and other physical properties of polymer products, makes the thermal processing difficult. Many methods have been developed to improve processability of single-site polyolefin. U.S. Pat. No. 6,127,484, for example, teaches a multiple-zone, multiple-catalyst process for making polyethylene. The polymer produced has a broad molecular weight distribution and improved processability. New methods for modifying aluminoxane compounds are needed. Ideally, the method would be inexpensive and easy to practice. Particularly, the modified aluminoxane would increase molecular weight distribution and improve the processability of single-site polyolefin.

1. Technical Field The present disclosure relates to automatic pumps for tires and more specifically to pumps that use changes in orientation due to tire rotation and gravitational force to drive pumps to automatically inflate tires. 2. Introduction Tires are a critical part of modern transportation. However, proper tire inflation is an important factor in the safety, efficiency and cost of using tires. Neither underinflation nor overinflation is an optimal condition for tire longevity or safety. Overinflation can lead to unsafe wear patterns, lower traction and increased potential for a catastrophic failure or blowout of the tire during otherwise normal operation. Underinflation lowers the fuel efficiency of tires, increases wear, lowers the tire sidewall (lateral) stiffness making the tire less safe and increases the potential for catastrophic failure or blowout of the tire during otherwise normal operation. All rubber-based, modern tires lose some amount of gas due to the natural porosity of rubber. These porosity losses can be minimized by using larger air molecules (Nitrogen) than air. However, the porosity losses are only reduced, not eliminated. Temperature can also affect tire inflation. Under higher temperatures, the tire pressure increases, while under lower temperatures, the tire pressure decreases. One solution is for users to manually check tire inflation periodically, but this is a difficult task, requires training and significant user time. Further, some portion of the user population will never check their tire inflation due to inconvenience, regardless of the benefits that proper inflation provide. Tire inflation is a problem that many drivers do not care enough about to invest the time to check or correct until the problem is so bad that the tire, and consequently the vehicle, become undrivable, or unsafe. An automatic approach to tire inflation that does not require end-users, i.e. the drivers of these vehicles, to spend time and effort would be significantly preferable.

1. Field of Invention The present invention relates to frames, mounts and/or bezels for packaging sealed flat-glass assemblies and for mounting such glass assemblies in end products, and to flat-glass assemblies for such frames, mounts or bezels. The flat-glass assemblies may be, for example, plasma, liquid crystal (LCD) or organic light emitting diode (OLED) display panels, in particular frit-sealed OLED display panels, or OLED lighting products. 2. Description of Related Art Producing flat glass panel assemblies for plasma, LCD and OLED displays involves many challenges. A key requirement for such processes is the ability to package and mount the display panels in an end device in a manner that balances cost, performance, and durability. Displays based on organic light emitting diode (OLED) technology are particularly sensitive to many factors, such as to the diffusion of oxygen and moisture into the OLED display. In order for an OLED display panel to have a satisfactory lifetime, it must be hermetically sealed to prevent incursion of oxygen and moisture into the display panel, or must include getter material within the panel to absorb moister that does leak into the display. One method for sealing an OLED display panel assembly is to seal the perimeter of the cover glass plate to the perimeter of the backplane glass plate with an epoxy or other polymeric adhesive. Such a polymeric seal is not hermetic and requires a getter material to be included within the display panel to absorb moisture that leaks through the polymeric sealing material, driving up the cost of manufacturing the display panel. A method for hermetically sealing an OLED display panel, and thereby eliminating the need for getter material, is to seal the perimeter of the display panel or to encapsulate the OLED material with a glass frit sealing material. Glass frit is brittle, and is therefore susceptible to fracturing when the display panel is subjected to mechanical shock or bending, potentially breaching the hermetic seal. Impact and bending stresses may also cause or propagate a flaw along the edges of the glass plates of the assembly 1, which may eventually propagate into the frit-seal barrier and allow the penetration of moisture and oxygen into the assembly. Thus, there is a need to increase the structural integrity and durability of a frit sealed display panel or other glass assembly, by making it more resistant to mechanical shock and bending. To protect against mechanical shock and bending, and other factors undermining the hermetically sealed glass panel's structural integrity, the assembly is typically packaged in a bezel, mount or frame, or combination of more than one of these, that provides a support structure and a protective shell for the glass assembly. As plasma, LCD and OLED display panels, and other hermetically sealed glass packages, continue to become larger with advances in technology and decreases in manufacturing cost, there is a need to further improve the packaging technology for such hermetically sealed glass assemblies.

1. Field of the Invention This invention relates generally to an exercise machine, and is particularly concerned with an exercise machine which has a pivoting user support providing two directions of pivoting movement. 2. Related Art Exercise machines with pivoting user supports typically provide for movement in one direction or plane about one pivot axis. Some abdominal exercise machines have a raised seat assembly which has an upper torso engaging structure that allows the exerciser to bend forwardly into a simulated crunch position against a variable resistance. One such machine is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,186,926 of Ellis. In these machines, there may be some difficulty for the user in maintaining their body in the same position during the exercise movement. Therefore, what is needed is a system and method that reduces or overcomes these significant problems found in the conventional systems as described above.

1. Field Disclosed herein is a purification media comprising a rigid porous polymeric block having an exterior surface and an interior surface, and containing porous, polymeric fabricated to have a wall that is thin, and a pressure drop between the exterior surface and the interior surface that is low, when compared to conventional commercial carbon purification blocks. In particular embodiments, the rigid porous polymeric block is desirably coupled with an additional material disposed on the exterior or interior surface thereof and in particular with a nonwoven fabric containing, an active material, such as aluminum-containing fibers or particles. These aluminum-containing particles or fibers may be in the form of metallic aluminum, alumina, aluminosilicates, or combinations of these. The purification media is suitable for purifying fluids, such as water, thereby removing one or more contaminants from the fluid and for reducing scale formation in equipment in contact with such purified water. 2. Description of Related Art Diarrhea due to water-borne pathogens in unsafe drinking water is a worldwide problem for many people, particularly in developing countries and emerging economies. While a number of different technologies are available for purifying water, most of these involve some form of mechanical filtration or size exclusion. Such techniques typically involve the use of submicron filters to remove pathogens. These filters, in turn, require elevated water pressure, particularly for point-of-use (POU) water filters, where clean water is expected to flow from a supply source within seconds of being turned on. Various purification media have been proposed that use blocks of activated carbon particles, zeolites, metal oxides, and other materials. Often, these materials purify fluids by one or more mechanisms, including size exclusion, physical entrapment, or chemical reaction of the contaminants. The latter two mechanisms generally require some physical interaction between the active purification elements (e.g., carbon particles) within the purification media and the contaminant-containing fluid to be purified. The particles of active purification elements may be dispersed within, or agglomerated by, a binder of some sort, typically a polymeric binder. The design of these media is complex and difficult, typically requiring trade-offs between properties such as the activity of the filtration media in removing contaminants and the pressure drop of fluid across the purification media. For example, decreasing the average particle size of particles in the purification media may increase their activity in removing contaminants by increasing the specific surface area of the particles that is exposed to contaminant-containing fluid. However, such an approach may result in increased pressure drops across the purification media, which actually decreases the flow rate of fluid that may be purified using the purification media. This can lead to the need for multiple filtration systems in order to purify a commercially acceptable amount of fluid. Other design problems include balancing the need for structural integrity of the purification media under fluid pressure with the need for fluid to be able to penetrate the purification media and come into contact with the active purification elements therein. The need to reduce pressure drop across the purification media is particularly acute in filtration systems that are to be used in developing countries and/or countries with emerging economies. Such systems are often used where the available water pressure is extremely low, typically only a fraction of the water pressure that is generally available in developed countries. For example, municipal water pressure in Mexico City is generally 14-16 psi. Water pressure in Mumbai is generally 12-16 psi. The availability of a low pressure drop purification media would allow for water purification at available water pressures in developing countries without the need to use additional energy pumping the water to a pressure that is generally available in developed countries. For example, water purification media for use in refrigeration systems, such as residential and commercial refrigerators and freezers containing water lines, ice makers, and the like, generally require purification media that are capable of processing large amounts of water over a significant period of time without the need to change the filter frequently. A relatively low pressure drop in such systems is desirable in emerging economies because of the low water pressure generally available in such countries. For example in a commercial point of use water purification in the U.S., the available water pressure is typically around 60 psi. However, purification media designed for use under such pressures would not provide adequate water flow in, e.g., Brazil, where the typically available water pressure is from 7-15 psi. Similarly, a purification media that is designed to require a water pressure of 60 psi to produce adequate flow would be unsuitable for use in a water line in a refrigerator in these countries, because water at a much lower pressure is generally all that is available. At least part of the reason for the inability of conventional water purification systems to operate effectively under low water pressure conditions is the higher design pressure drop noted above. However, this high pressure drop is not simply a function of the design parameters of conventional purification media, but is a function of the particular active purification materials used therein. For example, purification media containing activated carbon derived from coal and the like according to conventional methods and used in conventionally designed purification media would yield a purification media that provides little or no water flow at a water pressure of 10 psi. In this regard, conventional purification media that are designed to remove bacteria from water and are rated at 0.2 micron will not provide adequate flow (if any) at a inlet pressure of 10 psi. Another reason for the lack of effectiveness of conventional carbon block filters in emerging economies is the high water turbidity often encountered there. This can be due to a number of factors, and may be associated with the presence of pathogens or other contaminants in the water which should be removed to render it safer. While a combination of a pleated filter element and a carbon block filter has been proposed in U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2004/0206682. However, the arrangement suggested therein places the pleated filter element around the outer surface of the carbon block filter, so that incoming water encounters the pleated filter block prior to encountering the carbon block filter. Such an arrangement results in clogging and/or exhaustion of the pleated filter with contaminants, resulting in insufficient water flow through the filtration system. While not wishing to be bound by theory, it is believe that an alternative to impaction and sieving is electrokinetic adsorption, where the media is charged and particles opposite to that charge are attracted and adsorbed. Membranes have been modified to provide some electropositive functionality, but none appear to be suitable for low pressure operating. Examples of such materials are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,838,005; 7,311,752; 7,390,343; and 7,601,262. These materials, when used as water filtration media, have been found by the present inventions to be unsuitable for low pressure use, despite any suggestions to the contrary in the above cited documents. The present inventors have found that, even at low input pressures, the materials are subject to unsuitable amounts of compression and distortion, so that they are ineffective for practical use. In addition, the solution to this problem suggested by the patentees (placing multiple layers of the fabric in series) results in a significant pressure drop (e.g., 80% of incoming water pressure), making the material unsuitable for a low pressure installation. In addition, the extra layers of nonwoven fabric substantially increase the cost of this proposed solution. The nonwoven fabrics are disclosed to contain nanoalumina fibers. Attempts to use microbiological interception filters are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,913,154 and 6,959,820. However, these attempts use a so-called silver-cationic material-halide complex. Such a complex is difficult and expensive to prepare and use. Another problem typically occurring in water supply systems and in circulating water systems relates to the formulation of mineral scale. Dissolved solids in the water can precipitate onto surfaces of water processing equipment, interfering with the operation of such equipment. For example, heat exchange surfaces in contact with water having mineral solids dissolved therein can become fouled as mineral scale deposits thereon, interfering with the designed heat transfer characteristics of the surface, and rendering a heat exchanger containing such a surface less efficient. Mechanical filtration is of limited usefulness in addressing such problems, as the main cause of scale is typically solids dissolved in the water, rather than suspended solid particles. Accordingly, there remains a need in the art for a purification media that can provide purification of fluids, such as water, by removing significant quantities of contaminants while the purification system is processing water at significant flow rates with a low pressure drop across the purification media. Such a system must be able to process large quantities of water without clogging or substantially increasing in pressure drop. Similarly, there remains a need for a water purification system that reduces or eliminates scale formation in equipment used to process water, including water supplied at low input pressures. In addition to the need for filters that function at low water pressures, there is a need for purification systems that are sufficiently small that they can be incorporated into the water supply lines in household appliances, such as refrigerators, dishwashers, laundry washers, and the like.

Symptoms of abnormal heart rhythms are generally referred to as cardiac arrhythmias, with an abnormally rapid rhythm being referred to as a tachycardia. The present invention is concerned with the treatment of tachycardias which are frequently caused by the presence of an "arrhythmogenic site" or "accessory atrioventricular pathway" close to the inner surface of the chambers of a heart. The heart includes a number of normal pathways which are responsible for the propagation of electrical signals from upper to lower chamber necessary for performing normal systole and diastole function. The presence of arrhythmogenic site or accessory pathway can bypass or short circuit the normal pathway, potentially resulting in very rapid heart contractions, referred to here as tachycardias. Treatment of tachycardias may be accomplished by a variety of approaches, including drugs, surgery, implantable pacemakers/defibrillators, and catheter ablation. While drugs may be the treatment of choice for many patients, they only mask the symptoms and do not cure the underlying causes. Implantable devices only correct the arrhythmia after it occurs. Surgical and catheter-based treatments, in contrast, will actually cure the problem, usually by ablating the abnormal arrhythmogenic tissue or accessory pathway responsible for the tachycardia. It is important for a physician to accurately steer the catheter to the exact site for ablation. Once at the site, it is important for a physician to control the emission of energy to ablate the tissue within the heart. Of particular interest to the present invention are radiofrequency (RF) ablation protocols which have proven to be highly effective in tachycardia treatment while exposing a patient to minimal side effects and risks. Radiofrequency catheter ablation is generally performed after conducting an initial mapping study where the locations of the arrhythmogenic site and/or accessory pathway are determined. After a mapping study, an ablation catheter is usually introduced to the target heart chamber and is manipulated so that the ablation tip electrode lies exactly at the target tissue site. Radiofrequency energy or other suitable energy is then applied through the electrodes to the cardiac tissue in order to ablate the tissue of arrhythmogenic site or the accessory pathway. By successfully destroying that tissue, the abnormal signal patterns responsible for the tachycardia may be eliminated. The mapping and ablation procedures require means to locate the catheter, especially the tip section of said catheter, to the exact site of the arrhythmogenic sources. The conventional method uses x-ray fluoroscope to image the location of the catheter. While x-ray imaging is quite successful, some patients, such as the pregnant women, the fluorophobic patients and the like, can tolerate little x-ray exposure. It is imperative that other imaging means be used to locate the catheter within the body of a patient. Ultrasound imaging has been used extensively to reveal the existence of a device having the ultrasound emitter. In the U.S. Pat. No. 4,794,931, there has been disclosed a catheter and system which can be utilized for ultrasonic imaging. However, there is no disclosure on the technique of using ultrasound locating means to generate the three-dimensional location data. Based on recent advances in computer data analysis capability, the speed of analyzing the data obtained from a 3-D ultrasound locating system becomes feasible. While an electrophysiology mapping and/or ablation procedure using an existing catheter has had promising results under x-ray imaging, reduction or elimination of x-ray exposure becomes a clinical need and a health issue to certain types of patients undergoing the catheter-based treatment. Therefore there is a need for an improved catheter system having ultrasound locating capabilities.

It is known that acute infections of the bronchial system differ fundamentally from chronic bronchitis. The cause of chronic bronchitis is not yet sufficiently clarified. For this reason, the World Health Organization defines chronic bronchitis as a disease that progresses at least over a period of two years with coughing and expectoration throughout at least three months of this period and on most days of the week. Three forms can be differentiated from each other in the course of the disease. First there is an increased production in the bronchial system with productive coughing, then recurrent bacterial super-infections often ensue and finally flow impediments develope in the bronchi and bronchioles resulting in a chronic-obstructive bronchitis. Pre-examinations have shown that a rise of the tissue histamine can be observed in inflammatory changes of the tracheobronchial system. The possibilities of medicinal intervention in the histamine metabolism are manifold: (a) For one, they exist with the known H.sub.1 and H.sub.2 receptor antagonists, which, howerver, as recognized, were not very successful in the treatment of acute or chronic lung diseases, specifically also of Asthma bronchiale (Ulmer et al., Reinhardt, Reinmann et al., 1982). (b) Secondly, administering mast-cell membrane stabilizers that have found their permanent place in asthma therapy (Altunyan, 1981, Cox, Davis, Pepys et al., 1981). (c) Thirdly, by intervention in the construction of histamine by blocking the conversion of histidine into histamine. The long-term administration of histidine decarboxylase blockers leads to a decrease of the tissue histamine also by test persons with healthy lungs (Reimann et al., 1982). In the past various pharmaceutical compositions that intervene in the histamine metabolism were applied in the treatment of acute infections. Thereby, however, it was shown that blocking the histamine at the receptor does not lead to success.

There is always a risk that, e.g., a dishwasher and/or a washing machine overflows. If this happens when the owner is not at home, the entire home can be flooded resulting in enormous damages. Other appliances that could overflow are, e.g., an oil boiler or a water softening plant. Thus, such problems are encountered not only by house owners and landlords, but also by manufacturers and business owners. Insurance companies are very strict in their disbursements and the insured party must usually be able to show all due care. Thus, if the insured party would like to run the appliance unguarded, it could result in a very costly experience.

1. Field of the Invention The present invention generally relates to a keypad assembly for an electronic device, and in particular, to a keypad assembly in which key buttons of the electronic device each include at least one optical filtering layer that changes the color of an input light wavelength by reacting or not reacting to the light wavelengths generated from at least two light emitting devices. 2. Description of the Related Art Generally, a “portable communication apparatus” refers to an electronic apparatus which provides electrical communication between users and service providers. As examples of the portable communication apparatus, there are HHPs (hand held phones), CT-2 cellular phones, digital phones, PCS (personal communication service) phones, and PDAs (personal digital assistants). Conventional portable communication apparatuses may be classified in various types according to their appearance. For example, wireless terminals are classified into bar-type wireless terminals, flip-type wireless terminals, and folder-type wireless terminals according to their appearance. The conventional portable terminals are equipped with antenna devices, data input/output devices, and data transmission/reception devices. As the data input/output devices, keypads allowing data input through a finger press task are generally used. A keypad used for data input includes a plate-shaped elastic pad, a plurality of key buttons on the top surface of the elastic pad, having characters printed thereon, and a plurality of protrusions on the bottom surface of the elastic pad. The portable terminals generally include a plurality of (typically 15-20) light emitting devices for backlighting the key pad. FIG. 1 is a cross-sectional view of a conventional keypad assembly 1. The keypad assembly 1 includes a keypad 2, a switch board 3, and a plurality of Light Emitting Diodes (LEDs) 4. The keypad 2 includes an elastic pad 2a that is made of a flexible material (e.g., rubber) and is plate-shaped, a plurality of key buttons 2b that are formed on the top surface of the elastic pad 2a and has numbers and characters printed thereon, and a plurality of protrusions that are formed on the bottom surface of the elastic pad 2a. Each of the protrusions 2c is arranged at the center of each of the key buttons 2b and a plurality of grooves 5 may be formed in the bottom face of the elastic pad 2a. The grooves 5 are arranged around the protrusions 2c in such a way to avoid interference caused by the LEDs 4 and the protrusions 2c. The switch board 3 includes a plate-shaped Printed Circuit Board (PCB) and a plurality of dome switches 3a formed on the top surface of the PCB facing the keypad 2. The LEDs 4 are amounted on the top surface of the PCB and are positioned to be covered by the grooves 5 of the elastic pad 2a. If a user presses one of the key buttons 2b, a portion of the keypad 2 under the pressed key button 2b is transformed towards the switch board 3 and thus the protrusion 2c included in the transformed portion presses the dome switch 3a. A contact member 6 included in the dome switch 3a electrically contacts the protrusion 2c. For operations of the dome switches 3a, the LEDs 4 cannot be positioned under the key buttons 2b. Since a light A1 output from each of the LEDs 4 passes through the elastic pad 2a and illuminates each of the key buttons 2b in the form of a square, the illumination of the key button 2b is non-uniform and dark. If a large number of LEDs 4 are installed to uniformly and brightly illuminate the key buttons 2b, power consumption increases. Moreover, due to a large number of parts, the time required for the assembly of a terminal and manufacturing cost of the terminal increase. To address the problems, a keypad assembly including a light guide plate and reflecting patterns has been developed as shown in FIG. 2. FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view showing a light guide plate 20 and a plurality of reflecting patterns 40 in a conventional keypad assembly 10. Referring to FIG. 2, the keypad assembly 10 includes the light guide plate 20 through which a light moves, a plurality of key buttons 30 that are formed on the top surface of the light guide plate 20 and have numbers and characters printed thereon, the reflecting patterns 40 that are formed on the bottom surface of the light guide plate 20 and reflect the light A1 moving through the light guide plate 20 towards the key buttons 30, protrusions 50 under the reflecting patterns 40, a plurality of light emitting devices 70 that provide the light A1 to the light guide plate 20, and a switch board 60 including dome switches 80. The single light guide plate 20 is provided for the illumination of the entire key buttons 30. As such, the entire key buttons 30 can be illuminated using the light guide plate 20, but the numbers and characters printed on the key buttons 3 cannot be separately illuminated. As a result, the utility of the numbers and characters of the key buttons 30 may be degraded in some modes of the terminal.

Wireless access systems have been widely deployed to provide various types of communication services such as voice or data. In general, a wireless access system is a multiple access system that supports communication of multiple users by sharing available system resources (a bandwidth, transmission power, etc.) among them. For example, multiple access systems include a Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) system, a Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) system, a Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) system, an Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) system, and a Single Carrier Frequency Division Multiple Access (SC-FDMA) system.

Bicycles have been used for recreation, transportation, and sporting competition for decades, and can be found in all types of environments (e.g., urban, suburban, and rural). What started out as a relatively simple assembly of components has evolved into more complex forms as bicycles have been adapted from general use (e.g., transportation, exercise) to more specific niches (e.g., Olympic-style track racing, BMX-style racing, cross-country cycling, etc.). As bicycle use has changed, the cycling industry has adapted and improved various components of the bicycle in order to meet the evolving needs of the cycling public. A bicycle rear derailleur is one such component. The purpose of a rear derailleur is to assist in changing the speed of a bicycle by selectively moving a bicycle chain between gears of a cassette located near a rear wheel of the bicycle. A typical rear derailleur has a base member connected to the bicycle near the rear wheel, a chain cage (or chain guide) engaging the bicycle chain, and a movable member connecting the base member and the chain cage so as to move the chain guide laterally relative to the base member. Movement of the chain cage moves the bicycle chain between the gears of the gear cassette. A rider is able to shift gears due to a shift control device (or shifter) mounted on or near the bicycle's handlebar. One end of a control cable running down the length of the bicycle is connected to the shift control device and the other end of the control cable is connected the rear derailleur. The shift control device adjusts the amount of tension on the control cable. The shift control device allows the rider to pull (increase tension) or release (decrease tension) the control cable. An increase or decrease in tension on the control cable determines the direction on the gear cassette in which the bicycle chain moves (i.e., from lower gear to higher gear or from higher gear to lower gear). Increasing tension on the control cable causes the chain cage to laterally move in one direction relative to the base member (which, in turn, moves the bicycle chain in that same direction), while releasing tension on the control cable causes the chain cage to laterally move in another direction relative to the base member (generally the opposite direction the chain cage moves in when tension is increased). Thus, the chain cage (and bicycle chain) can be moved laterally by increasing or decreasing tension on the control cable. During use, a bicycle can be ridden over a variety of surfaces and terrains including, without limitation, smooth surfaces (e.g., paved surfaces), rough surfaces (e.g., dirt roads, off-road terrain), and the like that can subject the bicycle to various conditions including, without limitation, bouncing, vibration, and the like. There may be hazards including, without limitation, potholes, rocks, and the like. These various conditions and hazards can impact the bicycle in various ways including, without limitation, causing a bicycle rider to crash, causing the bicycle chain to become disengaged from the gear cassette, causing the control cable to become disconnected from the rear derailleur, or the like. For example, when the bicycle is moving on a rough surface, uncontrolled movement of the chain cage can result in the chain cage moving back and forth between the direction of chain tensioning and in the opposite direction. This can result in the bicycle chain bouncing to the extent the bicycle chain becomes disengaged from the chain cage and/or the gear cassette. Different types of rear derailleurs have been proposed that can move a bicycle chain between gears of a cassette. However, such rear derailleurs have their limitations and can always be improved. Accordingly, there is a need for an improved rear derailleur that can move a bicycle chain between gears of a cassette. There is also a need for a rear derailleur that can mitigate the effects of various conditions and hazards that can impact engagement of the bicycle chain and the rear derailleur. There is an additional need for a rear derailleur that is easier to manufacture, assemble, adjust, and maintain. The present invention satisfies these needs and provides other related advantages.

The present invention relates to a zoom lens barrel unit of a zoom lens camera or other similar device and a viewfinder of a zoom lens camera. More specifically, the present invention relates to a zoom lens barrel unit which is more compact in the retracted position and a viewfinder of a zoom lens camera in which a zoom lens barrel unit is made more compact through the provision of a smaller cam ring for detecting the degree of zooming. One example of a conventional zoom lens of the prior art is disclosed in Japanese Patent Publication Laid-Open No. 306808/1989. The structure and operation of that conventional zoom lens is bulky both in length and diameter than is desired. This result exists because the inside of the barrel unit in this disclosure has cam grooves required for operation. Also, a moving mechanism is made of several pieces, at least one of which that is required for zoom operation. A further conventional zoom lens camera which conducts a zooming operation interlockingly with the zooming of a photographic optical system is described, for example, in Japanese Patent Publication Laid-Open No. 207731/1989. A viewfinder of such a conventional zoom lens camera sits on the cam in the barrel so that the viewfinder will move with the cam. This requires that the cam groove be extended to have a length corresponding to the maximum axial movement of the viewfinder. This requires a longer barrel member than is desired. The present invention seeks to remedy these drawbacks of the prior art, allowing for the manufacture of a zoom lens which is more compact in the retracted position and a viewfinder of a zoom lens camera in which the zoom lens barrel unit is made more compact through the provision of a smaller cam ring used for detecting the degree of zooming.

A variety of regulatory molecules, known as cytokines, have been identified including interleukin-13 (IL-13). Various protein forms of IL-13 and DNA encoding various forms of IL-13 activity are described in McKenzie et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 90:3735 (1993); Minty et al., Nature 362:248 (1993); and Aversa et al., WO94/04680. Thus, the term "IL-13" includes proteins having the sequence and/or biological activity described in these documents, whether produced by recombinant genetic engineering techniques; purified from cell sources producing the factor naturally or upon induction with other factors; or synthesized by chemical techniques; or a combination of the foregoing. IL-13 is a cytokine that has been implicated in production of several biological activities including: induction of IgG4 and IgE switching, including in human immature B cells (Punnonen et al., J. Immunol. 152:1094 (1994)); induction of germ line IgE heavy chain (.epsilon.) transcription and CD23 expression in normal human B cells (Punnonen et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 90:3730 (1993)); and induction of B cell proliferation in the presence of CD40L or anti-CD40 mAb (Cocks et al., Int. Immunol. 5:657 (1993)). Although many activities of IL-13 are similar to those of IL-4, in contrast to IL-4, IL-13 does not have growth promoting effects on activated T cells or T cell clones (Zurawski et al., EMBO J. 12:2663 (1993)). Like most cytokines, IL-13 exhibits certain biological activities by interacting with an IL-13 receptor ("IL-13R") on the surface of target cells. IL-13R and the IL-4 receptor ("IL-4R") sharing a common component, which is required for receptor activation; however, IL-13 does not bind to cells transfected with the 130 kD IL-4R (Zurawski et al., supra). Thus, the IL-13R must contain at least one other ligand binding chain. Cytokine receptors are commonly composed or two or three chains. The cloning of one ligand binding chain for IL-13 has been recently reported (Hilton et al., Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. 93:497-501). It would be desirable to identify and clone the sequence for any other IL-13 binding chain of IL-13R so that IL-13R proteins can be produced for various reasons, including production of therapeutics and screening for inhibitors of IL-13 binding to the receptor and receptor signaling.

Due to the increasing attention to terrorist activities, there has been increased interest in providing more effective and more efficient systems for inspecting cargo at points of entry and to identify contraband, particularly explosive and fissionable material. While the smuggling of contraband onto planes in carry-on bags and in luggage has been a well-known, on-going concern, a less publicized but also serious threat is the smuggling of contraband across borders and by boat in large cargo containers. The development of systems for large container content control has gone in two different directions. 1. The first direction is a follow-on to X-ray machines, with high-energy (2.5 to 9 MeV) radio frequency (RF) electron linear accelerators (linac) generating bremsstrahlung radiation. In an RF linac, an electromagnetic wave is used to accelerate charged particles. There are two types of RF linac: traveling wave and standing wave. The traveling wave linac is a circular waveguide with diaphragms which slow the speed of the wave down to the speed of particles being accelerated. The speed of electrons with energy above 0.5 MeV is about speed of light. The standing wave linac is a chain of coupled cavities with the length of each close to half the wavelength of electromagnetic wave. Most electron RF linacs operate at a wavelength of 10 to 10.5 cm (i.e., a frequency of 2998 to 2856 MHz), and this wavelength band is named S-band. To accelerate the electron beam to 10 MeV in a traveling wave linac, its length must be 2.2 to 2.5 m, and it is necessary to install a solenoid above the waveguide for particle focusing. The standing wave linac for the same beam energy is about two times shorter and does not require the focusing solenoid; however, the RF source must be protected from reflected wave by the high power circulator. In both types of linacs, to produce an accelerating field, 2.5 to 3 MW of pulsed RF power must be spent, and about 1 to 1.5 MW RF power will be transferred to the beam, so the total RF power necessary for a cargo inspection linac is 3.5 to 4.5 MW. By decreasing the length of the electromagnetic wave, e.g., going to C-band (5.5 to 25 cm), the linac length and the RF power required to produce an accelerating field are decreased, approximately 2 and 1.5 times respectively. The RF linac generates bremsstrahlung radiation. Bremsstrahlung (or braking radiation) is produced when electrons hit the so-called bremsstrahlung target. To generate the maximum number of photons, the target is made of a heavy element material with high melting temperature, e.g., tungsten or tantalum, with a thickness 1.5 to 2 mm. At 10 MeV, 8 to 10% of the electron energy is transformed to the energy of the X-ray radiation. The energy spectrum of the generated X-ray radiation is continuous, with the end-point energy equal to the electron energy and the number of photons increasing with the decrease in energy. The X-ray energy spectrum can be hardened using so-called energy filters—a light element absorber installed after the bremsstrahlung target. A 2.5 to 9 MeV RF linac generating bremsstrahlung radiation permits detection of the variation of the high energy X-ray absorption or scattering factor across the container area and thus reconstructing an image of the container's contents. Currently, more than one hundred systems based on this technique are installed, mainly at seaports, worldwide and are used to detect contraband. 2. The second direction is based on more complicated processes, including nuclear processes—slow and fast neutron capture and scattering, high-energy monochromatic X-ray absorption, photonuclear reactions, and delayed neutron registration. Methods being developed do not aim to reconstruct details of the container content, but rather to produce an alarm signal if explosive or fissionable material is present in the container. Although early installations based on slow neutron capture were developed and installed at airports in 1980s, no commercial product currently is capable of operating with low levels of false alarms and high output. The main reasons for that are the low cross-section (probability) of the nuclear reactions, resulting in low levels of response signal; the absence of the probing particle sources with appropriate parameters; and the limited capabilities of the particle detectors. In most cargo inspection systems operating over the world (except some Chinese systems), the installation is a system based on the first direction discussed above using a machine marketed as Lintron-M, made by Varian Medical Systems. This machine was initially developed for medicine and defectoscopy and has been widely used for many years. It is produced in variants with different fixed electron beam energies of 1.9, 3, 6, and 9 MeV. The size and weight parameters for the 9 MeV machine are: HeightWidthLengthWeight(cm)(cm)(cm)(kg)Accelerating head6430142150Modulator1229276150RF source3461107136Cooling/thermoregulating51716275Control18483010 As can be seen from the first row of this table, the volume occupied by the Linatron-M accelerating head is 6.4 m 3.0 m 14.2 m=273 m3. The Linatron-M producing a 9 MeV beam requires about 5 MW klystron. Recently, a development of the first direction has been proposed in which two different energy electron linacs, operating in alternation, would generate two end point energy bremsstrahlung X-ray radiation illuminating the same part of the container. The different dependence of the X-ray absorption or scattering cross-section on energy for different elements is the basis for recognition of the light or heavy elements content anomaly, e.g., nitrogen in explosives or plutonium in fissionable materials.

The blood glucose level is an important marker for diabetes. As for an examination for diabetes, other than a clinical examination performed in a hospital laboratory or the like, a simple determination (point-of-care testing (POCT)) such as a simple examination by a medical staff member or the like or a self-examination by a patient himself or herself is performed. This simple determination is performed using a glucose diagnostic kit or a determination device (POCT device) such as a biosensor, and in such a POCT device, conventionally a glucose oxidase has been used. However, such a glucose oxidase is affected by a dissolved oxygen concentration and an error in the measured value is caused. Therefore, it is recommended to use of a glucose dehydrogenase which is not affected by oxygen. Examples of the glucose dehydrogenase include a coenzyme-unconjugated glucose dehydrogenase which requires nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD) or nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADP) as a coenzyme and a coenzyme-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase which requires pyrroloquinoline quinone (PQQ), flavin adenine dinucleotide (FAD) or the like as a coenzyme. Among these, the coenzyme-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase has advantages that the enzyme is less likely to be affected by impurities as compared with the coenzyme-unconjugated glucose dehydrogenase, the determination sensitivity is high, and further, in principle, the POCT device can be produced at low cost. However, a conventional PQQ-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase has low stability and also has a disadvantage that it reacts also with maltose and galactose. Maltose is a sugar used in an infusion, and when the PQQ-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase reacts with maltose, a blood glucose POCT device displays a higher blood glucose level than the actual value. Due to this, a patient administers an unnecessary insulin injection to the patient himself or herself, resulting in the occurrence of a hypoglycemic event such as impaired consciousness or comatose states, which has been a big problem. In particular, as for the current use of the blood glucose POCT device, not only it is used for simply determining the blood glucose, but importance as a means for self-care and self-treatment by a patient is increasing and the use of a self-monitoring of blood glucose (SMBG) device to be used for the purpose at home is expanding. Therefore, the demand for determination accuracy is considered to be very high. In fact, an official notice to draw attention about the use of a blood glucose meter using an enzyme requiring PQQ as a coenzyme was issued from the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare in Japan in February 2005 to patients under administration of maltose infusion or dialysate containing icodextrin (Pharmaceutical and Food Safety Bureau Notice No. 0207005 issued on Feb. 7, 2005, etc.). On the other hand, as the coenzyme-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase which catalyzes the dehydrogenation reaction of glucose and requires FAD as a coenzyme, an Agrobacterium tumefaciens-derived enzyme (J. Biol. Chem. (1967) 242: 3665-3672), a Cytophaga marinoflava-derived enzyme (Appl. Biochem. Biotechnol. (1996) 56: 301-310), a Halomonas sp. α-15-derived enzyme (Enzyme Microb. Technol. (1998) 22: 269-274), an Agaricus bisporus-derived enzyme (Arch. Microbiol. (1997) 167: 119-125, Appl. Microbiol. Biotechnol. (1999) 51: 58-64), and a Macrolepiota rhacodes-derived enzyme (Arch. Microbiol. (2001) 176: 178-186) have been reported. However, these enzymes oxidize a hydroxy group at the 2- and/or 3-position of glucose, have a high activity for maltose, and have a low selectivity for glucose. Further, a coenzyme-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase derived from Burkholderia cepacia having a high activity for maltose in the same manner is also known. However, an original naturally occurring enzyme is a heterooligomer enzyme comprising three kinds of subunits: α, β, and γ, and is known as a membrane-bound enzyme. Therefore, there are problems that a lysis treatment is required for obtaining this enzyme, simultaneous cloning of a necessary subunit is required for exhibiting a sufficient activity by cloning, and so on. On the other hand, the present inventors have purified a novel soluble coenzyme-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase which requires FAD as a coenzyme and is not a membrane-bound type from Aspergillus terreus (Patent document 1). This coenzyme-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase described in Patent document 1 has unprecedented excellent properties that it oxidizes a hydroxy group at the 1-position of glucose, has excellent substrate (glucose) recognition performance, is not affected by dissolved oxygen, and also has a low activity for maltose (the activity for maltose is 5% or less and the activity for galactose is also 5% or less with the activity for glucose taken as 100%). However, the coenzyme-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase described in Patent document 1 is isolated and extracted from a liquid culture of a wild-type microorganism (such as a microorganism belonging to the genus Aspergillus), and the production amount thereof is limited. Besides the fact that the production amount of the enzyme is extremely small, a large amount of sugars are linked to the enzyme, and the enzyme is in the form covered with sugars which are different from N-linked or O-linked sugar chains bound to a common enzyme (which might be called “a sugar-embedded enzyme”). Therefore, the activity of the enzyme is difficult to detect (the enzymatic activity is low), the sugar chains cannot be enzymatically or chemically removed, and as a result, in electrophoresis, almost no staining is achieved by common protein staining (coomassie brilliant blue G-250 or the like), and also it is difficult to read amino terminal and internal amino acid sequences of the enzyme which provide information necessary for acquiring a gene from the enzyme subjected to a common purification procedure. Accordingly, it is not publicly known that the cloning of a gene of this enzyme was successful or the expression of the activity of this enzyme was confirmed. On the other hand, the existence of a coenzyme-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase derived from Aspergillus oryzae was suggested in 1967 (Non-patent document 1). However, only partial enzymatic properties were revealed, and although a property that the enzyme does not act on maltose was suggested, there has been no detailed report with respect to the coenzyme-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase derived from Aspergillus oryzae since then, and also there has been no subsequent report with respect to a coenzyme-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase derived from other microorganisms or an enzyme which oxidizes a hydroxy group at the 1-position of glucose, and also no report with respect to the amino acid sequence or gene of the coenzyme-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase has been found at all. Further, an idea of using a glucose dehydrogenase EC 1. 1. 99. 10 in glucose determination (see Patent document 2) is known, however, an FAD-conjugated glucose dehydrogenase has not been produced at a practical level, and the enzyme has not been actually used in a sensor or put into a practical use. The reason is considered that the activity of this enzyme in microbial cells was very low, and even if the enzyme was secreted to the outside of microbial cells, the amount thereof was very small, and moreover, the enzyme was covered with a large amount of sugars, and therefore the activity was low, and even the detection thereof was difficult, and thus the gene thereof could not be cloned. Patent document 1: WO 2004/058958 Patent document 2: JP-A-59-25700 Non-patent document 1: Biochem. Biophys. Acta., 139, 277-293, 1967

Over the years, there has been an increase in telemarketing with negative affects on consumers and general public who may have felt at a disadvantage receiving unsolicited calls from entities not readily identifiable to them. In response, there have been increased government regulation and compliance requirements such as Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and Telemarketing State Registry (TSR). In particular, TCPA mandates that outbound telemarketing calls must show (for example, on a consumers' caller ID) an unblocked working number that can be called during normal business hours. Outbound telemarketing calls must also provide consumers with an option for Do-Not-Call request. Non-compliance with these regulations has resulted in severe fines. On the other hand, TSRs (such as, for example Wisconsin State Registry) require that an entity (e.g., a company) making outbound telemarketing calls report every phone number (branch, extension, personal, cellular, or home) used on behalf of the entity to a state resident for purposes of solicitation. In some states, such reports are required to renew a state business license. Accordingly, processes implemented to address the increased telemarketing regulations must include dial tone testing for verification of compliance for every new installation of a phone line, “dial tone installation,” that can be potentially used for telemarketing. Conventional processes implemented to ensure compliance with the telemarketing regulations suffer from various drawbacks including, for example, errors associated with manual data intervention for audit purposes, and high costs due to the need to continuously monitor and confirm compliance for every “dial tone installation”. Accordingly there is a need for dial tone verification systems and methods that will provide accurate and efficient means for documenting activities that help manage risk, monitor status, and enforce compliance for the national directive of the Do-Not-Call Implementation Act, registries that support the FCC Telemarketing Sales Rule (TSR), the FTC Telephone and Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), and the requirements of Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX).

The semiconductor industry has progressed into smaller technology node processes in pursuit of higher device density, higher performance, and lower costs. One process for improved device performance includes creating an epitaxy region for the source/drain for enhanced transistor device performance. The epitaxy region provides a strained region that enhances carrier mobility. Typically isolation regions such as shallow trench isolation (STI) features are used to separate adjacent n-type and p-type transistors. However, the STI feature may cause the epitaxially grown material to form a facet at or near the STI edge (or sidewall). These unwanted facets can impact subsequent processing including, for example, the formation of a contact. For example, silicide, which is typical of contact formation, may be improperly formed on the epitaxy region. Such problems may lead to device performance issues including increases in leakage currents. Therefore, what is needed is a device and method providing for reduced and/or eliminated facet-formation.

The present invention relates to polyolefin derivatives, and an electrophotographic photoconductor which comprises a photoconductive layer containing at least one of the polyolefin derivatives. Examples of photoconductive materials for use in conventional photoconductors for use in electrophotography are selenium, cadmium sulfide, and zinc oxide. In an electrophotographic process, a photoconductor is first exposed to corona charges in the dark, so that the surface of the photoconductor is electrically charged uniformly. The thus uniformly charged photoconductor is then exposed to original light images and the portions exposed to the original light images selectively become electroconductive so that electric charges dissipate from the exposed portions of the photoconductor, whereby latent electrostatic images corresponding to the original light images are formed on the surface of the photoconductor. The latent electrostatic images are then developed by the so-called toner which comprises a colorant, such as a dye or a pigment, and a binder agent made of a polymeric material; thus visible developed images can be obtained on the photoconductor. Fundamental characteristics required of the photo conductor for use in electrophotography are: (1) to a predetermined potential in the dark; (2) minimum electric charge dissipation in the dark; and (3) quick dissipation of electric charges upon exposure to light. While the above-mentioned inorganic photoconductive materials have many advantages over other conventional photoconductive materials, they also have several shortcomings. For example, a selenium photoconductor, which is widely used at present and sufficiently meets the above-mentioned requirements (1) to (3), has the shortcomings that its production conditions are difficult and, accordingly, its production cost is high. Further it is difficult to work it into the form of a belt due to its poor flexibility, and it is so vulnerable to heat and mechanical shock that it must be handled wit the utmost care. Cadmium sulfide photoconductors and zinc oxide photoconductors are prepared by dispersing cadmium sulfide or zinc oxide in a binder resin. Therefore they are so poor in mechanical properties such as surface smoothness, hardness, tensile strength and wear resistance that they are not suitable as photoconductors for use in plain paper copiers in which the photoconductors are used in quick repetition. Recently, varieties of the organic electrophotographic photoconductor have been proposed to cover the shortcomings of the inorganic photoconductor, and some of them are in fact put to practical use. Representative examples of the organic electrophotographic photoconductor are an electrophotographic photoconductor comprising poly-N-vinylcarbazole and 2,4,7-trinitro-fluorene-9-one (U.S. Pat. No. 3,484,237), a photoconductor in which poly-N-vinylcarbazole is sensitized by a pyrylium salt type dyestuff (Japanese Patent Publication No. 48-25658), a photoconductor containing as the main component an organic pigment (Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 47-37543), and a photoconductor containing as the main component an eutectic crystalline complex made of a dye and a resin (Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 47-10735). Although the above-mentioned organic electrophotographic photoconductors have many superiorities for practical use compared with other conventional photoconductors, they do still not satisfy all the requirements of the electrophotographic photoconductor.

1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to image-encoding methods, image-decoding methods, image-processing methods available for encoding, transmitting and accumulating images, especially regional images showing the occupancy region of a projective image of a substance, and devices thereof. The present invention relates to a motion vector-detecting device used for image encoding and format transformation such as a frame frequency transformation, an image-encoding device for transmitting and recording images with a little encoded volume, and an image-decoding device. The present invention relates to image-encoding methods for transmitting and accumulating images with a smaller encoded volume, and a device thereof. 2. Related Art of the Invention Conventionally, when images are synthesized by computer graphics and the like, information relating to the opacity(transparency) of a substance referred to as xe2x80x9ca valuexe2x80x9d, other than the luminance of the substance are required. The xcex1 value is determined for every pixel, and the xcex1 value of 1 means non-opacity, and the xcex1 value of 0 means complete opacity. Namely, when an image of a certain substance is embedded in the background, an image having the xcex1 value is necessary. Hereinafter, the images having such xcex1 values are referred to as xe2x80x9cxcex1 planexe2x80x9d. Incidentally, the xcex1 value has an intermediate value of [0, 1] in the case of substances such as clouds, frosted glass and the like, but in many substances, it tends to have two values of {0, 1}. Encoding of the xcex1 plane may be conducted as direct enumeration of the pixel value, however, when the xcex1 plane is composed of two values of {0, 1}, binary image-encoding techniques MH, MR, MMR encoding which are the international standard by CCITT and used conventionally for facsimile and the like may be used. These are named generally as xe2x80x9crun-length codingxe2x80x9d. In the run-length coding, pixel number of horizontally or horizontally/vertically continuous 0 and 1 is entropy-coded to perform coding efficiently. Furthermore, taking notice of the contour of substance boundary, positional informations of each pixel constituting the contour may be coded. In the present specification, encoding of the contour of substance boundary is hereinafter referred to as contour encoding. As typical contour encoding, there can be mentioned a chain enconding (described in H. Freeman: xe2x80x9cComputer Processing of line drawing dataxe2x80x9d, Computing Surveys, vol. 6, no. 1, pp. 57-96, (1974)). In an image having a simple contour of the substance boundary, the value of xcex1 plane can be encoded highly efficiently by chain-coding the group of each pixel constituting the contour of the region having the xcex1 value of 1. Considering the visual characteristics affected by the decoded result of xcex1 plane, there has been a defect in that in the above-mentioned run-length coding method and the chain coding method and the devices thereof, since encoding/decoding are carried out for every pixel, patterns of {0, 1} are coded/decoded accurately more than required from the view point of human visual characteristics, though it is not necessarily required to decode the pattern of {0,1} accurately, thereby a large coded volume becomes necessary. Namely, concretely explained, in a general image synthesizing, a processing to mix the image with the color value of the background image referred to as xe2x80x9canti-aliasingxe2x80x9d is performed in the vicinity of boundary of the image to be synthesized. This is equal to smooth the xcex1 value in the vicinity of the substance boundary, considering the xcex1 value to be a gray scale of [0, 1] equivalently. Namely, in the image such as xcex1 plane, the space resolution is not so required. Instead, the amplitude resolution becomes necessary in the vicinity of the substance boundary. In the conventional run-length coding and chain coding, there has been a problem in that since they are reversible coding, the space resolution is more than necessary from the view point of visual characteristics, thereby a large coded volume becomes necessary. Furthermore, there has been conventionally proposed a method to encode dynamic images by resolving the dynamic image into layer image, as shown in FIG. 31, in order to efficiently perform opacity and recording of the dynamic image, by J. Wang and E. Adelson. According to the literature xe2x80x9cLayered Representation for Image Sequence Codingxe2x80x9d by J. Wang and E. Adelson, Proc. IEEE Int. Conf. Acoustic Speech Signal Processing ""93, pp. V221-V224, 1993, and xe2x80x9cLayered Representation for Motion Analysisxe2x80x9d by J. Wang and E. Adelson, Proc. Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition, pp. 361-366, 1993, in which this method is disclosed, the image processings of from (1) to (3) described below are performed: (1) A region described by the same motion parameter (in the conventional case, affine transformation parameter) is extracted from the dynamic images. (2) A layer image is formed by superposing the same motion region. Each layer image is expressed by the opacity and luminance for every pixel showing the occupancy of the superposed region. (3) The upper and lower relations in the eyes"" direction between layer images are examined and sequenced. Here, the affine transformation parameter means the coefficient of a0-a5 shown in Expression 1, when the horizontal/vertical position in the image is assumed to be (x, y), and the horizontal/vertical component of the motion vector is assumed to be (u, v). (u(x,y), xcexd(x,y))=(xcex10+xcex11x+xcex12y, xcex13+xcex14x+xcex15y) xe2x80x83xe2x80x83(1) It is known that the motion of the projective image of a rigid body located with a sufficient distance from a camera can be approximated by the affine transformation parameter. They utilize this to synthesize dynamic images of from several tens to several hundreds of frames, while transforming several kinds of layer images composed of one frame by the affine transformation. The informations required for transmitting and recording this dynamic image are only the image which is the base of deformation relating to each layer image (hereinafter referred to as xe2x80x9ctemplatexe2x80x9d), the affine transformation parameter, and the upper and lower relations of each layer image, therefore, recording and opacity of the dynamic image can be performed at a very high coding efficiency. In addition, the template is expressed by the opacity and the luminance for every pixel showing the occupancy of the region, for the image synthesis. in the dynamic image expression by J. Wang and E. Adelson, the projective image deals with only the motion of a rigid body which can be described by the affine transformation. Therefore, their dynamic image expression cannot cope with the case where the motion of the projective image cannot be described by the affine transformation. For example, when a person shown in FIG. 31 conducts a motion of non-rigid body, if the camera-substance distance is small and the nonlinear item of perspective transformation cannot be ignored, it cannot be applied thereto. Moreover, their technique to determine the motion of projective image as the affine transformation parameter is composed of processings of two stages described below: 1. To determine a local motion vector at respective positions on the screen by a method based on the relational expression of space-time gradient of the luminance that the time change of the luminance can be approximated by the space luminance gradient and the inner product of the motion vector (B. Lucas and T. Kanade: xe2x80x9cAn Iterative Image Registration Technique with Anaplication to Stereo Visionxe2x80x9d, Proc. Image Understanding Workshop, pp. 121-130, April 1981). 2. To determine the affine transformation parameter by clustering the obtained motion vector. In the above-mentioned technique, however, it cannot be applied when there is a bit motion in the dynamic image such that the relational expression of the time-space gradient of the luminance cannot be realized. Furthermore, in the two-staged method to predict the affine transformation parameter from the obtained motion vector, there is caused a large prediction error when the motion vector which is the base of the parameter prediction is wrong. The motion vector is indefinite, in the region where there is no luminance change, or in the region composed of one-directional luminance change even if there is a luminance change. In the above-mentioned two-staged prediction technique, a special processing is required for the motion vector in these uncertain regions. Collectively, the following problems 1 and 2 are not solved. Problem 1: Efficient encoding of images (template) having luminance and opacity having irregular deformation Problem 2: Strong prediction of the affine transformation parameter Furthermore, in the conventional image-encoding methods and the devices thereof, for example, there is a method or a device described in CCITT Recommendation H.261. FIG. 37 is a block diagram showing the structure of the image-encoding device and the decoding device based on this H.261, wherein reference numeral 70 represents an predicted image-forming means, 71 represents a motion vector-detecting means, 72 represents a differential device, 73 represents a waveform-encoding means, 74 represents a waveform-decoding means, 75 represents an adder, 76 represents a frame delay means, 77 represents a Huffman encoder, 78 represents a Huffman decoder, 79 represents a waveform-decoding means, 80 represents an adder, 81 represents a frame delay means and 82 represents an predicted image-forming means. The image-encoding device and image-decoding device constituted as described above will now be described. First, the motion vector-detecting means 71 detects a motion vector having a minimum sum of the differential absolute value with the decoded image of the previous frame, with respect to the block composed of 16xc3x9716 pixels (referred to as a macro block) of the input image. The predicted image-forming means 70 forms an predicted image, by inputting this motion vector and the decoded image of the previous frame. The differential device 72 outputs the differential image of the input image and the predicted image (hereinafter referred to as xe2x80x9cprediction error imagexe2x80x9d or xe2x80x9cresidual difference imagexe2x80x9d). The waveform-encoding means 73 subjects this differential image to the discrete cosine transform DCT with regard to blocks composed of 8xc3x978 pixels, to transform the image to the DCT coefficient corresponding to the frequency, and the Huffman encoder 77 subjects this to the variable-length encoding. In order to make the predicted images formed on the encoding side and on the decoding side identical, the waveform-decoding means 75 has the same structure with that of the waveform-decoding means 79 on the decoding side, to perform the inverse discrete cosine transform (IDCT) and reconstruct the prediction error image. The adder 75 adds this to the present predicted image to form the image reconstructed on the decoding side. This image is delayed by the frame delay means 76 and used for the prediction of the next frame. On the decoding side, DCT coefficient is decoded by the inverse Huffman encoder 78, thereafter, respective blocks perform the same movements as those of blocks having the same name on the encoding side, thereby the image is reconstructed. As described above, in the encoding mode between frames of the encoding device based on H.261, when the current frame image is encoded, the predicted image of the present frame is made as a motion-compensating image from the image of the previous frame by the block correlation method (hereinafter this processing is referred to as xe2x80x9cmotion compensationxe2x80x9d), and the prediction error image of this motion compensation image and the present frame image is encoded. In this encoding device, when the motion-compensating image coincides with the previous frame without error, the volume of the information to be transmitted is only for the motion vector, thereby the image can be transmitted with a small encoded volume. Moreover, even if there is any movement in the dynamic image, when it is a simple movement or a local movement, the difference between the predicted image and the input image becomes small, thereby the dynamic image can be encoded with a smaller encoded volume compared to the case where the encoding within the frame is performed without utilizing the correlation between frames. By the way, H.261 is a specification of the image-encoding method and device recommended for the purpose of transmitting the image having a size of length and breadth of at least 144xc3x97176 pixels or so with the encoded volume of about 64 kilobits/sec. When the image having the same size is tried to encode at an encoding speed of about 20 kilobits/sec., the DCT coefficient has to be quantized roughly. Thereby, the mosquito noise caused in the vicinity of the edge because a strong edge cannot be expressed by the DCT coefficient, and the block noise generated in the block boundary due to the difference between the average luminance levels of DCT blocks are perceived as a visual disturbance. In H.261, the accuracy against the motion of the motion compensation is performed by the unit of one pixel. And in the recent dynamic image-encoding technique, it is performed with the motion accuracy of xc2xd pixel. When the motion of a substance takes an integer value of the pixel, the predicted image ideally coincides with the input image without error. Actually, however, it is not generally that the motion takes the integer value of the pixel, and even if the accuracy of motion is increased (for example, to xc2xd pixel accuracy of xc2xc pixel accuracy), the input pixel value is predicted by the interpolation or extrapolation of the pixel value in the vicinity thereof, thereby the prediction error in an impulse form is generated in the vicinity of the edge, even if the motion prediction is correct. This is shown in FIG. 34. Referring to FIG. 34(a), the input image moves horizontally toward the right while being deformed. Referring to FIG. 34(b), the predicted image is square, and the position of xe2x80x9cBxe2x80x9d on the left edge is wrongly predicted due to the deformation. On the contrary, the portion xe2x80x9cAxe2x80x9d on the right edge coincides roughly. In the portion xe2x80x9cAxe2x80x9d, however, though a visually appropriate predicted image is formed by the motion compensation, there is caused a prediction error which is subjected to the residual difference encoding, which becomes the factor to make the whole encoded volume large. Here in the drawings, (g), (h) and (i) express the luminance level cutting the input image, the predicted image and the residual difference image by A-B. This problem cannot be solved even if the waveform encoding means 73 is replaced by other transformation encoding means such as a sub-band coding. Finally, selection of a portion where even if it is not a portion to be actually subjected to the residual difference encoding, it does not cause visual deterioration becomes a problem. This is not limited to H.261, but is a common problem for the methods and devices to encode the residual difference image by forming predicted image based on a certain image. In the example of FIG. 34, the portion xe2x80x9cBxe2x80x9d obviously requires the residual difference encoding, but in the portion xe2x80x9cAxe2x80x9d, the residual difference encoding is not required under a limited encoding speed. Then considering said conventional problem of the encoded volume, the object of the present invention is to provide image-encoding methods, image-decoding methods, image-processing methods and the devices thereof which can reduce the encoded volume compared to the conventional methods and devices, while suppressing the visual deterioration by adding the visual characteristics. That is an image encoding method of the invention comprises: dividing an image into blocks containing a plurality of pixels; extracting a block where pixels with different values mingle in the same block, among said divided respective blocks; obtaining a positional information for identifying a position on said image, of said extracted block and subjecting the positional information to a contour encoding; and subjecting a pixel pattern in the block to be subjected to said contour encoding to a waveform encoding. Further the present invention intends to solve problems 1 and 2 and to offer devices of image encoding device, decoding device and motion vector detecting device for encoding and decoding efficiently the image of luminance opacity constituting hierarhchical images separated in a direction of the front and back relation on the axis of eyes. That is an image encoding device of the first invention for solving the problem 1, comprises a predicting means for predicting an image of a luminance and an opacity for an image which is a subject to be encoded, by using a correspondence between partial regions from a reference image composed of a luminance and an opacity and an inputted image series composed of a luminance and an opacity of a substance, a prediction coding means for encoding the correspondence between the partial regions in said predicting means as a prediction code, an error operational means which determines a difference of the luminance and the opacity between said predicted image and said image to be encoded, as the error image, and an error coding means for encoding said error image as an error image code, and wherein said image series are transmitted as the error image code and the prediction code with respect to said reference image. An image decoding device of the second invention for solving the problem 1, for holding the same reference image as that of the image encoding device according to the first invention and decoding an output of said image encoding device, has; a prediction code decoding means for decoding the correspondence between the partial regions from the prediction code, a predicted image formation means for forming a predicted image from the reference image, by using the decoded correspondence between said partial regions, an error image decoding means for decoding the error image from the error image code, and an adding means for adding said predicted image and said error image to obtain the image comprising the luminance and the opacity, wherein an image composed of the luminance and an opacity is decoded as the output of said predicted image formation means or said adding means. An image encoding device of the third invention for solving the problem 1, comprises a superposing means which inputs an image composed of a luminance and an opacity of a substance, classifies a region of the image into a transparent region and an opaque region, and forms a luminance image which is superposed with a luminance information and an opacity information in a manner that a luminance value of the substance is for the opaque region and a value outside the range of the luminance value is for the transparent region, wherein the luminance image superposed with said informatious of the luminance and the opacity is encoded. An image decoding device of the fourth invention for solving the problem 1, has a dividing means for dividing the luminance image into the opacity image and the luminance image by making a transparent region when the luminance value is a value outside the range, and making a luminance value when it is a value inside the range, wherein the luminance image of the luminance and the opacity is decoded. An image encoding device of the fifth invention for solving the problem 1, when an original image is layered by a front and back relation on an axis of eyes and an opacity of a region as well as a luminance, comprises; a layer image encoding means for inputting a plurality of such layer images and encoding the luminance and the opacity as a layer image code for every layer image, and a layer image decoding means for obtaining decoded layer image from an output of said layer image encoding means, a synthesizing means for synthesizing said decoded plural layer image by the front and back relation, the luminance and the opacity thereof, and an error image encoding means for determining an error image between said original image and said synthesized image and encoding the error image, and said original image are transmitted as the plurality of layer image codes and the error code between the original image and the synthesized image. An image decoding device of the sixth invention for solving the problem 1, when an original image is layered by a front and back relation on an axis of eyes and an opacity of a region as well as a luminance, comprises; a layer image encoding means for inputting a plurality of such layer images and encoding the luminance and the opacity as a layer image code for every layer image, and a layer image decoding means for obtaining, which has a layer image decoding means for decoding the layer image comprising the luminance, the opacity, and the front and back relation on the axis of eyes by using the plurality of layer image code, a synthesizing means for forming a synthesized image with said layer image, and an error image decoding means for decoding the error image from the error code, and decoding the image by adding the error image to said synthesized image. An image encoding device of the seventh invention for solving the preoblem 1 comprises; a reference image encoding means for preliminarily recording and transmitting a plurality of reference images, an approximating means of correspondence between images which approximates a deviation of positions where a luminance is corresponding between an input image and said plurality of reference images, that is deformation, as a polynomial function which makes a position on a screen a variable, and determines an approximation error, and a minimum distortion reference image-selecting means which determines a reference image having small approximation error among said plurality of reference images and outputs an identifier for the selected reference image and a coefficient of the polynomial function, and wherein a plurality of reference images are encoded by said reference image encoding means and the input image are transmitted as at least the identifier for said selected reference image and the coefficient of said polynomial function. An image decoding device of the eighth invention for solving the problem 1, has a reference image decoding means for reconstructing a plurality of reference images in advance, a reference image-selecting means for selecting from said plurality of reference images a reference image corresponding to the identifier of the reference image contained in the output, and a reference image-deforming means for determining the polynomial function which makes a position on a screen a variable on a basis of the coefficient of the polynomial function contained in the output and for deforming said selected reference image by said polynomial function, and wherein an image is decoded by using the reference image deformed by said reference image-deforming means. A motion vector-detecting device of the nineth invention for solving the problem 2 comprises; a superposing means which inputs a plurality of images composed of a luminance and an opacity of a substance, subjects the opacity to the addition/multiplication of a predetermined value to transform a value range, and forms the luminance image superposed with informations of the luminance and the opacity by adding the transformed value to the luminance, and an image analyzing means for obtaining a correspondence of the partial regions of two images by a correlation of a luminance, and wherein the image composed of the luminance and the opacity is transformed to the image composed only of the luminance by said superposing means, and a correspondence of the partial regions is obtained using said image analyzing means between the transformed plural images. A motion vector-detecting device of the tenth invention for solvig the problem 2, is device for expressing a motion vector at an optional position on a screen as a polynomial function which makes a position a variable, and has an error calculating means for calculating a correspondence of the partial regions of two different images as an error, with respect to a plurality of partial regions obtained by dividing an image, and for determining a deviation between said partial regions which becomes the minimum error and the error value in a vicinity thereof, an error function-calculating means for determining a quadratic error function which makes a deviation a variable from said deviation which becomes said minimum error and the error value in the vicinity thereof, and an optimizing means for expressing a sum total or a partial sum of said quadratic error function with a coefficient of a polynomial function as a variable, and minimizing this sum total of the partial sum with regard to the coefficient, and wherein the motion vector between different images are issued as the coefficient of the polynomial function. The image-encoding device of the first invention predicts the luminance and the opacity of the image to be encoded from a reference image to form a predicted image, by matching the partial region of the image to be encoded against the reference image (that is, template) by a prediction means. The correspondence of the partial region is output as the prediction signal by a prediction-encoding means. The difference of the luminance and the opacity between the predicted image and the image to be encoded is determined by an error calculation means, and it is encoded by an error-encoding means. The image-decoding means of the second invention holds the same reference image with that of the image-encoding device of the first invention, and decodes the correspondence between partial regions from the prediction code by a prediction encoding/decoding means and a predicted image-forming means, to form the predicted image from the reference image. On the other hand, the error image is decoded from the error image code by an error image-decoding means. And an adding means adds the predicted image and the error image to obtain the image comprising the luminance and the opacity. In the above two inventions, on the encoding side, the difference of luminance and opacity between the predicted image and the image to be encoded is determined to be encoded. On the other hand, on the decoding side, the difference of the opacity and luminance is decoded. Thereby, layer image allowing the irregular deformation of template can be encoded. In the image-encoding device of the third invention, making an image composed of the luminance and the opacity of a substance an input, a superposing means classifies the region into two, that is, a transparent region and an opaque region, and forms a luminance image on which information of the luminance and the opacity are superposed so that the luminance of the substance is taken in the opaque region, and a predetermined value outside the luminance value is taken in the transparent region, thereafter the luminance image is encoded. In the image-decoding device of the fourth invention, a dividing means divides the image into an opacity image and a luminance image, such that when the luminance value of the decoded image is a predetermined value outside the value, it is a transparent region, and when the luminance value is within the value, it is the luminance value. In the above two inventions, by transforming the two informations of the luminance and the opacity constituting the template into one luminance image, the deformation of the template can be treated as a variation of this luminance image. In the image-encoding device of the fifth invention, the original image is layered by the back and forth relation on the axis of the eyes and the opacity of the region in addition to the luminance. The image-encoding device encodes the luminance and the opacity as the layer image code by a layer image-encoding means for every layer image, making a plurality of layer images an input. On the other hand, said decoded layer image is determined from the results of the layer image-encoding means by a hierarchical image-decoding means, and synthesizes a plurality of decoded layer images from the back and forth relation, the luminance and the opacity thereof by a synthesizing means. Thereby, the synthesized result of the layer image by the decoding means is predicted. And an error image-encoding means determines the error image between the original image and the predicted synthesized image and encodes the error image. The image-decoding device of the sixth invention decodes the layer image comprising the luminance, the opacity, and the back and forth relation on the axis of the eyes from a plurality of layer image code by a layer image-decoding means and forms a synthesized image from the layer image by a synthesizing means. And an error image-decoding means decodes the error image from the error code. Lastly, by adding the error image to be synthesized image, the image is decoded. The above two inventions makes the synthesis of the layer image as an predicted image, not as the final result, and transmits and records the difference between this predicted image and the original image, thereby can transmit and record the image without any large visual deterioration, even if the template is irregularly deformed. In the seventh invention, the template is preliminarily transmitted and recorded by a reference image-encoding means. The correspondence between the input image and a plurality of templates is approximated as a polynomial function of image coordinates, by an approximating means of correspondence between images. A minimum distortion reference image-selecting means determines the reference image having small approximate error among this plurality of templates from said plurality of reference images irrespective of the time order, and outputs the identifier of the selected reference image and the coefficient of the polynomial function. By preparing a plurality of templates, the degree of be approximated by said polynomial function can be improved. In the image-decoding device of the eighth invention, a plurality of templates are preliminarily constituted by a reference image-decoding means. A reference image-selecting means selects the template corresponding to the identifier of the input template, and a reference image-deforming means deforms the image based on the coefficient of the input polynomial function. Since it is assured that the deformed result of the template by said polynomial function is analogous to the input image on the encoding device side, the image can be decoded with a small encoded volume. The motion vector-detecting device of the ninth invention, which makes a plurality of images composed of the luminance and the opacity of a substance an input, subjects the opacity to the addition/multiplication of a predetermined value, and if necessary, to the threshold processing by a superposing means to transform the range, and forms a luminance image superposed with information of the luminance and the opacity by adding the transformed value to the luminance. And an image-analyzing means obtains the correspondence of the partial region of two images by the correlation of luminance. Thereby, motion vector detection utilizing the correlation of not only the luminance but also the opacity can be performed. In a motion vector-detecting device of the tenth invention in which a motion vector at an optional position on the screen is expressed as a polynomial function of image coordinates, an error-calculating means calculates the correspondence of partial regions of two different images as an error, with regard to a plurality of partial regions obtained by dividing the image, and determines the quadratic error function which makes the deviation a variable, from the deviation which becomes said minimum error and the error value in the vicinity thereof. And an optimizing means expresses the sum total or a partial sum of said quadratic error function using the coefficient of said polynomial function as a variable, and minimizes this sum total or the partial sum with regard to the coefficient. In the present invention, a coefficient of the polynomial function of image coordinates (affine transformation is one example thereof) is determined so that the sum total or the partial sum is minimized, from the quadratic error function which makes the deviation a variable, not from the motion vector. Furthermore, considering said residual difference encoding problem, it is the object of the present invention to solve the problems generally caused in the predicted-image encoding which utilizes the correlation between different images and to provide an image-encoding method and a device thereof, in which the residual difference image is divided into the portion to be subjected to the residual difference encoding and the portion not to be subjected to the residual difference encoding, and even in a limited encoding speed, image encoding can be performed with a little visual disturbance. That is an image encoding method of the invention comprises: predicting the input image from different images, expressing a region with a large prediction error as a pattern information by the threshold processing of the prediction error, subjecting said pattern information to the morphology processing in which the region is dilated after being eroded and the equivalent processing to form a mask pattern, and performing the encoding of the predicted error image based on said mask pattern. And an image encoding device of the invention comprises: a means for predicting an input image from different images, a threshold processing means for expressing a region with a large prediction error as a pattern information, a morphology means for subjecting said pattern information to an equivalent processing to a morphology processing in which a region is dilated after being eroded, thereby to form a mask pattern, and a waveform encoding means for performing encoding for the predicted error image on the basis of said mask pattern. First, the morphology processing comprising a processing of dilation after erosion will be described. The morphology processing is a processing conducted for a shape of binary image or a planar shape of density of a multi-value image, and this is explained in detail in Literature 1, xe2x80x9cAcademic Pressxe2x80x9d (Henk J. A. M. Heijmans: Morphological Image Operators, Academic Press, Inc. 1994) and Literature 2, xe2x80x9cIEEE Transaction on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligencexe2x80x9d (R. M. Harallick, S. R. Sternberg, and X. Zhuang: Image Analysis Using Mathematical Morphology, IEEE Transaction on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence, Vol. PAMMI-9, No. 4, pp. 532-550, July 1987). Here, the action of the present invention will be described with reference to the definition described in Literature 3, Hua-Rong JIN and Idefumi KOBATAKE: xe2x80x9cExtraction of Microcalcifications on Mammogram Using Morphological Filter with Multiple Structuring Elementsxe2x80x9d, IEICE Transaction, D2, Vol. J75-D-II, No. 7, pp. 1170-1176, 1992-7. (1) Binary Morphology Operation Binary image which is an image to be processed is assumed to be X, and a structuring element (a set of a two-dimensional position vector, domain) is assumed to be B. And one image constituting B is assumed to be expressed by a pixel vector b. At this time, Bxe2x80x2 (here, xe2x80x2 is used for convenience) is referred to as xe2x80x9csymmetry of Bxe2x80x9d, and the following expression is realized: Bxe2x80x2={xe2x88x92b:bxcex5B}xe2x80x83xe2x80x83(101) Furthermore, Bz shows B which moves in translation by z (z is a two-dimensional vector), and means: Bz={b+z:bxcex5B}xe2x80x83xe2x80x83(102) Xxe2x88x92b means X which moves in translation by xe2x88x92b. What is the base of the morphology operation is Minskwski difference and sum, which are expressed by symbols (xe2x88x92) and (+). The definition is given by the following expression: Xxe2x8ax96B=∩bxcex5BXb xe2x80x83xe2x80x83(103) X⊕B=∪bxcex5BXb xe2x80x83xe2x80x83(104) Namely, Minkowski difference gives a domain (product set) common to the structuring elements whose all constituent elements are moved in translation by X, and on the contrary, Minkowski sum gives a union thereof. Based on these basic operation, Erosion and Dilation are expressed by the following expression: Erosion: Xxe2x8ax96Bxe2x80x2={Z:Bz⊂X}=bxcex5BXxe2x88x92b xe2x80x83xe2x80x83(105) Dilation: X⊕Bxe2x80x2={Z:Bz∩Xxe2x89xa00}=∪bxcex5BXxe2x88x92b xe2x80x83xe2x80x83(106) and Opening and Closing are defined as follows: Opening: XB=XoB=(Xxe2x8ax96Bxe2x80x2)⊕B xe2x80x83xe2x80x83(107) Closing: XB=Xxe2x97xafB=(X⊕Bxe2x80x2)xe2x8ax96B xe2x80x83xe2x80x83(108) Examples of Dilation processing and Erosion processing are shown in FIG. 35. The structuring elements are composed of a center pixel and four vicinity in the horizontal and vertical directions thereof. (2) Gray-Scale Morphology Operation When it is assumed that f(x) is luminance value, F is a defined region, g is a function of structuring elements (scalar value), and G is the defined region thereof (domain), it is defined that: Erosion: Erosion: ⁢ ⁢ ( f ⊖ g ) ⁢ ( x ) = min Z ∈ G , X + Z ∈ F ⁢ { f ⁡ ( x + z ) - g ⁡ ( z ) } ( 109 ) Dilation: ⁢ ⁢ ( f ⊕ g ) ⁢ ( x ) = max Z ∈ G , X + Z ∈ F ⁢ { f ⁡ ( x - z ) - g ⁡ ( z ) } ( 110 ) Opening: ⁢ ⁢ ( f ∘ g ) ⁢ ( x ) = ( f ⊖ g ) ⊕ g ( 111 ) Closing: ⁢ ⁢ ( f ⁢ xe2x80x83 ⁢ xe2x80xa2 ⁢ xe2x80x83 ⁢ g ) ⁢ ( x ) = ( f ⊕ g ) ⊖ g ( 112 ) If it is a pattern in which the pixel to be processed is two-valued, the dilation and erosion by the gray-scale morphology operation will have the same action with those shown in FIG. 35. In the image-encoding method of the present invention, the input image is first predicted from different images, and subjected to the threshold processing and a region having a large residual difference is extracted as a pattern information. Thereafter, the pattern information is subjected to the dilation processing after the erosion processing of said morphology operation, that is, the opening processing, to be deformed. Thereby, in the conventional example shown in FIG. 34, as shown in (e) and (k) as the morphology operation results, the region in the form of impulse in the vicinity of the edge is eliminated. By using this as a mask pattern to encode the residual difference image, high efficient encoding can be performed, ignoring a region where the residual difference encoding is not required. Similarly in the image-encoding device of the present invention, the prediction means predicts the input image from different images, and the threshold processing means outputs the region having a large residual difference as a pattern information. Said morphology means subjects this pattern information to an equivalent processing as said opening processing by the morphology means, and outputs a mask pattern in which the region in the form of impulse is eliminated. The waveform encoding means encodes based on this mask pattern, ignoring the region where it does not cause a large visual deterioration even if the residual difference encoding is not performed.

Optical proximity correction (OPC) has been a key enabler of the aggressive IC technology scaling implicit in Moore's Law. Optical proximity correction determines the photomask patterns that enable drawn layout features to be faithfully and accurately reproduced by optical lithography onto a semiconductor wafer. However, the runtime of model-based optical proximity correction tools (i.e., software tools that use optical simulation and geometric operations to determine the photomask pattern for each layout feature) has grown unacceptably long with each successive technology generation, and has emerged as one of the major bottlenecks in the turnaround time for IC data preparation and manufacturing. Model-based optical proximity correction is typically used, but is responsible for the bottleneck in turnaround time. Cell-based optical proximity correction has been proposed as a faster alternative to model-based optical proximity correction. The cell-based optical proximity correction approach is to run optical proximity correction once per each cell definition (i.e., per cell master) rather than once per placement or unique instantiation of each cell (i.e., per cell instance). In other words, in the cell-based optical proximity correction approach, the master cell layouts in the standard-cell library are corrected before placement, and then placement and routing steps of integrated circuit design are completed with the corrected master cells. Unfortunately, optical proximity effects in lithography have a certain interaction radius between layout pattern geometries. Since the neighboring environment of a cell in a full-chip layout is completely different from the environment of an isolated cell, the cell-based optical proximity correction solution can be incorrect when instantiated in a full-chip layout: as a result, there can be a large difference in feature critical dimensions between cell-based optical proximity correction and conventional model-based optical proximity correction.

This invention relates to links for grate conveyors chains and a method of manufacturing the links. The links to which this invention is directed are primarily for use as the links of chains for grate conveyors such as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,735,858issued May 29, 1973, more particularly for a grate conveyor of the type referred to as a cooling grate conveyor for the cooling section of sintering apparatus in which iron ore, flux and solid fuel substances are continuously delivered upon the conveyor, ignited at one end, and fed forward on the conveyor, air being drawn down through the bed of material on the conveyor (i.e. through the conveyor grates) for some distance in the course of its travel to complete the sintering and partial fusion of the product. In the prior art relating to grate conveyor chains, the pivotally connected links of the conveyor chains to which the grate members are connected are conventionally made of one-piece metal castings, including a pair of transversely spaced side walls formed at one of their ends to define a yoke portion, the chain bar sides merging at their opposite ends to define a neck or lug portion, the prior art chain link also including an integrally cast thin wall arched or web cover. The lug and the yoke portions contain circular connecting holes located on a transverse axis. The structure just described is one link in the prior art chain, and it will be understood that a plurality of such links are pivotally connected to each other with the neck portion of one chain link being received within the yoke portion of the next succeeding contiguous chain link. The plurality of pivotally connected chain links are known in the art as a "chain strand." In the one-piece chain link construction of the prior art as just briefly described, a serious problem has arisen because of changes in operating temperatures and fluxing methods. In particular, the leading and trailing faces of the link holes wear from abrasion. In addition, the holes in the links tend to "egg" out in the direction of travel because the metal creeps or stretches at operating temperatures due to mechanical pulling tensions applied to the chain during normal movement of the conveyor and when the conveyor moves around an end sprocket or the like, or during the return run of the conveyor. Also, the links are attacked by the hot gases so that they tend to "scale" and lose thickness. Further, in the final stages of the sinter, temperatures as high as 2200.degree. F. on the top of the product bed are encountered, and the links probably reach temperatures of the order of 1000.degree. F. to perhaps 1500.degree. F. As a result of these various conditions, the connecting portions of the links often fail by rupture through the wall sections of the connecting holes, generally in a transverse plane of the link and passing through the minimum thickness of the wall section of the link surrounding the hole. Various ways of minimizing the rupture problem have been suggested. For example, some sintering machine manufacturer's have experimented with links made of SFSA-ACI castings of the ferritic straight iron-chromium types, but these have been disappointing due to their very poor hot strength. There have also been tests using the SFSA-ACI type HP, which contains nominally 35% Ni, 26% Cr and the balance mainly iron. This alloy has the highest hot strength of all of the ACI alloys, but is also very expensive due to its high Ni content. The most widely employed link alloy today is ACI type HF, which contains about 20% Cr, 10% Ni and the remainder mostly iron. Nevertheless, while this alloy has moderately good hot strength at operating temperatures it also shows a tendency to wear out in the connecting holes. Another suggested solution to reduce the wear problem has been to employ hardened cylindric bushings or inserts of various steels in the connecting holes. In that approach the holes and the inserts have been machined to size. Unfortunately, this method is not only costly but also reduces the section thickness of the links around the bushings, so that the links tend to elongate and eventually rupture through the reduced wall sections. Even if rupture does not occur elongation causes misalignment of the links and gaps in the grate. Attempts have also been made to reduce machining costs by placing rough, unmachined cylindric inserts in the mold prior to casting of the links. It was anticipated that the cast metal would fuse to the bushing during the casting process. The final internal hole could then be finish machined. This approach also failed because the solid insert bushing is heating and expanding while the casting around it attempts to cool and shrink. The walls of the casting tend to crack around the bushing during the cooling process. Further, even those links that appear to be sound still tend to fail in service by rupturing through the wall sections that have been thinned by the presence of the bushings.

FIG. 7 is an example of a high-frequency circuit device of the prior art which employs a multiple-layer board 11 comprising a wiring layer 11a on the top face, a grounding layer 11d on the bottom face, a grounding layer 11b provided on an insulating material inside the multiple-layer board 11, and a wiring layer 11c provided on an insulating material between the grounding layers 11b and 11d. A line 12, or trace, is disposed on the surface of the multiple-layer board 11, and a line 13 crosses line 12 on the same surface as line 12. Line 13 has an unconnected section 13x (indicated with the broken line) which is not electrically connected at the crossing area. A line 14 is disposed on wiring layer 11c at an area which crosses underneath line 12. Both ends of line 13 facing the unconnected section 13x are electrically connected with line 14 respectively using through-holes 15a and 15b. A high-frequency circuit device of the prior art as explained above may require the entire board to be designed in multiple layers the crossing area being just a part of the overall wiring on the board. In the above structure, one disadvantage is that a multiple layer board may be required if even only one crossing of signal lines exists in the circuit, resulting in higher component cost. Another disadvantage is that the characteristic impedance of signal lines on the wiring layers 11a and 11c becomes smaller compared to that of a board with the same thickness which does not have multiple layers because of the presence of the grounding layers 11b and 11d. To obtain the equivalent characteristic impedance of signal lines to that of a board which does not have multiple layers, lines may need to be made thinner, resulting in increased resistance of lines, thereby causing deterioration in characteristics due to transmission loss. Simple jumper chips have already been implemented for crossing lines on a board. However, jumper chips may cause electrical coupling between lines, resulting in deterioration of performance.

The present invention relates generally to patellar components that are designed to form a patella portion (or knee cap) that replaces a part of a natural patella or knee cap, and particularly to patellar components that are designed to cooperate and articulate against a femoral component of a total knee prosthesis. Also provided are methods for implanting the described patellar components. Joint replacement, and particularly knee replacement, has become increasingly widespread. Various knee prostheses and procedures have been developed to treat the debilitating effects of knee joint deterioration (e.g., such as that caused by arthritis, injury, or disease). A fairly common procedure used to repair a patient's knee is total knee replacement, in which the tibia is resected and replaced with a tibial component, and the femur is resected and replaced with a femoral component. In some instances, the surgeon will also replace the articulating surface on the posterior aspect of the patella where it interfaces with the femoral component, which can help improve the results of total or partial knee replacements. The primary function of the patella is to increase the efficiency of the quadriceps muscles and to serve as a connection between the quadriceps tendon and the patellar tendon. The patella has a ridge on its posterior side which slides in a groove between the femoral condyles, referred to as the patellar track. The patella, patellar track, and condyles act together as a low friction pulley and lever for the quadriceps tendon. As shown in FIG. 1, during knee replacement surgery, a prosthetic patellar component 2 can be affixed to the natural patella 4 so that its posterior side 6 contacts the femoral component 8 during flexion and extension of the knee. The patellar component 2 then tracks the trochlear groove 9 of the femoral component (the line that separates the femoral condyles) during flexion and extension of the knee. In order to implant the patellar component 2, a part of the natural patella bone is removed, and an implant is secured thereto. Some implants are “inset,” meaning that a shallow hole is drilled into the bone using a counterbore so that the implant lies about flush with the bone. Other types are “onset,” which means that the back of the patella is planed off and the implant is placed on top of the flat bone. The invention described in this application transcends these types of implants and can be used for both. The maximum range of motion for a natural knee is about 150-160 degrees. By contrast, most knee replacements achieve only about 110-120 degrees of flexion. Some of this gap can be attributed to scarring within the knee joint and other physical conditions, but the remainder can be attributed primarily to failure of current implants to provide the proper prosthetic component geometries that take into consideration the natural kinematics of the knee. Thus, despite the relative success of some products on the market, many patellar components tend to fail after about five to fifteen years. Part of the reason they fail is due to excessive wear at certain regions of the component or loosening at the bone/component interface. For example, with a dome patellar component, one reason for failure is the downward forces of the femoral component acting on the patellar component during flexion can cause the pegs that extend from the patellar component and attach the component to the natural patella to weaken and break. Shear forces that are applied directly to the implant change during knee motion, and they increase as the knee is moved deeper into flexion. For example, at different angles of flexion, the contact stresses across the patello-femoral interface move outward towards the periphery of the interface and increase as knee flexion increases. During knee flexion, the patella itself flexes and the contact point moves superiorly on the component articular surface. At this location, the contact force (normal to the articular surface of the component) creates backside compressive forces and backside shear forces. For example, when a person is standing upright, the normal line of pressure that the femoral component 8 exerts on a button or dome patellar component 2 points at or near the center of the component dome. An example of the line of pressure is shown in FIG. 2, by arrow A. During flexion (e.g., as a person squats), the flexion of the knee increases and causes the contact point between the femoral component and the patellar component to roll deeper in the trochlear groove and into the condyles. The line of pressure also swings up from the center of the dome toward the upper part of the component. In full flexion, the line of pressure is no longer normal to the natural patella, but is directed downward, pointing down toward an upper portion of the patellar component, as shown by arrow B in FIG. 3. In full flexion, the force vector applies pressure at an upper portion of the patella. It essentially tries to “push” the button patella component off of the patellar bone surface. This force will be referred to as shear force. Part of the reason this occurs is because of the button patella's axis-symmetric dome-like shape. A useful analogy for illustrating shear force is to consider a dome-shaped paperweight on a desk top. If someone applies pressure at the center of the dome, the paperweight stays in place. This is analogous to a person standing upright, with the force (i.e., compressive force) of the femoral component being directed at the center of the patellar dome. Referring back to the paperweight example, if a person swings the pressure point normal to the surface and toward an upper part of the paperweight (e.g., toward one of the edges), the paperweight will slide along the surface of the desk. This is analogous to the knee in flexion, where the force of the femoral component is directed toward an upper part of the patellar component. In this position, the pegs that attach the patellar component to the patella are particularly stressed. In fact, a number of artificial patella failures are due to peg failures, and these types of forces can be painful for the patient. This force is referred to as shear force, and embodiments of this invention seek to avoid or decrease shear force. Part of the reason that shear force causes a problem with artificial patellar components and not with a natural patella is because artificial patellar components tend to be shaped like an arc or a dome, whereas the natural patella is more linear shaped. Because a natural patella is flatter, as the patella rotates during flexion and the contact vector(s) travel up the patella (note that when contact is with the condyles, there are two contact vectors, one from each condyle, and when contact is with the trochlear groove, there is a single contact vector), the force vector(s) from the femoral component still remain somewhat normal (or perpendicular) to the patella, as opposed to pointing down at an angle at the dome of a patellar component. Under ideal conditions, anatomically-shaped patella components exhibit lower interface shear forces due to their contact condition and shape. However, they can be particularly sensitive to high contact stress edge loading due to mal-rotation or positioning during surgical implantation. For example, many of the highly-conforming “anatomic” patella designs offered have different levels of constraint between the trochlear groove articulation area and the intracondylar articulation area. The constraint difference is magnified in the anatomic design compared to a button (or dome) design because the anatomic design interfaces with more of the femoral surface. This magnified constraint difference causes the anatomic patellar components to shift their alignment (equilibrium) with respect to the femoral component (particularly in rotational degrees of freedom) when moving from one area to the other, which can be perceived as an instability, pain, or a clunk to the patient. The shift seems to be more aggressive during ascent, when the patella is moving from the intracondylar area into the trochlear groove. The design challenge faced is to design surfaces of patellar components that minimize the shift in constraint, while still reducing the component/bone shear forces. Such designs will hopefully reduce patient pain and prolong the life of components. Accordingly, embodiments of the invention minimize shear force load between a patella component and the patella bone, but still provide a component that is not as sensitive to surgical mal-implantation or functional kinematics as highly-conforming “anatomically-shaped” patellas are. Another challenge experienced by patellar component manufacturers is to design a component that lessens the shear force issues described, but that also accommodates variations introduced by surgical inaccuracy and patient anatomical variation. For example, it is difficult to position a patellar component so that it precisely matches the orientation of the patello-femoral groove geometry on the femoral component. Accordingly, most designs on the market use an axis-symmetric configuration for the bearing surface of the patellar component (as shown in FIGS. 1-3), which results in a low conformity between the patellar component part and the femoral component. With such a design, the surgeon does not need to exactly and precisely position the component in order for it to function. However, such components cause the above-described shear force problems due to their shape. Other designs have attempted to make patellar components flatter or more concave, so that they more closely approximate a natural patella, but as the components are made flatter, they are more to sensitive positioning error. Due to a lack of precise instruments, data, and information, it can be difficult to surgically arrange for the rotational positioning of an anatomic patellar component so that it precisely matches the orientation of the patello-femoral groove geometry on the femoral component. In other words, flatter components are more sensitive to mal-rotation. When non-axis-symmetric patellar components are not implanted at the proper position, it can cause ever greater wear concerns than the axis-symmetric designs discussed above. For example, some designs provide components having saddle shaped articulating areas separated by a flat ridge. While these components theoretically allow for a larger surface contact area between the patellar component and the femoral component, they are also extremely sensitive to alignment (particularly rotational alignment and the inclination of the patellar component to the natural patellar bone). When surgical accuracy is not absolute, the error in alignment can cause edge loading and excessive fixation loading of the patellar component. Another problem experienced by conforming, anatomically-shaped patellas (such as saddle-shaped patellas) is that they have different constraint patterns with the femoral component throughout the range of flexion. Specifically, the constraint of the patella riding in the trochlear groove is different from the constraint of the patella riding in the intracondylar area. As a consequence, the patella seeks different equilibrium positions while articulating in each zone. During the transition of the patella from the trochlear groove to the intracondylar area, there is often a readjustment translation and/or rotation movement caused by the patella arriving at a new equilibrium condition with the different constraint pattern. This movement is referred to as clunk, and it is especially apparent during extension from deep flexion. As previously mentioned, it can cause pain and may also be perceived by the patient as instability as the transition may be non-linear and possibly inconsistent from one area to another. Accordingly, there is a need for a patellar component design that is more optimally shaped so that it can help reduce shear force, but that is also shaped to accommodate slight implantation error. There is also a need for a patellar component that can help lessen anterior knee pain, particularly during deep-flexion activities because the component/bone interface shear force is so high during these activities. There is also a need for a patellar component that can transition during the range of knee movement in a controlled way. There is a further need for a patellar component that has an increased volume of material in certain regions that strengthen the component and help reduce failures.

Public cloud storage is increasingly used for data storage, archived data storage, and disaster recovery (DR). Users require high confidence in data storage and DR systems, and thus require the ability to audit data stored in the cloud, as well as data storage and DR systems and processes. Auditing archived data stored in the cloud or a DR process conventionally requires accessing and retrieving data stored in a cloud storage system to check the stored data's integrity. Cloud storage systems, while convenient, may be slower to access than local data storage systems. Many cloud storage systems bill users hourly for access to and operations performed on data stored in the cloud storage system. Thus, auditing or scrubbing data stored in a cloud storage system for DR purposes may become time consuming, may consume costly bandwidth, and may therefore be expensive.

Flash memory is one type of non-volatile, rewritable memory commonly used in many types of electronic devices, such as USB drives, digital cameras, mobile phones, and memory cards. Flash memory stores information in an array of memory cells made from floating-gate transistors. In traditional single-level cell (SLC) devices, each cell stores only one bit of information. Some newer flash memory, known as multi-level cell (MLC) devices, can store more than one bit per cell by choosing between multiple levels of electrical charge to apply to the floating gates of its cells. A NAND memory is accessed by a host system much like a block device such as a hard disk or a memory card. Typically, the host system performs reads and writes to logical block addresses. The NAND memory is divided into blocks and each block is organized into pages or sectors of cells. Blocks may be typically 16 KB in size, while pages may be typically 512 or 2,048 or 4,096 bytes in size. Multi-level NAND cells makes management of NAND devices more difficult, particularly in multithreaded real-time run-time environments. In response, manufacturers have encapsulated NAND flash as memory devices in which a controller is placed in front of a raw NAND memory. The purpose of the controller is to manage the underlying physical characteristics of the NAND memory and to provide a logical to physical mapping between logical block numbers and physical locations in the NAND memory, which are being accessed by a host system. Reading and writing are asymmetric behaviors in NAND memories. To read a particular physical block, the address is programmed, and the operation started. After an access time, the data is available. This process of reading blocks can be repeated ad infinitum (ignoring certain NAND disturb phenomenon). Writing blocks is an asymmetric operation because a given block can only be written with data essentially only one time and so is not repeatable like a read. The initial condition of a NAND cell is to store a logical ‘1’. To write a data value, wherever there is to be a ‘0’, the data is written and the ‘1’ states are left alone. While it may be possible to continue to overwrite ‘1’ states with ‘0’ states, this is not generally useful. To completely enable the overwriting of a block, the initial condition must be again established. This operation is referred to as an erase cycle. Using currently available NAND devices as an example, typical read access times are in the range of 25-50 microseconds, write cycle times are in the range of 200-700 microseconds, and erase cycle times are in the range of 2,000-3,000 microseconds. Clearly there is a tremendous variance in performance, depending on the exact circumstances. In order to mitigate the vast difference between erase and read cycle times, write blocks are grouped together into erase blocks so that the time to erase is amortized over many write blocks, effectively reducing the erase time on a per page basis. In addition, generally more read operations can be performed on a block than erase/write cycle pairs. While there are technological subtleties, generally reads are non-destructive. Because of the nature of the charge storage on the floating gates, erase/write cycle pairs tend to damage the storage cells due to trapped charge in the oxide. For this reason, erase/write cycle pairs should be algorithmically avoided, or when inevitable should be balanced across all blocks. This later mechanism is referred to as “wear leveling”. Because of the impracticality of overwriting data (both because of the wear mechanism and erase block grouping), various techniques are used to virtualize the location of any given logical block. Within the current state of the art is what is called a file translation layer (FTL). This is a driver level software layer which maintains temporary and permanent tables of the mapping between a given logical block number and its physical location in the media. By presenting a logical block device to upper layers of software, any number of file systems may be implemented. Alternatively, a journaling file system may be implemented using the linear array of blocks. Here the blocks are allocated in order of need and the device block allocation is managed as (essentially) a large circular buffer. As alluded to above, data on NAND devices can be written in a unit of one page, but an erase is performed in the unit of one block. A page can be written only if it is erased, and a block erase will clear the data on its pages. Because a NAND device is write-once, pages are allocated in a block until all the pages in the block are used. Regardless of the specific implementation, obsolete or “overwritten” data in the NAND array is not truly overwritten but simply marked by the number of mechanisms as simply being obsolete or stale. Logically, a block that contains live data is called a valid block, and an “obsolete” block is one that contains obsolete or stale data. If a file is written too many times, for example, it may result in many obsolete blocks in the NAND array. When all (or nearly all) blocks contain data, blocks that have been written earlier may possibly contain stale data and therefore invalid data. When the NAND device is full or almost full, it becomes necessary to remove the stale data and efficiently pack the remaining valid data to make room in the NAND device. This process is referred to as “garbage collection”. FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating a conventional garbage collection on a NAND device. The garbage collection process on a NAND device 10 includes a pre-collection phase 12 and post collection phase 14. During the pre-collection phase 12, all the blocks to be erased, called erase blocks, are examined. Blocks that are stale are available. Blocks that are not stale must be made stale by moving their data, i.e., rewriting the data into a new area. Erase blocks to be erased in a group comprise an erase cluster 16. In this example, the erase cluster 16 includes three valid blocks and one obsolete block 18. The valid blocks are being moved to respective blocks in free cluster 20. For this reason, garbage collection is not done when the NAND device 10 is truly full, but is instead done when the block allocation crosses some threshold determined by file translation management requirements. After all blocks are made stale in the erase cluster 16, the blocks are erased and made available during post collection 14, resulting in free cluster 22. The new beginning of the log 24 is the end of the free cluster 22, and the new end of the log 26 is that last block that was moved. Because garbage collecting an erase block involves read-then-write operations—first the block must be read to determine its current state and may involve data movement (i.e., writing good data elsewhere to make the current block stale) it can be quite time consuming to perform. The garbage collection time is the sum of the erase time, the summation of the rewritten block and the summation of the other reads necessary to determine the block state. If erase blocks are garbage collected in groups/clusters as shown in FIG. 1, this erase time is yet again increased proportional to the number of blocks being garbage collected. Because it is not necessarily predictable to an application, operating system (OS) or a file system when a block driver needs to perform garbage collection, any throughput analysis must be able to tolerate a reasonably large asynchronous interruption in performance for the above described garbage collection. This is particularly true because in conventional systems, garbage collection is likely to be delayed until it becomes necessary. For a single threaded application, such as in a digital still camera, NAND performance can be optimized according to the usage model, and with currently available products in the memory category (e.g. Compact Flash and SD Card) often are. The camera usage model is to: 1) format a flash card; 2) take a picture, writing the data to the card as fast as possible (to minimize click-to-click time); 3) view random pictures to perform edits (e.g. deletion of unwanted pictures); and 4) mass transfer of picture files to another host (such as a desktop or laptop computer). Only steps 2) and 4) have real time performance requirements, and the usage of the storage is highly focused. When writing a new picture to the NAND device, all the NAND device has to do is be able to sustain sufficiently high write bandwidths. Conversely, when the NAND device has to read picture files to transfer to a host, all the NAND device is required to do is sustain sufficiently high read bandwidths. However, on more complex platforms where there may be multiple streams being read and written to the NAND device, and each stream may have its own characteristics including real-time requirements. Therefore, optimization is not nearly so simple because there are conflicting requirements. Consider as an example, a multithreaded environment in which two software applications are processing three file streams. One application is recording a real-time media stream (either video or audio) onto the NAND device, while the same application is also playing back either the same or a different media stream. (If it is playing back the same media stream, it is playing back at an earlier time point in the stream.) Assume that the second application is an e-mail client that is receiving e-mail updates over an internet connection and synchronizing the in-box. In this example, these two applications have different real-time requirements. The media streaming performed by the first application cannot be halted, whereas the e-mail synchronization performed by the second application has no a priori timing requirement. If the media stream write overflows, data will be lost. If the media stream read underflows, there will be annoying gaps in the video or audio playback. If there are delays in the e-mail synchronization, however, the performance will be affected, but since this is demand driven, there is no loss of data. Typically, media streams are taken from some kind of media source (e.g., over-the-air modem or stored media) at a constant packet rate. These packets may be stored into a ping-pong buffer to make the system resilient to variable latencies in some operations. Media stream data is written into the ping buffer until it is full, then it is written into the pong buffer. When the ping buffer is full, it is read out and passed along to the next stage in the processing pipeline (e.g., the buffer is emptied by software which stores the data onto the NAND device). If the pong buffer is not empty by a consumer by the time the producer is finished loading the ping buffer, there is an overflow situation. If the consumer needs the ping buffer before the ping buffer has been filled, there is an underflow situation. Large asynchronous garbage collection operations of memory devices may complicate the real-time needs real-time applications, such as in the media stream example. Garbage collection represents a worst case deviation in the typical write access times to memory devices, and this deviation can be extreme when compared to the typical result. The above scheme of using ping/pong buffers can accommodate large and variable latencies only if these latencies are bounded, and these buffers can do so at the expense of becoming very large. This places an additional burden on the platform in that it now requires very large media buffers in order to accommodate an operating condition that is rare. Memory devices lack an overall context to globally optimize the garbage collection process because memory devices do not have knowledge of the semantics of a given block operation. Accordingly, what would be desirable is a solution which balances the need for NAND management of garbage collection with the needs of applications having different real-time media requirements.

Technical Field The present disclosure relates to a method for manufacturing a light emitting device, and to a light emitting device, in which a phosphor layer is formed on the surface of a light emitting element. Related Art It is generally known that a light emitting device in which a light emitting element is used is compact, has good power efficiency, and emits light in clear colors. Since the light emitting element pertaining to this light emitting device is a semiconductor element, not only is there no worry about bulbs burning out and so forth, but the initial drive characteristics are excellent, and the device is resistant to vibration and repeated switching on and off. Because of these excellent characteristics, light emitting devices that make use of light emitting diodes (LED), laser diode (LD), or other such light emitting elements are utilized in various kinds of light source. The most popular method for producing a white LED, for example, is to coat the area around an LED element that emits blue light, with a yellow phosphor that turns the blue light from the LED element into excitation light. As such a method for forming a phosphor on the surface of an LED element, a technique has been disclosed in which a phosphor layer (wavelength conversion layer) of a light emitting device is formed by spray coating, thereby forming a phosphor layer in a uniform thickness (uniform phosphor coating) over the LED element (see, WO2013/054658). With a light emitting device in which a phosphor layer is formed, light distribution characteristics close to those of a point light source can be obtained by forming the phosphor layer extremely close to the light emitting element. When a light emitting device as a point light source is used, because it has a small emission surface area, it is easier to design an applied product that incorporates this light emitting device. Accordingly, light emitting devices used as a point light source are expected to use in the field of lighting and many other fields.

Conventional medicinal care for veterans of the armed services includes a bureaucratic government sponsored care system that limits the amount of care to those that need it the most. Veterans of war, for example, may have complex mental health issues that require spontaneous help and assistance to those willing to provide such care. The wait time for psychiatric care and related health care services varies from VA hospital to hospital throughout the United States. Ideally, the individuals could receive care through alternative services managed by a real-time service application and supported by the members of a social network.

The present disclosure, in some embodiments thereof, relates to pulmonary delivery of a substance using a personal inhaler device and, more particularly, but not exclusively, to controlling flow through an inhaler. U.S. Pat. No. 5,655,520 teaches “A nebulizer is improved by placing a flexible valve in the ambient air inlet tube. Inhalation suction and Venturi effect shut down the flexible valve in proportion to the strength of the inhalation. Thus, the same output flow rate is obtained even with variable strength inhalations. Medications can be properly administered by controlled inhalation flow rates. In an alternate embodiment a metered dose inhaler (MDI) is outfitted with a similar flexible valve. Once again the patient is forced to inhale at a constant flow rate, thus causing the medication to seep deeply into the lungs. In both embodiments the flexible valve is preferably shaped in a duck billed fashion with air flow flowing toward the narrow end of the duck bill.”

This invention is directed to a bearing for supporting rolls of paper. The bearing is made up of a pair of devices which are identical to each other and which have a core housed between each other. The core is generally tubular in shape and has a circular section, on which a strip of paper is wound to thus form the roll itself.

The present invention relates to electroluminescent devices, and more particularly, to light-emitting devices based on small organic molecules. Organic light-emitting diodes (OLED""s) have the potential for providing inexpensive alternatives to LED""s. OLED""s may be fabricated by coating the appropriate surfaces with the organic material either from solution or by using conventional vacuum deposition techniques, and hence, do not require the use of high cost fabrication systems such as those utilized in the fabrication of semiconductor devices. A simple OLED may be constructed from an electroluminescent layer sandwiched between an electron injection electrode and a hole injection electrode. More complicated devices utilize electron and hole transport layers between the above mentioned electrodes and the electroluminescent layer. Addressable color displays may be constructed from OLED""s if individual OLED""s having three primary colors can be constructed. However, compounds having a common chemical structure that can be modified with a dye to provide the primary colors and which have sufficient quantum efficiency at low operating voltages have been lacking. Broadly, it is the object of the present invention to provide an improved OLED. It is a further object of the present invention to provide a set of OLED""s that can be utilized in constructing a color display. It is a still further object of the present invention to provide an OLED that has higher quantum efficiency at low operating voltages than prior art OLED""s. These and other objects of the present invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art from the following detailed description of the invention and the accompanying drawings. The present invention is an organic LED having a cathode formed from a first conducting layer, an electroluminescent layer including an oxadiazole, thiadiazole or triazole compound, and an anode constructed from a second conducting layer which is transparent to light generated by the electroluminescent layer. In one embodiment, an electron transport layer is sandwiched between the anode and electroluminescent layers. Other embodiments utilize a hole transport layer between the electroluminescent layer and the anode either with or without the electron transport layer. In one embodiment, the anode is constructed from a layer of indium tin oxide and a layer of a hole transport material that bonds to indium tin oxide and which has an energy band intermediate between that of indium tin oxide and that of the hole transport layer.

1. Field The present invention relates to an organic light emitting display device. 2. Related Art Among various flat panel display devices, a light emitting display device is generally advantageous of a fast response rate and low power consumption. Since a light emitting display device does not need a backlight, it can be manufactured lightweight. In particular, an organic light emitting display device comprises an organic emission layer formed between an anode and a cathode. Thus, holes supplied from an anode and electrons supplied from a cathode are connected together within the organic emission layer to produce excitons, which are electron-hole pairs. When these excitons transit to a ground state, a certain level of energy is produced, and this energy causes the organic light emitting display device to emit light. FIG. 1A illustrates a plan view of a first substrate of a conventional organic light emitting display device. FIG. 1B illustrates a perspective view of the conventional organic light emitting display device. FIG. 1C illustrates a sectional view of the conventional organic light emitting display device taken along a line I-I′ illustrated in FIG. 1B. Referring to FIGS. 1A to 1C, in the conventional light emitting display device 100, a display unit A is disposed on the first substrate 110. The display unit A includes anodes 120 arranged in a stripe pattern, and cathodes 130 disposed to intersect individually with the anodes 120. Although not shown, an emission layer is formed in every space between the anode 120 and the cathode 130. A driver 140 is disposed on one side of the first substrate 110 to supply an electrical signal to the anodes 120 and the cathodes 130. The driver 140 supplies an electrical signal to the anodes 120 and the cathodes 130 through scan lines 117A and 117B and data lines 118. A sealant 170 is coated on a region of the first substrate 110 in an outer region of the display unit A. The sealant 170 seals the first substrate 110, in which the display unit A is formed, with a second substrate 160, which is an encapsulation substrate. A moisture absorbent 165 may be disposed on an inner region of the second substrate 160. The conventional organic light emitting display device often has a limitation in that a processing time is elongated due to complexity in those processes of forming the driver 140 and various lines 117A, 117B and 118 on the first substrate 110. Also, when a shock is exerted from the outside, the moisture absorbent 165, disposed on the second substrate 160, and the display unit A, disposed on the first substrate 110, make contact with each other, resulting in generation of a dark spot or a line failure on the display unit A. The dark spot and the line failure may degrade the image quality of the organic light emitting display device.

In a semiconductor integrated circuit device, particularly a DRAM (dynamic random access memory), it is very important to increase integration and make multilayer wirings microscopic. According to a first conventional approach, for example, disclosed in Laid-open Japanese Patent Application No. 06-120447, the DRAM design is structured to include two plugs, having a reverse trapezoidal cross section and with the bases thereof being smaller than the top, which are directly connected electrically to connect a diffused layer of a MOS transistor and a lower electrode of a capacitor (a storage node electrode) that consists of a polycrystal silicon, in a DRAM memory array portion. In conventional DRAMs, a storage capacitor is, typically, placed in a lower portion of a bit line or just above it, similarly to the case of the first conventional method, described above. In that case, however, one problem is that a focus margin in photolithography cannot cover a stage difference between a memory array portion and a peripheral circuit portions (an I/O control circuit portion and a decoder portion), posing limitations to microminiaturization. Further, in the case of fabricating an LSI chip containing a logic circuit, in addition to a memory array portion having a capacitor of a DRAM, etc., the above problem creates a major drawback. Accordingly, there is proposed a structure in which a capacitor is formed above wiring layers for the purpose of eliminating the limitations on microminiaturization by reducing the stage difference described above. For example, according to a second conventional approach, for example, in Laid-open Japanese Patent Application No. 06-085187, a plug for connecting a diffused layer of a MOS transistor and a lower electrode of a capacitor are formed after wiring layers have been formed. The first conventional art described above has the problem that because the cross section of the plugs is of reverse trapezoid shape with the sides not vertical and the top area large, the plugs occupy a large area and an area per memory cell increases. Although a polysilicon film is used as a lower electrode of a capacitor of the memory cell array portion, because smaller resistance is required for use as plugs of peripheral circuit portions and a logic circuit portion, a metallic film such as a tungsten film, etc. is usually used. Accordingly, the memory cell array portion, the peripheral circuit portions, and the logic circuit portion require that plugs made of mutually different materials be formed through processes different for each of them, increasing the number of process steps. Thus, the conventional arts cannot solve three problems simultaneously: (1) making a memory array portion microscopic; (2) lowering the resistance of plugs of peripheral circuit portions and a logic circuit portion; and (3) lowering fabrication cost. On the other hand, as with the second conventional art, in the case of forming a plug for connecting a diffused layer of a MOS transistor and a lower electrode of a capacitor after forming a wiring layer, although there are required the process to form holes with a large aspect ratio and the process to form plugs by padding the holes with a metallic film, the processes are technically difficult, making it difficult to obtain satisfactory results. Especially when the depth of a connection hole exceeds 1.0 .mu.m, the formation of the hole and the padding of a metallic film becomes very difficult, a yield decreases, and fabrication cost increases. This method requires a large alignment margin for layer alignment among multiple layers in photolithography performed to form connection holes, so that a unit memory cell area increases.

This invention relates to the independent operation of individual doors utilizing the self-closing feature on sliding doors and the optional employment of a self-activating locking device. To appreciate the solution which has resulted from the present invention, one must first understand the problems existing self-closing door systems have created. For example, fine jewelry showcases previously have had self-closing door systems installed, but because of the complexity of their construction, replacement and service of the self-closing components by store personnel was for the most part impossible. Combinations of cable and pulley, belts and sprockets, rods and springs, etc. and the periodical failure of the individual parts would in most instances require replacement by a manufacturer's service technician. Removal of doors from showcases was very difficult, thus making merchandising of the unit difficult.

1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to the treatment of diseases by the site-specific instillation or transformation of cells and kits therefor. 2. Discussion of the Background The effective treatment of many systemic and inherited diseases remains a major challenge to modern medicine. The ability to deliver therapeutic agents to specific sites in vivo would be an asset in the treatment of, e.g., localized diseases. In addition the ability to cause a therapeutic agent to perfuse through the circulatory system would be effective for the treatment of, e.g., systemic diseases. For example, it would be desirable to administer in a steady fashion an antitumor agent or toxin in close proximity to a tumor. Similarly, it would be desirable to cause a perfusion of, e.g., insulin in the blood of a person suffering from diabetes. However, for many therapeutic agents there is no satisfactory method of either site-specific or systemic administration. In addition, for many diseases, it would be desirable to cause, either locally or systemically, the expression of a defective endogenous gene, the expression of a exogenous gene, or the suppression of an endogenous gene. Again, these remain unrealized goals. In particular, the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis is characterized by three fundamental biological processes. These are: 1) proliferation of intimal smooth muscle cells together with accumulated macrophages; 2) formation by the proliferated smooth muscle cells of large amounts of connective tissue matrix; and 3) accumulation of lipid, principally in the form of cholesterol esters and free cholesterol, within cells as well as in surrounding-connective tissue. Endothelial cell injury is an initiating event and is manifested by interference with the permeability barrier of the endothelium, alterations in the non-thrombogenic properties of the endothelial surface, and promotion of procoagulant properties of the endothelium. Monocytes migrate between endothelial cells, become active as scavenger cells, and differentiate into macrophages. Macrophages then synthesize and secrete growth factors including platelet derived growth factor (PDGF), fibroblast growth factor (FGF), epidermal growth factor (EGF), and transforming growth factor alpha TGF-.alpha.). These growth factors are extremely potent in stimulating the migration and proliferation of fibroblasts and smooth muscle cells in the atherosclerotic plaque. In addition, platelets may interact with the injured endothelial cell and the activated macrophage to potentiate the elaboration of growth factors and thrombus formation. Two major problems in the clinical management of coronary artery disease include thrombus formation in acute myocardial ischemia and restenosis following coronary angioplasty (PTCA). Both involve common cellular events, including endothelial injury and release of potent growth factors by activated macrophages and platelets. Coronary angioplasty produces fracturing of the atherosclerotic plaque and removal of the endothelium. This vascular trauma promotes platelet aggregation and thrombus formation at the PTCA site. Further release of mitogens from platelets and macrophages, smooth muscle cell proliferation and monocyte infiltration result in restenosis. Empiric therapy with antiplatelet drugs has not prevented this problem, which occurs in one-third of patients undergoing PTCA. A solution to restenosis is to prevent platelet aggregation, thrombus formation, and smooth muscle cell proliferation. Thrombus formation is also a critical cellular event in the transition from stable to unstable coronary syndromes. The pathogenesis most likely involves acute endothelial cell injury and or plaque rupture, promoting dysjunction of endothelial cell attachment, and leading to the exposure of underlying macrophage foam cells. This permits the opportunity for circulating platelets to adhere, aggregate, and form thrombi. The intravenous administration of thrombolytic agents, such as tissue plasminogen activator (tPA) results in lysis of thrombus in approximately 70% of patients experiencing an acute myocardial infarction. Nonetheless, approximately 30% of patients fail to reperfuse, and of those patients who undergo initial reperfusion of the infarct related artery, approximately 25% experience recurrent thrombosis within 24 hours. Therefore, an effective therapy for rethrombosis remains a major therapeutic challenge facing the medical community today. As noted above, an effective therapy for rethrombosis is by far not the only major therapeutic challenge existing today. Others include the treatment of other ischemic conditions, including unstable angina, myocardial infarction or chronic tissue ischemia, or even the treatment of systemic and inherited diseases or cancers. These might be treated by the effective administration of anticoagulants, vasodilatory, angiogenic, growth factors or growth inhibitors to a patient. Thus, there remains a strongly felt need for an effective therapy in all of these clinical settings.

The present invention relates to the control of transmissions over a network by many stations or nodes all sharing that same network transmission path. Typical of such systems is the case where many nodes are coupled into the same optical fiber network and are capable of receiving the transmissions of all the nodes in the network. Various systems have evolved to permit the nodes on such a network to transmit and receive in a manner that does not cause a collision between nodes, i.e., prevents two or more nodes from trying to transmit over the network at the same time. One such scheme is known as time slotting. In this system, each node in the network is assigned a slot of time in a repeating sequence of plural slots, each typically of the same, unvarying size. This system is very inefficient in the use of network time because the time in each slot is committed to the corresponding station whether or not that station has any information to send. Only where all nodes on the network are always busy is there efficient use of the network capacity in such a system. The entry of or deletion of nodes from the network also requires complete rearrangement of the timing system, or the inclusion of extra time slots which waste network time. A second type of time sequencing for enabling all nodes on a network to have an opportunity to use the network communication capability is token passing. In this case, a node grabs the network and keeps it until it is finished with the traffic it wishes to send. That node then sends a token or special indicia over the network which informs the next to send node of the opportunity for it to transmit. This system is not ideal for real time network usage, such as in live voice communication or real time control in robotics, because it does not insure each node a chance to transmit often enough to maintain the requisite data exchange rate. A third system accommodating plural nodes trying to use the same network involves collision avoidance. Here a node desiring to send begins to transmit and continues unless it detects the presence of another node trying to send simultaneously. If this interfering situation is detected, both nodes cease sending and wait a different, randomly set interval before trying to send again. This approach is only efficient where there is little traffic from any of the nodes in the network. If communication is continuously underway, the time delays needed to resolve the collisions of nodes trying to send simultaneously is excessively wasteful. A fourth approach to the simultaneous use of a single network by several nodes is the use of a master-slave hierarchy between nodes in which one node acts as controller for all the other nodes. Only in rare cases where the nodes are not fully independent is this system effective. Finally, the grant-request approach of copending, commonly assigned application Ser. No. 534,562, filed Sept. 22, 1983, is an example of a further system utilizing a prioritization of requests for network use by all stations utilizing the same priority algorithm. Each station makes the same priority decision so that the node to send next is known to each node, including the node to send.

Many people enjoy the feel of wind rushing over their face while in a moving automobile. People sitting in the back seat of a car with an open window or in a convertible are in the best position for experiencing the exhilaration of wind in their face. Automobiles with sunroofs are also popular, however, they do not facilitate wind blowing on or rushing onto occupants in the cabin of a vehicle. Rather, the wind merely blows over the roof and sunroof of the car with very little of that wind making it into the vehicle cabin. In fact, the driver and passenger in the front seat of an automobile with a sunroof feel virtually no wind from the sunroof. This is in part because many sunroofs are designed with a deflector at the front end of the sunroof for directing wind over the sunroof rather than into the cabin. Accordingly, while enjoying the openness of a sunroof, many are left desiring the effects of wind rushing onto them through the sunroof but with no practical solution for achieving this exhilaration. To experience gushing wind, one can place their hand out the sunroof but they can only do this temporarily because their arm tires, they become nervous about sustaining an injury or they must concentrate on driving. They can also hold a flat object out of the sunroof, but this solution rarely works effectively and creates a risk of dropping the object or causing injury. Accordingly, they are left wanting. If there existed a device that could safely direct ambient wind through a sunroof or other vehicle opening into the cabin of the vehicle onto the driver or passengers, it would address these desires and be well received. However, there are no devices known that can redirect wind into the cabin of an automobile safely, effectively and efficiently. Therefore, there exists a need for an automobile accessory that can be safely and securely positioned in or near a sunroof for catching and directing wind into the cabin of an automobile while driving. It is, therefore, to the effective resolution of the aforementioned problems and shortcomings of the prior art that the present invention is directed. The instant invention addresses this unfulfilled need in the prior art by providing a wind deflecting or directing automobile accessory that directs wind into the cabin of an automobile while driving as contemplated by the instant invention disclosed herein.

In testing semiconductor devices such as ICs and LSIs by a semiconductor test system, such as an IC tester, a semiconductor IC device to be tested is provided with test signals produced by an IC tester at its appropriate pins at predetermined test timings and waveforms. The IC tester receives output signals from the IC device under test generated in response to the test signals. The output signals are strobed at predetermined timings and results are compared with expected data to determine whether the IC device functions correctly. The assignee of this invention has developed an event based test system wherein the desired test signals and strobe signals are produced by event data from an event memory directly on a per pin basis. In an event based test system, test data is described in terms of event and its timing where events are any changes of the logic state in the signals used for testing a semiconductor device under test. For example, such changes are rising and falling edges of test signals (drive events) or occurrences of strobe signal (strobe events or sample events). Typically, a timing of each event is defined either as a time length from the most recent event (immediately prior to the current event) or the absolute time of an event. The basic design of the event tester is disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,532,561 and 6,360,343, which is briefly described here. An example of basic structure in the event based test system is shown in a block diagram of FIG. 1. In the example of FIG. 1, the event based test system includes a host computer 12 and a bus interface 13 both are connected to a system bus 14, an internal bus 15, an address control logic 18, a failure memory 17, an event memory 30 consisting of an event count memory (event count RAN) 20 and an event vernier memory (event vernier RAM) 21, an event summing and scaling logic 22, an event generator unit 24, and a pin electronics 26. The event based test system evaluates a semiconductor device under test (DUT) 28 connected to the pin electronics 26. An example of the host computer 12 is a work station having a UNIX, Window, or other operating system therein. The host computer 12 also provides a user interface to enable a user to instruct the start and stop operation of the test, to load a test program and other test conditions, or to perform test result analysis in the host computer. The host computer 12 interfaces with a hardware test system through the system bus 14 and the bus interface 13. The internal bus 15 is a bus in the hardware test system for interfacing the functional blocks such as the address control logic (address controller) 18, failure memory 17, event summing and scaling logic 22, and event generator 24. An example of the address control logic 18 is a tester processor which is exclusive to the hardware test system. The tester processor (address control logic) 18 provides instructions to other functional blocks in the test system based on the test program and conditions from the host computer 12 as well as to generate address data for event memory 30 and failure memory 17. The failure memory 17 stores test results, such as failure information of the DUT 28. The information stored in the failure memory logic 17 is used in the failure analysis stage of the DUT. In an actual test system, a plurality of sets of event count memory and event vernier memory will be provided, each set of which typically corresponds to a test pin of the test system. The event count and vernier memories 20 and 21 store the timing data for each event of the test signals and strobes. The event count memory (RAM) 20 stores the timing data which is an integer multiple of the reference clock (event count data), and the event vernier memory (RAM) 21 stores timing data which is a fraction of the reference clock (event vernier data). The event summing and scaling logic 22 is to produce a signal showing overall timing of each event based on the timing data from the event count memory 20 and the event vernier memory 21. Basically, such overall timing signal (event enable) is produced by summing the event count data (integer multiple data) and the event vernier data (the fractional data). During the process of summing the timing data, a carry over operation of the fractional data (offset to the integer data) is also conducted in the timing count and offset logic 22. Further during the process of producing the overall timing signal, timing data may be modified by a scaling factor so that the overall timing can be modified accordingly. The event generator 24 is to actually generate the events based on the overall timing signal and the vernier sum data from the event summing and scaling logic 22. Typically, an event is generated by delaying the overall timing signal by the value shown in the vernier sum data. The events (drive events and/or strobe events) thus generated are provided to the DUT 28 through the pin electronics 26. Basically, the pin electronics 26 is formed of a large number of components, each of which includes a driver and a comparator as well as switches to establish input and output relationships with respect to the DUT 28. For producing high resolution timings, as noted above, the time length (delay value) between the events is defined by a combination of an integral part of the reference clock (event count data) and a fractional part of the reference clock (event vernier data). A timing relationship between the event count and the event vernier is shown in a timing chart of FIGS. 2A–2D. In this example, a reference clock (ex. master clock) of FIG. 2A has a time period T. The timings of Event 0, Event 1 and Event 2 of FIG. 2C are related in a manner shown in FIG. 2C. To describe the timing of Event 1 with reference to Event 0, the time difference NT+ΔT between the two events is shown in FIG. 2B where N denotes the event count data, T is a reference clock period, and AT denotes the event vernier data which is a fraction of the reference clock period T. The type of event is either a drive event shown in FIG. 2C or a sampling (strobe) event shown in FIG. 2D. A drive event drives a tester pin or a DUT input pin to a specific voltage level. A strobe event samples the output of the DUT pin at its timing. Ordinarily, a strobe waveform has no or almost no pulse width because it defines a single timing for sampling the output of DUT. However, as shown in FIG. 20D, there is another type of strobe having a significantly large pulse width, i.e, a window strobe, which is one of the subjects of the present invention. As noted above, in an event based test system, the event data in the event memory is expressed by a time difference between the current event and the previous event. Thus, to produce events according to the event data, an event based test system must be able to calculate the sum of the delays of each event up to the current event. This requires a logic in the test system to keep counting of the delay times expressed in the event count data and the event vernier data from the event memory 30. In the U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,360,343 and 6,557,133 and U.S. application Ser. No. 10/318,959 (Publication No. US-2003-0229473), owned by the same assignee of this invention, it is disclosed an event summing and scaling logic for calculating a timing of the current event using the event data from the event memory. In the event summing and scaling logic disclosed in the prior inventions, however, high speed reproduction of events was not fully established with use of pipeline processing. Further, compression technology is used for storing the event data in the event memory for saving the memory space. In the event summing and scaling logic disclosed in the prior inventions, high speed processing of decompressed vernier events is not fully established with use of parallel pipelines. Therefore, what is needed is an event processing apparatus and method for a high speed event based test system which is able to perform high speed event timing processing with use of pipeline structure.

1. Field of the Invention This invention relates to nonionic surfactants which are mixtures of alcohols which have been polyalkoxylated, and detergent compositions containing these surfactants. 2. Statement of Related Art The alkylphenol ethoxylates widely used today as nonionic surfactant components show considerably better low-temperature behavior (lower pour point and cold cloud point) than comparable ethoxylates based on linear fatty alcohols. Among the alkylphenol ethoxylates, the nonylphenol-10 E.O.-adduct (NP-10) is distinguished by such excellent performance properties that it constitutes not only a universally useable surfactant for detergents and cleaning preparations, but also an emulsifier for various technical applications. In addition, this surfactant has very good degreasing properties both on metals and on fabrics. By virtue of these favorable properties, NP-10 is today quantitatively by far the most important representative of the alkylphenol ethoxylates. The disadvantage of the alkylphenol ethoxylates is their poor environmental compatibility, so that considerable efforts are being made to replace this basically very valuable surfactant component at least partly by components showing improved environmental compatibility. Alkoxylated fatty alcohols of natural and/or synthetic origin are an obvious choice in this regard. However, their use involves the following difficulty: ether alcohols of the type just mentioned only show the hydrophilic data required in practice (for example, cloud point in the range 50.degree. to 60.degree. C.) in forms in which the ether alcohols as such are solid at room temperature. This imposes a significant limitation on efforts to replace the alkylphenol adducts by adducts of primary fatty alcohols.

The present invention relates to a volumetric dosage machine particularly for granulates, powders and loose products in general, including products that are not uniform or mutually compacted and have an extremely limited flow ability. As is known, conventional volumetric dosage machines are based on different operating principles, a common characteristic of which is the provision of a dosage chamber arranged on the bottom of the loading hopper to be filled with the product to be metered and provided with various systems that in succession open the chamber with respect to the hopper while closing the bottom, close the chamber with respect to the hopper to separate the chamber from the overlying product, and subsequently open to discharge the metered product. In order to perform this sequence of opening and closing operations, usually there are gates or impeller-like elements, a common characteristic of which is that they often damage the product, since when the dosage chamber is closed with respect to the hopper, a shearing action is unavoidably applied to the product and can, in many cases, damage it. Furthermore, another drawback of the solutions of the known art is that in all known systems one dosage chamber at a time is filled and emptied, consequently slowing the production cycle.

The present invention is generally in the field of reinforced window systems and more specifically it is related with window systems which offer improved protection against blast and impact hazards. The terms blast window and blast resistant refer to the ability of a window system to withstand blast caused for example by an explosion of a bomb, significantly strong wind, etc. A reinforced window may also be a window pane to which a film of material is adhered, as known per se. The terms impact window and impact resistant refer to the ability of withstanding impact force applied for example by kinetic energy of arms or shrapnel, force applied by vandalism actions, etc. The ever-growing threat of what was in the past referred to as non conventional war, namely chemical and biological war, has led to some recent requirements to provide blast-resistant and gas-tight window systems. In addition, it is often a requirement that such window systems also have improved resistance to impact hazards, such as, for example, resistance to bullets fired from firearms, shrapnel of explosive charges and bombs, and even vandalism, e.g. attempts to break into a building or crowds trying to brake through. A variety of windows offer blast resistance and impact resistance solutions, most of which typically offer a single type of protection, namely blast resistant or impact resistant. Other window systems offer dual protection but do not provide the climatic benefits of double glazing window systems. One considerable disadvantage of known window systems is that a single, reinforced impact-resistant laminated window absorbs also some of the blast energy (owing to its relative rigidity) and in many cases may forcefully fly into a room causing severe damage and casualties. Furthermore, for fixing a reinforced laminated window of the aforementioned type within an opening in a wall, a suitable structure and reinforcement of the opening are required, which at times are not feasible for retrofit U.S. Pat. No. 3,624,238 is concerned with a bullet resistant structure of laminated character comprising outer faces or piles of safety glass with an intermediary ply formed of a polycarbonate a resin. U.S. Pat. No. 4,312,903 deals with an impact resistant double glazed structure and is concerned in particular with the thickness of the layers of the laminated window panes, and their chemical compositions. U.S. Pat. No. 5,059,467 is concerned with a protective ballistic panel including a first-impact, front layer and a second rear layer. The layers being spaced from one another by a semi-elastic material, defining a sealed space. However, the panel is for use as a personnel protective shield and is not concerned at all with providing blast resistant protection or with serving as a window system. U.S. Pat. No. 4,625,659 discloses a bullet and explosion proof window or door system comprising two spaced apart panels, whereby the outer panel is spaced from a support soffit such that a gap is formed for providing a ventilation channel. However, peripheral portions of the panels are fitted with a security layer in order to prevent projectiles from entering through the ventilation gap. Double glazing windows typically comprise an outer window pane and an inner window pane spaced apart from the first window pane, with a sealed space between the window panes. The sealed space typically holds dries air or other gas and serves for improving thermal isolation of the construction in which the window is installed. The gas is dried so as to eliminate condensation within the sealed space. Such double glazing windows may be fixed window systems (wherein the framework is fixed within an opening in a wall and the window is not capable of being opened), casement window systems (swingably or tiltably opened), or sliding window systems. It is an object of the present invention to provide a window system offering improved resistance whilst not interfering with its function as a window, namely providing good visibility therethrough. By one specific embodiment, the window system is a double-glazing type, whereby it provides also good climatic and acoustic isolation between an in-side and an out-side thereof. According to the present invention, there is provided a reinforced window system for mounting within an opening in a wall, and a second at least partial frame fixed behind said first frame and corresponding with an in-side of the wall; at least the first frame supports a reinforced window pane; said first frame bears against said second at least partial frame such that forces applied to the first fame in direction normal to the pane are at least partially absorbed and dampened by the second at least partial frame. The term at least partial frame as used herein the specification and claims as referred to the second frame denotes one or more profiled members extending behind (inward) of said first frame, which second frame may be a complete, closed frame corresponding in shape with that of the opening in the wall, or may be one or more profiled members connected or disconnected from one another. Typically, the first frame and the second at least partial frame are independently fixed to the wall. Alternatively, the second at least partial frame is fixed to the first frame. By one particular embodiment said first frame bears against said second at least partial frame such that forces applied to the first fame are at least partially transferred to the second at least partial frame. By a different embodiment, there is a gap between the first frame and the second at least partial frame, with or without a gasket member therebetween. Still typically, the first frame is larger than the second at least partial frame and accordingly, where the second at least partial frame also supports a window pane, the second window pane is smaller than the first window pane. Preferably, at least a peripheral portion of the first frame is concealed by an overlapping protective portion either integrally formed with the wall or applied over the wall for protection of the first frame. According to an embodiment of the present invention there is provided a blast and impact resistant double glazing window system comprising a front laminated window facing the direction of impact and a rear laminated window opposite the direction of impact, said front and rear laminated windows being spaced apart from one another by a hermetically sealed space; each of the front laminated window and the rear laminated window being one of an impact resistant window and a blast resistant window; the front laminated widow is fixed to a first frame fixable within an opening of a wall and the rear laminated window is fixed to a second at least partial frame fixable within the wall""s opening. By a most preferred embodiment, the front laminated window is impact resistant and the second laminated window is blast resistant. The terms impact resistant and blast resistant define the mechanical properties of the laminated window to withstand impact and blast threats, respectively, as known per se. Preferably, the sealed space between the laminated windows is filled with a dried gas, such as, for example, dries air. This arrangement improves climatic and acoustic isolation and prevents condensation of liquid vapor within the sealed space. According to a preferred embodiment, either or both the first frame and the second at least partial frame are fixed to the wall in a gas-tight manner so as to prevent noxious gases from entering the room. According to still a preferred embodiment, wherein the front laminated window is larger than the rear laminated window. Alternatively, the front laminated window is smaller than the rear laminated window, Typically, the front laminated window has an outer face corresponding with an exterior side of the wall, and the rear laminated window has an inner face corresponding with an interior side of the wall, the first frame is in-accessible from the exterior side. According to one particular such design, at least a peripheral portion of the outer face of the front laminated window is concealed by an overlapping portion of the wall. The first frame and the second at least partial frame may be fixed to one another, with one or both of the first frame and the second at least partial frame being fixed to the wall or, alternatively, each of the first frame and the second at least partial frame are independently fixed to the wall.

The present invention concerns the processing of a color cathode ray tube and is directed most particularly to the etching of the color selection electrode of a color tube of the shadow mask variety. In greatest particularity, the invention is addressed to re-etching the shadow mask to enlarge its apertures to a desired predetermined size. The need for re-etching the shadow mask in color tubes of the type under consideration presents itself when it is desired to have the phosphor deposits on the screen of the tube of smaller dimension than the apertures of the color selection electrode. This requirement is characteristic of both the so-called black surround shadow mask tube and the post-deflection-acceleration or post-deflection-focus color tube. A preferred form of black surround tube is the subject of U.S. Pat. No. 3,146,368 issued on Aug. 25, 1964 1964 in the name of Joseph P. Fiore et al, and assigned to the assignee of the present invention. In its commercial form its screen is comprised of a multitude of phosphor dot triads each of which has a dot of green, a dot of blue and a dot of red phosphor. Instead of dimensioning the phosphor dots so that they are tangential with respect to one another, the dots are of reduced size so that there is a distinct separation between dots and a pigment or light absorbing material is deposited in those spaces, in effect surrounding each of the dots with a black material. By arranging the holes of the shadow mask to have a larger diameter than the phosphor dots, the electron beams are correspondingly larger than the phosphor dots and the full illumination of the dots permits maximum utilization of the phosphors while the black surround material contributes maximum contrast. In the post-deflection-focus type of tube the electron beams are subject to a focus field on the screen side of the center of deflection which increases the extent to which electrons of the scanning beams are permitted to impinge on the screen. Because of the post-deflection-focus effect the beams are reduced in diameter and therefore it is desirable to have the phosphor dots smaller than the holes of the shadow mask. In constructing the shadow mask tube with phosphor dots smaller than the apertures of the mask, it is convenient to form the shadow mask initially with a field of apertures that are sized appropriately for use in photoprinting of the screen. After the mask has been employed in screening, the holes are enlarged to the size, in relation to the size of the phosphor dots, that is desired in the completed tube. Enlargement of the holes may be accomplished by etching if the mask is made of metal such as steel which is normally the case. Since the holes are initially formed in the mask by etching, the enlarging step has come to be known as re-etching of the mask. In accordance with prior practice the re-etching process has been conducted by spraying an etchant over the mask with the intention of having the etchant pass through the holes to effect further etching and the desired enlargement of holes. Previously, the mask has been supported with its apertured portion vertically upward and its frame extending vertically downward but this introduces difficulties in the re-etch process when the spray is directed from above the mask. Such difficulties are avoided by the teachings of the subject invention.

1. Field of the Invention The invention relates to an integrated memory having memory cells, disposed at intersection points of word lines and bit lines, for storing data bits. In memories of this type, a number of bits are combined to form bytes and a number of bytes are combined to form a respective word. In this case, a word is the data length of the memory interface, that is to say data having the length of a memory word can simultaneously be written to the memory or read from it. In graphics applications, a screen may be required to show one and the same color over the whole surface. The screen is allocated an integrated memory whose content is in each case read for the purpose of producing the image on the screen. To show the same color over the whole surface of the screen, the same memory word must be written to all the addresses in the memory. To do this, it is possible to supply the appropriate word to the memory interface continuously and to write it to the whole memory successively by appropriate addressing. However, in so doing, it may be desirable not to overwrite specific information stored in the memory. In this context, the term used is "masking". Data sheet MT41LC256k32D4(S) from the company Micron, dated Jul. 1996, pp. 21-23, describes a 256k.times.32 SGRAM (synchronous graphics RAM) which allows byte-wise masking by appropriate masking signals. When a data word is being written, any desired bytes of the word can be masked by the masking signals, so that only the unmasked bytes of the word are written to the corresponding memory cells of the memory.

Methods to identify at least the monoisotopic mass or a parameter correlated the mass of the isotopes of the isotope distribution of one species of molecules, mostly various species of molecules, are in general available. Preferably these methods are used to identify the monoisotopic mass of large molecules like peptides, proteins, nucleic acids, lipids and carbohydrates having typically a mass of typically between 200 u and 5,000,000 u, preferably between 500 u and 100,000 u and particularly preferably between 5,000 u and 50,000 u. These methods are used to investigate samples. These samples may contain species of molecules which can be identified by their monoisotopic mass or a parameter correlated the mass of the isotopes of their isotope distribution. A species of molecules is defined as a class of molecules having the same molecular formula (e.g. water has the molecular formula H2O and methane the molecular formula CH4.) Or the investigated sample can be better understood by ions which are generated from the sample by at least an ionization process. The ions may be preferably generated by electrospray ionization (ESI), matrix-assisted laser desorption ionization (MALDI), plasma ionization, electron ionization (EI), chemical ionization (CI) and atmospheric pressure chemical ionization (APCI). The generated ions are charged particles mostly having a molecular geometry and a corresponding molecular formula. In the context of this patent application the term “species of molecules originated from a sample by at least an ionization process” shall be understood is referring to the molecular formula of an ion which is originated from a sample by at least an ionization process. So, monoisotopic mass or a parameter correlated the mass of the isotopes of the isotope distribution of a species of molecules originated from a sample by at least an ionization process can be deduced from the ion which is originated from a sample by at least an ionization process by looking for the molecular formula of the ion after the charge of the ion has been reduced to zero and changing the molecular formula accordingly to the ionization process as described below. In the species of molecules all molecules have the same composition of atoms according to the molecular formula. But most atoms of the molecule can occur as different isotopes. For example, the basic element of the organic chemistry, the carbon atom occurs in two stable isotopes, the 12C isotope with a natural probability of occurrence of 98.9% and the 13C isotope (having one more neutron in its atomic nucleus) with a natural probability of occurrence of 1.1%. Due to these probabilities of occurrence of the isotopes particularly complex molecules of higher mass consisting of a higher number of atoms have a lot of isotopomers, in which the atoms of the molecule exist as different isotopes. In the whole context of the patent application these isotopomers of a species of molecule designated as the “isotopes of the species of molecule”. These isotopes have different masses resulting in a mass distribution of the isotopes of species of molecules, named in the content of this patent application isotope distribution (short term: ID) of the species of molecules. Each species of molecules therefore can have different masses but for a better understanding and identification of a species of molecules to each molecule is assigned a monoisotopic mass. This is the mass of a molecule when each atom of the molecule exists as the isotope with the lowest mass. For example a methane molecule has the molecular formula CH4 and hydrogen has the isotopes 1H having on a proton in his nucleus and 2H (deuterium) having an additional neutron in his nucleus. So, the isotope of the lowest mass of carbon is 12C and the isotope of the lowest mass of hydrogen is 1H. Accordingly the monoisotopic mass of methane is 16 u. But there is a small probability of other methane isotopes having the masses 17 u, 18 u, 19 u, 20 u and 21 u. All these other isotopes belong to the isotope distribution of methane and can be visible in the mass spectrum of a mass spectrometer. The identification of the monoisotopic mass or a parameter correlated the mass of the isotopes of the isotope distribution of at least one species of molecules is by measuring a mass spectrum of the investigated sample with by a mass spectrometer. In general every kind of mass spectrometer can be used known to a person skilled in the art to measure a mass spectrum of the sample. In particular, it is preferred to use a mass spectrometer of high resolution like a mass spectrometer having an ORBITRAP mass analyzer, a FT-mass spectrometer, an ICR mass spectrometer or an MR-TOF mass spectrometer. Other mass spectrometers for which the inventive method can be applied are particularly TOF mass spectrometer and mass spectrometer with a HR quadrupole mass analyzer. But to identify the monoisotopic mass or a parameter correlated the mass of the isotopes of the isotope distribution of species of molecules if the mass spectrum is measured with a mass spectrometer having a low resolution is difficult with the known method of identification, in particular, because neighboring peaks of isotopes having a mass difference of 1 u cannot be distinguished. On the one hand, molecules already present in the sample are set free and are only charged by the ionization process e.g. by the reception and/or emission of electrons. The method of the invention is able to assign to these species of molecules contained in the sample its monoisotopic mass due to their ions which are detected in the mass spectrum of the mass spectrometer. On the other hand, the ionization process can change the molecules contained in the sample by fragmentation to smaller charged particles or addition of atoms or molecules to the molecules contained in the sample resulting in larger molecules which are charged due to the process. Also by an ionization process the matrix of a sample can be split into molecules which are charged. So, all these ions are originated from the sample by a described ionization process. So, for these ions the accordingly species of the molecules originated from the sample have to be investigated by a method for identification of the monoisotopic mass or a parameter correlated the mass of the isotopes of the isotope distribution of at least one species of molecules. To date, many methods to identify monoisotopic masses of isotopic peaks in mass spectra have been published, including Patterson functions, Fourier transforms, or a combination thereof (M. W. Senko et al., J. Am. Soc. Mass Spectrom. 1995, 6, 52; D. M. Horn et al., J. Am. Soc. Mass Spectrom. 2000, 11, 320; L. Chen & Y. L. Yap, J. Am. Soc. Mass Spectrom. 2008, 19, 46), m/z accuracy scores (Z. Zhang & A. G. Marshall, J. Am. Soc. Mass Spectrom. 1998, 9, 225), fits of experimentally observed peak patterns to theoretical models (P. Kaur & P. B. O'Connor, J. Am. Soc. Mass Spectrom. 2006, 17, 459; X. Liu et al., Mol. Cell Proteomics 2010, 9, 2772), and entropy-based deconvolution algorithms (B. B. Reinhold & V. N. Reinhold, J. Am. Soc. Mass Spectrom. 1992, 3, 207). These methods are often targeted at specific applications such as peptides and/or intact proteins, and the reported executing times are in the seconds time range on a 2.2-GHz CPU (Liu et al., 2010), which is not sufficient for an online detection and subsequent selection of species for a further MS analysis, as in standard methods of MS proteomics. An unpublished method of P. Yip et al., has been optimized for the analysis of intact proteins, using a high number of correlations of potentially related peaks, which have been transformed before from the original data to a logarithmic m/z axis with binary intensity information. However, with the speed is not fast enough for the use for a Fourier-transform mass spectrometer. Evidently, a holistic approach, which is not only suitable for a broader range of applications, including peptides, small organic molecules, and intact proteins, but also for a fast online analysis directly after the data acquisition (without delaying the acquisition of subsequent scans), is required for areas of applications where acquisition speed, i.e., the amount of data that can be analyzed experimentally per unit of time, is essential.

Following the high economic development and upgraded living standard nowadays, cars have long ago become a necessary traffic means in our daily life. Since there are only limited indoor parking lots available for the speedily increasing cars, most cars expose to sunlight or rainwater when they are parked. There are some kinds of cover conveniently supplied as automotive accessory, they are, however, inconvenient in operation, especially when the car is temporarily parked somewhere. Therefore, it is desirable to have a simple and convenient means which, when used in sunny days, can provide sufficient shade a parked car, and, when used in rainy days, may conveniently provides passengers an temporary awning to prevent the passengers from being wetted when they are getting on or off the car.

Wool is one of the most important animal fibres used in textile manufacture. Wool is considered superior to other fibres because of its outstanding natural properties of feel, moisture absorption, strength and its ability to hang. Before wool can be used in textile manufacture or for other uses, it must undergo a number of treatment processes. Raw wool from sheep and other animals contains many constituents considered contaminants by wool processors and the contaminants must be substantially removed from the wool prior to use. The type and amount of contaminants can vary according to breed, nutrition, environment and position of the wool on the animal. The main contaminants are a solvent-soluble fraction called wool grease, protein material, a water-soluble fraction (largely perspiration salts collectively termed suint), dirt and vegetable matter in the form of burrs and seeds from pastures. A fleece may contain up to 30% by weight of contaminants, depending on the animal, so it is important that the wool is treated before use. The first process of preparing wool involves the removal of the contaminants and this process is termed scouring. In traditional wool scouring, the contaminants on the wool, mainly grease, dirt, suint and protein material are washed from the wool fibre using water and detergents. The contaminants remain in the waste water either in emulsion or suspension (grease, dirt, protein) or in solution (suint). Extraction of the waste water produces grease contaminated with detergent and suint and is termed wool grease. The traditional methods of wool scouring involve extensive processing, the addition of detergents, and the use of large amounts of water. Typical scouring plants can consume up to half a million litres of water per day. Apart from the requirement of a large amount of water, there is a problem of disposing of the waste water without unduly contaminating the environment. The problem of disposal involves further expense and, with stricter environmental emission controls, requires some form of treatment prior to release into the environment. Other contaminants present in raw wool include herbicides and pesticides which often require specific treatment to remove them from waste water produced in conventional scouring. Any increased costs of scouring wool are usually passed on to the consumer and therefore result in an increase in the price of wool in relation to other competing fibres, including man-made fibres, used in the same industries. The present inventor has developed a method for scouring wool that requires substantially less water consumption than present methods and involves an efficient means of producing clean wool.

The present invention relates to a packet switching apparatus which is used in the asynchronous transfer mode (to be referred to as ATM hereafter) and a packet switching apparatus for forwarding IP (internet protocol) packets. FIG. 14 is a block diagram of an ATM switching apparatus for switching fixed length packets (referred to as cells for ATM). The ATM switching apparatus includes ingress cards 85, a switch 86, egress cards 87, and a controller 88. An ingress card 85 contains a line terminator 851 for terminating a physical layer signal received from a transmission line 850, a UPC (Usage Parameter Control)/OAM (Operation Administration and Maintenance) unit 852 used for flow monitoring and performance monitoring, a header converter 853 for changing the label of each received cell and for giving the cell a routing header for switching. An egress card 87 is provided with an OAM unit 871, a line output unit for terminating the ATM layer and for processing a physical layer signal to output the signal to a transmission line 870. The egress card 87 may have the function to distribute signals to lower the line speed. The egress card 87 may also be provided with a shaping buffer for priority control in some cases. Different types of ATM switch are described in xe2x80x9cBroadband ISDN and ATM Techniquesxe2x80x9d (page 101) issued in February, 1995, by The Institute of Electronics, Information and Communication Engineers. The ATM switches proposed so far have their own characteristics according to the placement of cell buffer memories. A shared buffer type ATM switch, disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,910,731 or xe2x80x9cShared Buffer Type Memory Switch for ATM Switching Networkxe2x80x9d, introduced in the Transactions of IEICE BI (J72-B-1, No. 11, pp. 1062-1069, November, 1989), has a centralized buffer memory shared among all the output ports of the switch. The shared buffer type switch has been widely used because buffer sharing can reduce the amount of hardware; in other words, buffer memory utilization is highly improved compared with that of a separated buffer type memory switch. FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a conventional ATM switch with a shared buffer. The operation of this switch will be explained as follows. Cells from all the input lines 10 (10-1 to 10-n) enter the multiplexer (MUX) 2. A route decoder 4 then selects a write address register (WA)6 (any of 6-1 to 6-n) by decoding the cell header obtained from MUX2, which indicates the destination output. The write address of a cell buffer memory 1 is obtained from a WA (any of 6-1 to 6-n) and multiplexed cells are written one by one into the cell area 1-1 in the buffer memory 1. At the same time, an idle address provided from an idle address buffer (IABF) 8 is written in the address pointer area 1-2 of the same address as the cell is written in, and it also is written in the, selected write address register (WA) 6 (any of 6-1 to 6-n) overwriting the former WA6 (any of 6-1 to 6-n) content. This address indicates the writing address of the next cell, which will be input into the output queue corresponding to the same WA6 (any of 6-1 to 6-n). When a cell is output from the switch, the reading address of the buffer memory 1 is determined by the read address register (RA) 7 (any of 7-1 to 7-n) each corresponding to the output line. An output counter 9 and an output decoder 5 specify one of the address registers (RA) 7 (any of 7-1 to 7-n) cyclically. The output cells from the buffer memory 1 are demultiplexed through a demultiplexer (DMX) 3 to the target output line 11 (any of 11-1 to 11-n). When the cell is read, the address pointer in the same address overwrites the read address register (RA) 7 (any of 7-1 to 7-n) which had indicated the reading address. The address previously contained in RA (same as the address from which the cell is read) is stored in IABF8, because this address. becomes idle and is replaced by the next address. FIG. 3 shows the structure of an address chain corresponding to an output line, constructed by the address pointers. An address chain 20-1 corresponding to an output line 11-1 is formed between a start address stored in the read address register (RA1) 7-1 and an end address stored in the write address register (WA1) 6-1. Another address chain 20-2 corresponding to an output line 11-2 is formed between a start address stored in the read address register (RA2) 7-2 and an end address stored in the write address register (WA2) 6-2. The operation described above shows a simple example of how to realize address chains corresponding to output lines. Each chain logically acts as a queue buffer for each output on the same memory. The above mentioned switch is easily modified to provide a priority control function by assigning a plurality of queues corresponding to multiple service classes and output lines, respectively, as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,910,731. Furthermore, the official gazette of Japanese Patent Application No. 3-10441 has disclosed a shared buffer switch, in which, m demultiplexers are connected to input lines and m multiplexers are connected to output lines of the switch having an I/O line speed of V and a switching capacity of nxc3x97n, resulting in a switch having I/O lines speeded up to mV and a switching capacity of (n/m)xc3x97(n/m). FIG. 4 shows a shared buffer switch with fast I/O lines, the speed of which is doubled using the method mentioned above A fast input line 12-1 is demultiplexed by a demultiplexer 13-1 to input lines 10-1 and 10-2. Both of the lines 10-1 and 10-2 are connected to a MUX 2, respectively. Each cell multiplexed by MUX 2 is stored in the shared buffer 1 by forming an address chain corresponding to each of the output lines 15-1 and 15-2. Two cells belonging to the same address chain are sequentially read from the cell buffer 1. Then, for example, the two cells bound for the same output line 15-1 are demultiplexed to lines 11-1 and 11-2, and next multiplexed to the designated output line 15-1 by a multiplexer 14-1. The above mentioned shared buffer switches have been mainly targeted for an ATM node which switches fixed length packets called cells. To realize a large-scale IP router, the same switching architecture with fixed length packets is effective. In this regard, a variable length IP packet is chopped up into fixed length packets and they are switched by hardware at the switch core, and then segmented portions are reconstructed into the original IP packet For example, xe2x80x9cThe Tirfy Tera: A Packet Switch Corexe2x80x9d (Hot Interconnects V, Stanford University, August 1996) has proposed a crossbar switch with input buffers. This switch architecture requires scheduling of packet transfer between input ports and output ports. In this configuration, each input buffer is divided into plural queue buffers corresponding to each output port so that packets can be read from any queue buffer indicated by the scheduler, thereby reducing the throughput degradation by HOL (Head Of Line Blocking). In the above conventional shared buffer switch, an address chain is formed for each corresponding output line. In other words, one logical queue per output port is constructed on the shared buffer memory. In this structure, the interval of updating each address chain limits the attainable line speed. Under such the circumstances, therefore, the main object of the present invention is to provide a shared buffer switch with a fast input and output line rate. According to the present invention, a plurality of address chains are assigned to each flow. (A flow is defined as different kinds of level, such as output port, priority class and so on). A plurality of logical queues formed by plural address chains are pipelined. Concretely, the switch of the present invention is equipped with a distributive pointer for distributing each cell flow to a plurality of address chains cyclically and a read pointer to select one of the address chains cyclically. These pointers are provided for each flow and have a task to select a chain each time in a manner to preserve the sequential order of cell flow. Consequently, with this architecture, it is possible to access another address chain of the same flow sequentially before updating one chain. As a result, the time interval of cells in each flow output from the shared buffer switch can be shortened. Furthermore, the distributive pointer and the read pointer can be activated on demand, thereby enabling selection of fast or slow input/output lines or coexistence of fast and slow lines in the same switch.

1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a gas turbine blade, in particular, having an improved cooling passages formed inside the blade. 2. Prior Art In the latest gas turbine plant, a technique of making a gas turbine high temperature has been remarkably developed, and a gas turbine inlet combustion gas temperature has been transferred to 1500.degree. C. or more via a former range of 1000.degree. C. to 1300.degree. C. In the case where the inlet combustion gas temperature of the gas turbine is made 1500.degree. C. or more, an allowable thermal stress of a gas turbine blade, which is representative of a gas turbine stationary blade or a gas turbine movable (rotating) blade, has already reached the limit although a heat-resisting material has been developed. In an operation having many times of start up and shut down, or in a continuous operation over a long time, there is the possibility that accidents such as a crack and breakdown happen in the heat-resisting material. For this reason, in the case where the gas turbine inlet combustion gas temperature is made high, an air is used as a technique for keeping the gas turbine blade within an allowable temperature by cooling an interior of the gas turbine blade. However, in the case of cooling the gas turbine blade with the use of the air, the air supply source is an air compressor connected directly to the gas turbine. For this reason, several ten percents (%) of high pressure air supplied from the air compressor to the gas turbine are used for cooling the gas turbine blade. In the relationship between heat input and heat output, the gas turbine plant, which uses much cooling air, has a plant heat efficiency lower than a gas turbine plant which uses a small amount of cooling air. Therefore, it is important to reduce the cooling air so as to improve the plant heat efficiency. In order to improve the plant heat efficiency, recently, in the gas turbine plant, an air supplied into the gas turbine blade is circulated, and then, is again recovered, so-called, an open loop system is reconsidered. Moreover, in the gas turbine plant, the following technique has been studied. That is, a steam is used as a cooling medium in order to make high the gas turbine inlet combustion gas temperature and to secure a high power. In that case, the steam supplied into the gas turbine blade is circulated. As described above, in the recent gas turbine plant, even in the case where the air or steam is used as a cooling medium, the cooling medium supplied into the gas turbine blade is again recovered, and then, the recovered cooling medium is supplied for heat utilization to other equipments, whereby it is expected that the plant heat efficiency is further improved. In the case of supplying a cooling medium into the gas turbine blade, the cooling medium is circulated to the gas turbine blade to be cooled, and thereafter, is supplied for heat utilization to other equipments. Therefore, a plant heat efficiency can be further improved unlike the conventional case where the cooling medium after cooling the blade joins together with a gas turbine driving gas (main stream). Further, the cooling medium cools the inside of the blade, and thereafter, is recovered, so that there is no disturbance of a stream line of the gas turbine driving gas. Therefore, a blade efficiency can be improved. Even promising cooling medium recovery type gas turbine plant described above has some problems in the case of supplying the cooling medium into the blade and circulating it. One of these problems is to improve a heat transfer coefficient and to reduce a pressure loss. Ordinarily, a leading edge or trailing edge of the gas turbine blade is requested having a thin wall thickness to improve a flow performance in spite of receiving a high thermal load of the gas turbine driving gas. Further, the leading edge or trailing edge of the gas turbine blade is required having a streamline shape having a larger curvature. For this reason, a cooling passage section area and the ratio of cooling surface area to an outer surface area inevitably become small as compared with the middle of the blade. In the case of the aforesaid cooling medium recovery type gas turbine, it is disadvantageous to plant efficiency to provide film cooing or ejection holes in a blade wall. For this reason, the following problem arises. That is, a cooling efficiency as a design value is not obtained by convection cooling of merely circulating the cooling medium. Further, a pressure loss of the cooling medium becomes great, and a velocity of flow lowers, resulting in local superheat. Therefore, effective cooling method is required for a blade leading edge and trailing edge. Recently, in order to improve a heat transfer coefficient of the cooling medium, there has been frequently proposed a technique of providing a rod-like rib in a cooling passage of the gas turbine blade. However, in the case of providing a rib which functions as a heat transfer accelerating element in the cooling passage of the blade, a pressure loss increases unless the heat transfer accelerating element is located on a proper position. As a result, a flow rate of cooling medium excessively increases, and for this reason, a heat transfer coefficient as a design value can not be obtained. Therefore, proper arrangement of ribs or new ribs are required in order to effectively cool the gas turbine blade.

Odor levels within gases or liquids are usually monitored by several techniques, including the room test and the use of a dilution apparatus such as an odor tester, odorometer or odorator. Although there are various procedures involved in odor-level determination, the most common mechanism used in the industry is the human nose. Because the objective is to determine the actual degree of odor, not the amount of odorant, the human olfactory sense continues to serve as the standard of pungency. Systems for injecting odorants are well known in the prior art. Such systems typically include a pump for injecting an odorant into a system, and some timer or other controller to effect actuation of the pump at predetermined intervals. Because it is important to know the total volume of odorant injected into a fluid system over the period of operation, more sophisticated systems in the art include verification devices to determine the quantity of odorant injected. One such injection system, designated by the Model No. NJEX-7100 and offered by the assignee of the present invention, included a positive-displacement pump for injecting odorant into a pipeline, a controller, a flow switch connected to the outlet side of the odorant pump, and an odorant inlet meter for metering the odorant to the pump. The controller tracked the flow rate of the gas in the pipeline using a flow signal, and this signal was also used to calculate the stroke rate of the pump. Monitoring was achieved by the flow switch and the inlet meter. In particular, the flow switch interfaced to a counter to provide a continuous readout of the number of strokes, and the meter served as an additional monitor by counting the number of times the meter was refilled. From the number of strokes and a preset pump displacement setting (in cc/stroke), the purported volume of odorant injected was calculated. The system also included appropriate alarm circuitry for signaling the user in the event of a malfunction. While injection systems such as described above provided significant operational advantages and improvements over the prior art techniques and devices, they provided somewhat "coarse" odorant usage data. For example, such systems were not capable of precisely monitoring how much odorant was being used per pump stroke because despite the preset pump displacement setting, the actual odorant displacement per stroke changed due to pump efficiency variations, static pressure variations, check valve performance variations, line debris and variations in the density of the odorant. Such variations caused inaccuracies in the odorant usage data, especially where the system was operating over long periods of time and in harsh environmental conditions. While these systems did provide quantitative raw data for analysis, adjustment and accountability of the odorant usage, they did not have any capability to present such data in any type of useful format to facilitate audit or reporting of system operation. The systems, although quite sufficient for their intended purpose, were also costly and had to be operated by experienced personnel. Accordingly, there remains a long felt need for improved odorant injection systems which overcome these and other problems associated with the prior art.

The present invention generally relates to the field of medical instruments for dissecting human and/or animal tissue. Such an instrument is known, for example, under order numbers 651050, 651055, 651060 or 651065 from the German catalog “Endoskope und Instrumente für HNO” [Endoscopes and instruments for ENT], 6th edition, Janurary/2000, from Karl Storz GmbH & Co. KG. The instrument for dissecting tissue is an instrument for detachment of tissue, for example of hard tissue and/or bone, in particular a tissue punch. Surgical instruments of this kind are used in the context of minimally invasive surgery for detaching hard tissue or bone in the human or animal body, usually under endoscopic visual control. For this purpose, instruments of this kind have an elongate shaft at whose distal end at least one movable tool is arranged which interacts with another movable or immovable tool at the distal end of the shaft in order to detach tissue. Surgical instruments whose tools cooperate with one another on the basis of an axial relative movement have the advantage that the effective diameter of the instrument does not change upon opening and closing of the tools. As a result, damage to the surrounding tissue or surrounding bone by opening and closing of the tools is avoided. By virtue of the fact that the effective diameter of the instrument does not increase upon opening and closing of the tools, such instruments can also be used in smaller body apertures than can those instruments which have tools opening like forceps. Such tissue punches are therefore preferably used in ear, nose and throat surgery (ENT surgery) in which the smaller effective diameter of the instrument is of great advantage. Such instruments have a shaft at whose distal end two tools are arranged. Of these two tools, at least one is axially movable relative to the second tool. In the known instrument, at least one of these two tools has an approximately circular cutting element on the side facing toward the second tool. By means of their axial relative movement with respect to one another, the two tools act in the manner of a punch. In this case, the at least one cutting element defines a punch area which is approximately at right angles to the longitudinal axis of the shaft in the distal area thereof. During use of these instruments, however, it has been shown that high loads can occur in small areas of the cutting elements of the instrument, especially when cutting through bone lamellae which are at an angle to the punch area. It has been found that this can lead to damage of the cutting surfaces or even to breaking-off of metal pieces from the cutting elements. These metal parts that have broken off are extremely sharp-edged and remain in the patient's body. These metal pieces left behind may migrate through the tissue and may cause not inconsiderable damage there. This is extremely dangerous for the patient, especially in the area of ENT surgery. The operational safety of the known instruments is thus not guaranteed. The patent specification U.S. Pat. No. 5,582,618 discloses a surgical instrument with a shaft at whose distal end two tools are arranged, of which one tool is axially displaceable relative to the second tool. These two tools each have a straight cutting element on an upper edge. A straight punch line is defined by these cutting elements. The disadvantage of these instruments is that they only permit cutting along a straight punch line. Cutting about a partial circle, as is possible with the above-described instruments and as is desirable especially in ENT surgery, is not possible with such an instrument. When an instrument of the type specified in the introduction is to be used for punching of bone lamellae, as is the case without limiting the general application of the instrument of the present invention, it is necessary first to push the distally arranged tools of the instrument through the bone lamella until the punch area comes to lie in the area of the bone lamella. The previously known instruments are not suitable for cutting through bone lamellae.

In certain clinical situations, patients can benefit from the occlusion of certain artery or vein segments through endovascular means. Clinical settings where endovascular vessel occlusion is beneficial include reducing bleeding from an injured vessel, reducing blood flow to tumors, and rerouting the path of blood in the vascular system for other purposes. Alternatively, minimally invasive, catheter-based, endovascular treatments have been developed to occlude blood vessel segments. Endovascular medical devices for blood vessel occlusion include balloon catheters wherein the balloon can be inflated to fill the lumen of a blood vessel segment and detached from the catheter. There are two major drawbacks to the use of detachable balloon catheters for blood vessel occlusion. First, the balloons are made of polymers that generally resist tissue incorporation that limits fixation of the devices where they are placed. Second, the balloons are configured with elastic walls which are expanded with pressurization and valves designed to maintain that pressure after detachment. Unfortunately, there is a substantial rate of balloon and valve failure, resulting in deflation. Without tissue incorporation, balloon deflation can lead to balloon migration and occlusion of non-target vessel segments. Endovascular medical devices for blood vessel occlusion include metal coils that are used to fill a portion of the lumen of a blood vessel segment to induce thrombosis and occlusion of the blood vessel segment. There are several major drawbacks to the use of metal coils and basket structures for blood vessel occlusion. First, numerous coils are usually required to occlude the blood vessel segment, resulting in higher costs and longer treatment times. Second, coil placement is difficult to control, often resulting in coil placement in non-target vessel segments. Third, coils only partially fill the blood vessel. The accumulation of thrombus and scar tissue is required to occlude the blood vessel, a process that takes weeks to occur and is sometimes incomplete, often resulting in incomplete occlusion or recanalization and a failed treatment. More recently, endovascular medical devices for blood vessel occlusion have been developed that include basket structures that are used to fill a portion of the lumen of a blood vessel segment to induce thrombosis and occlusion of the blood vessel segment. Although only a single basket structure is usually required to occlude a blood vessel segment, and the devices are generally easier to control, these devices only partially fill the blood vessel and require the accumulation of thrombus and scar tissue to occlude the blood vessel. As with coils, this process that takes weeks to occur and is sometimes incomplete, often resulting in incomplete occlusion or recanalization and a failed treatment. Therefore, there remains a need for catheter-based medical devices, systems, and methods for the occlusion of blood vessel segments that are simple to perform, result in a rapid, controlled, and complete occlusion, have a low risk of recanalization, device migration, or other complications, and can be purchased at a reasonable cost.

A subject of the present invention is new derivatives of 2-(iminomethyl)amino-phenyl which have an inhibitory activity on NO-synthase enzymes producing nitrogen monoxide NO and/or an activity which traps the reactive oxygen species (ROS). The invention relates to the derivatives corresponding to general formula (I) defined below, their preparation methods, the pharmaceutical preparations containing them and their use for therapeutic purposes, in particular their use as NO-synthase inhibitors and selective or non selective traps for reactive oxygen species. Given the potential role of NO and the ROS""s in physiopathology, the new derivatives described corresponding to general formula (I) may produce beneficial or favourable effects in the treatment of pathologies where these chemical species are involved. In particular: cardio-vascular and cerebro-vascular disorders including for example artherosclerosis, migraine, arterial hypertension, septic shock, ischemic or hemorragic cardiac or cerebral infarctions, notably those related with complications of coronary artery bypass grafting, ischemias and thromboses. disorders of the central or peripheral nervous system such as for example neurodegenerative diseases where there can in particular be mentioned cerebral infarctions, sub-arachnoid haemorrhaging, ageing, senile dementias including Alzheimer""s disease, Huntington""s chorea, Parkinson""s disease, Creutzfeld Jacob disease and prion diseases, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis but also pain, cerebral and bone marrow traumas, addiction to opiates, alcohol and addictive substances, erective and reproductive disorders, cognitive disorders, encephalopathies, encephalopathies of viral or toxic origin. disorders of the skeletal muscle and neuromuscular joints (myopathy, myosis) as well as cutaneous diseases. proliferative and inflammatory diseases such as for example artherosclerosis, pulmonary hypertension, respiratory distress, glomerulonephritis, portal hypertension, psoriasis, arthrosis and rheumatoid arthritis, fibroses, amyloidoses, inflammations of the gastro-intestinal system (colitis, Crohn""s disease) or of the pulmonary system and airways (asthma, sinusitis, rhinitis). organ transplants. auto-immune and viral diseases such as for example lupus, AIDS, parasitic and viral infections, diabetes, multiple sclerosis. cancer. neurological diseases associated with intoxications (Cadmium poisoning, inhalation of n-hexane, pesticides, herbicides), associated with treatments (radiotherapy) or disorders of genetic origin (Wilson""s disease). all the pathologies characterized by an excessive production or dysfunction of NO and/or ROS""s. In all these pathologies, there is experimental evidence demonstrating the involvement of NO or ROS""s (J. Med. Chem. (1995) 38, 4343-4362; Free Radic. Biol. Med. (1996) 20, 675-705; The Neuroscientist (1997) 3, 327-333). Furthermore, NO Synthase inhibitors, their use and more recently the combination of these inhibitors with products having antioxidant or antiradicular properties have already been described in previous Patents (respectively U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,081,148; 5,360,925 and an unpublished Patent Application). A subject of the present invention is the derivatives of 2-(iminomethyl)arrino-phenyl, their preparation and their therapeutic use. The compounds of the invention correspond to general formula (I): in which: A represents a hydrogen atom or: either a xe2x80x83radical in which R1 and R2 represent, independently, a hydrogen atom, a halogen, the OH group, a linear or branched alkyl or alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, R3 represents a hydrogen atom, a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a xe2x80x94COR4 radical, R4 represents a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, or a xe2x80x83radical in which R3 represents a hydrogen atom, a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a xe2x80x94COR4 radical, R4 represents a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, or a xe2x80x83radical in which R5 represents a hydrogen atom, the OH group or a linear or branched alkyl or alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; B represents a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, carbocyclic or heterocyclic aryl with 5 or 6 members containing from 1 to 4 heteroatoms chosen from O, S, N and in particular the thiophene, furan, pyrrole or thiazole radicals, the aryl radical being optionally substituted by one or more groups chosen from the linear or branched alkyl, alkenyl or alkoxy radicals having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; X represents xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90, xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90CHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Zxe2x80x21xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Zxe2x80x21xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94CSxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94SO2xe2x80x94 or a single bond; Het does not exist or represents a heterocycle containing from 1 to 5 heteroatoms chosen from O, N, S which can be substitued by one or more substituents Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94OR3, Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94NR3, Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94R3 and such as for example: oxetane, pyrrole, pyrrolidine, furan, tetrahydrofuran, thiophene, tetrahydrothiophene, sulpholane, imidazole, imidazoline, dihydroimidazole-2-one, dihydroimiidazole-2-thione, oxazole, isoxazole, oxazoline, isoxazoline, oxazolidine, oxazolidinone, thiazole, thiazoline, thiazolidine, thiazolidinone, hydantoine, 1,2,4-triazole, 1,3,4-oxadiazole, 1,3,4-thiadiazole, 1,1-dioxyde-1,2,5-thiadiazolidine, 1,2,4-triazole-3-one, tetrazole, tetrahydropyridine, piperazine, homopiperazine, 2-methylpiperazine, 2,5-dimethyl-piperazine or 4-aminopiperidine; Y represents a radical chosen from the xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94CH2xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94SO2xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 radicals, in which Q represents a single bond, Oxe2x80x94Z3, R3xe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94Z3 or Sxe2x80x94Z3; Z1, Zxe2x80x21, Z2 and Z3 represent independently a single bond or a linear or branched alkylene radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; preferably, Z1, Zxe2x80x21, Z2 and Z3 represent xe2x80x94(CH2)mxe2x80x94, m being an integer comprised between 0 and 6; R6 represents a hydrogen atom or an OH group; it being understood that when Het is absent, then A is not a hydrogen atom and that when A is hydrogen then Het does not represent a piperidine, pyrrolidine or morpholine radical; or are salts of the latter. The compounds of general formula (I) containing an asymmetrical centre are of isomeric form. The racemic and enantiomeric forms of these compounds also form part of this invention. The compounds of the invention can exist in the state of bases or of addition salts in particular with organic or inorganic acids or with bases, and in particular in the state of hydrates, hydrochlorides, dihydrochlorides, fumarates or herifumarates. By linear or branched alkyl having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms is meant in particular the methyl, ethyl, propyl, isopropyl, butyl, isobutyl, sec-butyl and tert-butyl, pentyl, neopentyl, isopentyl, hexyl, isohexyl radicals. By linear or branched alkoxy having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms is meant radicals the alkyl radical of which has the meaning indicated previously. By halogen is meant fluorine, chlorine, bromnine or iodine atoms. Preferably, the compounds of general formula (I) are such that they include at least one of the following features: A represents a radical in which R1 and R2 represent, independently, a branched alkyl radical having from 3 to 6 carbon atoms, R3 represents a hydrogen atom, a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a xe2x80x94COR4 radical, R4 represents a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, or A represents a radical in which R3 represents a hydrogen atom or a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; B represents a thiophene or phenyl radical; X represents xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Zxe2x80x21xe2x80x94; Het is absent or represents a piperazine or tetrahydropyridinyl radical; Y represents xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94; R6 represents a hydrogen atom. A particular subject of the invention is the following compounds of general formula (1), described in the examples (in the form of salts in certain cases): 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-{4-[(2-thienyl(amino)methyl)amino]phenyl}-benzamide; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-{4-[[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl]methyl}-benzamide; 4-acetoxy-3,5-dimethoxy-N-{4-[[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl]methyl}-benzamide; 3,5-dimethoxy-4-hydroxy-N-{4-[[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl]methyl}-benzamide; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-{4-[2-[(2-thienyl-(amino)methyl)amino]phenyl]ethyl}-benzamide; 4-acetoxy-3,5-dimethoxy-N-{4-[2-[(2-thienyl-(imino)methyl)-amino]phenyl]ethyl}-benzamide; 3,5-dimethoxy-4-hydroxy-N-{4-[2-[(2-thienyl-(imino)methyl)-amino]phenyl]ethyl}-benzamide; 3,4,5-trihydroxy-N-{4-[2-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)-amino]phenyl]ethyl}-benzamide; N-{4-[4-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxybenzoyl]-1-piperazinyl]-phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[4-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxybenzyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[4-[3,5-dimethoxy-4-hydroxybenzoyl]-1-piperazinyl]-phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; 3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-N-{4-[(2-thienyl(amino)methyl)amino]phenyl}-2H-1-benzopyran-2-carboxamide; N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[4-[(5-methoxy-1H-indol-3-yl)methylcarbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-[4-[{3-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-1-oxo-2-propenyl}-1-piperazinyl]-phenyl]]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-{3-[[(2-thienyl-(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl]methyl}-benzamide; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-Nxe2x80x2-{{4-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl}methyl}-urea; N-[5-[{3-(3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl)-1-oxo-2-propenyl}amino]-2-hydroxyphenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[3-[{3-(3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl)-1-oxo-2-propenyl}-amino]-4-hydroxyphenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[4-[3,4,5-trihydroxybenzoyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-Nxe2x80x2-{{4-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl}carbonylamino}-urea; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-Nxe2x80x2-{{4-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl}methyl}-thiourea; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-Nxe2x80x2-{2-{4-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]pheny}ethyl}-urea; N-(4-{4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-methoxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl}phenyl)-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-{4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1H-1,4-diazepin-1-yl}phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; (R)-N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; (S)-N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-{2-[3-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl]ethyl}-benzamide; N-{4-(4-[2-(3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl)-1-oxo-ethyl]-1-piperazinyl)phenyl}-2-thiophene-carboximidamide; 2-{4-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl}ethyl 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-benzoate; 2-{3-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl}ethyl 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-benzoate; 2-{2-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl}ethyl 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-benzoate; N-[4-(1H-imidazol-1-yl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-(3-thiazolidinylmethyl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-(1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridin-1-yl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-(1H-imidazol-1-yl methyl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-{2-(3-thiazolidinyl)ethyl}phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[2-(1H-imidazol-1-yl)ethyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[2-(1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridin-1-yl)ethyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-(3-thiazolidinylcarbonylmethyl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-(4-{[2-thiazolidinyl]carbonylaminomethyl}phenyl)-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)-5-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)-methylamino}phenyl]-2-furan carboxamide; 3-(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)-1-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)-methylamino}phenyl]-2,5-imidazolidinedione; 2-(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)-3-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)-methylanmino}phenyl]-4-thiazolidinone; 5-[(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)methylene]-1-methyl-3-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)methylamino}phenyl]-2,4-imidazolidinedione; 2-(S)-4-(S)-N-[4-hydroxy-3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-phenyl]-4-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}-prolinamide; 5,6-dihydro-N-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-1-(2H)-pyridine carboxamnide; N-[4-hydroxy-3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)phenyl]-2-(R.S)-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-4-(R)-thiazolidine carboxamide; N-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-2-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-4-thiazolecarboxamide; N-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-4-(S)-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}-pyrrolidine-2-(R)-carboxamide; methyl 1-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2-H-[1]-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-4-(S)-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]-phenoxy}-pyrrolidine-2-(S)-carboxylate; 1-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-[1]-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-3-(S)-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}-pyrrolidine; 3-{[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-[1]-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]amino}-1-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}pyrrolidine; 4-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-N-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]benzoyl}-N-methyl-1H-imidazole-2-methanamine; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-1-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-1H-pyrrole-2carboxamide; 1-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-3-{[4-[[imino(2-thienyl)methyl]amino]phenyl]carbonyl}-2-imidazolidinone; 3-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-4,5-dihydro-N-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-5-isoxazoleacetamide; 4-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-N-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-N-methyl-2-thiazolemethanamine; 4-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-N-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-N-methyl-1H-imidazole-2-methanamine; 3-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-4,5-dihydro-5-{2-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}ethyl}isoxazole; 1-{[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]amino}-carbonyl}-3-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}azetidine; 1-(2-hydroxy-5-methoxybenzoyl)-3-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}azetidine; 1-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-[1]-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-4-[4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}-piperidine; 1-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-[1]-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-3-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]-phenoxy}azetidine; as well as their salts, in particular their hydrochlorides, dihydrochlorides, fumarates or hemi-fumarates. In a preferential manner, the compounds according to the invention will be one of the following compounds: 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-{4-[2-[(2-thienyl-(amino)methyl)amino]phenyl]ethyl}-benzamide; 3,4,5-trihydroxy-N-{4-[2-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)-amino]phenyl]ethyl}-benzamide; N-{4-[4-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxybenzoyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[4-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxybenzyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; 3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-N-{4-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl}-2H-1-benzopyran-2-carboxamide; N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[4-[(5 methoxy-1H-indol-3-yl)methylcarbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-{3-[[(2-thienyl-(amino)methyl)amino]phenyl]methyl}-benzamide; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-Nxe2x80x2-{{4-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl}methyl}-urea; N-[5-[{3-(3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl)-1-oxo-2-propenyl}-amino]-2-hydroxyphenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[3-[{3-(3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl)-1-oxo-2-propenyl}-amino]-4-hydroxyphenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[4-[3,4,5-trihydroxybenzoyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-Nxe2x80x2-{{4-[(2-thienyl(imino)methyl)amino]phenyl}carbonylamino}-urea; or a salt of one of the latter, in particular a hydrochloride, dihydrochloride, fumarate or hemi-fumarate of one of the latter. Other preferred compounds for the invention will be the following compounds: 4-acetoxy-3,5-dimethoxy-N-{4-[2-[(2-thienyl-(imino)methyl)-amino]phenyl]ethyl}-benzamide; 3,5-dimethoxy-4-hydroxy-N-{4-[2-[(2-thienyl-(imino)methyl)-amino]phenyl]ethyl}-benzamide; or a salt of one of the latter, in particular a hydrochloride, dihydrochloride, fumarate or hemi-fumarate of one of the latter. Particularly preferred compounds of the invention will be as follows: N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[4-[(5 methoxy-1H-indol-3-yl)methylcarbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; (R)-N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; (S)-N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-(1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridin-1-yl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; or a salt of one of the latter, in particular a hydrochloride, dihydrochloride, fumarate or hemi-fumarate of one of the latter. More particularly preferred compounds of the invention will be as follows: N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; (R)-N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; (S)-N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; or a salt of one of the latter, in particular a hydrochloride, dihydrochloride, fumarate or hemi-fumarate of one of the latter. The invention also offers useful new synthesis intermediates of general formula (xcexa3) in which: A, X, Het, Y and R6 have the same meaning as in general formula (I); and W represents an amino or nitro radical; with the exception however of 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-(4-nitrophenyl)-benzamide. The invention further comprises a process for preparing a compound of general formula (I) as defined earlier, characterized in that a compound of general formula (xcexa3) in which: A, X, Het, Y and R6 have the same meaning as in general formula (I); and W represents an amino radical; is reacted in a lower alcohol, such as methanol, ethanol, isopropyl alcohol or t-butanol, preferably in isopropyl alcohol, at a temperature between 20 and 90xc2x0 C., for example at 50xc2x0 C., and for one to 48 hours, preferably for 15 to 24 hours, optionally in the presence of DMF, with a compound of general formula (IV) said compound of general formula (IV) being optionally salified by a mineral acid G, B having the same meaning as in general formula (I) and L representing a leaving group and in particular an alkoxy, thioalkyl, sulphonic acid, halide, aryl alcohol or tosyl radical (other leaving groups well known to a person skilled in the art which can optionally be used for the invention are described in the following work: Advanced Organic Chemistry, J. March, 3rd Edition (1985), Mc Graw-Hill, p. 315). Preferably, G represents HCl, HBr or HI. According to a particular variant of the invention, the compounds of the invention correspond to general formula (I)L: in which: A represents: either a xe2x80x83radical in which R1 and R2 represent, independently, a hydrogen atom, a halogen, the OH group, a linear or branched alkyl or alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, R3 represents a hydrogen atom, a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a xe2x80x94COR4 radical, R4 represents a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, or a xe2x80x83radical in which R3 has the meaning indicated above or a xe2x80x83radical in which R5 represents a hydrogen atom, the OH group or a linear or branched alkyl or alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; B represents a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, carbocyclic or heterocyclic aryl with 5 or 6 members containing from 1 to 4 heteroatoms chosen from O, S, N and in particular the thiophene, furan, pyrrole or thiazole radicals, the aryl radical being optionally substituted by one or more groups chosen from the linear or branched alkyl, alkenyl or alkoxy radicals having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; X represents xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90CHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94CSxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94SO2xe2x80x94 or a single bond; Y represents a radical chosen from the xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Q, piperazine, homopiperazine, 2-methylpiperazine, 2,5-dimethyl-piperazine, 4-aminopiperidine, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94SO2xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 radicals, in which Q represents a single bond, Oxe2x80x94Z3, R3xe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94Z3 or Sxe2x80x94Z3; Z1, Z2 and Z3 represent independently a single bond or a linear or branched alkylene radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; preferably, Z1, Z2 and Z3 represent xe2x80x94(CH2)mxe2x80x94, m being an integer comprised between 0 and 6; R6 represents a hydrogen atom or an OH group; or are salts of the latter. There will generally be preferred the compounds of general formula (I)L for which: X represents a linear or branched alkylene radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms and Y represents a piperazine, homopiperazine, 2-methylpiperazine, 2,5-dimethylpiperazine, 4-aminopiperidine, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 radical; or X represents xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90CHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and Y represents a piperazine, homopiperazine, 2-methylpiperazine, 2,5-dimethylpiperazine, 4-aminopiperidine, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 radical or xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Qxe2x80x2xe2x80x94 radical with Qxe2x80x2=R3xe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94Z3; or X represents xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and Y represents xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x3xe2x80x94 with Qxe2x80x3=Oxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94, R3xe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94 or Sxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94, or Y represents xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94SO2xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94; or X represents xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and Y represents a piperazine, homopiperazine, 2-methylpiperazine, 2,5-dimethylpiperazine, 4-aminopiperidine, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 radical; or X represents xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94SO2xe2x80x94 and Y represents xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x3xe2x80x94 with Qxe2x80x3=Oxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94R3xe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94 or Sxe2x80x94Z3, or Y represents xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94; or X represents xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94 and Y represents xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94; or X represents xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94CSxe2x80x94 and Y represents xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, or a piperazine, homopiperazine, 2-methylpiperazine, 2,5-dimethyl-piperazine, 4-aminopiperidine, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 radical; or X represents a bond and Y represents xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94. Moreover, the Xxe2x80x94Y group will preferably be chosen from the following radicals: in which T represents a single bond, the xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94 radical or the xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94 radical, or xe2x80x83or in which Rp represents a hydrogen atom or a methyl radical, or in which U represents a xe2x80x94Z2, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94 radical or an oxygen atom, or xe2x80x83or xe2x80x83or xe2x80x83or xe2x80x83or the Z1, Z2 and R3 radicals having the meaning indicated above. Finally, there will be particularly preferred for the invention the compounds of general formula (I)L presenting the following characteristics: either: X represents xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94; and Y represents an xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 or piperazine radical, Q representing a single bond or an Oxe2x80x94Z3, R3xe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94Z3 or Sxe2x80x94Z3 radical, and Z2 and Z3 representing independently a bond or a linear or branched alkylene radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms and R3 represents a hydrogen atom or a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms. or: R6 is an OH group. The invention also offers, as new industrial products, the synthetic intermediates of the products of general formula (I)L, namely the products of general formula (II)L: in which: W represents an amino or nitro radical, A represents: either a xe2x80x83radical in which R1 and R2 represent, independently, a hydrogen atom, a halogen, the OH group, a linear or branched alkyl or alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, R3 represents a hydrogen atom, a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a xe2x80x94COR4 radical, R4 representing a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, or a radical in which R3 has the meaning indicated above or a xe2x80x83radical in which R5 represents a hydrogen atom, the OH group or a linear or branched alkyl or alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; X represents xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90CHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94CSxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94SO2xe2x80x94 or a single bond; Y represents a radical chosen from the xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Q, piperazine, homopiperazine, 2-methyl-piperazine, 2,5-dimethylpiperazine, 4-aminopiperidine, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94SO2xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 radicals, in which Q represents a single bond, Oxe2x80x94Z3, R3xe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94Z3 or Sxe2x80x94Z3; Z1, Z2 and Z3 represent independently a single bond or a linear or branched alkylene radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; preferably, Z1, Z2 and Z3 represent xe2x80x94(CH2)mxe2x80x94, m being an integer comprised between 0 and 6; R6 represents a hydrogen atom or an OH group; with the exception however of 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-(4-nitrophenyl)-benzamide; or the salts of the latter. Moreover, the invention offers in particular, as new industrial products, the following compounds, which are synthetic intermediates of products of general formula (I): 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-(4-aminophenyl)-benzamide; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-[(4-nitrophenyl)methyl]-benzamide; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-[(4-aminophenyl)methyl]-benzamide; 4-acetoxy-3,5-dimethoxy-N-[(4-nitrophenyl)methyl]-benzamide; 4-acetoxy-3,5-dimethoxy-N-[(4-aminophenyl)methyl]-benzamide; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-[2-(4-nitrophenyl)ethyl]-benzamide; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-[2-(4-aminophenyl)ethyl]-benzamide; 4-acetoxy-3,5-dimethoxy-N-[2-(4-nitrophenyl)ethyl]-benzamide; 4-acetoxy-3,5-dimethoxy-N-[2-(4-aminophenyl)ethyl]-benzamide; 3,4,5-trihydroxy-N-[2-(4-nitrophenyl)ethyl]-benzamide; 3,4,5-trihydroxy-N-[2-(4-aminophenyl)ethyl]-benzamide; 2,6-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-{[4-(4-nitrophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-carbonyl}-phenol; 2,6-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-{[4-(4-aminophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-carbonyl}-phenol; 2,6-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-{[4-(4-nitrophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-methyl}-phenol; 2,6-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-{[4-(4-aminophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-methyl}-phenol; 2,6-dimethoxy-4-{[4-(4-nitrophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]carbonyl}-phenol; 2,6-dimethoxy-4-{[4-(4-aminophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]carbonyl}-phenol; 3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-N-(4-nitrophenyl)-2H-1-benzopyran-2-carboxamide; 3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-N-(4-aminophenyl)-2H-1-benzopyran-2-carboxamide; 3,4-dihydro-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2-{4-[(4-nitrophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-carbonyl}-2H-1-benzopyran-6-ol; 3,4-dihydro-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2-{4-[(4-aminophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-carbonyl}2H-1-benzopyran-6-ol; 1-[(5 methoxy-1H-indol-3-yl)methylcarbonyl]-4-(4-nitrophenyl)-piperazine; 1-[(5 methoxy-1H-indol-3-yl)methylcarbonyl]-4-(4-aminophenyl)-piperazine; 2,6-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-{3-[4-(4-nitrophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-3-oxo-2-propenyl}-phenol; 2,6-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-{3-[4-(4-aminophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-3-oxo-2-propenyl}-phenol; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-[(3-nitrophenyl)methyl]-benzamide; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-[(3-aminophenyl)methyl]-benzamide; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-Nxe2x80x2-[(4-nitrophenyl)methyl]-urea; N-[(4-aminophenyl)methyl]-Nxe2x80x2-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-urea; 3-[(3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-N-(4-hydroxy-3-nitrophenyl)-2-propenamide; 3-[(3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-N-(4-hydroxy-3-aminophenyl)-2-propenamide; 3-[(3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-N-(2-hydroxy-5-nitrophenyl)-2-propenamide; 3-[(3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-N-(2-hydroxy-5-aminophenyl)-2-propenanmide; 5-{[4-(4-nitrophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]carbonyl}-benzene-1,2,3-triol; 5-{[4-(4-aminophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]carbonyl}-benzene-1,2,3-triol; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-Nxe2x80x2-[(4-nitrophenyl)carbonylamino]-urea; N-[(4-aminophenyl)carbonylamino]-Nxe2x80x2-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-urea; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-Nxe2x80x2-[(4-nitrophenyl)methyl]-thiourea; N-[(4-aminophenyl)methyl]-Nxe2x80x2-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-thiourea; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-Nxe2x80x2-[2-(4-nitrophenyl)ethyl]-urea; N-[2-(4-aminophenyl)ethyl]-Nxe2x80x2-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-urea; 1-{[3,4-dihydro-6-methoxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl]carbonyl}-4-(4-nitrophenyl)piperazine; 1-{[3,4-dihydro-6-methoxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl]carbonyl}-4-(4-aminophenyl)piperazine; hexahydro-4-(4-nitrophenyl)-1H-1,4-diazepine; 1-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]hexahydro-4-(4-nitrophenyl)-1H-1,4-diazepine; 1-(4-aminophenyl)-4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]hexahydro-1H-1,4-diazepine; hydrochloride du N-[4-{4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1H-1,4-diazepin-1-yl}phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide hydrochloride; (R)-3,4-dihydro-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2-{4-[(4-nitrophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-carbonyl}-2H-1-benzopyran-6-ol; (R)-3,4-dihydro-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2-{4-[(4-aminophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-carbonyl}-2H-1-benzopyran-6-ol; (S)-3,4-dihydro-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2-{4-[(4-nitrophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-carbonyl}-2H-1-benzopyran-6-ol; (S)-3,4-dihydro-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2-{4-[(4-aminophenyl)-1-piperazinyl]-carbonyl}-2H-1-benzopyran-6-ol; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-[2-(3-nitrophenyl)ethyl]-benzamide; 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-N-[2-(3-aminophenyl)ethyl]-benzamide; 2-(4-nitrophenyl)ethyl 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxybenzoate; 2-(4-aminophenyl)ethyl 3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxy-benzoate; or their salts. Finally, this particular variant of the invention also comprises processes for the preparation of compounds of general formula (I)L as defined above and consisting, for example, of the reaction in a lower alcohol such as methanol, ethanol, isopropyl alcohol or t-butanol, preferably in isopropyl alcohol, at a temperature comprised between 20 and 90xc2x0 C., for example at 50xc2x0 C., and for 1 to 48 hours, preferably for 15 to 24 hours, optionally in the presence of DMF, of a compound of general formula (III)L as defined above with a compound of general formula (IV)L said compound of general formula (IV)L being optionally salified by a mineral acid G, B having the meaning indicated above and L representing a leaving group and in particular an alkoxy, thioalkyl, sulphonic acid, halide, aryl alcohol or tosyl radical (other leaving groups well known to a person skilled in the art which can optionally be used for the invention are described in the following work: Advanced Organic Chemistry, J. March, 3rd Edition (1985), Mc Graw-Hill, p. 315). Preferably, G represents HCl, HBr or HI. Other production processes can be envisaged and can be consulted in the literature (for example: The Chemistry of amidines and imidates, Vol. 2, Saul PATAI and Zvi RAPPOPORT, John Wiley and Sons, 1991). According to another particular variant of the invention, the compounds of the invention correspond to general formula (I)H: in which: A is a hydrogen atom or an aromatic corresponding to structures: in which R1 and R2 represent, independently, a hydrogen atom, a halogen, the OH group, a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, a linear or branched alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms R3 represents a hydrogen atom, a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a xe2x80x94COR4 radical, R4 representing an alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, or B represents a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, phenyl, pyridinyl or a heterocycle with 5 members containing from 1 to 4 heteroatoms chosen from O, S, N and more particularly: thiophene, furan, pyrrole or thiazole, the carbons of which are optionally substituted by one or more groups chosen from a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; an alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a halogen; X represents xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90, xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 or a bond, Xxe2x80x2 representiny xe2x80x94(CH2)nxe2x80x94 with n an integer from 0 to 6; Y represents xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94,xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94CO, xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94, Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94CH2xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94 or a bond, Yxe2x80x2 representing xe2x80x94(CH2)nxe2x80x94 with n an integer from 0 to 6; Het represents a heterocycle containing from 1 to 5 heteroatoms chosen from O, N, S which can be substitued by one or more substituents Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94OR3, Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94NR3, Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94R3 and such as for example: oxetane, pyrrole, pyrrolidine, furan, tetrahydrofuran, thiophene, tetrahydrothiophene, sulpholane, irnidazole, imidazoline, dihydroimidazole-2-one, dihydroimidazole-2-thione, oxazole, isoxazole, oxazoline, isoxazoline, oxazolidine, oxazolidinone, thiazole, thiazoline, thiazolidine, thiazolidinone, hydantoine, 1,2,4-triazole, 1,3,4-oxadiazole, 1,3,4-thiadiazole, 1,1-dioxyde-1,2,5-thiadiazolidine, 1,2,4-triazole-3-one, tetrazole, tetrahydropyridine, with the exception of the following heterocycles: piperazines, homopiperazines, 4-aminopiperidine; it being understood that when A represents a hydrogen atom, Het does not represent a piperidine, pyrrolidine or morpholine radical. The compounds of general formula (I)H containing one or more asymmetrical centres having isomer forms. The racemics and enantiomers of these compounds are also part of this invention. Similarly, the compounds of the invention can also exist in the state of bases or addition salts with acids. More particularly the invention relates to the compounds of general formula (I)H in which: A is a hydrogen atom or an aromatic corresponding to the structure: xe2x80x83in which: R1 and R2 represent, independently a linear or branched alkyl radical having 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a linear or branched alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, R3 represents a hydrogen atom or a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; B represents a heterocycle with 5 members containing from 1 to 4 heteroatoms chosen from O, S, N and more particularly: thiophene, furan, pyrrole or thiazole, the carbons of which are optionally substitued by one or more groups chosen from a linear or branched alkyl having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, an alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a halogen; X represents xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90, xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 or a bond, Xxe2x80x2 representing xe2x80x94(CH2)nxe2x80x94 with n an integer from 0 to 6; Y represents xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94 or a bond, Yxe2x80x2 representing xe2x80x94(CH2)nxe2x80x94 with n an integer from 0 to 6; Het represents a heterocycle containing from 1 to 5 heteroatoms chosen from O, N, S which can be substituted by one or more substituents Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94OR3, Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94NR3, Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94R3 and such as for example: oxetane, pyrrole, pyrrolidine, furan, tetrahydrofuran, thiophene, tetrahydrothiophene, sulpholane, imidazole, imidazoline, dihydroimidazole-2-one, dihydroimidazole-2-thione, oxazole, isoxazole, oxazoline, isoxazoline, oxazolidine, oxazolidinone, thiazole, thiazoline, thiazolidine, thiazolidinone, hydantoin, 1,2,4-triazole, 1,3,4-oxadiazole, 1,3,4-thiadiazole, 1,1-dioxyde-1,2,5-thiadiazolidine, 1,2,4-triazole-3-one, tetrazole, tetrahydropyridine, with the exception of the following heterocycles: piperazines, homopiperazines, 4-aminopiperidine. Quite particularly the invention relates to the compounds of general formula (I)H in which: A is a hydrogen atom or an aromatic corresponding to the structure: xe2x80x83in which: R1 and R2 represent, independently a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a linear or branched alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, R3 represents a hydrogen atom or a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms; B represents a thiophene ring, the carbons of which are optionally substituted by one or more groups chosen from a linear or branched alkyl having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, an alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a halogen; X represents xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90, xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 or a bond, Xxe2x80x2 representing xe2x80x94(CH2)nxe2x80x94 with n an integer from 0 to 6; Y represents xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94 or a bond, Yxe2x80x2 representing xe2x80x94(CH2)nxe2x80x94 with n an integer from 0 to 6; Het represents a heterocycle containing from 1 to 5 heteroatoms chosen from O, N, S which can be substituted by one or more substituents Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94OR3, Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94NR3, Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94R3 and such as for example: oxetane, pyrrole, pyrrolidine, furan, tetrahydrofuran, thiophene, tetrahydrothiophene, sulpholane, imidazole, imidazoline, dihydroimidazole-2-one, dihydroimidazole-2-thione, oxazole, isoxazole, oxazoline, isoxazoline, oxazolidine, oxazolidinone, thiazole, thiazoline, thiazolidine, thiazolidinone, hydantoin, 1,2,4-triazole, 1,3,4-oxadiazole, 1,3,4-thiadiazole, 1,1-dioxyde-1,2,5-thiadiazolidine, 1,2,4-triazole-3-one, tetrazole, tetrahydropyridine, with the exception of the following heterocycles: piperazines, homopiperazines, 4-aminopiperidinec Preferred compounds for this variant of the invention include the following compounds (described in the examples): N-[4-(1H-imidazol-1-yl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-(3-thiazolidinylmethyl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-(1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridin-1-yl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-(1H-imidazol-1-yl methyl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-{2-(3-thiazolidinyl)ethyl}phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[2-(1H-imidazol-1-yl)ethyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[2-(1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridin-1-yl)ethyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-(3-thiazolidinylcarbonylmethyl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-(4-{[2-thiazolidinyl]carbonylaminomethyl}phenyl)-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)-5-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)-methylamino}phenyl]-2-furan carboxamide; 3-(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)-1-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)-methylamino}phenyl]-2,5-imidazolidinedione; 2-(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)-3-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)-methylamino}phenyl]-4-thiazolidinone; 5-[(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)methylene]-1-methyl-3-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)methylamino}phenyl]-2,4-imidazolidinedione; 2-(S)-4-(S)-N-[4-hydroxy-3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-phenyl]-4-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}-prolinamide; 5,6-dihydro-N-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-1-(2H)-pyridine carboxamide; N-[4-hydroxy-3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)phenyl]-2-(R.S)-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-4-(R)-thiazolidine carboxamide; N-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-2-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-4-thiazolecarboxamide; N-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]4-(S)-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}-pyrrolidine-2-(R)-carboxamide; methyl 1-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2-H-[1]-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-4-(S)-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]-phenoxy}-pyrrolidine-2-(S)-carboxylate; 1-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-[1]-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-3-(S)-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}-pyrrolidine; 3-{[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-[1]-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]amino}-1-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}pyrrolidine; 4-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-N-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]benzoyl}-N-methyl-1H-imidazole-2-methanamine; N-[3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-1-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-1H-pyrrole-2-carboxamide; 1-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-3-{[4-[[imino(2-thienyl)methyl]amino]phenyl]carbonyl}-2-imidazolidinone; 3-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-4,5-dihydro-N-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-5-isoxazoleacetamide; 4-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-N-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-N-methyl-2-thiazolemethanamine; 4-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-N-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-N-methyl-1H-imidazole-2-methanamine; 3-[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]-4,5-dihydro-5-{2-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}ethyl}isoxazole; 1-{[3,5-bis(1,1-dimethylethyl)-4-hydroxyphenyl]amino}-carbonyl}-3-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}azetidine; 1-(2-hydroxy-5-methoxybenzoyl)-3-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}azetidine; 1-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-[1]-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-4-[4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}-piperidine; 1-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-[1]-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-3-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]-phenoxy}azetidine; as well as their salts, in particular their hydrochlorides, dihydrochlorides, fumarates or hemi-fumarates. Preferred compounds for this variant of the invention are the following compounds: N-[4-(1H-imidazol-1-yl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide hydroiodide; N-[4-(3-thiazolidinylmethyl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-[4-(1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridin-1-yl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide fumarate; N-[4-(1H-imidazol-1-yl methyl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide hydrochloride; N-[4-{2-(3-thiazolidinyl)ethyl}phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-{4-[2-(1H-imidazol-1-yl)ethyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide hydroiodide; N-{4-[2-(1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridin-1-yl)ethyl]phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide fumarate N-[4-(3-thiazolidinylcarbonylmethyl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide; N-(4-{[2-thiazolidinyl]carbonylaminomethyl}phenyl)-2-thiophenecarboximidamide fumarate; N-(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)-5-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)-methylamino}phenyl]-2-furan carboxamide hydroiodide; 3-(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)-1-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)-methylamino}phenyl]-2,5-imidazolidinedione hydrochloride; 2-(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)-3-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)-methylamino}phenyl]-4-thiazolidinone hydrochloride; 5-[(3,5-di-t-butyl-4-hydroxyphenyl)methylene]-1-methyl-3-[4-{imino(2-thienyl)methylamino}phenyl]-2,4-imidazolidinedione fumarate; 2-(S)-4-(S)-N-[4-hydroxy-3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)-phenyl]-4-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenoxy}-prolinamide hydrochloride; 5,6-dihydro-N-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-1-(2H)-pyridine carboxamide hydrochloride; N-[4-hydroxy-3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethylethyl)phenyl]-2-(R,S)-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-4-(R)-thiazolidine carboxamide fumarate; N-[4-(4-phenyl-1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridine-1-yl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide hydroiodide; N-[4-hydroxy-3,5-bis-(1,1-dimethyl)ethyl-phenyl]-2-{4-[(imino(2-thienyl)methyl)amino]phenyl}-4-thiazole carboxamide hydrochloride; or their salts or enantiomers. N-[4-(1,2,3,6-tetrahydropyridin-1-yl)phenyl]-2-thiophenecarboximidamide or its salts is the most preferred compound among the compounds of this variant of the invention. The invention also offers, as new industrial products, the synthetic intermediates of the products of general formula (I)H, namely the products of general formula (II)H, (III)H, (V)H, (VI)H and (VII)H in which A is a hydrogen atom or an aromatic corresponding to structures: xe2x80x83in which R1 and R2 represent, independently, a hydrogen atom, a halogen, the OH group, a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, a linear or branched alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, R3 represents a hydrogen atom, a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a xe2x80x94COR4 radical R4 representing an alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, or B represents a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, phenyl, pyridinyl or a heterocycle with 5 members containing from 1 to 4 heteroatoms chosen from O, S, N and more particularly: thiophene, furan, pyrrole or thiazole, the carbons of which are optionally substituted by one or more groups chosen from a linear or branched alkyl having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, an alkoxy radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms or a halogen; X represents xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90, xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 or a bond, Xxe2x80x2 representing xe2x80x94(CH2)nxe2x80x94 with n an integer from 0 to 6; Y represents xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94CO, xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94, Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94CH2xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94 or a bond, Yxe2x80x2 representing xe2x80x94(CH2)nxe2x80x94 with n an integer from 0 to 6; Het represents a heterocycle containing from 1 to 5 heteroatoms chosen from O, N, S which can be substituted by one or more substituents Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94OR3, Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94NR3, Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94R3 and such as for example: oxetane, pyrrole, pyrrolidine, furan, tetrahydrofuran, thiophene, tetrahydrothiophene, sulpholane, imidazole, imidazoline, dihydroimidazole-2-one, dihydroimidazole-2-thione, oxazole, isoxazole, oxazoline, isoxazoline, oxazolidine, oxazolidinone, thiazole, thiazoline, thiazolidine, thiazolidinone, hydantoin, 1,2,4-triazole, 1,3,4-oxadiazole, 1,3,4-thiadiazole, 1,1-dioxyde-1,2,5-thiadiazolidine, 1,2,4-triazole-3-one, tetrazole, tetrahydropyridine, with the exception of the following heterocycles: piperazines, homopiperazines, 4-aminopiperidine; Gp represents a protective group of the amine function preferably cleavable in an anhydrous acid medium, such as for example the carbamates of t-butyl, trichloroethyl or trimethylsilylethyl or also the trityl group. Finally, the invention offers preparation processes for the compounds of general formula (I)H as defined above and consisting of, for example, the reaction in a lower alcohol, such as methanol, ethanol, isopropyl alcohol or t-butanol, preferably in isopropyl alcohol, at a temperature between 20 and 90xc2x0 C., for example at 50xc2x0 C., and for one to 48 hours, preferably for 15 to 24 hours, optionally in the presence of DMF, of a compound of general formula (III)H with a compound of general formula (IV)H said compound of general formula (IV)H optionally being able to be salified by a mineral acid G, B having the meaning indicated above and L representing a parting group and in particular an alkoxy, thioalkyl, sulphonic acid, halide, aryl alcohol or tosyl radical (other parting groups well-known to a person skilled in the art and being optionally able to be used for the invention are decribed in the following work: Advanced Organic Chemistry, J. March, 3rd Edition (1985), Mc Graw-Hill, p. 315). Preferably, G represents HCl, HBr or HI. A subject of the invention is also, as medicaments, the compounds of general formula (I), (I)L or (I)H described previously or their pharmaceutically acceptable salts. It also relates to pharmaceutical compositions containing these compounds or their pharmaceutically acceptable salts, and the use of these compounds or of their pharmaceutically acceptable salts for producing medicaments intended to inhibit neuronal NO synthase or inductible NO synthase, to inhibit lipidic peroxidation or to provide the double function of NO synthase inhibition and lipidic peroxidation. More preferably, (S)-N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]-phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof, will be used in the pharmaceutical compositions of the invention. The same will also be preferred for producing medicaments according to the invention. In a preferred manner, the compounds of general formula (I), (I)L or (I)H, or their pharmaceutically acceptable salts, and in particular (S)-N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]-phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof, will be used produce a medicament intended to treat stroke, neurodegenerative diseases or ischemic or hemorragic cardiac or cerebral infarctions, notably those related with complications of coronary artery bypass grafting. The invention therefore provides a method of treating stroke or neurodegenerative diseases comprising administering to said warm-blooded animal a compound of general formula (I), (I)L or (I)H, or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof, and in particular (S)-N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]-phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof, in an amount sufficient to inhibit stroke or neurodegenerative diseases. The invention also provides a method of preventing or treating ischernic or hemorragic cardiac or cerebral infarctions related with complications of coronary artery bypass grafting in a warm-blooded animal comprising administering to said warm-blooded animal a compound of general formula (I), (I)L or (I)H, or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof, and in particular (S)-N-{4-[4-[(3,4-dihydro-6-hydroxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethyl-2H-1-benzopyran-2-yl)carbonyl]-1-piperazinyl]-phenyl}-2-thiophenecarboximidamide or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof, in an amount sufficient to inhibit said ischemic or hemorragic cardiac or cerebral infarctions. By pharmaceutically acceptable salt is meant in particular addition salts of inorganic acids such as hydrochloride, sulphate, phosphate, diphosphate, hydrobromide and nitrate, or of organic acids, such as acetate, maleate, fumarate, tartrate, succinate, citrate, lactate, methane sulphonate, p-toluenesulphonate, pamoate, oxalate and stearate. The salts formed from bases such as sodium or potassium hydroxide also fall within the scope of the present invention, when they can be used. For other examples of pharmaceutically acceptable salts, reference can be made to xe2x80x9cPharmaceutical saltsxe2x80x9d, J. Pharm. Sci. 66:1 (1977). The pharmaceutical composition can be in the form of a solid, for example powders, granules, tablets, capsules, liposomes or suppositories. Appropriate solid supports can be for example calcium phosphate, magnesium stearate, talc, sugars, lactose, dextrin, starch, gelatin, methyl cellulose, sodium carboxymethyl cellulose, polyvinylpyrrolidine and wax. The pharmaceutical compositions containing a compound of the invention can also be presented in the form of a liquid, for example, solutions, emulsions, suspensions or syrups. Appropriate liquid supports can be, for example, water, organic solvents such as glycerol or the glycols, as well as their mixtures, in varying proportions, in water. A medicament according to the invention can be administered by topical, oral or parenteral route, by intramuscular injection, etc. The envisaged administration dose for the medicament accordincg to the invention is comprised between 0.1 mg and 10 g according to the type of active compound used. According to the invention, the compounds of general formula (I)L can be prepared by the process described below. Preparation of Compounds of General Formula (I) The preparation of the compounds of general formula (I), corresponding to subformulae (I)L and (I)H, is described hereafter. A) Preparation of Compounds of General formula (I)L The compounds of general formula (I)L can be prepared from intermediates of general formula (II)L according to diagram 1. The reduction of the nitro function of the intermediates of general formula (II)L is generally carried out by catalytic hydrogenation in ethanol, in the presence of Pd/C, except when X=xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90CHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 or Y=xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94CH2xe2x80x94, the nitro group is selectively reduced using, for example, SnCl2 (J. Heterocyclic Chem. (1987), 24, 927-930; Tetrahedron Letters (1984), 25, (8), 839-842). The reaction is then carried out by heating the mixture to approx. 70xc2x0 C., for at least three hours, in ethyl acetate, sometimes with added ethanol. The aniline derivatives of general formula (III)L thus obtained can be condensed on derivatives of general formula (IV)L, for example derivatives of O-alkyl thioimidate or S-alkyl thioimidate type, in order to produce final compounds of general formula (I)L (cf. diagram 1). For example, for B=thiophene, the derivatives of general formula (III)L can be condensed on S-methylthiophene thiocarboxamide hydriodide, prepared according to a method in the literature (Ann. Chim. (1962), 7, 303-337). Condensation can be carried out by heating in an alcohol (for example in methanol or isopropanol), optionally in the presence of DMF at a temperature comprised between 50 and 100xc2x0 C. for a duration generally comprised between a few hours and overnight. Preparation of Intermediates of General Formula (II)L The intermediates of general formula (II)L can be prepared by different processes depending on the chemical functions which are set up: amines, carboxamides, ureas, thioureas, sulphonamides, aminosulphonylureas, sulphamides, carbamates, ethers, esters, thioethers, acylureas, etc.: When: X=linear or branched alkylene radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms and Y=piperazine, homopiperazine, 2-methylpiperazine, 2,5-dimethylpiperazine, 4-aminopiperidine, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 The amines of general formula (II)L, diagram 2, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above, can be obtained by nucleophile substitution of the halogenated derivatives of general formula (VI)L by an amine of general formula (VII)L. The reaction is carried out, for example, in DMF in the presence of K2CO3 at 20xc2x0 C. The halogenated derivatives of general formula (VI)L can be accessed, for example, by bromation of the primary alcohols of general formula (V)L using PBr3, at 0xc2x0 C., in anhydrous THF. The alcohols of general formula (V)L which are not commercially available can be prepared according to methods described in the literature (Tetrahedron Lett. (1983), 24, (24), 2495-2496). The amines of general formula (VII)L in which Y represents homopiperazine, 2,5-dimethylpiperazine, 4-aminopiperidine or more generally xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94 are synthesized in three stages from the corresponding commercial diamines. The diamines are selectively mono-protected in the form of the carbamate (Synthesis (1984), (12), 1032-1033; Synth. Commun. (1990), 20, (16), 2559-2564) before reaction by nucleophile substitution on a fluoronitrobenzene, in particular 4-fluoronitrobenzene. The amines, previously protected, are released at the last stage, according to methods described in the literature (T. W. Greene and P. G. M. Wuts, Protective Groups in Organic Synthesis, Second Edition (Wiley-Interscience, 1991)), in order to produce intermediates of general formula (VII)L. When: X=xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90CHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and Y=piperazine, homopiperazine, 2-methylpiperazine, 2,5-dimethylpiperazine, 4-aminopiperidine, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 The carboxamides of general formula (II)L, diagram 3, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above, are prepared by condensation of the commercial carboxylic acids of general formula (VIII)L for X=xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and of general formula (IX)L for X=xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90CHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 with amines of general formula (VII)L. The non commercial acids can be synthesized according to methods similar to those described in the literature (J. Org. Chem. (1974), 39 (2), 219-222; J. Amer. Chem. Soc. (1957), 79, 5019-5023, and CHIMIA (1991), 45 (4), 121-123 when A represents a 6-alkoxy-2,5,7,8-tetramethylchromane radical). The amines of general formula (VII)L in which Y represents homopiperazine, 2,5-dimethylpiperazine, 4-aminopiperidine, or more generally xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94 are prepared according to methods similar to those described in the previous paragraph. The carboxamide bonds are formed under standard conditions for peptide synthesis (M. Bodanszky and A. Bodanszky, The Practice of Peptide Synthesis, 145 (Springer-Verlag, 1984)) in THF, dichloromethane or DMF in the presence of a coupling reagent such as dicyclohexylcarbodiimide (DCC), 1.1xe2x80x2-carbonyldiimidazole (CDI) (J. Med. Chem. (1992), 35 (23), 4464-4472) or 1-(3-dimethylaminopropyl)-3-ethylcarbodiimide hydrochloride (EDC or WSCI) (John Jones, The chemical synthesis of peptides, 54 (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1991)). When: X=xe2x80x94Z1NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 The carboxamides of general formula (II)L in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above can also be prepared, as in diagram 4, by peptide condensation of an amine of general formula (X) with a commercial acid of general formula (XI)L. When X=xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and R3=H, the compounds of general formula (X)L are anilines which are obtained by hydrogenation, in the presence of a catalytic quantity of Pd/C, the corresponding nitrobenzene derivatives, themselves synthesized according to a method described in the literature (J. Org. Chem. (1968), 33 (1), 223-226). When Xxe2x89xa0xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and R3 is a linear or branched alkyl radical having from 1 to 6 carbon atoms, the monoalkylamines can be obtained according to a process described in the literature (U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,208,859 and 2,962,531). The non-commercial carboxylic acids of general formula (XI)L can be accessed using methods described in the literature (Acta Chem. Scand. (1983), 37, 911-916; Synth. Commun. (1986), 16 (4), 479-483; Phophorus, Sulphur Silicon Relat. Elem. (1991), 62, 269-273). When: X=xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 with Q=Oxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94, R3xe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94 or Sxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94, The ureas of general formula (II)L, diagram 5, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above, are prepared by the addition of an amine of general formula (X)L on an isocyanate of general formula (XII)L, (XIII)L or (XIV)L in a solvent such as chloroform at 20xc2x0 C. Synthesis of non-commercial isocyanates of general formula (XII)L is described in the literature (J. Med. Chem. (1992), 35 (21), 3745-3754). The halogenated intermediate ureas (XV)L and (XVII)L are then substituted by a derivative of general formula (XVI)L, in which Q represents Oxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94, R3xe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94 or Sxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94, in the presence of a base such as, for example, K2CO3 or NaH in an aprotic solvent such as THF or DMF in order to finally obtain ureas of general formula (II)L. When: X=xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and Y=piperazine, homopiperazine, 2-methylpiperazine, 2,5-dimethylpiperazine, 4-aminopiperidine, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 The ureas of general formula (II)L, diagram 6, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above, are prepared by the addition of an amine of general formula (VII)L, described previously, onto an isocyanate of general formula (XVIII)L in the presence of a base such as diisopropylethylamine. The isocyanates of general formula (XVIII)L are synthesized from primary amines of general formula (X)L, described previously, triphosgene and a tertiary amine (J. Org. Chem. (1994), 59 (7), 1937-1938). The amines of general formula (VII)L in which Yxe2x89xa0xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94 are prepared according to a method described in the literature (J. Org. Chem. (1984), 49 (8), 1348-1352). When: X=xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94SO2xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 The aminosulphonylureas of general formula (II)L, diagram 7, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above, are prepared by the addition of amines of general formula (X)L, described previously, onto chlorosulphonylisocyanate (J. Med. Chem. (1996), 39 (6), 1243-1252). The intermediate chlorosulphonylurea (XIX)L is then condensed on the amines of general formula (VII)L, described previously, in order to produce the aminosulphonylureas of general formula (II)L which can optionally be alkylated by a halogenated derivative in the presence of a base such as, for example, NaH in order to produce other derivatives of general formula (II)L. When: X=xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94SO2xe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, with Q=Oxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94, R3xe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94 or Sxe2x80x94Z3xe2x80x94, The sulphonamides of general formula (II)L diagram 8, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above, are prepared by the addition of amines of general formula (X)L, described previously, onto halogenoalkylsulphonyl chlorides of general formula (XX)L: The halogenoalkylsulphonamides of general formula (XXI)L, obtained intermediately, are then condensed on an alcohol, an amine or a thiol of general formula (XVI)L in the presence of a base such as, for example, K2CO3 or NaH, in a polar solvent such as, for example, acetonitrile or DMF. When: X=xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94SO2xe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 The sulphamides of general formula (II)L, diagram 9, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above are prepared in three stages from amines of general formula (X)L and chlorosulphonylisocyanate. The reaction of an alcohol, such as tBuOH, on the isocyanate function of chlorosulphonylisocyanate (Tetrahedron Lett. (1991), 32 (45), 6545-6546) leads to an intermediate of chlorosulphonylcarbamate type, which reacts in the presence of an amine of general formula (X)L to produce a derivative of carboxylsulphamide type of general formula (XXII)L. The treatment of this intermediate in a strong acid medium produces the sulphamide derivative of general formula (XXIII)L. Alkylation of the compounds of general formula (XXIII)L by the halogenated derivatives of general formula (XXIV)L in the presence of a base such as, for example, NaH in a polar aprotic solvent allows sulphamide derivatives of general formula (II)L to be obtained. When: X=xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 The carbamates of general formula (II)L, diagram 10, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above, are prepared by the reaction of amines of general formula (X)L, described previously, with chloroformate derivatives of general formula (XXV)L prepared according to a method described in the literature (Tetrahedron Lett. (1993), 34 (44), 7129-7132). When: X=xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90CHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 The esters of general formula (II)L, diagram 11, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above, are prepared by the reaction of acids of general formula (VIII)L or (IX)L and alcohols of general formula (XXVI)L in the presence de dicyclohexylcarbodiimide and of a catalytic quantity of 4-dimethylaminopyridine in a solvent such as, for example, THF or DMF at 20xc2x0 C. When: X=xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 The esters of general formula (II)L, diagram 12, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above, can also be prepared by the reaction of acids of general formula (XI)L, described previously, with the alcohols of general formula (V)L under the conditions described previously. When: X=xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94CSxe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, piperazine, homopiperazine, 2-methylpiperazine, 2,5-dimethylpiperazine, 4-aminopiperidine, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94, xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94 The thioureas of general formula (II)L in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above, are prepared from the ureas described previously using Lawesson""s reagent, following an experimental protocol described in the literature (J. Med. Chem. (1995), 38 (18), 3558-3565). When: X represents a bond Y=xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94, xe2x80x94Sxe2x80x94Z2xe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 and Q=xe2x80x94HNxe2x80x94 The etheroxides or thioetheroxides of general formula (II)L, diagram 13, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above are prepared from dihydroquinones of general formula (XXVII)L (J. Chem. Soc., Perkin Trans. I, (1981), 303-306) or thiophenols of general formula (XXVIII)L (Bio. Med. Chem. Letters, (1993), 3 (12), 2827-2830) and an electrophile (E+) such as, for example, bromoacetonitrile or 4-nitrophenyloxazolinone, in the presence of K2CO3 (J. Heterocyclic Chem., (1994), 31, 1439-1443). The nitriles must be reduced (lithium hydride or catalytic hydrogenation) in order to produce intermediates of general formula (XXIX)L or (XXX)L. The opening of the nitrophenyloxazolinones, accessible by reaction of the corresponding nitroanilines with chloroethylchloroformate as described in the literature (J. Am. Chem. Soc.,(1953), 75, 4596), by phenols or thiophenols leads directly to compounds of general formula (XXIX)L or (XXX)L which are then condensed on fluoronitrobenzene in order to produce intermediates of general formula (II)L. When: X represents xe2x80x94Z1xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90CHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94 Y=xe2x80x94NR3xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Qxe2x80x94 and Q=R3xe2x80x94Nxe2x80x94Z3 The acylureas of general formula (II)L, diagram 14, in which A, X, Y and R6 are as defined above are prepared by condensation of acids of general formula (VIII)L or (IX)L, diagram 3, and ureas of general formula (XXXI)L in the presence of a coupling agent usually used in peptide synthesis, as described previously, in a solvent such as, for example, dichloromethane or DMF. The ureas of general formula (XXXI)L are accessible from isocyanates of general formula (XII)L, diagram 5, according to a method in the literature (J. Chem. Soc., Perkin Trans. 1, (1985), (1), 75-79). B) Preparation of Compounds of General Formula (I)H The compounds of general formula (I)H can be prepared starting from intermediates of general formula (II)H, (III)H or (V)H according to diagram 15. The reduction of the nitro function of the intermediates of general formula (II)H is generally carried out by catalytic hydrogenation in ethanol, in the presence of Pd/C, except when the molecules contain an unsaturation or a sulphur atom, this being a poison to the Pd/C. In this case, the nitro group is selectively reduced, for example, by heating the product in solution in ethyl acetate with a little ethanol in the presence of SnCl2 (J. Heterocyclic Chem. (1987), 24, 927-930; Tetrahedron Letters (1984), 25, (8), 839-842) or by using Raney Ni with hydrazine hydrate added to it (Monatshefte fxc3xcr Chemie, (1995), 126, 725-732). The aniline derivatives of general formula (III)H thus obtained can be condensed on derivatives of general formula (IV)H, for example derivatives of O-alkyl thioimidate or S-alkyl thioimidate type, in order to produce final compounds of general formula (I)H (cf. diagram 15). For example, for B=thiophene, the derivatives of general formula (III)H can be condensed on S-methylethiophene thiocarboxamide hydriodide, prepared according to a method in the literature (Ann. Chim. (1962), 7, 303-337). Condensation can be carried out by heating in an alcohol (for example in methanol or isopropanol), optionally in the presence of DMF at a temperature comprised between 50 and 100xc2x0 C. for a duration generally comprised between a few hours and overnight. The final molecules of general formula (I)H are also accessible through another synthetic route passing through the intermediates of general formula (V)H which carry a heterocyclic amine function protected by a protective group xe2x80x9cGpxe2x80x9d, for example a 2-(trimethylsilyl)ethoxymethyl group (SEM) or by another protective group mentioned in: Protective groups in organic synthesis, 2d ed., (John Wiley and Sons Inc., 1991). The reduction and condensation stages which lead to intermediates (VI)H and (VII)H respectively are carried out under the same conditions as those described previously. The last stage of the synthesis consists in regenerating, for example in an acid medium or in the presence of a fluoride ion, the protected heterocyclic amine function. Alternatively, the intermediates of general formula (V)H can be converted directly into the intermediate of general formula (II)H by release of the heterocyclic amine by treatment, for example, in an acid medium or in the presence of a fluoride ion. Preparation of the Compounds of General Formula (II)H, (III)H and (V)H The intermediates of general formula (II)H, (III)H and (V)H can be prepared by the different synthetic routes illustrated below. When: Het=midazole, tetrahydropyridine, thiazolidine, dihydroimidazole-2-one and Y=xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The amines of general formula (II)H, diagram 16, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, can be obtained by nucleophilic substitution of commercial halogenated derivatives of general formula (IX)H by a heterocyclic amine of general formula (VIII)H. The reaction is carried out in acetonitrile, THF or DMF in the presence of a base such as K2CO3 at a temperature varying from 20 to 110xc2x0 C. The synthesis of heterocyclic derivatives of general formula (VIII)H, which are not commercially-available, is described below. When: Het=imidazole, thiazolidine, tetrahydropyridine and Y=xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The heterocyclic amines of general formula (III)H, diagram 17, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared in two stages starting from the amines of general formula (VIII)H (see below). The mixture of a brominated derivative of general formula (X)H, the synthesis of which is explained in detail below, with an amine of general formula (VIII)H in a solvent such as acetonitrile or DMF in the presence of a base leads to intermediates of general formula (XI)H. The deprotection of the amine function, in an organic acid medium, allows the compounds of general formula (III)H to be obtained. When: Het=thiazolidine and Y=xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The carboxamides of general formula (III)H, diagram 18, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared by condensation of the amines of general formula (VIII)H, decribed previously, with the carboxylic acids of general formula (X.2)H. The carboxamide bonds are formed under standard conditions of peptide synthesis (M. Bodanszky and A. Bodanszky, The Practice of Peptide Synthesis, 145 (Springer-Verlag, 1984)) in THF, dichloromethane or DMF in the presence of a coupling reagent such as dicyclohexylcarbodiimide (DCC), 1,1xe2x80x2-carbonyldiimidazole (CDI) (J. Med. Chem. (1992), 35 (23), 4464-4472) or 1-(3-dimethylaminopropyl)-3-ethylcarbodiimide hydrochloride (EDC or WSCI) (John Jones, The chemical synthesis of peptides, 54 (Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1991)). The synthesis of the carboxylic acids of general formula (X.2)H is described below. The intermediates of general formula (XII)H are then deprotected in an acid medium using, for example, trifluroroacetic acid or an organic solution of HCl. When: Het=thiazolidine and Y=xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94NH-xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The carboxamides of general formula (V)H, diagram 19, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared by condensation of carboxylic acids of general formula (XIII)H with the commercial amines of general formula (XIV)H under standard conditions for peptide synthesis. The synthesis of the carboxylic acids of general formula (XIII)H is described below. When: Het=thiazole, furan, pyrrole, tetrahydropyridine, pyrrolidine and X=xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The carboxamides of general formula (II)H, diagram 20, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared by condensation of anilines of general formula (XV)H with the carboxylic acids of general formula (XVI)H under standard conditions for peptide condensation. The anilines of general formula (XV)H are obtained by hydrogenation, in the presence of a catalytic quantity of Pd/C, of corresponding nitrobenzene derivatives, themselves synthesized according to a method described in the literature (J. Org. Chem. (1968), 33 (1), 223-226). The acids of general formula (XVI)H, diagram 20, which are not commercially available, are prepared according to methods described in the literature. The synthesis of pyrroles is described in Chem. Heterocycl. Compd., 1982, 18, 375. The substitued prolines are accessible starting from commercial hydroxyprolines and are prepared according to methods described in J. Org. Chem., 1991, 56, 3009. The synthesis of the thiazole and tetrahydropyridine derivatives is described below. When: Het=hydantoin and Y=xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The hydantoins of general formula (II)H, diagram 21, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared in 3 stages starting from the anilines of general formula (XV)H described previously. The substitution of the aniline by ethyl bromoacetate is carried out in the presence of sodium acetate in ethanol at a temperature of approximately 60-70xc2x0 C. The monosubstitution product of general formula (XVII)H is then condensed on an isocyanate of general formula (XVIII)H in an organic solvent such as, for example, dichloromethane, at a temperature of approximately 20xc2x0 C. The cyclization of urea (XIX)H is carried out by heating, at 50xc2x0 C., in ethanol, according to an experimental protocol described in the literature (J. Heterocyclic Chem., (1979), 16, 607-608). The isocyanates of gerieral formula (XVIII)H are synthesised starting from the corresponding commercial primary amines, triphosgene and a tertiary amine (J. Org. Chem. (1994), 59 (7), 1937-1938). When: Het=thiazolidinone and Y=xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The thiazolidinones of general formula (II)hd H, diagram 22, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared starting from commercial amines of general formula (XIV)H and aldehydes of general formula (XX)H in the presence of mercaptoacetic acid according to an experimental protocol described in the literature (J. Med. Chem., (1992), 35, 2910-2912). When: Het=hydantoin X=xe2x80x94CHxe2x95x90 and Y=xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The hydantoines of general formula (II)H, diagram 23, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared in 2 stages starting from the isocyanates of general formula (XVIII)H described previously. The reaction of the ethyl ester of sarcosine with the isocyanates of general formula (XVIII)H, is carried out according to an experimental protocol described in the literature (J. Heterocyclic Chem., (1979), 16, 607-608), leads to the formation of the heterocycle of the compounds of general formula (XXI)H. The substitution of the hydantoin is carried out in the presence of a weak base, xcex2-alanine, and an aldehyde of general formula (XX)H according to the experimental conditions described in J. Med. Chem., (1994), 37, 322-328. When: Het=pyrrolidine, thiazolidine X=xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The carboxamides of general formula (V)H, diagram 24, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared by condensation of the anilines of general formula (XV)H, described previously, with the acids of general formula (XXII)H under standard conditions for peptide synthesis. The syntheses of carboxylic acids (XXII)H, which are nont commercially available, are described below. When: Het=tetrahydropyridine and Y=xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The ureas of general formula (II)H, diagram 25, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared by condensation of the heterocyclic amines of general formula (VIII)H, described previously, with the isocyanates of general formula (XVIII)H (cf. above) in a solvent such as dichloromethane, at 20xc2x0 C., in the presence of a tertiary amine (e.g. diisopropylethylamine). When: Het=pyrrolidine, thiazole, thiadiazole and X=xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The carboxamides of general formula (II)H, diagram 26, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared by condensation of commercial carboxylic acids of general formula (XXIII)H with the amines of general formula (XXIV)H under standard conditions for peptide synthesis. The syntheses of the amines of general formula (XXIV)H, which are not commercially available, are described below. When: Het=imidazole, oxazole and thiazole and Y=xe2x80x94CH(R3)xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The carboxarmides of general formula (V)H, diagram 27, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared by condensation of the amines of general formula (XXV)H with commercial carboxylic acids (or the corresponding acid chlorides) of general formula (XXVI)H under standard conditions for peptide synthesis. The synthesis of the imidazole derivatives of general formula (XXV)H is described below. When: Het=imidazole and Y=xe2x80x94CH2xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The amines of general formula (V)H, diagram 28, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared by condensation of the amines of general formula (XXV)H (see below) with the commercial halogenated derivatives of general formula (IX)H under the conditions described previously. When: Het=dihydroimidazole-2-one and Y=xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2. The amines of general formula (II)H, diagram 29, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared by condensation of the amines of general formula (VIII)H (see below) with the commercial halogenated derivatives of general formula (XXVII)H, for example in an acetonitrile and THF mixture and in the presence of a base such as K2CO3. When: Het=oxazolidinone and Y=xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94. The oxazolidinones of general formula (II)H, diagram 30, are prepared starting from the diols of general formula (XXVII)H the synthesis of which is described in the literature (Daumas, M., Tetrahedron, 1992, 48(12), 2373). The formation of carbonates of general formula (XXVIII)H is obtained, for example, in the presence of carbonyl di-imidazole (Kutney, J. P., Synth. Commun., 1975, 5(1), 47) or in the presence of triphosgene at low temperature as described in Synth. Commun., 1994, 24(3), 305. The formation of oxazolidinone occurs during heating of the amines of general formula (XV)H with the carbonates of general formula (XXVIII)H in the presence of an acid catalyst, such as ZnCl2, to xylene reflux in order to eliminate the water formed during the reaction (Laas, H., Synthesis, 1981, 958). When: Het=isoxazoline, isoxazole, oxazole, thiazole and Y=xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94 The carboxamides of general formula (II)H, diagram 31, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, can be prepared starting from the commercial amines of general formula (XIV)H and the carboxylic acids of general formula (XXVIII)H by condensation in the presence of isobutyl chloroformate (Org. Prep. Proced. Int., (1975), 7, 215). The preparation of the oxazoles of general formula (XXVIII)H is carried out according to an experimental protocol described in Tetrahedron Lett., 1994, 35 (13), 2039. Similarly for the synthesis of the thiazoles of general formula (XXVIII)H: J. Med. Chem., 1983, 26, 884. The preparation of the isoxazolines is described below. When: Het=pyrrolidine, piperidine X=xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The carboxamides of general formula (II)H, diagram 32, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, can be prepared by condensation of the commercial carboxylic acids of general formula (XXIII)H with the amines of general formula (XXIX)H under standard conditions for peptide synthesis. The syntheses of amines of general formula (XXIX)H are described below. When: Het=isoxazoline, oxazole, thiazole, imidazole and Y=xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94 or xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The etheroxides of general formula (II)H, Diagram 33, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, can be prepared starting from the esters of general formula (XXVIII.4)H, diagram 31.1, by reaction with hydrides, for example LiAlH4, in a solvent such as, for example, anhydrous THF. The primary alcohols thus obtained are then condensed on halogenated derivatives of general formula (IX)H using a base such as for example KOH in an organic medium and in the presence of a phase tranfer catalyst such as for example Aliquat 336. The primary alcohols (XXXI)H can also be activated in the form of sulphonate derivatives, by tosyl chloride in the presence of pyridine, in order to produce intermediates of general formula (XXXII)H. The condensation of alcohols of general formula (XXII.2)H is then carried out in the presence of a strong base, such as, for example, NaH, in an aporotic solvent (THF or DMF) at a temperature comprised between 20xc2x0 C. and 80xc2x0 C., in order to obtain the ether oxide of general formula (II)H. Similarly, the amines of general formula (II)H, diagram 33, are obtained by the substitution of the tosylate function of the intermediates of general formula (XXXII)H, obtained in a standard fashion starting from the alcohols of general formula (XXXI)H and tosyl chlosride in the presence of pyridine, by the commercial amines of general formula (XXX)H by reaction in a solvent such as, for example, acetonitrile or DMF, in the presence of a base (K2CO3) at a temperature comprised between 20 and 85xc2x0 C. When: Het=azetidine X=xe2x80x94COxe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The carboxamides of general formula (III)H, diagram 34, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, can be prepared by condensation of commercial carboxylic acids of general formula (XXIII)H with the amines of general formula (XXXII)H under standard conditions for peptide synthesis. The synthesis of amines of general formula (XXXII)H is described below. The deprotection of the aniline is carried out by a strong acid such as, for example, trifluoroacetic acid optionally in the presence of triethylsilane. When: Het=azetidine X=xe2x80x94NHxe2x80x94COxe2x80x94Xxe2x80x2xe2x80x94 and Y=xe2x80x94Oxe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The ureas of general formula (III)H, diagram 35, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, can be prepared by the addition of the amines of general formula (XXXII)H on the isocyanates (XXXIV)H obtained from the reaction of the amines of general formula (XV)H with triphosgene in the presence of a tertiary amine such as for example diisopropylethylamine in a neutral solvent such as dichloromethane (J. Org. Chem. (1994), 59 (7), 1937-1938). The ureas of general formula (XXXV)H thus obtained are deprotected by treatment in a strong acid medium as described previously. The synthesis of the amines of general formula (XXXII)H is described below. When: Het=thiazole and Y=xe2x80x94CH2xe2x80x94N(R3)xe2x80x94Yxe2x80x2xe2x80x94. The amines of general formula (II)H, diagram 36, in which A, X, Y and Het are as defined above, are prepared by condensation of the amines of general formula (XXV)H (see below) with the commercial halogenated derivatives of general formula (IX)H under the conditions described previously. Preparation of Different Synthesis Intermediates Synthesis of Intermediates (VIII)H The syntheses of the intermediates of general formula (VIII)H are illustrated in diagrams 16.1 and 16.2. The intermediates of general formula (VIII)H, diagram 16.1, can be prepared, for example, in 3 stages starting from 4-imidazole carboxylic acid. The protection of the nitrogen of the heterocycle is carried out using (Boc)2O in the presence of a base such as K2CO3 in DMF. The condensation with the amines of general formula (XV)H (see above) is carried out in a standard fashion under the conditions for peptide synthesis in order to produce the intermediates of general formula (VIII.3)H. The amine of the heterocycle is regenerated by treatment in an acid medium and in particular with trifluoroacetic acid in order to produce the intermediates of general formula (VII)H. The dihydroimidazole-2-ones of general formula (VIII)H, diagram 16.2, can be prepared, for example, in 2 stages starting from the anilines of general formula (XV)H (see above) which are condensed on 2-chloroethyl isocyanate in DMF at 20xc2x0 C. in order to produce the ureas of general formula (VIII.4)H. The cyclization to produce (VIII)H is then carried out by treatment in a basic medium using, for example, tBuOK in DMF. Synthesis of Intermediates (X)H The intermediates of general formula (X)H, diagram 17.1, can be prepared starting from commercial carboxylic acids of general formula (X.1)H. Protection of the amine function in the form of a carbamate is followed by the selective reduction of the carboxylic acid function by lithium and aluminum hydride in a solvent such as THF, at 20xc2x0 C. Intermediate (X.3)H is then brominated in the presence of carbon tetrabromide and triphenylphosphine in a solvent such as dichloromethane. Synthesis of Intermediates (XIII)H The intermediates of general formula (XIII)H, diagram 19.1, can be prepared starting from (R or S) derivatives of thiazolidine carboxylic acids in the presence of (Boc)2O under standard conditions. Synthesis of Intermediates (XVI)H The intermediates of general formula (XVI)H, diagram 20. 1, can be prepared starting from commercial carboxamide derivatives of general formula (XVI.1)H. These carboxamides are treated by a Lawesson reagent in a solvent such as 1,4-dioxane for 2 to 3 hours at a temperature which varies from 25xc2x0 C. to reflux temperature of the mixture. The thiocarboxarnides of general formula (XVI.2)H are then treated by ethyl bromopyruvate, at 20xc2x0 C. in DMF according to an experimental protocol described in J. Med. Chem., (1983), 26, 884-891, in order to produce the thiazoles of general formula (XVI.3)H. The saponification of the ester is carried out over 15 hours by aqueous potash in solution in acetone. The tetrahydropyridines of general formula (XVI)H, diagram 20.2, can be prepared starting from commercial tetrahydro-4-pyridine carboxylicacid. Esterification is carried out in a standard fashion in the presence of para-toluene sulphonic acid, in methanol, in order to produce to the intermediate (XVI.4)H which is then condensed on a halogenated derivative of general formula (IX)H under the conditions described previously. The acid of general formula (XVI)H is obtained by saponification in the presence of, for example, LiOH or KOH. Synthesis of Intermediates (XXII)H The syntheses of intermediates of general formula (XXII)H are described in diagrams 10.1 and 10.2. The tosyylate function of the (L or D) proline derivatives of general formula (XXII.1)H (Tetrahedron Lett., (1983), 24 (33), 3517-3520), diagram 24.1, is substituted by the alcoholate of the derivaties of general formula (XXII.2)H, generated in situ by a base such as NaH. The substitution is carried out at 20xc2x0 C. in a solvent such as N-methylpyrrolidinone which produces the appropriate inversion of the configuration of the carbon seat of the reaction (Tetrahedron Lett., (1983), 24 (33), 3517-3520). The intermediates of general formula (XXII.3)H thus obtained are then saponified in a standard fashion by alcoholic potash. The intermediates of general formula (XXII)H can also be prepared (diagram 24.2) starting from the condensation of cysteine (L or D) on an aldehyde of general formula (XXII.5)H according to an experimental protocol described in the literature (J. Org. Chem., (1957), 22, 943-946). The amine of the heterocycle is then protected in the form of a carbamate in order to produce intermediates of general formula (XXII)H. The aldehydes of general formula (XXII.5)H, which are not commercially available, can be prepared according to J. Chem. Soc., Perkin Trans. I, 1973, 1, 35. Synthesis of Intermediates (XXIV)H The synthesis of intermediates of general formula (XXIV)H is described in diagram 26.1. The condensation of the amines (R or S) of general formula (XXIV.1)H, diagram 26.1, on the halogenated derivatives of general formula (IX)H is carried out in the presence of a base such as potassium carbonate in a solvent such as DMF. The condensation product (XXIV.2)H is then deprotected in an acid medium in order to produce intermediates of general formula (XXIV)H. Synthesis of Intermediates (XXV)H The syntheses of intermediates of general formula (XXV)H are described in diagrams 27.1, 27.2, 27.3 and 27.4. The imidazoles of general formula (XXV)H, diagram 27.1, can be prepared in 4 stages starting from the commercial compounds (XXV.1)H and (XXV.2)H. The condensation between the bromoacetophenones of general formula (XXV.1)H and the carboxylic acids of general formula (XXV.2)H is carried out in the presence of Caesium carbonate in DMF. The ketoester obtained (XXV.3)H is cyclized in the presence of 15 equivalents of ammonium acetate by heating in a mixture of xylenes and simultaneous elimination of the water formed during the reaction in order to produce the imidazoles of general formula (XXV.4)H. The nitrogen of the heterocycle is then protected, for example using 2-(trimethylsilyl)ethoxymethyl (SEM) or by another protective group mentioned in: Protective groups in organic synthesis, 2nd ed., (John Wiley and Sons Inc., 1991), in order to produce intermediates of general formula (XXV.5)H. The release of the amine from the chain can be carried out by hydrogenolysis in the presence of Pd/C. Alternatively, the intermediates of general formula (XXV.4)H can be alkylated in the presence of a base such as, for example, K2CO3, and a reagent such as R3xe2x80x94X in a solvent such as DMF or acetonitrile in order to produce the imidazoles of general formula (XXV.6)H. Deprotection of the side chain, as described previously, allows the intermediates of general formula (XXV)H to be accessed. The intermediates of general formula (XXV)H containing an oxazole, thiazole or an imidazole are also accessible via other synthetic routes such as that described in Bioorg. and Med. Chem. Lett.,1993, 3, 915 or Tetrahedron Lett., 1993, 34, 1901. The intermediates of general formula (XXV.7)H thus obtained can be modified, diagram 27.2, by saponification followed by decarboxylation, for example thermic, in order to produce disubstituted heterocycles of general formula (XXV.9)H. Release of the amine from the side chain, as described previously, allows the intermediates of general formula (XXV)H to be accessed. Alternatively, the carboxylic function of the heterocycles of general formula (XXV.7)H, can be reduced, for example by NaBH4, in order to produce alcoholic derivatives of general formula (XXV.10)H, diagram 27.3, which can be alkylated in the presence of R3xe2x80x94X and a base such as K2CO3 in a solvent such as acetonitrile or DMF. Release of the amine from the side chain, as described previously, allows the intermediates of general formula (XXV)H to be accessed. The thiazoles of general formula (XXV)H, diagram 27.4, can also be prepared in 4 stages starting from commercial sarcosinamide hydrochloride. The amine is first protected in a standard fashion in the form of tBu carbamate and the carboxamide function is converted into thiocarboxamide in the presence of Lawesson reagent. The formation of the thiazole ring is carried out by the reaction of thiocarboxamide with the intermediate of general formula (XXV.1)H according to an experimental protocol described in the literature (J. Org. Chem., (1995), 60, 5638-5642). The amine function is regenerated by treatment with the intermediate of general formula (XXV.12)H in a strong acid medium such as, for example, trifluoroacetic acid. Synthesis of Intermediates (XXVIII)H The isoxazolines and isoxazoles of general formula (XXVIII)H, Diagram 31.1, are prepared by reaction of commercial aldehydes of general formula (XX)H with hydroxylamine hydrochloride. The oxime of general formula (XXVIII.1)H thus obtained is activated in the form of the oxime chloride, of general formula (XXVIII.2)H, by reaction with N-chlorosuccinimide in DMF before reacting with the esters of general formula (XXVIII.3)H in order to produce isoxazoline derivatives or with the esters of general formula (XXVIII.4)H in order to produce isoxazole derivatives according to an experimental protocol described in the literature (Tetrahedron Lett., 1996, 37 (26), 4455; J. Med. Chem., 1997, 40, 50-60 and 2064-2084). Saponification of the isoxazolines or isoxazoles of general formula (XXVIII.5)H is then carried out in a standard fashion under the conditions described previously. The unsaturated esters of general formula (XXVIII.3)H and (XXVIII.4)H, which are not commercially available, can be prepared according to methods described in the literature (J. Med. Chem., 1987, 30, 193; J. Org. Chem., 1980, 45, 5017). Synthesis of Intermediates (XXIX)H The syntheses of intermediates of general formula (XXIX)H are described in diagrams 32.1, 32.2, 32.3 and 32.4. The intermediates of general formula (XXIX)H can be prepared, diagram 32.1, starting from the intermediates of general formula (XXII.3)H, described previously, by treatment in a strong acid medium to regenerate the heterocyclic amine function. The selective reduction of the carboxylic function in the presence of, for example, sodium borohydride in a solvent such as, for example, anhydrous THF, allows the intermediate of general formula (XXIX)H carrying a primary alcohol function to be obtained without touching the nitro group (Rao, A. V. R., J. Chem. Soc. Chem. Commun., 1992, 11, 859). The intermediates of general formula (XXIX)H can also be prepared, diagram 32.2, starting, from intermediates of general formula (XXIX.1)H (R or S) the preparation of which is similar to that of the compounds of general formula (XXII.1)H. Condensation of the alcoholic derivatives of general formula (XXII.2)H on the intermediates of general formula (XXIX.1)H is also described above. Release of the heterocyclic amine is carried out in the presence of an organic solution of a strong acid, for example, trifluoroacetic acid. The amines of general formula (XXIX)H, diagram 32.3, are also accessible starting from the substitution of tosylated derivatives of general formula (XXIX.1)H by the commercial amines of general formula (XXX)H. Detachment of the carbamate function from the intermediates of general formula (XXIX.3)H is carried out as described previously. The intermediates of general formula (XXIX)H can also be prepared, diagram 32.4, by reaction of the halogenated derivatives of general formula (IX)H with an alcohol of general formula (XXIX.4)H in the presence of a base such as for example tBuOxe2x88x92K+ in an anhydrous solvent such as THF. The intermediate of general formula (XXIX.5)H thus obtained is then deprotected in a strong acid medium (HCl or TFA). Synthesis of Intermediates (XXXII)H The intermediates of general formula (XXXII)H can be prepared, diagram 34.1, by reaction of the halogenated derivatives of general formula (IX)H with commercial 1-(diphenylmethyl)-3-hydroxyazetidine (XXXII.1)H in the presence of a base such as for example NaH in an anhydrous solvent such as THF. In this case, the nitro group of the intermediate of general formula (XXXII.2)H is reduced in the presence of SnCl2, as described previously, in order to produce the intermediate of general formula (XXXII.3)H the amine of which is then protected in the form of a tButyl carbamate. The detachment of the diphenylmethyl protective group is then carried out in a standard fashion by hydrogenolysis in the presence of Pd(OH)2 in order to produce the intermediate of general formula (XXXII)H. Unless they are defined differently, all the technical and scientific terms used here have the same meaning as that usually understood by an ordinary specialist in the field to which the invention belongs. Similarly, all publications, Patent Applications, Patents and other references mentioned here are incorporated by way of reference.

This invention relates to battery processing and manufacturing, and more particularly to methods and apparatus for filling batteries with electrolyte fluids. In the manufacturing and processing of batteries, two general goals always are sought after. First, it is important for reasons of quality control and safety that the individual cells of the battery be filled with a proper amount of electrolyte fluid. Secondly, both in the acid filling operations and in other similarly constituted steps of the manufacturing process, it is desirable that the machinery involved be designed with substantial structural adaptability such that batteries of varying configuration and size may be efficiently processed thereby. The safety and quality control problems associated with battery manufacturing processes are well-known. Typically, batteries are configured of multiple cells each having a separate inlet port for providing a predetermined amount of electrolyte fluid, such as acid, for reaction with the electrode plates in the respective cells. If a given cell is either overfilled or underfilled with acid, irregular electrical characteristics may result, with consequent damage either to the battery itself or to associated electrical apparatus driven by the battery. Similarly, the acid composition of most electrolyte fluids tends to produce gases which under certain circumstances may be explosive. In order, therefore, to yield a battery which is both safe and effective, it is important to ensure to as great a degree as possible that the battery cells will contain a proper amount of fluid. It is also well-known that, depending upon the eventual end use for the batteries, the size and configuration thereof may vary widely. For example, the number of cells and the volume of each may vary considerably, and the location of inlet ports of the various cells will be correspondingly altered. Similarly, depending upon the situs of use of the battery, terminal posts may be located at disparate points on the battery top or bottom surfaces. In order to accommodate these variations in battery characteristics, a given machine should present reasonable adaptability not only as to the amount of volume coupled to the battery in a filling process, but also as to the location of the portions of the machine which actually make contact with the battery. For example, the number and location of nozzles for the filling process should be as adaptable as possible, with such adaptability being reasonably quick and simple and without requiring major overhaul of the processing machinery. The prior art shows many attempts at realization of these general goals, but none is believed to be completely effective in any or all respects. For example, one class of filling apparatus involves the use of one or more pumps which transfer fluid from a receptacle tank into batteries. In addition to involving mechanical reliability problems, such as approach also requires rather sophisticated adjustment mechanisms in order to provide the volume adaptability required. Moreover, if a crimp or blockage occurs in a feed hose in such systems, many or all of the cells of the battery being filled will be subjected to overflow or underflow difficulties, with their consequent impairment of product quality and introduction of safety problems. The present invention is therefore directed to achievement of the foregoing general objects insofar as possible.

The use of touch-sensitive surfaces as input devices for computers and other electronic computing devices has increased significantly in recent years. Exemplary touch-sensitive surfaces include touch pads and touch screen displays. Such surfaces are widely used to manipulate user interface objects on a display. Exemplary manipulations include entering characters using one or more soft keyboards. A user may need to perform such manipulations on user interface objects in any program or application where character input is needed. But existing methods for using such keyboards are cumbersome and inefficient. For example, buttons for hiding the keyboard or switching to a different language keyboard can be unintentionally activated while typing on the keyboard, which makes the text entry experience tedious and creates a significant cognitive burden on a user. In addition, some conventional methods take longer than necessary to complete a task, thereby wasting a user's time and a device's power reserve, which can be particularly important consideration for battery-operated devices.

The preparation and use of 2-amino-5-halo-6-alkyl-4-pyrimidinols as antiviral agents is known (U.S. Pat. No. 3,956,302 and Nicols, Weed and Underwood, Antimicrobial Agents, Chemo. Ther. 9 433, 1976). P reparation of 2-amino-5-bromo-6-phenyl-4-pyrimidinol (V, where X.sub.3 is Br and X.sub.1 is phenyl) has been reported (Brown and Stevens, JCS Perkin I, 1023, 1975) but no utility has been described for this material. Snell, Elias and Freeman in GB 1,223,686 (1967) disclose a variety of 5,6-disubstituted 2-amino-4-pyrimidinols, such as 2-dimethylamino-5-bromo-6-methyl -4-pyrimidinol but do not identify antiviral properties. Various 5-unsubstituted 2-amino-6-arylpyrimidinols are known (e.g., Sirakawa, Yakugaku Zasshi 80, 1542. 1960; Kulkarni et al., J. Sci and Ind. Research (India) 19C, 6-8 (1960), CA 54, 22576C; and U.S. Pat. No. 2,776,283. Diuretics and cardioregulatory properties are-described for various 2-amino and 2-substituted amino-5-aminomethyl and 5 -aryl-6-aryl-4-pyrimidinols, U.S. Pat. No. 2,704,285, U.S. Pat. No. 2,723,977 and U.S. Pat. No. 2,776,283. Again no antiviral properties were noted. Although 2-amino-5-bromo-6-methyl-4-pyrimidinol (U.S. Pat. No. 3,956,302) exhibits useful antiviral and interferon inducing properties, we have found that its therapeutic application is limited to moderate doses since the material will crystallize in the urine and kidney of animals receiving high therapeutic dose. The novel 2-amino-6-aryl-5-substituted pyrimidinols of this invention exhibit antiviral activity, an improved therapeutic ratio and fewer side effects and are useful in preventing and treating viral infections. The antiviral activity of many of the compounds of this invention is associated with increased production of interferon. Other compounds of this invention exhibit antiviral activity but do not induce interferon production.

Strokes are the third leading cause of death in the United States (causing approximately 177,000 deaths per year) and the number one cause of long-term disability (affecting nearly 5 million people). Strokes result from abrupt damage to the brain or spinal cord caused by an abnormality of the blood supply. Strokes typically occur in one of two forms: (i) hemorrhagic, which occurs with the rupture of a blood vessel; and (ii) ischemic, which occurs with the obstruction of a blood vessel. Rapid diagnosis is a key component of stroke management. This is because treatments for ischemic strokes way be contra-indicated for treatment of hemorrhagic strokes and, furthermore, the effectiveness of a particular treatment can be time-sensitive. In particular, the only approved therapy for acute ischemic strokes, i.e., the administration of tPA to eliminate clots, is contra-indicated for hemorrhagic strokes. Furthermore, tPA is most effective if it is administered within 3 hours of the onset of an ischemic stroke. However, current diagnosis times (i.e., the time needed to identify that the patient is suffering from a stroke and to identify the hemorrhagic or ischemic nature of the stroke) frequently exceeds this 3 hour window. As a result, only a fraction, of ischemic stroke victims are properly treated with tPA. Imaging is generally necessary to: (i) distinguish strokes from other conditions; (ii) distinguish between the different types of strokes (i.e., hemorrhagic or ischemic) and (ii) determine suitable treatments. Computerized Tomography (CT) has emerged as the key imaging modality in the diagnosis of strokes, CT scans, including Non-Enhanced CT, CT angiography and CT perfusion, provide the necessary and sufficient information for diagnosing and treating strokes. Unfortunately, however, the “round-trip” time between the emergency room (where the patient is typically first received) and the radiology department (where the CT machine is typically located) can frequently take up to several hours, even in the best hospitals. As a result, the time spent in transporting the patient from the emergency room to the CT machine and back again can consume critical time which can compromise treatment of the patient. Thus, there is a need for a new and improved CT machine which is particularly well suited for use in stroke applications.

Air conditioning systems are installed in vehicle cabins for controlling air conditioning in the vehicle cabins to thereby maintain occupant comfort therein. Each of the air conditioning systems is normally designed to move an air mix damper, in other words, an air mix door, to an appropriate position to adjust the amount of air passing through a heater core to control the temperature of air blown out from the corresponding air conditioning system, thus controlling air conditioning in the vehicle cabin. For such an air conditioning system, there are needs to provide occupant comfort in the vehicle cabin as soon as possible, and to reduce occupant's operations of the air conditioning system. If air conditioning systems meet these needs, they can enhance their marketability. An example of an air conditioning system aiming to meet these needs is known in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. H08-276718. The known air conditioning system installed in a vehicle is provided with means for storing therein preset temperatures as cabin temperatures corresponding to running conditions of the vehicle; the running conditions include cabin temperatures, outside temperatures, amounts of solar radiation, and vehicle speeds. Even if a current running condition is changed to another running condition, the storing means permits a driver to run the vehicle under a suitable cabin temperature that meets the changed running condition without occupant's changing operations of the preset temperatures. Specifically, the known air conditioning system is designed to receive a temperature Ts set by a temperature setter, and read out one of the preset temperatures Ts′ stored in the storing means if the temperature Ts matches a predetermined reference temperature. Then, the air conditioning system is designed to control the cabin temperature based on the preset temperature Ts′ read from the storing means. The disclosed design of the known air conditioning system provides occupant comfort without occupant's changing operations of the preset temperatures. In engine-driven vehicles, air conditioning systems use the residual heat from their engines as the heating energy of air conditioning. Increasing engine efficiency of the engine-driven vehicles reduces the residual heat from their engines. Thus, an increase in fuel consumption is required to increase the heating energy of air conditioning, resulting in reduction of gas mileage. In electric vehicles, such as electric-powered vehicles and hybrid vehicles, air conditioning systems usually use electric heaters, such as PTC (Positive Temperature Coefficient) heaters, heat pumps with electric compressors, and the like as a heating source. Thus, an increase in power consumption by the electric heaters is required to increase the heating energy of air conditioning, resulting in reduction of electric mileage. Then, in order to improve gas mileage or electric mileage, one type of air conditioning systems is designed to calculate an amount of heat currently needed, and operate a heating source by a minimum amount of power, i.e. a minimum amount of fuel or a minimum amount of electric power, required to generate the amount of heat currently needed without operating its heating source by a large amount of power required to generate a sufficient amount of heat.

Passive optical networks are becoming prevalent in part because service providers want to deliver high bandwidth communication capabilities to customers. Passive optical networks are a desirable choice for delivering high-speed communication data because they may not employ active electronic devices, such as amplifiers and repeaters, between a central office and a subscriber termination. The absence of active electronic devices may decrease network complexity and/or cost and may increase network reliability. FIG. 1 illustrates a network 100 deploying passive fiber optic lines. As shown, the network 100 can include a central office 110 that connects a number of end subscribers 115 (also called end users 115 herein) in a network. The central office 110 can additionally connect to a larger network such as the Internet (not shown) and a public switched telephone network (PSTN). The network 100 also can include fiber distribution hubs (FDHs) 130 having one or more optical splitters (e.g., 1-to-8 splitters, 1-to-16 splitters, or 1-to-32 splitters) that output a number of individual fibers that may lead to the premises of an end user 115. The various lines of the network can be aerial or housed within underground conduits. The portion of the network 100 that is closest to the central office 110 is generally referred to as the F1 region, where F1 is the “feeder fiber” from the central office. The F1 portion of the network may include a distribution cable 120 having on the order of 12 to 48 fibers; however, alternative implementations can include fewer or more fibers. The portion of the network 100 that includes an FDH 130 and a number of end users 115 can be referred to as an F2 portion of the network 100. The network 100 includes one or more break-out locations 125 at which branch cables are separated out from main cable lines. Branch cables are often connected to drop terminals 104 that include connector interfaces for facilitating coupling the fibers of the branch cables to a plurality of different subscriber locations. Splitters used in an FDH 130 can accept a feeder cable having a number of fibers and may split those incoming fibers into, for example, 216 to 432 individual distribution fibers that may be associated with a like number of end user locations. In typical applications, an optical splitter is provided prepackaged in an optical splitter module housing and provided with splitter output pigtails that extend from the module. The splitter output pigtails are typically connectorized with, for example, SC, LC, or LX.5 connectors. The optical splitter module provides protective packaging for the optical splitter components in the housing and thus provides for easy handling for otherwise fragile splitter components. This modular approach allows optical splitter modules to be added incrementally to FDHs 130 as required. The FDHs 130 may be provided in outdoor or indoor environments. For example, some FDHs 130 may be mounted on pedestals or posts outdoors. Other FDHs 130, however, are installed in compact spaces in which room may be limited. For example, an FDH 130 may be mounted within a closet or other enclosed space in which a bulky cabinet can be detrimental. Accordingly, an FDH 130 having reduced dimensions may be beneficial.

This invention relates to a wedge-adjustable base for a stair rail system, and more particularly, to a base for a rail system of the type made from standardized components, capable of use in stairwells and on landings and balconies. A desirable attribute of such bases is the ability to accommodate with structural stability and ease of installation a range of unevenness or inexactitude (whether designed or accidental) encountered in field conditions. Dealing with different angles of stair rake, different rail post dimensions, and irregularities in surrounding construction is a challenging requirement for components intended for use in standardized rail systems. A rail system with which the present invention may be used to advantage is described in the applicant's copending application Ser. No. 354,946, assigned to the assignee of the present application.

During the manufacture of a semiconductor device, features are commonly patterned using optical lithography (photolithography). An exemplary photolithographic method and formation of a digit line contact is depicted in FIGS. 1–4. FIG. 1 depicts a conductively-doped diffusion region 10 within a semiconductor wafer 12, and a dielectric layer 14 such as borophosphosilicate glass (BPSG) formed over the wafer surface. A photoresist (resist) layer 16 is formed on the dielectric layer 14, then the photoresist layer is exposed and the exposed portion is removed to result in the structure of FIG. 1. The dielectric layer is etched using the resist 16 as a mask to form an opening 20 in the dielectric layer 14 to expose region 10 within semiconductor wafer 12 to result in the structure of FIG. 2. Next, the photoresist layer is removed and at least one metal layer 30 is deposited over the surface of the dielectric layer 14 and within the opening to result in the structure of FIG. 3. Finally, the metal layer 30 is planarized using mechanical polishing such as chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) to remove the metal layer 30 from the upper surface of the dielectric layer 14 and to form a digit line contact plug 32. A conductive line 40 is formed as depicted in FIG. 4 to electrically connect the plug 32 with peripheral circuitry (not depicted). A continual design goal during the manufacture of semiconductor devices is to produce smaller features. One limit to this goal is the deficiencies in optical lithography which restrict the minimum feature size. This minimum for feature sizes results from various optical properties of the photolithographic process. With the structure of FIGS. 1–4, it is often desirable to form opening 20 as narrowly as possible so that features can be formed within a minimum perimeter. FIG. 5 depicts an isometric view of a conventional flash memory device comprising a semiconductor wafer 12 having implanted source 50 and drain 52 regions with a channel region 53 between the source and drain regions. FIG. 5 further depicts transistor gate stacks 54 comprising gate (tunnel) oxide 56 formed under transistor floating gates 58, a capacitor dielectric layer 60 typically comprising a layer of silicon nitride interposed between two silicon dioxide layers, a word line (control gate) 62, and a silicon nitride capping layer 64. Prior to forming floating gates 58 and control gates 62, long, narrow trenches are etched into the wafer which extend across the wafer. A first portion 74 and a second portion 76 of a trench are depicted. The second trench portion 76 is filled with oxide 78 between adjacent drain regions 52. Oxide 80 also remains under the control gate 62. Spacers 82 are formed to electrically isolate the word line 62 from the floating gate 58. FIGS. 6 and 7 are cross sections depicting a method used for forming the FIG. 5 structure. The cross sections of FIGS. 6 and 7 are generally taken along A—A of the completed structure of FIG. 5. FIG. 6 depicts semiconductor wafer 12, gate oxide 56, polysilicon floating gate layer 58, capacitor dielectric 60, and patterned photoresist layer 16. With this embodiment, the spacing between photoresist portions 16 is at the limit of optical lithography, typically about 0.08 microns. The capacitor dielectric 60, floating gate layer 58, and at least a portion of the gate oxide 56 are etched. The resist 16 is removed and a blanket spacer layer is formed then etched to result in spacers 82. Blanket layers of word line polysilicon and capping layers are formed and then patterned to result in the word line 62 and capping layer 64 as depicted in FIG. 7. With the structure of FIGS. 5–7, it is desirable to form the floating gates along a word line as closely as possible. This allows the floating gates to be maximized to provide a maximum capacitive coupling between the floating gate and the control gate, and still provides a sufficient density of transistors. Trenches 74 are formed prior to forming the floating gates at a width corresponding to the distance between the floating gates, which is determined by the limits of optical lithography. The floating gates are formed in this direction during an etch of a blanket layer which separates the floating gate layer into a plurality of individual strips, and the individual floating gates are defined during the etch which defines the word lines. A method for forming a semiconductor device which allows for the definition of features smaller than those available with the limitations of optical lithography would be desirable.