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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a method of converting a picture signal, an apparatus for converting a picture signal, and an apparatus for recording and reproducing a picture signal. In addition, this invention relates to a method of encoding a picture signal, a method of decoding a picture signal, an apparatus for encoding a picture signal, and an apparatus for decoding a picture signal.
2. Description of the Related Art
Some digital VTR's (video tape recorders) handle digital component video signals (digital Y, Cr, and Cb signals) which are derived from analog component video signals (analog Y, Cr, and Cb signals) through an analog-to-digital conversion process. Here, the Y signals mean luminance signals. In addition, the Cr signals mean R-Y signals (first color difference signals) while the Cb signals mean B-Y signals (second color difference signals). Specifically, during the analog-to-digital conversion process, the analog Y, Cr, and Cb signals are sampled at given sampling frequencies respectively, and then the samples of the analog Y, Cr, and Cb signals are digitized.
There are the DV standards (the DVC standards) for home-use digital VTR's. Here, "DV" is short for digital video, and "DVC" is short for a digital video cassette. According to the DV standards, the ratio among the sampling frequencies for the respective analog Y, Cr, and Cb signals is "4:1:1".
Digital picture signals for DVD's (digital versatile discs) and CS digital broadcasting conform to the MPEG2 (Moving Picture Experts Group 2) standards. According to the MPEG2 standards, the ratio among the sampling frequencies for respective analog Y, Cr, and Cb signals is "4:2:0 (4:0:2)". In an example of the 4:2:0 signal format, horizontal scanning lines related to a sampling frequency ratio of "4:2:0" alternate with horizontal scanning lines related to a sampling frequency ratio of "4:2:0". Such a signal format is denoted by "4:2:0" for convenience.
Any simple methods and apparatuses for converting 4:1:1 picture signals into 4:2:0 picture signals are unknown. In addition, any simple methods and apparatuses for converting 4:2:0 picture signals into 4:1:1 picture signals are unknown. Japanese published unexamined patent application 8-46519 discloses a specification conversion circuit which operates to convert a 4:2:2 picture signal into a 4:2:0 picture signal. | {
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The demand for rocket engines capable of carrying payloads to space or near-Earth orbits continues to grow. However, engines such as those used to launch satellites are costly to design and manufacture. Consequently, manufacturers of such rocket engines are constantly seeking new ways to reduce the design and manufacturing costs of producing rocket engine components.
One such component is the rocket thrust chamber within which the propellants of the rocket engine are combusted and accelerated. Because of the extremely high temperatures of the propellants moving through the thrust chamber, the walls of the thrust chamber must be cooled in those applications that require sustained engine firings. Such cooling is typically accomplished by flowing a coolant through tubes that form the inner wall of the thrust chamber. Since the manufacture of such thrust chambers is costly, novel ways of manufacturing such thrust chambers have been developed.
One method of manufacturing such a thrust chamber is to braze a plurality of cooling tubes together to form of tube bundle onto which molten metal is sprayed to form a structural jacket. This method requires that any gaps between adjacent cooling tubes have been properly brazed so when the process of spring the molten metal occurs, none of the molten metal is allowed to infiltrate into gaps between adjacent cooling tubes. Should such infiltration occur, those adjacent tubes could become bonded together so rigidly that they are unable to expand and contract to the extent necessary to accommodate the thermal expansion that occurs during normal operation of the rocket thrust chamber. This could result in a useful life of the rocket thrust chamber that is less than the intended design life thereof.
Unfortunately, the process of brazing tubes to form tube bundle is a complex process, the success of which is highly dependent upon the tolerances to which the individual tubes have been manufactured. Slight variations and tube shapes can result in anomalies during the brazing cycle, causing one or more gaps occur in a braze that is supposed to be continuous. Attempts at additional brazing cycles to eliminate such gaps often fail to seal these gaps, and may cause gaps to occur in brazes that were continuous after the first brazing cycle. In those cases where the gaps cannot be eliminated, the tube bundle must be discarded, and a new tube bundle must be fabricated. As those skilled in the art will readily appreciate, discarding tube bundles that include these gap anomalies increases the overall cost of manufacturing rocket thrust chambers, and therefore the cost of manufacturing rocket engines.
What is needed is a method of making a rocket thrust chamber from a tube bundle that has one or more gap anomalies in a braze that is supposed to be continuous. | {
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The invention relates to a laminar-flow centrifugal separator.
This separator has been devised for fluid mixtures containing solids, liquids or gases in varied proportions, but above all mixtures containing solid suspensions in liquid phases, to be separated into at least one liquid fraction and one fraction containing the solid. Good separation of the constituents of the mixture is then sought and a solid fraction presented in a compact form, or cake, with a relatively low residual suspension liquid content is obtained. Even when the formation of a cake gives rise to a high flow resistance, or a significant sectional reduction thereof, it is generally sought to extract this solid fraction from the separator, and if possible in a continuous fashion despite the compact nature thereof, as it is formed in the rotary bowl, without enabling same to accumulate therein. This aim is not generally achieved with existing separators, many of which require on the contrary periodic process shutdowns, adverse to the yield thereof, to remove the cake. Separators envisaging continuous removal of the solid fraction are not normally suitable for obtaining a sufficient dry content.
Indeed, numerous centrifugal separators exist. Mention is made of the document WO-A-2007/133 161, describing a separator having some superficial resemblances with the invention. It comprises as a main part a biconical rotary bowl wherein separation is performed. The mixture is introduced into the bowl via a hollow conduit, corresponding to the bowl support and rotation axis. The heavier solid fraction is routed to the periphery of the bowl and more particularly into the bulging area corresponding to the cone junction. Opening peripheral bores at this point make it possible to extract said fraction, while the fluid fraction rises towards to the top of the bowl, as the mixture is added, and is discharged via an opening situated at the top of the bowl opposite the feed opening. Conical structures, referred to as dishes, flaring at the bottom and actuated at the same time as the wall of the bowl, occupy most of the inner volume thereof They are used to partition various portions of the mixture and help homogenise the separation conditions inside the bowl. However, this device is not suitable for obtaining a solid fraction that is as homogeneous or compact as that sought, and continuous extraction of this fraction is difficult.
Mention may also be made of the document WO-A-2012/025416, describing a separator wherein the chamber is also occupied by separation dishes, however perforated in places to clear the axial channels favouring axial flow of the fluid load, and the distribution thereof in the stack of dishes. A centripetal movement of the fluid is however imposed in the bowl between radially external inlet orifices and radially internal outlet orifices, which further essentially provides flow channelling in separate parallel streams and thus differs little from the design of the previous document. The fluid is separated from the solid fraction, emerging from the peripheral wall of the bowl via lateral openings and is deposited on an outer screw actuated by this wall. A further rotating wall, but at a slightly different speed, encompasses the screw and retains the solid fraction while allow the screw to run thereon and finally leave the device due to the different rotational speed thereof. Here again, fraction separation is not very effective.
In the field of apparatuses providing a rotating outer enclosure, satisfactory drainage performances are obtained with the equipment from WO-A-2009/005355 and WO-A-2011/028122 integrating an internally lined rotation mode and a barrel-shaped outer enclosure. The internal lining consists of dishes or plates in a spiral arrangement. The use of a laminar flow is never envisaged or mentioned as an enhancement option.
Dish separators have been the subject of enhancements to prevent the accumulation of solid matter and the appearance of unbalance in the centrifuge. One proposed solution consists of perforating the dishes or placing separation disks at the lower and upper part of the lining (WO-A-2012/033440). This type of development relates more particularly to low-concentration liquid and gas treatment (scrubbing). | {
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Lithium diphenylphosphide is used commercially to, e.g., to remove a hydroxyl group in organic and in inorganic chemical synthesis or as a ligand in organometallic catalysis. Typically the lithium diphenylphosphide is provided in tetrahydrofuran as a solvent. Such commercially available solutions of lithium diphenylphosphide in tetrahydrofuran are available, but these are not very stable and thus are, not commercially viable. New and stable formulations of diphenylphosphide are necessary.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,866,720 discloses alkali metal diarylphosphides formed by mixing triarylphosphine with, and preferably introducing triarylphosphine into, a two-phase mixture one or more alkali metals, preferably a mixture or alloy of sodium and potassium, in an anhydrous organic liquid diluent in the presence of molecular hydrogen. To form a cycloalkyldiarylphosphine, at least a portion of the reaction mixture as in the aforementioned process (or alkali metal diarylphosphide recovered therefrom) and cycloalkyl mesylate or tosylate are mixed together and maintained under suitable reaction conditions. The latter reaction is driven by the presence of residual sodium from the first reaction. Conduct of the latter reaction under a hydrogen atmosphere suppresses undesirable side reactions. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is related to methods of calibrating projectors in projector-camera systems, and more specifically related to methods of simplifying application of dual photography.
2. Description of the Related Art
When projectors and cameras are combined, hybrid devices and systems that are capable of both projecting and capturing light are born. This emerging class of imaging devices and systems are known in the research community as projector-camera systems. Typically, the images captured by one or more cameras, is used to estimate attributes about the display environment, such as the geometric shape of the projection surfaces. The projectors in the system then adapt the images projected so as to improve the resulting imagery.
A key problem that builders of projector-camera systems and devices need to solve is the determination of the internal imaging parameters of each device (the intrinsic parameters) and the determination of the geometric relationship between all projectors and cameras in the system (the extrinsic parameters). This problem is commonly referred to as that of calibrating the system.
In the computer vision community, there is a large body of work for calibrating imaging systems with one or more cameras. A commonly used method in the computer vision community for calibrating cameras is described in article, “A flexible new technique for camera calibration”, IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence, 22(11):1330-1334, 2000, by Zhengyou Zhang, which is herein incorporated in its entirety by reference. In this method, multiple images of a flat object marked with a number of known feature points (typically forming a grid) are captured by a camera, with the flat object posed at a variety of angles relative to the camera. The image location of each feature point is extracted, and since the relative location of each feature point is known, the collection of feature point locations can then be used to calibrate the camera. When two or more cameras are present in the system, the intrinsic parameters as well as the geometric relationship between all cameras can be estimated by having all cameras capture an image of the flat object at each pose angle.
Since projectors and cameras are very similar in terms of imaging geometry, it might seem reasonable that techniques for calibrating cameras may be applicable to the calibration of projectors, and projector-camera systems. However, since all camera calibration techniques require that the camera (i.e. the imaging device being calibrated) capture a number of images, it would appear that camera calibration techniques cannot readily be applied to projectors, which cannot capture images.
Therefore, in traditional systems the cameras are calibrated first, and then the calibrated cameras are used to calibrate the projector. In these systems, a “bootstrapping” procedure, in which a pair of calibrated cameras are used to form a stereo pair, is used. As it is known, a stereo pair of cameras can be used to estimate depth, i.e. a perspective view, of feature points visible to the stereo pair. To calibrate a projector, the projector is first made to project feature points onto a display environment (i.e. a projection surface), and then by using the stereo pair of calibrated cameras to determine the perspective depth location of the projected points, the projector can be calibrated accordingly to compensate for surface irregularities in the display environment.
While this bootstrapping technique is a tested-and-proven calibration method for projector-camera systems, it is not applicable to the calibration of self-contained projector-camera devices, since it requires the use of external stereo camera pairs.
A technique called dual photography was proposed by Sen et al. in article, “Dual Photography”, Proceedings ACM SIGGRRAPH, 2005, which is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety. Dual photography makes use of Helmholtz reciprocity to use images captured with real cameras to synthesize pseudo images (i.e. dual images) that simulate images “as seen” (or effectively “captured”) by projectors. That is, the pseudo image simulates a captured image as “viewed” by the projector, and thus represents what a projector-captured image would be if a projector could capture images. This approach would permit a projector to be treated as a pseudo camera, and thus might eliminate some of the difficulties associated with calibrating projectors.
Helmholtz reciprocity is based on the idea that the flow of light can be effectively reversed without altering its transport properties. Helmholtz reciprocity has been used in many computer graphics applications to reduce computational complexity. In computer graphics literature, this reciprocity is typically summarized by an equation describing the symmetry of the radiance transfer between incoming and outgoing directions, ωi and ωo: fr(ωi>ωo)=fr(ωo>ωi), where fr represents the bidirectional reflectance distribution function, BRDF, of a surface.
Thus, dual photography ideally takes advantage of the dual nature (i.e. duality relationship) of a projected image and a captured image to simulate one from the other. As is described in more detail below, dual photography (and more precisely Helmholtz reciprocity) requires the capturing of the light transport between a camera and a projector.
When dealing with a digital camera and a digital projector, dual photography requires capturing each light transport coefficient between every camera pixel and every projector pixel, at the resolution of both devices. Since a digital projector and a digital camera can both have millions of pixels each, the acquisition, storage, and manipulation of multitudes of light transport coefficients can place real practical limitations on its use. Thus, although in theory dual photography would appear to offer great benefits, in practice, dual photography is severely limited by its physical and impractical requirements of needing extremely large amounts of computer memory (both archive disk-type memory and active silicon memory) and needing extensive and fast computational processing.
A clearer understanding of dual photography may be obtained with reference to FIGS. 1A and 1B. In FIG. 1A, a “primal configuration” (i.e. a configuration of real, physical devices prior to any duality transformations) includes a real digital projector 11, a real projected image 13, and a real digital camera 15. Light is emitted from real projector 11 and captured by real camera 15. A coefficient relating each projected beam of light (from real projector 11) to a correspondingly captured beam of light (at real camera 15) is called the light transport coefficient. Using the light transport coefficient, it is possible to determine the characteristics of a projected beam of light from a captured beam of light.
In the present example, real projector 11 is a digital projector having an array of projector pixels 17 symbolically shown in a dotted box and comprised of s rows and r columns of projector pixels e. The size of projector pixel array 17 depends on the resolution of real projector 11. For example, an VGA resolution may consists of 640 by 480 pixels (i.e. 307,200 projector pixels e), an SVGA resolution may have 800 by 600 pixels (i.e. 480,000 projector pixels e), an XVG resolution may have 1024 by 768 pixels (i.e. 786,732 projector pixels e), an SXVG resolution may have 1280 by 1024 (i.e. 1,310,720 projector pixels e), and so on, with greater resolution projectors requiring a greater number of projector pixels e.
Similarly, real camera 15 is a digital camera having an array of light receptor pixels 19 symbolic shown in a dotted box and comprised of u rows and v columns of receptor pixels g. The size of receptor pixel array 19 again depends on the resolution of real camera 15. However, it is common for real camera 15 to have a resolution of 4 MegaPixels (i.e. 4,194,304 receptor pixels g), or greater.
Since real projector 11 is a digital projector having an array of individual light projection pixels e and real camera 15 is a digital camera having an array of individual light receptor pixels g, a matrix T is used to describe the group of light transport coefficients relating each projector pixel e in real projector 11 to each receptor pixel g of real camera 15 (i.e. element Tge in matrix T would be the transport coefficient from an individual, real projector pixel e to an individual, real camera receptor pixel g). Therefore, a real captured image C′ is related to a projected image P′ as C′=TP′.
The duality transformation, i.e. dual configuration, of the system of FIG. 1A is shown FIG. 1B. In this dual configuration, real projector 11 of FIG. 1A is transformed into a virtual camera 11″, and real camera 15 of FIG. 1A is transformed into a virtual projector 15″. It is to be understood that virtual camera 11″ and virtual projector 15″ represent the dual counterparts of real projector 11 and real camera 15, respectively, and are not real devices themselves. That is, virtual camera 11″ is a mathematical representation of how a hypothetical camera (i.e. virtual camera 11″) would behave to capture a hypothetically projected image 13″, which is similar to real image 13 projected by real projector 11 of FIG. 1A. Similarly, virtual projector 15″ is a mathematical representation of how a hypothetical projector (i.e. virtual projector 15″) would behave to project hypothetical image 13″ that substantially matches real image 13, as captured by real camera 15 (of FIG. 1A). Thus, the positions of the real projector 11 and real camera 15 of FIG. 1A are interchanged in FIG. 1B as virtual camera 11″ and virtual projector 15″. However, the pixel resolution of the real devices carries forward to their counterpart, dual devices. Therefore, virtual camera 11″ has a virtual receptor pixel array 17″ consisting of s rows and r columns to match projector pixel array 17 of real projector 11. Similarly, virtual projector 15″ has a virtual projection pixel array 19″ consisting of u rows and v columns to match receptor pixel array 19 to real camera 15.
Suppose a dual transport matrix T″ is the transport matrix in this dual configuration such that a virtual captured image C″ (as captured by virtual camera 11″) is related to a virtual projected image P″ (as projected by virtual projector 15″) as C″=TP″, then T″eg would be the dual light transport coefficient between virtual projector pixel g″ and virtual receptor pixel e″.
Helmholtz reciprocity specifies that the pixel-to-pixel transport is equal in both directions (i.e. from real projector 11 to real camera 15, and from virtual projector 15″ to virtual camera 11″). That is, T″eg=Tge, which means T″=TT, (i.e. dual matrix T″ is equivalent to the result of the mathematical transpose operation on real matrix T). Thus, given matrix T, one can use TT to synthesize the images that would be acquired in the dual configuration. | {
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In known cord winding structures for appliances, a part of the free end of the electrical cord and its connection plug are located outside of the casing of the vacuum cleaner or other household appliance when the appliance is not being used. Of course, the plug and its associated cord are always easily accessible, however there is a serious drawback to this known arrangement in that the projecting parts are often in the way when the vacuum cleaner is stored, and additionally the exposed plug and cord can be easily damaged unwittingly.
In order to avoid the above disadvantage a storing pocket for the cord end and its associated plug can be envisioned. However, if such a construction were made it would be necessary to make the internal pocket comparatively large in size since otherwise it will be difficult to insert a hand into the internal pocket for grasping the connection plug.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a cord winding structure and a housing which accommodates the entire cord and connection plug within the housing without requiring a large amount of interior space and at the same time making the connection plug easily accessible.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an arrangement in which a simple manner the movement of the cord during winding is braked. The arrangement includes a follower plate in the interior space which is operatively connected to a foot-operated push button that moves the connection plug from the space inside the housing to a position outside of the housing in which the plug is easily accessible when the push button is actuated. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a buffering device for buffering floating products, in particular floating fruit such as apples.
2. Description of Related Art
The buffering of floating fruit such as apples in a water channel is known in practice. The surface area of the water channel must have a size here such that the quantity of apples with which one crate of in practice about 400 kg of apples can be filled floats on the water. With this method of buffering a considerable water surface area is necessary, and a large installation area is therefore required. 30 to 60 parallel water channels with a surface area of about 10 m2 per water channel are usual in practice.
The object of the present invention is to improve the buffering of products, and particularly of floating fruit such as apples, such that the whole operation involving the handling of said products can be performed with a greater efficiency in respect of the surface area use. | {
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Several types of heat-insulating containers have been used commercially to pack hot liquids. A polystyrene foam heat-insulating container is one example. It is prepared by casting unfoamed polystyrene into a mold, heating the resin under pressure to foam it, and removing the foamed resin from the mold. Alternatively, a foamed styrene sheet may be shaped into a container. The container thus produced has outstanding heat-insulating properties but, on the other hand, it needs reconsideration from the viewpoint of saving petroleum resources or increasing the efficiency of incinerating waste containers. As a further problem, a slow, inefficient and high waste printing process is required to print on the outer surfaces of polystyrene foam heat-insulating containers since printing can only be effected after individual cups have been shaped. Further, the tapered surface of the container contributes to print flur at positions near the top and bottom of the container unless specialized and expensive printing technology is employed. As a further disadvantage, the outer surface of the foamed styrene heat-insulating container is often not sufficiently smooth to accept high resolution screen printing further affecting printability. Thus, the polystyrene foam containers suffer the disadvantage of low printability.
The conventional paper heat-insulating container can not be manufactured at low cost, and one reason is the complexity of the manufacturing process. One example is a container wherein the side wall of the body member is surrounded by a corrugated heat-insulating jacket. The process of manufacturing such container involves additional steps of forming the corrugated jacket and bonding it to the outer surface of the side wall of the body member. One defect of this type of container is that letters, figures or other symbols are printed on the corrugated surface and the resulting deformed letters or patterns do not have aesthetic appeal to consumers. Another defect is that the jacket is bonded to the side wall of the body member in such a manner that only the valley ridges contact the side wall, and the bond between the jacket and the side wall, and the bond between the jacket and the side wall is so weak that the two can easily separate. Often times, corrugated containers are not suitable for stacking and thus require large storage space.
Another type of paper heat-insulating container has a "dual" structure wherein an inner cup is given a different taper than an outer cup to form a heat-insulating air layer. The two cups are made integral by curling their respective upper portions into a rim. The side wall of the outer cap is flat and has high printability, however, the two cups may easily separate. Another disadvantage is that the dual structure increases the manufacturing cost.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,435,344 issued to Iioka teaches a heat-insulating paper container consisting of a body member and a bottom panel member, characterized in that at least one surface of the body member is coated or laminated with a foamed heat-insulating layer of a thermoplastic synthetic resin film whereas the other surface of the body member is coated or laminated with a thermoplastic synthetic resin film, a foamed heat-insulating layer of thermoplastic synthetic resin film or an aluminum foil. When manufacturing such a container, the water in the paper is vaporized upon heating, causing the thermoplastic synthetic resin film on the surface to foam. The container under consideration has the advantage that it exhibits fairly good heat-insulating properties and that it can be manufactured at low cost by a simple process. However, the thermoplastic synthetic resin film will not foam adequately if the water content in the paper is low. While high water content is advantageous for the purpose of film foaming, the mechanical strength of the container may deteriorate. Moreover, even if successful foaming is done, the thickness of the foam layer is uniform and cannot be controlled from one portion of the container to another. Further, the foam layer reaches an expansion limit regardless of the moisture content of the base layer.
In an effort to overcome the aforementioned shortcomings, U.S. Pat. No, 5,490,631 issued to lioka discloses a heat-insulating paper container including a body wherein part of the outer surface of the body members provided with a printing of an organic solvent based ink. The body portion is subsequently coated with a thermoplastic synthetic resin film which when heated forms a thick foamed heat-insulating layer in the printed area of the outer surface whereas a less thick foamed heat-insulating layer is formed in the non-printed areas. Further, there are portions of the outer surface which remain unfoamed. In manufacturing a container in this manner, the printing is carried out on the paperboard layer and consequently viewing of the printed matter by the consumer is obstructed by the foamed insulating layer. Moreover, because the foamed layer overlying the printed areas are thicker than the remaining portions of the foamed layers, these areas will be even more obstructed. Consequently, this container suffers from similar drawbacks as those containers discussed hereinabove.
Accordingly, there is a need for insulated stock material and containers wherein the expansion of the foamed layer on the surface of the stock material or container is controlled and which includes printed matter which may be readily observed by the consumer while providing a container presenting an appearance of having been debossed or embossed. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention is in the field of molded leadframes and methods therefore and, more particularly, is an apparatus for handling molded leadframes and a method therefore.
2. Description of the Related Art
Apparatus for handling molded leadframes typically include at least two major functional portions, namely a gripping device and a device for moving the gripping device. The instant invention involves novel advances in at least two primary portions of a molded leadframe handling apparatus, but prior to looking at the advances provided by the instant invention, one needs to understand the state of the art, and its associated shortcomings, with respect to both the moving device and the gripping device portions.
With respect to the moving device portion, apparatus currently implement three or more drivers such as motors. In particular, one has a number of magazines, each for holding a plurality of molded leadframes. A common requirement in handling molded leadframes is the ability to pick up a molded leadframe from one of the magazines and move it over to and place it atop a different magazine. Currently, this process requires three distinct movements. First, the molded leadframe is moved vertically upward in a linear motion away from the first magazine. Then, the molded leadframe is moved linearly to a position directly above a second magazine of molded leadframes. Third, the molded leadframe is moved downward in a linear motion until it is placed and released atop the second magazine of molded leadframes. This process, which implements three distinct motions, requires a total of three separate motors or drivers of considerable expense. It would be advantageous from an economic standpoint to accomplish the desired motion of a molded leadframe with fewer motors. Additionally, this three-step motion is time inefficient. In other words, it takes a relatively long time to move the molded leadframe from one magazine to another using the three-step process. Accordingly, it would be advantageous to effect the desired movement of a molded leadframe using a more fluid and time efficient motion. Therefore, there existed a need to provide a mover portion of a molded leadframe handling apparatus which implements fewer than three motors to move molded leadframes from one magazine to another, thereby saving time and cost.
Focusing now on the current state of gripping device portions in an apparatus for handling molded leadframes, it is important to recognize that the trend in semiconductor devices today is for size to be minimized. Accordingly, the molded leadframe packages enclosing the semiconductor devices are also becoming smaller. When very small, thin molded leadframes are stacked upon each other in a magazine, the clearance between adjacent molded leadframes is extremely small. This makes it nearly impossible to insert conventional grippers between the adjacent molded leadframes in order to remove only the top leadframe from the stack. Thus, it would be advantageous to devise a gripping device portion in an apparatus for handling molded leadframes which smoothly and efficiently removes one molded leadframe at a time from a stack of molded leadframes in a magazine.
Therefore, it is the main focus of the instant invention to integrate the aforementioned advantages to the mover and gripping device portions into an improved apparatus for handling molded leadframes. | {
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As is well known and historically, the control for the gas turbine engine has typically adjusted fuel flow in attempting to optimize operation of the engine. In a typical installation the fuel control monitors a plurality of engine operating parameters and processess these signals to produce outputs that would be indicative of a desired engine operation while assuring that the engine avoids surging, overheating and rich and lean flame out. To achieve this goal the computer portion of the control manifests a control logic that represents the operation of the engine and continuously schedules fuel flow to reflect the setting of the power lever. In engines, particularly of the military variety, the control also, independently, monitors engine variables to schedule the variable geometry portions of the engine such as inlet guide vanes, exhaust nozzles and the like, to likewise attain optimum operation for any given operation within the engine's operating envelope.
Hence, it is apparent that a change in one control function would affect the condition of others so that there would be constant iterations of each of the controls to assure optimum operation of each. For example, a change in the exhaust nozzle area would typically change the pressure within the engine, which pressure would be monitored by the fuel control, which in turn would manifest a change in the fuel control to ultimately adjust fuel flow to reflect this change. In this process the scheduling of the fuel flow either to increase or decrease fuel will occur even prior to the time it takes the variable geometry of the engine to react. This "bootstrapping" effect has been addressed in U.S. application No. (Attorney Docket No. F-5759) entitled Active Geometry Control System for Gas Turbine Engines, supra.
In this co-pending application, supra, the control attains a faster thrust response and improved surge margin by synchronously scheduling fuel flow and the variable geometries of the engine in response to a single parameter which is a function of certain engine and aircraft operating variables. In order for this type of active geometry control system to be a useful system, it must be able to attain a high degree of repeatability in assuring that for any given setting the control will return to a given steady state operating point in the operating curve after any transition excursion. During a transient excursion, the control logic will assure that the point of operation is identical to the setting of the power lever which request is desired thrust even though the engine operating variable changes as a result of wear and tear of the engine, power extraction or compressor air bleed.
This invention contemplates utilizing a corrected speed (RPM) of the low pressure spool (N.sub.1) of a twin spool engine as the primary control parameter. As is the case in many of the military engines, the low pressure spool is only aerodynamically coupled to the high pressure spool. In order to attain the optimum engine operation from a performance standpoint, the corrected rotor speeds for the high and low pressure spool must be proportional to each other for every given steady-state engine condition.
In fighters and other military aircraft, it is extremely important that a demand by the pilot for a change in thrust produced by the engine be as fast and as accurate as possible. The aircraft's ability to undergo the violent maneuvers anticipated when operating in the combat box, for example, in fighter aircraft, bears directly on the performance of that aircraft. When a demand for a thrust change is initiated, for example, when the pilot exercises a bodie maneuver, i.e., a quick demand for a drop in thrust (decel) followed by an immediate demand for an increase in thrust (accel) or vice versa, the engine should attain the demanded thrust levels by decelerating to the desired thrust level before accelerating to the desired thrust level in the quickest time possible. With heretofore known control logic, maneuvers, such as these bodies as well as chops, are influenced by the constraints owing to the high inertia of the rotating spool. Since a thrust change necessitates a decrease or increase in RPM of the high pressure compressor, this high inertia adversely affects the time responsiveness of the engine.
Needless to say, it is also extremely important that the engine operates as efficiently as possible to achieve good TSFC (thrust specific fuel consumption) and stable engine operating conditions, namely, avoiding surge, engine flame out and overheating.
We have found that by controlling both the fuel and high compressor variable vanes as a function of corrected low pressure compressor speed, we can enhance both steady state and transient operations. In transients, this invention contemplates locking in a fixed corrected high compressor speed (N.sub.2), setting a target for the desired thrust and zeroing in on this target by adjusting the angle of the high compressor variable vanes. This logic allows the low pressure compressor spool to adjust speed to a value corresponding to the targeted thrust (Fn). A proportional plus integral controller assures that the N.sub.1 speed is properly attained while N.sub.2 is held constant. Once the target is reached, the active high compressor controller (AHCC) automatically trims the high pressure compressor spool speed and HCVV to return to the operating line at a value that is equivalent to the desired speed ratio of the high and low pressure compressor to assure optimum engine performance. | {
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The present disclosure relates generally to computer systems and software, and more particularly to techniques for authorization policy customization and authorization policy lockdown.
Cloud-based enterprise technologies enable companies to access and use various different enterprise-level applications without requiring a significant on-site infrastructure. Instead, these enterprise-level applications can be accessed as cloud services, from typical client devices such as desktop, laptop, and mobile devices. This allows many different sized companies to use these applications, beyond those companies that can support large on-premise infrastructure. Standard cloud services from a cloud services provider can be customized to meet the particular needs of a given enterprise. However, these customer-specific customizations can lead to complications when cloud services are upgraded, or otherwise modified, by the cloud services provider.
Currently, application upgrade procedures for on-premise, on-demand, or cloud-based are performed manually to account for individual authorization policy customizations made for each customer. This adds significant complexity to the upgrade process, and leads to longer down times. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to reciprocating powered pumps, and more particularly to reciprocating pumps which are provided with means for adjusting the positive displacement stroke of the pump.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Adjustable stoke positive displacement pumps are known. Some such pumps are provided with eccentric reciprocating drives. The piston or chamber is driven in the feed or displacement direction against the fluid head at the outlet and also against a return spring. When the drive for the piston attempts the return stroke the positive coupling is disconnected and the piston or chamber is returned to a predetermined limited position by the return spring.
Positive displacement pumps of the prior art types load the pump motor with the work of performing the feed stroke at the same time energy is stored in the return spring for performing the suction or intake stroke.
Heretofore, positive displacement pumps have been designed and manufactured as intregal assemblies. When such pumps are employed for metering pumps and the capacity limit of the pump is reached, the user has been forced to buy the next larger size pump.
Heretofore, a purchaser of a positive displacement metering pump has been limited in the accuracy available to a percentage of the maximum volume displacement of the pump being employed. Pumps employing large diameter chambers or pistons are limited in the accuracy of the adjustable stroke and as the volume being pumped is decreased the volume error remains constant regardless of the amount being pumped during each displacement stroke.
Heretofore, positive displacement pumps, especially those designed for metering chemicals, have employed check valves in the inlet lines and outlet lines which were connected through plenums to the piston or expandable chamber. Spring loaded valves of the prior art type are subject to deterioration of the valve materials. If metal springs are used the springs tend to deteriorate. If the springs are made very strong to resist deterioration and weakening, they tend to create wire drawing and or cavitation which causes errosion of the valve face and valve seats. Plastic pumps having moving pistons and concentric mating valves and seats tend to wear and or erode and are not suitable for metering pumps because leaks destroy the accuracy of the pump and its intended purpose.
Heretofore, pumps have been made from plastics which resist wear and chemical action, however such pumps have not been made in a manner which permits ease of replacement of all of the wearing parts, moving parts and parts subject to field replacement.
There is an unfullfilled need for a cheap reliable and accurate positive displacement metering pump which is resistant to most chemicals. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image-detectable monitoring system and a method for using the same, and more particularly, to a human face image-detectable monitoring system and method that is capable of detecting, enlarging, and capturing a subjects' facial images, compressing the images for records and storage, and thereafter allowing searching and retrieving of the compressed and recorded images.
2. Description of the Related Art
The next generation closed-circuit TV (CCTV) system is a monitoring system having at least one monitoring camera installed at monitoring spots where security is required, and a display for displaying the images taken by the installed monitoring camera in real time. The display is provided on monitors installed at certain places to enable fewer monitoring personnel to observe both usual and unusual situations at the monitoring spots.
Furthermore, the CCTV system records an image signal, such as a video signal taken through the monitoring system on a recording medium, and reproduces and displays the recorded video signal on monitors. A digital video recorder (DVR) system can be an example of one such CCTV system component.
The DVR system captures an analog video signal input from a monitoring camera, and compresses and records the analog video signal on a hard disc drive (HDD) as a high-definition digital video signal. Thus, the captured video signal can be recorded and maintained for a greater period without image quality deterioration so that it can be used in cases that require securing exhibits or searches in the future.
Such a conventional CCTV system uses at least one fixed monitoring camera to monitor and/or record positions where monitoring is necessary. It is impossible however, for the fixed monitoring camera to rotate beyond the fixed direction, therefore it captures images only for a specific spot at the installed position, and often covers and captures images within a wide area rather than a specific, or more narrow part of the monitoring spot. Accordingly, a video signal for the wide area of a monitoring spot has lesser image quality when compared to a video signal taken for a specific part of the monitoring spot, causing difficulties in exactly identifying a subject within the image. That is, since the monitoring camera captures images of both a subject and surroundings rather than images specific to the subject in the monitoring spot, the subject's face is recorded as relatively small so that it is difficult to identify the face and which causes difficulties in securing clear exhibits or evidence for future use.
Furthermore, the conventional CCTV system has a lower recording space efficiency level since it records all video signals taken of subjects and surroundings. Having recorded such a large amount of information, the conventional CCTV system requires a long time to search for a desired video signal.
Accordingly, a need exists for a monitoring system and a method that is capable of detecting and recording facial images from a monitored position, excluding surroundings, such that the images are more useful and the analysis, storage and retrieval of images is achieved in an efficient manner. | {
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The present invention relates, in general, to the field of computing systems and techniques. More particularly, the present invention relates to multi-adaptive processing systems and techniques for enhancing parallelism and performance of computational functions.
Currently, most large software applications achieve high performance operation through the use of parallel processing. This technique allows multiple processors to work simultaneously on the same problem to achieve a solution in a fraction of the time required for a single processor to accomplish the same result. The processors in use may be performing many copies of the same operation, or may be performing totally different operations, but in either case all processors are working simultaneously.
The use of such parallel processing has led to the proliferation of both multi-processor boards and large scale clustered systems. However, as more and more performance is required, so is more parallelism, resulting in ever larger systems. Clusters exist today that have tens of thousands of processors and can occupy football fields of space. Systems of such a large physical size present many obvious downsides, including, among other factors, facility requirements, power, heat generation and reliability. | {
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The present invention relates to improved navigation programming that provides information about walking to a final destination in combination with information about driving toward the final destination.
Navigation application programs are available that calculate a route from an origin location to a destination location in a geographic region. These navigation application programs use geographic data included in one or more geographic databases. The geographic data includes information about the road network in the geographic region. The kinds of information may include the positions of the roads in the geographic region, speed limits along portions of roads, address ranges along the road portions, turn restrictions at intersections of roads, direction restrictions such as one-way streets, and so on. Using geographic data that include these kinds of information, a navigation application program identifies a continuous series of road segments that connect between the origin and destination locations and then provides driving instructions for traveling along these identified road segments to reach the destination from the origin.
Although navigation application programs and navigation systems that include these kinds of programs can provide useful information, there continues to be room for additional advancements. For example, although navigation programs may calculate a route for an end user to drive to a desired destination and provide the end user with driving instructions to get to the destination, the end user may not necessarily be able to park at the destination location. The destination location may not provide parking or all the parking spaces at the destination location may already be occupied. Accordingly, there exists a need in navigation systems and/or navigation application programs to assist end users in locating and evaluating parking places at, or near to, the destinations to which the navigation systems or application programs direct the end users. There exists an additional need to take combinations of travel by driving and travel by walking into account when calculating a route to a destination with a navigation system or program. In addition, once a navigation system or program guides the end user to a parking place, the end user may require assistance to reach the desired destination. Accordingly, there exists a further need to assist end users of navigation systems and navigation programs to reach desired destinations after parking their vehicles.
To address these and other objectives, the present invention comprises a system and method that provide an end user of a navigation program with information about walking to a desired destination in combination with information about driving to or close to the desired destination. In addition to the calculation of a route for driving to the desired destination, the navigation program uses data in a geographic database to calculate one or more walking routes to reach the desired destination by walking from locations within a walking threshold around the desired destination. In calculating these one or more walking routes, the navigation program uses the data in the geographic database to assess the suitability of roads around the desired destination for pedestrian travel. In calculating these one or more-walking routes, the navigation program can also include road segments in the one or more walking routes without regard for travel restrictions that only apply to vehicular traffic. Additionally, if the navigation program is installed in a vehicle, the navigation program may indicate the walking distance to the desired destination along one of the calculated walking routes as the vehicle approaches the desired destination. In a further aspect of the inventive subject matter, the navigation program may provide the end user with walking directions to walk to the desired destination along the calculated walking route upon which the vehicle is parked. | {
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As stated by Dr. John C. Wingfield, the ultimate frontier in biology is taking the lab to the field to study organisms in their environments. Dr. Wingfield's assessment is even more important in the study of aquatic environments. Aqueous microbes constitute a hidden majority of life on earth, and comprise the most diverse group of organisms on our planet. They are the key players in global carbon cycling and other biogeochemical processes that broadly affect the health of the planet. However, they are among the most under-studied life forms because of the vastness of their often inaccessible habitats and their ‘patchy’ distribution.
Aquatic microbes are interesting on a species level as well as on a community level. On a species level, certain harmful algae are of public interest due to their ability to infect fish populations and transmit toxins to humans and the ecosystems. Others, such as Naegleria fowleri, a freshwater amoeba, infect humans directly often leading to death. Aquatic microbes are also very interesting on a community scale. Indeed, key questions of environmental microbiology include “who are the members of the microbial community” and “which members are the major contributors to community dynamics.” Understanding these key microbial players and the dynamic interactions among them and their environments are of great societal interest. Models regarding ocean acidification, carbon cycling, climate change, species adaptation, and the effects of geochemical perturbations are underdeveloped and require increased understanding of microbial population dynamics. The technical requirements for monitoring microbes in their natural environment are extremely demanding, at least because they are to be deployed remotely and conduct automatic in situ measurements.
While development of technologies for systems biology has made it more feasible to study the interaction of microorganism in aquatic environment, much of the technological developments are limited to in-lab instruments. Although there are bench-top microfluidic platforms for analysis of aquatic organisms, these platforms are unsuitable for autonomous microbial genomic profiling. Unlike bench-top instruments, instruments for autonomous in situ genomic instruments require robust fluidic handling, low energy consumption, long-term reagent storage (especially for enzymes), and easy portability. Additionally, being situated in the field, autonomous in situ genomic instruments cannot reply on pressurized gas, continuous vacuum, refrigeration, or manual intervention.
In addition to obstacles in the workability of an automatic in situ genomic instrument, there are heavy burdens in maintaining the function of such an instrument. In situ genomic sensors are expensive and require large payloads of batteries to achieve relatively short short deployment time. Unfortunately, the assay performance is often insufficient. Accordingly, there is a need to develop an in situ device with improved energy consumption, reduced running costs, increased per-unit throughput that at least retains the analytical assay performance of existing in situ genomic sensors. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the treatment of skin employing paraffin wax or similarly available material applicable to the skin after reaching melting temperature.
More particularly it relates to a device and method for heating individual sterile packages shaped to conform to a body part of the patron receiving the sterile individually applicable paraffin treatments.
2. Prior Art
A popular cosmetic and medicinal treatment for the skin is provided by the application of heated paraffin to various areas of the body in coatings or masks such as the hands, arms, elbows, and in coatings on the face for facials. Conventionally, paraffin wax is heated to approximately 53 degrees Celsius in a suitable deep dish wax heater. Once the wax has substantially reached this temperature, the appropriate body part of the user is initially sprayed or wiped with a disinfectant preparation. Once the body part has been so wiped, the body part to be treated is then repeatedly dipped into the melted wax supply. This concurrently delivers a warm, very pleasant and soothing sensation while the body part is being coated. During this process, a generous layer of wax is accumulated on the body part being treated. In the case of the customer's feet or hands, once so coated, they are inserted into a plastic type bag which is then wrapped in a towel or similar mitt to maintain warmth for approximately twenty minutes during a rest and treatment interval. During this rest interval the wax relaxes muscles of the hands. Concurrently the wax itself is allowed to deeply penetrate the heat-expanded pores of the skin which promotes skin hydration. At the end of this process, the mitts and protective bags are removed and the coated wax on the body part is then peeled away. The result to the user is skin with an enhanced feel and finish and which is more fully hydrated.
In addition to the hydration and softness improvement of the skin so treated, other benefits are provided the user. The application of heated paraffin wax and the subsequent relaxation period with the heated wax applied also increases blood circulation to the area and allows for the restoration of improved skin color. The heat provided by the paraffin can also be employed to ease stiffness and discomfort of joints associated with injury, arthritis, overworked muscles, and other ailments.
Conventionally, in preparing for the treatment, the paraffin wax is heated to approximately 53 degrees Celsius in a suitable deep dish wax heater. Prior to application of the wax to the body, the intended body part is initially sprayed or wiped with a disinfectant preparation in an attempt to prevent germ or other contamination of the reservoir of paraffin. Following the disinfectant treatment, the body part is then repeatedly dipped into the paraffin reservoir to achieve a coating on the body part. Through one or a plurality of these subsequent dips into the reservoir, a generous layer of wax is accumulated on the body part being treated.
In the case of the feet or hands being treated, once the wax layer has accumulated, they are then directly inserted into a plastic type bag and then inserted into a towel or similar mitt or cover for approximately twenty minutes. Having cooled after the elapsed time, the wax is then easily peeled off leaving an amazing feel and finish to the skin.
However, this method of dipping and coating body parts, even after the application of disinfectant, has been determined to be fraught with peril from contamination of the wax reservoir by users. Many germs, bacteria, and viruses have been found to survive not only the disinfectant wipe, but also the heat in the reservoir of paraffin. Some pathogens actually thrive in such an environment.
The same is true of other temporary skin coating material with similar skin and body enhancement properties such as mud, oil, bee's wax, salt, and the like. Communal reservoirs of these materials have been used in the past with the same problems.
As a consequence of this high potential for contamination, the multiple dipping of body parts into a common reservoir, by different consecutive users, has already been outlawed in many countries. This is especially true where the paraffin applique is employed for hair removal applications. However, anywhere a heated wax pot is being employed cosmetically with customers, there is currently an ongoing and intense industry discussion relating to the possible hygiene concerns with current paraffin wax application methods.
Further, from a marketing standpoint with patrons of establishments providing wax treatments, the mere thought of someone else's feet or hands or body parts having been dipped into the same wax reservoir as the next client, can be disgusting. The thought of another person's hair, skin, germs, or even DNA floating in the reservoir of warm wax is more than enough to discourage many patrons from undergoing the procedure.
As a consequence, the beauty industry has either had to discontinue a very profitable procedure, or, provide individualized wax reservoirs which are then discarded. These individual treatments and subsequent disposal of the wax reservoir contents, severely increases the cost of the procedure and is not very ecological in practice.
As such, there is an unmet need for a method and apparatus for providing individual portions of warmed paraffin or material with similar characteristics, for cosmetic and medical treatments. Such a method and device should provide the hygiene and convenience which will encourage more clients to willingly indulge in much desired paraffin treatments. Such a method should provide for quick, easy, and most importantly, hygienic, wax solutions and similar materials which may be applied to the skin of clients. Such a method and device should also allow for widespread standardized use so that clients become familiar with it and feel safe, and, establishments may offer standardized services and order standardized supplies to provide them. | {
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Law enforcement and other public safety personnel respond to incidents in the course of their duties. Responding to incidents often involves collecting a myriad of pieces of information (for example, police reports, evidence, witness reports, video and other media assets, and the like) related to the incident response from numerous callers. During the occurrence of one or more incidents, the number of calls received at a dispatch command center may increase. Emergency call takers and incident-handling dispatchers may not be able to handle the calls efficiently by themselves.
Skilled artisans will appreciate that elements in the figures are illustrated for simplicity and clarity and have not necessarily been drawn to scale. For example, the dimensions of some of the elements in the figures may be exaggerated relative to other elements to help to improve understanding of embodiments of the present invention.
The apparatus and method components have been represented where appropriate by conventional symbols in the drawings, showing only those specific details that are pertinent to understanding the embodiments of the present invention so as not to obscure the disclosure with details that will be readily apparent to those of ordinary skill in the art having the benefit of the description herein. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to fixed-focus cameras and more particularly to a system and method for automatic engagement of a close-up lens in a fixed-focus camera.
2. Discussion of the Prior Art
Producing a well-focused image is a primary consideration of most camera users as well as camera manufacturers. Another important and sometimes conflicting goal is the cost of making a camera to produce such images. Fixed-focus cameras are relatively inexpensive due to their simple design, but are unable to focus on objects closer than a given focal length for the design of that fixed-focus lens. To circumvent this limitation, a retractable close-up lens with a shallow depth of field is often added to the lens assembly for photographing nearby subjects (typically one foot).
The addition of a close-up lens enables users to switch between the fixed-focus lens and the close-up lens, depending on the photographic subject's distance from the camera. The photographer can then determine which lens is likely to produce a focused image and switch to the appropriate lens. This task can sometimes be difficult as well as distracting, and must be performed for each and every picture taken to ensure consistent results. Many camera users cannot estimate distances accurately enough to effectively switch between using normal and close-up lenses. Also, the time necessary to estimate focal distance and switch to the appropriate lens may result in missed photographic opportunities. Even when a skilled user operates the camera, it is difficult to consistently produce well-focused images using a manual lens-switching system.
Previous attempts to overcome the lens-switching problem in fixed-focus cameras include active range finding schemes using infrared light or sonar to measure the distance from camera to photographic subject. The distance measurement can then be used to engage or disengage a close-up lens. Passive measurement schemes include providing lengths of cord or similar measuring devices whose lengths correspond to focal lengths of the respective lenses. The photographer may then use the measuring devices to determine proper lens configuration. These range finding schemes of the prior art add elaborate components to the camera and make the picture-taking process more complex and difficult.
Another prior art approach features an auto-focus camera with a focal-distance measuring system combined with a lens-adjusting mechanism. The adjusting mechanism automatically moves the lens through the entire range of lens focal lengths responsive to the focal distance measurement. Due to its increased complexity, the adjustable lens mechanism's cost is generally significantly higher than a comparable fixed-focus lens. Common auto focus systems are not applicable to fixed-focus cameras because a fixed-focus camera's lens is not movable or adjustable over a range of focal lengths.
Therefore, an improved system and method is needed to automatically engage and disengage a close-up lens in a fixed-focus camera, to economically permit capture of well-focused images with minimum difficulty and distraction to the camera user. | {
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Airborne particle-s can be removed from a polluted air stream by a variety of physical processes. Common types of equipment for collecting fine particulates included, for example, cyclones, scrubbers, electrostatic precipitators, and baghouse filters.
Most air-pollution control projects are unique. Accordingly, the type of particle collection device, or combination of devices, to be employed normally must be carefully chosen in each implementation on a case-by-case basis. Important particulate characteristics that influence the selection of collection device include corrosivity, reactivity, shape, density, and size and size distribution, including the range of different particle sizes in the air stream. Other design factors include air stream characteristics (e.g., pressure, temperature, and viscosity), flow rate, removal efficiency requirements, and allowable resistance to airflow. In general, cyclone collectors are often used to control industrial dust emissions and as precleaners for other collection devices. Wet scrubbers are usually applied in the control of flammable or explosive dusts or mists from such sources as industrial and chemical processing facilities and hazardous-waste incinerators; they can handle hot air streams and stick particles. Large scale electrostatic precipitators or filtration devices and fabric-filter baghouses are often used at power plants.
Electrostatic precipitation or filtration, which are interchangeable terms, is a commonly used method for removing fine particulates from air streams. In an electrostatic precipitator, an electric charge is imparted to particles suspended in an air steam, which are then removed by the influence of an electric field. A typical precipitation unit or device includes baffles for distributing airflow, discharge and collection electrodes, a dust clean-out system, and collection hoppers. A high DC voltage, often as much as 100,000 volts in large scale applications, is applied to the discharge electrodes to charge the particles, which then are attracted to oppositely charged collection electrodes, on which they become trapped.
In a typical large-scale electrostatic precipitator the collection electrodes consists of a group of large rectangular metal plates suspended vertically and parallel to each other inside a boxlike structure. There are often hundreds of plates having a combined surface area of tens of thousands of square meters. Rows of discharge electrode wires hang between the collection plates. The wires are given a negative electric charge, whereas the plates are grounded and thus become positively charged.
Particles that stick to the collection plates are removed periodically when the plates are shaken, or “rapped.” Rapping is a mechanical technique for separating the trapped particles from the plates, which typically become covered with a 6-mm (0.2-inch) layer of dust. Rappers are either of the impulse (single-blow) or vibrating type. The dislodged particles are collected in a hopper at the bottom of the unit and removed for disposal. An electrostatic precipitator can remove exceptionally small particulates on the order of 1 micrometer (0.00004 inch) with an efficiency exceeding 99 percent. The effectiveness of electrostatic precipitators in removing fly ash from the combustion gases of fossil-fuel furnaces accounts for their high frequency of use at power stations.
Large-scale electrostatic precipitators are expensive, difficult to build, and quite large. However, electrostatic filtration is exceedingly efficient and highly reliable. As a result, skilled artisans have devoted considerable effort and resources toward the development of small-scale electrostatic precipitators or air filtration devices specifically adapted for small scale applications, such as for filtering breathing. Although considerable attention has been directed toward the development of small-scale and portable electrostatic filtration devices utilized principally to filter breathing air, existing implementations are difficult to construct, expensive, must be constructed to strict and often unattainable tolerances, cannot be tuned or calibrated as needed to meet specific and/or changing environmental conditions or air filtering requirements, and are not suitable for use in large-scale applications, such as in conjunction with large-scale air conditioning systems utilized in large building establishments, such as casinos, office buildings, hospitals, and schools. Given these and other deficiencies in the art of electrostatic air filters, the need for continued improvement is evident. | {
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(a) Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a liquid crystal display and a driving method thereof. More particularly, the present invention relates to a field sequential driving type liquid crystal display (FS-LCD) and a driving method thereof.
(b) Description of the Related Art
As personal computers and televisions, etc., have become more lightweight and thin, the demand for lightweight and thin display devices has increased. According to such requirements, flat panel displays such as liquid crystal displays (LCD) have recently been developed instead of cathode ray tubes (CRT).
An LCD is a display device used to display a desired video signal by applying electric fields to liquid crystal materials having an anisotropic dielectric constant and injected between two substrates, and controlling the strength of electric fields so as to control an amount of light from an external light source (i.e., backlight) transmitted through a substrate.
The LCD is representative of portable flat panel displays, and TFT-LCDs using a thin film transistor (TFT) as a switching element are mainly used.
Each pixel in the TFT-LCD can be modeled with capacitors having liquid crystal as a dielectric substance, such as a liquid crystal capacitor. An equivalent circuit of each pixel in such an LCD is as shown in FIG. 1.
As shown in FIG. 1, each pixel of a liquid crystal display includes a TFT 10, of which a source electrode and a gate electrode are respectively connected to a data line (Dm) and a scanning line (Sn); a liquid crystal capacitor Cl connected between a drain electrode of the TFT and common voltage Vcom; and a storage capacitor Cst connected to the drain electrode of the TFT.
In FIG. 1, when a scanning signal is applied to a scanning line (Sn) and the TFT 10 is turned on, data voltages (Vd) supplied to the data line are applied to each pixel electrode (not shown) though the TFT. Then, an electric field corresponding to a difference between pixel voltages Vp applied to pixel electrodes and the common voltage Vcom is applied to liquid crystal (which is equivalently shown as the liquid crystal capacitor Cl in FIG. 1). Light transmits with a transmittivity corresponding to the strength of the electric field. In this instance, a pixel voltage Vp needs to be maintained during one frame or one field, so the storage capacitor Cst in FIG. 1 is used to maintain a pixel voltage Vp applied to a pixel electrode.
Generally, liquid crystal display can be classified into two methods, a color filter method and a field sequential driving method, based on methods of displaying color images.
A liquid crystal display of a color filter method has color filter layers composed of three primary colors such as red R, green G, and blue B in one of two substrates, and displays a desired color by controlling an amount of light transmitted through the color filter layer. A liquid crystal display of a color filter method controls an amount of light transmitted through the R, G, and B color filter layers when light from a single light source transmits through the R, G, and B color filter layers, and composes R, G, and B colors to display a desired color.
A liquid crystal display device displaying color using a single light source and 3 color filter layers needs unit pixels respectively corresponding to each R, G, and B subpixel, thus at least 3 times the number of pixels are needed compared with displaying black and white. Therefore, fine manufacturing techniques are required to produce video images of high definition.
Further, there are problems in that separate color filter layers must be formed on a substrate for a liquid crystal display in manufacturing, and the light transmission rate of the color filters must be improved.
On the other hand, a field sequential driving type of liquid crystal display sequentially and periodically turns on each independent light source of R, G, and B colors, and adds synchronized color signals corresponding to each pixel based on the lighting periodic time to obtain full colors. That is, according to a field sequential driving type of liquid crystal display, one pixel is not divided into R, G, and B subpixels, and light of 3 primary colors outputted from R, G, and B back lights is sequentially displayed in a time-divisional manner so that the color images are displayed using an after image effect of the eye.
The field sequential driving method can be classified as an analog driving method and a digital driving method.
The analog driving method establishes a plurality of gray voltages, selects one gray voltage corresponding to gray data from among the gray voltages, and drives a liquid crystal panel with the selected gray voltage to perform gray display with an amount of transmission corresponding to the gray voltage applied.
FIG. 2 shows a driving voltage and amount of light transmission of a conventional liquid crystal display of the analog driving method.
In FIG. 2, the driving voltage is a voltage applied to liquid crystal, and optical transmittivity is transmittivity through the liquid crystal. That is, optical transmittivity refers to a torsion degree of the liquid crystal that allows light to transmit.
Referring to FIG. 2, a driving voltage having a V11 level is applied to the liquid crystal, and light corresponding to the driving voltage having the V11 level transmits through the liquid crystal in the R field period Tr for displaying an R color. A driving voltage having a V12 level is applied to the liquid crystal, and light corresponding to the driving voltage having the V12 level transmits through the liquid crystal in the G field period Tg for displaying a G color. Further, a V13 level driving voltage is applied to the liquid crystal, and an amount of light transmission corresponding to the V13 level is obtained. A desired color image is displayed by combination of R, G, and B lights transmitted respectively during Tr, Tg, and Tb periods.
On the other hand, a digital driving method applies a constant driving voltage to the liquid crystal, and controls the voltage applying time to perform a gray display. The digital driving method maintains a constant driving voltage, and controls timing of a voltage applying state and a voltage non-applying state, so as to control a total amount of light transmitting through the liquid crystal.
FIG. 3 shows a waveform which illustrates a driving method of a liquid crystal display of a conventional digital driving method, and shows a waveform of a driving voltage and optical transmittivity of liquid crystal based on driving data of a predetermined bit.
Referring to FIG. 3, gray waveform data corresponding to each gray is provided with a digital signal having a predetermined number of bits, for example a 7 bit digital signal, and a gray waveform according to 7 bit data is applied to the liquid crystal. Optical transmittivity of the liquid crystal is determined based on the gray waveform applied to perform gray display.
In the conventional field sequential driving method, correct gray is typically not displayed since an effective value response of a desired gray for display (for example, a gray scale of R) is changed by a previous gray display (for example, a gray of G). That is, a pixel voltage Vp actually applied to the liquid crystal is determined by a gray voltage (or a gray waveform) supplied to a present field (for example, an R field) and a gray voltage (or a gray waveform) supplied to the previous field (for example, a B field).
U.S. Pat. No. 6,567,063 (“the '063 patent”) discloses a field sequential driving method using a reset pulse to solve the problem of the field sequential driving method in which an effective value response of the desired gray is changed because of a previous gray display.
FIG. 4 shows a field sequential driving method using a reset pulse described in the '063 patent. In FIG. 4, periods (T31˜T36) indicate an R field, a G field, and a B field performing gray display for each of R, G, and B.
Referring to FIG. 4, a predetermined voltage (reset voltage) is applied, which is independent of input gray data, and is more than a maximum value of gray data applied during a predetermined time (t31˜t36) at the point where each of the periods (T31˜T36) is ended. A state of all the liquid crystals is reset to the same state (for example, a black state in which no light can be transmitted, that is, optical transmittivity is 0) at the point where each of the periods (T31˜T36) is ended.
Thus, when the liquid crystals are driven by voltages applied with gray data at each period (T31˜36), the state of the liquid crystals become the same regardless of previous grays displayed, thus the display period for the present gray is not affected by the previous gray display.
However, according to the '063 patent, since a reset voltage of a constant size and width of more than a maximum value of gray data is always applied regardless of input gray data, there is a problem in that power consumption is increased. | {
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This disclosure is directed to system and methods using an automated tag migration strategy to improve Image Quality (IQ), and/or to modify IQ according to a user's desires or requirements, of an image produced in an image forming device.
IQ for images formed in image forming devices is dependent on a number of complex and varyingly related factors. Among these factors are a time lapse or number of operations performed since a most recent service, repair, or replacement of one or more replaceable components and/or consumables in the image forming device. The IQ for images produced in the image forming device often degrades over time with the age of one or more replaceable components and/or consumables. When IQ deteriorates to such an extent that service is required, individual components may be serviced and cleaned, replaceable components and/or consumables may be replaced with fresh components or consumables, and calibration may be performed. As a result, IQ for images formed in the image forming device may be returned to an original level as when the device was new, the image forming device having been considered to be returned to a “pristine” condition.
Production image forming devices produce their highest IQ level immediately after recent repair functions or after replacing old consumables such as, for example, toner, with fresh material, and/or replacing aging components that degrade over time with new units. Because IQ generally decreases over time and with usage, a number of adjustments of parameters that are controllable within the image forming device, such as those that may be controllable within, for example, a digital front end (DFE) of an electrostatic image forming device, may be manipulated in order to attempt to maintain IQ at a highest level based on a degrading condition of the components and the consumables within the image forming device.
Measures of IQ are known to be decreasing functions of time following a calibration, individual part replacement and/or based on a condition of a consumable. IQ degradation curves may be plotted as functions of one or more parameters, such as a selected halftone frequency at which the image forming device is operated. The functional relationship to any specific rendering parameter, including a selected halftone frequency is generally a depiction of a trend in IQ rather that being based on an actual measurement. These functional relationships may be depicted as a representative illustration to show a robustness versus an initial IQ trade-off for example with respect to differing rendering parameters, such as, for example, halftone frequencies, over time.
A low frequency halftone is generally least stressful to the imaging system and therefore more robust and repeatable, but has the lowest initial IQ and, slowest rate of decline over time. Highest frequency halftones produce the highest initial IQ, but they are very stressful on the image forming device and suffer from significant IQ declines over comparatively shorter periods of time relative to the low halftone frequency performance. A medium frequency halftone may have a moderate initial IQ level and moderate rate of decline. Ideally, end users seek to maximize IQ over time. This can be done by manually selecting an appropriate halftone frequency candidate. | {
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The present invention is concerned generally with the prevention of accidental damage to the mesh screening used in screen doors, and particularly with the prevention of accidental bulging, rending and puncturing which often occur in that region of the mesh screening which is adjacent to a handle or pull. The sort of damage which occurs in this portion of the screening is usually occasioned by accidental pressure of the human hand on the screening instead of on the handle, which occurs in all too many cases because the handle itself is too small or improperly shaped to permit a ready grasp in the humand hand. Under these conditions actual contact and pressure between the fingers of the hand and the screening over a period of time causes unsightly bulging and puncturing or tearing of the screening material. These problems are particularly severe in the case of mesh screening made of lightweight or fairly stretchable materials, however, no mesh screening can for long withstand the continuous application of pressure without yielding in some way.
Although it might seen that an approach to the solution of this problem would be simply to adopt a much stronger grade of mesh screening for use in window and door screens, both economics and aesthetics generally argue against this approach. This is particularly so because there is little reason to provide extra strength over the entire surface of the screening, since only the regions adjacent handles, pulls, etc. are subjected to heavy stress.
An alternate approach which is sometimes used is to merely extend the width of the frame surrounding the screening material, such that the human hand does not normally come into contact with the screening during operation of the door or window. Unfortunately, the extra cost and the "heavy" appearance of the widened frame have made this approach unsatisfactory. Moreover, there are already in existence a multitude of screen doors which are so designed as to have inadequate shielding of the screening materials adjacent handles, knobs and pulls. Clearly a solution which can be simply and inexpensively retrofitted to these doors and windows is needed.
In view of the impracticality as noted above of redesigning existing screen frames or of adopting a heavier and stronger grade of mesh screening, there is a need for a device which simply, unobtrusively and inexpensively reinforces just that region of the mesh screen surrounding a handle or pull. | {
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The present invention relates to an image-capturing apparatus for recording a wide dynamic range image data by image capturing, an image processing apparatus for applying optimization processing for forming an output-referred image on the outputting medium, to such a wide dynamic range image data by image capturing, and an image recording apparatus.
At present, the digital image data captured by an image-capturing apparatus is distributed through such a memory device as a CD-R (Compact Disk Recordable), floppy disk (registered trade name) and memory card or the Internet, and is displayed on such a display monitor as a CRT (Cathode Ray Tube), liquid crystal display and plasma display or a small-sized liquid crystal monitor display device of a cellular phone, or is printed out as a hard copy image using such an output device as a digital printer, inkjet printer and thermal printer. In this way, display and print methods have been diversified in recent years.
When digital image data is displayed and output for viewing, it is a common practice to provide various types of image processing typically represented by gradation adjustment, brightness adjustment, color balancing and enhancement of sharpness to ensure that a desired image quality is obtained on the display monitor used for viewing or on the hard copy.
In response to such varied display and printing methods, efforts have been made to improve the general versatility of digital image data captured by an image-capturing apparatus. As part of these efforts, an attempt has been made to standardize the color space represented by digital RGB (Red, Green and Blue) signals into the color space that does not depend on characteristics of an image-capturing apparatus. At present, large amounts of digital image data have adopted the sRGB (See Multimedia Systems and Equipment—Color Measurement and Management—Part 2-1: Color Management—Default RGB Color Space—sRGB” IEC61966-2-1) as a standardized color space. The color space of this sRGB has been established to meet the color reproduction area for a standard CRT display monitor.
Generally, a digital camera is equipped with an image sensor, serving as an image-capturing device (CCD type image sensor, hereinafter also referred to as “CCD” for simplicity) having a photoelectric conversion function with color sensitivity provided by a combination of a CCD (charge coupled device), a charge transfer device and a mosaic color filter. The digital image data output from the digital camera is obtained after the electric original signal gained by conversion via the CCD has been corrected by the photoelectric conversion function of the image sensor, and processing of file conversion and compression into the predetermined data format standardized to permit reading and display by image editing software.
Correction by the photoelectric conversion function of the image sensor includes, for example, gradation correction, spectral sensitivity, crosstalk correction, dark current noise control, sharpening, white balance adjustment and color saturation adjustment. The above-mentioned standardized data format widely known includes Baseline Tiff Rev. 6.0 RGB Full Color Image adopted as a non-compressed file of the Exif (Exchangeable Image File Format) file and compressed data file format conforming to the JPEG format.
The Exif file conforms to the above-mentioned sRGB, and the correction of the photoelectric conversion function of the above-mentioned image-capturing element is established so as to ensure the most suitable image quality on the display monitor conforming to the sRGB.
For example, if a digital camera has the function of writing into the header of the digital image data the tag information for display in the standard color space (hereinafter referred to as “monitor profile”) of the display monitor conforming to the sRGB signal, and accompanying information indicating the device dependent information such as the number of pixels, pixel arrangement and number of bits per pixel as meta-data as in the case of Exif format, and if only such a data format is adopted, then the tag information can be analyzed by the image edit software (e.g. Photoshop by Abode for displaying the above-mentioned digital image data on the digital display monitor, conversion of the monitor profile into the sRGB can be prompted, and modification can be processed automatically. This capability reduces the differences in apparatus characteristics among different displays, and permits viewing of the digital image data photographed by a digital camera under the optimum condition.
In addition to the above-mentioned information dependent on device type, the above-mentioned accompanying information includes; information directly related to the camera type (device type) such as a camera name and code number, information on photographing conditions such as exposure time, shutter speed, f-stop number (F number), ISO sensitivity, brightness value, subject distance range, light source, on/off status of a stroboscopic lamp, subject area, white balance, zoom scaling factor, subject configuration, photographing scene type, the amount of reflected light of the stroboscopic lamp source and color saturation for photographing, and tags (codes) for indicating the information related to a subject. The image editing software and output device have a function of reading the above-mentioned accompanying information and making the quality of hardware image more suitable.
The image displayed on such a display device as a CRT display monitor and the hard copy image printed by various printing devices have different color reproduction areas depending on the configuration of the phosphor or color material to be used. For example, the color reproduction area of the CRT display monitor corresponding to the sRGB standard space has a wide bright green and blue area. It contains the area that cannot be reproduced by the hard copy formed by a silver halide photographic printer, ink-jet printer and conventional printer. Conversely, the cyan area of the conventional printing or inkjet printing and the yellow area of the silver halide photographic printing contain the area that cannot be reproduced by the CRT display monitor corresponding to the sRGB standard color space. (For example, see “Fine imaging and digital photographing” edited by the Publishing Commission of the Japan Society of Electrophotography, Corona Publishing Co., P. 444). In the meantime, some of the scenes of the subject to be photographed may contain the color in the area that cannot be reproduced in any of these areas for color reproduction.
As described above, the color space (including the sRGB) optimized on the basis of display and printing by a specific device is accompanied by restrictions in the color gamut where recording is possible. So when recording the information picked up by a photographing device, it is necessary to make adjustment of mapping by compressing the information into the color gamut where recording is allowed. The simplest way is provided by clipping where the color chromaticity point outside the color gamut where recording is possible is mapped onto the boundary of the nearest color gamut. This causes the gradation outside the color gamut to be collapsed, and the image will give a sense of incompatibility to the viewer. To avoid this problem, non-liner compression method is generally used. In this method, the chromaticity point in the area where chroma is high in excess of an appropriate threshold value is compressed smoothly according to the size of the chroma. As a result, chroma is compressed and recording is carried out even at the chromaticity point inside the color gamut where recording is possible. (For the details of the procedure of mapping the color gamut, see “Fine imaging and digital photographing” edited by the Publishing Commission of the Japan Society of Electrophotography, Corona Publishing Co., P. 447, for example).
The image displayed on such a display device as a CRT display monitor, the hard copied image printed by various types of printing devices, or color space (including sRGB) optimized on the basis of display and printing by these devices are restricted to the conditions where the area of brightness that allows recording and reproduction is of the order of about 100 to 1. By contrast, however, the scene of the subject to be photographed has a wide area of brightness, and it often happens that the order of several thousands to 1 is reached outdoors. (See “Handbook on Science of Color, New Version, 2nd Print” by Japan Society for Science of Colors, Publishing Society of the University of Tokyo, P. 926, for example). Accordingly, when recording the information gained by the image sensor, compression is also necessary for brightness. In this processing, adequate conditions must be set for each image in conformity to the dynamic range of the scene to be photographed, and the range of brightness for the main subject in the scene to be photographed.
However, when compression has been carried out for the color gamut and brightness area as described above, information on gradation prior to compression or information prior to clipping is lost immediately due to the principle of the digital image to be recorded in terms of the discrete value. The original state cannot be recovered. This imposes a big restriction on the general versatility of high-quality digital image.
For example, when the image recorded in the sRGB standard color space is printed, mapping must be carried out again based on the differences between the sRGB standard color space and the area for color reproduction of the printing device. For the image recorded in the sRGB standard color space, however, the information on gradation in the area compressed at a time of recording is lost. So the smoothness of gradation is deteriorated as compared to the case where the information captured by the photographing device is mapped directly in the area for color reproduction of the printing device. Further, if gradation compression conditions are not adequate at a time of recording, and there are problems such as a whitish picture, dark face, deformed shadow and conspicuous white skipping in the highlighted area, improvement is very inadequate as compared to the case where the new image is created again from the information gained by the photographing device, even if the gradation setting is changed to improve the image. This is because information on gradation prior to compression, and information on the portion subjected to deformation or white skipping have been already lost.
As a solution of the above-mentioned problems, the art of storing the process of image editing as a backup data and returning it to the state prior to editing whenever required has long been known. For example, Patent Document 1 discloses a backup device wherein, when the digital image is subjected to local modification by image processing, the image data on the difference between the digital image data before image processing and that after image processing is saved as backup data. Further, Patent Document 2 discloses a method for recovering the digital image data before editing, by saving the image data on the difference between the digital image data before image processing and that after image processing. These technologies are effective from the viewpoint of preventing information from being lost, but the number of sheets that can be photographed by a camera is reduced with the increase in the amount of data recorded in the media.
The problems introduced above are caused by the procedure where the information on the wide color gamut and brightness area gained by a photographing device is recorded after having being compressed into the output-referred image data in the state optimized by assuming an image to be viewed. By contrast, if the information on the wide color gamut and brightness area gained by a photographing device is recorded as scene-referred image data that is not compressed, then inadvertent loss of information can be prevented. The standard color space suited to record such scene-referred image data is proposed, for example, by RIMM RGB (Reference Input Medium Metric RGB) and ERIMM RGB (Extended Reference Input Medium Metric RGB). (See the Journal of Imaging Science and Technology, Vol. 45 pp. 418 to 426 (2001)).
However, the data expressed in the standard color space like the one described above, is not suitable for being displayed directly on the display monitor and viewed. Generally, a digital camera has a built-in display monitor or is connected to it in order for the user to check the angle of view before photographing or to check the photographed image after photographing. When photographed data is recorded as output referred image data like the sRGB, it can be displayed directly on the display monitor, without the data being converted. Despite this advantage, when the photographed data is recorded as scene-referred image data, the data must be subjected to the processing of re-conversion into the output-referred image data in order to display that data.
Patent Document 3 discloses an image processing apparatus characterized by two modes; a mode of recording in the form of an image signal displayed on the display means and a mode of recording in the form of captured image signal. The form of image signal in the latter case is generally called RAW data. Using the special-purpose application software (called “development software”), such digital image data can be converted into output-referred image data of the above-mentioned Exif file or the like for display or printing (called “electronic development” or simply “development”). Since the RAW data retains all information at a time of photographing, it permits output-referred image data to be remade. If other color system files such as CMYK are created directly, there will no inadvertent modification of the color system due to the difference in color gamut from the display monitor (sRGB). However, the RAW data is recorded according to the color space based on the spectral sensitivity characteristics inherent to the type of a photographing apparatus and the file format inherent to the type of a photographing apparatus. Accordingly, image suitable to display and printing can be obtained only when special-purpose development software inherent to the type of the photographing apparatus is used.
The above description is concerned with a commonly used digital camera. Needless to say, it is preferred that the image-capturing apparatus itself be improved so as to get information on a wider color and brightness range than the conventional products. The solid image sensor has a limited dynamic range with respect to the intensity of incoming light. The Patent Document 4 discloses a method wherein a low-sensitivity image sensor and high-sensitivity image sensor are provided, and the value obtained by level conversion of the output of each of these devices is compared with a reference voltage; thus, the dynamic range of the signal obtained by photoelectric conversion of the intensity of incoming light is expanded by instantaneous switching of the output of either of the level values.
The Patent Document 5 discloses a technique wherein the first light receiving devices (high-sensitivity image sensor) and second light receiving devices (low-sensitivity image sensor) of the image sensor are arranged in a honeycomb figure in positions displaced, in the direction of vertical column and/or and horizontal row with respect to each other in terms of the centers of the geometrical profile of the image sensor, by half the pitch representing the interval between light receiving devices, namely, by ½ pitch; and the signal saturation level of the first light receiving device is adjusted for synthesization between the first and second signal.
Patent Document 6 discloses the method wherein the image sensor generates the high-sensitivity video signal and low-sensitivity video signal, and addition is made in terms of sensitivity ratio, if the high quantization data is saturated subsequent to quantization of the high-sensitivity video signal by high quantizing resolution and low-sensitivity video signal by low quantizing resolution, and the high quantization data is selected otherwise, thereby forming a wider dynamic range image.
Further, the Patent Document 7 describes the art of selecting the output values of the low-sensitivity image sensor and high-sensitivity image sensor according to the exposure area, and Patent Document 8 shows the method for selecting the output value of the low-sensitivity image sensor and high-sensitivity image sensor without moiré.
[Patent Document 1] Tokkaihei 7-57074
[Patent Document 2] Tokkai 2001-94778
[Patent Document 3] Tokkaihei 11-261933
[Patent Document 4] Tokkohei 8-34558
[Patent Document 5] Tokkai 2000-125209
[Patent Document 6] Tokkai 2001-8104
[Patent Document 7] Tokkai 2003-18445
[Patent Document 8] Tokkai 2003-18479
In a digital camera having the image-capturing section obtained by high integration of image sensors with different characteristics, loss of information can be avoided by referring to the information on wide color range and brightness as a non-compressed scene-referred image data (e.g. [scRGB], [RIMM RGB] and [ERIMM RGB]). However, the abovementioned technology has problems in that it fails to enable viewing by display on the aforementioned camera display monitor, and to overcome the variations of the image quality due to the camera model inherent problem, similarly to the case of raw data or the difficulty in optimization of the image quality for use in display and printing. This has created a problem in the prior art. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to audio decoders. More particularly, the present invention relates to mull-channel audio compression decoders with downmixing capabilities.
2. Description of the Related Art
An audio decoder generally comprises two basic parts: a demultiplexing portion, the main function of which consists of unpacking a serial bit stream of encoded data, which in this case is in the frequency-domain; and time-domain signal processing, which converts the demultiplexed signal back to the time-domain. A mufti-channel output section may be provided to cater to a multiple output format. If the number of channels required at the decoder output is smaller than the number of channels which are encoded in the bit stream, then downmixing is required. Downmixing in the time-domain is usually provided in present decoders. However, since the inverse frequency-domain transform is a linear operation, it is also possible to downmix in the frequency-domain prior to transformation.
The encoded data representing the audio signals may convey from one to multiple full bandwidth channels, along with a low frequency channel. The encoded data is organized into synchronization frames. The way in which the demultiplexing and time-domain signal processing portions are related is a function of the information available in a synchronization frame. Each frame contains several coded audio blocks, each of which represents a series of audio samples. Further, each frame contains a synchronization information header to facilitate synchronization of the decoder, bit stream information for informing the decoder about the transmission mode and options, and an auxiliary data field which may include user data or dummy data. For example for an AC-3 audio decoder from Dolby Laboratories of San Francisco, Calif., the data field is adjusted by the encoder such that the cyclic redundancy check element falls on the last word of the frame. The cyclic redundancy check word is checked after more than half of the frame has been received. Another cyclic redundancy check word is checked after the complete frame has been received, such as described in Advance Television Systems Committee, Digital Audio Compression Standard (AC-3), 20 Dec. 1995. Another example is the MPEG-1 standard audio decoder where the cyclic redundancy check-word is optional for normal operation. However, if the MPEG-2 extension is required, then there is a compulsory cyclic redundancy check-word.
An audio block also contains information relating to splitting of the block into two or more sub-blocks during the transformation from the time-domain to the frequency-domain. A long block length allows the use of a long transform length, which is more suitable for input signals whose spectrum remains stationary or quasi-stationary. This provides a greater frequency resolution, improved coding performance and a reduction of computing power required. Two or more short length transforms, utilized for short block lengths, enable greater time resolution, and are more desirable for signals whose spectrum changes rapidly with time. The computer power required for two or more short transforms is ordinarily higher than if only one transformation is required. This approach is very similar to behavior known to occur in human hearing.
Again as an example, in the Dolby AC-3 audio decoder mentioned above, dither, dynamic range, coupling function, channel exponents, bit allocation function, gain, channel mantissas and other parameters are also contained in each block. However, they are represented in a compressed format, and therefore unpacking, setting-up tables, decoding, expansion, calculations and computations must be performed before the pulse coded modulation (PCM) audio samples can be recognised.
The input bit stream for a decoder will typically come from a transmission (such as HDTV, CTV) or a storage system (e.g. CD, DAT, DVD). Such data can be transmitted in a continuous way or in a burst fashion. The demultiplexing and bit decoding portion of the decoder synchronises the frame and stores up to more than half of the data before the start of processing. The synchronisation word and bit stream information are unpacked only once per frame. The audio blocks are unpacked one by one and at this stage each block containing the new audio samples may not have the same length (i.e. the number of bits in each block may differ). However, once the audio blocks are decoded, each audio block will have the same length. The first audio block contains not only new PCM audio samples but also extra information which concerns the complete frame. The rest of the audio blocks may contain a smaller number of bits. The bit decoding section performs an unpacking and decoding function, the final product of which will be the frequency transform coefficients of each channel involved, in a floating-point format (exponents and mantissas) or fixed-point format.
The time-domain signal processing (TDSP) section first receives the transform coefficients one block at a time. In normal operation, when the signals spectra are relatively stationary in nature and have been frequency-domain transformed using a long transform length, a block-switch flag is disabled. The TDSP uses a 2N-point inverse fast Fourier transform (IFFT) of corresponding long length to obtain N time-domain samples. When fast changing signals are considered, the block-switch flag is enabled and signals are frequency-domain transformed differently, though the same number of coefficients, N, are also transmitted. Then, a short length inverse transform is used by the TDSP.
Where the audio decoder receives M channel inputs (M an integer), and produces P output channels, where M>P and P>0, the audio decoder must provide M frequency-domain transformations. Since only P output channels are required, a downmixing process is then performed. The number of channel is downmixed from M to P: | {
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The present invention relates to thermal management in computer systems. More specifically, embodiments of the present invention relate to heat exchangers for mobile systems.
The movement of electrons within the electrical components of a computer system causes a great deal of heat to be generated. Unless the heat is dissipated, it will accumulate, causing damage to the system. Such damage may include the warping of the electrical components and possible fire hazards. Mobile systems have certain geometric spacing considerations that make heat dispersion more difficult than large systems.
One current method for dispersing the heat generated by an electrical component is to directly attach a heat exchanger to the component that needs cooling. A thermal attach platform coupled to the top of the component draws the heat up from the component. The thermal attach platform may be a copper block or plate, copper being an excellent heat conductor. The direct attachment heat exchanger may include a set of fins attached to the thermal attach platform on the side opposite the component. An air circulation unit is coupled to the direct attachment heat exchanger. The air circulation unit may be a fan or some other method for moving air across the fins of the direct attachment heat exchanger.
An alternative method for dispersing the heat generated by an electrical component is to thermally couple the electrical component to a remote heat exchanger. The remote heat exchanger is located remotely from the electrical component, allowing for the heat dispersion system to be arranged to fit the computing system.
A method for greater heat dispersal than either the direct attachment heat exchanger and the remote heat exchanger is needed. | {
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The present invention relates essentially to a member for controlling or operating a device such as an electric switch of the kind shaped as a lever mounted in pivoting or swinging relationship in a box or casing so that at least one end thereof is pivotable or swingable between a position retracted into the casing and a position in which it projects at least partially from the casing to be visible, at least one zone of the outer surface area of the visible part of the end being colored to show the operating state or working condition of the device.
The problem of coloring the visible zone has not been solved in a satisfactory manner until now. With a known type of switch lever, this zone is painted or a color film is applied thereon for instance through adhesive bonding, sticking or gluing. In both cases, the layer or coating or the superficially applied film does not withstand friction, attrition or wear for a long time. It may vanish with the passage of time or be removed thereby, giving rise to a serious safety problem. To avoid this difficulty, a colored signalling zone has been provided in a material which exhibits a color differing from the remainder of the lever upon integrally moulding the lever in one single piece. This method of manufacturing the lever suffers from the major inconvenience of being complicated and expensive. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a TV program and more particularly, to an apparatus and method for capturing an object in a TV program.
2. Discussion of Related Art
FIG. 1 shows a typical construction of a television (TV) including a remote control 1 which allows a wireless control of the TV by a user; a remote receiver 2 which receives and outputs a signal from the remote control 1; a tuner 3 which tunes a signal received through an antenna; a demultiplexer 4 which separates the tuned signal into an audio/video signal and additional information data; an audio/video decoder 5 which decodes the audio/video signal from the demultiplexer 4; a display unit 6 which displays the decoded signal; a storage 7 which stores the additional information data; a controller 8 which controls the demultiplexer 4 in response to the signal from the remote receiver 2 and extracting the additional information data stored in the storage 7 to output a corresponding control signal; and a memory 9 which temporarily stores the data extracted from the storage 7.
To view a TV program by the television of FIG. 1, the user selects a program from broadcasting stations or external program providers by using the remote control 1. The remote receiver 2 receives a signal indicating a selected program from the remote control 1 and outputs a corresponding signal to the controller 8. Thus, the controller 8 outputs a control signal to tune the program selected by the user in response to the signal from the remote receiver 2. Also in response to the signal from the remote receiver 2, the controller 8 outputs a control signal to separate the program of a broadcasting station or an external program provider selected by the user.
The tuner 3 receives signals through an antenna and tunes a signal of the broadcasting station or the external program provider with the program selected by the user in response to the control signal from the controller 8. The tuned signal is output to the demultiplexer 4, through which the program selected by the user separated into audio/video signal and the additional information data, in response to the control from the controller 8. The additional information data includes an electronic program guide (EPG) data or information regarding objects such as a particular actor or actress in a TV program being displayed.
The audio/video decoder 5 receives and decodes the audio/video signal from the demultiplexer 4 and outputs a decoded signal. Accordingly, the display unit 6 displays the program selected by the user in response to the signal output from the audio/video decoder 5. The additional information data is received and stored in the storage 7 in response to the control signal of the controller 8. The controller 8 extracts the additional information data corresponding to a program being displayed on the display unit 6 from the storage 7 and stores the extracted information in the memory 9. Thereafter, the additional information data for the program being displayed is read from the memory 9 and signal processed to be displayed. Finally, a prescribed message is displayed through the display unit 9 to inform that there is additional information for the program currently being displayed.
The TV as described above can process, reproduce TV programs and display additional information about objects in the TV program on the TV screen. However, a user may wish to select an object from an image frame currently being displayed, and display or print the additional information regarding selected object. Because the TV in the related art does not have such function or capability, a limited service is provided to users.
Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to solve at least the problems and disadvantages of the related art.
An object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus and method for capturing an object in a TV program being displayed and displaying the captured object on other displaying equipment.
An object of the present invention is to provide an apparatus and method for capturing an object in a TV program being displayed and printing the captured object
Additional advantages, objects, and features of the invention will be set forth in part in the description which follows and in part will become apparent to those having ordinary skill in the art upon examination of the following or may be learned from practice of the invention. The objects and advantages of the invention may be realized and attained as particularly pointed out in the appended claims.
To achieve the objects and in accordance with the purposes of the invention, as embodied and broadly described herein, an apparatus for capturing an object in a TV program includes a Media Object Description Table (MODT) decoder for decoding additional information data from a demultiplexer into a plurality of MODT data; an object data memory for storing the plurality of MODT data; a controller for controlling the demultiplexer in response to a signal from a remote receiver, extracting the MODT data stored in the object data memory and outputting a corresponding control signal to display various additional information; and an output device for converting the extracted MODT data corresponding to a captured object into a data file of a specific format according to a control of the controller. The MODT data corresponds to an object captured among image frames currently being displayed on a display unit.
A method for capturing an object in a TV program in accordance with the present invention comprises capturing an object desired by a user from an image frame being displayed; extracting the data corresponding to the captured object; signal processing and outputting the extracted data; and converting the signal processed data into a data file of a specific format, and displaying or printing the file. The displaying or printing step may further comprise moving, and enlarging or reducing the data after converting the data into a file of a specific format. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of data processing systems. Specifically, the present invention relates to a method and apparatus for efficiently synchronizing information between a portable computer system and a host computer system.
2. Related Art
As the components required to build a computer system have reduced in size, new categories of computer systems have emerged. One of the new categories of computer systems is the “palmtop” computer system. A palmtop computer system is a computer that is small enough to be held in the hand of a user and can be “palm-sized.” Most palmtop computer systems are used to implement various Personal Information Management (PIM) applications such as an address book, a daily organizer and electronic notepads, to name a few.
Since palmtop computer systems are very small, full-sized keyboards are generally not efficient input devices. Palmtop computers using keyboards have keyboard devices that are so small that a user cannot touch-type. Furthermore, to use a keyboard device, a user must either place the palmtop computer system down onto a flat surface, so the user can type with both hands, or the user holds the palmtop computer system with two hands and types with thumbs only.
Instead of a keyboard device, some palmtop computers utilize a touch screen and display an image of a small keyboard thereon. When a particular button is pressed or tapped, a small keyboard image is displayed on the display screen. Instead of using a keyboard device or a displayed keyboard, many palmtop computers employ a pen and a digitizer pad as an input system. The pen and digitizer pad combination works well for palmtop computers because the arrangement allows a user to hold the palmtop computer system in one hand while writing with the pen onto the digitizer pad with the other hand. Most of these pen-based palmtop computer systems provide some type of handwriting recognition system whereby the user can write words and letters on the digitizer pad with a stylus.
In addition to using keyboards, virtual keyboards and the digitizer, it has also proven convenient to exchange data between a computer system and a palmtop computer using a communication interface, such as a serial or parallel input port. Alternatively, infrared (IR) or wireless radio frequency communication may be used for the interface. A number of programs today transfer data between palmtops and personal computer systems (PCs), but they are currently limited in functionality. For instance, some programs transfer all the information from the palmtop to the PC without regard for the prior content on the PC. These programs assume that changes to that particular data are only made on the palmtop, and that the changes made on the palmtop take precedence over any changes made on the PC. As a result, any independent updates made directly on the PC will be lost.
Other programs make inefficient use of the communication link between the two computer systems. Frequently, the user may wish to synchronize several applications, such as an appointment book, an address book, and an electronic notepad application. The same program is used to synchronize all applications, but the applications are synchronized serially. FIG. 1 illustrates the use of the communication link over time for three applications being synchronized serially. A, B, and C represent the time when the respective synchronizing program is using the communication link to synchronize application A, B, or C. Unfortunately, for a considerable portion of the time, the communication link is idle. For example, the communication link is idle when the synchronizing program is comparing records transferred from the palmtop with records on the host computer. This comparison process can be computationally intensive, and hence very time consuming. After the comparison phase is done, selected records are than transferred over the communication link. Also, the synchronizing program must wait for the palmtop to respond to its request for information—resulting in a latency period when the link is idle. Additionally, the host computer may have a relatively slow hard drive, causing idle time on the link while the synchronizing program waits for host data. Consequently, there are numerous reasons for the communication link to be idle for much of the time during synchronization.
As a consequence of the inefficient use of the communication link, the synchronization process can be expensive. For example, if the communication link is via a cellular link, the user is paying a high access fee even during the time the communication link is idle. Clearly it is undesirable to have an idle communication link whenever the user pays for connection time, whether the link is cellular or otherwise.
If the user has a palmtop connected to a host computer via a serial cable, connection fees are not a severe issue; however, the lengthy synchronization time is a problem. Palmtops have many application programs which need to be synchronized and will only find more applications in the future. Programs which synchronize one application at a time force the user to wait a substantial period of time for the synchronization of all of the application programs to complete. Inconvenient synchronization can lead to users not performing synchronization as much as they should, which is a very undesirable result.
Other systems, such as those described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,727,202, U.S. Pat. No. 5,832,489, U.S. Pat. No. 5,884,323 and U.S. Pat. No. 6,000,000 allow data synchronization between a portable computer system and a desktop computer system for the exchange and updating of data. However, like the above described systems, these synchronization systems are serial and they can be time consuming and can make inefficient use of the communication link. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field
This application relates to a securement device for securing a medical article to a patient.
2. Description of the Related Art
It is common in the treatment of patients to utilize catheters to introduce fluids and medications directly into the patient or to withdraw fluids from the patient. Often, it becomes desirable to maintain such catheterization over an extended period of time during the treatment of a patient. In order to keep the catheter or other medical article properly positioned for the duration of treatment, the catheter or medical article can be secured to the patient in a variety of ways. Most commonly, this involves taping or suturing the catheter or medical article to the patient.
Securing a catheter with tape upon the patient traditionally has certain drawbacks. The use of tape at the insertion site can retain dirt or other contaminant particles, potentially leading to infection of the patient. Tape also fails to limit catheter motion and, therefore, contributes to motion related complications like phlebitis, infiltration and catheter migration. Additionally, removal of taped dressings can itself cause undesired motion of the catheter upon the patient.
Taped dressings also require periodic changes. The frequent, often daily, removal and reapplication of adhesive tape to the skin of the patient can excoriate the skin. Such repeated applications of tape over the catheter or medical article can additionally lead to the build up of adhesive residue on the outer surface of the catheter or medical article. This residue can result in contaminants adhering to the medical article itself, increasing the likelihood of infection of the insertion site. This residue can also make the catheter or medical article stickier and more difficult to handle for healthcare providers.
Suturing also carries risk, both to healthcare workers and patients. Healthcare workers can suffer accidental needlestick injury, which may expose them to hepatitis, HIV, and other pathogens. Patients can suffer local or even systemic infection from suture, as well as scarring and pain.
Therefore, an improved system that obviates tape and suture is desired for securement of catheters and other medical articles. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field
This invention relates to the solvent extraction of hydrocarbon materials from inorganic matter such as from oil spills, tar sands, sludge ponds and the like and the recovery of solvent from the separated hydrocarbons. More particularly, this invention relates to an apparatus and process for the processing of tar sands and the remediation of oil spill sites and sludge ponds or other hydrocarbon contaminated locations using a low boiling chlorinated solvent and the subsequent recovery of solvent from the separated hydrocarbons. This invention also relates to the separation of a liquid having a lower vapor pressure from a liquid having a higher vapor pressure and to a flashing apparatus for accomplish said separation.
2. State of the Art
It is well known that there are large deposits of bituminous hydrocarbons throughout the world, particularly in Canada and the United States. These are commonly referred to as tar or oil sands. The exact bitumen composition and sand particle envelopment, e.g. with either water or oil surrounding the sand particles, may vary from site to site but all are susceptible to solvent extraction of the bitumen from the inorganic particles and the need to dispose of the lean sands in an environmentally acceptable manner.
There are numerous processes which have been developed and patented relating to the processing of such deposits using various extraction means including hot and cold water extraction; solvent extraction; combinations of water and solvent extraction; oleophilic sieve separations and the like.
In addition, there is a constantly escalating environmental contamination problem associated with the deliberate or accidental deposition of hydrocarbons of various types on both land and sea. For example, petroleum dumps, drilling rig sludge ponds, oil refineries, retail gas stations, chemical plants, superfund sites, pipeline and tanker spills on both land and sea all contribute to the environmental pollution of the sites where hydrocarbons are deposited and may lead to pollution of other locations due to spillage into waterways or migration to surrounding soils unless removed and/or contained.
Thus far, most soil remediation processes have involved either hauling the hydrocarbon contaminated soil to a more remote storage site or dump or the building of a containment barrier around and/or over the contaminated site. Little had been done to actually remediate or restore contaminated soils to a clean or original condition. Some remediation suggestions have involved burning off the hydrocarbons, bioremediation and water or solvent extraction. Burning only exacerbates problems of pollution and water or water/solvent extraction processes contaminates the water. Further, many sites needing remediation are not near water sources. Solvent recovery processes often require the addition of one or more solvents which cannot then be completely or economically separated from the hydrocarbon they are to extract resulting in loss of both solvent and extracted hydrocarbon.
Because of similarities between hydrocarbons deposited on or soaked into soils and the naturally occurring tar sand deposits, processes suitable for the extraction of bitumen from tar sands seem likely methods for also cleaning up soil sites contaminated by spilled or residual hydrocarbons. Since many sites needing remediation are not conveniently located near water supplies, solvent removal processes are preferred if practical.
Blaine, U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,046,669 and 4,057,485, disclose a process for extracting oil from tar sands utilizing a chlorinated solvent such as monochloroethane, dichloroethane, trichloroethane or tetrachloroethane.
Gagon, U.S. Pat. No. 4,342,639, is drawn to a process of removing bitumen from tar sands using a chlorinated solvent, preferably methylene chloride, that is heavier than water. The solvent extraction of bitumen from the sand takes place under a blanket of water, preferably at ambient pressure and at a temperature which is below the boiling point of the solvent at the pressure used. The bitumen rich solvent solution is withdrawn from the lower portion of the extraction chamber and the cleaned sand is washed by passing through the water blanket layer and disposed of. The bitumen rich solvent solution is subjected to flash evaporation to separate the bitumen from the chlorinated solvent in an evaporation chamber maintained under a negative pressure. The solvent vapors removed overhead are placed under positive pressure by a compressor and introduced into a condenser.
Haschke et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,532,024, summarizes a compendium of solvent extraction systems for treating tar sands. Predominant among these methods is the use of chlorinated hydrocarbon solvents. Most of these are deficient in that they do not provide for the complete removal of the solvent from the extracted bitumen prior to further refining. The means mentioned for separation of solvent from the bitumen include flash distillation and conventional evaporation and ambient temperature evaporation. It is concluded by Haschke et al. that, of the chlorinated solvents, methylene chloride has the best overall properties for extraction of bitumen because it behaves as a nonflammable solvent, has the greatest solvency power of solvents tested, has a workplace safety standard which can be achieved with good work practices and is one of a few solvents that the EPA has determined to have insignificant photochemical reactivity and consequently its emissions may not have to be controlled under regulatory VOC emission regulations. A primary thrust of this patent is the removal of methylene chloride from the bitumen in a two step process. The first step involves the simple distillation of the major portion of the solvent followed by a second step which uses a high-boiling stripper diluent solvent to remove the residual solvent. It is stated that, with the proper stripper diluent solvent, essentially complete removal of residual halogenated solvent is accomplished by monitoring the temperature of the exiting bitumen product stream. In other words, it is desirable to choose a stripper diluent solvent that has an acceptable boiling point to strip out all residual chlorinated hydrocarbon solvent. Not all of the stripper solvent is removed from the bitumen and some may be deliberately left in or even added to control the viscosity of the bitumen for purposes of transportation and refining. Suitable stripper diluents are stated to be intermediate boiling hydrocarbon fractions such as mineral sprits, Stoddard solvent, xylene, kerosene and #2 diesel oil. Also, pure components, such as ethyl benzene which has a suitable boiling point, can be used. This process has the disadvantage that a stripper diluent must be transported to the remediation site or tar sand extraction site and also is not completely recovered but incorporated into the recovered contaminant hydrocarbon or extracted tar sand. It is both expensive and inefficient to require the addition of an extra component in order to recover and remove the extracting chlorinated hydrocarbon solvent Moreover, to remove the chlorinated solvent it is necessary to heat the solution containing the stripper solvent to temperatures above the boiling point of the stripper solvent. This required the heating of relatively large amounts of solution, including the bitumen recovered from the tar sand extraction, to temperatures well above the boiling point of water, e.g. from about 130.degree. to 160.degree. C. (265.degree.-320 .degree. F.).
It would therefore be highly beneficial to develop a process for the efficient removal of hydrocarbons from soils in a remediation process or in the extraction of bitumen from tar sands wherein essentially complete removal of the solvent from the hydrocarbon or bitumen could be obtained without the need of extra processing steps and wherein the solvent could be recovered almost quantitatively in a closed system without environmental damage to the surrounding atmosphere. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The continuing demand for increasing computational power and memory space is driving the miniaturization of integrated circuits and their component parts. For instance, the aggressive scale-down of metal oxide semiconductor (MOS) transistor critical dimensions has shrunk the length and width dimensions of the source/drain electrode into the nanometer regime. One concern arising from this scale down is that an increased sheet resistance of smaller dimensioned salicided source/drain electrodes will decrease the drive current of the MOS transistor for a given gate-drain capacitance.
Previous efforts to maintain the drive current within acceptable limits, as the critical dimensions of the MOS transistors are scaled down, have focused on changing the metals used in the source/drain electrode. Specifically, with each reduction in technology node, lower resistivity metals have been used. Thus, metal salicide source/drain electrode have transitioned from titanium salicide to cobalt salicide, and now currently to nickel salicide. The transition to different metal salicides is not without problems however. Colbalt salicides are subject to resistivity degradation due to the well-known necking phenomenon observed at device feature sizes of less than about 90 nanometers. Nickel salicides, while having a lower resistivity than titanium or cobalt salicides, suffers from thermal instability and the formation of spike defects that can extend into the channel region of the transistor, resulting in shorts and increased leakage current.
Accordingly, what is needed in the art is a method of increasing drive current in semiconductor devices that is compatible with existing metal salicide source/drain electrode fabrication schemes that overcomes the above-mentioned problems, and in particular that minimizes source/drain electrode resistivities at technology nodes of about 90 nanometers and lower. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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This invention generally relates to containers and more particularly to two or three piece containers made of sheet metal material such as steel or aluminum.
The general concept of an outwardly flexible bottom wall in a metal container has been known at least since U.S. Pat. No. 2,894,844. Such a structure enables the use of less metal in the container, thereby reducing the cost of material. Various other configurations of container bottom end wall structures have previously been suggested as illustrated by U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,391; 79,692; 2,541,065; 2,847,144; 2,929,525; 3,043,461; 3,259,296; 3,430,805; 3,598,270; 3,690,507; and 3,871,541. In addition, a metallic container having a spherical dimple in an outwardly flexible bottom wall providing a continuous circular support rim in an outwardly flexed position has been disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,904,069.
The primary purpose of the present invention is to provide a can-type sheet metal container made of relatively thin sheet stock and having a relatively thin side wall and a relatively thin bottom wall so as to reduce material costs. In a container made of such thin material the bottom wall will be axially outwardly flexible when filled with goods under pressure such as beer, other carbonated beverages, or other consumer goods canned as for example in sanitary cans. In order to enable such containers to be supported in a vertically upright position, new and improved integral support means are provided in the bottom wall to be effective in the outwardly flexed position to provide very stable support for the container, while being capable of manufacture and filling in high speed production lines. Although various integral support structures have been previously proposed, the results have not always been satisfactory from the standpoint of displacement of internal volume inside the can, reliable stability, internal coatability and of ease of manufacture at high production speeds. In most presently utilized can structures, the bottom wall is relatively thick and has either a flat ribbed bottom surface providing support for the can or an axially inwardly extending concave configuration locating the center portions of the bottom wall axially inwardly of a bottom rim portion of the can. In an outwardly convex configuration portions of the bottom wall unpredictably extend varying axial distances beyond the bottom rim portion and because of the convex curvature produce an unstable condition when the can is placed on a flat support surface. In order to provide stability for such cans, it has been previously proposed to provide integral support means in the bottom wall portion effective in the outwardly convex configuration. However, it has been determined that in connection with the present invention there are inherent problems in the manufacture of such cans including obtaining uniform dimensional characteristics and uniform residual stresses in the bottom end wall so that each bottom end wall of mass produced cans will have the same or similar characteristics without resorting to exceptional manufacturing means for achieving metal control such as double acting domer cylinders, etc.
In the present invention, the bottom wall is manufactured and constructed in a manner to obtain uniform axial displacement during outward flexing while also providing for increased uniform stability of such cans in the outwardly flexed position. The central portion of the bottom wall is first formed into an axially inwardly extending concave portion of compound curvature within a central bottom wall area of polygonal configuration, an equilateral triangular area being presently preferred, and equilaterally spaced linear support areas are provided about the area of compound curvature in the portions of the bottom wall furthest axially outwardly deflected in the outwardly flexed position. In this manner, at least three support areas providing essentially point or short length line contact with a flat support surface are located between the bottom rim of the can and the central concave portion of the bottom wall so that the can is supported by relatively widely spaced relatively narrow width and short length support areas providing stability for the can. In the manufacture of cans having the aforedescribed construction, the central concave portion is formed in the bottom wall with a generally hemispherical doming die, and an ironing punch having a prismatic cavity of polygonal, preferably equilateral triangular, base section coaxially aligned with and surrounding the dome portion of the doming die when the ironing punch and doming die are in the closed position. Due to varying metal stress the inwardly concave central portion of the bottom wall thus formed is of compound curvature with a relatively short length radius extending from each of the support areas toward the central axis and a relatively long arcuate surface of relatively long length radius extending opposite each of the support areas from the central axis toward the apex portions of the polygon. The arrangement is such that when the bottom wall is subsequently flexed outwardly under pressure of the contents of the can, the support areas are located furthest axially outwardly and the adjacent areas are axially inwardly displaced relative thereto so that only the support areas contact a flat support surface for the can. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Mobile or wireless devices are increasingly becoming used for a variety of tasks. These tasks may require different hardware and configurations in order to run more efficiently, and in some cases the different hardware is comprised of various processors having specialized tasks. For example, one processor may be used to run user applications, while a second may be used for control of the radio and voice path on the mobile device.
In multi-processor environments where the audio path may be generated from either of an application processor (controller processor) or a radio processor, a complex series of tasks need to occur in order to produce the audio output at one of a plurality of audio outputs. This is further complicated if additional hardware such as an audio chip, referred to herein as a Melody chip, is added. With the above dual processor configuration, the Melody chip is controlled by the application processor.
The audio source with the above configuration can be either the Melody chip or a voice codec. In this case, the analog output from the Melody chip needs to be amplified before being sent through a multiplexer to choose between the Melody chip and the voice codec chip output. Once multiplexed, the audio can go to the output, such as a speaker, headset, handset, Bluetooth™ or any other such audio output. This requires considerable hardware and coordination in the output of the audio. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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This invention relates to identifying a particular specification of fishing line installed on a fishing rod and reel assembly and, more particularly, to identifying a particular specification of fishing line by using a label having indicia thereon that is representative of the particular specification.
A typical angler (fisherman/fisherwoman) has a plurality of fishing rod and reel assemblies to accommodate the various types of fish desired to be caught and the various conditions that can exist at the time of fishing. Each fishing rod and reel assembly is usually adapted for a specific purpose and has specifications suitable for that purpose. One way a fishing rod and reel assembly is adapted for a specific purpose is through the choice of fishing line installed on the fishing rod and reel assembly. Often, an angler has a plurality of different types of fishing lines that fit on a fishing reel to choose from or purchase. The angler chooses the type of line that best fits his/her fishing needs. The type of line chosen may be based on line test (tensile strength) or some other line specification. Because various factorsxe2x80x94such as the material of construction, the diameter of the fishing line, and the number of filaments used in making the fishing linexe2x80x94determine the particular specifications of the fishing line, an angler cannot ascertain by looking at the fishing line the particular specifications for that fishing line. Therefore, an angler needs to either remember the particular specifications of the fishing line installed on each of the fishing rod and reel assemblies or maintain a record of the particular specifications of the fishing line installed on each of the fishing rod and reel assemblies.
As the number of fishing rod and reel assemblies employed by an angler increases, it becomes increasingly difficult for the angler to remember or keep track of the particular specifications of the fishing line installed on each of the various fishing rod and reel assemblies. Additionally, any written record of the particular specifications of each of the fishing lines installed on the various fishing rod and reel assemblies may not be available at the time the angler is selecting a fishing rod and reel assembly to use. Furthermore, because anglers remove the existing fishing line and install a different fishing line on a fishing rod and reel assembly, any marking on the fishing rod and reel assembly to indicate the particular specifications of the fishing line should preferably be capable of being removed or changed. Therefore, to alleviate the need for the angler to remember or record the particular specifications of the fishing line installed on a fishing rod and reel assembly, a method of visually identifying the particular specifications of the fishing line installed on a fishing rod and, reel assembly is needed. Additionally, such method preferably should also be nonpermanent and capable of being removed from the fishing rod and reel assembly without damaging the fishing rod and reel assembly.
Among the several objects of the present invention is the provision of a method and apparatus that overcomes the above mentioned disadvantages; the provision of such method and apparatus which is of simple construction; and the provision of such method and apparatus which is easy to use.
In general, a method of the present invention comprises providing a fishing rod and reel assembly comprised of a fishing rod and a fishing reel. The method includes placing a fishing line having a particular specification on the fishing rod and reel assembly and attaching to one of the fishing rod and fishing reel a label having indicia thereon that is representative of the particular specification of the fishing line. The label is attached in a manner to enable a user of the fishing rod and reel assembly to view the indicia while the user is fishing with the fishing rod and reel assembly.
In another aspect of the present invention, the method comprises providing a fishing rod and reel assembly comprised of a fishing rod and a fishing reel. The method includes providing a package that contains a fishing line having a particular specification and a label having indicia thereon that is representative of the particular specification, removing the fishing line from the package, and placing the fishing line on the fishing rod and reel assembly. The label is then attached to one of the fishing rod and fishing reel in a manner to enable a user of the fishing rod and reel assembly to view the indicia while the user is fishing with the fishing rod and reel assembly.
In general, the apparatus of the present invention is a kit for use with a fishing rod and reel assembly. The fishing rod and reel assembly comprises a fishing rod and fishing reel and the kit comprises a fishing line and a label. The fishing line has a particular specification and the label has indicia thereon that is representative of the particular fishing line specification. The label has first and second ends and a length therebetween. The label is moveable between a coiled position and an uncoiled position with the label being biased toward the coiled position so that the label assumes the coiled position when no external forces are acting on the label. The label is moveable to the uncoiled position by the application of an external pulling force on the label. The label is adapted to wrap around a portion of the fishing rod in a manner to enable a user of the fishing rod and reel assembly to view the indicia while the user is fishing with the fishing rod and reel assembly.
Other objects and features will be in part apparent and in part pointed out hereinafter. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a digital image processing apparatus, and more particularly, to a digital image processing apparatus and method for displaying a plurality of images on a display.
2. Description of the Related Art
Typically, digital image processing apparatuses reproduce image files from a storage medium to obtain images from image data in order to display the images on displays. A digital photographing apparatus is a kind of digital image processing apparatus that photographs a subject in a photographing mode, stores image data in a storage medium, reproduces an image file from the storage medium, and displays an image obtained from the image data on a display.
Such a conventional digital image processing apparatus displays an image or a plurality of images on a display. However, when the conventional digital image processing apparatus displays the plurality of images, a user cannot effectively compare the plurality of images. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Industrial automation systems are used for monitoring, controlling and regulating technical processes, such as in the field of production and process automation, and allow operation of machines and industrial installations when necessary as autonomously and as independently of human intervention as possible. Due to the continually increasing importance of information technology for automation systems, which comprise numerous networked computer units, methods for the reliable configuration and activation of distributed services for providing monitoring, control and regulation functions are becoming increasingly important.
Consistent with the previous approaches to a solution, configuration data are provided in distributed automation systems by appliance-specific configuration systems and are used for activating a local service. In addition, provision of configuration data is to date followed by immediate activation of the respective local service without further checking. In the case of distributed services whose service components are provided by a plurality of different computer units, uncoordinated configuration and activation of individual systems can cause problematic inconsistencies. Such inconsistencies endanger the error-free provision of a service and have a disadvantageous effect on system stability and availability. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Mobile devices like mobile telephones, personal digital assistants and game consoles have been planned small in size and light in weight to become handy and easy to keep with in any situation. One limiting feature in diminishing mobile devices is the usability of a keypad. The popularity of sms-messages (short message service) makes the easy and convenient use of a keypad even more important. Further there are many functions for example in wap (wireless application protocol) devices, which make it inevitable to have a wide range of keys available.
There are devices in the market, which combine a standard mobile phone with personal digital access (pda) features, like touch sensitive screens and larger keyboards. As important as the screen size and the graphical interface are, especially business users value also the capabilities of working with text, accessing menus and sending and receiving messages. Users do a lot of input manually with modern mobile phones. It is rather difficult to make a compromise between a small device and the keyboard big enough to be convenient to use.
In new wap-enabling, smart devices keymats are made bigger to achieve better usability. For example in the Communicator 9210 device manufactured by Nokia Corporation, Espoo, Finland there is a revised keyboard, which includes slightly bigger concave keys than earlier models of the Communicator series. “Communicator” is a registered trademark of Nokia Corporation. In so-called normal mobile phones there are many characters in one button, in order to reduce the actual number of buttons. In personal digital assistant devices, for example in those manufactured by Palm Inc., Santa Clara, Calif., USA, there have been introduced extra tools for writing. An extra tool can be for example a touch screen panel, which accepts a written input on a valid area of a screen panel. Also it is publicly known to input the data by activating drawn pushbuttons or graphical images. Typically this is done by positioning a cursor and activating a selected operation with the aid of a mouse, trackball, pen, wand, stylus, etc. The use of these auxiliary means requires a stable environment and situation.
In the publication EP 651543 there is introduced a personal communicator including a touch sensitive display. This mobile personal communicator includes a casing for a cellular phone, a modem and data processing system. On a touch sensitive display it is possible to choose a next operation by touching a drawn button on a display. Further by touching the screen it is possible to magnify graphical images, such as parts of a fax view and move the images around the display. In this publication the touch screen display comprises a pressure sensitive overlay on a liquid crystal display (LCD).
The publication U.S. Pat. No. 4,899,292 presents a computer coupled to a terminal having a resistive touch screen. As the former one, also this publication deals with images or image formatted data on a display, which are to be magnified. A tactile input is done with the aid of a wand on the touch sensitive screen. The screen detects a voltage signal, which is then converted into coordinates in known manner.
The publication U.S. Pat. No. 6,073,036 illustrates a mobile station with a touch sensitive input means and an automatic symbol magnification operation. A mobile station is provided with a touch sensitive input means, such as a touch sensitive display or a touchpad. The symbols or keys on a touch sensitive keypad can be implemented smaller in size, because the touched key is magnified so that it can be distinguished before selecting it as an input. The magnification is implemented as if there would be a convex lens in the middle of the user and the screen. So the illusion seen by the user is non-linear magnification of the original symbol(s) touched. Subsequent detection of the tactile input and its location can be used for further magnification or for selecting the symbol. In this solution the whole used keypad, which can include for example numbers, alphanumeric characters or special characters, is depicted at a time. The size of one symbol in the screen is dependent on the resolution of the screen. After the magnification, all symbols are still depicted. The pointed, selected one(s) is (are) magnified by the expense of diminishing all the others. The non-linear, lens-like magnification of selected symbol(s) causes the decreasing of the other, non-selected symbols done in proportion to their distance from the selected one(s). | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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A dry exhaust-gas treating apparatus for removing various harmful substances in an exhaust gas, such as SOx (sulfur oxide), NOx (nitrogen oxide), and so forth, by bringing the exhaust gas into contact with an adsorbent introduced into an adsorption tower has been known as an apparatus for treating the exhaust gas from a boiler, an incinerator, or a sintering furnace.
Examples of the adsorbent include a carbonaceous adsorbent, an alumina adsorbent, a silica adsorbent, and so forth. The carbonaceous adsorbent is excellent, because it can be treated at a relatively low temperature and remove various harmful substances at the same time. Examples of the carbonaceous adsorbent include activated carbon, activated coke, and so forth. Particularly, the adsorbent pelletized to a size of 0.5 cm to 4 cm is preferable. These adsorbents are well known.
In this apparatus, SOx in the exhaust gas is removed as sulfuric acid by adsorption to the adsorbent. Further, when ammonia is injected into the exhaust gas for pre-treatment, SOx is adsorbed as ammonium salts, and NOx is harmlessly reduced into nitrogen and water by catalysis of the adsorbent. The other harmful components are mainly adsorbed by the adsorbent and removed.
A large quantity of various substances such as sulfuric acid, ammonium salts, and so forth are attached to the adsorbent used for treating the exhaust gas in the adsorption tower, so that the adsorbent has low activity. For this reason, this adsorbent is transferred to a regeneration tower via a transfer passage such as a conveyor, heated and regenerated, and adsorbed substances are released from the adsorbent in the regeneration tower so as to restore the activity of the adsorbent to its original state.
The adsorbent whose activity is restored is transferred back to the adsorption tower via a transfer passage such as a conveyor. When the adsorbent is heated and regenerated, a gas (e.g. a carrier gas) for purging the substances released from the adsorbent may be used. For example, an inert gas such as nitrogen is used.
As a heating and regenerating method in the regeneration tower, a counterflow method of causing a desorbed gas, in which the adsorbed substances are released from the adsorbent, to flow in a direction opposite to a flow direction of the adsorbent that flows down in the regeneration tower standing in a tube shape is known. This counterflow method has an advantage in that initially released ammonia is barely present in the desorbed gas because the released ammonia is adsorbed to the adsorbent again (e.g. see Patent Documents 1 and 2).
As such, when the desorbed gas is sent to byproduct recovery equipment to produce a byproduct such as sulfuric acid or gypsum, it is possible to reduce a load of cleaning equipment, and thus this counterflow method is excellent. Here, the desorbed gas is adjusted so that its pressure is kept constant.
In the dry exhaust-gas treating apparatus disclosed in Patent Document 1, lock hoppers having excellent sealability are provided at both upper and lower ends of the regeneration tower. The lock hoppers regulate the flow of the adsorbent into and out of the regeneration tower, as well as the leakage of the desorbed gas from the regeneration tower and the introduction of oxygen into the regeneration tower.
Further, in the dry exhaust-gas treating apparatus disclosed in Patent Document 2, double rotary valves are disposed at both upper and lower ends of the regeneration tower. An inert gas is injected between the double rotary valves at each end of the regeneration tower. As in the case of Patent Document 1, the leakage of the desorbed gas from the regeneration tower and the introduction of oxygen into the regeneration tower are regulated by a sealing unit. Patent Document 1: Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2000-61253 Patent Document 2: Japanese Patent No. 3725013 | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
This invention relates generally to the electrophotographic printing machine, and more particularly concerns an improved processing station which may perform the functions of charging, developing and transferring.
In an electrophotographic printing process, a photoconductive member has its surface charged to a substantially uniform level. The charged photoconductive member is exposed to a light image of the original document being reproduced. Exposure of the sensitized photoconductive surface selectively discharges the charge thereon. This records an electrostatic latent image on the photoconductive surface corresponding to the informational areas contained with the original document being reproduced. Development of the electrostatic latent image recorded on the photoconductive surface is achieved by bringing developer material into contact therewith. Typical developer materials employ toner particles and carrier granules. Generally, the toner granules are made from heat settable thermoplastic particles, while the carrier granules are made from coarser ferromagnetic granules. Alternatively, the developer material may comprise a single component, such as fine conductive magnetic particles. In either case, when the developer material is brought into contact with the latent image recorded on the photoconductive surface, the greater attractive force thereof causes particles to adhere to the electrostatic latent image.
Hereinbefore each of the foregoing steps were performed at an individual processing station. For example, the charging step is performed at a charging station, exposure at an exposure station, development at a development station, and transfer at a transfer station. Each processing step required individual stations which were separate and independent from one another. The broad concept of electrophotographic printing was originally disclosed by Carlson and U.S. Pat. No. 2,297,691 and is further amplified and described by many related patents, in the art. U.S. Pat. No. 2,846,333 issued to Wilson in 1956, describes a typical single component developer material.
It is a primary object of the present invention to improve electrophotographic printing machines by reducing the number of processing stations employed therein. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Frozen carbonated beverages (also known as FCBs) were invented in the 1950s in the USA by Omar Knedik. They are typically semi-frozen in a slush state, and can be eaten with a spoon, or other utensil, and in some cases sucked through a straw. A common FCB is the Slurpee™, which comes in a variety of different flavours and is typically sold at convenience stores. The FCBs are typically made with a syrup which is similar (or in some cases the same as) to the syrup used in regular non-frozen beverage dispensers. In many cases, an emulsifier is added which also helps to prevent the FCB mixture from solidifying when cooled.
Dedicated FCB machines have been implemented which dispense the FCB at the point of sale. The FCB machines have the syrup, water, and CO2 added, which is then mixed and cooled, typically below 0° C. and in most cases to approximately −3° C. The mixture is typically constantly stirred, and scraped from the edges of the chamber it is mixed in, to prevent the mixture solidifying when cooled.
Some FCB machines have a two stage process and others a single stage process. In a two stage process, the gas/liquid mixture is mixed/blended in a blend tank and is then fed to a freezing chamber where the temperature is lowered until ice crystals form in the liquid (and stirred as described above). In a single stage process, the constituents of the gas/liquid mixture are fed directly via valves into a header block and then straight into the freezing chamber.
A common problem associated with FCB machines is that, as the FCB is dispensed, the quantity of FCB within the machine is decreased, and fresh mixture is required to be added to the freezing chamber. Measuring the quantity of mixture, or quantity of the gas/liquid constituents, is important and is typically performed using one of two methods; namely pressure or gravity. In the case of a pressure method, a pressure transducer is provided that measures the pressure in the freezing chamber. As the FCB is removed, the pressure drops and more syrup, water, and CO2 mixture is added to the freezing chamber. Typically a float is provided that floats on the FCB surface and as the FCB is removed, the float lowers. The height of the float (or angle of the float relative to a fixed point) is measured and when it reaches it certain level, more syrup, water, and CO2 mixture is added to the freezing chamber.
Both of these methods have inherent problems that compromise their accuracy. As the CO2 is mixed and absorbed into the water/syrup mixture, the volume of the mixture changes. This change in volume affects both the pressure in the chamber and the level of the FCB in the chamber resulting in the pressure or gravity measurements changing as the CO2 is mixed and absorbed. This can alter the ratio of gas (CO2) to liquid (water and syrup) in the mixture, which can result in inconsistencies in the FCB being dispensed.
It is an aim of this invention to provide an improved beverage dispenser which overcomes or ameliorates one or more of the disadvantages or problems described above, or which at least provides a useful alternative.
It will be clearly understood that any reference herein to background material or information, or to a prior publication, does not constitute an admission that any material, information or publication forms part of the common general knowledge in the art, or is otherwise admissible prior art, whether in Australia or in any other country. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to telecommunications systems and methods for positioning a mobile subscriber within a cellular network, and specifically to alerting a mobile subscriber that a request for a positioning of that mobile subscriber has been received. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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In the field of Directory Assistance, typical land line listings are widely available for call completion between a calling party and a requested listing. However, in the field of wireless listings, due to privacy concerns, wireless contact information, such as wireless/cellular numbers, are not freely distributed to directory assistance systems. This privacy concern is of particular concern because of the current fee/billing structures where cellular/wireless users are charged for airtime regardless of whether they initiate or receive the call.
This leaves a large gap in the ability of directory assistance systems to connect callers with potential desired parties/listings, especially in view of the growing number and preference to use wireless numbers as a primary contact information. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The present invention relates to an assembling structure for eyeglasses and, more particularly, to a pair of eyeglasses including replaceable lenses while providing improved stability and improved reliability after assembly.
A pair of eyeglasses generally includes an eyeglass frame, two lenses, and two temples. The eyeglass frame includes a frame portion having two notches respectively at two outer sides thereof. Each notch has a screw hole. The frame portion can be expanded at the notches to permit installation of the lenses in the frame portion. The notches are sealed, and screws extend through the screw holes to assemble the lenses in the eyeglass frame.
However, the screws are disposed at obvious positions at the outer sides of the eyeglass frame, failing to provide a sense of quality of the overall appearance. Furthermore, loosening of any screw could result in falling of the corresponding lens.
Taiwan Utility Model Nos. TWM449971, TWM498321, TWM 544014, TWM550414, and TWM551702 disclose a pair of eyeglasses including an upper frame and a lower frame. The upper and lower frames are coupled together via fasteners to form a receiving frame for receiving two lenses. Since the upper and lower frames are detachable from each other, when the pair of eyeglasses falls inadvertently or under the action of an external force, the upper and lower frames are apt to completely disengage from each other, leading to loss of the lenses.
To solve the drawback of the above mentioned upper and lower frames, an example disclosed in Taiwan Utility Model No. TWM528437 includes an eyeglass frame including a central nose portion having an upper section and a lower section. The upper and lower sections can be expanded and folded. Furthermore, first and second magnetic members are respectively disposed on the upper and lower sections. Thus, lenses can be placed into the eyeglass frame when the upper and lower sections are expanded. The upper and lower sections are closed when the first and second magnetic members attract and come in contact with each other. Thus, the lenses can be securely disposed on the eyeglass frame.
Although the eyeglass frame of the above structure would not separate into two parts and, thus, provides a better assembly integrity. However, the upper and lower sections of the central portion are simply secured by the magnetic members. When the pair of eyeglasses falls or is subject to a larger external force, the upper and lower sections could expand and result in falling off of the lenses. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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With multi-stage vehicle automatic transmissions and automatic vehicle manual transmissions known from conventional use, hydraulic shifting elements designed as clutches or brakes are used for inserting different transmission stages of the transmission. In this process, for changing or inserting a desired transmission stage of the transmission, the hydraulic shifting elements are pressurized or vented with fluid pressure (fluid pressure is relieved). Fluid valves, in particular pressure control valves, are used for this purpose.
The current standard fluid valves for vehicle transmissions, for example, that which is disclosed in WO 2005/026858 A1, has two poppet valves interconnected at a hydraulic half-bridge circuit. Such a fluid valve has an inlet opening and two outlet openings, whereas, in terms of flow engineering, a first part valve is arranged between the inlet opening and the first outlet opening, and a second part valve is arranged between the first outlet opening and the second outlet opening. Thereby, the part valves are mechanically coupled in such a manner that the part valves alternately close or open. A single electromagnetic actuator is used for the actuation of the part valves.
Equipping such a fluid valve with a flow control device is known from WO 2009/092488 A1. The valve is provided with several channel areas, such that the fluid flowing in the direction of the second part valve is brought into a swirl. Thereby, the second part valve is designed as a cone poppet valve. Here as well, a single electromagnetic actuator is used for the actuation of the part valves.
The fluid valves known from these two documents are so-called “proportional pressure control valves.” In operation, such valves are set to a desired fluid pressure p at one of the outlet openings (to the working pressure connection), whereas such fluid pressure is essentially dependent in a proportional manner on an electric current I, which is supplied to the electromagnetic actuator. Thus, on the basis of the supplied electric current I, the desired fluid pressure p may be directly preset. As such, a p/I characteristic curve of such a proportional pressure control valve is essentially line-shaped in the normal operating range; i.e., the output fluid pressure p there is proportional to the supplied electric current I.
However, in some situations, such a purely proportional manner of operation is not advantageous. This is especially the case when, on the one hand, a fluid valve is to be set at low fluid pressures with a very high accuracy, and on the other hand high fluid pressures are to be made available. For precision control of a low fluid pressure, fluid valves require a very flat p/I characteristic curve, as current fluctuations thereby only slightly affect the output fluid pressure. In order to then set a proportional pressure control valve at a high fluid pressure, given the flat p/I characteristic curve, a very large electric current is necessary, which is possibly not available.
Fluid valves with a progressive p/I characteristic curve are known. Their p/I characteristic curve is relatively flat at low fluid pressures/currents (relatively low inclination) and relatively steep at increased fluid pressures/currents (relatively high inclination). Therefore, the p/I characteristic curve for such valves is not line-shaped, or is only partially line-shaped. Thereby, both a more precise setting of low fluid pressures, and a provision of higher fluid pressures, is possible.
A fluid valve with a progressive characteristic curve can be taken from, for example, DE 102 55 414 A1. For the production of the progressive characteristic curve, the electromagnetic actuator provided there, which serves the purpose of actuating the valve, has a two-part solenoid armature, whereas the armature parts are pushed away from each other by means of a spring. A complex assembly of the electromagnetic actuator, and thus the fluid valve, arises from the many individual parts of the solenoid armature,
An electromagnetic actuator is also known from DE 199 53 788 A1; with this, a disproportionately large force is achieved in an end position of the armature, by providing two pole faces on one magnetic yoke of the actuator, with each pole face interacting in succession with a tapering (cone-shaped surface of the armature) for the generation of the actuating force of the actuator. Thereby, the first of the pole faces is provided in an interior space radially enclosed by a solenoid coil of the actuator, and the second of the pole faces is provided outside of this interior space.
The travel path of such electromagnetic actuator is restricted by the second pole face, since it is located in the armature's direction of movement. In addition, a significant interaction between the second pole face and the armature can be achieved at a point that is very late, almost at the end of the travel path of the actuator, since only at that point have the armature and the second pole face sufficiently converged (the air gap between them is then sufficiently reduced). The actuating force path characteristic curve of the actuator correspondingly increases in a progressive manner for the first time at the end of the maximum possible travel path (see FIG. 3 of DE 199 53 788 A1: the actuation here takes place from right to left; i.e., the armature moves in the direction of actuation from s>0 to s=0). | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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This invention relates generally to carriers for handguns and the like, and, more specifically, to an adjustable holster which can securely accommodate a wide variety of handguns while providing superior protection for the same against the corrosive effects of leather.
Typically, holsters are manufactured substantially of leather to form a rigid and non-adjustable gun receiving pouch or pocket. These holsters, which each can only accommodate one size of handgun, are usually worn either on a gun belt designed specifically for holding such holsters, or on some other type of suitable strap. Moreover, the typical holster is manufactured for use by either a right or left handed shooter, but not both.
Prior holsters have generally shared one or more drawbacks making each less than ideal. For example, the tannic acid contained in holster leather has a corrosive effect on a gun's bluing. The gradual erosion of a gun's bluing can reduce the aesthetic beauty of the gun, as well as its resale value. Further, the typical holster, when worn on a belt, usually interferes with one or more of the wearer's pockets. Moreover, prior holsters have been constructed to be non-adjustable, requiring gun enthusiasts to buy several holsters to accommodate several handguns of varying sizes.
Accordingly, there has been a need for an improved holster which can be adjusted to accommodate most all sizes of handguns. Such an adjustable holster must be inexpensive an comfortable to wear. Further, an adjustable holster should protect the handgun's blued finish from damage due to unnecessary contact with abrasives, or contact with tannic acid. To be truly versatile, an improved holster must also be constructed for use by both right and left handed shooters. The present invention fulfills these needs and provides other related advantages. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
There are high unmet medical needs in the few established therapies for several autoimmune, inflammatory and metabolic diseases. Despite the diverse clinical manifestations of these diseases, Retinoic Acid Receptor-Related Orphan Receptors (RORs) regulate and contribute to the pathogenesis of these diseases through modulation of immune responses and lipid/glucose homeostasis. Only recently has the critical regulatory role of RORs been well-characterized and target validated in several animal models of some of these diseases.
RORs are transcription factors which belong to the nuclear hormone receptor superfamily (Jetten (2009) Nucl. Recept. Signal., 7:e003; Jetten et al. (2013) Front Endocrinol. (Lausanne), 4:1; Jetten & Joo (2006) Adv. Dev. Biol., 16:313-355). The ROR subfamily consists of three major isoforms: RORα (NR1F1), RORβ (NR1F2), and RORγ (NR1F3), encoded by the RORA, RORB and RORC genes, respectively. RORs are multidomain proteins that contain four principal domains typical of nuclear receptors: a highly variable N-terminal A/B domain, a highly conserved DNA-binding domain (DBD), a ligand binding domain (LBD) that contains the ligand-dependent activation function-2 (AF-2), and a hinge domain between the DBD and LBD.
Each ROR gene through alternative splicing and promoter usage generates several ROR isoforms that differ only in their amino-terminus.
In humans, there are four RORα isoforms (RORα1-4), one RORβ1 isoform, and two RORγ isoforms (RORγ1 and RORγ2 [RORγt]) that are expressed in a highly tissue-specific manner. RORα and RORγ play an important role in the regulation of lipid/glucose homeostasis, cellular metabolism, immune function and circadian rhythms, and have been implicated in the pathogenesis of several autoimmune, inflammatory and metabolic diseases (Burris et al. (2012) Chem. Biol., 19:51-59; Burris et al. (2013) Pharmacol. Rev., 65:710-778; Huh & Littman (2012) Eur. J. Immunol., 42:2232-2237; Jetten 2009 Nucl. Recept. Signal., 7:e003; Jetten, Kang, and Takeda 2013 Front Endocrinol. (Lausanne), 4:1). Synthetic ligands have been described that interact with the RORa and RORy LBD functioning as a switch that induces a ROR LBD conformational change.
Such change promotes the recruitment and displacement of regulatory coactivator and corepressor proteins and upon ROR DBD binding to the ROR responsive element of the target genes lead to the induction or inhibition of ROR-regulated gene transcriptional activity. Therefore, small molecule drugs that bind to the nuclear receptor LBDs such as ROR could elicit a variety of pharmacological responses, including activation (agonists), inactivation (antagonists or non-agonists), and for receptors that are constitutively active, ligands can downregulate the constitutive response (inverse agonists).
RORγt is the master regulator of human T Helper 17 (TH17) cell differentiation, function and cytokine production (Ivanov et al. (2006) Cell, 126:1121-1133). The critical role of TH17 cells in the pathogenesis of autoimmune and inflammatory diseases has been established and is conferred by the production of its signature proinflammatory cytokines IL-17A, IL-17F, IL-17AF, IL-21, IL-22 (Ghoreschi et al. (2010) Nature, 467:967-971; Lee et al. (2012) Nat. Immunol., 13:991-999; Miossec et al. (2009) N. Engl. J. Med., 361:888-898; Miossec & Kolls (2012) Nat. Rev. Drug Discov., 11:763-776; Zepp et al. (2011) Trends Immunol., 32:232-239). Although several transcription factors regulate TH17, γ/δ T and innate lymphoid cells as important sources of TH17 cytokines, these cells are distinguished by its specific regulation of RORγt for cytokine transcriptional output and effector functions and to a lesser extent by RORα in humans (Cua & Tato (2010) Nat. Rev. Immunol., 10:479-489; Huh and Littman 2012 Eur. J. Immunol., 42:2232-2237; Ivanov, McKenzie, Zhou, Tadokoro, Lepelley, Lafaille, Cua, and Littman 2006 Cell, 126:1121-1133; Spits & Di Santo (2011) Nat. Immunol., 12:21-27; Sutton et al. (2012) Eur. J. Immunol., 42:2221-2231). Also, in several autoimmune disease models, there is a relative imbalance of increased TH17 cells over low numbers of immunosuppressive CD4+CD25+Foxp3+ regulatory T cells [TReg] (Edwards et al. (2011) J. Neurol., 258:1518-1527; Littman & Rudensky (2010) Cell, 140:845-858). Targeting RORγt could have a broader anti-inflammatory effect on the combined inhibition of all TH17 cytokine production and inflammatory cellular function, and in the induction and expansion of suppressive TReg cells, important in autoimmune and inflammatory disease resolution, and may also have therapeutic potential in metabolic diseases such as diet-induced insulin resistance known to be regulated by RORγ.
Since both RORγ1 and RORγt [RORγ1] protein isoforms, contain identical LBDs, small molecule RORγ modulators that inhibit RORγt activity will also inhibit RORγ. RORα similarly plays an important regulatory role in the pathogenesis of autoimmune and inflammatory disorders, and also in metabolic diseases.
RORα critically regulates lipid and glucose homeostasis and cellular metabolism that contribute to the development of metabolic diseases. The therapeutic benefits of inhibiting RORα for metabolic diseases is associated with diminished inflammation and downregulated expression of RORα target genes as seen in RORα-deficient mice. As ligand-dependent transcription factors, it is desirable to prepare compounds that modulate RORα and/or RORγ activity which can be used in the treatment of RORα- and/or RORγ-regulated autoimmune, inflammatory and metabolic diseases. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention concerns a method of covering shadow areas in a cellular mobile radio system and a radio booster for implementing this method.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In cellular mobile radio systems the environment of fixed and mobile transceiver stations includes obstacles due to the terrain or to buildings, for example.
Because radio propagation is more or less directional, radio shadow areas exist in the vicinity of these obstacles, i.e. areas in which radio transmissions can be partially blocked or absorbed by some feature of the environment, with the result that they can be strongly attenuated.
Shadow areas can also exist at the extreme range of the transmitters of the fixed stations of the network.
Accordingly, the signal transmitted can deteriorate significantly.
Various solutions to this problem have been put forward.
A first solution is to use a radio booster comprising a transceiver and an associated antenna provided with an amplifier located in the shadow area. The radio receiver is a broadband receiver, i.e. it can receive and retransmit a major part of the frequency spectrum used in the radio network to which it belongs.
Its function is to receive radio transmissions in the shadow area, to amplify them and then to retransmit them on the same frequency, at a different angle. It is therefore virtually "transparent", i.e. it modifies only the amplitude of the retransmitted signal. The advantage of using a booster is that it is autonomous: no cables have to be connected to the booster. This solution is therefore of low cost.
This solution is unsatisfactory, however, because of a phenomenon similar to the Larsen effect that occurs, especially if the booster is not far away from the fixed transceiver station it relays. The Larsen effect is a spurious oscillation which occurs when the output of an electro-acoustic system, such as the sound from a loudspeaker, for example, impinges on its input, usually the microphone, and the effect produced is a whistling. In the case of radio waves this phenomenon produces interference in the signal transmitted.
One solution to this problem is to use a booster which converts or translates the frequency of the signals received before retransmitting them. A solution of this kind is described in patent application GB-A-2 253 324, for example.
It has been found that this solution is unsatisfactory in the case of cellular mobile radio systems because the base transceiver station cannot determine if frequency translation has been applied unless devices to carry out the converse frequency translation are used at the boundaries between cells, which is costly in hardware. Another solution for cellular mobile radio systems avoids these problems. This solution increases the number of cells, and therefore the number of base transceiver stations, by creating additional cells to cover the shadow areas.
This solution is effective and has the advantage of avoiding the problems that arise with the previous solution.
It has drawbacks of its own, however.
First of all, it is very costly in installation terms because, unlike a radio booster, a cellular network base transceiver station must be connected by cables to a base station controller and to a network operation and maintenance center.
Also, given its complexity, a cellular network base transceiver station is inherently a high cost item.
An object of the present invention is therefore to provide a method of covering shadow areas in a cellular mobile radio system that is not costly to implement but which guarantees good quality radio signals so that the base transceiver stations can determine if the signals received are at a frequency resulting from frequency translation in a booster without needing to use devices to carry out the converse frequency translation. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The generation of an immune response involves the sensitization of helper (CD4+)(TH) and cytotoxic (CD8+)(CTL) T cell subsets through their interaction with antigen presenting cells. Antigen presenting cells express major histocompatibility (MHC)-class I or class II molecules associated with antigenic fragments (i.e., specific amino acid sequences derived from an antigen which bind to MHC I and MHC II for presentation on the cell surface). The MHC in humans is also referred to as the HLA (human leukocyte antigen) complex. The sensitized CD4+ T cells produce lymphokines that participate in the activation of B cells as well as various T cell subsets. The sensitized CD8+ T cells increase in numbers in response to lymphokines and act to destroy cells that express the specific antigenic fragments associated with matching MHC-encoded class I molecules. In the course of a tumor or viral infection, cytotoxic T cells eradicate cells expressing tumor or virus associated antigens.
Dendritic cells (DCs) are thought to be the most potent antigen presenting cells of the immune system (reviewed in Steinman, R. M. 1991. The dendritic cells system and its role in immunogenicity. Ann. Rev. Immunol. 9:271; Banchereau, J. B. and R. M. Steinman. 1998. Dendritic cells and the control of immunity. Nature. 392:245). Given their broad spectrum of roles in initiating the immune response by internalizing and processing antigens, migrating to lymphoid organs, secreting cytokines, and expressing co-stimulatory molecules required for lymphocyte signaling, it is no surprise that dendritic cells are logical targets for clinical use (Banchereau, J. B. and R. M. Steinman. 1998. Dendritic cells and the control of immunity. Nature. 392:245). By targeting antigens into dendritic cells in vivo or exposing dendritic cells to antigen ex vivo, it may be possible to enhance the immunogenicity of vaccines by eliciting helper and cytotoxic T cells, antibodies, and IL-12 for prophylactic applications, or induce T cell mediated anti-tumor responses for cancer immunotherapy. Akbari, et al. have suggested that transfection and activation of dendritic cells are key events for immunity following DNA vaccination by scarification of the ear skin in mouse models (O. Akbari, N. P., S. Garcia, R. Tascon, D. Lowrie, and B. Stockinger. 1999. DNA vaccination: transfection and activation of dendritic cells as key events for immunity. J. Exp. Med. 189:169). Anti-tumor CTL activity and protection against lethal tumor challenge in mouse models have been demonstrated using cytokine-driven bone-marrow-derived dendritic cells (BMDCs) pulsed with tumor-associated peptides (J. I. Mayordomo, T. Z., W. J. Storkus. 1995. Bone marrow-derived dendritic cells pulsed with synthetic tumour peptides elicit protective and therapeutic antitumour immunity. Nature Med. 1:1297), and whole tumor lysates (R. C. Fields, K. S., and J. J. Mule'. 1998. Murine dendritic cells pulsed with whole tumor lysates mediate potent antitumor immune responses in vitro and in vivo. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 95:9482) transferred by the subcutaneous route.
In vitro generation of dendritic cells has been optimized sufficiently so that genetic immunotherapy based on passive transfer of dendritic cells has become an attractive target for development (N. Romani, S. G., D. Brang. 1994. Proliferating dendritic cell progenitors in human blood. J. Exp. Med. 180:83). However, in vitro transfection efficiency of dendritic cells by non-viral methods has been extremely poor (J. F. Arthur, L. H. B., M. D. Roth, L. A. Bui, S. M. Kiertscher, R. Lau, S. Dubinett, J. Glaspy, W. H. McBride, and J. S. Economou. 1997. A comparison of gene transfer methods in human dendritic cells. Cancer Gene Ther. 4:17) and has limited progress toward effective dendritic-cell-based immunotherapy. While progress has been made by the use of electroporation, the efficiency of transfection is extremely low and results in substantial loss of cell viability (V. F. I. Van Tendeloo, H.-W. S., F. Lardon, GLEE Vanham, G. Nijs, M. Lenjou, L. Hendriks, C. Van Broeckhoven, A. Moulijn, I. Rodrigus, P. Verdonk, D. R. Van Bockstaele, and Z. N. Berneman. 1988. Nonviral transfection of distinct types of human dendritic cells: high efficiency gene transfer by electroporation into hematopoietic progenitor—but not monocyte-derived dendritic cells. Gene Ther. 5:700). To date, no purely chemical method has been shown to be effective.
Particulate carriers have been used in order to achieve controlled, parenteral delivery of therapeutic compounds. Such carriers are designed to maintain the active agent in the delivery system for an extended period of time. Examples of particulate carriers include those derived from polymethyl methacrylate polymers, as well as microparticles derived from poly(lactides) (see, e.g., U.S. Pat. No. 3,773,919), poly(lactide-co-glycolides), known as PLG (see, e.g., U.S. Pat. No. 4,767,628) and polyethylene glycol, known as PEG (see, e.g., U.S. Pat. No. 5,648,095). Polymethyl methacrylate polymers are nondegradable while PLG particles biodegrade by random nonenzymatic hydrolysis of ester bonds to lactic and glycolic acids, which are excreted along normal metabolic pathways.
For example, U.S. Pat. 5,648,095 describes the use of microspheres with encapsulated pharmaceuticals as drug delivery systems for nasal, oral, pulmonary and oral delivery. Slow-release formulations containing various polypeptide growth factors have also been described. See, e.g., International Publication WO 94/12158, U.S. Pat. 5,134,122 and International Publication WO 96/37216.
Particulate carriers have also been used with adsorbed or entrapped antigens in attempts to elicit adequate immune responses. Such carriers present multiple copies of a selected antigen to the immune system and promote trapping and retention of antigens in local lymph nodes. The particles can be phagocytosed by macrophages and can enhance antigen presentation through cytokine release. For example, commonly owned, co-pending application Ser. 09/015,652, filed Jan. 29, 1998, describes the use of antigen-adsorbed and antigen-encapsulated microparticles to stimulate cell-mediated immunological responses, as well as methods of making the microparticles.
In commonly owned provisional Patent Application 60/036,316, for example, a method of forming microparticles is disclosed which comprises combining a polymer with an organic solvent, then adding an emulsion stabilizer, such as polyvinyl alcohol (PVA), then evaporating the organic solvent, thereby forming microparticles. The surface of the microparticles comprises the polymer and the stabilizer. Polynucleotides such as DNA, polypeptides, and antigens may then be adsorbed on those surfaces. See also PCT US99/17308.
Commonly owned Provisional Application 60/146,391 discloses a method of forming microparticles with adsorbent surfaces that are capable of adsorbing a variety of macromolecules including polynucleotides. In one embodiment, the microparticles are comprised of both a polymer and a detergent. The microparticles are derived from a polymer, such as a poly(α-hydroxy acid), preferably, a poly(D,L-lactide-co-glycolide), a polyhydroxy butyric acid, a polycaprolactone, a polyorthoester, a polyanhydride, a polycyanoacrylate, and the like, and are formed with detergents, such as cationic, anionic, or nonionic detergents, which detergents may be used in combination. Cationic detergents disclosed are cetrimide (CTAB), benzalkonium chloride, DDA (dimethyl dioctodecyl ammonium bromide), DOTAP, and the like. It is noted that these microparticles yield improved adsorption of viral antigens, and provide for superior immune responses, as compared to microparticles formed by a process using only PVA.
Dendritic cells can capture antigen at peripheral sites via macropinocytosis using membrane ruffling, or may also internalize antigen by receptor-mediated processes involving FcγIII, the mannose receptor, or the C-type lectin DEC-205 (reviewed in Lanzavecchia, A. 1996. Mechanisms of antigen uptake for presentation. Curr. Op. Immunol. 8:348). Thus, dendritic cells may be targeted by the capture of larger (>250 nm) particulate antigens by phagocytosis. Biodegradable polymer microspheres such as poly-lactide-co-glycolide (PLG) are readily internalized by phagocytic cells up to a diameter of 5 μm (Ikada, Y. T. et al. 1990. Phagocytosis of polymer microspheres by macrophages. Adv. Polymer. Sci. 94:107) and have been utilized as carriers for drug delivery systems.
Recently, Newman, et al. reported cytoplasmic delivery of Texas red labeled dextran encapsulated in PLGA microspheres following phagocytosis in mouse peritoneal macrophages (K. D. Newman, G. K., J. Miller, V. Chlumecky, J. Samuel. 1999. Cytoplasmic delivery of a fluorescent probe by poly(D,L lactic-co-glycolic acid) microspheres. In 1999 AAPS Annual Meeting Abstracts Online, vol. 1).
The application of synthetic biopolymers for nucleic acid delivery has proven advantageous by protecting DNA against nuclease degradation and increasing cellular uptake (C. Chavany, T. S.-B., T. Le Doan, F. Puisieux, P. Couvreur, and C. Helene. 1994. Adsorption of oligonucleotides onto polyisohexylcyanoacrylate nanoparticles protects them against nucleases and increases their cellular uptake. Pharm. Res. 11:1370).
Evidence for direct transfection of non professional antigen presenting cells mediated by PLG was recently reported by Ciftci and Su who found PLG microparticles containing a DNA:polycation complex provided controlled release of DNA and surfactant-enhanced uptake and gene expression in 293 and MCF-7 cells (K. Ciftci, J. S. 1999. DNA-PLGA microparticles: a promising delivery system for cancer gene therapy. In 1999 AAPS Annual Meeting Abstracts Online, vol. 1).
While polyalkylcyanoacrylate nanoparticles have been used to bind CTAB-oligonucleotide complexes to deliver antisense oligonucleotides to macrophage cell lines in vitro (C. Chavany, T. S.-B., T. Le Doan, F. Puisieux, P. Couvreur, and C. Helene. 1994. Adsorption of oligonucleotides onto polyisohexylcyanoacrylate nanoparticles protects them against nucleases and increases their cellular uptake. Pharm. Res. 11:1370; E. Fattal, C. V., I. Aynie, Y. Nakada, G. Lambert, C. Malvy, and P. Couvreur. 1998. Biodegradable polyalkylcyanoacrylate nanoparticles for the delivery of oligonucleotides. J. Controlled Release 53:137), these vehicles have not been shown to transfect dendritic cells with plasmids carrying recombinant genes.
Hence, there is a need in the art for an effective non-viral technique for the transfection of dendritic cells. While microparticle technology has been heretofore used for introduction of polynucleotides into cells, applicants are aware of no such technology having been used for the transfection of dendritic cells, which are notoriously resistant to transfection. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
One type of a conventional EE-PROM mainly comprises memory cells arranged in a matrix pattern, a sense amplifier circuit for producing a signal dependent on the content of a memory cell selected from the matrix memory cells, a reference voltage producing circuit for producing a reference signal, and a differential amplifier for comparing the signal dependent on the content of the selected memory cell and the reference signal and amplifying a compared difference between the signals.
In operation of the reading mode, a reading voltage is applied to a gate electrode of a transistor for the selected memory cell. Then, the transistor is turned on where the memory cell has been programmed, while the transistor is turned off where the memory cell has been erased. As a result, a voltage V.sub.ON which is lower than the reference signal is supplied from the sense amplifier circuit in the former state, while a voltage V.sub.OFF which is higher than the reference signal is supplied from the sense amplifier circuit in the latter state. Consequently, a signal "L" is supplied from the differential amplifier in the former state, while a signal "H" is supplied therefrom in the latter state. Accordingly, stored information can be read from the selected memory cell. The construction and operation of the conventional EE-PROM will be described in detail latter.
According to the conventional EE-PROM, however, there is a disadvantage that a speed of reading a content of a selected memory cell is not so fast as expected for the reason why the time in which a reference signal level is set to be a reference value is difficult to be shortened. The reasons thereof will be explained in more detail later. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The present invention is directed to construction toy sets, and more particularly to improvements in construction toy sets of the type in which the components are individual blocks formed with projecting studs and/or recesses to enable assemblies to be constructed by joining projecting studs of one block with recesses of another.
In general, construction toys utilizing blocks with studs and recesses are well known and are commercially available. The present invention is directed to improved features in building blocks of this general type, to the end of making them easier and more desirable to use, more securely joined when assembled, yet readily disassembled when desired.
In a preferred form of the invention, individual building blocks are comprised of upper and lower shells, formed of injection molded plastic, which are joined together, preferably permanently, to form a lightweight, hollow block. For convenience, but without intending any limitation, one of the halves may be referred to herein as the top and the other as the bottom.
One or more studs, integral with the top of the block, extend upward therefrom and, in a preferred embodiment, a corresponding number of recesses of similar configuration are formed in the bottom of the block. It is also contemplated that, in certain cases, blocks may be provided with only studs or only recesses, or with studs and recesses in different number.
Although other configurations are possible and contemplated within the basic teachings of the invention, in a particularly preferred and advantageous form of the invention the studs and recesses are configured in the form of equilateral octagons. In each block, the studs and recesses are of equal number and are arranged in coaxial pairs, with each stud being coaxial with a corresponding recess on the opposite side of the block, and the sides of all of the studs and recesses being oriented in the same manner.
In accordance with one of the features of the invention, the side walls of the recesses are formed to give the recesses a slight negative taper. That is, the width of the recess opening, at the surface of the block, is slightly less than the width of the recess at a distance from its surface opening. In a similar manner, some or all of the side walls of the projecting studs are configured to provide a slight negative taper, such that the cross section of the stud at the base is slightly smaller than at the top, and at least some of the width dimensions at the top of the stud are at least slightly greater than the width of the openings into the recesses. Accordingly, in order to insert a stud into a recess, the end of the stud has to be forced into the recess opening, and the assembly is accomplished with a tactilly sensible snap action effect. Once assembled, the parts are securely held in place by the fit of the reversely tapered stud and recess walls.
Desirably, the studs are of substantially greater width than height. This is made possible and practicable by relying upon the snap fit interlock of the studs and recesses, to maintain adjacent blocks in assembled relation, rather than relying on a simple friction fit as is customary with such devices. The relatively short projecting length of the studs facilitates disassembly of connected blocks by enabling one block to be more easily tilted with respect to another, providing leverage to effect separation of the interlocking parts.
In an advantageous form of construction toy building block according to the invention, the blocks are formed with opposite side walls which are spaced apart and parallel, and end walls arranged in the form of three sides of an octagon. In a block with a single projection and/or single recess, the body of the block is of octagonal configuration arranged concentrically with the stud and/or recess, with side walls of the block body being parallel with corresponding side walls of the stud and/or recess. For larger blocks, formed with a plurality of sets of studs and/or recesses, the side walls are appropriately elongated.
For a more complete understanding of the above and other features and advantages of the invention, reference should be made to the following detailed description of preferred embodiments of the invention and to the accompanying drawings. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The optical disks known as CD (Compact Disc), DVD (Digital Versatile Disc), etc. have spread widely as compact information recording media with large capacities. As a recording film of the optical disk on which information is rewritable, one that uses a phase change material has become commercially practical and the one enables information to be recorded, erased, or overwritten by means of reversible phase change between a crystal phase and an amorphous phase of the material.
In this type of rewritable optical disk, recording of information is made possible by irradiating high-power laser light onto the recording film and forming amorphous recording marks. It utilizes a fact that, when light is irradiated onto a recording film, its reflectivity is different between the recording mark of an amorphous material and a portion that is a crystalline layer and is other than the recording mark. On the other hand, reproduction of information is made possible by irradiating laser light of such a low power as does not change the recording film and detecting a difference of the reflectivity between the recording mark (amorphous phase) and the portion other than the mark (crystal phase). Moreover, erasing of information is made possible by irradiating laser light of a medium power between the high-power laser light at the time of information recording and the comparatively low-power laser light at the time of information reproduction. On the other hand, overwriting information becomes possible by irradiating a combination of the high-power light and the medium-power light.
Now, looking specifically at the phase change type optical disk, if it is subjected to information reproduction with laser light of an excess power, or if the same portion is repeatedly reproduced many a time, there occurs a phenomenon that a part of the amorphous phase returns to the crystal phase, namely a part of the mark are erased. By this phenomenon, some of the recording marks deteriorate and become hard to recognize, and accordingly a reproduction error tends to occur.
Especially, in the case of a combination of a high-density optical disk, such as the BD disk (Blue-ray Disc) that has been put in practical use lately and an optical system that uses a short-wavelength blue light source (wavelength is approximately 400 nm) as a light source, since a light spot size is small and the power density of the spot is large, recording mark deterioration during reproduction tends to occur easily as compared with a case of a red light source even when the information is reproduced using the same power; therefore, the read power cannot be made larger than that of the case of the red light source. The BD disk is described in detail in White Paper: Blu-ray Disc Format—General.
Practicably, since the disk is required to allow the information to be reproduced repeatedly for 106 to 108 times or more, it is often the case that an upper limit of the read power is specified for each disk medium or specified collectively by a standard in order to guarantee a predetermined number of reproducible times. In addition, from the viewpoint of protection of recorded information, when reproducing an optical disk in a drive device, an upper limit of the read power in the case of using a read power of, for example, a blue light source must be strictly observed.
However, since laser lights of short wavelengths like a blue light source have small photoelectric conversion efficiencies in photodetectors and the signal to noise ratio of a readout signal found when information is reproduced with the laser light of a short wavelength is small, a reproduction error tends to be produced. Therefore, from the viewpoint of reliability (low error rate) of information reproduction, it is desirable that the read power is as large as possible in order to obtain a large signal to noise ratio of the readout signal.
In order to establish compatibility between the above-mentioned two requirements, that is, protection of recorded information and reliability of information reproduction at the time of reproducing recorded information, the read power must be controlled with high accuracy. As the conventional method for controlling the read power, for example, there has been used a method for controlling the magnitude of a current flowing in a laser diode of a light source so that the laser light outputted from the objective lens may be kept at a predetermined magnitude. This method configures the system such that a part of the laser light outputted from a laser diode is divided in a halfway, and is made to enter into a photodetector for exclusive use (front monitor), and it controls the drive current of laser diode so that the output current of the front monitor may be maintained at a predetermined magnitude. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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When dealing with the clinical symptoms of Parkinson's disease, the three largest characteristics that are often observed are tremors, bradykinesia, and rigidity. It is considered that a decrease in dopamine in the brain causes Parkinson's disease. Therefore, the treatment of Parkinson's disease is carried out by administering dopamine with a form of precursor, which regulates dopamine metabolism or uses dopamine agonist. There have been several known remedies for Parkinson's disease, and typical examples include levodopa, sinemet, atropine sulfate, scopolamine, dopamine agonist, bromocriptine mesylate, and selegiline. However, these drugs suffer from a few drawbacks, such as tolerance to the drug after prolonged administration, side effects, failure to prevent the progress of the disease and so on.
Tablets made from a composition of levodopa and carbidopa are also commonly used to treat Parkinson's disease. Carbidopa is an aromatic L-amino acid decarboxylase inhibitor, which can efficiently reduce the transformation of levodopa to dopamine and raise the concentration of levodopa and dopamine that functions in the brain. In addition, U.S. Pat. No. 5,446,194 also discloses a medicine, called entacapone, for Parkinson's disease treatment. The medicine is a catechol-O-methyl transferase (COMT) inhibitor, which is used with levodopa to raise the concentration of levodopa in the brain and increase the bioavailability of levodopa. Patients can take a tablet comprising levodopa and carbidopa as well as a tablet containing entacapone several times a day to control their symptoms. However, it is a burden for patients suffering from dysphagia or tremors to take two tablets each time they need to administer treatment.
Therefore, the current treatment for Parkinson's disease lacks an effective method that combines the convenience of taking the medicine and having better curative effects for Parkinson's disease. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
In order to efficiently manage a large number of devices connected via a network, there are methods in which the devices are managed in groups. Regarding the methods for managing devices in groups, a static management method is known in which a predetermined group structure is used, and a dynamic management method is known in which groups are generated and deleted according to the situation. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Field
The disclosure relates to envelope tracking for power amplifiers.
Background
Envelope tracking is a technique for increasing the efficiency of power amplifiers. In an envelope tracking (ET) system, the supply voltage of a power amplifier is dynamically adjusted to keep the power amplifier operating with sufficient headroom to maintain linearity, while nevertheless minimizing DC power consumption. The supply voltage of the power amplifier is commonly generated using a separate linear amplifier that tracks the envelope of the power amplifier output. In certain prior art implementations, the linear amplifier is itself coupled to an amplifier supply voltage generated by a boost converter, which is capable of generating a boosted supply voltage for the linear amplifier that exceeds the maximum supply voltage otherwise available to the system, e.g., a battery voltage. In this manner, the power amplifier output can reach and even exceed the battery voltage when necessary.
The amplifier supply voltage is typically set to be higher than the peak required power amplifier output plus some additional headroom voltage. In certain prior art implementations, this headroom voltage is a static value that is pre-programmed and not updated over time. However, as the preferred headroom voltage may vary considerably across different operating scenarios, e.g., across different processes, temperatures, load conditions, etc., a single static value for the headroom voltage may not be optimal in all cases. Furthermore, a headroom voltage that is chosen too low may undesirably lead to startup failure in the boost converter, which would compromise the linearity of the system.
It would be desirable to provide techniques for dynamically determining the optimal headroom voltage for an ET system according to the particular operating scenario, and further for preventing startup failure for boost converters in ET systems. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Technical Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of wireless communications; and, more particularly, to a wireless communications system for providing access to the computer infrastructure of an organization.
2. Description of Related Art
In recent years, the growth in the availability and use of personal portable electronic devices has been phenomenal. Examples of the numerous portable electronic devices that are currently available for personal use include wireless telecommunications devices such as analog and digital cellular devices, direct-to-satellite devices, 900 MHz and 2.4 GHz portable home telephones, CB radios, pagers and 900 MHz point-to-point “walkie-talkies”; Internet access devices such as palmtops and laptops with wireless modems; and information storage devices such as Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs).
Many of these portable electronic devices provide features and capabilities that are not available in other devices; and, as a result, it has become a relatively common practice for an individual to carry around several electronic devices on his or her person. For example, an individual may, at the same time, carry around a device to communicate (e.g., a cell phone), a device for on demand notification (e.g., a pager) and a device to carry small amounts of information (e.g., a PDA or a Palm device).
Most personal portable communications devices currently on the market contain user interfaces of varying complexity, typically either a two-way audio transduction system or a screen and key/mouse/pen entry system; as well as communications hardware and software that are designed to maximize the range and bandwidth of the devices within the constraints of the particular applications for which the devices are designed. In this regard, although voice bandwidth requirements are relatively modest; even devices incorporating voice systems are today used for long-distance batch downloads, thus increasing the bandwidth requirements of the devices. Portable information storage devices often require central information servers and other components that increase their complexity, as well.
In view of the complexity of most personal portable electronic devices, the devices are somewhat costly; and also tend to be rather large and heavy, resulting in that the devices usually must be carried, rather than worn.
Furthermore, each personal portable electronic device comes with its own set of inconveniences. For example, most of the devices require periodic battery charging; and many also require periodic data backup. Also, because they must usually be carried; the devices are highly susceptible to being damaged, lost or mislaid.
Many of the numerous personal portable electronic devices currently in use duplicate capabilities of computer infrastructure that already exists in many organizations. For example, most universities and many companies already possess an extensive network/array of communications and database servers. For the most part, however, such existing infrastructure is only accessible to individuals when they are at their work stations or at other specific locations. The infrastructure is usually inaccessible to individuals as they move about the organization, even if they are carrying a cell phone, pager, PDA, or other portable electronic device.
It would, accordingly, be desirable to provide individuals with access to and the ability to utilize databases, communications capabilities and other features of the computer infrastructure of an organization even when the individual is away from his/her work station or other specific location where access to the infrastructure is normally available. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Ventilated seats with axial or radial fans are known, Often the nonuniform distribution of air is disadvantageous.
Additional prior art on seat surfaces, are air distribution layers that are impinged on from their front edges or through their flat surface by an air flow, Great energy consumption and space requirements are often undesired. However, generic systems should be distinguished in having effective air conditioning regardless of the type of passenger. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Computer systems typically comprise a central processing unit, random access memory, read only memory, and a variety of peripheral devices such as data input devices, data output devices, and a variety of nonvolatile data storage devices such as floppy disks and fixed or hard disks. Communication between the respective devices in a computer system is typically controlled by a computer operating system. One well known computer operating system is the MS-DOS operating system available from Microsoft.
In the MS-DOS operating system, a single file system describes and defines the organization of files stored on peripheral devices. In order for the computer system to read or write data in a format recognized by both the computer system and the respective peripheral devices, data must be organized in accordance with this file system. For example, in a conventional floppy disk peripheral device used with the MS-DOS operating system, data on a floppy disk is structured in accordance with a file system known as the FAT file system which is so named because of its use of file allocation tables. The FAT file system is one of the most widely used file systems in the world today. Other file systems may be associated with other types of data storage types of peripheral devices such as tape storage devices.
File systems facilitate communication between the operating system kernel and device dependant drivers and are responsible for converting read and write commands generated by an operating system kernel (as well as functions such as opening and closing files) into a form which may be recognized by the device driver.
When using the MS-DOS operating system, the operating system must be configured to define the relevant file systems to be used with specific peripheral devices employed by the computer system. Once the file systems are defined, file systems remain static or unchanged unless the operating system is modified. This typically requires extensive programming effort and is typically quite time-consuming. It further requires extensive knowledge of the computer operating system and individuals who do not have access to operating system details can not easily modify the file systems.
Furthermore, in prior systems, disk media which contains files of foreign file systems may not by used with the native system. For example, over the years, many computer systems have been developed by a variety of manufacturers, each of which are based on alternate file system structures. With current static file system architectures, disk media from one system typically will not function with another type of system. As computers become more popular, it is increasingly important that files may be shared among all types of computer systems. No system is known which allows disk media from virtually all known computer systems to be automatically recognized and read in a single operating environment. Further, no system is known which allows file systems to be added to a system or modified without the need for altering the computer operating system kernel. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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This invention relates to products having a low degree of emissivity, and to methods for producing same, and in particular to low emissivity products which also exhibit a high level of moisture vapor permeability.
As pointed out in U.S. Pat. No. 5,231,814 ("U.S. '814"), which is incorporated herein in its entirety by reference, and which is owned by the assignee of this patent application, roof decking typically is formed of structural wood products, such as plywood or oriented strand board ("OSB"). These structural wood products are attached to the structural members of a house by nails or other fastening means.
This roof decking defines the confines of the roof of the house and serves as the substrate for joining the outer protective water-shedding materials, i.e., the tar paper and shingles, which are attached thereto and complete the protective roof assembly.
This roof structure is formed of materials which inherently have minimal thermal insulating and emissivity barrier properties. Therefore, heat transfer through the roof structure from the outdoors to the interior space of, for example, a home, particularly during the summer months, is a problem to homeowner. Either a homeowner undergoes severe discomfort due to elevated temperatures inside the house, or they must pay a high price for installing and operating air conditioning.
Prior to the product described in U.S. '814, the insulative solar or heat emitting properties of a structural roof have undergone limited improvements such as by applying insulative materials to the exterior of the roof decking under the outer protective materials.
Excess heat transfer is generated on a daily basis in the summer months, which penetrates into the interstices of building materials such as sheet rock and insulation causing unwanted elevated temperatures within the interior living space.
Thus, under conventional home construction conditions, the air temperature in attics and ceilings can be raised to about 140 degrees F. or higher.
U.S. '814 addresses certain problems relating to heat transfer. In U.S. '814, a roof structure is fitted with roof decling comprising a sheet of plywood or OSB with a layer of foil material adhered thereto. The foil material comprises a layer of metallic foil such as an aluminum foil material. The foil material covers a roof decking material which in turn is fastened to rafters in a typical roof structure.
The foil material used in U.S. '814 includes a plurality of substantially uniformly distributed perforations which are preformed in the foil material prior to applying of the adhesive, and adhering same to the underlying substrate, i.e., OSB, plywood. The expressed reason for introducing the perforations into the foil material is to permit the passage of moisture between the moisture barrier layer and the roof In this way, it is thought that a significant portion of excess moisture can be released through the perforations located in the foil material thereby permitting the roof decking to "breathe." If a significant portion of the excess moisture is not released, unwanted degradation of the substrate can result.
Moisture can be present due to, for example, water vapor which enters the house during construction (before the roof is put on), or after construction from roof leaks of various types. Unwanted moisture can also result from the cumulative effect of vapor condensation.
Typically, the decking is placed in position with the foil layer facing inwardly toward the attic of the house. The low emissivity foil faces at least one adjacent air space (the attic) to prevent unwanted heat transfer.
A partial sectional view of the roof decking structure is shown in FIG. 1 of U.S. '814. A plan view of the decking structure of FIG. 1 is illustrated in FIG. 2, which shows the perforations in approximately true scale. As shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, the perforations extend only through metallic foil 16 and not through the kraft paper 17 to which the foil is attached. The kraft paper is, in itself, capable of breathing. It is stated in U.S. '814 that kraft paper 17 need not be perforated, although perforations through or partly through the paper are not particularly detrimental. The kraft paper is provided for physical support of the foil during the handling, which precedes attachment of the foil material to the panel structure.
The density of perforations is in the order of 125 per square inch, although perforations in the range of from about 50 to about 160 per square inch are usable. Each perforation is about 0.06 mm or less in diameter. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The present invention generally relates to a water closet and more particularly to a flush water arrangement to minimize the amount of water expended during the flushing operation.
A water closet typically includes a flush tank, a bowl, and a siphon trap to discharge waste from the bowl and prevent gases and waste water from flowing back into the bowl. Efficient water closet performance is a balance between that volume of falling water needed to fill the bowl, either directly from the tank or indirectly from a flush rim which encircles the bowl, and the rate of flow of flush water into the trap required to start and maintain a vacuum in the siphon trap during the flush operation.
Residential homes and buildings are typically equipped with only a single water supply system providing only potable water, irrespective of the uses intended thereof by the resident. Water conservation is now important, especially in the various sunbelt states, and unnecessary consumption of potable water from water closet usage represents an area where water conservation can be achieved. For example, while a typical U.S. water closet consumes about 3.0 gallons of flush water, a conventional European water closet is more water efficient and only uses about 1.5 gallons of water in a thrust-type flushing action. However, this thrust-type action lacks a swirling action which is necessary to clean the interior sidewalls of the bowl. A desirable water closet would efficiently utilize the lower amount of water without sacrificing the benefits gained by thrust and swirling action imparted by the flush water.
One approach to save water is to make the water closet smaller and equip the closet with restrictors to limit the flush water from the tank and thereby render the flushing water more effective. While use of a separate device constitutes a step in the right direction, it would be desirable to have a self-contained water closet which reduces the amount of water required per flush by making the flushing operation more efficient.
A slow discharge of waste has a further unexpected disadvantage. As the discharge leaves the closet it must travel a significant distance to reach the community sanitary system. If the sewage pipes are too great in diameter, the waste will not fill the pipe and tend to form on the pipe wall, resulting in clogged lines. A faster discharge will obviate this situation by acting to scrub the pipe walls.
Accordingly, an object of the invention is provision of a water closet which efficiently uses a substantially reduced head of flush water that cleans the bowl without appreciably affecting the flushing action of the water being discharged and without raising the average head under which this smaller amount of flushing water is delivered.
In accordance with this invention there is provided a water closet including a frusto-pyramidal flush tank expanding vertically downwardly, a downwardly converging bowl including a top flushing rim section receiving flush water from the tank and a lower outlet opening for discharging waste material from the bowl, a conduit for supplying fresh flush water from the tank to the bowl, and a trapway connecting the lower outlet of the bowl to the discharge opening, the bottom part of the bowl and trapway forming a water trap for the sealing function. The trapway forms a continuous passageway described by a specially configured inverted "U" which includes an upleg portion which extends vertically upward from an orifice that defines a contracting expanding nozzle where connected to the bowl outlet, a transition portion which defines the free water level in the main part of the bowl, and a downleg portion which snakes vertically downward from the transition to a discharge opening whereby to pass the waste from the closet. The rim section rapidly supplies fresh flush water to the bowl in a vortex motion to center the waste for entrance into the trapway. The orifice adjacent the bowl outlet communicates waste from the water trap and increases the velocity of the effluent from the bowl. Thereafter, the upleg passage expands in cross-section to receive all waste discharged from the bowl. The transition portion is reduced in cross-section to rapidly become filled and create a siphon in the downleg. As the waste material travels down the downleg the passage expands to form an expansion chamber and then contracts to form an orifice adjacent the discharge opening, the chamber cooperating with the downleg to impart a swirling movement in the waste flow to prevent entry of air into the downleg orifice which could break the siphon action.
Advantageously, the upleg portion allows the waste to be accelerated from the bowl ahead of the flush water with the flush water head rapidly emptying into the bowl to provide the acceleration. Provision of an expansion chamber adjacent the inlet and outlet, respectively, surprisingly allows the siphon action to initiate sooner and not be disturbed during the flushing. This results in substantially less flush water being required for a like flush.
Slow flush water input develops less siphon action in the trap resulting in the waste in the bowl water trap tending to rise to the top of the free surface of the water in the bowl and be the last to be discharged from the bowl. Advantageously, the downwardly converging bowl with the slotted water feed rim rapidly imparts a swirling action to scrub the bowl wall and center the waste for discharge, and the area increase in the upleg, adjacent the transition portion of the closet, defines an expansion chamber that assists in rapid movement of waste material to fill the downleg and start the siphon. The expansion chamber in the downleg adjacent the discharge opening imparts a swirling movement to the waste to prevent turbulence in the flush water, thereby inhibiting air which could break the siphon from entering the downleg.
Other advantages and features will become apparent from the following specification taken in connection with the accompanying drawings. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Reversing a vehicle while towing a trailer can be challenging for many drivers, particularly for drivers that drive with a trailer on an infrequent basis or with various types of trailers. One reason for such difficulty may be that backing a vehicle with an attached trailer requires steering inputs that are opposite to steering inputs when backing the vehicle without a trailer attached to the vehicle. Another reason may be that objects may be present in the perimeter of the vehicle and the trailer that provide limited space to manipulate the vehicle and otherwise direct the trailer to a desired position or along a desired path. A further reason for such difficulty may be that small errors in steering while backing a vehicle with an attached trailer are amplified, which may cause the trailer to quickly depart from a desired path. Yet an additional reason backing a trailer can prove to be difficult is the need to control the vehicle in a manner that limits the potential for a jackknife condition to occur. A jackknife condition may occur when steering of the vehicle cannot control the hitch angle, such that the hitch angle would continue to increase and the vehicle must be pulled forward to relieve the hitch angle. However, in addition to the jackknife condition creating the inconvenient situation where the vehicle must be pulled forward, it can also lead to contact between the vehicle and trailer, thereby damaging the trailer and/or the vehicle. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The present invention relates to a semiconductor device and a method for producing the same, and an anisotropic conductive circuit board. In particular, the present invention relates to a semiconductor device employing a circuit board including a bonding pad portion on which a semiconductor element is to be mounted on its upper surface and electrode pads connected to electrode terminals of the semiconductor element via a connecting member, and a method for producing such a semiconductor device, and relates to a semiconductor device having good electrical and thermal characteristics and a method for producing such a semiconductor device.
Hereinafter, a semiconductor device employing a commonly used printed circuit board used as a component of a semiconductor package will be described.
FIGS. 8A to 8E are views illustrating the production process of a conventional LGA (lard grid array) type semiconductor device in the order of the production. FIG. 8A is a plan view, FIGS. 8B to 8E are cross-sectional views of a relevant part taken along line A-A1 of FIG. 8A.
First, to produce a printed circuit board as shown in FIG. 8A, an insulating substrate 2 to which copper foils having a thickness of 6 to 35 xcexcm are attached to its upper and lower surfaces is prepared. This insulating substrate 2 is a substrate in which glass fabrics have been incorporated into an epoxy resin.
Next, via holes are formed having a predetermine diameter in predetermined positions of the insulating substrate with a drill or a laser. Then, thick copper films are formed on the side walls of the formed via holes by electroless plating or electrolytic plating. At this point, the copper foils on the upper and the lower surfaces of the insulating substrate are connected by the thick copper films.
Next, dry films are attached onto the surfaces of the copper foils on the upper and the lower surfaces of the insulating substrate by heating and pressing. The dry films are made of a material that causes a reaction with respect to light having a specific wavelength, and the surfaces of the dry films are irradiated with light having a wavelength for a reaction via a photomask on which a predetermined circuit pattern has been formed. Thereafter, in the circuit pattern formed on the dry films on the copper foil surface on the upper and the lower surfaces of the insulating substrate, the portions to be removed of the dry films are dissolved with a developer and removed after exposure to the light. Then, after the removal, the dry films are heated or irradiated with ultraviolet rays so that the remaining portions of the dry films are cured. Using these dry films as masks, exposed copper film portion is removed by allowing the copper foil erosion chemicals such as nitric acid, sulfuric acid or hydrochloric acid to be in contact with the surface of the copper foils, for example, by dipping or spraying.
Finally, the dry films that have been exposed to the chemicals and cured are removed by using a detaching agent, dissolving it in oxygen plasma, or converting it to carbon dioxide. Solder resist films are formed on the upper and the lower surfaces of the thus obtained printed circuit board 1 by screen printing, and the pattern is formed on the solder resist film via a photomask by an exposure machine. Then, the portion to be dissolved of the solder resist film is dissolved with a developer and removed, and then heated and cured. Then, nickel and gold are deposited in this order in predetermined thicknesses by electrolytic plating on the surface of the copper foil portion corresponding to the opening of the pattern from which the solder resist film is removed. Thereafter, the printed circuit board is divided so as to form a frame shape or divided into individual segments by stamping with a pressing machine or a cutting machine.
The printed circuit board 1 for use in a conventional board structure package, which includes bonding pads, electrode pads, and through-holes connecting the bonding pads and the electrode pads on the upper surface to those on the lower surface, has been produced in this manner.
As shown in FIG. 8A, on each of the upper and the lower surfaces of the insulating substrate 2, the produced printed circuit board 1 includes a bonding pad 3, electrode pads 4 and through-holes 6 connecting the pads 3 and 4 on the upper surface to the corresponding pads on the lower surface. The surface of each of the pads on the printed circuit board 1 is coated with a thin film made of gold or silver. The bonding pad 3 consists of the upper bonding pad and the lower bonding pad, and the electrode pad 4 consists of the upper electrode pad and the lower electrode pad. A solder resist film 5 is formed on the substrate in such a manner that the pads 3 and 4 are exposed.
Next, referring to 8A to 8E, a method for producing a semiconductor device (for a LGA type package) including the printed circuit board 1 will be described below.
First, the circuit board 1 as shown in FIG. 8A is prepared. In the prepared circuit board 1, as shown in FIG. 8B, an upper bonding pad 3a, a lower bonding pad 3b, upper electrode pads 4a, and lower electrode pads 4b are formed on an insulating substrate 2, and through-holes 6 for connecting the bonding pads 3a and 3b and the electrode pads 4a and 4b on the upper surface of the substrate to the corresponding pads on the lower surface are provided.
Then, as shown in FIG. 8C, a die bonding process is performed, in which a semiconductor element 7 is attached onto the upper bonding pad 3a with a conductive adhesive 8 such as silver paste, and then heating is performed at 150xc2x0 C. for one hour in the air for strong adhesion.
Then, as shown in FIG. 8D, a wire bonding process is performed, in which electrode terminals (not shown) on the semiconductor element 7 mounted on the substrate are connected to the upper electrode pads 4a with connecting members 9 such as metal fine lines (wires) using a wire bonder. This connection is performed under the following conditions: The heating temperature of the printed circuit board 1 is 200xc2x0 C., the load for connection between the connecting members 9 and the electrode terminals of the semiconductor element 7 is 20 gf, and the load for connection between the connecting members 9 and the upper electrode pads 4a on the printed circuit board 1 is 100 gf. This connection is performed using ultrasonic vibration as well.
Next, as shown in FIG. 8E, an outline molding process is performed, in which a sealing resin 10 is molded to a predetermined package outline with a transfer mold or a print sealing so that the semiconductor element 7 and the connecting members 9 provided on the upper surface of the printed circuit board 1 are sealed and formed into one piece.
In this manner, a semiconductor device for an LGA type package including a conventionally commonly used printed circuit board as a component is produced. Furthermore, if metal ball terminals are provided on the lower electrode pads 4b (land portions) on the bottom surface of the printed circuit board 1, a BGA (ball grid array) type semiconductor package can be achieved.
However, the conventional semiconductor device has the following problems. In the conventional printed circuit board type package including a glass epoxy substrate, the connection between the upper electrode pads and the lower electrode pads or the connection between the upper bonding pad and the lower bonding pad are established via the via holes, so that variations in the structure of the via holes or the plating thickness in the via holes may cause variations in the electrical resistance or the inductance of the wiring portions. Furthermore, since the substrate material is an organic substance, a dielectric constant of the printed circuit board is large, so that it is not suitable to a semiconductor package that requires a high frequency performance. In addition to this problem, there is also an electricity and moisture resistance-related problem in that a water content enters the inside from the outside via the via holes and corrodes the copper foil layer in the upper electrode pad portion of the printed circuit board to which the connecting members such as wire are connected.
Furthermore, the printed circuit board is made of glass epoxy, so that this is insulative with respect to thermal conduction. This causes a heat-related problem as well. More specifically, when a semiconductor element having high power consumption is mounted on the printed circuit board, heat is not released sufficiently, so that the temperature increases in the principal surface on which an integrated circuit is formed in the semiconductor element. As a result, the temperature in the principal surface exceeds the allowable temperature, which leads to malfunction of the circuit.
Therefore, with the foregoing in mind, it is a main object of the present invention to provide a semiconductor device employing a circuit board that has good electrical and thermal characteristics and a method for producing such a semiconductor device.
A semiconductor device of the present invention includes a circuit board; a semiconductor element that is mounted on an upper surface of the circuit board and has an electrode terminal; and a sealing resin for sealing a periphery of the semiconductor element that is mounted on the upper surface of the circuit board. The circuit board includes a plurality of conductive members and an insulating substance for binding and fixing the plurality of conductive members to each other. Each of the plurality of conductive members includes a conductive material formed integrally from the upper surface through the lower surface of the circuit board, and an insulating material covering an outer circumference of the conductive material. The conductive material of at least one conductive member of the plurality of conductive members is exposed to the upper surface of the, circuit board. The electrode terminal of the semiconductor element is electrically connected to the conductive material of the conductive member exposed to the upper surface of the circuit board via a connecting member.
In one embodiment of the present invention, a bonding pad made of a metal coating film connected to the conductive material of a part of the plurality of conductive members, and an electrode pad connected to the conductive material of a part of the plurality of conductive members are provided on the upper surface of the circuit board. The semiconductor element is mounted on the bonding pad. The electrode terminal of the semiconductor element is connected to the electrode pad via the connecting member. A lower electrode pad corresponding to the electrode pad on the upper surface is provided on a lower surface of the circuit board. The lower electrode pad is connected to the conductive material of the conductive member connected to the electrode pad provided on the upper surface.
It is preferable that the conductive material of at least one conductive member of the plurality of conductive members is exposed to the lower surface of the circuit board, and a ball electrode or a protruding electrode is connected to the conductive material of the conductive member exposed to the lower surface of the circuit board.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the conductive material is a fine line-like conductive material.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the conductive material has a cross-sectional shape of a circle or a polygon.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the conductive member and the insulating substance are exposed alternately to a side surface of the circuit board.
It is preferable that the circuit board is an anisotropic conductive circuit board that has electrical conductivity with respect to the upper and the lower surfaces and is electrically insulated in a horizontal direction.
In one embodiment of the present invention, a shape of the circuit board viewed from the upper surface thereof is any one of a circle, a rectangle, a hexagon and an octagon.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the connecting member is a conductive metal fine line or a metal ribbon.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the connecting member is a conductive protruding electrode.
A method for producing a semiconductor device of the present invention includes the steps of: (a) bundling and arranging a plurality of conductive members, each of which includes fine line-like conductive materials whose outer circumference is covered with an insulating material to form a conductive member cluster; (b) attaching and fixing the conductive members constituting the conductive member cluster to each other with an insulative resin to form a rectangular solid substrate block; (c) slicing the substrate block with a predetermined thickness to form a substrate element in which cross-sections of the plurality of conductive materials and the insulating materials covering the outer circumferences of the corresponding conductive materials are arranged and whose periphery is made of the insulating resin and the plurality of conductive members; (d) forming metal coating films on an upper surface and a lower surface of the substrate element, thereby forming a circuit board; (e) mounting a semiconductor element having an electrode terminal on an upper surface of the circuit board; (f) electrically connecting the electrode terminal of the semiconductor element mounted on the circuit board and the conductive material positioned on the upper substrate of the circuit board with a connecting member; and (g) sealing a periphery of the semiconductor element mounted on the upper surface of the circuit board and the connecting member with a sealing resin.
In one embodiment of the present invention, in the step (C), slicing is performed at an angle between 30xc2x0 to 150xc2x0 with respect to the longitudinal direction of the conductive member cluster constituting the substrate block such that a thickness becomes 0.05 mm to 3.00 mm.
It is preferable that the method for producing a semiconductor device further includes performing surface-processing by polishing both surfaces of the sliced substrate element, after the step (c).
In one embodiment of the present invention, the step (d) includes forming a metal coating film in a portion on the upper surface of the substrate element on which the semiconductor element is to be mounted to form a bonding pad portion; forming a metal coating film as an electrode pad connected to the conductive material of the substrate element in a portion of the upper surface of the substrate element to which a connecting member for electrically connecting to the electrode terminal of the semiconductor element to be mounted is to be connected, and forming a metal coating film on the conductive material exposed on the lower surface of the substrate element to form an electrode pad.
It is preferable that in the step (a), a plurality of conductive members are bundled and arranged in a plurality of rows such that they are densely filled in a grid or staggered manner in cross-section.
In one embodiment of the present invention, in the step (f), the connection is performed using a conductive metal fine line as the connecting member.
In one embodiment of the present invention, in the step (f), the connection is performed using a conductive protruding electrode as the connecting member.
In one embodiment of the present invention, the method for producing a semiconductor device further includes forming a ball electrode or a protruding electrode on an electrode pad on the conductive material exposed on the lower surface of the circuit board, after the step (g).
In one embodiment of the present invention, in the step (a), the conductive material is a metal fine line made of at least one selected from the group consisting of copper, a copper alloy, aluminum, an aluminum alloy, nickel, and a nickel alloy.
A circuit board of the present invention includes a plurality of conductive member; an insulating substance for binding and fixing the plurality of conductive members to each other; wherein each of the plurality of conductive members include a conductive material formed integrally from one end through the other end and an insulating material for covering an outer circumference of the conductive material, and there is a difference in conductivity between a direction to which the conductive material extends and directions other than that.
According to the present invention, a semiconductor element is mounted on the upper surface of a circuit board obtained by binding and fixing a plurality of conductive members, each of which includes a conductive material formed integrally from the upper surface through the lower surface of the circuit board, using an insulative substance. Therefore, the electrical resistance and the inductance between the upper and the lower surfaces of the board are significantly small, so that an electrically and thermally excellent semiconductor device can be achieved. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a light emitting device that has a light emitting element.
2. Description of the Related Art
Since a light emitting element has a self-light emitting property, it is superior in visibility and a viewing angle. Accordingly, a light emitting device that has a light emitting element has been attracted as well as a liquid crystal display device (LCD).
As a light emitting element, an organic EL element in which several organic layers are interposed between an anode and a cathode is given. The organic layer specifically includes a light emitting layer, a hole injecting layer, an electron injecting layer, a hole transporting layer, and an electron transporting layer. In such an organic EL element, light can be extracted by applying a potential difference between a pair of electrodes.
When a light emitting device is put into practical use, it is considered that life extension of the organic EL element is an important topic. Time degradation of the organic layer causes luminance reduction of the organic EL element. The rate of time degradation depends on material characteristics, a sealing method, a driving method of the light emitting device, or the like. In addition, since the organic layer is particularly weak in moisture, oxygen, light, and heat, the time degradation is also promoted by factors thereof.
In addition, when the light emitting device is put into practice use, the amount of current flowing in the organic EL element is desired to be constant without depending on the temperature. Even if the voltage applied between electrodes of the organic EL element is the same, the current flowing in the light emitting element becomes increase as the temperature of the organic layer becomes higher. In other words, when constant voltage driving is performed to the light emitting device, luminance change and chromaticity discrepancy occur in accordance with the temperature change. In the light emitting device having such an organic EL element, a technique in which the luminance of the light emitting element is to be constant independently from the environmental temperature is proposed (Patent Document 1: Japanese Published Patent Application No. 2002-333861). | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Technical Field
This invention generally relates to windows having muntin bars that simulate the appearance of traditional divided lite windows having individual panes of glass set in wooden muntin bars. More particularly, the present invention relates to a method of fabricating muntin bars on automated machinery for use in simulated divided lite windows. Specifically, the present invention relates to a method of automatically sizing, cutting, and joining foam strips to the top and bottom edges of traditional thin metal inner muntin grid elements for use in insulating windows having outer muntin bars positioned in coincidental alignment with the inner muntin bars. The invention also relates to the structure of the muntin bars.
2. Background Information
Traditional windows have individual panes of glass separated by wooden muntins. While these windows are attractive and have functioned for many years, they are relatively expensive to fabricate. The expense is particularly high when a consumer desires an insulating window having spaced panes of glass sealed together by a perimeter spacer. A single window having twelve panes of glass requires twelve spacers, twenty-four panes of glass, and a precisely formed muntin grid. In addition to the cost of materials, the assembly process is also relatively expensive. Thus, although consumers desire the aesthetic properties of traditional divided lite windows, most are unwilling to pay for a true divided lite window.
Modern, energy efficient insulating windows include at least two panes of glass separated by a spacer to form a sealed cavity that provides insulating properties. These insulating windows are most efficiently manufactured with two large panes of glass separated by a single spacer disposed at the perimeter of the panes. Various solutions have been implemented to provide the divided lite appearance in insulating windows. One solution to the problem has been to place a muntin bar grid between the panes of glass. Another solution has been to place the muntin bar grid on the outer surface of one, or both, panes of glass. Although these solutions provide options for consumers, each has visual drawbacks when compared with traditional muntin bars.
Placing muntin bar grids between the panes of glass is one of the most common solutions to the divided lite problem. In fact, so many internal muntin grids are fabricated that automated muntin bar manufacturing equipment has been created and is used in the art. This equipment works in cooperation with the automated window manufacturing equipment. In this equipment, the user inputs the desired size of window and the computer automatically selects the ideal number of grid intersections to form an aesthetically pleasing muntin bar grid. In other embodiments, the user may override the automatic selection and manually select the number of muntin bar intersections in the grid. The computer then controls automated fabricating equipment that roll forms flat metal stock into the hollow, substantially rectangular muntin bars used to form the muntin bar grid. The muntin bars are dadoed or notched at their intersections half-way through their thickness to provide the overlapping joint required to form the grid. These notched areas are also automatically formed. The muntin bars are then cut to length and an assembler manually assembles the bars into a grid that is mounted to the spacer that spaces the inner and outer panes of glass. The muntin bar grid is attached to the spacer with specially designed clips that fit into holes punched into the spacer during the manufacture of the spacer. These systems allow muntin bar grids to be quickly and easily manufactured for a relatively low price after the user invests in the automated equipment. The muntin bar grids are painted and deburred to have a pleasing appearance either before or after the grid is assembled.
One product developed by Edgetech I. G. of Cambridge, Ohio, in response to the insulating window muntin bar problem includes the use of a pair of material strips positioned on the upper and lower edges of metal muntin bars inside an insulating window assembly. Outer muntin bars are then provided in coincidental alignment with the inner muntin bars to achieve a simulated divided lite appearance. The material strips visually join the aligned outer muntin bars to create the appearance that the muntin bar grid extends entirely through the insulated window assembly. This product also hides the metal muntin bars. The metal muntin bars thus do not have to be painted and may be fabricated from a lower quality material than exposed, painted inner metal muntin bars. Although this product achieved acceptance by the consumer because of its visual appearance, the insulating window manufacturers objected to the relatively large amount of labor required to size, cut, and install the material strips. It is thus desired in the art to provide a method for sizing, cutting, and installing the material strips to muntin bars that are fabricated with automated machinery.
Another problem encountered with this product occurs when the material strips are stretched during installation or applied to the outside of a curved muntin. It has been found that the strips relax overtime and delaminate causing the window to have an unattractive appearance. It is desired in the art to provide a solution to this delamination problem.
In view of the foregoing, it is an objective of the present invention to provide a method for fabricating muntin bars for simulated divided lite windows.
Another objective of the present invention is to provide a method for creating muntin bars for simulated divided lite windows wherein material strips are automatically sized, cut, and applied to the muntin grid elements that are then assembled into a muntin bar grid.
Another objective of the present invention is to provide a method for creating muntin bars for simulated divided lite windows wherein the muntin grid elements are roll formed from metal stock and automatically cut to length with the material strips being fabricated based on the data used to roll form the muntin grid elements.
Another objective of the present invention is to provide a method for fabricating a muntin bar grid wherein the person fabricating the grid only needs to provide the window size and the number of desired panes as well as to assemble the muntin bar grid after the individual muntin grid pieces are fabricated.
Another objective of the present invention is to provide a method for fabricating a muntin bar grid wherein muntin grid elements are provided and measured, with the measurements being used to fabricate the material strips that are then applied to the grid elements.
Another objective of the present invention is to provide a method, as above, wherein opposed strips of material are simultaneously cut to length and applied to the grid element.
Another objective of the present invention is to provide a method, as above, wherein the strips of material are formed with flaps that cover a portion of the muntin clips when the insulating glazing unit is assembled.
Another objective of the present invention is to provide a method wherein the strips of material include a non-extensible material to prevent the strips from stretching during installation.
Another objective of the present invention is to provide foam strips for use with muntin bars wherein the foam strips have a non-extensible material connected to the foam strip to prevent the foam strip from stretching when it is used around curves.
Another objective of the present invention is to provide strips for use with muntin bars wherein a mechanical connection is formed between the strips and bars to help prevent delamination.
A further objective of the present invention is to provide a method of fabricating muntin bars for simulated divided lite windows that achieves the stated objectives in a simple, effective, and inexpensive manner that solves the problems, and that satisfies the needs existing in the art.
These and other objectives and advantages of the present invention are obtained by a method for fabricating muntin grid pieces wherein each muntin grid piece includes a muntin grid element and a pair of material strips connected to opposed edges of the muntin grid element; the muntin grid pieces being capable of being assembled into a muntin bar grid for a window; the method including the steps of: (a) providing a muntin grid element having a length; (b) providing material strip stock having a pair of connected material strip lengths; (c) simultaneously cutting the material strip stock to a length related to the length of the muntin grid element; (d) separating the pair of connected material strip lengths to provide a pair of material strips; and (e) connecting the pair of material strips to the muntin grid element to form a muntin grid piece.
Other objectives and advantages of the invention are achieved by a method for fabricating a muntin bar grid for a window including the steps of: (a) providing at least two muntin grid elements; (b) providing at least two material strips; (c) connecting at least one material strip to each of the muntin bars to form muntin pieces; and (d) assembling the muntin pieces together to form a muntin bar grid after the material strips are connected to the muntin grid elements.
Other objectives and advantages of the invention are achieved by a muntin piece assembly for a muntin grid; the muntin piece including: at least one muntin grid element having a width, a thickness, and a longitudinal length; the muntin grid element having first and second ends separated by the longitudinal length of the muntin grid element; the muntin grid element further having first and second edges separated by the width of the muntin grid element; a first clip connected to the first end of the muntin grid element; and at least a first material strip connected to the first edge of the muntin grid element; the first material strip having a first flap that covers at least a portion of the first clip.
Other objectives and advantages of the invention are achieved by a material strip for a muntin piece in a simulated divided lite muntin bar grid, the material strip including: a body having a width, a thickness, and a longitudinal length; and a non-extensible member connected to the body and extending in the longitudinal direction.
Other objectives and advantages of the invention are achieved by a muntin grid piece for a muntin bar assembly; the muntin grid piece including: at least one muntin grid element having a width, a thickness, and a longitudinal length; the muntin grid element having first and second ends separated by the longitudinal length of the muntin grid element; the muntin grid element further having first and second edges separated by the width of the grid element; at least a first material strip connected to the first edge of the muntin grid element; and the first material strip being mechanically connected to the muntin grid element. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Electronic devices commonly have some type of bulk storage device available to them. A common example is a hard disk drive (HDD). HDDs are capable of large amounts of storage at relatively low cost, with current consumer HDDs available with over one terabyte of capacity.
HDDs generally store data on rotating magnetic media or platters. Data is typically stored as a pattern of magnetic flux reversals on the platters. To write data to a typical HDD, the platter is rotated at high speed while a write head floating above the platter generates a series of magnetic pulses to align magnetic particles on the platter to represent the data. To read data from a typical HDD, resistance changes are induced in a magnetoresistive read head as it floats above the platter rotated at high speed. In practice, the resulting data signal is an analog signal whose peaks and valleys are the result of the magnetic flux reversals of the data pattern. Digital signal processing techniques called partial response maximum likelihood (PRML) are then used to sample the analog data signal to determine the likely data pattern responsible for generating the data signal.
HDDs have certain drawbacks due to their mechanical nature. HDDs are susceptible to damage or excessive read/write errors due to shock, vibration or strong magnetic fields. In addition, they are relatively large users of power in portable electronic devices.
Another example of a bulk storage device is a solid state drive (SSD). Instead of storing data on rotating media, SSDs utilize semiconductor memory devices to store their data, but include an interface and form factor making them appear to their host system as if they are a typical HDD. The memory devices of SSDs are typically non-volatile flash memory devices.
Flash memory devices have developed into a popular source of non-volatile memory for a wide range of electronic applications. Flash memory devices typically use a one-transistor memory cell that allows for high memory densities, high reliability, and low power consumption. Changes in threshold voltage of the cells, through programming of charge storage or trapping layers or other physical phenomena, determine the data value of each cell. Common uses for flash memory and other non-volatile memory include personal computers, personal digital assistants (PDAs), digital cameras, digital media players, digital recorders, games, appliances, vehicles, wireless devices, mobile telephones, and removable memory modules, and the uses for non-volatile memory continue to expand.
Unlike HDDs, the operation of SSDs is generally not subject to vibration, shock or magnetic field concerns due to their solid state nature. Similarly, without moving parts, SSDs have lower power requirements than HDDs. However, SSDs currently have much lower storage capacities compared to HDDs of the same form factor and a significantly higher cost per bit.
For the reasons stated above, and for other reasons which will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon reading and understanding the present specification, there is a need in the art for alternative bulk storage options. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a system and method for verifying the face of a user using a light mask, and in particular, to a system and method for recognizing an image input through a camera and verifying a registered user in a robotic environment.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the prior art, there are many technologies for recognizing and verifying a face. Conventional face verification technologies are mainly related to a process for dividing a facial image into blocks, extracting features from respective blocks, and creating Gaussian Mixture Models (GMMs). The division of a facial image into blocks is shown in FIG. 1A. In the method of dividing a facial image into small blocks and extracting features from the blocks in this way, GMM learning may be excellently performed because a plurality of data items can be obtained using a small number of images, but learning and adaptation time and verification time may increase due to the increased number of GMMs, and the entire facial image may not be sufficiently taken into account. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Conventional two-dimensional (2-D) optical data storage is accomplished by using photonic excitation of the storage material in the visible or infrared wavelengths at the diffraction limit. The theoretical limit for storage density in a 2-D system is typically ˜108 bits/cm2. With the presently growing need for economically viable, high performance computers with increased memory and storage capacity, optical storage media that provide the capability writing and reading data in a three-dimensional (3-D) format (with a theoretical storage capacity of >1012 bits/cm3) offers a potential solution for enabling compact, low-cost, high-speed memory devices with high storage capacities. Optical storage of information inside the volume of a 3-D storage or “memory” device is usually accomplished by inducing chemical changes via photonic processes (typically in the ultraviolet range) in micro-domain areas in a 3-D mode within an optical storage material comprising an optical storage media. “Optical storage materials” as used herein refers to materials (including chemical compounds) that are capable of undergoing a photo-induced change that can be subsequently monitored. “Optical storage media” as used herein refer to suitable forms and configurations of the optical storage materials so as to render them capable of presenting themselves in a 3-D matrix to an optical source in a manner that enables irradiation of micro-domains within the matrix in a pre-determined pattern representing an information set. The information (or data) storage process is termed “writing”, which denotes irradiation of the photon-absorbing “write” form of the molecules within the storage medium, transforming them into either a visible-light-absorbing form, or cause a change in their light transmission properties. Molecules that have undergone these changes are denoted to be in the “written” form. The stored data is accessed (or retrieved) by “reading”, which refers to probing the “written” form of the molecules with a photon source and by monitoring their optical response such as emitted fluorescence or changes in transmission due to altered refractive index.
Presently, two approaches are adopted for providing 3-D optical storage memory in materials. The first involves optically writing in micro-domains within the optical storage material whereby a change in the local refractive index of the material is introduced in the written micro-domains. The differential refractive index pattern is then subsequently read using standard optical methods. The second approach is to use optical storage materials that either include photochromic molecules, or polymers that are capable of undergoing photobleaching that may be additionally doped with chromophores such as dye molecules. Optical changes are photonically introduced in the dye molecules causing them to emit radiation in the visible range that are subsequently monitored. Although such materials are theoretically capable of providing bit densities of terabits per cubic centimeter, they have not been proven to be commercially viable for providing stable 3-D storage media.
Conventional 3-D optical storage media may be categorized into two types. The first constitutes a recordable medium comprising a stack of 2-D bit arrays that multiply the data density by the number of planes in the resulting 3-D stack. This type of optical data storage and retrieval processes in storage media has been conventionally accomplished by utilizing a multi-photon excitation process. It involves a two-photon excitation step to initiate the “write” process, whereby a photochemical reaction is induced in micro-domains within the medium that induces a permanent chemical change in the said domains. For optical storage media that are comprised of a polymeric matrix impregnated with a photoactivatable dye, the chemical change involves transformation of the dye, for example, into a fluorescent moiety. The written micro-domains comprising stored data can be subsequently “read” by photo-irradiation that causes them to emit fluorescence. U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,466,080 and 4,471,470 disclose the use of a plurality of intersecting beams to localize the writing and reading of information in 3-D photochromic optical memory media. U.S. Pat. No. 5,034,613 discloses a more simplified method that utilizes a single highly focussed beam to record and read information via a two-photon excitation. A two-photon photoactivation of a fluorescent dye that is non-fluorescent until photochemically modified has been also reported. However, the useful lifetime of such two-photon excitation processes that rely on fluorescence modulation is limited by photobleaching that occurs with multiple reads of the written data. This limitation may be attributed to the fact that the photoexcitation energies for the read process in these media induce photochemical degradation or crosslinking of the polymeric matrix and render them optically less transmissive. Thus the data stored within the media can no longer be read efficiently by the optical source. Another major limitation in this type of media is “cross-talk” between the planes, wherein the excitation beam strongly contaminates the planes above and below the focal plane on which data is being written. Since writing with 3-D resolution in these stacked array systems is accomplished by a nonlinear two-photon excitation of the medium to confine data storage to the focal plane, such contamination or “cross-talk” seriously limits both storage capacity and integrity of stored data.
The second approach for providing 3-D optical storage media uses storage materials that are capable of undergoing a photochemically induced localized change in material refractive index during the “write” process. This is accomplished by initiating a photochemical reaction such as photo-crosslinking in micro-domains within the material, thereby causing a localized change in the material refractive index of said domains relative to the surrounding media. These changes are subsequently “read” by an optical source that is capable of recognizing the change in light transmission properties within the material caused by the alteration in refractive index. U.S. Pat. No. 5,289,407 discloses a technique for writing and reading data in a three dimensional multi-layered format wherein information is written as submicron voxels (i.e. domains that are processible by means of visualizing 3-D shapes and structures by utilizing a series of cross-sectional images) of modified refractive index domains that are induced by a photo-crosslinking reaction initiated by a two-photon excitation process of a polymeric medium. An array of optically refractive “beads” is formed in a plurality of stacked planes. The written information is subsequently read with 3-D resolution using differential interference contrast microscopy. Although such storage media are not susceptible to photobleaching as in the case of the fluorescent dye impregnated type, their limitations include the following: 1) The photopolymer comprising the medium has to be irradiated with UV light prior to its use for writing optical data to gel the sample in order to prevent distortion due to shrinkage and flow, and 2) This pre-gelation process typically results in crosslink densities within the polymeric medium that are non-uniform, thereby resulting in varied refractive indices within the bulk medium. This, in turn, can result in reduced storage capacity due to domains of high crosslink density or “dead-spots” within the gel that are non-writable, as well as substantial loss in sensitivity for reading stored data.
Another drawback in existing optical data storage and retrieval methods in conventional media is that the photon excitation energies for the write and the read process are substantially similar. In dye-doped polymer media, for example, the data writing process typically involves a two-photon excitation of the impregnated dye matrix in micro-domains so as to render the dye in the said domains to become it fluorescent. The written micro-domains are subsequently read by photoexcitation of the fluorescent domains and analyzing their emission patterns. Since the “read” process requires photon energies that are similar in magnitude as those required for writing, written data can be contaminated by “overwriting” during the read process. This limitation is inherent in optical storage media that function via a photo-induced optical refractive index change during the write process, since the subsequent optical read process can cause contamination or “overwrite” problems, resulting in data degradation (“memory loss”) over multiple read cycles. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of circuit board testing. More specifically, the invention relates to a system and method for digitally testing for shorts, opens and connected nodes on printed circuit boards using automatic test equipment.
2. Background Art
Testing complex digital circuitry at the circuit board level is frequently performed on an Automated Test Equipment (ATE) system. The HPFTS40 functional test system, available from Hewlett Packard Company, Palo Alto, Calif., is an example of such an ATE system. The preferred embodiment of the present invention is implemented using the HPFTS40.
Testing performed on an ATE system includes functional test and in-circuit test. Functional test conventionally involves providing input signals to the external inputs of a circuit board or printed wiring board (PWB) under test and observing output signals from the external outputs of the PWB. This type of testing becomes quite complex for large circuits and generally provides limited diagnostics. Both in-circuit testing and functional testing on ATE systems enables nodes on a printed circuit board to be tested for short circuits, open circuits, interconnects or other manufacturing or device defects, by driving selected nodes on the circuit board and observing the response at other nodes. In-circuit testing entails utilizing contact probes which can contact internal nodes on the circuit board. Signals are applied to and received from the board via these probes. Detailed diagnostics are available from in-circuit testing. Functional testing is normally performed from an edge connector on the circuit board.
Both functional and traditional digital in-circuit testing require that power be applied to the board being tested. Applying power, however, can damage components if short circuits are present. Therefore, it is desirable to perform a low power shorts test to detect and correct short circuits and other misconnections prior to subjecting the board to full power.
Interconnect tests can be performed as part of either a functional test or an in-circuit test. Interconnect tests seek to locate problems which are introduced during mounting of the integrated circuit (IC) chips on the PWB. An interconnect test involves testing each conductive "net" or "node" on tile PWB to ensure that it connects the proper devices (for example, input and/or output buffers of one or more IC chips). A "net" or "node" is defined as an equipotential surface formed by a physical conductor. The primary problems that are tested for are open-circuits and short-circuits. Open-circuits frequently result from broken pins or "cold" solder joints. Short-circuits may be caused by excess solder bridging the gap from one IC pin connection to the next.
Historically, in-circuit and/or functional testing on an ATE system enables nodes on a printed circuit board to be tested for short circuits by driving the nodes on the circuit board with analog instruments. Analog instruments allow low voltages to be used to drive the circuit board pins, or nodes, and accurate measurements can be made. Typically an analog measurement is less susceptible to noise errors because measurement can be accomplished using a long integration cycle. The problem with analog testing is that signal throughput is slow. Digital testing can significantly improve signal throughput. The cost of utilizing digital signals is that measurements made utilizing long integration cycles are not possible because of the step-like characteristic of digital signals. Therefore errors are more prevalent. Attempts have been made to use digital signals when performing functional testing of circuit boards. However, special equipment has been required to reduce signal errors. Such special equipment includes damped drivers and receivers with filters. This special equipment adds cost and size to the testing system. Even utilizing such special equipment, digital shorts testing has not achieved satisfactory results.
What is needed is a system and method for performing low powered interconnect tests with increased throughput for test signals in an automatic test environment without requiring specialized equipment, while maintaining the accuracy associated with traditional analog test systems. | {
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This invention relates generally to keyboard trays and, more specifically, to a keyboard tray apparatus which provides easier attachment and adjustability.
With the expansive growth in the field of personal computers, a similar growth in the field of computer accessories has occurred. As the use of computers has increased, so too have the incidents of office workers suffering from fatigue, numbness or tingling in the arms, hands and wrists, carpal tunnel syndrome and other maladies. To combat or prevent these problems, it is necessary for the computer user to maintain the proper posture and hand position when using the keyboard of a computer. Many keyboard accessories accomplish this by providing a keyboard tray slidably coupled to a desk or table. This design is problematic, however, since different computer users have varying arm lengths and body heights which require the keyboard tray to be positioned at varying heights.
To address this problem, some keyboard trays are coupled to an articulating arm which allows for the keyboard tray to be raised or lowered depending upon the needs of the user. Typically, the keyboard tray will be coupled to the articulating arm by an installer. Installation of prior art keyboard trays to prior art articulating arms requires the use of tools and hardware and can be a time-consuming process. Moreover, the removal of the keyboard tray can be necessary when the keyboard tray is in need of repair or replacement, or when one keyboard tray is shared between multiple desks, each having an articulating arm. Where such removal is necessary, it will again involve the same time-consuming process as during installation.
Additionally, some keyboard trays are coupled to a mouse pad to allow the user to engage the use of a mouse on the same plane as the keyboard. However, it is often the case that the mouse pad is fixedly coupled to either the left side of the keyboard (for left-handed users) or the right-side of the keyboard (for right-handed users). If an installer has a right-side mouse, for example, and needs to install a tray/mouse pad combination for a left-handed user, the installer cannot use the right-side mouse/tray combinationxe2x80x94or vice-versa. It is also sometimes necessary for the mouse pad to be in a forward position (close to the user) or in a rear position (away from the user) depending on the needs and preferences of the computer user as well as the shape of the desk or workstation.
Moreover, prior art articulating arms couple to the center of the keyboard tray. However, once the mouse pad is attached, the articulating arm is not centered on the tray/pad combination. This can result in a phenomenon known as xe2x80x9cmouse bounce,xe2x80x9d where use of the mouse causes side-to-side wobbling of the tray.
A need therefore existed for a keyboard tray capable of being removably coupled with relative ease to an articulating arm. A need further existed for a reversible mouse pad capable of being removably coupled in a tool-free manner to either side of a keyboard tray, in either a forward position or a rear position. Still further, a need existed for a tray adapted to be coupled with the arm closer to the mouse pad, so as to reduce or eliminate xe2x80x9cmouse bounce.xe2x80x9d The present invention satisfies these needs and provides other, related advantages.
An object of the present invention is to provide a keyboard tray capable of being removably coupled with relative ease to an articulating arm.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a keyboard tray having a reversible mouse pad capable of being removably coupled in a tool-free manner to either side of a keyboard tray.
It is yet a further object of the present invention to provide a keyboard tray having a mouse pad capable of being coupled to either a forward position or a rear position along the side of a keyboard tray.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a keyboard tray adapted to be coupled to an articulating arm at a point other than the center of the tray, so as to reduce or eliminate xe2x80x9cmouse bounce.xe2x80x9d
In accordance with one embodiment of the present invention, a keyboard tray apparatus is disclosed, comprising, in combination, an articulating arm having a table coupling end and a keyboard tray coupling end, the table coupling end is dimensioned to be coupled to a table, the keyboard tray coupling end comprises a plurality of hooks positioned on opposing sides of the keyboard tray coupling end and dimensioned to couple to a keyboard tray, and a keyboard tray having a top surface and a bottom surface and a first side and a second side, a center portion of the bottom surface defines a plurality of slots dimensioned to mate with the plurality of hooks of the keyboard tray coupling end to secure the keyboard tray to the articulating arm.
In accordance with another embodiment of the present invention, a keyboard tray apparatus is disclosed, comprising, in combination, an articulating arm having a table coupling end and a keyboard tray coupling end, the table coupling end is dimensioned to be coupled to a table, the keyboard tray coupling end is dimensioned to be coupled to a keyboard tray, a keyboard tray having a top surface and a bottom surface and a first side and a second side, the keyboard tray is dimensioned to be coupled to the keyboard tray coupling end of the articulating arm, and a reversible mouse pad having a top surface and a bottom surface and a first side and a second side, the first side comprises at least two arms dimensioned to mate with at least two corresponding sleeves in the first side of the keyboard tray, the at least two arms of the first side of the mouse pad are dimensioned to mate with at least two corresponding sleeves in the second side of the keyboard tray when the mouse pad is reversed so that the bottom surface is facing up and the top surface is facing down.
In accordance with yet another embodiment of the present invention, a keyboard tray apparatus is disclosed, comprising, in combination, an articulating arm having a table coupling end and a keyboard tray coupling end, the table coupling end is dimensioned to be coupled to a table, the keyboard tray coupling end is dimensioned to be coupled to a keyboard tray, a keyboard tray having a top surface and a bottom surface and a first side and a second side, the keyboard tray is dimensioned to be coupled to the keyboard tray coupling end of the articulating arm, the first side and the second side of the keyboard tray each define a forward two-sleeve set and a rear two-sleeve set, the forward two-sleeve set is dimensioned to receive a mouse pad in a forward position and the rear two-sleeve set is dimensioned to receive a mouse pad in a rear position.
The foregoing and other objects, features, and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following, more particular description of the preferred embodiments of the invention, as illustrated in the accompanying drawings. | {
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Precise control of RF voltage applied to a quadrupole in mass spectrometer is generally desirable as the applied RF voltage generally contributes to the ejection and/or filtering of ions in the quadrupole. Hence, the precision to which RF voltage is applied affects the accuracy and reliability of the quadrupole. In order to control the RF voltage, the RF voltage is generally measured via an RF detector and an RF power source controlled in a feedback loop with the RF detector. FIG. 2 depicts an RF detector according to the prior art in which a rectifying diode array is used to measure RF voltage in combination with an averaging circuit, such as an RC filter, for providing an average of the rectified RF voltage. However, such an RF detector suffers from reverse leakage current in the diodes, which in turn leads to instability in the detector resulting in mass drift in the quadrupole and breakdown of the diodes. | {
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According to a known design, the end of the driving shaft comprises a conical section, the surface of which is provided with a series of raised catches which extend parallel to the axis, and a threaded end section.
The conical section is mounted in a recess having a complementary profile, with a smooth wall, formed in the driving head whereas the threaded end protrudes above the upper face of the driving head in order to be screwed into a clamping nut, the annular clamping face of which cooperates with the upper face of the driving head.
The clamping operation in the assembled position of the driving head due to the nut has the effect of causing penetration of the catches into the material forming the wall of the conical recess of the driving head.
The clamping force applied to the nut causes progressive penetration of the catches into the driving head and the catches become impressed into the wall in order to form the rotational driving means of the driving head by the motor shaft.
This particularly simple design has the drawback of varying the axial position of the driving head on the motor shaft as a function of the value of the clamping force, i.e. it does not enable a precise dimension of the driving head in relation to the motor shaft, and therefore in relation to the pane of glass to be wiped, to be determined.
The object of the present invention is to propose a new design of such a windscreen wider device which enables this drawback to be removed. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is broadly concerned with methods for purifying synthetic peptides in which reversible alterations of the physicochemical properties of the peptides are exploited. More particularly, in preferred embodiments, a polymer is added to a desired peptide either by condensation with preformed polymer or by in situ polymerization such that a cleavable linker is interposed between the polymer moiety and the peptide moiety of the resultant polymer-peptide adduct; the adduct is then easily purified from undesired, nonadducted peptides since the adduct and the nonadducted peptides have different solubility characteristics; subsequently, the adduct may be cleaved at the linker and the desired peptide purified from the polymer.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The demand for synthetic peptides in many research fields has increased in recent years, particularly since the advent of solid-phase peptide synthesis. For example, in immunochemistry, peptides as epitopes of proteins are important for antibody production. Also, peptides are often used as ligands in affinity chromatography.
In solid-phase peptide synthesis, amino acids are coupled in stepwise fashion to a peptide attached to an insoluble support contained within a reaction vessel. The insoluble support is composed of a resin which is typically polystyrene. Each successive coupling of an amino acid is carried out by passing the amino acid through the reaction vessel. The amino acid is "protected," i.e., it has a stable but reversible blocking group attached to it which prevents polymerization of that amino acid. Suitable reversible blocking groups include benzyloxycarbonyl, t-butyloxycarbonyl (BOC), and 9-fluorenylmethoxycarbonyl (Fmoc) groups. After the amino acid is coupled to the peptide, the reversible blocking group is removed to allow addition of another amino acid to the peptide.
Amino acid coupling reactions are highly efficient; more than 99% of the peptides have an amino acid added to them during each coupling cycle. However, a small percentage of the peptides fail to receive an amino acid during each coupling cycle; these peptides, referred to as "failed sequences," represent a serious problem in the synthesis of peptides. A 1% failure rate per coupling cycle gives a significant amount of failed sequences at the end of a synthesis having multiple cycles.
For example, a failure rate of 1% per cycle in the syntheses of a 30-residue peptide (29 cycles) and a 50-residue peptide (49 cycles) generates greater than 22% and 39% by weight of failed sequences, respectively, in the final mixtures. Furthermore, a variety of failed sequences different from each other are generated which may be deficient in as little as one residue as compared with the target peptide. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to separate the target peptide from the failed sequences using normal separation techniques since the target peptide and the failed sequences may have nearly identical physicochemical properties. Typically, specifications for peptides call for a purity ranging from 95 to 98%. This level of purity can be attained for peptides having less than 30 residues using high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) as the purification method. However, this level of purity cannot be attained for larger peptides using HPLC or other state-of-the-art purification techniques.
In the past, this separation problem has been alleviated somewhat by passing a "capping" reagent through the reaction vessel in order to "cap" failed sequences. The presence of the reversible blocking group on a coupled amino acid prevents capping of the elongating target peptide. This cap prevents failed sequences from participating in subsequent coupling cycles. Thus, the sequences that fail early in the peptide synthesis are substantially shorter than the target peptide and therefore have different physicochemical properties that can be exploited in separation techniques. Typical capping reagents include acetic anhydride and 4-methoxybenzoic acid.
Despite the use of capping reagents, separation of the target peptide from failed sequences remains a serious problem. Affinity chromatography methods have been proposed wherein a target peptide is biotinylated while failed sequences are not Journal of Chromatography, 638:21-27 (1993); Tetrahedron Letters, 36:9097-9100 (1995)!. The biotinylated peptide and the failed sequences are then cleaved from the support and passed through an expensive avidin-agarose column to adsorb the biotinylated peptide. The adsorbed biotinylated peptide is then eluted from the column and treated with base to release the biotin moiety and yield the target peptide. These methods have not gained wide acceptance because the presence of the biotin moiety does little to alter the physicochemical properties of the target peptide, and the avidin-agarose column is very expensive and has a limited life-time.
There is accordingly an unsatisfied need in the art for a method for the synthesis and purification of peptides which is simple, uses relatively inexpensive reagents, and provides the desired peptide in good yield and at a high level of purity. | {
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Some engines may be configured to utilize a fuel that includes a mixture or blend of different fuel components. As one example, some engines can utilize E85 which includes a mixture of approximately 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline. Still other engines may be configured as a flex-fuel engine, whereby a plurality of different fuel mixtures may be used by the engine. For example, a flex-fuel engine may be configured to utilize a variety of different blends of ethanol and gasoline including up to 100% gasoline, E10 which includes approximately 10% ethanol and 90% gasoline, E85, and up to 100% ethanol. Thus, engines can utilize a variety of different fuel mixtures. Alternatively, other biofuels such as methanol may be used. The inventors herein have recognized that the use of fuel mixtures that include ethanol or other biofuels such as methanol can result in reduced combustion quality during lower temperature conditions. The inventors have noted that ethanol has a higher temperature of vaporization than gasoline. Thus, the rate of vaporization of the mixed fuel is reduced as the relative concentration of ethanol in the fuel increases. During a start-up of the engine, such as from ambient temperature conditions which may be referred to as a cold start, the reduced vaporization of the mixed fuel due to increased ethanol concentrations may be insufficiently combusted and may result in engine misfire or stall. Thus, under these conditions, one approach has been to increase the total amount of fuel delivered to the engine in order to ensure that sufficient combustion of the fuel occurred. However, the use of additional fuel as a remedy to the reduced vaporization of the mixed fuel can result in increased levels of unburned fuel and products of combustion that are exhausted by the engine.
To address at least some of the above issues, the inventors have provided, as one example, an engine system for a vehicle, including an internal combustion engine having at least one cylinder; a fuel system configured to provide a fuel to the cylinder; an ignition system including at least a spark plug; a control system configured to vary a level of ignition energy provided to the cylinder via the spark plug in response to a composition of the fuel provided to the cylinder by the fuel system. As one example, the control system can respond to a fuel having mixtures of gasoline and alcohol (such as ethanol) in varying relative amounts. A method of operating the engine system by varying a level of ignition energy provided to the engine after a start-up is also provided, whereby the level of ignition energy can be adjusted in response to the temperature of the engine and/or the number of combustion events that have occurred since start-up. In some examples, the adjustment of ignition energy may be accompanied by an adjustment in the amount of fuel delivered to the engine for a given air charge.
In this way, combustion quality can be improved during lower engine temperature conditions regardless of the composition of fuel that is available to the engine. Additionally, by operating the ignition system to provide increased levels of ignition energy under select operating conditions, accelerated degradation of the ignition system that may result from the increased ignition energy may be reduced or minimized. Further, such an approach may also be extended to hot restarts under selected conditions. | {
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The present disclosure relates generally to closures for containers, and relates more particularly to a closure for a container holding contents that are removed from the container with the aid of a utensil such as a spoon or scoop, wherein the utensil is provided as a part of the closure.
Containers are often used for products that are most conveniently removed from the container with the aid of a utensil such as a spoon, scoop, fork, or the like. For example, various food products are offered in containers of the single-serving type such that a consumer can eat the food directly from the container. In many cases, the food is of a type that requires the use of a utensil. However, if the consumer is not at home or in another place where there is ready access to a utensil, the consumer may not be able to consume the product. Accordingly, to increase the convenience for the consumer, manufacturers of such food product containers have developed various container designs that have a utensil attached in a removable fashion. For example, it is common to mold a utensil separately from a lid for the container, and then to fasten the utensil to the lid using adhesive or mechanical means for attaching the utensil. This requires additional post-molding steps in the lid manufacturing process.
Another common approach for providing a utensil is to integrally mold a plastic lid and utensil together in such a fashion that the utensil can be detached by breaking small plastic tabs or sprues that connect the utensil to the lid proper. In some cases, the lid and utensil are initially molded such that the utensil projects radially outwardly from an outer edge of the lid, and then the utensil is folded about its attachment tab such that the lid overlies the utensil. The post-molding operation of folding the utensil under the lid represents a complication of the overall manufacturing process. | {
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When a sample is irradiated while scanning with electrons and secondary charged particles released from the sample are detected, the structure of the surface of the sample can be observed. This is called a scanning electron microscope (hereinbelow, abbreviated as SEM). On the other hand, also by irradiating a sample while scanning with an ion beam and detecting secondary charged particles released from the sample, the structure of the sample surface can be observed. This is called a scanning ion microscope (hereinbelow, abbreviated as SIM). Particularly, when a sample is irradiated with an ion species which is light in mass such as hydrogen or helium, sputtering action becomes relatively small, and it becomes suitable to observe a sample.
Further, the ion beam is more sensitive to information of a sample surface as compared with an electron beam. The reason is that an excitation region of secondary charged particles locally exists more in the sample surface as compared with irradiation of the electron beam. In the electron beam, since the nature as waves of electrons cannot be ignored, an aberration is caused by the diffractive effect. On the other hand, since the ion beam is heavier than electrons, the diffractive effect can be ignored.
By irradiating a sample with an ion beam and detecting ions passed through the sample, information in which the structure of the inside of the sample can also be obtained. This is called a transmission ion microscope. In particular, by irradiating a sample with an ion species which is light in mass such as hydrogen or helium, the ratio of passing through the sample increases, and it is preferable for observation.
On the other hand, by irradiating a sample with an ion species which is heavy in mass such as argon, xenon, or gallium, it is preferable to process the sample by sputtering action. In particular, a focused ion beam (hereinbelow, abbreviated as FIB) device using a liquid metal ion source (hereinbelow, abbreviated as LMIS) is known as an ion beam processor. In recent years, a composite FIB-SEM device of a scanning electron microscope (SEM) and a focused ion beam (FIB) is also used. In the FIB-SEM device, by forming a square hole in a desired place with irradiation of an FIB, a section can be SEM-observed. A sample can also be processed by generating a gas ion of argon, xenon, or the like by a plasma ion source or a gas field ion source and irradiating a sample with the gas ion.
In the ion microscope, a gas field ion source is preferable as the ion source. The gas field ion source supplies gas of hydrogen, helium, or the like to a metal emitter tip having a tip curvature radius of about 100 nm, applies a high voltage of a few kV or higher to the emitter tip to ionize gas molecules, and extracts the resultant as an ion beam. As characteristics, the ion source can generate an ion beam having a narrow energy width and, since the size of the ion generation source is small, generate a fine ion beam.
In the ion microscope, to observe a sample at a high signal-noise ratio, an ion beam of high current density has to be obtained on a sample. For this purpose, the ion radiation angle current density of the ionization ion source has to be made high. To make the ion radiation angle current density high, it is sufficient to increase molecule density of ion material gas (ionization gas) in vicinity of the emitter tip. The gas molecular density per unit pressure is inversely proportional to temperature of gas. Consequently, it is sufficient to cool the emitter tip to extremely low temperature and decrease the temperature of gas around the emitter tip to low temperature. By the operation, the molecule density of the ionization gas in the vicinity of the emitter tip can be made high. The pressure of the ionization gas around the emitter tip can be set to, for example, about 10−2 to 10 Pa.
However, when the pressure of the ion material gas is set to 1 Pa or higher, the ion beam collides with neutral gas, and the ion current decreases. When the number of gas molecules in the field ion source becomes large, the frequency that gas molecules which collide with the wall of a high-temperature vacuum vessel and come to have high temperature collide with the emitter tip increases. Due to this, the temperature of the emitter tip rises, and the ion current decreases. Consequently, the field ion source is provided with an ionization chamber mechanically surrounding the emitter tip. The ionization chamber is formed by using an ion extraction electrode provided so as to be opposed to the emitter tip.
Patent Reference 1 discloses a method of improving the ion source characteristic by forming a small projection at the end of the emitter tip. Non-patent Reference 1 discloses a method of manufacturing the small projection at the end of the emitter tip by using a second metal different from the material of the emitter tip. Non-patent Reference 2 discloses a scanning ion microscope having a gas field ion source for ion-emitting helium.
Patent Reference 2 discloses a method of providing, in positions apart from each other in the circumferential direction of a side wall of a vacuum vessel of an ion source, a plurality of supporting pieces for vibration prevention extending from the inner face of the side wall toward the ion source and whose length can be adjusted from the outside so as to penetrate, and sandwiching a heat insulating material between the inner end of each of the supporting piece and the supporting face to press the ion source, thereby preventing vibration of the ion source. However, inflow of heat from the supporting pieces to the ion source is not considered.
Patent Reference 3 discloses a method of making a spherical device float in a predetermined position over a superconductor material at the time of exposing the sphere device to light.
Patent Reference 4 discloses a liquid metal ion source having a needle-shaped member as an ion emitter, an extraction electrode, and an acceleration electrode, wherein an opening through which an extracted ion passes is provided on the side opposed to the needle-shaped member of the acceleration electrode, and a shield member for preventing sputter particles generated by collision of the extracted ions with each other or with the acceleration electrode from reaching the needle-shaped member is provided.
Patent Reference 5 discloses an electron beam device having a movable diaphragm which can be inserted from a passage of an electron beam, wherein a spare chamber which is communicated with the electron beam device body in vacuum and can be shielded by air lock means, and means for evacuating the spare chamber are provided, and the movable diaphragm is moved to the spare chamber without exposing the electron beam device body to atmosphere, and can be replaced. In the device, without exposing the electron beam device body to atmosphere, the movable diaphragm which is contaminated can be easily replaced or cleaned.
Patent Reference 6 discloses a charged particle beam device which is downsized by using a non-evaporable Getter pump, not an ion pump, as main exhaust means of the electron source.
Patent Reference 7 discloses a gas field ion source provided with a change-over switch for connecting a high-voltage lead-in wire for the extraction electrode to a high-voltage lead-in wire for the emitter tip. In the gas field ion source, after forced discharge process between the ion source outer wall and the emitter tip, that is, so-called conditioning process, discharge between the emitter tip and the extraction electrode can be prevented.
Patent Reference 8 proposes an apparatus for observing and analyzing a failure, a foreign matter, or the like by forming a square hole near an abnormal place in a sample with an FIB and observing the section of the square hole by an SEM device.
Patent Reference 7 proposes a technique of extracting a small sample for transmission electron microscope observation from a bulk sample by using an FIB and a probe. | {
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Curious children attracted to electrical outlets are at risk of shock and injury resulting from touching live contacts or inserting metal objects into plug holes of electrical outlet receptacles. The prior art includes several types of protectors or guards to prevent the accidental or inadvertent insertion of fingers or metallic objects into the receptacle openings of electrical outlets. One such device is an electrically non-conducting dummy plug which can be inserted into the outlet receptacle when the receptacle is not in use. A short-coming of such a device is that it has no means to attach the dummy plug to the outlet when the dummy plug is not in use. A significant disadvantage of such a device is that when not in use, the dummy plug may become lost, misplaced, or broken.
A safety cover comprising a pair of safety plugs connected by a tether is disclosed by Buckshaw, U.S. Pat. No. 5,017,148 issued May 21, 1991. Buckshaw describes a flexible, linear tether having an aperture therein between the two safety plugs so that the tether can be attached to an electrical outlet by a screw. When a safety plug is not in use it is folded away from the receptacle and over the tether exposing an electrical outlet socket. While the Buckshaw apparatus keeps the safety cover in place when not in use, access to the outlet receptacle is crowded or obstructed by the close proximity of the unused safety plug in combination with the tether.
Accordingly, it is an object of this invention to provide a safety plug for protecting conventional duplex electrical outlets that is simple in structure, easy to use, and economical to produce.
Another object of the invention is to provide a safety plug which can be removably attached to conventional duplex electrical outlets without altering or modifying the structure of the outlet.
Another object of this invention is to provide a safety plug that can be quickly and easily employed to protect an outlet receptacle, and easily disengaged when access to the electrical outlet receptacle is desired.
A further object of the invention is to provide a duplex safety plug for a duplex electrical outlet that permits the use of either one or both of the outlet receptacles while the safety plug is still attached to the outlet, whether by means of one of the plugs or by means of the tether attached to the center mount.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide a safety plug protector that can be quickly and easily placed on a conventional duplex electrical outlet to cover and seal it during painting, and then be easily removed after the painting has been completed. | {
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The present invention relates to an anti-bounce device for preventing the multiple shocks of a moving mass after a first shock or impact against another element.
The device of the invention may be used for very different applications. It finds its application more particularly in the field of seismic or acoustic wave sources where a moving mass forcibly strikes a target element against which it is precipitated by gravity and/or drive means. A percussion source for land seismic prospection comprising a mass falling along a guide means towards a target element anchored against the surface of the ground is described in French Pat. No. 2 398 316 and corresponding U.S. Pat. No. 4,205,731. Another, adapted more particularly to use in a borehole, is described in French Pat. No. 2 552 553. The use of drive means for hurling a mass against a target element anchored in a well described in French Pat. No. 2 558 and corresponding U.S. Pat. No. 4,648,478.
When the mass is left free, it generally bounces after impact against the associated target element and then strikes it one of more times with decreasing force. The "signature" of the seismic source, i.e. the shape of the pulses which it emits, comprises then in this case several secondary pulses of decreasing amplitude following the main pulse and this disturbs the seismic recordings corresponding to the seismic reflections from the discontinuities of the sub-soil of the shocks transmitted.
In French Pat. Nos. 1 337 935 and 548313 sound generators are described comprising members vibrating under the effect of the shocks of striking elements hurled towards them, and means for exerting recoil forces which prevent said striking elements from again coming into contact after the first impact.
From the French Pat. No. 2,509,052, and corresponding U.S. Pat. No. 4,505,362 a device is known or preventing multiple shocks on a target element, coupled with the surface of the ground, of a mass guided in its fall by guide means, with these multiple shocks being due to bouncing of the mass after its first impact. This device comprises essentially a deformable element fastened to the guide means and control means adapted for applying the deformable element against the lateral wall of the mass after its first bounce and immobilizing it before it falls again. The control means comprise, for example, a movable member moved radially by the action of a hydraulic cylinder and an impact detector delivering a cylinder control signal.
This device very efficiently stops any falling back of the mass but, because of its transverse position perpendicular to the longitudinal axis of the guide means, its size would not be compatible with the reduced dimensions of boreholes in which the well seismic sources are generally lowered. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a stencil mask for ion plantation used in an Ion Implantation process of semiconductor device fabrication.
2. Related Art
In semiconductor device fabrication, it is important to control a conductivity type and an impurity profile of a silicon single crystal substrate by introducing impurity atoms of III and V families therein. As to methods of introducing impurity atoms, a diffusion method and an ion implantation method are given for examples.
The diffusion method is to thermally diffuse desired atoms in crystal lattices of a substrate. Generally, a glass layer including impurities is formed on a substrate surface, and by a substitution due to an oxidation-reduction reaction between the glass layer and atoms in the substrate, impurity atoms are introduced into the substrate.
However, recently, in response to higher integration of LSI, further precise control of impurities (such as a junction depth and decrease in variation of resistance) has been required, and in response to mass production, improvements of repeatability and processing capacity have also been required.
Accordingly, the importance of the ion implantation method, which is the other example of impurity control methods, has been increased, and the ion implantation method has been used practically as a substitute for a conventional diffusion method. The principle of the method is that ions having high energy are collided with a substrate to bury them physically, and defects are recovered and impurities are activated as carriers by a subsequent heat treatment, When the substrate is made of silicon, ions such as B in the III family, or P, As, or Sb in the V family, for example, are implanted as impurities.
This ion implantation method is basically characterized in that masking for controlling an implantation region is possible. If a material of the mask sufficiently thicker than the range of ions to be implanted is used, the ions stop inside the mask and do not reach into the substrate under the mask. As for such a mask for ion implantation, conventionally, a method using a resist mask having a necessary thickness and formed on a desired region of a substrate by a photolithography process has been employed. However, as for a conventional resist mask produced by a photolithography, there is needed a long process in which a resist mask is formed by applying resist, exposing and developing it, and after the mask is used in an ion implantation process of semiconductor device fabrication, the resist mask no longer required is subjected to ashing for removal and cleaned in conclusion. Therefore, the reduction of processing hours has been required.
Under such a circumstance, recently, an ion implantation technique using a stencil mask for ion implantation was suggested (see “T. Shibata, et al., “Stencil Mask Ion Implantation Technology for High Performance MOSFETs”, IEDM 2000 Proceedings, San Francisco, Calif. (Dec. 11–13, 2000)”). It was reported that in the ion implantation technique, shorter process time, lower manufacturing cost, and decrease in an occupied area of an apparatus to be required are achieved.
Conventional stencil masks for ion implantation have been produced from easily obtainable SOI (Silicon on Insulator) substrates, and each stencil portion is made of a silicon single crystal material. For example, the stencil mask for ion implantation described in the aforementioned reference (T. Shibata, et al.) has a structure that a stencil portion made of silicon and having a thickness of 5–10 μm in which a patter is formed is supported by a base material portion made of silicon and having a thickness of 500 μm. However, when the stencil portion is made of silicon as described above, its lifetime in practical use has come to an issue.
To be more precise, there are problems in that (1) since stress of the stencil portion made of silicon is changed by ion irradiation, its implantation precision is decreased, and (2) since bond of silicon in a stencil mask is broken, silicon atoms are implanted as impurities. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field
This application relates to methods and systems of electronic transactions and particularly relates to mobile secure electronic transactions.
2. Description of the Related Art
Mobile devices with increasing capabilities enable users to communicate with each other and to perform other computing functions. However, while the widespread use of these devices can enable business transactions, it also increases the difficulty of supporting those transactions in a secure way. A need exists for improved methods and systems for enabling a wide variety of electronic transactions. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to a marine propulsion system, and in particular to a transmission system for a counter-rotational propulsion device.
2. Description of Related Art
Many outboard drives of marine watercrafts employ counter-rotational propeller systems which utilize a pair of counter-rotating propellers that operate in series about a common rotational axis. By using propeller blades having a pitch of opposite hands, the dual propeller arrangement provides significant improvement in propulsion efficiency. Such transmissions are common in both outboard motors and in outboard drive units of inboard/outboard motors.
Prior designs of counter-rotational propeller systems, however, are not easily or readily incorporated into existing single propeller outboard drives because of incompatibilities between the components of the old drive units and the counter-rotational propulsion systems. As such, the conversion process usually is not cost efficient. This new propulsion technology thus has generally not been integrated into existing outboard drives.
In addition, prior designs of counter-rotational propulsion systems tend to operate inefficiently when driven in reverse. In prior counter-rotational propulsion system designs, the propulsion system drives both propellers in opposite directions during a forward drive mode, and drives only a rear propeller during a reverse drive mode. The front propeller, however, tends to block the thrust stream produced by the rear propeller and thereby inhibits the performance of the outboard drive when operated in reverse. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Programming and description languages may require a formal syntax to describe data types and their values. Methods are believed to be available for defining data structures using a formal notation, independently of a specific language. The data types defined in accordance with one of these methods may be of a desired complexity and may dynamically change in part. Thus, such data types should be clearly represented for display purposes or to enable user input of values. This should be done for the management of communications networks, since very complex data structures may be processed in these networks.
In various languages and syntax notations, rules exist for textually representing values. Thus, for example, when working with ASN.1 data types in accordance with ITU-T recommendation X.208, the value is represented as a character string in a manner, which is not believed to be very straightforward.
It is believed that the structure of the data type may be recognizable when the form of representation of a tree is used. A representation of this kind is discussed in the reference “IBM TMN Development Platform”, Piscataway, N.J., U.S.A., 1998. Another method is believed to include assigning the value of an attribute to a graphic component by manually creating rules, for example, defining the color of the graphic object by the value of the data type, discussed, for example, in the reference “Objective Systems Integrators: NetExpert Framework Overview”, Folsom, Calif., U.S.A., 1997.
Since any data type definitions at all may be possible, it is believed that the available methods may expend a great deal of time programming a separate graphical user-interface window for each new data type. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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A fuel cell has been proposed as a clean, efficient and environmentally responsible power source for electric vehicles and various other applications. Individual fuel cells can be stacked together in series to form a fuel cell stack for various applications. The fuel cell stack is capable of supplying a quantity of electricity sufficient to power a vehicle. In particular, the fuel cell stack has been identified as a potential alternative for the traditional internal-combustion engine used in modern automobiles.
One type of fuel cell is the polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) fuel cell. The PEM fuel cell includes three basic components: an electrolyte membrane; and a pair of electrodes, including a cathode and an anode. The electrolyte membrane is sandwiched between the electrodes to form a membrane-electrode-assembly (MEA). The MEA is typically disposed between porous diffusion media (DM), such as carbon fiber paper, which facilitates a delivery of reactants, such as hydrogen to the anode and oxygen to the cathode. In the electrochemical fuel cell reaction, the hydrogen is catalytically oxidized in the anode to generate free protons and electrons. The protons pass through the electrolyte to the cathode. The electrons from the anode cannot pass through the electrolyte membrane, and are instead directed as an electric current to the cathode through an electrical load, such as an electric motor. The protons react with the oxygen and the electrons in the cathode to generate water.
It is also known to use other reactants in the PEM fuel cell such as methanol, for example. Methanol may be catalytically oxidized to form carbon dioxide. Protons from the methanol oxidation are transported across the electrolyte membrane to the cathode where they react with oxygen, typically from air, to generate water. As with the hydrogen PEM fuel cell, electrons are transported as an electric current through the external load, such as the electric motor, from the anode to the cathode.
The electrolyte membrane is typically formed from a layer of ionomer. A typical ionomer is a perfluorosulfonic acid (PFSA) polymer, such as Nafion®, commercially available from the E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company. The electrodes of the fuel cell are generally formed from a finely divided catalyst. The catalyst may be any electro-catalyst which catalytically supports at least one of an oxidation of hydrogen or methanol and a reduction of oxygen for the fuel cell electrochemical reaction. The catalyst is typically a precious metal such as platinum or another platinum-group metal. The catalyst is generally disposed on a carbon support, such as carbon black particles, and is dispersed in an ionomer.
The electrolyte membrane, electrodes, and DM are disposed between a pair of fuel cell separator plates and sealed, for example, with a gasket providing a substantially fluid-tight seal. Each of the separator plates may have a plurality of channels formed therein for distribution of the reactants and coolant to the fuel cell. The separator plate is typically formed by a conventional process for shaping sheet metal such as stamping, machining, molding, or photo etching through a photolithographic mask, for example. In the case of a bipolar separator plate, the bipolar separator plate is typically formed from a pair of unipolar plates which are then joined. It is also known to form the separator plate from a composite material, such as a graphite composite or graphite-filled polymer. Undesirably, the known methods for forming the separator plates can be costly and time consuming.
It is also known to manufacture separator plates for fuel cells according to conventional foaming processes, such as with reticulated metal foam materials. However, conventional foaming processes yield non-uniform and random (not ordered) three dimensional microstructures. Certain techniques do exist to create ordered three dimensional microstructures, such as stereolithography techniques; however, these techniques typically rely on a bottom-up, layer-by-layer approach which prohibits production volume scalability.
Radiation-cured structures are described by Jacobsen et al. in “Compression behavior of micro-scale truss structures formed from self-propagating polymer waveguides”, Acta Materialia 55, (2007) 6724-6733, the entire disclosure of which is hereby incorporated herein by reference. One method and system of creating radiation-cured structures is disclosed by Jacobsen in U.S. Pat. No. 7,382,959, the entire disclosure of which is hereby incorporated herein by reference. The system includes at least one collimated light source selected to produce a collimated light beam; a reservoir having a photo-monomer adapted to polymerize by the collimated light beam; and a mask having at least one aperture and positioned between the at least one collimated light source and the reservoir. The at least one aperture is adapted to guide a portion of the collimated light beam into the photo-monomer to form the at least one polymer waveguide through a portion of a volume of the photo-monomer. Further radiation-cured structures are disclosed by Jacobsen in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/801,908, the entire disclosure of which is hereby incorporated herein by reference. A polymer material that is exposed to radiation and results in a self-focusing or self-trapping of light by formation of polymer waveguides is also described by Kewitsch et al. in U.S. Pat. No. 6,274,288, the entire disclosure of which is hereby incorporated herein by reference.
There is a continuing need for a structure and method of manufacturing separator plates for a fuel cell that optimizes fuel cell durability, minimizes tooling costs, minimizes production costs, and minimizes development time. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Disclosure
The present disclosure relates to an input device, and particularly relates to an input device that is able to generate a sharp operation feeling.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, input devices that allow an input operation to be performed by touching an operation surface and are able to provide an operation feeling to an operator by applying vibration to the operation surface have been increased in number. An input device described in PCT Japanese Translation Patent Publication No. 2008-516348 is known as such an input device.
The input device described in PCT Japanese Translation Patent Publication No. 2008-516348 will be described below with reference to FIG. 17. FIG. 17 is a side view showing the configuration of the input device 900 described in PCT Japanese Translation Patent Publication No. 2008-516348.
The input device 900 described in PCT Japanese Translation Patent Publication No. 2008-516348 includes a touchpad 916, a spring 952, and an actuator 954. The touchpad 916 is positioned on one or more springs 952 and held so as to be movable along a Z1-Z2 direction. In addition, the actuator 954 is connected to a lower side (Z2 direction side) of the touchpad 916 and is able to apply a force to the touchpad 916 to move the touchpad 916 along the Z1-Z2 direction. The actuator 954 is a linear voice coil actuator and is able to apply an impact by a short pulse or vibration having a specific desired frequency. As described above, it is possible to provide an operation feeling to the operator by the actuator 954 applying vibration or the like to the touchpad 916. The springs 952 return the touchpad 916 to a stationary position after the touchpad 916 moves up and down by a force from the actuator 954. In addition, the springs 952 are able to provide elastic springing to the touchpad 916 to increase a force outputted by the actuator 954.
Such an input device having a function to provide an operation feeling to the operator by vibration or the like is desired to provide a good operation feeling. A good operation feeling refers to a sharp feeling from which generation and end of vibration or the like are clearly felt. However, the input device 900 described in PCT Japanese Translation Patent Publication No. 2008-516348 has a structure in which the actuator 954 directly presses the touchpad 916, and has a structure in which the touchpad 916 is always pulled downward by the springs 952. Thus, when the touchpad 916 is moved downward (in a Z2 direction) after being moved upward (in a Z1 direction) along the Z1-Z2 direction by activation of the actuator 954, the speed at which the touchpad 916 changes from its upward movement to its downward movement is faster than the speed at which the actuator 954 changes from its upward movement to its downward movement. In other words, the actuator 954 hinders downward movement of the touchpad 916. Thus, it is difficult to clearly feel vibration, and the operation feeling worsens. In addition, the touchpad 916 is returned to the stationary position by the springs 952, but it takes time to terminate the vibration of the springs 952. Thus, the vibration is prolonged to make the operation feeling worse.
The present invention solves the above-described problem and provides an input device that is able to generate a sharp operation feeling. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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A multilayer printed wiring board is known as a technology to permit high-density packaging and the shortest connection of components. The term “connection” as used herein means electrical continuity. An interstitial via hole (IVH) technique is applied to the manufacture of a multilayer printed wiring board in which higher-density packaging is required. The IVH technique is characterized in that a via hole passing through adjacent layers is filled with a conductive material so as to connect the adjacent layers. According to the IVH technique, the interlayer connection can be formed only at a portion where the connection is required. In addition, a component can be mounted on the via hole. Hence, the IVH technique enables high density wiring allowing a high degree of flexibility.
For example, Fujikura Technical Review 107, pp. 37-41 (October, 2004) describes a multilayer printed wiring board manufactured by stacking single-side copper clad polyimide substrates by means of the IVH technique. FIG. 4 is a process drawing illustrating the process of manufacturing the multilayer printed wiring board.
First, a copper foil of a single-side copper clad polyimide substrate (CCL: FIG. 4a) is etched to form a circuit (FIG. 4b). After an adhesive sheet 23 is laminated on the single-side copper clad polyimide substrate (FIG. 4c), via holes are formed by a perforation process utilizing laser irradiation (FIG. 4d). After the via holes are filled with a conductive paste by screen printing, a substrate 26′ that is manufactured by the same method and a single-side copper clad substrate 27 including a circuit are stacked on the adhesive sheet 23 while adjusting their positions. Their interply adhesion is performed altogether by heating under pressure so that a multilayer printed wiring board is formed.
For the purpose of filling such a via hole, a conductive paste which is made by dispersing conductive fillers such as metal powders in a resin binder is widely used. For example, Patent document 1 discloses a conductive paste composition used for filling a via hole, which composition is made of a liquid epoxy resin in which a plurality of electroconductive powders having different average particle diameters are dispersed. According to the description of Patent document 1, the fill ration of the electroconductive powders in a via hole can be increased by blending the electroconductive powders having different average particle diameters, and consequently the reliability of connection can be improved.
Patent Document 1: Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2003-92024.
Non-patent Document 1: Fujikura Technical Review 107, pp. 37-41 (October, 2004) | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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As the popularity of cable television services increases, new consumer devices may become available for home use. For example, new types of consumer devices such as cable ready televisions, cable tuners, and video cassette recorders may be connected to cabling which carries the transmission of the cable television services for use by consumers in their homes. As the number of consumer devices used in the home increases, the cabling needed inside the home may also increase and become unwieldy. As a result, the cabling may be integrated into the structure of the home, for example in the walls and floors. It is known to use coaxial cable having an impedance of 75 ohms in some cable systems for the transmission of the cable television services.
The cabling may conduct television signals and other signals which include the cable television services, and Direct Current (DC) voltages or Alternating Current (AC) voltages for controlling the consumer devices. For example, a television signal and a DC voltage may be transmitted over the cabling to provide a video signal and a DC voltage for controlling a cable tuner.
Other devices, such as Personal Computers (PCs), are also used in consumers' homes. Some of these devices may be capable of communicating with other devices, such as the consumer devices described above. Unfortunately, separate wiring may be needed to provide the communications between the devices. For example, a serial data cable may be needed to connect two PCs. Unfortunately, if the PCs are located in different areas of the home, the serial data cable may need to be long which may make the serial data cable expensive and unwieldy. Therefore, a need exists to further improve communications between devices such as consumer devices and PCs. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The present invention pertains to a bracket for attachment to a movable window and connection to an automotive window lifting mechanism.
In vehicles, and especially automobiles, it is highly desirable to have movable windows. With reference to automobiles, windows are displaceable upwardly and downwardly relative to a door assembly by use of a manual crank or an electrically driven window lifting mechanism. Many window lifting mechanisms include a scissoring linkage which transfers motion from a manual crank or electric drive to a window connected to the window lifting mechanism. The scissoring linkage is used in order to limit the movement of the window in a generally vertical direction. A cross member is attached to the scissoring linkage to provide a support for the movable window.
Mounting brackets or window lift brackets are often used to attach the movable window to the cross member attached to the scissoring linkage. These brackets generally are attached to a mounting edge of the window at two spaced apart locations and a portion of the bracket is attached to the window lifting cross member.
Prior art brackets presented many problems in a movable window assembly, are difficult to manufacture, and are relatively expensive. With regard to the problems associated with prior art window lift brackets, these brackets are typically manufactured from a stamped strip of metal which has been deformed to a specified bracket configuration. These deformed metal components are subject to damage and failure as the result of corrosion thereby providing a weak link in the movable window assembly.
With regard to the manufacturability of such prior art window lift brackets, many opportunities for complications and defect arise. We will briefly review the numerous steps involved in producing a window lift bracket as found in the prior art in order to appreciate and elaborate on the aforementioned problems. Initially, a strip of metal is stamped or cut to a desired size. Next, the metal component is stamped, bored or drilled to provide through holes which will be used as described here and below. The stamped metal component is deformed to form a bracket having a generally "Y" shaped cross section. The deformed metal component must now be protected by painting, anodizing or other means to delay the corrosion process. Once protected, plastic mounted clips are positioned in a channel portion of the bracket and secured in the thru holes by use of a heat staking process. The base of the bracket is drilled for receiving a fastener which will be used to attach the bracket to the lift mechanism cross member.
In applying the prior art lift bracket to window, an adhesive is disposed in the channel portion of the lift bracket and the lift bracket is attached to the mounted edge of a movable window. The window, with two or more brackets positioned thereon, is subjected to a heat curing process in order to cure the adhesive. A heat curing adhesive is used in order to properly adhere the adhesive to the surfaces of the bracket and window.
As may be understood from the description hereinabove, there are numerous opportunities for problems to arise in the manufacture of a window lift bracket as set forth by the prior art. For example, if the bracket is not properly formed it may not properly fit on the window or function in the movable window assembly. In each step of the fabrication process a new operation, coating, or joining method is used, each presenting its own opportunity for problems.
For example, as mentioned, clips must be used with the deformed metal bracket in order to prevent the bracket from scratching the window glass and the protective coating on the window. The plastic clips are an individual piece part which must be designed, purchased, and managed in the manufacturing system. The clips are typically produced by selectively cutting an extruded plastic strip. Each clip must be cut to a generally precise dimension thereby requiring an additional inspection step. The clips must also be heat staked to the metal bracket. The heat staking process deforms a portion of the plastic clip over an abutting portion of the metal bracket. If the plastic portion is not properly melted, it may not be securely held to the metal bracket which could result in a release of the window from the bracket under certain circumstances. Clearly, it is not desirable to have a release of the window from the bracket.
Additionally, an adhesive is disposed in a channel portion of the metal bracket to secure the window to the bracket. The adhesive must be selected to attach or adhere to the plastic clip, the metal bracket (or the protective surface of the metal bracket) and the window glass and/or coating. The numerous and diverse material properties involved can make selection of an appropriate adhesive somewhat difficult. Further, if the metal bracket begins to corrode, the corrosion could result in the adhesive detaching from the metal bracket.
As may be clear, there are numerous problems associated with the manufacture and use of metal window lift brackets as currently used in the prior art. As such, it is important to find a window lift bracket which will overcome the problems associated with the prior art devices. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Technical Field
This invention relates generally to methods, systems and apparatus for managing digital data transmission and/or communications systems.
2. Description of Related Art
Digital subscriber line (DSL) technologies can provide large bandwidth for digital communication over existing telephone subscriber lines (also referred to as loops and/or the copper plant) and can adjust to the characteristics of a line by using discrete multitone (DMT) line code that assigns a number of bits to each tone (or sub-carrier), adjustable to channel conditions determined during training and initialization (typically by transceivers that are both transmitters and receivers) at each end of the subscriber line.
In DSL communications systems, significant performance gains can be achieved by reducing the crosstalk that occurs among the twisted pairs, as is well known by those skilled in the art. One such technique for reducing crosstalk is to suppress the far-end crosstalk by jointly processing the signals transmitted and/or received by a group of lines, commonly referred to and described as “vectoring.” When vectoring is applied to improve performance in the downstream transmission direction among a group of lines that do not have a common termination point, then joint signal processing can only take place at the transmitter side. This joint signal processing is often described as preceding.
Systems, apparatus, methods and techniques that improve precoding would represent a significant advancement in the art. More specifically, systems, apparatus, methods and techniques for implementing such precoding that are implementation adaptive to changes in the channel and noise, permit dynamic subtraction based on power limitation and utilize modulo operation and dither signal likewise would represent a significant advancement in the art. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The invention set forth in this specification pertains to new and improved hand trucks. More specifically it pertains to new and improved hand trucks which are constructed so as to employ wheel units having multiple wheels. The use of such wheel units makes the hand trucks of the present invention especially desirable for use in moving loads both upon a horizontal surface and in moving loads up and down stairs.
Most conventional hand trucks are constructed so as to utilize an elongated, normally vertically extending body or frame carrying at its lower end a toe plate extending from the front of the frame and carrying wheels or wheel means generally at each side of the frame and adjacent to the back of the frame adjacent to the lower end of the frame. Such a hand truck normally includes handles or handle means attached to the frame adjacent to or at the upper end of the frame for use in manipulating the hand truck and, when a load is carried upon it, the hand truck and the load from one location to another. Such conventional hand trucks have been employed for many years in many different applications and are satisfactory for many different uses.
During the normal use of such a conventional hand truck an object or load is located on the toe plate of the hand truck generally adjacent to or against the frame or body and the hand truck is tilted back as it is supported by the handles so that the weight supported by the wheels is reasonably "balanced" relative to the wheels as the hand truck is thereafter moved and/or manipulated. Frequently there is a problem in maintaining such a "balance" with a hand truck. Also on occasion the movement of such a hand truck as, for example, in moving the hand truck up or down a flight of stairs or over a curb can be a significant problem.
As a result of the recognition of such problems a large number of different hand truck constructions have been proposed to facilitate the manipulation and movement of a hand truck in transporting loads both upon vertical surfaces and up and down stairs. It is not considered that an understanding of the present invention requires any sort of a discussion of the various expedients which have been proposed and to various extents used to facilitate the use of a hand truck in moving loads. Many of such expedients have proved reasonably desirable and utilitarian. In spite of this it is considered that there is still a need for new and improved hand trucks for use in moving loads of various different types either along a generally vertical surface or up and down various types of stairs or related structures. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to applications involving the Internet, and in particular, to a system and method for operating scientific instruments over wide area networks such as the Internet.
2. Description of Related Art
Access to sophisticated scientific instruments is often difficult and problematic for most researchers. Usually, only wealthy organizations can afford such instruments, making it difficult for researchers at smaller or less well off organizations to perform necessary experiments. Educational institutions especially can rarely afford all the equipment needed to provide adequate scientific training. In addition, there are often only one or few such instruments available in a geographic area, or the world at large, requiring researchers to travel in order to use the instruments. As a result, such instruments may not be used effectively or continuously.
The advent of the Internet holds the promise for resolving these and other problems. More specifically, the present invention solves these problems by providing real-time access to remote devices, such as scientific instruments, using the Internet. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a gate valve mounted on a vacuum chamber in a semiconductor processing apparatus and used for opening and closing an opening communicating with the vacuum chamber and, more specifically to a non-sliding gate valve configured to be capable of opening and closing the opening without sliding.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a semiconductor processing apparatus, a gate valve is used for opening and closing an opening communicating with a vacuum chamber. The gate valve generally includes a valve plate configured to open and close the opening, a valve shaft coupled to the valve plate, and an air cylinder coupled to the valve shaft, and is configured to open and close the opening by bringing a valve seal of the valve plate toward and away from a valve seat surface around the opening by operating the valve shaft with the air cylinder.
Examples of the gate valves include a system for opening and closing a valve plate by causing the valve shaft to tilt about a point as a pivot point and a system for opening and closing the valve plate by moving the valve shaft and the valve plate vertically with respect to the valve seat surface.
From these systems, in the gate valve of the system of opening and closing the valve plate by tilting the valve shaft, since the valve seal receives a predetermined pressing force after coming into contact with the valve seat surface, if the tilting movement of the valve shaft is continued, the valve plate is displaced with respect to the valve seat surface in the direction along the seat surface. Consequently, friction may be generated between the valve seal and the valve seat surface, or the valve seal may rotate within a mounting groove, whereby abrasion powder is generated which may be detrimental to cleaning of the valve.
In contrast, in the gate valve of the system for opening and closing the valve plate by moving the valve shaft and the valve plate vertically with respect to the valve seat surface, since no friction is generated between the valve seal and the valve seat surface, there is no fear of generation of the abrasion powder. Patent Document, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 11-351419, described below discloses a non-sliding gate valve in which no friction is generated between the valve seal and the valve seat surface. This gate valve includes a plurality of links, cam followers and guide grooves interposed between a drive rod (propelling shaft) of the air cylinder and the valve shaft (valve rod), and is configured to close the opening by moving the valve plate from an open position to a position facing the opening in parallel with respect to the valve seat surface around the opening, and then moving the valve plate vertically with respect to the valve seat surface. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Various messaging systems are available that allow users to exchange messages to conduct continuous device enabled conversations. Applicant has identified a number of deficiencies and problems associated with conventional message exchanging systems. Through applied effort, ingenuity, and innovation, many of these identified problems have been solved by developing solutions that are included in embodiments of the present disclosure, many examples of which are described in detail herein. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Interior and exterior construction boards with cores of plaster, cement, or hybrid materials, such as cement boards or gypsum boards, are used in a wide variety of indoor and outdoor structural applications. For example, cement boards are used as a support surface for overlying materials such as wood siding, stucco, synthetic stucco, aluminum, brick, tile, stone aggregate and marble. In addition, cement boards are used in exterior insulating systems, commercial roof deck systems, and exterior curtain walls.
Generally, cement boards contain a core formed of a cementitious material which is interposed between two layers of facing material. The facing material advantageously contributes flexural and impact strength to the high compressive strength but brittle material forming the hardened cementitious core. In addition, the facing material can provide a durable surface and/or other desirable surface properties to the cement board.
One material which has been used to form facing sheet material is glass fibers. In addition to increased dimensional stability in the presence of moisture, glass fiber facings provide greater physical and mechanical properties to the cement board. As described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,371,989 to Lehnert et al., the method of making cement boards containing glass fiber facing sheets typically consists of providing a continuous feed of the facing material and depositing a cementitious slurry onto the top surface of the facing material. A second continuous feed of facing material is then applied to the top surface of the slurry. The slurry is then dried to harden the cementitious composition and to integrate the facing material in the cement board. The cement board is cut to a predetermined length for shipping and for its eventual use.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,647,496 to Lehnert et al. describes the use of randomly oriented fibrous glass mats as the facing material for gypsum boards. Additionally, U.S. Pat. No. 5,397,631 to Green et al. describes coating a gypsum board including a randomly oriented glass mat with a water-resistant resinous binder to prevent the deterioration of the bond between the gypsum and the glass mat.
An alternative to the randomly oriented fibrous glass mats to reinforce cement boards is the use of open mesh glass scrims formed from continuous glass yarns. Because these scrims contain continuous yarns, they possess greater tensile strength than the randomly oriented fibrous glass mats. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,993,882 to Knauf et al. describes using a facing sheet formed of a glass fabric. In addition, published European patent application 637,658 to Bay Mills Limited describes the use of glass rovings to form nonwoven scrims for stucco boards.
In order to reduce glass usage, the mesh size of the glass scrims may be increased thus reducing the number of yarns or "picks per inch" in the transverse and/or the longitudinal direction without reducing the strength of the cement board. Nevertheless, the resulting increase in the size of the mesh openings in the glass fiber facing sheet causes other problems. Particularly, when the open mesh facing is applied to a cementitious slurry, pitting or the formation of indentations may occur in the center of the mesh openings which negatively affects the aesthetic appearance and surface properties of the cement board. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the present invention relate, in general, to distance measuring equipment and particularly to reducing the effects of systematic error in the analog to digital conversion of detected laser pulses.
2. Relevant Background
Laser range finding apparatuses determine distance measurements based on a round trip calculation of the time of flight of laser pulses. The detection of reflected laser pulses depends on photodiodes, and the two major categories of receiver photodiodes used in laser detection are P-type Intrinsic N-type (“PIN”) diodes and avalanche photodiodes (“APD”).
When using time of flight to measure distances, the time of flight is the time needed for a laser pulse to travel from the laser range finder to the target and back. Here, the term “reflected pulse” means a laser pulse that has been reflected from a target, and the term “detected pulse” means a reflected pulse that has been detected at a detection unit, i.e. a receiver photodiode. For a pulse to be detected it must be of sufficient intensity to distinguish itself from noise.
While this concept is theoretically simple, in practice it is more difficult to obtain readings due to the variability of a number of factors. For example, different targets can have different surface characteristics such as color and can be positioned in different environments having different backgrounds. Different colors and backgrounds can affect the intensities of the reflected laser pulses. Therefore, even when the distances from the laser range finder to a first target and to a second target are identical, the intensity of the detected pulses from the first and second targets may be substantially different.
Most long distance laser range finders utilize APDs. APDs possess an electro-optic gain which eliminates or significantly reduces the effect of noise produced by the receiver. A PIN diode does not provide such an electro-optic gain thus requiring the received signal to distinguish itself over an often substantial amount of noise. Thus, while the PIN diode functions adequately for short range returns wherein the signal to noise ratio is relatively high, long range detection has long relied on APD based detectors. Unfortunately, APDs are substantially more expensive than PIN diodes. Thus, a design tradeoff is often made between the competing factors of cost and performance.
Theoretically, the noise associated with a PIN diode based detection circuit can be accommodated for by firing more pulses and summing the results. Random noise is proportional to the summation of the square root of the number of pulses while the actual laser return signal varies linearly with the number of pulses. Accordingly, the more pulses you fire the better the signal to noise ratio. However, in practice, a limit is placed on this approach by resolution of the Analog to Digital Converter (“ADC”) and systematic noise induced into the system that is linked to the clock running the ADC. Thus, the limit of using PIN diodes has been associated with a combination of the ADC resolution and systematic noise correlated with the clocking frequency that is running the ADC.
Systematic noise in ADCs is synchronized with the edge of the clock pulse driving the ADC. This type of noise is well known to one skilled in the relevant art and is often regarded as insignificant as compared to other sources of error such as random noise. However, as other sources of noise are addressed, this systematic noise source becomes problematic. And, while error linked with the running of a clock found in a processor or an Application Specific Integrated Circuit (“ASIC”), and the like can be shielded from the detection circuit, systematic error associated with an ADC remains a challenge. ADC systematic error is induced by the actual working components of the ADC. ADC designs include switches that alternate between multiple parallel pathways to convert analog signals to digital signals. This switching is linked to the clock frequency and other sub-harmonic clock frequencies resulting in systematic noise.
These errors act to mask the detection of incoming signals in PIN diodes. While the use of certain ADCs can overcome many of these problems, the cost associated with such a solution is prohibitive. Reducing the effects of correlated noise, spurious signals, and systematic clock errors associated with an ADC is desirable. | {
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Work machines of the type used to remove downed timber from timber harvest areas oftentimes must navigate across rough terrain consisting of uneven ground slopes and obstacles such as stumps, downed timber and rocks. For certain work machines such as the forwarder which are required to traverse this type of terrain while transporting heavy loads it becomes important to maintain the load in a substantially horizontal orientation so as to prevent tipping of the work machine.
A prior art example of a method of automatically adjusting a body of a tractor to a horizontal position can be found can be found in U.S. Pat. No. 6,131,919 which issued on Oct. 17, 2000 to Lee et al. Although the arrangement and corresponding method taught by Lee et al. may be adequate for its intended purpose, it fails to teach an arrangement and method thereof for ensuring that all of the wheels of the work machine remain in contact with the grounds surface.
The subject invention is directed at overcoming one or more of the problems as set forth above. | {
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This invention relates to a method of testing semiconductor chips in multiple stacked configurations with different rotational interconnections and optimizing a stacked chip yield.
Bonding of multiple substrates is required to enable three-dimensional integration of semiconductor chips. Two semiconductor substrates are processed independently, and subsequently brought into physical contact with each other so that one chip in one substrate overlies another chip in another substrate. The functionality of each stacked chip requires functionality of each individual chip within the stacked chip.
Referring to FIG. 1, a commonly encountered situation in manufacturing of stacked semiconductor chips is schematically illustrated. A first wafer has a high yield area, which is herein referred to as a “first wafer high yield area,” and a low yield area, which is herein referred to as a “first wafer low yield area.” Also, second wafer has a high yield area, which is herein referred to as a “second wafer high yield area,” and a low yield area, which is herein referred to as a “second wafer low yield area.”
Because semiconductor chips in each wafer are patterned in the same orientation, the first wafer and the second wafer must be bonded with a unique predetermined azimuthal orientation relative to each other. For example, the requirement for functional bonding between the first and second substrates may be that the notch of the first wafer matches the notch of the second wafer when bonded. In general, once a first wafer and a second wafer to be bonded are determined, there is a one-to-one correspondence between chips on the first substrate and chips on the second substrate. The first and second wafers cannot be expected to produce functional stacked chips if bonded with a relative rotation.
Because the distribution of high yield areas and low yield areas are statistical, the first wafer high yield area may overlie the second wafer low yield area upon bonding, and the first wafer low yield area may overlie the second wafer high yield area upon bonding. In such a case, the yield of the stacked chips is low across the entire bonded structure because the functionality of a stacked chip requires functionality of both an upper chip from the first wafer and a lower chip from the second wafer. | {
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The present invention relates to the art of floating docks and, more particularly, to an improved deck structure for a floating dock.
Floating docks are of course well known and, generally, are comprised of a deck structure suitably secured to underlying sealed metal drums, styrofoam floats, hollow or foam filled plastic floats and the like. Examples of floating docks using hollow or cored plastic float drums and the structures of such drums are disclosed in my prior U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,683,833; 4,799,445; and 4,974,538 which are incorporated herein by reference. As disclosed in the earlier two of my foregoing patents, a floating dock may be comprised of a plurality of dock sections suitably interconnected to provide a floating dock assembly, and the deck structure for each dock section is comprised of a rectangular frame having side and end members of wood or metal, and decking in the form of wooden deck boards. The deck boards have opposite ends overlying and secured to the side members of the frame, whereby the frame and decking is a unitary structure. In such prior deck structures, rigid fastening of the opposite ends of the deck boards to the side members of the frame is often necessary to assure rigidity and structural integrity with respect to the deck structure. In order to provide boaters using the dock with utilities such as electricity and water, lines for the latter can be supported beneath the decking such as by an electrical raceway and/or waterlines secured to the underside of the deck boards or to the insides of the side and end members of the frame. If the frame is constructed from metal members, a wooden bump board is usually secured at least to the outer sides of the side members of the frame, and cleats are secured to the top sides of the deck boards to facilitate the tying of boats to the dock.
When it becomes necessary or desirable to access the interior of the deck structure beneath the deck boards for purposes of, for example, inspection, maintenance and/or replacement with respect to the frame components, float drums and/or utility lines, such access is both difficult and time consuming to achieve. In this respect, each of the deck boards must be removed from the frame in the area of the floating dock to be accessed, and this requires removing the individual fasteners such as screws or bolts by which the deck boards are secured to the underlying frame members. Both the difficulty and normal time required to remove such fasteners can be increased if the fasteners have rusted, and if the deck cleats span two adjacent deck boards then the cleats also have to be removed. Moreover, the deck boards have to be replaced following the inspection, maintenance or other operation necessitating access to the interior of the deck structure, and such replacement is likewise time consuming and tedious. If the utility lines are secured to the undersides of the deck boards, even more time is required because of the care which has to be taken to preclude damaging the lines. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a subsea pipe attachment and receiving assembly for use in subsea pipeline repairs.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There are thousands of miles of pipelines laying on the seabed. Pipe laying technology permits pipelines to be laid in extremely shallow water depths to water depths of thousands of feet. A serious problem results when a subsea pipeline in deep water is damaged and in need of repair. A few examples of how a subsea pipeline can be damaged are by an object impacting the pipeline, an anchor dragging across the pipeline, or corrosion.
Typically, to repair a damaged submerged pipeline in the past, a couple of repair methods were available. One repair method required the damaged section of the pipeline to be recovered to the water surface and the necessary repairs were conducted on the deck of a vessel. After the repair was made the pipeline was lowered and repositioned on the seabed. This method was generally limited to small diameter pipelines in relatively shallow water. A second method involved conducting the repair in situ by divers, using either repair clamps or hyperbaric welding techniques. This method had also limitations related to water depth and pipeline size.
It is known to use a remotely operated vehicle (ROV) in deep water to sever and recover a submerged pipeline. U.S. Pat. No. 5,044,827 to Gray et al. discloses a method for severing and recovering a submerged pipeline. The ROV jets beneath a portion of the pipeline and then a deflated lift bag is lowered to the submerged pipeline. The deflated lift bag is positioned under the submerged pipeline and then inflated until a section of the pipeline has been raised off of the seabed. A cut-off saw is lowered to the raised section of the pipeline. The cut-off saw is clamped to the pipeline prior to severing the pipeline. The cut-off saw is then removed from the severed pipeline. A recovery head is lowered to the raised end of the severed pipeline and after alignment is placed in the raised end of the severed pipeline. The recovery head is activated to establish a gripping relationship with the pipeline. A recovery cable is lowered and connected to the recovery head. The recovery cable is retrieved to recover the recovery head and the pipeline to the water surface.
As the offshore pipeline industry continues to venture into deeper and deeper waters, more and more pipelines of increasing diameter are being laid in water depths beyond the range of divers. Due to a variety of factors such as pipeline size, seabed bearing capacity, sea currents, and lay barge daily rates, a reliable and dependable method for repairing submerged pipelines without retrieval to the water surface is needed. The method should minimize the amount of handling of the damaged pipeline. Furthermore, the method of repairing the pipeline should minimize costs and dependency on vessel motions due to sea conditions, such as heave, roll, or pitch, which can result in a significant amount of standby time and cost.
It is desirable to have a subsea pipe attachment and receiving assembly for use in subsea pipeline repairs which can sever a pipeline at a nominal distance above the seabed to allow the damaged section of pipeline to be removed. It is further desirable to have a subsea pipe attachment and receiving assembly which aligns and manipulates a replacement spool to be installed between the severed ends of the subsea pipeline. Furthermore, the subsea pipe attachment and receiving assembly should be operable with the use of an ROV. | {
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Poly(glycerol sebacate) (PGS) is a cross-linkable elastomer formed as a co-polymer from glycerol and sebacic acid. PGS is biocompatible and biodegradable, reduces inflammation, improves healing, and has antimicrobial properties, all of which make it useful as a biomaterial in the biomedical field.
To create a PGS thermoset/solid structure, neat PGS resin must be crosslinked/cured at elevated temperatures. However, at physiological temperatures, PGS resin is a liquid and flows, thus limiting the application of neat PGS resin. Therefore, it is generally required to cast the PGS resin in a mold to hold the PGS resin shape during the crosslinking step at an elevated temperature to create a shaped thermoset structure.
As a result, creating any kind of spherical conformations of PGS is especially difficult, even more so when microparticles or microspheres are the intended article. PGS microparticles may be created from neat PGS resin through emulsion and solvent evaporation, but subsequent thermal processing steps to cure the PGS microparticles result in melting the PGS microparticles and a loss of their spherical conformation.
Other methods of making crosslinked PGS structures involve the use of a dissolvable solid form, addition of fillers to “solidify” the resin, or changing the chemistry of PGS to allow for crosslinking methods other than thermal curing.
U.S. Pub. No. 2009/0011486 describes nano/microparticles formed from poly(glycerol sebacate acrylate) (PGSA). However, this involves incorporating photo-crosslinkers into PGSA and ultraviolet (UV)-curing the PGSA microparticles to form solid particles. UV photoinitiators and catalytic crosslink agents are known to elicit immune responses to both the toxicity and by-products of use, making such particles unfavorable for use in biological systems. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a plasma display, and more particularly to a plasma display that is adaptive for causing a stable discharge at all lines as well as eliminating a side abnormal discharge.
2. Description of the Related Art
Generally, a plasma display radiates a phosphorous material using an ultraviolet ray with a wavelength of 147 nm generated upon discharge of an inactive mixture gas such as He+Xe, Ne+Xe or He+Ne+Xe, to thereby display a picture including characters and graphics. Such a PDP is easy to be made into a thin-film and large-dimension type. Moreover, the PDP provides a very improved picture quality owing to a recent technical development. Particularly, since a three-electrode, alternating current (AC) surface-discharge PDP has wall charges accumulated in the surface thereof upon discharge and protects electrodes from a sputtering generated by the discharge, it has advantages of a low-voltage driving and a long life.
FIG. 1 is a perspective view showing a cell structure of a conventional plasma display.
Referring to FIG. 1, a discharge cell of the conventional three-electrode, AC surface-discharge PDP includes a scan electrode Y and a sustain electrode Z provided on an upper substrate 10, and an address electrode X provided on a lower substrate 18. The scan electrode Y and the sustain electrode Z include transparent electrodes 12Y and 12Z, and metal bus electrodes 13Y and 13Z having a smaller line width than the transparent electrodes 12Y and 12Z and provided at one edge of the transparent electrodes 12Y and 12Z, respectively.
The transparent electrodes 12Y and 12Z are usually formed from indium-tin-oxide (ITO) on the upper substrate 10. The metal bus electrodes 13Y and 13Z are usually formed from a metal such as chrome (Cr) on the transparent electrodes 12Y and 12Z to thereby reduce a voltage drop caused by the transparent electrodes 12Y and 12Z having a high resistance. On the upper substrate 10 provided with the scan electrode Y and the sustain electrode Z in parallel, an upper dielectric layer 14 and a protective film 16 are disposed. Wall charges generated upon plasma discharge are accumulated into the upper dielectric layer 14. The protective film 16 prevents a damage of the upper dielectric layer 14 caused by a sputtering during the plasma discharge and improves the emission efficiency of secondary electrons. This protective film 16 is usually made from magnesium oxide (MgO).
A lower dielectric layer 22 and barrier ribs 24 are formed on the lower substrate 18 provided with the address electrode X. The surfaces of the lower dielectric layer 22 and the barrier ribs 24 are coated with a phosphorous material layer 26. The address electrode X is formed in a direction crossing the scan electrode Y and the sustain electrode Z. The barrier rib 24 is formed in a stripe or lattice shape to thereby prevent an ultraviolet ray and a visible light generated by a discharge from being leaked to the adjacent cells. The phosphorous material layer 26 is excited by an ultraviolet ray generated during the plasma discharge to generate any one of red, green and blue visible light rays. An inactive mixture gas is injected into a discharge space defined between the upper and lower substrate 10 and 18 and the barrier rib 24.
Such a PDP makes a time-divisional driving of one frame, which is divided into various sub-fields having a different discharge frequency, so as to express gray levels of a picture. Each sub-field is again divided into a reset period for initializing the entire field, an address period for selecting a scan line and selecting a cell from the selected scan line and a sustain period for realizing the gray levels depending on the discharge frequency. Herein, one scan line includes cells arranged on one line. The cells included in one scan line are scanned by the same scan pulse to simultaneously apply data voltages.
For instance, when it is intended to display a picture of 256 gray levels, a frame interval equal to 1/60 second (i.e. 16.67 msec) is divided into 8 sub-fields SF1 to SF8 as shown in FIG. 2. Each of the 8 sub-fields SF1 to SF8 is divided into a reset period, an address period and a sustain period as mentioned above. Herein, the reset period and the address period of each sub-field are equal every sub-field, whereas the sustain period are increased at a ratio of 2n (wherein n=0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7) at each sub-field.
In such a PDP, as shown in FIG. 3A and FIG. 3B, scanning pulses are applied to scan lines sequentially for each line along a specific scanning direction. In other words, the PDP selects cells to be turned on by an address discharge between scanning pulses sequentially applied to the scan electrodes Y and data pulses uniformly applied to the address electrodes X.
However, such a PDP has a problem in that an unstable address discharge is generated at the first scan electrode Y1 or Ym in the scanning direction. More specifically, the remaining scan lines other than a scan line scanned by the first scanning pulse (hereinafter referred to as “first scan line”) are supplied with priming charged particles generated by an address discharge at the previous scan line. Thus, the cells at the remaining scan lines other than the first scan line makes use of a priming effect caused by the priming charged particles to thereby cause a stable discharge. However, since the first scan line generates a discharge only by an external voltage without a priming effect caused by the priming charged particles, it causes a more unstable discharge than other scan lines. As a result, the cells at the first scan line causes an unstable address discharge, and causes an unstable sustain discharge because wall charges within the cells generated by the address discharge are small. Due to such a first scan line, it becomes difficult to assure a voltage margin. For instance, the same voltage is applied to the first scan line and other scan lines, then there occurs a phenomenon in which the cell is turned on/off without being turned on at the first scan line unlike other scan lines.
In order to stabilize a discharge at the first scan line, a discharge voltage applied to the first scan line may be raised. However, in this case, power consumption is increased and a voltage margin becomes insufficient due to a rise of the discharge voltage.
In a single scan scheme as shown in FIG. 3A and FIG. 3B, it is difficult to increase the number of sub-fields for the purpose of corresponding to a high resolution of the PDP and improving a picture quality. This is because, if the number of scan lines is more increased or the number of sub-fields is more added as the PDP goes a higher resolution, an address period is lengthened to cause a difficult assurance of the sustain period. In order to overcome a limit of such a single scan scheme, there has been developed a dual scan scheme as shown in FIG. 4A and FIG. 4B. In the dual scan scheme, as shown in FIG. 4A and FIG. 4B, the PDP is divided into two parts of an upper half 30 and a lower half 32 to make a simultaneous scanning on a line-by-line basis at the upper half 30 and the lower half 32, thereby reducing an address period. Each of the upper half 30 and the lower half 32 includes n/2 scan lines when it is assumed that scan lines of the PDP should be n.
However, the dual scan scheme as shown in FIG. 4A and FIG. 4B also has a problem in that an unstable discharge is generated at the first scan line like the single scan scheme. In other words, the PDP adopting the dual scan scheme also cannot use the priming effect at the first scan line unlike other scan lines.
Meanwhile, as shown in FIG. 5 and FIG. 6, a discharge space having the same structure as the cell at a display area 31 is defined at each of the upper outside and the lower outside of the display area 31 including n scan lines. In other words, an upper non-display area 32 and a lower non-display area 33 are provided with address electrodes X and dummy electrode pairs UD1, UD2, BD1 and BD2 and is provided with a dielectric layer covering the electrodes X, UD1, UD2, BD1 and BD2. The dummy electrodes UD1, UD2, BD1 and BD2 provided at the upper non-display area 32 and the lower non-display area 33 cause a discharge at the non-display area during the aging process, thereby stabilizing a discharge characteristic of the cells at the first scan line and the nth scan line of the display area 31 under the same condition as other cells of the display area 31. To this end, the dummy electrodes UD1, UD2, BD1 and BD2 are supplied with a voltage capable of causing a discharge during the aging process. However, there is raised a problem in that the cells of the upper non-display area 32 and the lower non-display area 33 forces the PDP to cause a side abnormal discharge. Such a side abnormal discharge is a discharge generated at the non-display areas 32 and 33 accidentally.
A cause of the side abnormal discharge is as follows. If a discharge is generated within the cells upon driving of the PDP, then space electric charges 61 and 62 caused by the discharge are moved into the upper non-display area 32 and the lower non-display area 33 as shown in FIG. 6, to thereby accumulate the electric charges onto the dielectric layer provided at the cells of the non-display areas 32 and 33. When a wall voltage 62 caused by the electric charges accumulated onto the non-display areas 32 and 33 is raised into more than a discharge voltage Vf capable of causing a discharge, a side abnormal discharge is generated among the electrodes X, UD1, UD2, BD1 and BD2 within the non-display areas 32 and 33. If such a side abnormal discharge occurs at the non-display areas 32 and 33, then a visible light 81 emitted due to the discharge is diffused into the edge of the display area 31 as shown in FIG. 7 to thereby deteriorate a display quality. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a cooling device for an optical information recording/reproducing apparatus, which can cool a movable mechanism for an optical pickup housed in a casing.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Recently, there have been noticed optical information recording/reproducing apparatuses which can record information in a recording medium at high density by applying a light beam to the medium and reproduce the recorded information at high speed.
In the above-mentioned apparatus, an optical pickup mounted on a carriage is coarsely moved in the radial direction of a disk recording medium (referred to as a disk) so as to be accessible to a target track of the disk at high speed. As means for driving the pickup, a voice coil motor (referred to as VCM) is adopted. Further, in some apparatus, an external scale is used for locating the pickup.
With the VCM, since heat is generated from the driving coil, there exists a problem in that the generated heat exerts a harmful influence upon the optical system; for instance, the optical axis thereof is shifted due to thermal expansion of the system. Therefore, the heat generating section such as the VCM is required to be cooled.
Japanese Published Unexamined Patent Appl. No. 60-107789 discloses an example of prior art cooling devices, in which cooling air stream obtained by a fan mounted on a door is directly blown against a head disk assembly to be cooled. In the above prior art device, although cooling air is blown from the right or reverse side of a disk, since the fan is disposed away from the head disk assembly and therefore the cooling air is readily diffused, it is difficult to effectively cool the VCM which generates heat. | {
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Subsets and Splits